9/11 Short Stories

We saw a tiny roof on the side of a trailer. We waited under there until the rain died down. I wanted to go home—I really did—but I knew I had promised Phoebe that I wouldn’t run for the hills. The rain died down and we continued walking home.

Out of the darkness, rivers of brilliant light and color began to flow all around her, as if a dam holding back a rainbow had miraculously burst. Then she heard the music... a melody so beautiful it tugged at her very soul. It was as if the euphony clothed her in an impenetrable blanket. She felt warm. She felt safe. Uncontrollably, tears welled up, the hymn gripping her heart, and she was forced to squeeze her eyes shut and instinctively her body curled into a protective ball.

Red light, bright as the midday sun, flared into existence. It began to flicker and waver. Small tongues of flame spread their reach, jumping from the floor onto the nearby curtains. It began to pick up the pace as it consumed more and more like a starving creature. In seconds, it had spread to all the curtains that spanned across the room-length window. Smoke filled the air, giving the walls a fine layer of ash and soot. In the bed opposite the window, a girl rested her head. Her eyes flashed open as she breathed in the heavy tang.

Obtrusively,the thunder bellowed outside and the roaring sound filled the small room like rock music to a broken soul.Amongst the thunder, raindrops could be seen ebbing down the windowsill forming undecipherable miniscule shapes and later sinking down in the wall to gather at the edge.

I awoke to a cacophony of screams, both of excitement and of pain. I jolted up quickly, unable to control my own muscles or vocal chords, as if a spectre was holding me back with airy fingers of death.

‘Well…. Well, after Dad came back from his deliveries, he accidently brought back someone else with him,’ sighed OJ, ‘Her… her named was Tammy…. Tammy No-Teeth.’

Barbara knew that there was only one place Andy would go, and that was in the dark underbrush that grew by the side of the garden shed. For once, her thorns would come in handy, thought Barbara. With a renewed air of strength Barbara made her way towards the garden shed, worryingly noticing along the way that what was once a patch of browned earth near the pond had already grown and over taken more than half of the garden. As Barbara neared the shed, she overheard Andy’s sugary voice, and paused behind a dead dandelion to listen

Alys ran through the street, holding a coat above her head in attempt to shield from the downpouring rain. Holding all the rain it could, the coat dropped all the water on to Aly’s head. She stopped under the archway to a shop and ran a hand through her white-blonde hair. The rain had taken out the curls and made it shoulder length.

Rain hit my head, raced down my face and back. We trudged through the mud, sinking in our boots feet deep. All we could see was our breathe, all we could hear was the wind slapping against the trees, rain hitting, and our boots squishing in the mud. We expected the weather to be like this, the weather channel had been going crazy all week about a storm passing through our way around 5 pm today. Just as predicted the rain became heavier, fog thicker, and sky darker. But our search group did not give up; we had been searching months for the beloved missing girl named Emma Barrett in the Elliott State Forest in Oregon. She was last scene heading into the forest with her parents on a Tuesday afternoon for a hike, hours

Cadenza walked the halls of Garden Grove High School quickly and quietly, taking soft steps and not looking up. You had to be careful when you were something like her. All through her family tree, from her great great great great great grandmother to as recent as her mom, her ancestors had been cursed with this gift. Every time, they had tried to help the people. Every time, they had been burned alive. But she had something special. Something, she thought, other witches didn’t have.

“Please, Mr. Henderson.” Melissa tugged her shawl tighter around her shoulders despite the glow of coals from the stove inside the small brick office. Half past nine o’clock and the sun had yet to break through the morning clouds. With rain threatening, along with its tendency to turn the roads into quagmires deep enough to swallow a horse or two, she needed to persuade the banker soon.

It had been raining intermittently for the past four days and by late Saturday afternoon, another storm was approaching the rural southern town of Wrongberight. Clemmy Sue Jarvis since birth has lived in the town and had a simple philosophy concerning weather. As long as she was six feet above ground instead of six feet below, she did not care what it was. Today as she lifts her petite frame into her rusty Ford pickup, she is preoccupied with what she hopes to accomplish this evening. Absorbed in though she pulls out of her driveway and heads south on Flat Bottom Road along the edge the Dismal Swamp towards the isolated home of her dearest friend Estelle

Sandra pulled her black trench coat tighter around herself in an ineffective attempt to fend off the biting July winds. A sliver of moon hung in the night sky but it was obscured by the dark clouds that prowled across it. Street lights dimly illuminated the houses on Melrose Lane, casting an eerie orange glow across white picket fences but leaving front gardens a shadowy forest. All the lights were out except those at number 33. A familiar red Ford Fiesta was parked in the driveway.

“ Mom, did you read the tv? There 's supposed to be a flash flood tonight” Jordan said, she’d never been in a real storm before. She wondered if tonight could be the night.

Amelio wrote Leliana and Alistair’s names on the board next to the words Summer Street library. After every spot next to each library was filled, the bell rang that signaled that it was time to go home.