Birds. I hate badminton. Eye-hand coordination was never my strength.
"You'll have fun," Fanny told me.
I hate how the little birdies fall apart if you step on them. Which I always do. They're easier to miss, fallen in the long grass like puffs of dandelions.
"Tell her to play," Fanny told her brother. We avoided eye contact. Like we always did when she was around. Our secret.
"You'll have fun," he said, not looking at me. "I'll let you win."
I didn't want to beat anybody, least of all him. I wanted to fold him in my arms, cradle...
I lost my grip on the wheel. The cruise ship went off to the left, then to the right, then dtrihght into a pile of rocks by the shore. Taking on water, I evacualted my crew and passnegers. Once safely on land, I looked around and wondering where in the heck we were. All I saw was slime...pink slime...and a McDonalds on every street corner. What a great place this is! I mean, McDonalds everywhere? That's gotta be good, right? Then I nboticed the people walking around...um, they were all, well, not in great shape? I looked at myself...not Arnold...
I danced in the circle. Just me, my friend Jeanine, and a fairy. That's right, a fairy. People who study this would call me an idiot. NEVER GO AND DANCE IN A FAIRY CIRCLE, YOU WILL DIE. Oh yeah? Screw you, I want to dance. Dancing is really fun. Especially with a fairy. But I'm kinda tired...I've been dancing for three weeks straight. I should be dead, no human can go without water for more than a week. And I'm rather sweaty. Hey Miss Fairy, can we stop dancing? Please? I just need a water break.
The letter was an important one. The boy knew that much. His mother didn't send much correspondence. In fact, she had to explain where the mailbox was at first. The boy had never been sent there. He had merely observed it in his daily comings and goings, placing no more significance on it than on the tree down the street from it or the fence alongside it.
His mother patiently explained where to find the mailbox and exactly what to do to ensure the letter was delivered. He clutched the letter close to his heart as he walked down the...
Outnumbered three to one. And I think A fourth was creeping up behind me. They fanned out across the mouth of the alley and whispered to each other. They walked forward slowly, and together, I chuckled a bit when I imagined them to be a dancing troupe.
They saw me laugh and slowed their pace, not by much, but just enough to show me I had rattled them.
Cold, black steel appeared in their grimy fingers. One knife, one section of pipe, and the lead man pulled a snub-nosed pistol. A .22, a woman's gun. I wondered how close I...
I still washed his shirt. There was only his plaid shirt, because it was what he'd worn. But I still washed it. My son disappeared a few years ago. They found his body by the lake. He was wearing that old plaid shirt. The rest of his clothes I gave to my nephew, about his size. But that plaid short...I'd never give that to anyone. It was his, it was all I had left. The plaid shirt. His room was in perfect condition, but it didn't seem right. But his shirt in my soft-from-washing-so-many-dishes hands. It felt like everything was...
Marie Antoinette sat in the tub, eating chocolate truffles and drinking champagne. Her ruffled leggings lay in a heap on the floor. She thought as she looked out the window that she was ever the perfect Mademoiselle. She gazed out onto the misty countryside, daydreaming. Although, what could she dream about? She was living her dream. She took another bite of chocolate and smiled.
Just then, her little sister's pink range rover came trundling into the driveway, reminding her that it was 2015 and she was not in France. She would not marry her prince, because princes don't exist nowadays....
Kelsey had always hated Kent. Kent was a skinny, chaste, and weak man. His skin was light and ashy, his hair not blonde but not quite brown. His teeth could have been more white. She hated the way he talked, all whispery. His voice, unreliable. His feelings, pushing up and making this more of a life.
Kelsey looked in the mirror and hated Kent so much it hurt. She hated him with sorrow. She hated him with Rage.
She decided to kill him.
She took a knife in her left hand.
She held out Kent's right hand, as if showing...
He wasn't certain he believed her, or that he'd heard her correctly.
She believed it, though. That much was obvious, from the earnest look in her eyes, from the way she clung to her coffee cup with such a tight grip, as if it was the only thing tethering her. As if it was what was keeping her real, keeping her here.
"How did it happen?" He asked finally.
Althea seemed to relax a little at that, as if she'd overcome a hurdle, as if she was relieved - finally, somebody believed her. "I don't know. If I did, I...
Backwards, triumphant, towering low over this once perfect field of brown and dusk.
held soft in the omnipresent rapture of breathing.