A Hope and Dreams

A man is leaning on a column, waiting for something. A man and a woman come walking in, dressed in fresh cream colored suits. “Oh, sir, I almost didn’t recognize you!” the man in the black suit exclaims. “Me neither, what are you doing here?” the other man mutters, the second part quietly under his breath. “You best get out of here darling, I’ve got money on the underdog for this next race,” The woman nods, and continues away from the two men, but does not make her way to the track. “What were you thinking, showing up here?” the younger man asks. He waves a package of cigarettes at the other man. “No thanks, you know I hate that crap. And I could ask you the same thing. You’re in at least as much danger as I am.” “No, you’re not. I’ll use my own lighter. You have to get out of here.” “As do you. I’m not as naive as you think, I have some idea of the danger that you’ve put yourself in by even just talking to me here.” “You get out, and I’ll meet you in the usual spot. I...

Hey everyone, sorry for the long gap in posts. Life snuck up on me, I think you probably know how that feels, and if you don't then I don't think I can describe it in more depth then 'I lost track of time'. Anyway, the whole point of this post isn't to say sorry, but to let you know what to expect in the coming days, because I want to try something new. I usually don't write dialogue, so I was working on a dialogue exercise that I'm going to post. A few days after that, expect something big to come in. I don't want to spoil what it is, but I spent a lot of time on it last year and I'm trying to fix it up now, and that's also taking a lot of time. After that, I'm thinking of starting writing a longer story that I will post in segments here, so I'll start working on that too. Long story short, I'm sorry for the break and you should expect great (I think) things in the future! -JS

It looked like it was abandoned, worn to the point that it didn’t seem as though it had been used in years. And perhaps the tracks hadn’t been used for year at that point, but years from now the tell-tale orange signs of constructions planned may morph into new ground. Trains may run past the blockade, beyond the water, continuing into the city that for now lies forever on the horizon. The worn out, scuffed walls that to the right person may tell an entire story, but then again they may not, may be broken down and reformed into something sleek, shiny, and new with a new history written over the erased chapters of another life. The water may dry up, or be redirected to the train, whipping around it like long hair in the wind, pushing the train forward as it surges forward to its destination. But then again it may not. Perhaps the ground around the tracks will continue to crack. Perhaps the memories on the walls will be allowed to fade away, slowly forgotten. Perhaps the 26 protesto...

the distant school bells chime, in summer in the same moment, a nearby belltower clangs the rhythm they create together is imperfect, bumpy in the lack of synchronization, I look up at the sky for a moment the echo of the sun rings in my closed eyes, glowing red

She backed up slowly, her back pressing against the back of the closet, and a slight groan sounded from behind her. Turning around, her eyes growing larger with fear, she saw a rotting hand reaching toward her. Her eyes followed the hand, back up the arm attached to it, up to the caved in head slowly dripping a sticky, oily, black-ish substance; the viscous substance flowing down, clumping their hair, dripping to the ground in an irregular beat. She didn’t open her mouth to scream. In that moment, her mind shut, as primal fear took over. She jolted back, avoiding the brush of the monster reaching toward her, but in her haste, she slammed back against the door of the closet, the door bursting open under her weight. She fell backwards out of the closet, falling on her back with an impact that knocked the air out of her lungs. Gasping for air, she struggled to sit up when something grabbed the back of her jacket and the next thing she knew, she was upright again. The grip on the back...

The sun quickly rises today, heralded by the presence of of the girl in the orange dress. She has been holding a lamp in one hand, and nothing in the other every morning that I can remember. We don’t know why she stands there, motionless, staring at the horizon as the light of the sun slowly creeps over the hills until the sky is the same brilliant shade of her dress and she fades into the sky. One day, when we were children, an adventurer–or perhaps they were another child, no one cares to remember–tried to find her, to ask her what her duty was, why she always stood there, motionless. The next morning, as we rose to greet her from afar, we could see him, his faint grey silhouette pale and lifeless next to the vibrant contrast of her dark one. But she met him, holding his hand tightly with her smaller one, until the sun absorbed her once more, and he was left there, standing alone. We watched as he turned, framed against the vibrant light of the sun and suddenly his silhouette did ...