My Creations 

Check out Obsidian: Literature in the African Diaspora. Two of my stories are included. This collection features Lenard D. Moore, Zelda Lockhart, Jaki Shelton Green, Grace O'Casio, Evie Shockley, Carole Boston Weatherford, and other really talented authors.

http://english.chass.ncsu.edu/obsidian/vol_10.1.php

It's also sold at some independent bookstores. In Raleigh, check out: http://www.quailridgebooks.com

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My short story collection entitled Salt in the Sugar Bowl will be published by Main Street Rag in Spring 2012. http://www.mainstreetrag.com

Stay tuned for advanced sales information.

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Read an excerpt from short story In My Soul by Angela Belcher-Epps

Em dropped by my shop as I was installing a water pump. I glanced over and saw her feet approaching. Big, slew feet. Big, but pretty. Nails done bright pink. And she said, “Can I get the oil changed in my truck?” with some accent. And when I turned to say she could, I looked into her eyes—very direct. And she looked directly into mine.

My shop is more like a shelter. I built it in six days. Three miles up from the house. Out in the middle of nowhere, but you have to pass by it on the way to Studemeyers. More than an eighth of the county works at Studemeyers so I never have to advertise. Just keep my sign hung.

So I asked this woman, who goes by the name Em, if she wanted her oil changed right then, and she said, “If you can.” And I did—changed the oil in her little purple Nissan truck, while she talked a blue streak. Not real mouthy. Not one of them that you wonder if they’ll ever take a breath. It was a steady rate of pleasant talk. When I was finished, she stayed leaned against the cab of her truck, and I leaned against the Buick I’d been working on. She had on one of the bluest dresses I’d ever seen. With colorful shining pieces set in around the neck—looked like glass, but must have been plastic. It looked like pink jellybeans dripped from her fingertips.
So after a while, she handed me $15 and said, “I get my oil changed every two months, like clockwork. So it’s okay I bring it to you?”

So life went on like normal. Same shit. Different day. Nothing much to tell one day from the next—except maybe a Saturday from time to time when me and Anita went dancing at the Colony House. Or I rode up to Langster with Roddie and Matthew to catch a minor league ball game. Then just like she said, two months later, like clockwork, there she was. I dropped what I was doing and changed the oil. Something about her voice. I was lying under the car. She’s steady talking. It was like getting a massage without being touched. The feeling I had inside. I couldn’t describe it if you held a gun to my head. So when I come out from under the car, I had to look at her kind of questioning. Cause I didn’t get it. I didn’t know what it was I wasn’t getting. But it was something. It was like she had a soothing instrument lodged in her throat. But when I looked at her, she had the same kind of questioning look on her face. And I had to shake it off to keep from staring.

So that went on two or three more oil changes. Which means months later. Like clockwork. Then one day, we were standing and going on and on talking about nothing, and she reached over to take a weed off my shoulder that was stuck on me from being under the car. When she touched me, I felt like all the air rushed out of my head. Almost faint. Felt like if I didn’t grab on to her, I’d lose my mind. So I reached out to her.

There were no words. It felt like a part of me sprung alive—like one of them one-inch blocks that turns to a sponge when wet. I buried my face on her shoulder and took in her smell. It was a smell I don’t ever run across. If I could’ve, I would’ve probably melted into her pores and stayed there. But thank God, such things don’t happen. When she left that day, she turned and looked at me—reflecting back at me the same questioning feeling I had.

I can’t say I counted the days or any such nonsense as that. But when she pulled up two months later, it was like I was finally breathing again. Even though I didn’t know I hadn’t been breathing. She stepped out of the truck in a flimsy long red skirt, neon-green flip flops, and a snow-white gauzy shirt with beads swinging back and forth in front of her. By the time she got to the shelter, all I could do was lead her behind the partition, open my arms, and fold her into me. There was a feeling—Was it tingling? Electricity? Itching? It was traveling between us so strong that it was like being wired. There wasn’t anything to think about. Just the soft warm flesh, the deep wet mouth, the thunderous beat of her heart. Cause I could feel her heart beating—more clearly than my own.

When we had clung to each other long enough, and given every bit of what we could to each other in a greasy shelter full of motors and parts, I asked, “What is your full name?” As if knowing her full name would fill in all the blanks.
“I’m holding a man who doesn’t know my name. My God!” she threw her hand over her mouth. “I’m Em.”
“I know you’re Em. But there’s more than that. ”
“Call me Em. It’s too hard to say if you’re not from my country. The tongue works different there. It’s Eelampirai Olichudar. When I come to this country, it was clear I needed different name and I become Emma. Emma.”
“Damn.”

At home that night, I could feel her on me, in me. I sat down at the table with Anita and the boys and ate chicken and corn and buttered rolls. I laughed at this and that-- like nothing was different. All the while knowing something had broke loose in me that afternoon.
Some nights later, half way to sleep, I felt Em on me. Not like her weight, but her. Felt her caressing up inside my body, like a thin sheet licking inside me, or a damp wind spraying me. Something light. Something all over. Not like a kiss. Like a bathing—a baptism. When I opened my eyes, for a second I was surprised she wasn’t there.

To be continued............