Worth A Thousand Pictures

Tony hadn't been up this early in – well – ever, maybe. He thought there'd been a few times in college when he'd still been up at this hour, but that was different. Nobody should ever get up at 4:00 am on a Sunday. He tripped over something that wasn't there on the way to Shane's door, had to try twice to grab the door knob before he got it turned and the door open a crack, mumbled something into the darkness, heard a mumble back and shuffled off to the bathroom. Turned on the light and ducked his head to get away from it. What had he been thinking? Why had this seemed like a good idea? He was aware of only seeing what was directly in front of him. His peripheral vision hadn't turned on yet. It occurred to him that if an axe murderer had to choose a good time to hide behind the shower curtain, this would be the day. He opened it just to be sure. Nobody there. Even the axe murderers were still in bed. Everybody was still in bed. Except, ap...

Spring had never been Eloise's favourite season. It was too wishy-washy. Never absolute. The weather got better or worse, but was never really good or bad. The naked raspberry canes and muddy grass left her feeling like a kid in the back seat, asking “Are we there yet?” except she couldn't see who she was asking. But every now and then there was a day like this one, warm enough to sit outside, she and Artie in their Muskoka chairs, he with his homemade root beer, she with a cup of herbal tea from last summer's garden, each with a dog or two curled up beside them, and usually a lap cat each. Artie called it “sitting on the porch” in spite of the fact that they couldn't even see the house from here. The shrubs were just tall enough when you were sitting down to make it invisible. All they could see was the woods to the right and the garden to the left. It was too early in the year to get seriously busy, but they'd started planning. The tomatoes were just comi...

Shane was going to be a vet. He'd never wanted anything else and he never would. His marks were good enough, even for a scholarship at Western. Which Tony was actively praying for. For now he was working at the animal shelter where he'd volunteered as a kid and he was learning a lot. He was younger than he should officially be for some jobs, but everybody knew him and knew that if he didn't think he could handle something, he'd say so. The shelter staff was just the director, the vet and himself. Everything else was done by volunteers, especially on the weekend. His favourites were Artie and Eloise. Hippies now for like 50 years or something, they had matching long grey braids, and matching heart tattoos on their left hands. They looked after adoptions on the weekend. Busy days, but they were kind and warm and absolutely impossible with paperwork. One time, Artie had actually filled in a form upside down. Shane thought it mu...

At 10 minutes to midnight, Meg was sitting in the safest place she could find. On the couch in front of the TV, wedged between the armrest and an extremely affectionate young couple. She figured she was inaccessible. She'd spent the evening dodging the optimistic Ed. A friend of Joyce's from work who Meg had heard quite enough about over the last while. "You'd really like him!" Ug. Joyce had invited them both to her New Year's Eve party, and Ed had decided, after a few martinis, that he did, indeed like Meg. And with midnight looming, she wasn't going to be in kissing range. Not that there was anything wrong with Ed, she just didn't appreciate being set up and wasn't going to play. As long as the affectionate couple stayed affectionate, she figured she was safe. She balanced her drink on the armrest, laid her head back on the cushion and relaxed a bit. And yawned. She realized how tired she was. The TV was set to Tim...

This was Tony's first Christmas on his own for, well, ever, really. He'd been with his parents for the first 25 or so, then with Meg. Last year Shane had been here, then off to Meg's for New Year's. So this was his first real bachelor Christmas and he was determined that it wouldn't suck.  He was going to decorate, and play some tunes, and eat Nanaimo bars and gingerbread. Christmas Eve was taken care of. He'd found a sign-up sheet on the bulletin board at work for a charity hockey game. One of those 24 hour things to raise money for the hospital. A few guys had already signed on, and Tony thought it sounded fun. He hadn't played in a few years but he'd been pretty good in his day.   Then, he'd been having coffee with Walt and telling him about the game and Walt asked, "What are you doing Christmas Day?" "Don't know yet." "Neither do I. We should do something together!" "Sounds...