He set the plate before her. She was petrified, the bugs an creepy crawlies moving around on her plate didn't help. She hadn't seen her family since he had taken her, 3 years ago, and every day since then she was abused, punched and everything in between. He had been obsessed with her since they'd met 6 years ago and it took him 3 years until he finally had her all to himself. She had tried to escape so many times but she was never successful. She knew her time was up soon but she wasn't sure when, she had...
She wasn't the kind of girl who kept love letters, wrapped in pink ribbon, locked in an inlayed wooden box. Not that anyone sent love letters these days.
She would have no wild stories of her youth to tell her neices, no lost loves, no ones who got away.
She was, as she always had been, just her.
She had got so use to being on her own, the proverbial independant woman, that she ended up so afraid, afraid of being any other way.
And so , even though she was still young, she had stopped looking for love letters...
Daring to be noticed for the first time in her life, she pushed back her chair and stood up. "*ahem* Ladies and gentlemen, i do believe an error has been made." she said. everyone looked in her direction, and she could feel her cheeks burning. Her english was soft, lilting, with a formal accent no one could place. "Mr. Devon was there on the night of December 13th." she said, growing louder so she could be heard by the entire courtroom. Even the judge was afraid to breathe. "The evidence presented suggests a robbery, does it not?" Celine said, nodding...
The sounds of the protest reverberated through the streets. Police on horseback formed walls, blocking the side streets, helicopters hovered overhead. The crowd pulsed and moved like blood in the veins. We held placards and shouted in time. People banged on drums and pots and pans and clapped their hands. Sirens wailed on either side.
Steel gates were pulled down or across the glass of storefronts. The media had terrified the small business owners and that terrified the public and then screamed about how we need to be stopped.
The fact they missed the point wasn't important. The fact they...
Face down on the cold floor of the cathedral, Brother Fidelis whispered his prayers. Though his lips brushed the dust and filth of the stones, his eyes were angled forward, watching the door. Though he lay in front of the altar, he faced away from it.
The flat light of dawn was pushing through the open spaces where the stained glass had been, the thin, watery edge of light creeping slowly across the burned and broken pews. There were no noises yet. The day was not far enough advanced to bring them home. When the clear light rose above the...
Wine, a girls best friend. Here she was,party in full swing, glass in perfectly manicured hand,playing the good-time girl role to perfection . Giddy and rosy cheeked they laughed until their jaws ached.
She did her usual party gags and the all girls were in stitches. Dressed to kill with glossy chestnut hair that fell effortlessy around her designer clad shoulders, how they envied her life- young, free and single.
Time to go home now.Air-kissed cheeks and hugs exhancged,they left full of promise of the next girls night in.
She closed the door as the last guest left and stood...
The year was 1986 and we were going to see Under the Cherry Moon, Prince's new movie. "We" was me, old man McCracken, and Penelope, my talking handgun.
We got to the theatre and it had been turned into a chicken coop. "Gol," says Old Man. "this durn wrecks my day."
Then out comes a chicken. he's 8 feet tall. "Dont worry. we're still showin the movie. C'mon in."
In we go. There's only 4 seats and they're all covered in bird dung, but s'okay. Down we sit and the movie starts. There's Prince shaking his tiny ass, singing Girls...
What's this?
Dad showed me the picture of the orangutan splayed on the grass.
A monkey, I said.
It's you, he said.
Neither of us laughed.
Remember that time you asked me for a Coke and I stood at the soda machine filling it with Root Beer imagining Homer Simpson saying Mmmmm Root Beer?
Dad laughed.
I laughed.
It's silent most of the time now. I don't think to text and neither does he.
"Clung to" means everyone in the house knowing when I am there and when I am not. A friend is dropping off some cookies she made...
Kenya was the name of my doppelganger. I thought it a strange name, thought he might call himself Jim or John, both my names. I am James John Madison. But no, he told me he was Kenya that first time I spotted him in the bathroom at the hotel.
At first I thought I was hallucinating, but he was real. Not a ghost, but an actual man. He said it was amazing our paths had crossed this way although he always guessed there was a second version of him around.
We discussed urban legends, that seeing our other half could...
My father had died.I was lost without any one to hold my hand.I was left alone. With no family.My hand just banged against my side as I was walking. I am now walking , lost , without any hand to hold. Since my father's death I haven't felt the same.He promised me he would be back as he left on his journey to Singapore he whispered into my ears and said "I will come home I promise". He had lied. He had left me. He left me to fend for myself.
I am lost. I continued to walk through the...