ache again

One week Stetson decides to frame his sermon as an address to the denizens of hell, as a sort of sideways warning to the congregation before him. But somehow during the sermon he feels the attention of another audience, and afterward the plight of the souls lost to damnation takes a hold of him. He feels compelled to preach to them again, and several more times, to the bewilderment of his congregation.

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represent a roar

The president must decide how to use federal troops when Wisconsin declares war on, and invades, Michigan.

delete

Robbie responded to a medical alert to find a man who had had a stroke while looking at internet pornography. Or maybe he had the stroke somewhere else and was trying to delete his history before dying. This thought kept worming its way through his head as he tried unsuccessfully to hit on the neighbor who had seen the ambulance pull up and had come over to help out if she could. As he was leaving the thought bloomed into an idea for a product – an emergency delete button to delete everything you don’t want your loved ones to see on your computer. It could be a button next to the medic alert – it could be incorporated as an option on the existing service.

hedge

The twentieth intracloud confrontation between heteronyms saw the past tense of wind matched against the synonym for injury. The mole lawyers speculating fortunes on the outcome relied on play by play whispered to them through the conduits of the ether. They could not share the tension of the melting sunset which signalled the impending end of the contest. Their audit to protect themselves from Newman/Redford antics was an examination for effects of the outcome of meteorites which passed through the cloud arena.

tough it out

A professional union organizer, discouraged one night, takes a bottle down to the hotel lobby. He enters a philosophical debate with the desk clerk, who turns out to be a nominalist. The clerk argues that the organizer is failing to accomplish his ideals because his ideals are themselves a fiction.

run through

Artist Dwyer developed a video installation that consisted of recorded speed-runs of video games, but with a character or some other element replaced by something incongruous. Sonic the Hedgehog became a cricket batsman, Link became a cowgirl. Before his installation opened he and the gallery were sued by Nintendo, so they cancelled the exhibit. Frank and Linda learn about the work and wanted to see it. They visit Dwyer’s studio but he is suspicious of them and refuses to let them see it. He doesn’t destroy it, though.

semispeaker

On a school band trip, the bus stopped at a fast food restaurant in a highway oasis. The flirt from the girl traveling with her family earned Patrick a big “ooh” from his friends seated at nearby tables. She wrote her skype id on his hand. He called her a couple days later and they began a long-distance relationship. Soon he was on the phone with her every night as she told him about her abusive family life. He was by turns disturbed and excited by it, then disgusted with himself, then skeptical of her.

mete

I knew how trips with Greg usually went. They were disasters. So as part of my preparation I sewed emergency rations into my clothes. When I needed them, and ripped open the seams, I discovered that the pouches had been cut into. I realized they had been leaking, which allowed the wolves to follow me all the more easily. Greg must have done it out of spite, while I slept. Jerk.

postcard

I saw your comments at the following url. I can guess the meandering path which your argument walks, discarding bits of itself in order to address a new tangential subject. your fevered murmurings do not move me, though I confess they are neither obsequious nor supercilious, on which I must congratulate you. I hate to disturb the charming patina of responses which your statements have grown, so I send you this card. If you wish to debate further you can send a response to the post office box below. Otherwise I will not correspond further.

responsibility

Their lips approached each other but slowed before touching to revel in the tension, which was suddenly broken by the click and flare of a cigarette lighter. The shadow behind the glowing red dot spoke: “I was working on some calculations when I heard you two fumbling around down here. I felt it my duty to interrupt.”