coldfire323

on me For an exam I had to memorize all the tactics we use to get people to like us. I tell you I like you even if I don't. I feign similarity even if I am as black as you are white. I make myself attractive with scalpels and starvation. I project modesty even if I like to brag. I do not like this, but I still wear bright red low-cut tops to job interviews and lie about my interests and achievements around strangers. There is a tension between truth and sleeping ignorance. I am searching for the core. At the center of it all, a pulsing, slimy revelation waits for me. I don't know if it is a deeper crime to act this way without knowing, or

Thou Mayest —00:01:41 Heat and smoke and screaming. The world lurched around him. Roland scrabbled at the floor, and something brushed against his fingers. He froze. He had just touched a dead man. In his back pocket, the phone was a piece of granite. —15,694:59:59 Roland was a beautiful newborn with a full head of hair and a proud squall. As the nurses separated him from his mother he threw out his tiny fists. Pink skinned, perfect reflexes, perfect percentages. In his mother's arms he smiled and she almost forgot about the second child stirring in her womb. —15,694:21:19 There were complications. The cord had wrapped

From the Staircase It was late and everyone was sleeping except for Mr. and Mrs. Robinson. The couple started the talk over tea and innocence, but like all actors they were beginning to tire. It started when Mrs. Robinson asked Mr. Robinson if he wanted any tea. “Do you want any tea, Darling?” He grunted. “It's supposed to help with your heart, Darling.” “I don't need tea clink. said the teacup. Mrs. Robinson looked down at the bottom of the cup and saw her future in it. “I heard it on the television today. On the news. One cup of black tea—“ “What're we gonna do about th

Now it so happened that a certain traveler had taken the wrong fork in the road and wound up in their town. He was in quite a state when he arrived, pawing and mewling his way about the streets like a fool who had looked at the sun for too long, and when the Pettigrews asked what troubled him he could only shake his head and point and make grand gestures at the ground. "The colors!" He swirled on his feet and opened up his arms to the world. "Where are the colors?" Now after a while he seemed to calm down, and the kind old Pettigrews invited him to their lodging. They smiled through lips to hide their gossipy teeth and offered the travele

Oh, this won't do. I'll have to reapply. I snatch up a q-tip and dab at my eye to try and even out the eyeliner. My mouth lolls open that way all girls' mouths open when they're thinking too hard about their make-up. As I dabble along, I imagine the Tracy who, in another universe, had done it just right the first time and was now locking the door to her apartment. The thought curls up and sticks and I can't let go of it. There we go. Much better. I fluff up my hair with my hands. Getting it short like this makes mornings so much quicker. Just flutter it up and brush it once and you're ready to go, badda bing, just like that. I step back

You feel a bit prickly. He'd said. Your legs are usually so soft. And now this morning she stood hunched over in the shower, razor poised to trim away the criticisms of last night. Soon she would return again to perfection, as defined by the contented and silent approval of her lover's touch. Shaving began when she was 12 and her friends had started to call her Alexa instead of Lexi. There was nothing particularly grotesque about the silky hairs tip toeing across her legs, but the arrival of hair in other places fed her shame and encouraged her to compensate by removing it in more public areas. She used her mother's razor in secret, thoug

It was finals week and she really had no business going to this party, said the angel. "I know the material," said the girl. She combed insecurity through her hair. "I'm gonna pass and afterward I'll get pizza with my friends to treat myself." There was no devil on her shoulder because she had put it out of business. The night was a throbbing sore-spot of lost ideals, of wide laughing mouths and vodka and saliva. There used to be a time when the devil needed to talk—when decisions teetered deliciously between the lines of glory and failure. She took the final. She did not know the material. She failed. That night the girl got p