It was the fall that surprised me most. I had never been a graceful person, and I was no stranger to the more than occasional stumble and bumble, but to actually lose my balance, to land hard on my rump, feet splayed out in front of me with no chance to catch myself, that was a surprise.
Luckily, I didn't land on my trombone, which was strapped to my back in a relatively unprotected cloth gig bag. Trombone players are marginally useful as it is, and trust me, NOBODY needs a trombone player with a flat bell or bent slide....
He wanted people to know he'd been there, so he left his shoes. There was nothing else he could leave. He trudged back up the hill towards camp. But the boots stayed. Years after, as groups of people ventured to the clear lake, they saw his shoes and left their own shoes. Without meaning to, he had started a tradition. Pairs of shoes after pairs of shoes were left by the lake, a little memento of the wearer there by the lake forever. Pairs of shoes after pairs of shoes after pairs of shoes.
It was full of bees! They emerged with a furious buzz, attacking her and stinging her ruthlessly. In a state of unreasoning terror, she fled, running up the stairs to the bedroom. She quickly locked the door behind her, isolating herself from the malevolent insects.
Left to their own devices, the bees zipped around the house, gathering any valuables they could find, and vandalizing everything else. They smashed dishes, burned furniture, stole silverware and broke windows. Laughing in their mysterious, buzzing tongue, they delivered a bee-related pun, and flew away, never to return.
I'm with stupid. The boy I was standing next to is an idiot. He continuously talked to me about whales, telling me how big they can grow to and what their teeth are made of. Why was I stuck with him? I could have been stuck on an island with anyone else, but nope.
He decided to swim for a bit, not thinking about the shark infested waters. I let him go without realising what he was doing. I was daydreaming of being home and eating blueberry pancakes. I soon was snapped out of my world and back into reality...
Can I survive? Am I really as strong as they think I am? They all think that I'm some prefect little girl who is strong and mature enough to keep her head and endure anything all by herself, but am I really? I just keep searching for an elusive escape that doesn't exist, I keep praying for answers that I know I will never find. Why don't they see my cheeks, burned by the tears? Why don't they hear the screaming of my heart as I live my life? They don't because I don't let it show. I can't let...
Hospitals won't help a dying man. At least not one who is truly dying. Most hospitals will rush to help a man who's body is dying but very few will ever stop to nurse the man who's life is dying. Right before the eyes of his friends and family, he begins to fade away. Slowly at first, but then more rapidly until one day, he is no longer alive. Sure, he will still walk around, eat, sleep, talk - all the things that are needed too be considered "alive". Anyone who has ever felt truly alive, like you do when...
I like my room. It seems the four walls move closer to me everyday. I feel like I’m sitting in a mental asylum. People come in and out, give me food and leave. Just like the Neverending Story, The Nothing will soon crawl over every inch of my world, plunging me into eternal darkness. I walk through the sea of faces. Expressions nearly as blank as mine. Someone taps my shoulder. I whip around, avoiding eye contact. I see a man. I slowly lift my head to inevitably meet his eyes. My eyes slowly moved passed his perfectly plump...
Potatoes. They were on my plate at dinner. I ate them. They tasted fine. After dinner I went to the bookstore and thought of you. I think of you there most, though we never shared our favorite books with each other. I don't know if you like Tolstoy or Camus, Kurt Vonnegut or George Orwell. But I think of you most often at the bookstore. Or the library. Anywhere with a million stories and possibilities between fresh and aging paper. I think of us that way, a million possibilities; a story waiting to be written or read. A story to...
The quality of the sex we were having in the wheat field is indescribable. It was better than any sex that I have had before. The sex would make the toes of a dead woman curl. It was great sex. I am quite certain you'd be jealous if I went into any lurid details about the sex that we were having in the wheat field, her legs up in the air, me doing things that you have only read about in books. The sex was great. It was not just great, it was amazing. This was amazing sex.
We were...
A flash of red. A tiny girl huddled in a doorway, solace from the stinging wind. She was alone, completely alone, in a place that used to hold hundreds of thousands. Grey as far as the eye could see, except for that beautiful red dress. It was a gift from her mother. The result of much whining and pleading on her part, and saving and scrounging on the mother's. 3 days ago, on her birthday, she had opened the ornately wrapped package to discover it. She was so happy.