The Cross

by John Rowlands

The rough wooden cross sat tilted, shoved to one side by the winds from the constant stream of cars on State Highway 81. Jenny straightened the cross. Most of the flowers she’d put at its base two weeks ago had blown away, so she replaced them with new plastic ones she'd bought yesterday at Wal-Mart. They looked just like the other real flowers, but she hoped they would last longer. An old oak stood guard nearby, its bark scraped clean where the car had slammed into it. Her sister and brother were dead and yet the oak, like her memories, still lived.

6S

John Rowlands is the pretentious literary persona of a real person, occupying the ever brief moments that lie between his many faces as adventurer, traveler, scholar, conservationist, and wage slave, while providing an excuse to refer to himself in the third person. He currently resides in Virginia and is collaborating with Dr. Hannibal Lecter on a cookbook. (Click here to make a donation to John, half of which will support 6S.)