1765 2 1
|
Linus had it right with the security blanket he held like a beloved pet swan. Geneva had it all wrong with a pastel-colored music box, painted with impressionist-styled daisies and tied up in gold-ribbed pink bow. But it had come from her grandmother. Her
|
1765117
|
... he led what might be called a quiet life
|
176521
|
Miriam forced herself to focus on the kitchen door and on putting one foot in front of the other.
“Is everything alright?” she heard Ada ask the family.
“Of course, everything is fine,” the woman said. “What could be wrong other than the impossible serv
|
176400
|
“We’re starting to get into weather control,” Mark said.
“Can you really do that?” Rachel asked, trying to sound supportive and not skeptical.
“There are people out on the west coast in Seattle, who’ve been experimenting with it,” Mark said.
“Bec
|
176445
|
The summer when I was six and my sister Audrey was eight, she'd walk around our house pretending to be in a trance, fingers strategically hovering over my mother's vases and lamps, leaving smudges behind on my father's heavy oak desk and rocking chair. She'd lumber past my…
|
176483
|
He was supposed to be a garden gnome. Give pause to the squirrels, keep an eye on the impatiums. We found him at Wegman’s. He looked hopeful and observant.
|
17641212
|
Your mother is a great and dying bird. Once, she tended her grand feathered nest. Once, she preened.
|
1764136
|
I travel over your body with small feet,
reach your heart.
|
176421
|
Judith was a bed wetter. Judith was a first-year college student and she was embarrassed that she wet the bed.
|
176487
|
"There are many dark places;but still there is much that is fair, and though in all lands love is now mingled with grief, it grows perhaps the greater."--J.R.R. Tolkien If the love never came you must have been Dragging your feet. If the hatred carved your…
|
176474
|
My mother's afraid the dog will drown. It's raining and our street is flooding and the dog is standing on top of his doghouse. My mother is pregnant. I can stand beneath her stomach and not even see her face. I watch her from the kitchen window. She's shoeless. She holds…
|
176433
|
I remember mad strong words out of a teenager, fresh from the shower without a blouse: First! He will be my age, period! He will be the first to walk me to my room as my fear crashes to earth, final, considered.
And I will be the first to milk the w
|
176432
|
We love the sparkling, speckless, spotless, spic-n-span, sanitary.
|
176410
|
Sophie hoped that Ryan would just stay in the bathroom and never come out. Her stomach turned just thinking about him, but wealthy nerds were easier to work than wealthy regular guys. No self-esteem, no experience with women…no problem.
|
176300
|
“We all come out from Gogol's 'Overcoat'," said Dostoevsky. Well, sometimes, I think otherwise.
|
176331
|
At five a family relative took my life away from me and no one cared
|
176321
|
For the briefest moment, she was part of the sky. She hung there. Frozen. Suspended. Arms outstretched. She thought maybe she could take off flying, if she strained against gravity hard enough. She would soar into the pale blue until she reached the clouds. They …
|
176300
|
There won't be dancing, anymore. That isn't true, that can't be true; but there is no floor to dance on, you know?
|
176374
|
I married a penguin. Her waddle made for a scenic view.
|
176394
|
William Shakespeare (a surname that meant "wanker" back in the day, by the way)
|
17632012
|
I say her- it might be him-/
but from a distance I supply the details I prefer.
|
176284
|
The house had to be clean - I mean thorough-clean - when he got home from the pit for his tea, or he’d throw his plate at the wall and the gravy would run down onto the carpet. There was always gravy.
|
176242
|
Looking with his ears, Hearing with his eyes, Not really mute, he simply didn't know how to speak.One word, then another string together,a crack spreads across an ice covered lake. Now there is an open channel, and his thoughts roil the…
|
176221
|
An undercover agent posed as an Orthodox Jewish woman in a sting operation that led to the arrest of two rabbis for kidnapping men who refused to grant divorces to their wives.
|
176250
|
Flash’s hackles stood brushlike but he kept his head bowed just enough beneath the bigger dog’s stare to delay the inevitable fight. Flash, Mal thought approvingly, would pick the time and place.
|
176210
|
The young cop says, “Sorry ma’am, you’ll have to wait.” In the strobing red-blue glare he looks like a teenager. Melissa wonders if Tony had looked so young when he started, all those years ago.
|
176276
|
I ain’t your kissing cousin
That’s pretty plain to see
Baby, keep your pretty lips
Far away from me
I ain’t your kissing cousin
That’s pretty plain to see
You’re really very pretty
Come kiss me and we’ll see
We don’t live in a barnyard
|
176253
|
Slept on a chair last night in the Springfield, Mass., bus terminal. It was March, and a dude in shorts asked: "Yo, you smoke trees?" I said, "Sure. Who doesn't?" He said, "You buyin'?" I said, "Nope, I'm going out of the country." He smiled and said, "Alright." He started…
|
176288
|
|
176232
|
The trash is full. Again. I open the bathroom trash—because the diaper genie is stuffed—but there’s no room. I try the kitchen next. The lid swings open, catapulting carrot shavings onto the floor. I lay the diaper on the counter for later.
|
