I could hear the airboat before I saw it; the thrum of the fan propeller grew louder as it approached and finally came into view. It’s driver, a sallow-faced Korean man, was wearing a bright yellow poncho and camo waders; he expertly steered the boat parallel to the dock on which I was standing [...]
The bright orange piping on his Orlan space suit made the glowering Russian cosmonaut look like he had stepped directly out of a 1970s science fiction flick. He held the suit’s helmet casually by fingertip, bouncing it between his legs. The tight-fitting communication cap emphasized his gaunt facial features and with his thousand [...]
First day on the job the slate roof was black
rain slicked
and loose tiles skittered past like nervous bones
knocked loose by the boots of strangers
All through the gray morning I hauled
stone
bundles bound by steel bands
Halfway up on
spindly aluminum legs
I stopped.
Leaning against the load
balanced on my right shoulder
the narrow frame was
bending
bouncing under the weight
And I realized (too [...]
His lips moving silently, the professor tapped out the rhythm of the words with a long fingernail as he read. He moved quickly through the pieces, spending more time with some and less with others, and began neatly dividing them in two piles: one to his left, the other to his right.
The Frankish army’s siege engines had been bombarding Pamplona for a week. Pale streams of dust drifted down to where Christóbal lay as the dull thud of stone on stone shook the dry well. A sliver of sunlight touched one corner of the damp circle of packed earth as the sun traveled past [...]
He paused, took another deep drink, rested the guitar on his knee and fretted an A. He removed his hand and shook it as it throbbed with pain. He examined it, the 2nd joint of his middle finger was red and swollen and a dime-sized scab had crusted over with yellow pus.
Wednesday
Mr. Dickson stood in front of an open wardrobe freshly showered in boxers and undershirt. Considering his possibilities for a moment he removed a a coral dress shirt and teal double-breasted suit from padded hangers and put them on. He took a matching bow tie from his breast pocket and skillfully knotted it [...]
Robert sat motionless on a black vinyl drum throne the tips of his drum sticks resting against the head of the snare. He lifted a stick above his ear and spun it between two fingers. Robert’s mother had gone out and the house was dead quiet, he was almost reluctant to break the silence. He [...]
A sensation of drowning, a great weight on my eyelids, reaching, clawing for the surface, and finally, light. I sit up. Someone takes me by the shoulders and I lean against them. I smell damp, recently soaped, skin and feel the prickle of stubble against my forehead.
“You’re okay, you’re alright.”
I crouched in a shady alcove and waited for Romero to run by before giving him both barrels of my shotgun. Romero cursed at me and I heard the rapid clickity click as he summoned the next level into existence. This level was set in an abandoned building and I climbed two flights of rickety stairs to a narrow hallway and proceeded carefully checking the doors to my left and right for supplies. Third door on the left opened to reveal an invisibility power up which I greedily took. Romero never saw me coming. Next level.
The screen door slamming shut awoke me suddenly. I had crawled out my bedroom window and was standing on the roof’s edge of the veranda. My arms were spread and I was pale and shaking. My pulse was racing and my nightgown was damp with rain. My father ran out the front door and looked up just as I fell.
10. Thou shalt not forget to stock the beer with fridge, I mean the fridge with beer, prior to the beginning of the project.
9. Thou shalt not obsessively play video games during the project period, or play video games at all, for that matter.
8. Thou shalt not take breaks to use the bathroom, eat a [...]
The crimes that Larry Jaworski was alleged to have committed were the terrorist’s equivalent of vaulting down dark cellar stairs (with a 1/4 turn) while solving a Rubik’s Cube and sticking the landing.
Of course Larry Jaworski is the type of person who probably solves the Rubik’s Cube blindfolded.
Long gone was the cacophony of the freeway—screeching rubber on asphalt, honks of frustration, the roar of engines, the bone-shaking rattle of air brakes. Aerodynamic electric cars now flowed effortlessly down the expressway, carried like leaves caught in a current. When roadwork reduced the Expressway to four lanes, then to three, the cars smoothly interlocked like clockwork gears, their running lights crisscrossing and bobbing hypnotically.
Monday morning, 10:45. I’m sitting in a conference room at my department’s weekly status update meeting. Our kind-hearted patriarch has steadily been making his way around the room asking “Who are you? What are you doing here? Why shouldn’t I fire you?” in the nicest possible way.
I start to panic. It’s [...]
McKnight is working on his bio. He's having trouble keeping it factual.