I was going to tell her the truth...honesty is always the best policy...right? But then I wasn't ready just yet. What would she think? How would she react? Would anything ever be the same?
"No. I can't tell her." I muttered quietly to myself. I hunched over another inch on my bar stool. I was alone although surrounded by patrons at the hotel called The Silent Sleeper's pub. The TV roared football overhead. I could hardley notice anything else in the room but the grain of the wood on the wooden bar counter in front of me, as I grew...
ha!
you can count me out
nope
not doin' it
uh-uh
nooo wayyy
mm-mmm
nooooo
screw that
never
I Said No.
..alright let's do it
She'd have preferred the electric chair. Being in the San Francisco State Women's Penitentiary was, well, prison. The orange jumpsuits were tacky. And the food was simply disgusting. She could not believe that she had been jailed for Aren's crime. She'd witnessed, but Aren's lawyer daddy had pulled some strings and landed her in this disgusting hole. Aren should be wearing that jumpsuit. The murder had been gruesome. How could the judge think that a preppy, pretty girl like her would get her hands dirty with such a thing? As soon as her sentence was over (fortunately, the judge had...
The audience stared open mouthed at me. They hadn't seen the thin rubbery form that had slinked across the stage. Lucky for me the crucial moment was timed perfectly to the final battle scene. This unatural creature obviously had a penchent for the dramatic. Why else would it make the theatre's labarynthine basement and costume storage its base?
The smoke obscured the stage but not my double flip kick.
It took me a while to regain my composure, but afterwards I enjoyed taking the bow.
her bedroom wall was a collage of every valentine's day card, folded secret note, doodles, drawings, things her friends had written before their father's got a job in another city and moved. Streamers, deflated balloons, pressed leaves, plastic flowers, candy wrappers, subway, bus and concert ticket stubs. Polaroid pictures and regular rectangle pictures and pretty much anything else a teenage girl might come across in her lifetime of movement.
The detective went over every piece thumb-tacked, taped or stuck to the wall, writing in his little notebook.
"Usually they just run away for a few days," he said. "Then they...
The library was dark, lights shutting off behind me but I continued to thumb through the book. They had lamps on the desks, the kind with telescopic arms so that you could adjust the height. I'd pushed the bulb close to the pages so it left half of the images in shadow, a charcoal mystery for the eyes. I slid the page beneath the warm glass to uncover the next page. Illuminated- a dog sitting on the wooden cap of a fence, his face towards the sea. The rest of the picture was hidden in black shadow, the dog was...
I wonder, looking at the picture, who he was, to dream so... audaciously. Really. To even think he could surpass me-- us, I remember, looking over at her. Her belly is round and curved, like a ripe melon, and I smile. She does not reply; she is tinkering with some wires. I am sure in a few minutes she will have something ready that will sell for millions.
The man in the photo is looking off to the side at something else. He is wearing a bulky waistcoat. I should think he epitomizes the stereotypical inventor. Indeed, the fantastical creation...
Dark spires pierce the night, reaching for full moons and distant stars. It's more than most could contend with. We sleep, conjuring pistol dreams while the tall buildings and statues do the work of our desires of actively attaining the beauty that this world has to offer. Every day we awake to the soft sunlight shining through our windows believing that today is the day that we will quit our jobs and move to distant cities and start anew. But these thoughts dim as we put on our clothes for work and eat more morning breakfast and continue on with...
Just put it away, I don't want to play.
Come on.
Not now.
Come on, we're just sitting here waiting. You know it'll take forever for them to get back to us.
Okay, fine.
All right, who invented the hot air balloon?
I did.
No, the Montgolfier Brothers.
Well...
Listen, if you're gonna answer "me" for every question, it's not gonna be fun.
It's not fun.
You're a real drag.
I'm just having an off day. Let's sit in silence.
Let's try another question.
Fine.
What is next week's winning lottery number?
That's it. I've got to go.
Oh, come...
They were listening. Outside of the door, on the floor, in their footed pajamas. Listening while they heard yelling from their Mom and Dad. Listening to "Leave, I hate you," and "How could you love him and not me?" Holding empty sippy cups, on the verge of crying because they didn't know what was going on. Sitting there outside the door with their matching blonde hair and matching haircuts with matching faces. The twins Andrew and Erik holding each a stuffed cow and an empty sippy cup. Andrew started crying, screaming for his parents. The door opened, he stopped crying....