Though the close-packed crowd cheered passionately, howling, growing ragged and hoarse in the dark abandoned barn, their screams were all drowned out by the atonal arhythmic thunder of the music. The concert was so deafening that the congregated youths seemed more to be gasping silently underwater than cheering for the musicians.

I decided, again, that I didn't like the painting. I can't remember what number I'm up to, how many repetitions of this same seascape I've made, or even why this particular composition never seems to live up to what I envision.

Indigo. A fading dream of the color, and the sound of soft rain. Passing geese loudly lamented from beyond her window. Morning light fell warm on her closed face. An ache in her spine. Shoulders cold cliff-rock. Creaking knees. Complaining muscles knotted tight as wood. The wooden house around her also creaked. Winds whistled. She scented the vibrant rain, the scent of another damned day. And echoing somewhere through her fields Edgar barked three times, then once more with playful affirmation. Inside her mind’s eye, falling almost back into dream again, Nora surveyed those long acres surrounding her cold home. Untended wheat, alfalfa, cattle-corn, all woven with untold ecosystems of weeds. Stray indigo flowers and violets, maybe. Scattered dust-filled barns. Husks. What the place must look like after all this time. With her right hand she sought the frame of the bed, found it, felt rough chips of paint flaking. Slowly exhaling at once Nora lifted her iron legs over the edge. Thin-socked feet found the bedroom’s planks. Cold air. November hopelessness.

Once upon a time there were two fish, because I wanted them to be happy. But I couldn’t let their happiness last forever because then there would be no story. Perhaps they are mackerel — no, wait, they are tuna. With bluesilver scales and moon-like eyes, one large fish and one small one. A mother fish, I suppose, and her little silver son. He is missing, maybe. I may not know much but I know she doesn’t want him to be missing. She loves him, and I love him too even though I don't know who he is or why I have just now accidentally made him. The mother fish grows desperate with worry. She leaves her whole school behind and searches the ocean’s underworld for her son. Maybe she will find him or maybe she never will. There is no way of knowing, just like no one will ever read these words. Then again, no one needs to read them, it’s enough that I have written them.