I came down the stairs after I heard the rumbling in the streets. Something shook my potted plant, the one my grandmother gave me before she died. It shook so hard, it fell to the ground.
Earthquakes don't happen in Chicago, and my third floor one-bedroom was luckily sturdy enough to withstand whatever caused all this motion.
The rumble happened again. This time more prominent feel. The earth began to split farther up the street. Cars rocked on their shocks.
I knew what this was, and I knew it was here for me. The shaking continued, the sky darkened. He...
I felt a dim glow of satisfaction deep within my soul as the night turned into day. My dreams of before, now a reality. There was nothing I wanted...
But one thing... The one thing I couldn't have.
I believe in miricles as they happen every day around me, birth, growth, laugther and joy. I pray for a miricle now, even. Guide him, save her. I can hardley get everyones name into the list sometimes as the hours pass by.
But there is one name that stands out like a black print on a white paper. A name that still...
Absolutely ridiculous. I mean really, how could anyone expect that much of me when I'm only seventeen! So I said no, of course I'm not going to. Then the question came that I'd hoped he wouldn't ask: "why?" Oh, there are so many reasons why but I didn't tell him any of them. I didn't say anything. I just stood there telling myself not to cry, that I never could have said yes even if I wanted to. I tried to convince myself that I didn't want to say yes but I'm still not entirely sure if that's true. Well,...
"Come on, Brad," she sighed. "Can't you be serious once in your life?"
"Maybe," he said. "We may not know for sure until I'm dead, though."
"This is really important," she told him. "We have to defuse this nuclear bomb before the silo doors open and Dr. Malevolence's computer virus launches it and starts World War III."
"You know, I'm not totally convinced," Brad argued. "How many viruses work perfectly when they're released? Writing viruses is hard, you know. Even evolution needs to try billions of times to get it right."
"You really want to risk the fate of the...
Bombs were the last thing on his mind.
Everyone was hiding under desks, wary of the slightest sound whereas he was wondering how soon before people registered the change in him.
They might be in shock and forget. But what if they didn't? Would he have to convince the survivors they were hallucinating?
Crouching in under the lower shelve in the store cupboard Jack could feel his ears growing and wings strain against his shirt. It wouldn't be long before his faerie body would be a giveaway, hopefully the others would have been rescued by then and he could stay...
In hindsight, the solution was obvious. I'm not sure why I didn't see it at the time, but then again who does? I suppose that's why they say 'hindsight's always 20/20'. Perfect vision. I can't say that I've ever really had a knack for figuring things out on the spot, on the fly, with no real time to think about it. I'm a 'processer'. I like to process things, take my time, really think things through. Unfortunately, that doesn't always work to my advantage.
There are situations in life when you just have to come up with an answer, lightning...
The city was empty. The skyscrapers during the day looked powerful and full of promise. At night, they just looked like pieces of art. The hustle and bustle of New York was beginning to bug me, for the first time ever. I was going to walk far, but I'd see someone. So I stayed in my quiet neighborhood, passing by restaurants and apartment buildings. "Being alone was possibly the worst thing that has ever happened to me." I thought to myself. From then on, that's all I could think about. That sentence rang in my head like a dinner bell....
Once there was a beautiful kingdom with a wise ruler, a red wolf demon. He was cunning and strong, and loved long. During an especially daunting hunt, chasing a herd of water buffalo, he was joined by a pack of ordinary wolves, gray and black and brown. They all enjoyed the feast that hunting together had brought them, and in the celebrations, he met the most beautiful she-wolf he had ever laid eyes on. Her fur was gray, with that glossy sort of sheen you only see in the mornings of the reddest of sunrises, a color that rivaled his...
Only four days were left until the end of camp, and he'd resigned himself to his fate. He wasn't going to talk to the girl with the ponytail. He had run through the reasons why she would never see anything in common with him, and could almost recite it like a creed of self-defeat.
He saw her at the ridge, looking out over the farms in the valley below. Her headphones were plugged into her walkman, and she seemed completely at peace.
The tape player clunked to a stop. She sighed, took off the headphones and looked around. He realized...
She was supposed to be running. Fifteen more miles to go. But the butterflies caught her attention and she couldn't drag herself away.
"Go! Go! Go!" she heard the spectators shout. Or was that her subconscious?
She had to keep running she told herself. She needed the prize money for her next search. Money that would buy her time and equipment she would need. A top of the line GPS system, tape recorder, memory sticks. Anything that would help her track down her sister.
A year ago, her sister left a note and disappeared without a trace. And Amelia had...