Writing Pratice ~ the crosswalk

March 17, 2013 My first ever public reading

As you've read on my blog, I've been doing a little writing practice. So on March 17, I did another first. I read my writings to a group of about 40 people. (Seven other women read too, not just me) It was kinda cool, and I'm proud for challenging myself, not only to write and edit my writing, but to read it aloud in front of people.

Reading my own words

The Crosswalk 
by Jane LaFazio

And it came to pass that a girl child was born to a 26-year-old divorcee and her brand new, nervous husband (but he’d always been high strung.) Before the birth of the girl and when she was in her mother’s stomach, there was an incident while crossing a busy street. The brand new husband was a step or two ahead in the crosswalk. The girl child’s 7-year-old half-brother--her mother’s first born son--was in the lead. All were within the white painted cross walk lines, facing the green light as they crossed the intersection.

Suddenly, a 16 year old driver careened through the light, catching the 7 year old boy and dragging him by his chrome bumper for 100 feet along the asphalt, till the child fell free and tumbled another 50 feet. He was bloody. His left ear hung by a tendon. The boy’s step father fell to his knees in the crosswalk holding his stunned wife around her linen-clad hips and sobbed.

Three months later, the girl was born. Five pounds, healthy and pretty. (Her photo was in the window of the town’s photographer shop window for years, as an example of a pretty poised baby.)

A year and a half after the girl was born the parents divorced.

If the boy hadn’t been hit by the car, would the story have been different?

+++++++++

Published!