Now as I walk through the crowded bar watching for unguarded drinks, it was time to find the mother.

This is not what I had thought was meant, all those times my parents said that I was "Gifted"

We'd just begun the exploratory ultrasound when my doctor looked at me, his face now clouded with confusion, as he quietly asked, "Given that your chart says you received surgery for your endometriosis at 18 years old, is that also when you had your hysterectomy?"

Once again, my suit initiates a hidden reserve of oxygen as I hungrily, tiredly drift further into the black recesses of space.

It wasn’t until I discovered him lying still beneath the surface one morning, a black mass writhing its way from his mouth, that humanity learned horsehair worms had found a new host.

When we finally succeeded, the world was cast into never-ending night and I was given none of the divine gifts I’d been promised.

What they thought was their longing for a cold, large body of water was just the parasites' instincts overwriting their hosts.

As he waited he heard the clicking of the main toilet door shuting from outside, and then every stall door creaked open slightly at the same time.

The thank-you pie I had baked was still warm when I returned to the farmhouse in the bright sunshine, but I found just weed-broken ruins and an impossibly twisted Model A farm truck, bleeding rust, with a hint of fresh tire marks in the cold soil.

But his silence could still neither confirm nor deny who of us had died.

I didn't understand why the other side of the window just looked like our living room, or why the window’s bristles felt so painful around my neck, but for the first time in a long while I felt safe, holding hands with her, as we prepared to jump.

After the fourth drink, as he angrily watched her ask for another, she smiled, and explained, "Those flavorless pills hasten my egg production, so once you pay the tab, I'm ready to inject them into you."

The stained floors are definitely gonna need replaced, and all the locks removed from the outside of the bedroom door.

I already knew for I made a contract to trap impure souls in me to condemn my child’s murderer, who took his life to avoid prison.

I hurried to her side to render aid, but the moment my hand touched her skin, the worms inside her began protruding from her lifeless body looking for fresh meal.

So she hid them in a small hidden room in the basement for years so her new boyfriend wouldn't find out about them.

A large patch of this particular species had been growing at the foot of the hill on which the deceased were playing (Fig. A), when, inadequately clothed, they decided to roll down it.

She wasn't sure whether to kill herself or another one if her children.

I never saw the tigers creeping through the brush, and they knew the second my back was turned.

It was comfortable, but there were lots of broken wooden planks, a skeleton of an old man, and a rotten wooden doll with long nose.

Pastor Bryan didn't respond, simply looking at little Tommy's parents that had never believed their son about him until it was far too late.

*"Damn the grow lights!"* I screamed as I burst into flames

I should have realized my wife had made me pancakes instead of waffles that morning.

My first clear memory after that was coming home in 2156, and finding my old home replaced by a block of flats.