Th dapper man picked up a penny and turned it over in his fingers, scrutinising it.
"Yes, this is definitely his," he said, after some time.
"How do you know?" his companion prompted, with bemused admiration.
"We know our chap must have had a lucky penny. This one is worn, as if it has been rubbed many times - for luck, you see - but it is still dirty. Our chap is a dockhand; it is grime from his workplace that has become ingrained in the coin. He must have dropped it when he realised he was being pursued."
"How...
I slowly lifted my head, spat the straw out of my mouth and wondered who the hell had encased my skull in lead.
What a party!
The details were a little vague. I knew Big Dave was there and I had a faint recollection of him laying in the bath fast asleep and covered in lipstick. I laughed quietly so as not to hurt my head.
'Heavy night mate' came a voice from behind?
I responded with a grunt, the best I could manage with a mouth like a sandpit.I turned very slowly and my eyes finally began to focus....
Lola. That was the name of my new girlfriend. The one my friends all warned me not to get involved with. But of course, it was my life and she had been through so much already.
Bi-polar mother, alcoholic father, maladjusted siblings. Not really surprising Lola cut herself, gambled her benefits on the arcade machines and didn't eat much apart from dried Chinese noodles you boil in a cup.
Now that she knew that someone loved her, all this would change. She could pursue her artistic abilities, finish those novels, sleep at nights instead of watching movies and worry about...
The disco ball was turning. It would complete its revolution in 43.247 seconds. Just now, 100 times since he'd arrived. It had 1579 mirrored faces. That was a good number. Prime and a Fibonacci. Doubly good. Three tiny squares of mirrored glass were missing, showing the grey of the adhesive beneath.
"39.7617907."
"What? Oh, square roots again."
His brother smiled a sigh, then leaned nearer to combat the thunderous bass and the high pitched chatter. It wasn't enough. He had to shout over the music.
"I'm nearly done. Just a few more minutes, ok?"
He took the shrug as acceptance...
The princess gazed from her tower to the lake, the castle reflected ever so perfectly in the waters. "Nann." She whispered. She could almost see herself in the window of the watery tower. "Look at the castle in the lake."
Her nanny crept behind her, stole a glance over the princess' shoulder. Shuddered. "Come away, child. Away from the window."
"Why, what for, Nann?"
"There's worlds sometimes should not be looked at. There are good castles and bad. Please, m'dear. That lake stole your brother from us. Ain't nothing good to come from it."
So the princess was shuffled to...
A small woman in her mid-20's sits in a doctor's office staring, seemingly at nothing, right in front of her, as if peering deep into herself. Her eyes, drooping at the small corners, glistening slightly as they search from left to right and then from right to left. A deep sigh lodged in the cavernes of her being finally escapes.
The door opens and in shuffles an older man, gray speckled hair, deep wrinkles on his forehead and around his eyes from squinting at translucent sheets held up to lights, his glasses resting on his nose several inches from his...
Where am I going? thought Harold Sunday as he sped through yet another red light. The intersection blurred behind him, he couldn't believe the sensation of time slowing the quicker he travelled. Marty McFly may have travelled through time in a DeLorean, but Harold blew him away with his long-distance journey in a Ford Focus. It may not have been as snazzy, but at least he could open the doors inside his garage - low ceiling be damned. At first, travelling faster than the speed of sound was disconcerting; his radio wouldn't even work, despite its being inside the car's...
She had always been in love with him. He was so cool, so mysterious. She spent three years watching him. When he started watching her it was divine. Heaven come true.
When they got together she was so happy. For once, she'd gotten what she wanted. She was a prize winner, a champion, a woman. Bye bye Mum. Bye bye childhood bedroom and tears.
But then things got boring. From a distance he'd seemed exciting-but living with him everyday was a different story. All they did all day every day was stay in and watch television. it wasn't even so...
They were trapped for seven days. Aleena tried to hold back the tears as it had been seven days since she had seen the wolf- warrior Felan being taken away by Balor. She felt that she had let everyone down: the people who had brought her up as their own. She wondered where they were; if they were still trapped in the cage that she had tried to rescue them from when she and Felan had been caught. She wished she could see them one more time, even if it was to say sorry for bringing them into this. They...
monster was close behind, groaning with teh weight of its recent feeding. The awnings above shuddered witht eh raor, the inhuman aching roar of a beast long gone from the mortal realm. The man gripped his shoulder, a wound sputtering orange-red blood. The beast hunted my scent and fear, grasping at the walls of the citadel with its massive tendrils.
A mouth emerged from its muddied hide, screaming with the fuel of nightmares and horrific things. It was the face of a child, crying and in seconds, it was swallowed back into the amorpheous body of the beast. The man...