Elizabeth’s Quarters:
Elizabeth wakes up and feels herself being held. She could feel something soft being pressed against her back. It took her mind a few seconds to realize who was in bed with her. Her mouth had a weird taste, a taste she had never tasted before.

She was wet between her legs and hoped she wasn’t going back to how she was when she came to the vineyard. She manages to turn around in the arms to face who is holding her. A smile forms on her face as she realizes it is Carol.

“So now you want to show me mercy? The old woman who wouldn’t lift a finger to save you?” She laughed, soft and dry. “Try again.”

The Pageant: Then and Now
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

Part 1 – Before the Pageant

“Is that really your hair? I can’t believe it,” said Mac, at last working the mouth that had just gaped for a full minute.

“Color highlights, curlers, backcombing and hair spray and shit. You would not believe what I have been through.” said Brad. “Like I just said, I wish I had never got Mom involved.”

“You will win the prize, Man,” said Mac. “You just have to, looking like that.

Several days later I asked them about the other people they had mentioned lived across the stream. My friends didn’t seem to be on a friendly basis with them. When we got there, we found that whoever had lived there was gone, with only the dead remains of their flowers left, which meant in all likelihood they were dead. They hadn’t eaten the flower remains, and my friends had told me how unlikely a merger was, much less three of them.

Two Days Before Christmas Eve:
Charlotte finishes wrapping the Christmas gifts she bought for her brother’s. Her older brother was spending Christmas with his long-term girlfriend. His girlfriend didn’t get along with their parents and she couldn’t blame her.

As for Jamie, she barely saw her. When she was home, Jamie wasn’t and when Jamie was home, she was asleep, which was fine. Christmas was coming up and Jamie had Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, and the day after.

The crunch of tires on gravel announced Elena's arrival twenty minutes later. Her Subaru Outback, mud-spattered from recent fieldwork, pulled into the lot with the practiced ease of someone who spent more time on remote forest roads than highways. Her headlights swept across the gathered group before cutting off, leaving them in the glow of Alex's modified exterior lighting.

Bigger Than I Expected

I could barely catch my breath as I stood before the mirror, my heart racing in my chest—not from physical pain, though there was certainly plenty of that—but from sheer, overwhelming disbelief at my reflection.

Let me take a step back for a moment.

A group of people wake up in video game world and are forced to work together to survive and find out how to escape.

Chapter 48 The End.

Ever since graduation from high school, my dream of the good life has seemed to be a lesson in futility. First there was my Mom’s accident, her injuries didn’t take her life, but maybe that would have been better. I loved my Mom but couldn’t stand to be around watching her in a wheelchair, knowing that most likely she would be confined to one for the rest of her life. The idiot driver walked away from the crash, apparently drunk, never admitting fault for the trouble and grief he caused.

Part Eight by Iona Laing.

Chapter Twenty-two.

I earned my living as a consultant, advising people in how to invest their money and hold on to what they had in today’s economy. I purposefully selected only female clients, most males think they know better and do not listen to the advice I offer them. Then, when they lose a chunk, they blame me for steering them wrong. I avoid all of that drama by not taking them as clients in the first place. I have been very fortunate, managing over the years to amass quite a few clients, mostly in the upper echelon of business, across a large spectrum of business types.

Billy’s Desires
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

I had convinced myself that being born male was the best thing in the world. I mean, men run it – the world I mean. Men are in charge. Women have babies. Women are meant to look pretty and look at their men adoringly, but they offer nothing when it comes to leadership or innovation – that was my position, back then. Somehow it seemed that the more I said it out loud, the truer it became.

I was in a grassy field, but I couldn't tell what I was.

I saw a green-skinned girl enter the field, a prepubescent girl with green skin and no hair, and seemingly naked. She came pretty close, maybe examining me, whatever I was. She walked about 100 feet away, dug a small hole with her hands, and squatted down over it. Maybe she pooped there? She covered it up with the dirt and grass she dug from the hole, then left.

The next day, a group of girls similar to the first one came by. I couldn’t tell if the original one was part of the group. They came right up and touched me. I could feel the touches even though I couldn’t tell what it was they were touching. One of them said something I thought sounded like “Soon, soon.” Sort of, anyway; I don’t think I actually heard the words, but I definitely understood it even though I’d just arrived here and had no idea what language they might speak. Some of them went to other spots in the field and pooped in holes like the first girl did.

A group of people wake up in video game world and are forced to work together to survive and find out how to escape.

Chapter 45 Revenge.