1. October 31, 11:57 p.m. McKenzie shows up at the Spruce Street Guest House a few minutes before midnight, dressed all in black as if she’s some kind of ninja. She’s even got a black stocking cap pulled over her blond hair, which is sticking out from the bottom in a luminous sheet and ruining […]
For Jill and Julia Rios Emma Anne had a tin can attached by a string to her belt. Lots of things on strings bounced and banged from it: some useful (like the pocket knife), some decorative (a length of red ribbon longer than herself, looped up), some that simply seemed interesting enough to warrant a […]
Chapter 4 “But they’re going to kill you,” the woman said. Harkim sighed at her silhouette. “Of course they are,” he replied. Chapter 2 The car lurched again. Harkim looked up from his agent’s face on the backseat screen, wondering what on earth was wrong with his driver. “Luketon? Have you been at the […]
Entrance There’s a ticket booth on my tongue. Don’t look in my eyes, don’t plead curiosity, you won’t get anywhere with that. Try it and you’ll see your reflection in my sea-green gaze: your shadow sprinting through the heavy glass doors. You’ll smell a whiff of brine, perhaps something more volatile. You’ll be caught and […]
Hello. Is this your city? No, no. We understand. It is not a city yet. It is merely embryonic. Conceptual. An idea to which your bones are laced, the sinews that tether the tendons of your dreams. It is only a city in waiting, a city mid-birth, a city breathless, inexorable. But you desire a […]
Outside the cracked window of the garret, the cockle-seller hollered, “Cockles an’ mussels! Cockles an’ mussels!” Her voice blended with the other London morning street sounds to mean that Vaughn was going to be late. “Botheration.” He tied off the thread in the fine blue leather of the gloves he was stitching and snipped it […]
Today is not the day I wanted to do this, but we aren’t always given choices. It’s time to pack for the new seasons. No, you can’t stay. This place won’t be here soon. It’s already going, slipping away, each new summer tearing off strips. You can see the new flesh underneath. We’re still guessing […]
With thanks to Stephanie Burgis, Fran Wilde and Kate Elliott It was a large, magnificent room with intricate patterns of ivy branches on the tiles, and a large mirror above a marble fireplace, the mantlepiece crammed with curios from delicate silver bowls to Chinese blue-and-white porcelain figures: a clear statement of casual power, to leave […]
Listen well, oh best beloved, for I have much to tell you before the tide comes in, and there will come a time when you are called to recite it, word for word, whether I am here or no. Listen well, and remember what I tell you: In the long-ago, when the sea blossomed with […]
The letter from my grandmother arrived twenty years after she died. It—and its contents—were completely unexpected. “She left me her house,” I told my mom. “Well, you ought to be able to get decent money for it,” she said. “That’s the catch. I have to live in it for a year first. Otherwise the money […]