The sheep were at pasture.
It was 0300 and the troops were restless. They wanted action, not this placid chewing of grass. Every day was filled with nothing but chewing and the occasionally terrifying sheering.
The ones that came back from the shed came back wrong. Nude and shivering, wild looks in their eyes. Year after year. Jimmy couldn't take it anymore. When they came for him the last time, he ran for it. He chewed and bit and growled his sheep growl.
He didn't come back. That night they looked in when they saw the soft lights come on...
This was only temporary.
She told herself this every morning when she woke up, and every night when she laid down. She had been telling herself this for 6 months now and she didn't really believe it anymore but she still said it. This is only temporary. Who was she kidding. It wasn't getting any better. She was surviving but only just. She had used up all her time at the shelters and really families with kids should get priority. She was surviving. She used to have a plan. Things she was going to do to get her out of...
The poor thing had followed a Marine from the wharf to the deck of the aircraft carrier; someone had put a leash on it and of course he was named Devil. He was the mascot for the Bravo Company and even the officers pretended not to see. And even if the Sailors had said anything, a Marine or twenty would have made sure they forgot, quick.
Devil Dog was a mutt, a half-starved thing that a Marine on leave had tossed a bit of bread at, to impress the pretty Australian broad on his arm. The Marine didn't get the...
Ridiculous. Absurd. Absolutely and beyond all normal standards of decency, indecent. That was how I looked in the mirror the morning that I discovered my first gray hair. Or was it my third. I was faced with the overwhelming reality of a head of lustrous, youth-infused auburnness marred by the upright and wiry soldier who insisted on taking up some precious real estate in my brain that could have been much better utilized by a sudoku puzzle or a cure for cancer. How were things now to possibly proceed in a direction other than graveward? What was the sense in...
Let me tell you a story or a hero named Sam. He was quite a character, as he worked as an Ambulance driver. His goal had been to be a doctor, but his villain of a college professor had failed him, and squashed that dream. He had hitched a ride from a paramedic one day, and he had gotten a job as the man's assistant. Since he had the credentials, Sam was already qualified to become a paramedic. He enjoyed the job, knowing that he could be vital to saving another person's life, and that was alright for him. But...
That night everything changed. She would never think of the stars in the same way. Or the grass, or the flowers. In five minutes her whole perception of the world changed. She could acknowledge that the thoughts running through her head at that moment were not what she would have imagned she would be thinking in a scenario such as this. Her thoughts were clear and concise. Practical almost. She blinked. It hurt. A seering pain shot from her left eye through (what it felt like anyway) her brain. She tried turn her head to the left where she knew...
She bent down to tie her shoe as the sun was setting. The reflection of the pinkish-yellow ball was right in front of her at the edge of the lake. The pebbles beneath her feet were wet and smooth. The umbrella she brought with her, still resting on her beach towel by the tree.
With many thoughts in her head, Chelsea folded up her umbrella and tucked it beneath her arm, rolling up her damp towel and stuffing her towel into her drawstring bag.
Today was a good day, she thought. She could get through this day. Days at the...
"Flash mob. 12 PM. Be there or be LAAAAAAAAAAAME."
I put my phone back in my pocket and smiled. This was it, I thought. This was my chance to be part of the group, for good. I wouldn't let them down this time. Not when they had finally started to accept me. I rushed to my computer and opened the video Jayna had sent me. It was time to learn this dance.
Jayna had never been the most popular girl at school, but she had always been the coolest. With her blue hair and her ever-present messenger bag, the other...
As soon as Roger grabbed my wrist, I knew the spell was broken. Silence had been my way of being. Silence, yes, on the outside. But inside? Screaming. Screaming an Ella Fitzgerald glass shattering scream. But Roger's fat fist around my bloodless wrist created an outlet for me. Finally. THere was no way in hell he was going to take my sister's banana bike. I may not have spoken for the first 9 years of my grade school existence, but I wanted to make sure She WOULD.
I flipped out of the wrist hold with a Karate move my brother...
" what do you want, more than anything int he world?" The woman asked me.
"I want my daughter back" I said.
She did not ask where she was or what had happened to her. She did not ask how old she was, or what her name was. She just nodded, opened her hand, and blew a handful of glitter over me. Glitter in my coffee, glitter in my hair.
I was suddenly angry. Stupid crazy woman. She didn't know me. She didn't know Cindy. She had no idea that my little girl was locked in a coma so deep...