“I’ll give this to you, but I can’t promise happiness.”

“Can you promise that you’ll stay forever?”

“I can’t promise that, either.”

“Then what’s the point of this?”

“I thought it’s what you wanted.”

“What I want is to know that the man I love wants to spend his life with me. To know it, to not have to wonder all the time if you’d rather be somewhere else.”

“I’m here because I want to be here.”

“Or because you have no other choice.”

“No, I’m choosing to be with you.”

But after that conversation, she never got the ring.… Read the rest

He tore her heart out with the grace of a dancer.

First he spun around her and pulled her clothes away, baring her nakedness that she tried to cover, but couldn’t.

He scalped her, ripping off her golden hair, relishing the blood that was pouring in waterfalls over her pretty face.

He stabbed at her, cut her, slashed her, and when she was crying in a ball on the ground, he yanked her back to her feet.

With a flourish, he waved in the air and then plunged into her chest.

She went down again, her heart in his hand.… Read the rest

“I would take on the most barbaric monster in the land for you.”

“I am the most barbaric monster in the land.”

“I would raise the sun and pull the tides for you.”

“Oh, come on, enough of that shit. You’re all talk and no action. You always say you’ll do things and then you never follow through.”

“You know what I followed through with to get here to you, the battles I’ve fought, the friends I killed along the way, what will ever be enough for you?”

“You. You’ll be enough for me, just you.”

“I don’t believe you.”… Read the rest

The day had finally arrived.

She’d been stalking the mailbox for days, but the envelope, more of a package, really, was waiting for her exactly when she should have expected it.

But she didn’t like to assume or expect anything.

She went inside and tore it open, and pages and little booklets came spilling out onto the kitchen table.

“Honor’s Society”, “Lacrosse Club”, “Women’s League of Voters”, “Writing Group”, there were so many things to be excited about.

The door opened.

“Mom, I got in!”

And as happy as she was, her mother still felt a tinge of lost hope.… Read the rest

She had no control over the pen. It kept writing and writing, white pages filled with ink.

My plan was finally coming along, I had successfully built a robot that could write novels for me, and she didn’t even care that I used my name on the covers.

How was she to know I took credit for her work?

How was I to know she could become capable?

“I wrote this, Cheney,” were the last words I heard before all went dark.

I woke up in a cell, aching and cold.

“You shouldn’t take credit for other people’s work.”

“People’s?”… Read the rest