Augustine - certainly not a saint at this point in time - sat in the garden reading. According to the custom of the time, he read aloud. He read his new passion, the letters of St Paul and the Holy Gospels. Today he was reading in Galatians. Freedom was God's gift to the Christian. Augustine searched his heart and his body. He was not free. He was attached: attached to his mistress and his son, named ironically Deodatus (God's gift); he was attached to the enjoyment of sexuality; he was attached to his comfortable lifestyle. He was imprisoned by his...
She could feel it clawing at her as she sat in the room, nudging her, trying to pull her back.
The fantasy was becoming ever more difficult to escape from. The fantasy of her life years from now, successful job, a partner who was her equal and who she could love for the rest of her life, the promise of children, the happy ending that she had always desired.
It was consuming all her waking moments.
The hope that she held in her heart that she would survive this and everything would turn out well.
She hadn't needed to escape...
Okay, look. I had this idea that this was going to be a nice relaxing trip.
It was.
And we were going to come out here --
Yes.
And enjoy ourselves --
Yes.
And not have to deal with stress. Do you understand?
Yes, of course.
And now, what do you see?
What do you mean?
What do you see here?
I don't know... Trees, blue sky --
Stress!
Sorry?
Stress. It's stress. Every direction I look is stress.
Okay, look, you need to just take a breath. Remember what they said at the clinic. Deep breaths.
Stop it. I...
The safari proved to be the biggest mistake of the Henderson family's vacation. First, a rhino attempted to mate with their station wagon, then an enormous elephant slung an entire tree at them. What really topped off the misery, though, was what happened with the lions.
I'd tell you all about it, but I just got called into my boss's office, so just know this: teenage girls equal big cat Meow Mix.
"Wait, so he hit you?"
I nodded furiously, still trying to chew what was left in my mouth before retelling the all-to-famous story of how "Yes, he hit me." No one every seemed to believe me.
But it happened. No kidding. It really happened. He hit me.
Not that I would tell anyone. Ya know, other than my best friends.
Okay, so a lot of people.
It's not a big deal. I swear.
So this is how it goes. Or at least, how I remember it. . .
I was in the backyard, wading my feet in the pool...
Behind me, the world caved in. There it goes, I thought. There it goes at last. I emptied my pockets and threw my hands over my shoulders. I remember the sun was descending but the moon was so bright the day wouldn't leave. Night whined and nudged but the day wouldn't surrender. You are confused, moon, I yelled over my shoulder. Fade out, lady, I shouted over my other shoulder. Another ending of another world.
As a child my Mother has always told me to make something of myself. She'd push me into doing things I really did not want to do.
"Learn the piano!"
"Take up dance!"
"You will act!"
Order after order. I wasn't any good at any of it really. So I just gave up quietly in my mind and pretended to care.
For Mother there wasn't any point in just being alive.
"You must be living!" she'd shout whilst doing something boring and mundane like peeling an onion.
I didn't get why she was so determined that I do something. I...
In hindsight, the solution was obvious. They had sat there for nearly half an hour, staring up at the stars. She'd tried to figure out why he was so quiet. He'd picked her up at 7, right on time, survived her dad's "look of death", and taken her out on the river in his boat. Now, sitting on the little sandbar, the remains of their picnic sitting in the basket beside him, he'd gone silent. She wondered if she'd said something wrong, something that made him regret ever asking her out in the first place. Or perhaps he was bored;...
I could feel their glares. They loved to do this. I kept tripping over branches and I could feel the cuts on my arms.
They would save me eventually and they would take me home and I would tell mother what they had done. She would tell them to go home and tell brother to go to his room, there would be no dinner for him and I would get sad because I felt trapped. I felt wronged and needed my mother's comfort, but I knew that my tattle-taling would only result in spite from them the next time we...
From the edge of a hole in the ground, lying on his side in a pool of his own blood, Jim looked around for his arm.
Eventually his glazed eyes drifted down the side of the pit, down to the bottom, where a mess of body parts mixed together like a good gumbo.
"Is that my arm?" Jim thought about thinking.
His ears rang, buzzed, sounded like being tumbled in a wave, with the adrenaline rush of wondering if you'll break the surface or if this is it.
He looked to the tree nearby, to wear a squirrel was peeking...