In hindsight, the solution was simple. But Tim hadn't thought that five minutes ago.
The boy pounded the keyboard furiously; letters, numbers and symbols flashing across the screen.
Dave peered over the other boys shoulder, tentatively.
"Are you sure you can do this?" he asked.
Tim ignored this comment. Of course he could do it. Yes, they would detect the hack in a matter of minutes, but he never doubted his ability to circumvent their security before then.
He began to type faster, his fingers a blur.
Dave stepped back, sweat beginning to bead his head. If they could get...
Johnny, my boyfriend was aptly named. Laura, my dad's girlfriend called him 'The Pirate' because of his long dark curly hair, caught up around the forehead with an old blue and white bandana. Looking remarkably like Johnny Depp in his Caribbean pirate movies.
I suspected something was going on between them. Lots of eye contact, protracted, meaningful. And they were always joking about, you know that kind of banter where you can just feel the sexual tension.
Johnny was handsome so I suppose it wasn't that unusual. He looked mean and sexy in his long black leather coat, black boots...
It was the fall that surprised me most.
I had never intended to move to the Northeast. Strange set of circumstances. Long story. Really long. Maybe not too long to relate, but longer than I'd like it to have. I just sort of ended up there.
Anyway, I got there in early December. I thought, having come from California, that that was "winter".
That's not winter.
Winter is bleak. Winter is white death. Winter is hell -- not just for Chekhov, mind you. For Vermont, too.
The first week I was there, I was talking about how poorly-equipped Southern California...
A Sad State of Affairs
It is three o’clock in the afternoon and she has kept the same position since breakfast, writing in her journal, nursing each fresh drink, drawing it out so that her budget (small) will see her through until she is forced to give up her seat. She is in no hurry to leave, having nowhere else to go, no pressing appointment – except with home, and the house is depressingly quiet and yet still too full, inhabited by a long line of hours waiting impatiently to be filled, the space between now and then too vast...
As per usual, our conversation lasted two words:
"Hey"
"Hi"
And that was it for the rest of the day.
I can't explain it. It's not like we were friends or acquaintances, or even enemies although some might've described our relationship as such. We certainly had a bit of an obsession with one another, but whether it was in a negative or positive way (one can {and will} argue that obsession is never a positive thing) I can't be sure.
But everyday was the same; walk in, greet each other, and stare from the corners of our eyes.
It wasn't...
I woke up this morning fuzzier than usual.
It's easier to remember in my sleep but the memories are now tied with hopefulness--your hopefulness. Your jacket was cold on the outside as I hugged you, and I remember your body warm as I slipped my hand in and tried to squeeze. I remember you tried to kiss me goodbye and I moved from it as I sobbed. I didn't want to miss that kiss but still I moved.
The journey alone has been quiet. You text me or email me or my own brain will write your words for me...
Locked door. Single occupant, female, age 27. No signs of a struggle. Cause of death was strangulation. Body found face-up on the bed.
Three suspects. One witness.
Cal sighed, his breath cutting a thin passage through the haze of cigarette smoke. He rewound the tape and pressed play once again. In all the surveillance tapes, there was nothing to positively incriminate any of them.
He'd tried isolating them, questioning them individually. Good cop, bad cop. Threats. The works. They were all lying about something, but they wouldn't say what Cal wanted to hear. At least one of them, probably all,...
I looked at the passport, and then back up at the woman standing in front of me.
"Are you serious?" I asked, a puzzled look on my face.
She looked sad.
"What is to be funny?" she said, her broken English somehow endearing.
"I don't know how they do things in..." I turned her passport over, and looked at the country name listed. It took up three lines, and many of the letters just looked like squiggles to me. "...your home country, but over here we do things differently."
"Is me!" she smiled, and I felt my tough exterior melting...
A bathroom break. A broken TiVo. Who would have thought that in the two minutes that it takes to pee he would have tore the TiVo from the wall and promptly thrown it out the window. On the other hand, there would be no need to rush the bathroom breaks anymore.
A long sigh escaped my mouth as I suddenly realized that she saved me. Saved me from the meaningless drone that is the TV. All those sitcoms, so little value. And yet, I hated her. Hated that I would no longer be able to waste hours watching re-runs of...
1943. The year of my birth. To a very young mother. Raped by a stranger. I spent forty years believing that Tom Morran was my real father. When I found out the truth (by accident) I had a breakdown which took me by total surprise as I had always been an unemotional, logical man. Cold, is what my wife called me. A cold fish. No empathy, no sentiment or sympathy. Even when our youngest was miscarried after a car accident I didn't shed a tear.
Divorce was not something my wife contemplated after her short stay in hospital but I...