The dry slithering sound suddenly started up again and this time it was much closer.

They fell on their swords like good little soldiers while their boss pretended not to know them.

The days grew shorter and her heart sadder.

Grand artifice was America's gift to the world.

Although he looked much younger, Todd gave away his age with his vast knowledge of obscure 80s bands who he had seen in their heyday.

Bumping along the back roads she realized her desultory sense of direction could be applied to a number of other parts of her life.

They hid together in the neon and dust.

Where the sky meets the ocean dreams become tactile.

The plane touched down on the tarmac touching off the rush back to real life.

The times they spent together camping, broke but happy, were the best of their short lives.

The night sky with its unlimited possibilities was his last refuge.

Their message of hate was wrapped in Christianity and tied with a nationalist bow for good measure.

Barb went from being wined and dined to listening to her husband's whining and the din from the constant bickering of her three step kids.

As Adelaide hopped over the cracked and uneven pavement she suddenly realized she no longer had to avoid the clefts in the sidewalk since her mother was dead.

The arbiters of taste raged against the so called hoi polloi who didn't give a rat's ass what they thought.

Politics had seeped into everything, from the breakfast cereal you chose to the clothes you wore to the television shows you watched.

Irene mused about her ennui and a deep-seated penchant for the darker aspects of life, which only made her that much more weepy.

Our lives had been slowly dismantled and left to rust.

The blustering buffoonery worn like a royal robe hid a weak, weak man.

Her computer had more empathy than her boss did.

The bleak black night had only just begun.

He spent his entire life waiting for a single shining moment of revenge.

As the gunman levels his pistol at Burt's chest all he can think about is what a great story this will make to tell the boys at the bar, if he survives.

Perfidy was the senator's most prominent attribute and yet he kept getting reelected.

Ever the optimist, Patricia believed her son's espousal of nihilism meant he was finally starting to care about something.

They burned it to the ground and blamed the voiceless and we all just nodded our heads, thankful the finger hadn't yet been pointed in our direction.

"Shit and dirt are what make seeds grow," he told his captor as he sat chained to the floor.

The tightrope she was forced to walk at work on a daily basis now seemed as thin as floss and as high as the Andes. 

Where were the heroes as in ancient times who would save us from ourselves?

The dead had only been in the ground a few weeks when, with a quick name change and a wink and a nod, the corporation was back in business.