There is a place, near where I used to live, that looked like this - you see it, right there? It's a bowling green. Not the bowling you and I would do, the bowling that belongs to another age. Mostly the elderly.
There were, in fact, two near me - high amusement, I can tell you, since we came to the conclusion that one had decided it was a rival for the other. And that said other had no idea that it existed. That this perceived rivalry would fuel them entirely, even though the other lived in blissful ignorance of...
In hindsight, the solution was obvious. I'm not sure why I didn't see it at the time, but then again who does? I suppose that's why they say 'hindsight's always 20/20'. Perfect vision. I can't say that I've ever really had a knack for figuring things out on the spot, on the fly, with no real time to think about it. I'm a 'processer'. I like to process things, take my time, really think things through. Unfortunately, that doesn't always work to my advantage.
There are situations in life when you just have to come up with an answer, lightning...
In hindsight, the solution was obvious.
Anyway, that's what I thought when I awoke, face and hands already sweaty, the dark and humid air beginning already to claw at my face.
There was no light. I didn't have one on me. Didn't think I'd need a phone, with no reception. No, that wasn't part of the plan. And I don't smoke.
So, unlike the movies where there is in-scene lighting when the hero is trying to claw his way out of the coffin, it was nothing. It was dark and moist and stiflingly, oppressively silent.
The plan had been easy:...
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,”...
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...
The sound reverberated through the streets. The sound of the mob on the move. Fear clouded her mind and she acted on pure instinct, she had nothing else to work with. She ran.
Had she been able to think clearly, she would have been surprised about her instinct to run, always considering herself much more of a fighter, but run she did.
Down alleys, through gaps in fences, turning often, doing everything in her power to escape them. Everything but use the gift, the curse for which they were hunting her.
She had been hiding her abilities for so long...
Vanquished, that was how they wanted me to feel as I knelt there on the cold flagstone, my head bowed, my hands clasped.
I could hear the echoes of the crowd marching up the street and knew that they would be upon me soon, their torches ablaze, their spirits hungry for blood.
I was to be renounced as a witch, that most reviled of creatures.
My fate was no longer in my hands, I was to surrender that along with my freedom and my life when the mob broke into my sanctuary.
Because I had dared too love too much,...