The dapper man picked up a penny. He rolled it around in his fingers, enjoying the coolness of it. It was raining, and he had had only seen it because the bronze colour had shone up in the middle of a shallow puddle.
The dapper man remembered a rhyme he had heard when he was tiny. See a penny, pick it up, all day long you’ll have good luck. He thought there might be more to it than that, but that was enough for now. He had a Very Important Meeting to go to that afternoon, and if a bit...
It was cold, so cold. I had been held captive in this house for a little over 6 months now, and i was starting to go cabin crazy. The tiny oven was the only source of heat until my captor got home. I recalled the day i was kidnapped. I had been walking with friends in Central Park. Suddenly, a man grabbed me from behind and chloroformed my friends. I had been tied up, and had been laying in the back of a truck for a few hours before i saw where i was. It was al little house, in...
Meteorites struck a Russian town today. I wondered what I'd be thinking if they hit the place I live. Probably not worrying about my hair as I am today. Nor whether to meet up with the unsuitable man that I know I shouldn't ever see again. Nor would I procrastinate yet again over finishing paperwork and chores. None of that would matter. Only survival. Family. Are they ok? None of the mindless timewasting unimportant trivia we are all obsessed with would even cross our minds in that situation.
It reminds me of the time I was stuck underground in an...
It approached. The deadline was upon him. There was no more time, no more stalling, no more pleading and simply no more giving. It was time, a harsh fate was to be met. Failure on all accounts, many unsuccessful attempts, it was not good enough. Their eyes met, tears sprang to hers and determination hardened his jaw. There was no way out, this was it. They would not see him cry. They would not see him ground down. He raised his hand and placed it on the window that separated them. She did the same. They had each said all...
"Saranghae."
His words made my heart stop.
"What did you say?" I whispered, not daring to look back at him.
" I love you Hye Jin. I said I love you. So please..Come back. Be mine." Sae Joon reached for my hand, but I quickly slapped it away.
"No! I..I'm not good enough for you. I have to leave. I have to get out of here." I stepped towards the plane entrance and held back my tears.
"You can't please!" Sae Joon fell to his knees and hugged my leg.
"Joon..Please don't make this harder than it needs to be....
TWIST.
The World Is Still Turning.
It was months after the destruction. We knew it was coming so we headed to the shelters that our grandfather had dug, in the deep mountains. We went in and closed the doors, sealing out the world and sealing ourselves inside.
Eventually, cabin fever struck. We decided that living like rats, in a hole, was not acceptable. We had to know what was going on.
We opened the seals and felt the rush of truly, fresh air. Everything outside looked the same. We decided to venture out to see what was what.
Part way,...
In 1921, he flew from the Great Rift Valley. In 1924, he toppled the world's second fastest record in a marathon. In 1927, he won the nobel peace... Must I say anymore?
He is and will always be, the most interesting man in the world. Of course, you wouldn't believe me, would you? You couldn't possibly believe that I would have this sort of person in my recent family line, nor would you believe that it was so direct that he was my great grandfather.
I never did get to meet him, I do wish I had heard more stories...
They crouched to peer beneath the stairs; a small boy and his even smaller sister.
"What are we looking at, Jack?"
Jack frowned and shushed his sister, pointing conspiratorially at the darkness between the slats of the steps.
They stayed that way for several minutes, scrunched up tight, necks disappearing into shoulders, rocking forwards on their toes.
"There, Arianna, look!"
He pointed towards a patch of darkness that had begun to twist and swirl in very much the way darkness shouldn't. Two yellow eyes blinked and stared back at them.
A voice like poison treacle spoke into the silence.
"It's...
Balanced on the line, he told her again, "Put it down!"
Regan the vampire could not move closer. For the first time in his long life, he was powerless. The girl tricked him by her unnatural beauty into drinking the potion. Standing on the narrow path dividing the graveyard he could feel his life ebbing away before she had even touched him with the metal spear. He prayed to his god, unanswered as he predicted.
Just before she pierced his heart she whispered 'I love you but I have to let you go'.
He took his last breath and inhaled...
He likes his own room, but he likes mine more. He's five. Half the time, if he had his way he would climb back inside me. He can never get close enough. Half the time. The other half he's complaining. Scowling. "You're interfering with my personal space!" Like he's breaking up with me.
So when he stands there, waiting, in the corner, and he asks if he can share our room, our bed, our space, I do what any rational human would do. And that's to pick him up and hold him, smell his head, that getting-bigger head, and say,...