He sprinted through the line of trees that marked the end of the forest, his sanctuary. He had known something was terribly wrong. His hometown, a small village with just over thirty people in residence, was burning. He had seen the smoke rising into the sky when he woke and ran toward it immediately, praying that she was okay. He hated that he had to leave Jade alone, unprotected, with Lord Westley and his army raging across Torrin, but he dared not stay near people during the full moon. Aidan slowed as he reached the outskirts of the little town....
He stares into her bloodshot eyes, her glaring furious and terrified back.
She has not slept in over 24 hours and it is by sheer will-power that she manages to remain erect and alert. He must not win.
It must be over soon, she dreams, hallucinates, cries to heaven and God and all her nightmarish waking hells.
Freshman Biology.
First it was the night sweats. Then the spontaneous attacks of anxiety. Her boyfriend left after the sleep talking began, screaming about failing and nonsense and the like.
A test? No, more than a test. This was it.
Her delusions extended...
Seed sack in one hand and broom pole in the other, Johnny Appleseed approached a patch of freshly tilled earth. Four rows, twelve feet long each, ran parallel to one another. With the broom pole in his left hand, he faced the first row, made a hole and dropped three seeds within. He sidestepped six inches to the left, made another hole, dropped another three seeds in. At the end of the first row, Johnny briefly glanced back over his shoulder and caught a hoarding chipmunk stuffing his face with seeds from a hole he'd just sown four feet away....
What's this?
Dad showed me the picture of the orangutan splayed on the grass.
A monkey, I said.
It's you, he said.
Neither of us laughed.
Remember that time you asked me for a Coke and I stood at the soda machine filling it with Root Beer imagining Homer Simpson saying Mmmmm Root Beer?
Dad laughed.
I laughed.
It's silent most of the time now. I don't think to text and neither does he.
"Clung to" means everyone in the house knowing when I am there and when I am not. A friend is dropping off some cookies she made...
There was originally only one photograph. Now there were two. Well, two halves. Incomplete. Roughly cut down the middle of the bay, neatly bisecting the bench. One was lightly discarded in a pile of "Things to do/sort."
The other was folded and refolded and bent again, then sat in a wallet. Strangely, the one that was thrown aside was the more loved. It showed regret. It showed hope. It showed Faith.
The tattered half showed bitterness, anger, loss. Odd, really as the original showed promise. Anticipation. Love. The man who captured all these strange emotions just thought they were a...
Dispossessed
All he had to his name was this park bench, and not even that.
As he sat and gazed off into the distance, he contemplated his fate. He'd lost his job, then his home, then his family. Nothing was left to him, not even his body that lay six feet under rotting in a pauper's grave. His spirit sat on the bench that the shelter had dedicated to his memory. Suicide had not ended his suffering. Dispossessed of everything he had held dear, he contemplated getting his life back.
His ex-wife stood looking at the bench, at his name...
In 1921, he flew from the Great Rift Valley. Ever since then, Luke had been a hero, from New York to San Francisco to everywhere in between, he was known for conquering the seemingly impossible laws of physics and flying from the valley. But he didn't reverie in his fame. Instead, he settled down in Castor, Arizona, keeping a simple life tending to sheep and cattle for the local farmers. Ince in a while, a television crew would show up and he would dissapear for a while; no one knew where he went. Except for me. I knew exactly where...
We sat on our toboggan at the top of the hill behind the house. It wasn't much of a sliding hill, but it was easy to walk up, so, there you go.
Me, Jenny, Eric and Becky took turns sliding down on the hot pink crazy carpet and then struggling up the slope in ski pants and too big boots. It was only the third or fourth snow of the season and between the melts there was just enough of the white stuff to pick up a bit of speed on your descent.
Eric or Jenny came up with the...
I slept inside the dream I didn't spin from yarn
this time inside my dream
i didn't spin another lie within the tale
you never sold to me
I look inside this bed I didn't make
the spell i didn't spin
from yarn inside my dream
I couldn't sell this dream to awakened eyes and ears
and dreams never do
sell themselves well outside the walls inside our hearts
I bake for you but do not eat
I draw for you but do not sell
I sing for you but do not sing
The things and songs from stolen dreams...
I looked up at the cathedral door and I thought this is what it means, this is how it all culminates, in this big round arch towering above my head. It was like a mouth, opening wide to swallow me up and draw me down inside, to consume and digest me. Just like the church, I thought. This is what it does. Consumes me.
After I'd breached the threshold, the sounds of the war outside hushed and all I heard was the soft murmur of the others, deeper inside, the soft crying of lost and destroyed. Here's where we come,...