He didn't think he was much of a cat person until he met Matilda. He'd found her one morning in a battered cardboard box on his doorstep and, seeing her huge green eyes and tiny paws, took her into the house. But he didn't know then that Matilda was a very special cat.
The first couple of years passed and Matilda grew from a small ball of fluff into a fully grown feline with glossy black fur. But it was the third year that Matilda began to change dramatically.
The black began to fall away to be replaced by bright...
"It was just like all the others.
"Fear. Defense. Anonymity.
"Just enough of the subject's face had been blurred so we couldn't discern their identity. Another one of the Foundation's pieces of work, no doubt.
"It was just too much. Too many people had turned in photos like this. The same damn camera, and the same damn style. Always in the middle of nowhere, with one person fearing for their life, as if the camera itself were the entity attacking.
"There were other varying problems with this one, that the other pictures did not display. This subject's head was turned...
The angel wasn't at all what I expected. Jeans and hoodies weren't the kind of thing Divine Messagers should wear. And squeamish of spiders too!! He jumped up when the large hairy creature walked over his white trainers, I only noticed because I happened to drop my cell phone at that precise moment. As soon as he looked down he screamed as though all of hell was after him and leapt in the air.
John told me that he was getting therapy for his phobia and had been relegated to ordinary duty by his heavenly master, nothing spectacular for him...
He didn't think he was much of a cat person until he met Matilda.
When Luke first set eyes on Matilda in the local cafe he knew it was her. It was HER. His one and true love. She just didn't know it yet...
Every day he'd see her and two months rolled on by before he introduced himself.
"Hello, my name's Luke and you are?" he asked one morning nervously.
"Matilda..." she replied cautiously.
Matilda! Oh Matilda Matilda Matilda! What a beautiful name for a beautiful woman!
A few awkward seconds ticked past.
"I um...I've seen you around and...
"Bitch don't know how to swim. Bitch need to learn how to swim wit da sharks."
"What?" my Grandmother said.
"You see, whatchoo need he'ah is a metafough."
"A what?" she spluttered.
"A metafough!" he insisted.
We weren't in uptown anymore.
"I think what the kind doctor is trying to say is that it helps to use metaphor to explain your condition, Grandma," I said, waxing poetic to his accented jargon.
God love her, but my granny is a racist old bitch. Nobody would be more happy to see her kick that bucket more than me, were it not for...
Giles inhaled the drink and closed his eyes, fluttering his eyelashes.
“A hint of dark oak definitely.”
“Perhaps a deeper bouquet like a rusty copper,” Lynton replied.
Giles cradled his cigar lovingly, and crunched on some spare ribs.
“Why would you call a a fine cigar a Cuban he mused? The Cubans were incredibly common
and impoverished. I mean it’s a symbol. It stands for something more.”
“Why would you call a decrepit decaying old bat a Queen?” Lynton replied, that’s the English
language Giles, cut a vowel here twist a syllable there; it’s a kind of phonetic prostitution,”...
This is not what Steve had in mind when he signed up to test the virtual reality technology at work. Not at all. He thought it would be unicorns farting rainbows. But this was ridiculous.
The scenes were patterned after video games. Not because the team wasn't creative, but because that meant the testers didn't need to take the time to learn the rules of a new environment.
Steve had pulled Super Mario Bros. from the lot. Except there was a fatal flaw in the technology. Enemies didn't die, they just disappeared for a bit. Then they came back with...
"And now, a nice, juicy twist. That's it. Keep twisting. One final push! Aaaaand release. Other side, now. Raise your left hand in the air, look toward the ceiling. Now twist!"
Sweat dripping from my brow down to my neck down to my collar bone down to my underwear. Release. Downward dog.
"Chataranga! Keep going guys, you're doing great!"
Heaviness of covers, you tuck me in as you leave. I don't stir, I don't breathe. Your receding back.
"Now breathe in, and let it go."
There were mountains. There were hours to drive. Everything I measure, I measure it like...
The room kept spinning for the delicate human. You could tell by the way it swayed in its place on the floor beneath the feet of the beast. It only had seconds to live before the creature dug into its chest cavity for meat. "M-make it quick..." the feeble meat-sack uttered in its primitive language.
The demon snickered in its own language and burrowed its snout into the stomach of the human, tossing blood-soaked pieces of security guard this way and that. The animal was a mad thing, unknown to any kingdom or phylum on the planet, Earth.
And it...
"If you don't stop humming 'Leaving on a Jet Plane', I'm going to strangle you!"
Our first vacation in 5 years and already we were at each others' throats. I continued to hum as she dug through her carry-on for a book.
She sighed and in a wistful voice said "The beach, some sun, a palm tree. What could be better?" Reaching out, she patted my knee and turned to look anxiously a the departure board.
I put my hand on top of hers and squeezed. "Relax, they'll be fine by themselves. They're old enough to keep out of trouble."...