The thing about mermaids is, well, that they aren't.
You're thinking seashell bikinis and fish tails, but that isn't it. Not at all.
My cousin Marjorie, this is back in '30, mind you, and the turn for the worse had been taken by all of us. She kept her things, her jewels and her dresses. They became her scales, her fins.
She decided to become a mermaid in the same way that some of us choose to marry. It was deliberate, it took forethought. She knew that she would dive beneath the waves to never return. Perhaps she would give...
Lola. That was the name of my new girlfriend. The one my friends all warned me not to get involved with. But of course, it was my life and she had been through so much already.
Bi-polar mother, alcoholic father, maladjusted siblings. Not really surprising Lola cut herself, gambled her benefits on the arcade machines and didn't eat much apart from dried Chinese noodles you boil in a cup.
Now that she knew that someone loved her, all this would change. She could pursue her artistic abilities, finish those novels, sleep at nights instead of watching movies and worry about...
She stumbled blindly through the woods, images of every horror movie she'd ever seen flashing through her mind. Admittedly there were very few of them, but they all seemed to involve people getting lost in the woods and meeting an untimely end. The Blair Witch Project had been the most recent, and she hadn't been able to sleep for weeks after watching it. But this was only a game.
Only a game. She kept repeating the words under her breath, letting them calm her. Only a game. None of this was real. Her best friend, lying motionless on the ground...
"Josh, I'm leaving." She felt the tears burning behind her eyes as she spoke. A look of hurt, confusion, and concern began to etch lines into his forehead as he stood.
"What do you mean, you're leaving? Where are you going? Why?"
"You know why I'm leaving. I can't just stand by and watch everything from my old life die away while they try to rebel against the things your family are doing to them! I can't be here while my life is with them." The confusion and hurt vanished from Josh's face, but the concern remained, softening his grey...
The angel wasn't at all what I expected. Jeans and hoodies weren't the kind of thing Divine Messagers should wear. And squeamish of spiders too!! He jumped up when the large hairy creature walked over his white trainers, I only noticed because I happened to drop my cell phone at that precise moment. As soon as he looked down he screamed as though all of hell was after him and leapt in the air.
John told me that he was getting therapy for his phobia and had been relegated to ordinary duty by his heavenly master, nothing spectacular for him...
She'd been a good wife. Comely and passionate, even through bearing 6 children (4 of whom survived) and I'd only strayed but once.
Of course she had known straight away, but had nodded; she wasn't perfect either. But while I loved her, and she me, we'd understood. No one can bear everything alone. And some loads were the cause of each other.
I'd known she had gazed upon others with a lusty eye. To be honest, I wasn't as philosophical as she; fierce jealous rage had filled me with hypocrisy. I learned a valuable lesson in self-delusion, but maybe not...
I never realized just how high the flats in this area stood. Concrete giants standing over this urban world which I am unfortunate enough to call my home. Just last week a local boy was beaten up because of drugs, or money, or girls or whatever is the driving force behind the yobs that unfortunately for me call this area their home too.
Berkley Estate. Full of Highrises but empty of hopes, that about sums up this place.
As I continue my daily journey from work to home through the grey streets filled with grey people I am unfortunate enough...
Six minutes. You wouldn't think it a long enough span of time to affect anything. Anyone.
And yet.
It's time enough and more to change your life. My life.
We were given six minutes. The span between one time slot and the next.
Six minutes to explain.
Six minutes to speak.
And I couldn't. There was nothing I could say to erase what I did.
So.
I kissed her.
Again.
And this time she melted into my arms.
Wrapped hers around my neck.
And for six minutes it was perfect.
Bliss.
Until the buzzer rang. And someone rapped on the...
"Mary?" a middle aged, crows footed woman queried as she stepped over the threshold.
"Mistress…" the young maid gestured her in, both blushing. Somewhat flustered the farmer's wife surveyed the room.
"Tom!" she blushed on blushes. Something the old woman had not thought possible. Interest upon Interest. Clearly no Pythagorean shape would ever do this web justice.
"I haven't said naught, Po… I mean, Mistress." the plough boy blurted. He was good at blurting, the witch noticed. It was good he had found what he was good at, at such a young age.
"Meg, I need your help again…" the...
With a sharp, breathy hiss, the seal of the airlock broke, and Simon felt the cool Earth air blow across his face.
Well, technically he didn't feel it, but his suit's sensors recorded data on the air; its composition, pressure, and temperature.
It was the first time a human had set foot on the planet in over two centuries. The Consumption had taken total control over the planet in 2077, rendering it uninhabitable. The survivors had fled to Mars and the Jovian colonies just before the air itself had been sucked away to feed the relentless multiplying of the microscopic...