dreamszilla

Little sister Poppy is hurt, but it's ok, it was only a tiny accident - only a tiny accident. Image generated with OpenAI I broke my sister's brain, and I don't know how to put it back together again. We'd been banished outside because Mommy and Father had to talk to an ugly man in a suit about Grandma's money. Father was angry because Grandma was a fan of the slots, and now she's dead and there's no money left for us. Mommy told me to take Poppy and go play, because she didn't want us to hear him yelling, but we heard. In the woods on the outskirts of the city, there's a hole that's twice as deep as Poppy is tall. It's called The Dump, and it's where people toss things that they don't want anymore. It's usually pretty dry in the summertime, and you can find all sorts of stuff - license plates, old toys, pieces of fancy dishes. A few weeks ago, we even found a puppy. Poppy was excited at first, no doubt picturing l...

In the 1970s British criminal underworld, Pat tries to protect Julia and her son Thal from maniac crime boss Lionel who is hunting Jack, Thal's father. Image generated with OpenAI Euston was choked with diesel fumes, smog, and cigarette smoke. It made his eyes sting. He hoicked his coat collar up around his neck. Over three hours cooped up in that carriage with all that fag smoke and coughin'. It was diabolical. No relaxation with those kids chargin' up and down and screamin'. It just set his nerves on edge. That woman needed a swift kick in the jacksie, letting the little runts run wild. No fuckin' parenting these days! No bleedin' relaxation what-so-ever. Always something to fuck up the scene, and that train guard was a useless prick. Scared of his own shadow, that one. It made Pat feel weary, the thought of Tam and the others. All the bullshit and palaver; all that stupid banter and the paranoia. It made him want to turn around and get the next tr...

Janelle Moats takes an interest in a fellow student at her music class, rough-around-the-edges Red Robichaux. Image generated with OpenAI Janelle Moats boarded the Broad Street bus as the first drops of condensation fell from the air conditioning units in the second story windows of the houses behind her. It was March, and windy, and the clatter of the droplets on the palmetto fronds below could not be heard, but as Janelle glanced back, waiting on the bottom step as the two old men ahead of her paid their fare, and saw the droplets glittering, refractory and prismatic, each in its own irrepeatable life, their flat rhythm formed the center of her consciousness. How we doin, Miss Moats, said the driver, palm up, fingers held loose, slightly spread. I'm doin good, thank you, Mr. Ernest, said Janelle as she laid a quarter in the waiting palm. Her jaws were heavy, muscular, so that when she spoke her voice came forth for all its pleasant flavor like light trying one las...

A sister and brother are shipped out for a month every year to live with their mother on a remote island, and feel like strangers in their own family. Image generated with OpenAI The arrangements were these. Early Sunday morning - it had to be a Sunday, he got nervy in heavy traffic - he would drive us in his old jeep from East Grover where we lived, to the ferry at Wooster's Point, about three hours away. The he in question was Preston, my father. My brother, Joey, would hold his stomach and act sick in the car because he didn't want to go. We told him things would be fine, and that he would have a great time, but he was always resistant to spending a month away from his home; his main home that is, with our father. At Wooster's we would cross the small ramp with our shoulder-bags and my father would wave us off. Sometimes he would tap the underside of his chin with the back of his fingers; it was a message to Joey. I can picture him now, our father, as clea...