A grenade landed in the trench. He grabbed it and hurled it back, screaming for everyone to take cover. Dirt exploded into the air, burying them. The medic was pinned behind the rubble of a collapsed house. Enemy fire wouldn’t let up, and the medic was out of ammunition.
He smashed the glass with his elbow—the in case of emergencies panel hidden behind the painting—and pulled the lever, then pushed the button. An electric hum rose from beneath the floor. The carpet and sofas dropped away, vanishing into a hidden shaft. A ladder unfolded along the side.
Holding the long metal handle, she pushed open the glass door and stepped onto the stone road, bags of clothes clutched in her hands. She walked quickly, glancing back to see if she was still being followed. Reaching an empty alley, she hurled one of the bags inside. With a
He looked at his own body as it slept, then drifted closer to the window and gazed into the night sky. He asked a star for a favor and shook the air in front of him. His mind was crowded with bad ideas. One collided with another, and suddenly there
Another day in hell, he thought. It had been a year. Busy year doing nothing except getting fired from job and the stereotypical decline of his mental health. From cyanide to nuclear radiated earrings. From human trafficking to the drug operation of the whole world. Who knew that with the
1 If you’re reading this, I’m already dead. The conversation I never had about a place I never saw. I placed the roses on the bar and ordered the bartender’s favorite drink. I was waiting for the only thing I had ever asked for: a dinner with
He sat down to write and lit a cigarette. A man stepped into the room from a dark corner. “Still looking?” the man said, smiling. “I want a deal,” he replied without looking up from the page. He continued, stretching his arm to offer the cigarette. “I need to borrow
The game show host started to introduce the game of the night. The man on the screen didn’t know yet, but the people in the street he had talked to were being brought inside the studio as audience members. The well-dressed, animated host made a joke, and the signs
In a white marble room, she made music from the wishes taken from the fountain. A jukebox in the corner swallowed the coins that diners pulled from the water. Each coin carried a wish, which surfaced between the jukebox buttons as a small shot. She would take it and play
The tree stood in the middle of the field. Light passed through its leaves, drawing their shapes on the ground. She sat beneath it, reading somewhere between a dream and a memory. The house was far away, the sky blue, and the sound of cicadas filled the air on that
A homeless man moved a box and sat on it. “Right your wrongs. The wolves are coming,” he said, lighting a cigarette. He walked past, hearing the words but paying no attention. “You’ll see yellow eyes in the corner of your room,” the man continued, exhaling a cloud of
She watched the top of the hill from the dock. A figure walked up to the edge and waited. The figure stayed until it was dark, until the lighthouse turned on. Then she would leave, walking slowly away from the edge. One day, a ship arrived—one of the old