The trick was picking the tired, lost ones. That was the trick. Many passengers coming into Warsaw Airport had been warned about 'unlicensed' taxis, but if you chose well they would be too confused to argue. The trick was getting their bag. Once you had that, with a "Let me carry your bag, Sir/Madam," they would have to follow you.
The trick was to walk fast enough to scare them into following you, for fear of losing their baggage in the busy arrivals lounge, but not so fast the airport police would think you were stealing something.
That was the...
"Do you think we'll be there in time?" Annette didn't care but she felt as though she should say something to break the awkward silence in the car.
"No." Paolo answered. Annette waited for him to say something else. He didn't so she just continued staring out the window, watching the world pass by outside the car.
They had been traveling for two days, stopping only briefly at a run down motel on the outskirts of some city to catch a night of sleep. Yesterday had been Annette's birthday but the occasion passed by without so much as a balloon....
Travel light, but take everything with you. Words that my grandmother used to say in wisdom. And words that I've never take to heart till now. The twister ripped though our neighborhood and everything I owned was taken with it. My Children and wife stand now where our Kitchen was. With a heavy sigh, I remember those words my Grandmother used to say, I truly have all I need standing in the kitchen.
"Will you just buy a newspaper?"
"I don't need a newspaper. I'm going to say 1985."
"No way, it can't be any later than 1973. Look at the can."
"I see the can, but -"
"Then you see the logo style. That's totally an early seventies steel can. Just buy a paper so we can figure out when we are."
"Look, the phone has a Southwestern Bell logo. That means it's AFTER the breakup of AT&T. Therefore, we are sometime in the mid-eighties."
"But soft drink companies had already switched to aluminum cans. How do you explain that?"
"I don't...
If given enough time to think of it he would go back into the fire to get it. The moment the Christmas gift was opened, he got up and filled the cup with coffee. Ever since then and with few exceptions it had been used most every day. It was white with Disney's Magic Kingdom logo on it just over the letters D-A-D also in blue. This wasn't his style or desire, but yet this was. He knew the minute he picked it up who the previous owner was, and it was a connection that he would never make in...
I looked through my photo album, my fingers flipping the pages quickly, as I looked for that one photo.
There it was, towards the back.
I stopped and smiled.
I could still hear my voice demanding to have this photograph taken.
A woman stood to my right. Her smile shining with pride as her hand held mine. She had always been there for me. Almost as far back as I could remember now. I often thought of her as the source of my conscience because she always seemed to give advice that pointed to the moral north, but at the...
Daring to be noticed for the first time in her life, she pushed her chair back and stood up.
"Ladies? Gentlemen? Entities?" Helen paused. No response.
Helen glanced around. The large workroom -- some schizophrenic combination of retro and avant0-garde -- was loud, clicking and warbling and chatting in a very large number of tongues.
Helen cleared her throat. It should have been for effect, but it was because her throat had suddenly dried, as if she had swallowed the entirety of the Sahara back on Terra. "People! And non-people! Listen!"
To their credit, many did. Many didn't, but that...
It wasn’t a specific look, or anything she said exactly. It was the things she didn’t do that gave it away. The way that she didn’t automatically include me in the conversation, the way she didn’t look to me when something funny happened, the way she didn’t move up to get more space but stayed, leg pressed against mine, reminding me that she was there.
All the instincts we’d developed about one another over the many years we had been friends were now kicking into gear and compensating for all the things we couldn’t say, not with all these people...
I was reading a great book when the words turned to sand. A hole opened up on the page and the words drained through, and I, engrossed in the plot, followed them.
When I awoke everything was different. But just slightly so. My alarm clock's red letters were blue. My green-striped sheets were now blue striped. The knobs on my dresser had turned from square to oval. My fat tabby cat was a calico.
The stuff was all there, it was just the details were mixed up. It was like a sketch artist had recreated my room based on a...
She didn't look at him.
Instead, she stared out of the window, quivering as though she would cry at any second.
"Bev?" Steven called out tentatively.
She shook her head, still not looking at him. All Steven wanted was for her to look at him. Her gorgeous green stare always made him breathless. She always made him happy.
But now? He screwed up.
"Beverly, c'mon. Say something."
She stared out of her window as though he weren't even there. He walked closer and reached out to touch her shoulder. "Beverly-"
Jerking back violently, she twisted his direction and snarled, "Don't....