Tuesday Tales: From a Picture

Posted bySusanne MatthewsPosted inUncategorized

Welcome to this week’s Tuesday Tales. Our prompts this week are pictures, and our posts are limited to 300 words. Here’s the picture I chose.

Hallway with brown trim and hardwood floor in old house. Wooden staircase with carpet floor and blue rugs. Antique style wall clock.

“Wow! I can’t imagine going through all that,” Anca said. “Your mother was better after Marianne left?”

“In some ways, yes. In others, no. Before she left, Marianne introduced me to a friend of hers, a Wiccan priestess from Boston, Gabriella, who agreed to help with Mother if things got bad again. She saw my potential and taught me about the Goddess. I found comfort and peace with Mother Earth. With her help, I gathered those with similar powers to me and set up the first coven here in Salem. We met in Laticia’s home, another house that dated back to the time of the Witch Trials, and life was good. Colby and I were together once more.”

“But something happened.”

“Yes. By then, I’d learned to garner the Goddess’s energy and could keep Mother comfortable for extended periods of time. After we learned that my brother Russell had been killed in Vietnam, everything went horribly wrong. It took everything in me to settle her again. I knew I couldn’t risk sending her into another tailspin. So, while I still loved Colby, I refused his offer of marriage. Hurt and confused, he turned to Laticia, the one we’d chosen as high priestess. She was my best friend.”

“And he married her instead of you,” she said, her voice cracking with emotion.

Aunt Selma nodded. “Hester did her best to console me, but there was nothing I could do. When my mother died a few months later, it was too late for us. He’d made a commitment, and we honored it. Knowing how hard it would be on both of us, I packed up and left, taking the parrot with me. I didn’t come back until the Goddess ordered me home.”

That’s it. Stay safe, and don’t forget to check out the other Tuesday Tales.

Published by Susanne Matthews

Hi! I live in Eastern Ontario. I'm married with three adult children and five wonderful grandchildren. I prefer warm weather, and sunshine but winter gives me time to write. If I’m listening to music, it will be something from the 1960s or 1970s. I enjoy action movies, romantic comedies, but I draw the line at slasher flicks and horror. I love science fiction and fantasy as well. I love to read; I immerse myself in the text and, as my husband says, the house could fall down around me, and I’d never notice. My preferences are as varied as there are genres, but nothing really beats a good romance, especially one that is filled with suspense. I love historical romance too, and have read quite a few of those. If I’m watching television, you can count on it being a suspense — I’m not a fan of reality TV, sit-coms, or game shows. Writing gives me the most pleasure. I love creating characters that become real and undergo all kinds of adventures. It never ceases to amaze me how each character can take on its own unique personality; sometimes, they grow very different from the way I pictured them! Inspiration comes from all around me; imagination has no bounds. If I can think it, imagine it, I can write it!

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