"It worked!" He stood, startled by the sound of his own voice. What had worked?
Looking around, he wasn't quite sure if he should be more worried that he didn't know why he had said something he didn't understand, or about the fact that he was in a place he didn't recognise with no memory of having arrived there. A word caught his eye. Phone. He rolled it around his head. Yes. He could make a call. He should make a call. A number emerged from his growing consciousness. Should he be worried about that feeling of expansion, as though...
A small office, four storeys up a marble staircase with an flowery ironwork bannister. Dark. Quiet. A light passes the window, shifting the shadows. There, in the darkness behind the desk, a face. An open mouth. Staring eyes. John's heart hammers in his chest so loudly. Can he here it? Can Adam see him? And the girl. The poor girl. Blood pools beneath the desk. And for what? A painting? Art from an artist centuries past. A dead work for dead people. His hand tightens on the suitcashandle. The Pelican. Is it worth this?
When you got home you found me in the back corner of our not-quite-walk-in-sized closet, surrounded by shoes I hadn't worn in years, clothes I should have given away long ago, and miscellaneous scarves and belts and things that I hardly remembered owning.
I hadn't planned on ending up there, but washing the dishes led to laundry, which led to vacuuming, which led to looking under the furniture, which led to me finding that pin you had given me. I wanted to see the other things you had given me. When I was beautiful and you were kind.
I'm not...
Once, in Beijing, a young girl in a red gown huddled in a doorway. Waiting, patiently. Hoping that he would answer. But, with her ear pressed up agaisnt the door, she heard nothing. No footsteps. No television blaring music videos. No german shephard barking incessantly. Her greatest fear had been realized. Yet at the same time, her wish had come true. He was gone. The man that lured her in some three ago, only to break her heart. The man she followed half way across the world to be with. The man she gave up her hope and dreams for....
Once, in Beijing, a young girl in a red gown huddled in a doorway. She was the last surviving member of the Yoshi Crew, a band who had until recently been quite the rage amongst the in-crowd of Berlin. Her devil-may-care attitude and foul mouth had won her a place in the hearts and minds of Berlin's anti-establishment, anti-casual, anti-everything crowd. In Beijing, things had gone more than a little wrong. Mechmal, the under-fed, over-exaggerated singer had found them a gig at a nightclub in the centre of Beijing's equivalent of Soho as they worked their way around the world....
Once, in Beijing, a young girl in a red gown huddled in a doorway.
An American girl, a lost girl. Separated from everything she had ever known in the world. Just 18, but young enough to be scared to death. Her bright blue eyes and mahogany hair were a dead giveaway that this girl didn't belong. Her eyes met mine and I motioned to her with my left hand. She was shocked, like a deer in headlights; I could tell she was thinking, "why me." The look on her face was one that was asking for help - when she...
Once, in Beijing, a young girl in a red gown huddled in a doorway. She had just wrapped up a long evening answering the phone in her family's restaurant. She took the orders, and her brother and father cooked the food, while her mother ran the counter in the front of the neon food stall.
She was waiting for her best friend, but it looked like it was going to be a longer wait than usual. As she looked down at her red gown, she ran her hands over the cotton fabric and smoothed out some wrinkles, then created some...
She'd been in the park till noon, watching the gate to the Forbidden City, seeing the tourists as they milled about in mist-rimed sunshine. Finally, she caught sight of him as he approached the gate. Every day without fail, staggering slightly under the weight of his bag. She was overdressed for the streets in a red dress meant for parties not park benches. Flung out suddenly from the warmth of the car, out of favour and, quite suddenly without comfort. At the bottom of the hill she lost him briefly, then saw him, walking alongside two Western tourists, his sack...
These images flash in my brain whenever I close my eyes. A metal door. A girl in a red gown. Rain in a filthy alley.
I can't shut them off. I can't forget. I tried to drown myself in a bar, years ago. I couldn't forget then, I can't forget now. These memories of her are too strong.
She said her name was Maria. Her English was heavily accented. Her name wasn't Maria and we both knew it. I never learned where she came from. It wasn't something I wanted to know. Sometimes you have to walk past the detail;...
I woke up hung over, my head throbbing. It felt like mini-jackhammers were destroying my frontal lobe, something I am sure the Scotch took care of last night.
The room was unfamiliar, but I had seen it plenty of times laid out in some IKEA or Sears catalog. I was on the bed with an Oak, maybe Maple, night-stand next to it. The room smelled, not good or bad, just different from my bedroom. Clothes covered the floor in front of the closet, where I suddenly saw my pants. A desperate roll to my side brought back the mini-jackhammers.
The...