I just stepped off the train, and the heat is unbearable. Before I left my apartment, it was already at 90. That was at 5:45 this morning.
Now, it is the end of the day, and I am stopping to grab a drink with a friend. They are visiting the city, so I have meet them up in a place I normally don't go to. Well, except for work.
The heat is so intense, taking the train was easier than walking. I would normally walk but this would have been too much of an exercise.
Michael Phelps would have been...
"If life were only that easy."
The boy stood up and began his usual every day routine. He reached for his old and torn up sweat pants and applied them to his lower body with ease. He then walked over to his closet and yanked out the first t-shirt that he felt, moving it towards his face.
"It smells, but eh, it is Exodus!"
He put the musty shirt on and made his way into the kitchen. His sister, as usual, was making what he considered the greatest French Toast in the world. He knew that this claim was most...
"Skipper! Where are you, dammit?"
Op.8. Op.8.
"Wretched dog! You've only got so much time!"
Locate Rory. Locate. Locating. Locating.
"Where are you?" Another voice chimes in. "I want my paper. It's early in the morning. They told us you were an obedient creature."
Rory found, chasing butterflies on the south lawn. Come closer. Closer.
The little girl shouts, "Skipp-er! Skipp-er!"
Skipper barks, and Rory calls back. Safety is across the bridge, across the broken-windowed fairy house and shattered pond, but the voices are coming and Skipper has no idea how to stop them.
"I want my newspaper! Come over...
"Son" I said squinting, I think we are here. "it's Colorado, wake up." I dug out the petrified french fry for Charlie, who was ripping up the upholstery in my v.w.
"Mom, why did we drop Frances on the highway, again?" Eric asked sleepily. He was plump and pink from sleep. I felt for him. There were many books under his rump, but looking in the rear view mirror, he seemed cozy with the dog. The sky was a deep navy, the long prairie grass synchronized so beautifully with the wind. And the black cows lying, trusting all this open...
It was weird, the way the rest of the world could see something that you yourself couldn't.
Like, I look in the mirror and there's - yeah, there's a girl there. And...yes, those eyes are dark, and that hair is...kinda curly, if it's behaving, and that skin is pale, freckled -
And I'm seeing the things I need to do to get to beautiful. Pluck that, moisturise that, define that, conceal that (some mornings, conceal all of it, please)
The amount of times I look at myself and I think that I need to be fixed. That I need to...
I don't know when I stopped believing in unicorns and rainbows. But I know I was a kid. A very troubled kid. Life wasn't as easy as it should have been for a child. Everything was bigger and scarier. Especially the things and the people that were supposed to make me feel safe and protected.
Home wasn't safe. I thought it was. I thought we were the Cleavers. My parents were perfect. My mother worked hard. She kept a beautiful home and prepared perfect meals. She kept her kids in line and made sure we were all just right before...
When I swam across the ocean to my new home, I never guessed that I would meet the man of my dreams, or all the hassle we would encounter. As a mermaid, I was promised at birth to the son of another wealthy family that lived like mine. Humans were off limit, although it did happen every now and again, and caused terrrible rifts within the community.
Jack was so handsome, striking green eyes just like mine and long wavy hair. First saw him fishing at the pier when my hair got tangled in his line. What a surprise he...
The bird landed. The men initiated procedures drilled into them back on earth and dream't of for the past month. The main hatch slowly opened. The first men stepped out onto the Martian surface. This would be their home. For the rest of their lives, they'd volunteered knowing they wouldn't ever return to earth. Alphonso stepped forward and turned back to face the rest of them. This is what they had rehearsed. He flipped the switch that would enable the broadcast to be heard by everyone on earth, instead of the internal channel to the corporation. He began to speak,...
Victoria and her sister Elizabeth spent their Sundays in the shopping district of their small town, on what they called their "promenade," saying the word in the closest thing they could affect to a french accent.
They would start in cafes and sip teas or coffees, nibbling shortbread, or butter cookies. They would each attempt to look both beautiful but also very bored, and would study each other for comparison later on.
When their cups were empty, they would walk, slowly, and purposefully along the narrow cobblestone streets. Looking in the window display of the second-hand and conscription stores and...
He could not even translate it. It was what one might call a specific knowledge, the fact that he did not understand this particular currency conversion did not mean he was not smart it just meant that he well did not understand it.
Still he felt anxious.
Hot
Clammy
He walked around the building, reading the strip of paper again and again. It was a a large number it could be something, life changing, probably not. Probably just another day. Someone had something wrong, something lost in translation.
He straightened his collar and opened the door.
Ready to deal.