Sarah's Alice

Sarah had been an open bottle of Coca- Cola that Joseph held firmly under his thumb and shook for six years. Now, free of his thumb, the bottle spewed.

Everything and anything she wanted, she would take.

At first, Joseph could not comprehend the enormity of the crime against him. He was poor. He had not starved her out; she had starved him out. He had been stripped naked by a woman.

An Ugly. Stupid. Woman.

As he thought of the evil she had done to him, his anger flared into a wildfire out of control. The burn in his chest flowed to his arms and his neck, and he clenched his teeth to block the flames away from his brain.