The sunlight pushed its way through the heavy curtains at my enormous window and I shut it out. I need to be alone, I tell myself but I know that I can never be alone for long. After a while someone is bound to come along and try to cheer me up. I might smile, might even laugh but we all know that laughter can't last forever. I force myself to peek out the window and observe the street below. A cluster of small children play on the sidewalk, laughing. The joy on their faces lights a spark in me...
Everyone tries to be funny and make jokes about the magic beans. "Trade a cow? How about my wife?" they say. But magic beans, and the vines that grow from them? That's no laughing matter, and my garden is a mess.
You ever known a weed to go away by cutting it down? No of course not, you cut the weed, and it will just grow back. You have to pull the thing out by the roots if you're going to have any hope of getting rid of the thing, and even then it's usually back in a week. Well,...
It was the fall that surprised me most. One minute you're standing and the next you're plummeting towards the earth. Time seemed to slow. I counted the stories of the building as I whizzed by them. Twenty, twenty one, twenty two. My last thoughts probably shouldn't be counting.
I thought my life was supposed to flash in front of me. I closed my eyes for a moment but nothing popped into my head at all. In fact, I was slightly irritated that I had stopped counting. I was probably about forty floors up. I should have paid more attention in...
She pulled her red gown high over her head, trying to shield herself from the oncoming terror, but to no avail. The sheer vivid colour of the gown made her stand out from the bustling crowds, no matter how much she tried to huddle into the dank doorway of the closed shop.
"Please let me in," She whispered, scratching desperately on the chipped wooden panelling, "please." Tears started to fall down her cheeks as she heard the heavy footsteps of her pursuers getting closer and closer, the people around her seeming not to notice her distress.
Suddenly the door creaked...
Once, in Beijing, a young girl in a red gown huddled in a doorway. She held a bowl in one outstretched hand. Her eyes were studying the gravel on the road, not rising to the gaze of passersby who occasionally dropped a coin into her bowl. Her mother was dead, her father was missing, she had no siblings that she knew of, she had only a red gown and a bowl. When the bowl filled with money at the end of the day, as it often did, she would take it to a nearby shop and exchange it for rice...
After removing the gown and sliding to the floor, she flinched - another splinter. Number four. That is simply too many splinters.
Fen agreed.
I once tried a six minute story
As a cure for a tapped-out mental quarry
Writer's block was the snare
"Toujours ici" filled the air
And I floundered like a carp in a dory
"Adam! Give me the Pelican! Now!" John half screamed half sobbed. "It's mine!"
"No mine!" Adam clutched the Pelican to his chest. "My turn!"
"But mommy gave it to me! My Pelican!" John grabbed for it. "Mine!"
Adam would not relent. "No!"
"I'm gonna tell mommy that you took my Pelican!"
"Boys!" Both men looked up. "You are 30 years old. Adults! You should not be acting like 3 year olds!"
Both men hung their heads. "Yes mommy..."
"Now Adam. Give John back his pelican. I'll get you your Teddy bear, alright?"
"Yes mommy..." Adam slowly gave his brother back...
"Ice Snakes! I will not let you beat me into the Olympics!" Woolly Mammoth shouted as he watched the Ice Snakes perform their gymnastics trick. He was shushed by the judges. "Be quiet or you'll be disqualified." The Ice Snakes smirked as they completed their routine. Woolly Mammoth was next. He stepped up onto the trampoline and stated his name. "I am Woolly Mammoth." He started his routine. He flipped, jumped, and twirled. He blew away the judges completely. When it was time to announce who would be going to the Olympics, "Polar Bear, Sloth, Penguin, and Woolly Mammoth." The...