Morning’s pale light radiates through the cracks in the storehouse where I sleep, and I lean into the comforting warmth. The air is silent and still. Heavy with expectation. My stomach pinches in hunger and I tuck my legs to my chin, whimpering. Wait for the pain to pass.
Pain. One.
You wrap me in colored blankets every night, muttering to yourself in an ancient tongue, the words falling from your lips like a desperate prayer, like a spell that never finds its mark. You are a mother at heart—just not my mother.
I watch you empty the basin at my window,
I sit up gasping, drenched in sweat. For the third time this week, I’ve awoken from nightmares of our city on fire. People screaming, houses exploding.
Each nightmare ends the same way–with blackened bodies staring at me from their smoldering graves.
I leave our bed to stare out the window with my oil lamp…
“We’ll be late, Harold!” Beatrice scolded as Harold zipped toward the nearby star. “I told you we needed to leave early!”
“We would’ve been fine if it weren’t for that construction on the Tarangian Way!” Harold snapped back, purple facial tentacles writhing angrily. “Who reduces an intergalactic byway to one lane? Traffic was stopped completely!”
July 4th, 2050
I didn’t think my husband and I would qualify for the program. Things don’t usually go our way, especially since Gavin’s release from active duty and the months of trauma that followed. He sits next to me, his fingers playing with his ID badge. The word ARMY is emblazoned across it.
Doctor Holloway! Can we please swim in your pool?” The boy looked about nine, and a couple of multicolored beach towels flapped over his shoulder as he came running toward Denise, who was about to pull a lawnmower’s cord. With him was a slightly younger girl, an inflatable swim ring encircling her waist
Read it now
Helios gripped his resume. After an hour of waiting, the paper was somewhere between crumpled and wilting.
He attempted to smooth it out on his lap. It didn’t help. Maybe the Boss wouldn’t notice…
He glanced over the details listed under Education and Activities. Graduated from Celestial Gasses Academy—middle of the class.
I’m late.
My sandals slap against the cobblestones as I hasten to my post. Scents of olives, fish, and fresh bread assault my nostrils. My stomach rumbles.
I stop at Clelia’s stand, a simple board set atop old barrels. She has the best takeaway food of anyone in the city.
“This is all I need,” Hades muttered.
He peeked around the kitchen doorframe at the knot of self-invited guests mingling in his living room. Athena told him that crowds could be expected when you got a new puppy, but this was just adding insult to injury. I never asked for this.
April 27, 1986
The comforting notes of Babushka’s music box make my heart shatter.
What would she have thought, standing in her granddaughter’s shoes, watching the sky morph as radiation pours into the air? Even in the pain, I imagine she would’ve known what to do. How to help. How to make a difference.
The harsh lights in the interrogation room stung my eyes as Detective Ironflutter smacked her police-issued wand against her palm and fluttered her wings to loom over me. “C’mon, Ivory. Just tell us where the fairy godmother’s wand is.”
I leaned back but forced my eyes to meet hers.
Akiak’s life was a tapestry of legends.
She knew it was Silla, Keeper of Sky, who glazed the night with northern lights when he was lovesick for the Sun. The tears Tapeesa shed for her lost daughter caused the tiny arctic flowers to bloom on the hillsides in the warm season.
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