"That's it. You've gone and gotten us lost!"
"Now, I haven't done any such thing. I simply need to reorient myself." He adjusted his thick spectacles and scanned the wide expanse of the coast before him.
"We've been wandering around this city for three hours and haven't seen another living soul. Now, that'd be what I'd call lost, huh?" The second man slung one hand into his pockets and took a long drag on a cigarette with the other. He exhaled a stream of smoke, in his anger reminding the glasses man of a fire breathing dragon. He relaxed a...
I'm dead. Really dead. Not in the "there'll be a twist at the end and I'll be saved" kind of way. Just dead. My story has no happy ending, no prince, no knight in shining armour, none of those fairy tale fables. I lie there motionless, on the cold, dew covered ground. I look truly awful; the complete stillness of my chest makes me cringe. This is what I wanted, was it not? No. Not this way.
I leave my limp body there and find my way back to town. I need my mom, I need my dad, so I...
One hundred and eighty thousand pounds. Sterling. Sitting on her dresser, in tight little wads of cash. One hundred and eighty thousand pounds is a lot of money. Hell, before today, one thousand was the absolute maximum I had seen in any one place at one time, and that was in the hands of Stu, the dealer, and he was just flashing it around to show off. One hundred eighty thousand? It damn near crowded everything else off the dresser. And she was just, what, going to leave it there?
"Where's this from?" I asked.
"You know where it's from."...
The wind blows between my toes. It tickles the little hairs on my big toes and reminds me I forgot to shave them. Those two little hairs on each big toe make me feel like I'm never totally girly. All these scars on my legs, too. The scar from the broken beer bottle my dad left in his car. Bad memories attached to that one. Eleven stitches, and a trip to the beach after where I couldn't get my leg wet. Those aren't the bad memories tangled up with that scar. The beer bottle, the alcoholism, the drugs: the father...
Green cover holds me. Oak Tree stands guard behind me. Sun warms me. Stream sings me to sleep. Sleep meets with Dream and carries me into the depths of Imagination where everything is what nothing ever was or will be.
If money was the root of all evil, then wine must surely be a close second.
Jasper gazed through the rosy depths of the wine glass in his hand, observing the scene beyond with quiet detachment. Wine had always mellowed him, left him with a feeling a pleasurable distance from his surroundings, as though nothing that happened would effect him at all. He remembered his girlfriend's anger at his apparent coldness when she informed him of her condition, the way she had yelled and screamed and beat her fists against him as he silently took in her news, analysed the...
Finally. Mom would be pissed, dad will be furious, and well, Auntie Selah will have a martini in my honor.
Perfect for me? Good family? Education, potential, background of a presidents son, check.
But he totally does not give a shit about what is most important to me. He refuses to accept my reasoning that animals are here for their own purposes and are not for consumption, entertainment, or anything else. I am VEGAN. He is cruel enough to smile through dinners, arguing with me that this is all very temporary and that as soon as we are married he'll...
Highrises.
This was the life. High up in the skies, towering above the poor commuters who have to walk the streets. I stood on the balcony, the speeders whizzing past. The sun was rising, spraying its rays over the metal surface of the building.
I showered. The sonic waves power washed all the dirt off of my skin. Five minutes later, I was fully dressed and ready for work. I headed back to the balcony, and stepped off onto my speeder.
It only took a minute to get to work. I waved at the scanner at the front door. It...
It wasn't like that. It wasn't. She hadn't led him on. Or him her. It wasn't like she'd planned to have an affair. There, she'd finally said it. An affair. With her boss. Her married boss. Her dreamy, overworked, misunderstood boss, Tim. It wasn't like it was sordid, or wrong. It wasn't like they'd been indiscreet. It wasn't like any of her colleagues had known. It wasn't like she'd expected him to break it Off. It wasn't like he wasn't kind. The bastard.
"Tim, you bastard. Why do you care enough to want an end to spare your wife?"
It...
My father was born. The pressed leaves of Limerick brushed from the crib. A mirage shimmers over the pond. Ships and flags and trucks. Red brick stoops on analog streets. Lamps on the corners.
We move and it is 30 years later. Soon the crushed leaves of New York gather. The east coast bleeds in tides, rushing us over the Plains.
In the West, we dry in the momentary sun, then open our mouths for the never-ending rain.