"I can do this," Jimmy thought as he ran across the field. It was early Sunday morning; the light was pale and there was still dew on the grass. At 5 A.M., Mom had woken up in a cold sweat groaning and swiping at imaginary demons in her bedroom.
"Go get Aunt Jane," Dad had said. Jimmy had never seen his hands shake or heard his voice crack.
After the first mile, a stitch built in Jimmy's side. He was breathing heavy. Another mile ahead was Aunt Jane's tiny cabin. She lived alone and had a garden of herbs. When...
The sun seared our backs as we dove hand in hand. We were days from civilization, and it was the happiest we had ever been. The sand invaded every nook and crevice of our lives, but we had no shadows and no secrets, so it was inconsequential.
I looked at my son and saw his mother in him. His eyes were the color of eagle-sky, as if he spent so many hours cloud-gazing that the heavens imbued his irises with their hue.
"What did you learn today, daddy?" He asked me this every evening, knowing I had long been mute....
I've been taught to play it safe since I was a child. Everything always slipped out of my grasp. And I never seemed to mind. Then you managed to come into my life and make scars that, even decades later, will remind me of the love we had. Can you fathom how beautiful that is? I held onto you tightly because you were the only thing that mattered. Please don't say that my love was suffocating you. I couldn't imagine loving you any less. Maybe we were too young to understand what we had. Maybe I was too naive and...
"The day after tomorrow, this will all be over. I will stop being sick, I will no longer be a whale. I will be able to touch my toes again. Heck, I'll be able to see my toes again.
"I'll have a tiny body to care for. I will no longer be a me, but an us. I was an us once, but now I'm a me. But the day after tomorrow, I will be an us again. I will be stop being sick. Did I mention that? Maybe. I will be able to look at food without retching. I...
Nicky crouched, letting sand dribble through her fist. If only the sand were falling through the hour glass instead, the time for departure drawing closer one grain at a time. The water was almost flat, small wave rolling onto the shore.
"Why can't we leave?" She asked without looking back. A sigh and a rustle of sand and clothing.
"Red sky at night, sailor's delight," Dirk answered, letting the rest of it go unsaid.
Nicky grumbled, dropped the rest of the sand and stood. "Why do they hold everything up for an old saying?" Just above the high tide mark...
I let out a heavy sigh as I stepped over the cobwebs, allowing myself to have a moment of preparation. The swing rocked softly in the wind, beckoning me closer to its creaking gears. A piece of fabric rustled, caught in the links of the toy. I rushed towards it, snatching the piece of fabric from the wind, as it threatened to engulf it. The only piece of evidence that Mary had been here.
I stalked home, allowing myself to breathe, as I saw the missing posters pasted on the wall. The evidence would never be found, they would never...
He had her in his sights. The moment he saw her, he zeroed in on his prey. Her grace, her beauty... she stood apart from the rest of the herd. Easy pickings.
He waited for her to stop, her attention focused elsewhere, light illuminating her silhouette - almost like a halo. Perfect.
Ready, aim... *click*
"Excuse me, ma'am?" he asked, running over to her with the rapidly-drying Polaroid. "Would you like a souveneir of your trip here? Only five dollars for the pretty lady!"
The woman blushed and pushed the film away. "No thanks," she said, "I'm fine."
No doubt...
I lay now in silent musings. The wedding party over and I a long way between there and home.
A cool desert breeze blew over me and the silver moon kissed my cheek. Through my dreaming landscape she flitted, lithe and beautiful, a Berber princess whom I had loved all my days.
I longed for her now in this strange place where dangers lurked, even in these wide open spaces between the mountains and the sea. Then she came to me as she always had when I felt uneasy and alone. She touched my face with her soft mane and...
Imagine you're sitting at a table and the drunk version of you sits before you.
What would you say to one another?
Would the drunk you tell you the truth, admit to all the honesty you bury deep within or would the sober you manage to quell all of the clarity with your denial and issues?
And which one is the real one at this point? You spend more time with alcohol than you do with the voices in your head these days. So if your friends were to join you at the table, which of the two of you...
They were trapped for seven days. Faced with a myriad of uncertainties, this much Antonius knew to be true. The pangs of hunger had eventually morphed into a constant feeling of nausea. However there was no escaping the continual thirst that couldn't be quenched. How he desired his lips to touch the current of a fresh spring. Anything to replace the mix of his urine and rain water he had survived on this past week. Still the worst of his locked away environment was the person with whom he shared his cell, Marcus.
"How can he sit there with that...