#weird

Have you ever searched for employment for so long that pretty much any offer looked like a dream job? That was me a few summers ago. Fresh out of college, broke as shit, and desperate enough to answer a CraigsList ad. Yes, people still use CraigsList. Yes, it’s mostly sketchy as Hell. The post was titled “WANTED: WATER SAFETY EXPERT. START IMMEDIATELY.” It sounded like an official title, something important… but then again, so do “Sanitation Engineer” and “Sandwich Artist”.

Darkness. Not a peep in the void. Then shapes, sounds, blurred and distorted, but growing into something more tangible. I feel my feet on the floor and my arms by my sides. My mouth is dry, and my breath comes to me in short gasps. Tasteful piano music soothes my aching brain, though I see no piano. I blink the haziness away and take in my surroundings, realising with moderate shock that I’m in my household ballroom.

Tommy Morgan did not have the best life. Coming from a broken home, the young 11-year-old only experienced the worst: his father would return home drunken like a skunk, and he would get into heated arguments with his wife over money and how since he was the bread maker, he could do with his earnings what he saw fit. Tommy’s mother would do chores around the house, her eyes red from sobbing.

No, he wore that outfit last time and felt overdressed. Something more casual would be better. Just not too casual.

There she is the center of my affection. The reason I wake up in the morning. I have heart palpitations because of her. Jessica Mackenzie. I have known her ever since preschool, and I have been in love with her since. I have tried to confess my feelings to her, believe me I have, but every time I see her, I freeze up and bite my tongue. She was always sociable. Like the planets that revolve around the Sun, she could pull people into her orbit.

Three years. It has been three years since that incident. Three years since I put myself out there and got into the dating field. Despite it being years since I met her, I hear her voice any time I’m alone, and I often felt her touch on my skin whenever I laid restless in bed. Not a day would go by without me reflecting on the past which I agree is unhealthy, but it was a force of habit. I feel that I owe you all an explanation.

A magician came to our town one dreary day after a large thunderstorm. He carried a briefcase that he claimed was filled with people's hopes and dreams. The briefcase was large and wrapped in an exotic coating. Many witnesses described seeing it move under the magician's grasp.

I didn't remember how I got there. One moment, I was somewhere ordinary—a grocery store, maybe my car—and the next, I was standing in the polished hallway of a sprawling mansion. The floors gleamed like polished obsidian under chandeliers that glittered coldly overhead. The place was immaculate, almost painfully so, but something about it felt wrong.

This story is about a young guy named Finn who lived and survived in a dark thick forest where snow fell often and anything that could move was still and frozen. Finn was ice fishing with his regular gear, near a hut he had found which was made from tree bark and vines growing over a structure formed from ice. He smiled as he reeled in a large catch, and he began to dance. However he slipped on the ice and hit his head on a rock. Looking around for any witnesses of his embarrassment, he saw…