The cover image for the book was not exactly what she had envisioned. Then again neither was the book really. But she was published, that's what mattered right? True she had used a pen name, but she knew the book was hers. The words on the pages her doing (well most of them anyway). But that image. It really didn't have all that much to do with the story in the book. Would people be disappointed when they read it? Would it make it more buyable as the publisher claimed. Well it was out of her hands. Thank God she...
My father and I were lying on the beach wondering why the moon looked larger than usual. My father argued idly--something about the flat terrain and the empty skyline. "If we could see a house, or a tree, or a traffic light, it wouldn't look so big."
It was a stupid explanation, but we are not the kind of people who carry iPhones, and whip them out to settle any debate. We hate those people. They ruin everything.
We'd been drinking wine from the motel's paper cups. We'd run out of wine a long time ago, but occasionally we still...
It approached. Well, as much as the end can be said to approach, as opposed to us approaching it. The great beast, that stalking horse of the apocalypse, with massive paws that looked like human hands, a lion's head with a mane of fire, and the body of a wolf.
The great hunter Talianto was selected from all people to confront this end. Of all people her spear flew the straightest, her blade cut sharpest and cleanest. If there was any hope of defeating such a monstrosity, of doomsday that moved in shadow and swished a spiked tail clearing all...
I lost my grip on te wheel. The snow on my windshield was blinding. The ice beneath my tires made my car skid into the guardrail in a sort of slow motion. I could see the front of my car hitting the railing and the hood folding back up toward me. The lights shattered and white and yellow fragments came flying up toward my windshield. The airbags inflated, slow motion, hitting my face, making my head turn sideways. My iPhone flew out of my hand and hit the passenger side window, then slammed to the floor. My dog, Erin, screeched...
She felt stupid. Stupid? No, she felt worse then that. She felt bipolar and insane and hormonal.
she shouldn't have lost it like that, now he thought she was a total freak and not in the good way.
The kind of freak, you ignore their texts and messages, the kind of freak you tell your friends, "Stay away, that one is totally nuts!"
She was so angry with herself, angry that she couldn't just leave well enough alone, that she just HAD to speak her mind.
She liked him, but then that one little thing; when he asked about her....
DAY 1
I saw it passing by. It was only a glimpse, a brief glimpse, one of many taxis that I see every single day. But one thing stood out about it. I can't exactly say what, but I remembered it enough, it had left enough imprint in my mind for me to recognize it the next day. Then, I was on my way to the Tube when it zoomed by me. There was no one in it.
No one at all. The driver's seat was empty. I blinked once, hard, but by the time I opened my eyes, it...
You know how people always use that metaphor of how an iceberg shows a small portion of the story, but the ice travels much deeper underneath? I was quite literally experiencing that right then. Both externally and internally. My chest was burning for air and my body was thrashing up against the coarse underneath of the ice pool. I didn't care that my eyes were stinging or the water in my mouth was gushing down my throat. What may have been a beautiful glistening lake was now a dark trench of terror. I had never known what snow was like...
On the top of a roof, in Australia, there was a chair carved from an Italian carpenter in the 18th century. It was a day that was certain to rain and a day that was certain to never get better. `A man sat on the old chair while thinking about his day and how he could improve it. It was a day that was clearly never going to get better and a day that made everyone feel down and upset.
The lamp wouldn't turn on. The bed felt heavy on the other side. A draft of warm and slobbery air was on his neck. He flicked and flicked the switch, and failing and rubbing his finger raw he leapt out of the bed and ran to the wall. The lights coming on, the room appearing all at once its sterile, diseased-yellow look. The covers tousled, pillows strewn, the light greyish-yellow stain like a teardrop on the wall behind the simple wrought-iron headboard.
Panting now, hand clasped tight on the switchplate, and wits coming back only like a smoldering fire. There...
The moon was judging me. There was no doubt about it. It was staring me in the eye like a big pizza pie. Judging.
Okay, fine. Maybe I shouldn't have spread all those rumors about you, moon! No, I don't believe you're actually made of the blood and sweat of innocent cheeses. No, I don't believe you're the one who secretly caused the Great Chicago Fire, or that you tap our phone lines and replay particularly embarrassing conversations with ex-girlfriends back for the constellations. I just say these things because you frighten me, quite frankly.
I'm only human, though. What's...