When the war was over, she pulled up the floorboard, dug the vase back up, and showed it to her husband and children. They knew it had been in the family for six generations. The painted porcelain was done by Jean-Jacques Bachelier. It had survived through the War of the First Coalition, War of the Sixth Coalition, the Hundred Days between France and the Netherlands, and now the Great War. Its beauty still in tact.
Read More Shards of History… Her room was filled with all the things I would want in my own, if I had a room. It took all the breath I had left for the day to walk up the six flights to Lela’s apartment. Situated a few blocks from the yellow beach, her windowsills were speckled in shells, incense and statues of animals. On one wall hung a tapestry with a mandala. On another wall hung a giant floral anatomy poster, complete with a magnetic wooden frame that mimicked schoolhouse pull-down charts. Her bed had the soft, cooling linen that one only finds in a room like hers— creamy in every sense of the word: texture, color, and scent. Each item in her room was perfectly spaced out from the others, like a well-designed landscape. I felt entirely out of place there, wearing my ripped jeans, faded t-shirt and boots that were starting to come apart at the seams. My hiking pack was covered in dirt. My hair was a little messy, and mousy brown, and my skin was excessively tan, from being outside all the time.
Read More A Day In The LifeThe winds rushed in every direction. The flickers of light through the grave curtain of grey were few and far between, glaring out from the lighthouse a mile down the beach. Edgar’s arms were crossed at his chest like a mummy, and he stood in the sand, tied to a tree, expecting the worst. His thin black pin-stripe suit barely retained any heat, so he shivered in the cold of this stormy morning. His white shirt was crumpled and dirty from sleeping in the sand the night before. He looked ragged—a splayed version of his usual self. His black tie hung halfway out of his pants pocket—he had the intelligence to at least remove it from his neck so it wouldn’t flap him in the face.
Read More Reflective Winds“She’s the only one the cat will even come close to.” The Rabbi told my mother in his gentle and slightly raspy voice that exuded wisdom. We were walking down the hallway of the synagogue. His long, white robes glistened with gold filigree. My mother stood in stark contrast, dressed all in black. She wore a tank top, against the rule that shoulders must not show in the holy house, which even reform jews were supposed to follow. This wasn’t a service, though, she would say.
Read More Cat’s CradlingMilly entered the library with one thing on her mind. Where was she being commissioned next? It would take a six mecra-long flight to get anywhere worth studying. She had coordinates that looked much closer. As she walked down the echoing, cold, marble steps, she hoped it was somewhere she could study the lifestyle habits of the Gannibions. But she didn’t know of any Gannibion outpost this close to galactic center. Long ago, the Gannibions had left Earth for safe havens where they could practice mushroom farming in peace, away from the noises and pollution of the city planets.
Read More Planet X7