A peach clothed in the gaud of life and spring

Its downy skin glistened with beads of dew.

What better image for the fleeting zing

Of youth, and its pressed hope for life anew?

A peach which holds within itself the tree

And hundred more like peaches too. Alas,

Within its flesh and seed does death tarry.

For sacrifice is want for life to pass

From one to one and keep the scales aright.

This I know and contemplate it often.

Whilst searching fruits or viewing birds in flight

This I know and say with soul unsoftened

To our precious child that you left me

With eyes like yours and skin bright and downy.

She rolled over naked in her bed. Norma reached for the water bottle in her feeble state. Where is my diary? She knew it had been taken. Although glad she had taken the antidote to narcotics, she was sick and tired of all the bullshit in her life. Her fame, her lost loves, her hangover and her loneliness were very real. They were squarely in her face. She reached for the phone. It was dead. Of course she thought, for she was not stupid. In the fog of the realization that her very life was worthless to some, she "push-buttoned" her psychiatrist, who was unavailable. Of course she realized.

Plan B: I will be dead as they expect. I will be gone as they expect. I have but a few hours to contact Beverly, her look-a-like. She staggered to the front porch light to give the sign. Beverly had begged her to be the one to "take one for the team," the Marylin team. Her family would be compensated as Beverly was dying of pancreatic cancer anyway.

Norma was well ready to leave the life she had endured. Beverly was ready to leave the life she had endured. Marylin was finally free. Beverly was finally free and her family would be quite comfortable.

Norma knew this day would come; the day she would be "silenced." She slipped on her clothes as her body would allow, and walked to the back door where the foliage welcomed her.

Beverly arrived. she removed her clothes and took Norma's pills (and the ones before arriving), to make it all undisputable.

Marylin is a beautiful woman still living, in Colorado. She has an art gallery. Her name is Samantha Tolbert.