Yearly Archives: 2012
Thor, Sif, and Loki walked into the bar.
“Oh fuck.” It was twenty minutes to closing and the place was deserted, except for the bartender. She snapped her fingers and the sign flipped from open to closed. “I told you to stay out of here.”
“Relax, Sigyn,” said Sif. “He’s with us.” Sif shook her hair loose from her cloak, and four beer steins sprang onto the bar. “What ‘s on tap?”
Sigyn stared at the mugs for a few seconds. “The Sam Adams isn’t bad.” She regarded Loki with lowered eyebrows, while he looked at everything in the room except his wife.… Read the rest
“Fit!” I ordered the tire gauge. But it popped off the valve with a hissing sigh. My bike tire was still malleable even after three go-rounds with the air hose. I didn’t really need to read the PSI to know I was doing it wrong. “Here, you’ve actually got a car flat.” I handed the air hose to a man waiting beside me.
“Take your time,” he said. But he didn’t hand it back. Instead he shook it. “There’s the problem. It’s broken. There isn’t enough pressure to force the inner tube to inflate.”
I glared at the machine for deceiving me with its hiccupping hum.… Read the rest
China let herself into her sister’s apartment. “Where’s Brian? I didn’t see his car.”
Sally clicked off the TV. “Bar.”
“Again?” China tugged her suitcase in and then locked the door. “He’s not going out to avoid me because I come so much, is he?”
“No.” Sally patted the couch. “It’s his letdown at the end of the week.”
“Every week?” China perched on the edge of a cushion that swallowed her.
Sally shrugged.
“Doesn’t that worry you?” China reached down and unhooked her shoes, then wiggled her toes free and rotated her ankles.
“Nah.” Sally leaned back into the sofa, her small body enveloped in its too-soft folds.… Read the rest
Fall may be the season of cooler temperatures and leaf-raking, but for me, fall truly begins with my daughter’s birthday. Every Year since 2003, The Autumnal Equinox has been my sweet Caroline’s time. Happy birthday, Ducks.
Love, Mama
… Read the rest
“How was your day?” I buckled Sam’s seatbelt then climbed back in front while Caroline hooked her own.
Caroline said, “It was AWESOME! I get to be in classroom B, and I’m only with one of the Katies, but it doesn’t matter because I get to go up to C and D for reading and math and spelling, and language, and writing, and I have the best seat ever in all the classrooms, and I’m right next to my one Katie in homeroom…”
When she paused to inhale, I jumped in. “Sam, how about you?”
“I like my teacher.”
The barrage from his sister’s side resumed.… Read the rest
Laura tugged the pumpkin suit over her ample stomach. “Still fits.” She smiled at her reflection, but a triple twinge in her abdomen told her bending down had been a bad idea.
“Every pregnant lady does ‘pumpkin’ for Halloween.” Her fiancé watched from the bed.
“Only the vastly pregnant ones, Sherman.” She turned to view herself in profile and strapped on the stem-shaped hat. The twinge intensified.
“You were a pumpkin last time.”
“No I wasn’t.” Laura hated Braxton Hicks. She had been dealing with them on and off for four days now, and the last three hours had been worse.… Read the rest
The Great White Shark flossed her incisors. “The better to eat you with, my dear,” she murmured to the mirror. It was the wrong line, from the wrong fairy tale, but the Brothers Grimm didn’t have any stories about a big toothy fish she could draw from. And it fit the case. It was what the defendant had repeated to his victim when he killed her. His bite marks on her body were some of the strongest evidence in the trial. That and the eyewitness testimony from her daughter.
In the kitchen, the Shark’s husband handed her a travel mug with hot coffee, Raven’s Brew.… Read the rest
Sherry the hygienist scraped along my gumline. “I did this funhouse for Halloween last year,” she said. “They had me dressed up as the little kid in that Freddy Kreuger song.” She hummed a few notes of the movie’s eerie minor-key version of the old “one, two, buckle my shoe” rhyme.
“That’s freaky.” I didn’t use any consonants, because she had a gloved hand and a dental pick jammed in my mouth, but she understood me anyway. In the background, the dentist’s drill whined as he filled another patient’s cavity.
“I know. It completely flipped this one woman out. She like ran back to the entrance.”… Read the rest
“Run babies, run babies, run.” The farmer’s wife studied the cat crouched over its kill, tail twitching. She disinfected her carving knife with a rag. “Two down, pussy,” she purred. “One to go.”
This weekend, for its 33rd edition, Trifextra is asking for 33 words that use the Rule of 3 in some way.
… Read the rest