When I was 12, I went to sea. My parents hated me. I don't know why, they just did. I was a good kid. I just think I was a little too energetic. It all started when I threw my mom's car keys down the well out back of my house. Why did I do that? Well, it just seemed like the thing to do at the time. I saw it on TV, that was what I told her anyway. Yes, blame TV. Evryone always does, when we all know it all starts with parenting and your upbringing...but I digress....
There's somebody standing in the corner of my room. I can't see him, but I know he is there, and yes, it is a he. The collar of his shirt flaps soft with the night air, and the breadth of his hands dwarfs the whole space. I don't move, but it's not because I'm scared. I just don't want him to know that I know. That he's there. I don't want him to leave. His keeping watch while I sleep, a sort of volunteer sentryman, comforts me like my father's stroking my hair. Maybe it was my father who dispatched...
Twisting, turning, bending, breaking. Well, I haven't broken yet, but I sure can't bend much further without snapping in a million pieces. I mean, how many lies can a person twist before they break? I've been living this life for so long that you'd think lying would just be part of the job by now. I mean, come on. I'm a spy. It shouldn't be this difficult anymore. At the beginning, sure but not now. They stand in front of me and I can see in their eyes that they aren't quite as clueless as before. Oh boy. The boss...
She hadn't felt like this since she was six years old. Once, at a circus, she had begged her father for a balloon, swearing that she would take the best care of it . She realized now that his protests weren't cruel-hearted, but frugal. That he didn't have the money. That when he begrudgingly gave in, it meant that the family would have to go without that week, so that she could feel the joy of holding that light, floating orb above her head by a string, feeling the gentle tug upwards that whispered of something more magical, more ethereal...
There once was a man named Fernando
Who encountered a man named Orlando
They met at mid-morning
But then, without warning
They were killed by a robot commando
If I had a camera every time he did something like that, I'd be winning contests. Funniest Kids, Giggling with the Stars, stuff like that.
Henry bought me the camera when the baby was six days old. He was supposed to be picking up the Chinese take-out (I loved those pancakes back then), but he stopped by the camera store. Not Wal-Mart or some big box store. No, Henry spent the extra forty-seven minutes to go to some specialty place.
I was painfully post-partum, couldn't sit without that donut, and he was buying an SLR. Like I was going to...
"Where am I?" asked Jolene, as she took some hesitant steps toward the elevator. "Am I on the moon?"
"You are not on the moon," was the response. The voice seemed to come from all around her. "You are on a spacecraft. The Earth as you know it is uninhabitable."
"What? Why? What happened?"
"You will find out later," it said. "Take the elevator to the highest floor."
Jolene entered the small enclosure and pressed the button marked '35'. There was no 36.
"God will ask you a series of questions," the voice continued. "If the answers are incorrect, he...
Forget all you know about everything. Forget history in it's whole. What If you'd not only have the power to control time, but everything else ? Not in a B-movie ' timemachine ' kind of way, no,no. Meet Ivan Barbossa. The undeniable man. The man who never dies, and when he does, he just shows up again. He only dies when time and space stop existing. The end of all things mean his end as well. This man has been around since the beginning of time, seen the first cell evolve, or met the first man and woman to have...
"I'm sorry," said the President of the National Leg Prosthetics Company. "But there's nothing I can do to help you."
"But you're the President," said David plaintively, looking up at the tall man from his wheelchair.
"Yes, but I've got a tee time in almost two hours," the man said dismissively. "I'm afraid you're on your own."
"Don't you understand?!" shouted David. "A life is at stake! One of your own employees!"
The President sighed. "Look, if it'll get you to leave ..." he sat down again.
"This is standard operating procedure for the NLPC," he explained. "We encourage all...
The conversation lasted two words: Why now? The blank stare that met Angela's question was all the answer she needed. The time didn't matter, it never mattered. All that he was concerned about now was getting to the engine room.
Without looking back, she spun swiftly on her heel and stormed across the deck to the lift, already standing open, waiting for her. This was the day they had been waiting for, and she would be damned if she would allow something so trivial as a fleeting moment of emotion overcome her and destroy all that she had trained for....