Until now, she'd never thought of herself as pretty. And, if she was honest, she still didn't. It wasn't her mind that had changed. It wasn't even thhe mind of the world in general. Just the rather pleasant opinion of one particular man who she had met while walking into town. He had caught her eye as she passed, caught her hard and fast in fact. She was forced to an abrupt halt, staggered by it's impact. Not unpleasant, mind. Gentle, but admiring. There was power in that. He had looked and smiled and then complimented her on her looks,...
Sasha stretched as she woke, the cold early morning air stinging her skin. Looking around, it took a moment to figure out where she was. The woodland near the playing fields. She had never come out this far before. She should hurry back before anyone realised she was missing. There was no way she was going back to see Dr Williams again. He gave her the creeps. There wasn't anything wrong with her anyway. She knew her parents despaired at her stories, but they weren't just stories. Why couldn't they see that? They were every bit as real as she...
I hoped they would stop worshiping the coat soon. After my husband Ed spilled coffee on his shoulder I'd washed it and put it out on the line to dry.
Someone from town happened to pass by as it swung from the line. He said he saw the face of Jesus in it. Right where Ed had spilled the coffee.
They came after. Ed tried to run them off with his shotgun. He tried to sick the dogs on them. They still came. All wanting to look at it. Take a piece of it home with them.
I took it...
Collapsing in a fit of giggles, Claire stopped to catch her breath. Catching up with her, Simone danced around her, still singing.
Claire laughed. It had been the perfect night. And morning, come to think of it. It was 6am and the sun was already beginning to rise above the terraced houses.
"Thank you for a fantastically brilliant birthday!" Simone hugged her tight.
"You're welcome" she slurred. She was due at work in just over two hours. This was going to need a lot of coffee. Continuing to walk, they reached Claire's house and she crept in through the back...
I couldn't sleep with her next to me. The smell was making me crazy. She dead to the world, breathing her breath, rustling the covers, each movement sent her smell across the bed. Sour. Sick.
For weeks she wasted away in front of me. Now she didn't eat and her body was starting to draw on what little reserves we left. All fat gone, now her muscle. I was afraid to touch her. Afraid to look too closely. Afraid to see her slow wasting death.
But we still shared this bed. She and I, as always. The only difference now...
The wires passed from hand to hand in the complex trading ritual. THe boy watched raptly, taking his training with the serious concentration of surgeons and chess-masters.
"You wrapped the wrong red and pulled the wrong green," he noted to his papa in mixed Spanish. The wires were then braided into his hair, the auburn hues mixing with the artificial Christmas tones.
"The day your hair grows out of these strands, you will have all there is to desire in this world. On that day, you may cut these colors and move on to the next."
The tea kettle screamed...
The shipwreck was catastrophic -- the kind where the powder magazines fireballed into the sky. Wood and masts and sails and all that turned into a bunch of toothpicks even Dennis Hoffman couldn't count.
Only Dark James Jameson survived, catapulted as he was from the plank he'd been stumping down as he crossed himself and wished the darling world goodbye. He landed in the evian blue water with a sploosh, swam about in a silent camera shot and bobbed to the surface for a breath -- upside down. His leg was the only bouyant bit about him.
He hung upside...
I'll do anything… No, not that!
I am different.
I know it.
They know it.
They being society.
In our society, we are to dress the same, act the same, our names are the same, and the only thing different about us is our eyebrow angles. Strange, isn't it? I know there are a few like me in the world, but I don't know where. When I was very little, my parents lived on the edge. They would be different, and the society would scold them. When I was three, they were to be killed. Before my parents died, they decided they wanted me to stand...
Until now, she’d never thought of herself as pretty. She though of her body as a reclamation project. One of those trash dump sites that had filled up and had to be pounded down, covered over and made to look like something else. Something stable and pretty. Like a piece of ground someone would be willing to invest in - maybe build some houses on and raise kids without ever knowing what was underneath.
She couldn't fix everything, of course. Those scars...well, there just wasn't much she could do about them. Long sleeves, not tanning too much so they wouldn't...