Em asked her Dad to mount a full length mirror on the inside of her door when she was nine years old. The mirror whispered to her just after she turned ten. Or rather, something in the mirror whispered. She had just started fourth grade, and for the first time in her life noticed that others looked at her, others judged her: her clothes, her skin, her weight, her hair. She started hearing words that had been around her al...

Driving along the highway. POP. There it goes again, you think. Sounds like a rock hitting the side of the car. That can't be good. Might ruin the finish. This car is only five or six years old. Dammit all. Nothing to do. It's just gravel or stones along the highway. Can't avoid 'em. You let it go. Let it pass from your mind.  Days later you're heading down the highway again.  POP. What the heck. You didn't see any rocks....

He’s been waiting for this day to come for a very long time. Half his life. He’s spent countless hours over the years tracking her down.  She’s married to a wealthy man and lives on the coastline of Massachusetts. She’s a professor of Spanish at a small college.  Ironically, when they were together she spoke no English. But things change. Life changes things. And today the old man will change.  He’s going to see her today...

It started with a whisper. A subtle phrase ripening within my conscious mind. “Devour the world,” it said. Slowly I rolled out of bed and dragged my limp body across the weathered linoleum floor to the edge of the room. It was almost midday. “Too early for that,” I thought to myself. For hours each day I would lay there, half-asleep, staring at the flakes of dust that become visible only in the sunlight, in the decaying r...

Scamp, the monkey, and her friends are going on a picnic by the stream that runs near the farm. They are all excited about it. All of the animals are going on the picnic.They are all having their favorite foods. Of course every critter has a different favorite food so they need a really big picnic basket. Lady packs up the wagon with the basket and blankets for the animals to sit on.She leads them to the clearing by the s...

It's been so lonely, you are thinking, and this happens. These simple words make you hope, it might be. You always recognize your own hope appearing. "Hello darlin'." That's what he said. He's flirting, you consider. It startles you a little. It's been awhile. At least, since it wasn't someone that was overbearing, rude. Yes, you wonder, is this one going to be rude and mean. You don't think you can take that again. The t...

Scamp, the monkey, and her friends love to play games on the farm. Their favorite games are chase and hide and seek. The family farm has lots of great places to hide. The sun peeks over the horizon and the alarm goes off. Lady wakes up all the sleepy animals and they have their favorite breakfast. Lady cleans up the messier of the little animals that need help. They are getting ready for a fun day on the farm. A kindergar...

I lie face-up to feel the coolness of the room touch my skin; much as a lover’s hand might do. There’s a whisper of an air current that walks its fingertips of a breeze down my chest and across my nipple until it teases hairs on my manhood. The fingertips reach the tops of my thighs before the feeling dissipates. There is a presence on my skin and then there isn’t; a sense memory that comes and goes. The ghosts of our lov...

Clocks had a way of misbehaving in the house. Clocks often misbehave, particularly mechanical ones. The clock in the car that is two or three minutes slower than the clock last spied before leaving the house. The clock on the oven timer that never quite matches up with the always correct digital clock on the iPad being consulted for a recipe. The unused coffee-maker clock forever blinking 12:00, from now until the end of...

“Excuse me. Is the bar still open?” I look up from cleaning to see an older male with an overly patched burlap messenger bag that has seen better days. I motion for the man to sit down at a table that doesn’t have its chairs upturned. “The bar is closed for the night, but I can get you something. What would you like?” I asked. “A dirty martini,” he replied. “Extra gritty, double olives?” “It’s the only way I roll.” As I m...

“You’re fat,” the little girl inside the mirror said to Em. It was long past midnight. Em’s parents and sister were in bed. Em was standing in front of the closed door of her room, where her Dad had hung the full length mirror. She regarded the reflection. The person in the mirror looked just like Em. She wasn’t Em, though. She wasn’t even a little girl, though she looked like one. She wasn’t Em, wasn’t a little girl, pro...

She sat back, headphones on, pressed play and closed her eyes. As she listened to the music she heard the distant rumbling of thunder, it was getting louder, closer. She smiled. Soon the rains would be here. Looking around, taking in the dry harsh plains, the cracked white earth pierced by the odd clump of long crisp parched grass, she breathed in, filling her lungs with the hot air. A few kilometers away thick billowing...

The house stood at the entrance to the block, dwarfing all the other houses. John and Alice learned a bit of the history of the house from the previous owner, who was a bit of an amateur historian. The original owner of the house, a Mr. Reginald Bowens--the man who built it, gave it life, brought it into the world--was a railroad scion for C&S Railways. The smaller houses in the neighborhood that huddled under the house’s...

As his band stepped onto the stage, Tyrone stole a moment to sip his dirty martini. He ran his tongue along his upper lip as he admired the glass, savoring the lingering taste of the alcohol. With a contented sigh, he got up and walked onto the stage. During his break, the din of the bar had swelled to a jumbled murmur. The restless audience had taken to chattering over clinking glasses filled with liquor to lighten moods...

A penguin walks into a local little dive bar. The neon sign in the window didn't just flash “open” like most. She blinked as it flashed "Dirty Martini served here.” It was 4:20pm when she climbed up on the empty barstool and placed her most prized possession, a battered guitar case that held a Gibson Les Paul guitar, on the stool beside her. She had inherited the guitar from an unknown source. It came in the mail with a n...