My father had a word for men like him: cancers. They start small, in a single department, but if left unchecked, their malignancy spreads, poisoning the entire culture. I watched him on screen now, a little tyrant on his little stage. He was berating a young busboy, a teenager named Leo who couldn’t be more…
Month: December 2025
My name is Emily Carter. Just two hours earlier, the world had made sense. My younger sister, Emma, had finally given birth after years of fertility struggles. My husband, Daniel, and I had driven through the relentless Seattle drizzle to St. Mary’s Medical Center, a bouquet of yellow tulips in my hand and a stuffed…
But the air in the room suddenly shifted. The temperature seemed to drop ten degrees. I turned to look at Daniel. He wasn’t smiling. He wasn’t offering the teddy bear. He was staring at the infant with an expression of pure, unadulterated horror. His pupils were blown wide, swallowing the blue of his irises. His…
He dragged a hand down his face, wiping away cold sweat. He looked around to ensure the hallway was empty, then leaned in close, his voice barely audible. “I recognized him, Emily. The hair. The eyes. The specific, crescent-shaped scar above the left eyebrow.” “Babies have scratches,” I argued, trying to rationalize the insanity. “He…
The woman barely spoke, never looked anyone in the eye, just took her bags and left. She had a strange, pungent smell — a mix of iron, rotting meat, and something else the butcher couldn’t identify. Rumors quickly spread around the market. Vendors whispered:— They say she’s feeding her son’s family.— Or maybe her dogs.—…
The girl crouched down and began to stroke its wet fur. The otter didn’t run away — on the contrary, it pressed against her knee, touched her hands, and twitched its whiskers as if sniffing her. Everyone around smiled; the scene was so touching that many stopped to watch. But suddenly, the otter stopped playing….
He didn’t say anything more, but from that day on, he changed — cold, distant, and almost like a stranger. He began spending more and more time away from home, stopped caring about his wife’s health, and seemed to be waiting for her to disappear from his life. Months passed. Anna continued to work in…
Someone must have abandoned it, maybe even tried to drown it — the river was right there. I felt an overwhelming wave of pity. I gently picked it up — a warm, trembling little body. It whimpered softly and pressed itself trustingly against my hands. I wrapped it in my jacket and hurried home. All…
There she was in the kitchen, casually pouring a glass of wine. Nathan cried from his playpen nearby. She didn’t comfort him. She kicked the side of the playpen instead, hard enough to make it slide across the marble floor. “Shut up!” she snapped at the screen. Then Sophie appeared. Isabelle grabbed her arm, yanking…
She nodded, eyes wide, and disappeared down the hall. I heard the lock click. I walked into the kitchen. Isabelle stood there, phone pressed to her ear, laughing. “Richard, I know,” she was saying. “I’ll call you back. He might be home soon.” She ended the call and turned toward me, her face instantly transforming…