She slept in the open air, in the windy hills, on a soft pillow. She was covered in the blankets of her mother's mother. She sang God's songs. When she played music, her hands made the strings talk and her voice accompanied. From atop her hill no one could hear her. The would hear her one day. She spoke God's words. When finally she slept, she would always dream. New songs would be woven in her head, on that soft pillow. Her message was the word of God and when she came down off this mountain she would save her...
The dream had been wonderful, yet it would never be real: she knows, even as she wakes, in the taste of bitter almonds at the back of her throat.
She tries to still herself completely so she can relive it in the morning haze. There was a boy-- no, a man-- and he had called her somewhere, taken her somewhere--
She breathes. In, out. In, out. Maybe there's something in dreamcatchers after all.
There had been a man in the dream. That is certain. There had been a man in the dream, and he had--
The fan drones incessantly. She...
The water was clear. The Captain held the glass aloft for the crew to see. So far, so good. The riotous lot seemed somewhat calmed by the sight. It was purely a temporary respite.
"Aye, for sure it *looks* clean," said one of the braver sailors. "But I can't merely believe that won't poison us all just like what was in the barrels before. And, beggin' your pardon, we can't be drinking no seawater, no matter what fancy magic you do to it."
The Captain sighed. The two sailors lost to the poisoned water had caused an uprising, it seemed...
I remember this day. This was the happiest and saddest day of my life. That morning, my soulmate Pete and I were married. On our way to the reception disaster struck. SCREECH, CRASH. Next thing I knew, I was in the Intensive Care Unit at the hospital. I looked to my side but there was no Pete. At this moment, I knew the worst had happened. Pete was dead. I was in hysterics. It was supposed to be the happiest day of my life but instead, it was the worst. This was worst then the time my high school sweetheart...
The lamp wouldn't turn on. He clicked it once, and twice. He tapped the bare bulb, once he'd removed the lampshade. He followed the cord down to the wall and unplugged and plugged it back in.
He dug in the drawer in the kitchen and found a new bulb but it didn't fit, so he dug some more and found another, smaller bulb and it did fit but still the damned lamp wouldn't turn on.
At the power box, he switched the breaker, killing the power for a moment to the living room, setting the VCR back to high noon....
Knives. Where were the knives? she thought to herself, getting more aggravated by the second. There were plenty of forks. If she needed a fork, or even a spoon, there were loads. The drawer was overflowing with cutlery of all kinds, excpet for knives.
She could hardly cut the ham with a spoon, gouging chunks out of it. Sighing, she tried to count to ten, calmly. This is what her therapist talked her through. Stand still, breath deeply and count. One...two...three...But, where were all the knives?
They had been there at some point. The cutlery had been bought in a...
Not that he could fell it, but judging from the way he staggered with every few steps, his legs hadn't healed completely. It was likely he was setting himself up to trip and collapse again, unable to move, but he knew he couldn't stay any longer. He tried to make his steps as steady as possible, but with no percerption of how much weight he was applying, he was at a loss to gauge if he was accomplishing much, and in the back of his mind simply waited for the tell-tale crack of bones re-fracturing, and plummet into the grass....
In 1921, he flew from the Great Rift Valley. That was the foundation of his reputation. Whispered, announced, stated, introduced, it always provided a collective puckering of lips, a breathing of "oohs" and then sips of champagne as fingers were taken into hand, and warm, hearty pats on the back offered. What a way to enter a party, what a ticket into every party!
He never tired of these parties, the compliments on his swarthy, sun embraced flesh, and the women who plucked at his sleeves and asked what it was like up there, racing against clouds. A man could...
(To read Part 2, follow this link: http://sixminutestory.com/stories/somewhere-better-part-2.)
Gigantic.
The voice was gigantic, though how such powerful sound came out of such a small creature was beyond her.
The furry animal was sitting back on its haunches in the tall emerald grass, looking up at her as if anticipating something.
She shifted uneasily. "You said you call yourself Someone Good?" she said. "What kind of a name is that?"
"We name ourselves by our attributes," said the creature, in its gigantic voice, which seemed to be full of every meaningful thing. "We are good," it continued. And from behind her,...
"Go! Go! Go!" We pushed forward, trudging through the thick sticky mud and holding globs of the stuff in our fists. "Get down!" We flattened ourselves to the ground as mud balls flew at us from the enemy lines. The warning had come to late. As I army crawled through the mud, dodging the sticky mud bombs coming at me from every direction, I saw one, two of our men fall to the ground as the mud struck them with enough force to pin them to the ground. At this rate, we had no hope of winning this war. A...