I was studying in science class when he came up to me. He slowly sat down next to me and asked me for help with a few questions from the textbook. "I need to hear someone explain it to me." He was begging now, but I knew that he understood the material. "You tell me. You know the answers, now teach them to me." I was trying to get him to put his thoughts into words and sort them out in a way that he could remember. And then he looked at me with his soft eyes and said, "But...
The lamp wouldn't turn on. After all, it wasn't supposed to. If the lamp had turned on, it would have been back to square one for the elite team of lamp-saboteurs that had been hard at work here for a good week. It was with some relief, then, that the captain was able to announce their part of the mission to be complete. The not-turning-on of the lamp was the final piece in an elaborate and highly confidential plan, the full nature of which even the saboteurs were blissfully unaware...
It all came to a head just two weeks later....
Standing on the edge, my mind was white. No; it was clear. Nothing I had experienced in my 18 years was going through my head. Not my mother's voice, or the orange corduroy couch in my Aunt Lucy's basement.
And then I jumped. Rocks and crashing waves below this cliff in Martha's Vineyard, our family vacation spot. Rushing into my head were thoughts of my first kiss, first time, smoking pot under the high school bleachers... My dad's face when I learned to drive, my mom's when I crashed the minivan.
My white sneakers were about to get soaking wet,...
"Travel light, but take everything with you."
It took her a moment to try and work out whether it was meant as a philosphical proposition or actually practical advice. Not that it felt paticularly practical.
Still. One easy solution. "What are you on about now?"
Effective, too. "Everything you need. I don't want to have to use a phrase book to work out how to ask for...what do you always forget?"
"Nothing. Clearly. Or you'd remember. You may well have learnt the lingo for it, if there was just one thing..."
"Sunglasses. You always lose them."
"Ah, well, that's different."...
The room faded away around her, the bed, the dressers, the walls and windows, disappeared, faded out, until the only thing he saw was her standing there. A sheet twisted demurely around her body. Hair falling haphazardly. Chin tucked in slightly, eyes looking up and beckoning with each slow flap of her eyelashes.
Nothing else existed, just her and him and the unbearable distance between them.
The sheet shifted, her leg emerged, bent at the knee. She spun slowly to face him. Walking forward, unbuttoning his shirt, kicking his shoes off and into the white void surrounding them.
The emptiness...
You can't be a hero if you can't move your arms. You can't get the girl with a stutter like that. What can you do in your condition? What did you expect? How can you live without the means to earn respect?
Well, mister President. Maybe I won't be a hero. Maybe I will show you how a villain gets respect. Maybe I will let you watch. Show me what a hero is, mister President.
The elephant dragged its feet. Reen felt a little sorry for the great beast, obviously ready for a big meal and a nice nap after having carted the two of them around for the day. She hadn't raised a fuss at being led in circles for a half hour--but that was the last time he depended on Kai's sense of direction--and she did several neat tricks with her trunk on command regardless of the repetition--peanuts seemed to keep her happy then. But now the homestretch seemed just as long for her as it for them. The archduke pat at her...
"You know," Clark said, in-between rising above the water to take breaths as he swam. "I really hate you."
John shrugged; or, at least, performed as much as a shrug as you can while swimming. "I don't see why."
"What do you mean, you don't see why?"
"We're doing what I said we'd do, right? Go for a swim together. You were all uppity about the whole thing, so I challenged you to do one length of the pool with me. Well, here we are, doing one length."
"Yes, but you didn't tell me that we were going to be...
Daring to be noticed for the first time in her life, she pushed her chair back and stood up. She was 15, in a house full of her friends, and some 20 and 21-year-olds that were there for Ali's older sister. The hookah was on the table, the alcohol free-flowing, and she stood out to all the guys in the room. On;y 15, and they were already eyeing her. Zak, his younger brother, his best friend, and she was completely clueless. Kerri went upstairs to sleep around 2am and later found out she had been followed up to Ali's room...
Marie wiped her sweaty palms on her jeans. Breathing heavily, she glanced impatiently at the bland, hospital door; its paint peeling around the edges; the hinges rusted. She knew that her sister was not in the hands of the most experienced doctors in town, but it was the closest hospital to home. Unsure of what to do with her hands, she interlaced her fingers, scrutinising the short, stumpy nails; a result of her anxious gnawing. Marie's mind wandered, as far as it could from the looming thought of her sister's fate. But within seconds, her thoughts were pulled right back...