If victory had a literal taste, it would taste like citrus. Like peeling an orange or grapefruit, you would smell victory first; bright and sharp. Like peeling a tangerine or slicing a lemon, victory is always a little bit messy. But the moment you first taste victory, like citrus, it is bright and made of little bursts of happiness. If victory had a literal taste, it would taste of citrus....

I looked at the shriveled roses, the ends of the stems resting in two inches of slimy water, the sides of the vase cloudy with residue, browning petals and dry leaves scattered on the table around the base of the vase. Just two days ago they were gorgeous with dewy petals of yellow tipped with red, vibrant green leaves, resting in crystal clear water that refracted rainbows through the vase. I s...

Against the stone wall of the cave, a scraping talon sounds.

The cold, the dark, and the constant drip of water all around.

Flee! Your mind cries.

Stay! Your heart sighs.

For here and only here, dragon eggs abound....

As I turned the corner into aisle 8, my foot hit something slick, and I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt, I was going down. Unfortunately, my body still thought there was hope of saving itself and grabbed for my shopping cart. At least that’s what I assumed happened, because here I was laying on my back staring up at the fluorescent lights of the grocery store ceiling underneath my overturned car...

I watched him through my last working security camera. I’d had to shut down most of my peripheral inputs at the time of the great earthquake. The rest had gone down one by one, either failing on their own or because I cut power as my solar power panels were covered with dust and debris reducing the power out put. The days of hundreds of people, mostly happily but some very unhappily occupying, ...

Warning: some swear words appear in this story.

Well, this is awkward, I think to myself. I’ve spent the last half hour answering what felt like endless questions on the latest and greatest dating app. The ink is barely dry on my divorce papers, but I’m not getting any younger. That’s why I’m sitting her being grilled by an app.

What am I interested in?

What activities do I enjoy?

What ...

Darkness… falls

… evil calls

Whispered words…

… cawing birds.

Them… I see

They see…me

Latches click…

Locks snick…

Rain…squalls

Darkness falls

Darkness falls

Darkness falls....

“The universe is neither good nor bad.” The self help podcast proclaimed. I figured I should make some use out of my hour long morning commute. “Good and bad, opportunity and complications, they just exist. What you look for and how you frame things is what you will get out of what simply exists. You have to synchronize yourself with what you need.”

I snorted. So if I look for money, I will fi...

“Eek!” I exclaimed, dashing into the bathroom and peeking through the thin opening. “It’s bad luck to see the bride on her wedding day! Why are you here?” And more importantly, where were my mother and my bridesmaids? They were supposed to have gotten here a half hour ago.

“Ella, I have something important to tell you. I was going to wait until we were on our honeymoon, but I just can’t.” ...

The roses sprouted from the ground, climbed the the sides of her burial vault and bloomed by the light of the full moon. For ten years she had waited, refusing to move on, waited for tonight. Reanimating her skeletal corpse still shrouded by the wispy remains of her diaphanous wedding dress had taken much of her remaining power. She sat among the roses for a few moments, gathering her strength. ...