Selina De Luca

“ What Time Is It, Mr. Wolf? ” A short story written in my teens By Selina De Luca                I opened my eyes.  What was the point of keeping them closed, if I couldn’t sleep?  Mom always said that if I pretended to sleep, soon I’d really fall asleep, but it never worked.  I looked across the room at the wall to see what time it was.  The wall grinned back at me like a sheet of ice, clean and blank.  No clock.  That’s right,  I reminded myself,  we haven’t unpacked it yet. We’d just moved in to the new house the other day, and nothing was unpacked yet.  Just the bed I was lying in and the dresser, empty and bare, along the equally-empty-and-bare wall. The dresser had been my grandfather’s, and his initials were carved into it: B.W., for Bradley Walters.  Those were my initials too, but they didn’t stand for Brad Walters, they stood for Brandon Wolf.  The B.W. took a little away from ...

 Harmony A Short Work of Fiction by Selina De Luca Written in 2013      There was something about that sheet of music that frightened me.  After only a few moments of looking for a melody beneath the fog of dread, I hid it away – buried it under a pile of dusty spell books in a chest in the darkest corner of the attic.  The wind that night banged so violently on my window I was certain something powerful and dangerous was trying to get in.  Sarafina always said that we were hiding away in this house because the world outside was so dangerous.  She also always told me to sing whenever I was afraid and it would all go away, so I did, and soon forgot about the dangerous world outside and the sheet of music in the attic.        I was ten years old then, half-blind and ugly, living in a hidden house alone with my Russian Blue cat Sarafina and a world of music.  This world belonged to someone else before me, but I knew I wa...

 Seagirl By Selina De Luca Written for a teen writing competition That’s what she was. A seagirl. “Yer pa found her after a storm, near dead. We brought her in and nursed to her back to health,” Grandma told me. To her she said, “One day, ye’ll have to go back, girl.” The way Grandma said “girl” sounded like “gull”, and everyday when we went to the sea we would throw our heads back and watch the same six seagulls soaring in the wild wind, and imagine we were flying with them. But our neighbour’s son threw rocks at the gulls and called them “ugly.” “You don’t think I’m ugly, do you?” she would ask him. “No,” he admitted. “Well, I’m one of them,” she said. He laughed at her. I was indignant. “She is, ” I insisted. “And one day, she’s going back to join them.” He didn’t believe us, but we wouldn’t let him take the wind out of our sails. But one morning, Papa said to me, “Don’t go outside today. The tide’s real high, and there’s a bad storm brewing.” “Yes, Papa,” I said. I could see he...

The Engagement Ring A Play based on “The Monkey’s Paw” by W. W. Jacobs/ Louis N. Parker Adapted by Selina De Luca 2008 Performed on stage at St. Clement School in 2008 Characters:    Mr. Charles Wood    Mrs. Mary Wood     Henry Wood     Dame Beckett     Marguerite Beckett (young Dame) The Fakir     Mr. Thompson     The Postman     Setting:   a small cottage home  SCENE 1   (begins in the home of the Wood family.  A cozy fire is burning, which Mrs. Wood is tending to while Mr. Wood and his son Henry play chess/ cards.  Outside is horribly strong windy storm.) Mr. Wood:  Hah!  Got you now, my boy! Henry:  No, you haven’t, Father— look! (Mrs. Wood peeks over to see.  Mr. Wood frowns and examines his cards/ contemplates his next move, etc. while Henry grins mischievously)  Mr. Wood:  Darn it!  My own son…  He’s got ...