“Petra,” Ella called. “Come out from under the bed. What's wrong?”

I was huddled in the corner of the Monster Under The Bed's room, clutching my knees to my still enormous chest. The Monster was patting my head with her trunk, making cooing sounds trying to calm me down. One of her long, multi-jointed arms took a cookie from a plate on her table and held it up to me. I didn't take it. I barely noticed it.

Gaby and the Tyrannosaurus.
by Angharad

“If I find that bloody Drew Bond, I’m gonna bloody well kill ‘im.” The large, ill-tempered boy, nicknamed Tyrannosaurus Becks, made his way out of the school. Quite what he had against young Bond nobody seemed to know—especially Bond, as he was away racing when the comment was made. However, it soon made its way via the grapevine at Warsop College to the gang.

“What’s he after Drew for?” asked Maddy, second cousin and on-off girlfriend of the aforementioned boy.

“Shapes, not bodies,” I corrected.

“What's the difference?”

“I have no idea, but seems important.”

Jo takes steps to deal with mother-in-law problems and has a surprise proposition.

“Hi , you must be Sally Walker, thanks for coming to talk with me.” I smiled as we shook hands before sitting down.

“I’m intrigued Jo, Jim Marshall did not tell me much about what you want me to do, other than the fact that you need some confidential investigative work done. The main thing that intrigues me is why use a reporter like me rather than a private investigator?”

“About once a month, on average, yeah.”

I just had to hope I wasn’t going to move too far down the alphabet.

Musings of a tights obsessed transvestite

Dennis becomes infatuated with the girl in the blue denim skirt who sits on the low brick wall running along the path inside Aston Park. He knows that his infatuation with her is troublesome and that he should just ignore her but he just can't resist her allure.

Looking out the window at the howling blizzard, Von sipped his tea, contemplating his rather open schedule for the day. Since Mage Aleksandar had taken over all Council business, he had found himself largely at loose ends. Scratching his stump, he realized he should have expected that to happen. While he hadn't been declared a traitor, he couldn't expect much more than that.

Hanging by my skirt, looking down at the mock hydra who was almost close enough to touch, with only a small tree keeping me from falling on top of the monster, I silently sent prayer to every single god and demon I knew of, including my history teacher. It didn't seem to help as the tree cracked again and I got another inch closer to the reptile.

As he watched the sunrise on the horizon, causing the brilliant golden spires of the city to twinkle like the multi-colored stars that had just retreated from the sky, the King couldn’t help but issue a forlorn sigh. Even the flock of yellow and green dragons that passed by overheard shortly thereafter, off to begin their morning hunt for the red whales of the nearby purple sea, did little to lift his spirits.

Slave to Beauty
A vignette from some images found
By Maryanne Peters

I was brought up in a beautiful home. My mother called herself “A Slave to Beauty” as if that could explain everything that she did to me – or perhaps excuse it. It was like saying that she had no choice, but surely that was mine.

“You’re not as bony as you used to be,” Dad commented.

He took both my hands in his, startling me. “I’d like to make it up to you."

The orinal story was written as a bit of topical fun for Coronation Day, but I decided that there was still a bit of life left in it and completed a sequel following on with how Lou's life changed.

A group of friends streams their gaming on Wednesday nights. But not all the action is on the dining room table.

Drying off after the hot tub, I leaned over and quietly asked Ella, “What exactly is a manicure and pedicure?”

“You really are a boy,” she whispered, her smile taking any potential sting out of her words. “They're going to clean, massage, and colour our hands, feet, and nails. It feels really nice, just relax and go with it.”