Each of the men was holding some sort of object made of metal and wood. They pushed a rod into the holes in the metal and tapped it down a few times.
Tag: fiction
Die, Mug, Silence
The waitress stopped at the coffee maker and began reloading her pot. She glanced back at his table; the mug still locked in his hand.
Sleep, Store, Offense
The setting and characters shifted. The clacking bones and whirring lenses morphed into the strange noises coming from all the people in the marketplace.
Canvas, Excavate, Term
Again, he dipped the ink and again he whipped his hand over the canvas until before him was the rough shape of a choppy sea. The dots, he thought reminded him of the spray
Reservoir, Material, Crack
Then some priest was like, I’ll pray about it. For all we know he’s still doing that.
Guitar, Waiter, Poetry
I flagged down the waiter for another Sangria and sat, trying to figure it out. All this raw emotion and rush of feelings but I was alone. In younger days it was easier to identify my feelings. This is happiness. This is regret. This is anger. As I grew older, the feelings tied themselves to memories and experiences, making it harder to untangle one emotion from another.
Field, Carrot, Clock
He snapped off the end of his carrot and kept thinking. More than a cup of coffee, chewing woke him up in the mornings. This morning, however, his mind seemed to be stuck in that fog between dreams and the reality of the world that his eyes took in.
My last confession
I took a long pull from the cigarette. With no filter, the smoke punched a hacking cough out of my lungs. I choked it down to hear the rest of Father Ibsen’s sermon.
Multimedia, Bite, Eagle
A young girl, taking her parents lasers and adding some of her own, taped all of them together and stuck them on the weather vain of her roof. As she stepped back to admire the lasers whipping in all directions the wind would blow, she fell off the roof and never was the same, but neither was the world.
Extraterrestrial, Prisoner, Distance
Dust. So much swirling in the air that it became mud in the eyes and chewed up cake in the mouth. Their ears built dams of wax and stone. Their noses reduced to only to hold up glasses, unable to pass air in or out from the mucus and wet clay caking its opening.
Rugby, Shy, Shine
Flat-nosed. Ears like used tinfoil. Arms, legs and a neck like chiseled stone from a sculpture still in progress.
Be right back
He looked up at the faces of the other guests. Nodding, smiling, winking, head-tilting, lip-biting, red cup sipping, arm touching, eye fluttering, eye fucking, and jealousy. Bob noticed it all in those faces. He took a deep breath and downed the rest of his drink. What was he doing there?
Voice, Dock, Hushed
It only takes a moment for our animal instincts to take over us. A hushed whisper of a thought becomes the booming voice of vice.
Deer, Crackle, Leave
Now she could see the task of the morning. It involved pouring two elements; liquid and solid into one bowl. An alchemy resulting in a new element.
Nifty, Manage, Call
Sometimes I already know what the message is by looking at the phone number. I know what they want, how much they want, where I should meet them and what time I need to meet them.
Dusty, Bored, Thundering
“Hair! You’ve lost 37,564 hairs from the top of your head BUT you gained 63 hairs in and around your left ear and 59 hairs in and around your right. You had an increase in your nose hairs, both in number of individual follicles as well as girth of each hair.”
Pushy, Collect, Hulking
For waiting customers, the owners had items for purchase on display. There were a number of Nascar hats, greeting cards, various candy bars and energy pills. There were also scarves and handkerchiefs.
Heave, Obey, Moult
Above his head he held the words which were meant to give his life purpose, the words he was meant to obey.
Slippery, Provide, Flesh
In this dream walked a procession, four deep. They had come from the hill shaded by the Samanea Saman tree at its summit. They walked; the Cloaked Ruby leading her troupe, stretching and yawning at the sky.
Popcorn, Jar, Bounce
The man pulled a Mason jar full of water from below the counter and took a swig. His eyes bulged, his cheeks flushed red and he let out a puff of smoke before replying, “well, if you are camping alone, I recommend a pup tent.”
Accept, Salt, Noiseless
One packet at a time he sprinkled the salt in a circle around his tent. Satisfied, he took the bag from his mouth and stepped inside the tent.
Pale, Review, Expansion
Peter had seen something on TV where a guy used one magnet to move around another magnet that was on the other side of a wall. That feeling of nostalgia was like that, a pulling of something that felt familiar but wasn’t seen.
Remake, Iron, Easy
After the golf session, about 15 minutes of screeching tires, broken glass and honking cars, he drove down to the nicest restaurant in town.
Knowledge, Belief, Motivation
You do your best to keep the ball in the air. You drop it a few times while doing your hygiene routine but pretty soon it becomes second nature to keep the beach ball in the air.
Imbricate, Pongee, Zucchetto
We passed a display with all sorts of symbols. The Christian cross was pointed out as another symbol of irony; a torture device used by the Roman Empire became the symbol of a supposedly peaceful belief system.
Account, Arm, Sniff
A club with a pink sign in Miami vice style writing that said “Lazerbeam” only the “m” was going in and out so every few seconds it was club “Lazerbea”, which I thought sounded cooler.
Nutritious, Cap, Measure
The seagull shit was the easiest to get. All we had to do was climb up the masts and scrape the white chips into a cup. The job could even be done without looking.
Master, Grim, Bate
She was in a foul bate sitting in traffic. Her knuckles were white, gripped around the steering wheel and she was gritting her teeth. She refused to look at the drivers or passengers in the cars all around her.
Curdle, Debauchery, Feckless
Jerry’s dead now. Susan came by with a carton of milk that had been in the fridge for two years. She doused him with it. While he was trying to rub away the milk from his eyes, she asked him if he wanted a towel and instead handed him a plugged in toaster.
Ridiculous, Sleep, Honk
“For the follicular-ly challenged I have this hair powder. Mix with raw egg, a splash of gin and leave it on your head for two days.” said the medicine man.
Regular, Tiresome, Popcorn
“Hey,” said Jerry. “what do you miss most about home?”
“Toilet paper,” said Miles. “As many plies as I want plus folded. Toilet paper.”
Flame, Famous, Shy
Do I belong here for my ideas? Or will I always be a female body with ideas, doomed never to be separated from my anatomy?
Yearn, Rasp, Grit
The guy who said “follow me” was our tour guide. His outfit would have been fine in the jungle but we were in downtown Los Angeles in July. This jungle required less clothing.
