She was the most delicate girl in town. A town that thrived on beauty. It was everything, and so was she. When I first met her, we were on a field trip in 6th grade. Back then, she wasn't even wearing make up yet. A completely different person. So, of course I was nervous when I woke up next to her.
"What are you thinking?", she asked me. I didn't know what to say. All I felt was shame. "Didn't you like it?" "I did."I lied. "So, what's the problem? I know you wanted me since high school." "Yeah, but...
The only thing that felt worse than being left alone was being left alone at nighttime.
It was 2004 and Keri was 18; visiting Zak's downtown apartment after he finally kept a promise and picked her up to see him.
On his mattress on the floor - crumpled blankets, the two of them in t-shirts and underwear.
He got high, they watched MTV until 4am; in between he ate Cheetos and asked Keri to marry him. He always, always, talked about how beautiful their children would be. How could Keri say yes when she was 18? How could she say...
Just the facts, man.
That's how it works right? But sometimes facts aren't enough. I need more. I need more.
The pen quivers beneath my grasp, the words necessary to breathe life to this blank canvas escape me, forcing me to dig down into the unfrequented corners of my mind for wisdom, nuggets of truth, or inane ramblings...or all three.
Shoot. This bio is due in seven hours and here I am huddled in a cold basement awaiting inspiration, mind whirring at the speed of light with nothing in the way of progress visible on the horizon.
I begin to...
Upon my soft upholstered chair
I sat and spoke into the air
For they were listening, you see
The ones who come and sit with me
I cannot see them, though I try
Their form is but a wistful sigh
More solemn than a flow'ring tree
The ones who come and sit with me
I have no proof that they exist
But still my thoughts of them persist
A secret kept? A fantasy?
The ones who come and sit with me
My audience in silence waits
As softly I pass though their gates
Perched upon a thin branch flailing in the wind, the owl cried out into the night, "Who cooks for you? Who cooks for you?" Only the still, dead night and the rustling of branches and drying leaves responded.
I tampered with my oil lamp and let the flame grow tall, casting shadows that played hide and seek on trees. Shadows bounced off of trunks, flickered to the branches, and waned off on the broad, saw toothed leaves.
The owl's cry grew into the night, screeching to the stars, to the trees, to anyone that was willing to listen. "Who cooks...
There was this mouse, see, and her name was Dot. Dot the mouse. Anyway, Dot had a son whose name was Dwight. Dwight was hungry all the time because the only thing he would eat was Egg Foo Yung from the Golden Chopsticks restaurant in downtown Buffalo. Problem was Dot, Dwight, and the owner of the house, Helen Quartermain, lived in Detroit.
So Dot was pigging out on cheese and rice that Helen Quartermain had left on the floor. Dwight wouldn't touch it. So Dot goes up to Helen and says: "Yo, HQ. My baby's starvin and you better pick...
The footprints in the snow suddenly ended. Or rather, the snow ended, suddenly and strangely. The footsteps continued, singed into the dry winter grass. Black footsteps continued, an at an even pace, all the way to the dunes.
At first, I thought that they would disappear at the sand, but as I got closer, I saw that they had continued, but the sheer heat had melted the sand into glass. Glass footsteps, glittering and shining, clearly the shape of a human foot, worked their way over the dunes, without any seeming regard for the angle of the dune. I climbed...
"Don't touch it", he said, "Danny is going to call."
"How can you be sure?" Marcus asked
"He said he would, now sit down and relax. We just need to wait".
The phone sat silent for a few seconds both of them staring intently at its small features, the chrome casing, the fingerprints of the thousands of times it used by others.
"He's not calling" Marcus said softly
"Dammit man, you needs to relax, he said he'll call then he'll call, just wait." Leon paced out his words to making every single syllable count. He was looking past Marcus at...
She stood waiting by the binoculars. How sappily romantic was that? She shook her head at her own ridiculousness.
To distract herself, she gazed out across the city. The beautiful city she called home.
From here, everything was so clear and straight. The roads looked easy to navigate, like one could never get lost.
She had moved to this city four years ago. Following a dream, a memory. Some how she had stumbled upon him. And he was, real.
He was also no where to be seen.
She looked down at her wrist for the watch she didn't wear anymore,...
There were three daughters of the Feng family, and when the father lost his business and the mother lost her mind, the three daughters were left to serve others on their own china, long ago sold for half its value to a family of gloating pretenders.
The first daughter married a nice young man from across the way, not a family of any importance but he was a hard worker and that was enough. The second daughter died young, and since no one cared to remember her family, much less her, her life was brief and short and unremarkable.
The...