Young Adult
No Seat Belt
Imagine you are 6 years old and going to Woodfield Mall with your parents. You leave the apartment with them, climb into the sports car, and crawl over the seat to the console between the two bucket seats. Your mom gets in on the right side of the car, and your dad gets behind the wheel of the orange sports car. You sit between them , happy to go for a ride in your daddy’s fast car.
By Andrea Corwin about 23 hours ago in Fiction
Stitch: The lore of Sara Foxgrave.
Sara didn’t even know why she went out there that morning. She told herself it was just curiosity, just wanting to see how far the construction crew had gotten on the new house, but really it was because she hadn’t come back here since she returned. Not once. The old willow tree still hunched over the hill like it was guarding Lake Downing, its branches rattling in the cold wind, whispering the same secrets they used to whisper when she and Birdi climbed it and pretended they were queens of the whole damn world. The lake hadn’t changed at all. But she had. It felt smaller now, or maybe she did.
By Syl De'Vil2 days ago in Fiction
Presumption of a Bold Girl
Think of the 1960s, a time of racial tension and riots in the streets. Your school has lockdowns with police stationed at the doors. You see the Disciples motorcycle gang roll up outside the school. You know they are a feared biker gang of black riders, and that they came from Chicago to see what’s up in your little town. Your small town is five miles up the road from the State Penitentiary, where you assume some of their buddies currently reside. You watch as they slowly circle the high school on their bikes, just observing. You wonder if they are silently daring the police to come at them - to cross the line. Imagine your fear of them as an impressionable high schooler - you don’t know violence except in movies like Easy Rider, Hells Angels on Wheels , and The Born Losers .
By Andrea Corwin 5 days ago in Fiction
Dragon Horse
Date: Di-6 Triakosia Location: Coliseum, SE In the eye of the hurricane of the Cetus and Mensa troops, Sklodowska and Aroon – now Naresuan – prop their elbows on the sundial in the center of the arena. Their fingers slot together like a Titanoboa’s jaw re-hinges itself after swallowing its prey.
By Wen Xiaosheng5 days ago in Fiction
Wrong Identity
Curtis slowed to a crouch, his processors analyzing the terrain. The obsidian ridge acted as a natural Faraday cage, a jagged spine of volcanic glass that could mask his signal if he could reach the base of the cliffs. But between him and the ridge lay the Salt Flats—a blindingly white expanse of alkaline crust where there was nowhere to hide. To a thermal drone, he would be a black inkblot on a white canvas.
By Forest Green18 days ago in Fiction
Wrong Identity
Curtis didn't waste the second of disorientation. He rolled off the bed, his servos screaming as they fought the lingering effects of the dampening field. The room was suddenly plunged into a dim, flickering twilight, the only light coming from the dying embers of the television and the bruised purple glow of the Oakhaven evening filtering through the grime-streaked window.
By Forest Green18 days ago in Fiction
Wrong Identity
He hit the asphalt in a roll, his palms scraping raw against the grit. Behind him, the window of Room 12 glowed with a flickering, sickly orange light as the electrical fire he'd ignited began to feast on the moth-eaten curtains. He didn't look back. He knew the geometry of the parking lot by heart now—the oil-stained patches, the leaning telephone pole, the way the gravel transitioned into a soft, treacherous silt near the tree line.
By Forest Green18 days ago in Fiction
Wrong Identity
The afternoon sun beat down warmly against the fine, white grains of sand as Curtis sat cross-legged near the shoreline, the rhythmic crashing of the turquoise waves providing a soothing, hypnotic soundtrack to his thoughts. A gentle ocean breeze rustled his hair, carrying with it the salty tang of the sea and the distant cries of circling gulls. He looked down at the two plastic cards resting in the palm of his calloused hand, catching the glare of the sunlight reflecting off their glossy surfaces.
By Forest Green18 days ago in Fiction
Wrong Identity
The exodus began as the first light of a bruised dawn touched the rim of the plateau. They moved in a long, silent line, a procession of the broken and the beautiful, carrying their salvaged treasures and their youngest children. Soren led the way, his limp more pronounced but his head held high. He didn't look back at Anchorage, the cliffside sanctuary that had been their only home for a generation. To look back was to invite the longing that the facility used as a hook.
By Forest Green18 days ago in Fiction
Wrong Identity
The man didn’t answer immediately. Instead, he reached into the pocket of his canvas jacket and produced a small, handheld device that looked like a vintage radio tuner, though it lacked a speaker. He turned a dial with a slow, methodical precision, and the humming from the television shifted from a low drone to a piercing, high-frequency whine. Curtis felt the sound vibrate through his teeth, a digital needle stitching its way through his consciousness.
By Forest Green18 days ago in Fiction
