The Bookkeeper

See how the shelves are lined with books of every size and shape. They have no titles here, only names. Look, that shelf just to your right, on the lower shelf, it’s a small book. Red cover. Small words. Young Thomas Mann. Please, pick it up, take a look. No? It’s not to everybody’s taste. It was only written in a few days, not much thought went into it before the author finished.

Let‘s keep going, shall we?

You’ll notice some books are newer than others, some far thicker, some almost too thin to be a book at all. For a time we held a section entirely composed of leaflets, but we gave up the endeavor to catalogue our books by year, rather than length. Some things, you know, are just too predictable, and others are simply too constant. There will always be brief stories. And yet, they are sometimes the brightest, most sincere. However, as you may find as you look about, the lengths have been growing steadily longer for quite some time. The curator upstairs tend to think it’s a trend that’ll be reversing soon. We shall see.

In any case, what is your preference? Would you rather the vibrant ones, rich with detail and vivacious prose? They’re thrillers, in a way, strewn with velocity but sometimes lacking any genuine conflict. There are others, mind you, with a bit more wisdom, rather, a touch more timelessness: They may have softer covers, seem bound from a time before ours, the words dense with vicarious longing, drawn out and slow, a relaxed pace fit for nightly pleasures. Oh, look, just consider these two: Courtney Brown, a bright piece that’ll surely make you feel for her, and then Malcolm Jones, that might as well be a history if you make it through.

Still not piquing your fancy? Don’t worry, though, we’ll all end up on these shelves eventually–whether you want it or not, authorship is inevitable in the library of life.

Defining Lines

Two points define a line
like lines define movies
“You had me at hello”
or maybe, baby
nobody puts you in a corner
and a corner, perfectly shaped
is sharper than words
and words, perfectly forged
are sharper than swords
and you stabbed me, baby
with a pen to the aorta
and thick, black ink poured out
formed a puddle in my hands
and two hands define a body
define a man, because actions
speak louder than words
and words spin with angles
and angles make corners
and two corners, perfectly shaped
form a line, and one line
is all you remember.

NaNo 14: Story 2

My first two stories this month have stretched longer than anticipated, so I’m not sure if I’ll actually reach thirty stories…for now, I’m more focused upon writing good stories. (And if I must, I can reach thirty with a mad-dash of flash fiction at the end.)

This story was inspired by a dear friend who has given me prompts in the past: both prompts were serious in nature, but magic seeped into the stories nonetheless (inspiring “Sunday Sails Away” and “The Man Behind the Camera,” respectively).

This time, the prompt they gave me began with magic–and since they shared so many magical moments with me in the past, even more magic slipped in and the story found a place within my mythology–in fact, it tethered to this series of tales another story idea I’ve had for probably a decade or so, and in writing this, it has become my first contemporary tale in the mythos. (Yes, some of this mythology continues today, in this world.)

As promised, here’s the beginning and ending.

Ash sat at the edge of the post. A soft touch on the back of his hand turned his gaze downward: A small spider crawled across him.

Ash watched as the four winds rose into the air, no longer bound by the Sky God, no longer controlled by the key–completely free after millennia of imprisonment. And then, like waves of the auroras, they darted toward the horizon, each of them returning to their ancestral homes. Ash’s knees wavered and he fell to the ground. He had awakened the winds and defeated the Storm King–but at what cost?

Inspire my next story by clicking here.

NaNo 14: Story 1

NaNoWriMo is my most favorite time of the year–it’s an insane challenge to write 50,000 words in one month, and instead of writing a single story this year, I’m writing thirty. (Or at least, that’s my goal–if the stories become too long, I might not write as many as I’d like.) Ultimately, I plan to share each of these stories here, so what better way to share this experience than by sharing these stories right away?

But they’re not at all ready for public eyes, so every time I finish a story, I’ll post just the first line and the last–and hopefully you’ll be as excited for the final story as I’ve been to write it!

This first story belongs to my Kaidh mythology and predates the Silent Sun trilogy.

There was on the southeast shore of Athua a small kingdom called Sol. Bordered chiefly by the ocean on all sides but two, they had found themselves greatly endowed with resources and never had much need to venture outside their thin borders. Nor did many others find cause to enter theirs: They were nestled between a vast woodland to their north, and to their west, a range of stout but largely unremarkable mountains.

Then the flames touches her flesh and Erowen started to scream.

Inspire my next story by clicking here.

The Suffocant

The first breath was my last: at the threshold I felt it seeping through the minuscule opening between jam and door as I reached for the bolt, tempering the cool air with its searing fingertips. The second breath, as the door opened, filled my lungs with a desert’s dryness, sinking to the pit of my stomach and making me want to retch. The third breath—I was at the precipice now, only steps from truly entering the world—came with raw heat striking my skin, slipping through the fibers of my clothes and tearing at my pores. The fourth, as I stepped into the sun, struck like a whip to my back, white paint onto black, a lion poised to attack. I staggered forward, my hands reaching, my eyes reduced to blurry forms of faded colors before me: is this all the world has to offer? Is this our destiny, drab and delusional? Saturated with life but devoid of the living?

The fifth breath took me to my knees, hands flailing over pavement, nails caught on stone slivers and lifted from the flesh, agonizing screams lost in a desiccated world.

Is this the emptiness borne of no inspiration? Is this my suffocation when I cannot write?