Sunday, July 17, 2011

Excerpt from CELIA (one of the 53 women in my novel Daisy Chain)


By the time Celia and Dixie were walking through the grocery doors with their stocks, they had only exchanged pleasantries about the wonder of coincidences.
     Celia: Funny how we bought the same things!
     Dixie: Isn't it?
     They didn't say anything else. Dixie seemed to be in a hurry. Maybe she wasn't reading much into their synchronicity, but to Celia the whole affair was fascinating. She'd never had the experience of buying exactly the same things in the grocery as someone else! She hung back a bit, walking a few steps behind Dixie, curious to see if they might even be getting into the same kind of car. But no. Dixie was heading towards a small, forest-green van with an eagle sticker on the back windscreen.    
     Celia turned the key in the door of her trusty old red Volkswagen bug, which she'd named Elma after a woman with flaming red hair about whom she'd read in a novel someone had left in the women's toilet at the cinema. As she piled her groceries into the back seat, she couldn't take her eyes off Dixie. She found herself trying to memorize the number plate, so that she would know it if she ever saw it again. But . . . hmmm, maybe that wasn’t necessary. Not many people had forest green vans with eagles on the back windscreen.
            Maybe one day she would see the eagle van parked somewhere, like outside a bar. She would definitely stop, go in and possibly find out that they would order the same drinks, or something equally amazing.
            Eagle Woman, she said to herself. She realized that she didn’t even know this woman’s name. Should she call out and ask? Or would that be rude and invasive—a complete stranger calling out for another complete stranger’s name in the middle of a public car park in broad daylight?
            Eagle Woman was still piling her groceries into the back of the van when Celia walked up to her. “Hi. I didn’t get your name when we were inside,” she said, extending her hand. “I’m Celia.”

To continue reading this and more, purchase Daisy Chain online now at amazon.com

1 comment:

Lynn Cohen said...

I always enjoy reading your stories...this one is fun.