The gods used the lake as their mirror, reflecting their beauty along its still waters, awash with azure skies and billowing clouds of purest white. The earth goddess tolerated their use of her lake, because it suited her. The heavenly colors complimented her own, golden shores and the brown shining mountains that surrounded the blue waters. If only the heavens could grant her wish, she would trade places with the gods of the sky and walk upon her own shores. As maudlin thoughts filled her like the waters of that same lake, she changed her mind and only wished to...
Eternal life.
That's what he'd promised, wasn't it?
Jane didn't know the tall, dark-haired man who had approached her late that night. He appeared as if an apparition as she exited the lonely subway terminal on the way home from an excruciating double shift.
He had spoken just two words. Eternal life. It was a dreamlike declaration - not quite a question, not a statement, just a whisper. But that was impossible.
She had looked at him with a mix of fear and curiosity before shaking her head and walking briskly up the dimly lit staircase. Just before walking into...
Her joints screamed as the winter chill ran through her veins and iced her skin. It was so cold out and this blizzard was never-ending.
Julia huddled around the oven pumping heat into the 500 square-foot apartment, something her mother said to never do but it's not like the heat worked.
"Why the hell did I go out there?" Julia said aloud to the appliances.
She threw Ryan out for a reason but months of anticipation made the actual act much harder. She wasn't even sure if it was going to be today, but in the end it was. He...
It had been a long morning. The shouting and screaming had been relentless, as it always is with three children under six. She had spent the hours trying to patch up arguments, mollify sulkers, and generally bring a sense of cheer. Even the thought of their friend's birthday party had not raised a smile at one point. She felt like she was near the point of giving up completely.
The twins eventually seemed to decide that if they got ready they may enjoy the upcoming festivities. By quarter to twelve they were dressed in their finest party outfits and starting...
She stared down into the shallow pond from where she stood on the banks, and sighed. There was world just below the broken surface of the water, a world that she longed to understand. The lillypads floating on the surface seemed to hide their world from hers, but she knew better. The world below, it was alive and well. It was something that she could feel, from the tips of her fingers, up her arms and across her heart, and all throughout her entire body.
All she had to do was jump.
Though the pond was only a foot or...
Good night…
Good morning…
Good afternoon…
Chet had to find his own fun while working as a department-store greeter. Sometimes he said “Good evening” instead of “Good night” to the fancier-looking customers. Sometimes he said it to the disreputable customers, too, but a bit sarcastically, to see if they’d pick it up on it. They usually didn’t.
Every now and then Chet would greet someone with the wrong time of day. “Good afternoon, sir,” he’d say, as the sun was peeking over the mountains. “Good night, ma’am,” while the sun was burning hot overhead. And usually people just continued on...
One foot in front of the other. He had to keep going. There was no turning back.
They almost caught up with him several times. In the woods he'd tripped over a branch, sprawled, and felt their hot breath on his back just before he kicked off and escaped. Now he was in the clear, wide open spaces of the school's football field. No obstructions in his path. No cover or refuge in sight.
On foot in front of the other. If he could just keep running for another mile or so, he could make it to the church where...
The maple leaves will change and fall with a certain grace - November will begin.
Carla read that sentence in her Literature textbook over and over, and the thought that kept running through her mind was, 'Who edited this book?'
That wasn't entirely true, but her internal monogue ran along these lines. Was she the only tenth grader who knew that semicolons connected independant phrases? Older people complained about how texting was ruining the language, but what difference did that make when a text book author, in what she assumed was an edited textbook ILLUSTRATING the language, couldn't even catch...
It's here somewhere.
How did we lose it in the first place? I don't dare say it out loud, because they'll blame me.
We've been at this for hours and still we haven't found it.
I was told to put it someplace safe. Someplace it wouldn't be lost.
But I did. Well, maybe not technically, more like made it impossible to get to. How was I supposed to know they were going to pick this up and ship it out overseas as donations. I blame my crazy Aunt Ida, that woman has a bad habit of promising things to the...
"Oh god. Oh god, oh god, oh god. I think there's something underneath the bed."
Jacob sighed, rolling over and twisting the blankets in an infuriating fashion. "Anna, you're twenty-five years old. Don't you think you're a little old for this?" Of course, he would say that.
Anna twisted the blankets right back. Blankets were protection. Blankets were life. If she were covered with the blankets and Jacob were not, the rules dictated that Jacob would be eaten and Anna would be spared. Everyone knew that. But Jacob wouldn't let this go without a quarrel.
"Jesus, Anna! I'm cold! It's...