The sun set. My boat had stopped drifting. The Delaware River between New Jersey and Pennsylvania was calm. The rain stopped, the crickets chirped, happy with the still summer air. My bathingsuit was finally dry. The only problem with that river is not having shelter on either side from a rainstorm. I watched the residents of the river banks put umbrellas over their heads while grilling. Some took their dogs and children inside. The teenagers laughed, and had mud fights. The rain stopped, the grillers closed their umbrellas, the dogs came out to play, and the teenagers stuck their feet...
I stood on tiptoe to see what the catcalls and commotion were about. "Let her breathe!" someone shouted. "Get a room!" called a tall man next to me. I watched the jubilation, the adoration, with partial mortification. The people around pushed and jostled as the couple became the sideshow.
"Don't let go," my mother said, squeezing my hand tightly in hers.
I preferred her hand to the passion going on above me. The clutch of bodies surged ahead, straining to see. The couple was quickly forgotten as the crowd's attention was captivated by the parade ahead, passion finding another outlet.
It was becoming night. Quickly, stealthly, Navy SEALS approached a haunting compound. Sand-surrounded, barbed-wire covered; its contents unkown, its inhabitants, suspected. This was do-or-die time. The code "Geronimo" was on everyone's minds. This desert, this foreign country, was their home for the past year. Now they had Presidential orders, "capture or kill," "wanted, dead or alive." It wasn't just read off of an old saloon poster. This was it. With intelligence officials watching, and waiting, the world went about its business, until five hours later, when everyone got word of the actions that occurred inside that haunted-looking building. A terror-leader...
Wow. The Statue of Liberty. I've lived in New York my whole life, and have personally seen it one time, and it's on my I heart NY credit card, of course. I played the Statue of Liberty once in a 5th grade play about America. I was "Miss Libby" and I sang about inflation. "The Red White and Blues" my song was called. I was 11. I wasn't a very great singer, but my teacher had great faith in me, as did my mother. There's a VHS tape of it somewhere, I do know that. Only once, though, have I...
The conversation lasted two words: 'Come on.'
She couldn't refuse. His large, blue eyes pleaded with her and as he held out his hand, she smiled and took it. He lead her into the garden and down the narrow path flanked by roses on one side and neat lawn on the other. The sun was beating down on the top of their heads, and he started to run, pulling her along. She started to laugh.
They reached the very spot, and he pointed solemnly. Lisa bent slowly, tucking her grey skirt beneath her carefully to stop herself toppling over. The...
I thought she was made of china, the first time I met her. Girls that perfect didn't exist, only dolls. Frozen icons of perfection, unattainable.
She made me feel clumsy - she was slight, small, pale, hiding behind perfect ringlets. On paper we sound the same - the same could be said of me (apart from the ringlets; my hair is straight, limp) but she wore it with pride, I treated my height as a disability, my weight as an inconvienience, my skintone a health hazard. I looked sickly, she looked ethereal.
Somehow it wasn't a surprise when she spoke...
She knew more than she was letting on - then again, that was her weapon. That was the way she lived her life, mostly on her wits.
He'd been watching her for longer than he should, longer than he'd been contracted to. He'd taken the case on (and that sounded ridiculous, he wasn't a detective, he was just a man) and had found himself captivated.
It wasn't lust. Wasn't love either. Neither of those things interested him, especially not with her (she may have been beautiful, once, a long time ago, or maybe she would become it when she grew...
Our city used to have one psychic, an old blonde woman who read palms and tarot out of her ground floor apartment. Her name was Liza and she spoke with a rolling California speech, peppering every other sentence with "fer sures" and "gnarlies".
Since the housing crisis, the population of palmists has grown. There is a stretch of road on Congress Street where seven women ply their trade, each operating from their own storefront. They are the only profession that seems to be growing, buying up empty retail locations.
It's worth noting that the women are just mere footsteps from...
What did it matter what he thought of her? She knew he couldn't ever really see into her.
"You want the veal," he said.
And he was right; as much as she didn't like it, he was right.
"You're wrong," she told him. She looked at the waiter. "I'll have the mixed greens with the balsamic on the side."
It was a kind of a sneer, a way to get back at him.
Simon carved out a bite-sized piece of meat and held it on his fork, reaching across the white linen tablecloth.
She opened her mouth, mesmerized by him,...
she tracked him to the cafe. it wasn't right that her past was in his mind, and not her own. she watched his every move. when he sat down, she entered. she sat across from him, acting as if this was perfectly normal. "I need to aquire the information you're carrying. that information doesn't belong in your hands, anyhow." she said. "I don't know what you're talking about." he said simply, taking a sip of the dark liquid swirling in his glass. "I'm talking about my past. my parents, the journal, the apprentice, everything." she said, softer with every word....