- Where We Live Now
- It Was Never About The Girl, Was it, Jarvis?
- Spooky Time Rhyme
- Invisible Bodies
- Tips for the Novel Writer’s Block
- A Short Story Collection by Alex
Speaker’s Red (250 words)
I hold my breath and wait, patiently, in the dawn. I bend over, hiding behind the window. Under intense focus my sense is getting clearer and better.
I watch him through the glass on my gun, closer, until he’s at the right position. I can only hear my stable heartbeat, under my control, that shows I’m highly focused. Calm. On top of my mission.
Extreme silence. I think I hear a bird flapping its wings.
He showed up, finally, welcomed by the crowd. Walking from the stage to go up, I hear people clapping and yelling greetings for him.
I stare at him. The moment he opens his mouth, the moment I pull the trigger. Then he falls, I hear screams of scare, the echoes of the mic annoying and sharp, not pleasant.
But my task is completed, I won. It has nothing to do with me anymore. I see the red, the color staring to spread like a flower on his chest and head, right between his two eyes, in the middle. Two shots, excellent level of accuracy.
A masterpiece. A sense of achievement staring to rise and warm me up.
Then I follow my planned routine to leave, leaving the end of the gun to cool down slowly by itself.
New rules and a brand-new world tomorrow. “The old king is dead, long live the king.”
I pack up, then quietly withdrawal.
Thrilling, I can feel the adrenaline is working, pumping in my blood. I disappear in the dark.
Stalemate (195 words)
“Indeed, but I’m not a bird in the cage, “ she smiles, with a sense of irony like – like wine in a glass of water, only showing slight color with no taste at all. “I’m just a golden cage with an open door.”
“If I just have to go inside?” The questioner questions.
“There’s no point at all trying to understand the rot and decay inside of the gold and jade.” Words gently come out of her mouth between lips. “Although I don’t care about your disappointment or not, it’s always a trouble.”
She loosely breaks down grammar, sentences are unclear like seeing through clouds and fog, mixed meaning spread like vine.
Questioner temporarily keeps silence, sends shivers down her spine.
“What if I use fire to engulf you?”
“This is not a question.”
“Melt the cage to hot gold, pour into a submissive clockwork nightingale, a bird in the cage that only sings for me.”
Questioner gazes at her, seeking ways to look through her flesh to find the sweet, rotten core — a defoliated flower, a forbidden fruit, emerge itself and perish itself. “Outspoken person.” He admits.
He kisses her wrist, slips through her sensuous skin.
The Pearl Mussel (242 words)
He has noticed this pearl mussel for a long time.
It is hiding in a corner of the beach, closing its shells tightly.
He knows probably plenty of people stopped by to admire and touch this beautiful pearl mussel and its shells, but no one is as patient and serious as him.
The pearl mussel appears to be vigilant and indifferent, lying in the sand quietly. Its smooth, white, and shiny shells are glimmering under the sun.
He approaches the mussel, from watching it far away, and eventually he sits beside the pearl mussel, gently feels the unique texture by touching it along the grain, tickle it with childlike naughtiness.
The pearl mussel is a good listener with its own philosophy in its shells.
He is willing to tell the mussels stories and share things with it, hear the ocean and feel the waves will sitting on the sand, sea waves run under his feet, till moonlight kisses his skin.
Time after that is slow, close to still. He schools himself in patience until one day, he smiles and see his pearl mussel opens itself a crack.
His lover makes him think of seawater, the sun, raindrops, shadows, sales, lights, addictions, music of love, eternal poetries or the fox which has been domesticated by the little prince.
But now, it opens its soft and tender inside widely without scruples, like a pearl mussel.
He smiles, leans forward, and picks up his pearl mussel.
Angel V.S. Demon (232 words)
I got separated from the team.
After the explosion, the building kept falling apart. Dust is in the air, everywhere. The smell of blood and corpses, sounds of conjuring magic and crashing of cold weapons continue to stimulate my senses.
I think I accidentally step into a portal set by… I don’t know which side of the mage. I got transmitted to the dark forest. The fight started in the edge of Archangel main site, and the dark forest is so far from it.
I suppose the user of the portal meant to drag enemy to a dangerous place and kill them using natural hazard or make them get lost and reduce military presence.
It’s a high-level magic, common to make mistakes.
I suddenly saw someone lying down in the shade of tree. He looks fragile, severely injured with then disappearing breath. I go check on him, and he doesn’t show wings of angel or demon in attack mode.
He has pale skin and looks like a hybrid. As I open his eyelid (he seems to be in coma), I see dark red pupils – he is not angel, he is not one of our kind.
Even far away from the battlefields the enemy is still enemy. Angel and demon aren’t on the same side.
I raise my right hand, preparing to take his life, but golden magic particles did not appear.
I don’t understand.
Her Perfume Smell
What will her perfume smell like?
Like a letter written with hidden feelings, but never delivered, piled up, hiding among books till one day the writer chooses to burn it, so it was silently set on fire, sometimes crack a sound with the nice fragrant of paper and ink in the air.
Or like the smell of plants growing up in a dark seedy corner, praying for sunshine, shaking because of the wind passing by.
The smell is pleasant in a weird way and it lingers, so he secretly leans forward, trying to sniff it into his lungs to remember.
A Poem for ENFJ (Extroverted, iNtuitive, Feelings, Judgment)
What is that? Bright red, burning, romantic, sparkling, scolding, swayin, live long and prosper, always beautiful.
What is dancing? Dancing in your chest, dancing in your palms, dancing in the eyes of the crowd, dancing in the jungles and thorns.
The stable, warm and mighty dancing. So what is that? It is heart – no, no, it’s fire.
It’s the fire of hope.
