a simple procedure (NEW)
The place stinks like stale sweat and burnt coffee. He closes the door and starts flipping the locks. "So you wanna be a hotshot, huh? What'll it be? Superhuman strength? Wanna breathe fire?"

marooned
He finds her marooned a few feet from her transport, sporting her usual arsenal of deadly weaponry—tiny ring-mounted laser turrets, lipstick laced with neurotoxins, boots loaded with poison fléchettes and the oldest doomsday device known to man. . . paralyzing beauty.

tofu
"Leave the tofu for the vegetarians, please," he says. That's his job; he stands here and tells people to leave the tofu for the vegetarians. Unbelievable.

rain in arkansas
Raindrops slap her forehead. She levels the lens at him, praying the light will be good enough. He rattles on and on about how great everything was when he was getting nookie in the oval office and how his library will teach everybody in this awful state to read.

canoe
The air is thick with heat. Something screeches in the canopy. I flinch, shaking the canoe. Olhado keeps rowing and we glide into the jungle. The trees stand on spindly roots that reach into the water like hands. In my periferal vision I catch one of them moving, repositioning its hold on the muddy water. I peer into the jungle and rub my eyes.

just talk
Two Australians and a Scotsman sit around the fire. Their faces are ruddy from the flames and pineapple juice mixed with rice whiskey. The ocean whispers to itself just beyond the flicker of a bonfire.

sale
We came for the coffee maker. It was now safe in the trunk of my car, but we lingered—like rubberkneckers at the scene of an accident.

trouble
Once again it's raining in the city and I find myself wondering through its wet streets.  A fine mist falls through the air and collects on flashing neon signs that read "Live Nude Girls" and "Triple X". They cast an eerie glow that awakens an appetite for some trouble.