It wasn’t until the next morning when Anton sat down in his chair in his large ornate office, that the full impact of what had happened the night before began to sink in. As usual, Audrey his para legal came in with the first of his endless mugs of strong coffee. But he noticed she didn’t have her usual smile which constantly adorned

After every couple of years, Chris would return to the village where he was born and grew up. Whenever he did, just before the bus from the large city terminal dropped him off not very far from his old home, his heart would begin to soar knowing that a rush of memories would fill his mind as soon as he got off the bus.

As he done on so many occasions in the past, Campbell lay in bed way after the alarm had sounded trying to motivate himself to begin his day. His mind played tricks with him. It was as if half his mind told him he was retired and thus didn’t need to be anywhere, while the other half told him that time was no longer a friend.

“Charlie, come on in here for a moment, please.”

Robert Bentley hung up the phone and sat back in his armchair waiting for his son and heir to his business to show up. As he did, Robert kept looking at the photographs of a newly constructed building while violently shaking his head. Finally, his son made his long-awaited appearance.

Mr. Levy came into Kumar’s office. “Good morning,” he said jovially as he put a folded newspaper on his desk. Kumar was surprised to see Mr Levy. He didn’t usually come into his office.

“Good morning, sir,” he replied standing up. Mr Levy smiled and indicated to him to sit down. Kumar looked at the folded newspaper.

The doorbell rang. Anton didn’t hear it. He was laying on a couch in his living room, which was in the back of the house with his eyes closed and the music cranked up to drown out the sounds of the everyday and allow him to decompress.

It was very late when Ian pulled into the motel car park. He smiled. ‘The ABC Motel,’ the sign said. How original he thought as he left his car running and went into the office. There wasn’t anyone there. The lights were on though.

There was a chance, nay not a chance but a great probability, that life would not turn out the way Dennis had planned. In fact, using the word planned is an insult not only to the word and its specific meaning, but also to those who make planning an art. It is to those people that Dennis owes an apology.

“Why do you sprint the last 100 yards or so at the end of your 2 mile walk?”

“Just to prove to myself,” replied Ian completely winded, “just to prove to myself I can still do it!”

It was deep winter when Marjorie finally met up with Kumar. The Northeast winds had that year decided warm winters were to be a thing of the past and had subsequently ushered in blizzard like conditions nearly every week.

It had been about 3 months since the two of them had last met at the country club.

Anton, a tall gaunt man with a pronounced square jawline in his early 30s, stood in the dock. He had been standing there for the last two hours. His hands were tied behind his back with a nylon tie. They had been tied behind his back for the last two hours. He wasn’t allowed to talk.

“Look, look, look!” shouted Bruce standing in his garden holding a large green vegetable in his arms, while extending them above his head. His shouts of glee went unheeded, but his enthusiasm did not diminish. “Look!” he shouted again but this time he addressed those in the house by name.

“Next stop Africa!” Howard enjoyed proclaiming that in a most dramatic fashion, by throwing his arms wide open while facing the ocean. He especially enjoyed doing that when a friend of his visited him at his home on the Eastern coast of the US.

“The world’s worst invention!”

“What is?”

“Leaf blowers.”

“Leaf blowers?”

“Yes, leaf blowers are the world’s worst invention.

“What are you doing here?”

“Hello Marjorie,” replied Kumar getting up from the plush armchair he was sunk in and extending his hand towards her.

Marjorie closed her eyes for a second and took in a deep breath. “I’m sorry,” she said sounding apologetic for her direct sharp question.

“No, no, but listen to this, she says to me if these don’t work, there are others available to us.” Chris laughed. He hadn’t stopped laughing ever since his friend Barry and he had sat down together under the shade of a very large beach umbrella, while their wives went off for their morning walk.

“A man and his dog should never be parted.” Steven shook his head in disbelief. “How do you think up these things?”

Bryan shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t know. They just come to me, but in this case, I don’t think I made that up. I’m sure I’ve heard someone else say it.”

One can always count on Nathan to do the wrong things when it matters most. Nathan lives in a perpetual virtual world in which he is the only occupant, or if there were others nearby, they were inconsequential. Nathan fails to rise to the occasion, in fact fails to rise to any occasion.

Robert slipped out on to his deck just as the first rays of the new morning sun were a faint glow on the horizon. He sat down on a seemingly cold wrought aluminium chair and put his coffee down on the table. He wasn’t ready just yet to take the first sip and thereby welcome in another day in his life.

“Where did you go to lunch?”

“We didn’t go anywhere.”

“You mean to tell me that Mr Levy met with you and didn’t take you anywhere for lunch?”

“That’s not what I meant. We didn’t go out for lunch. We had lunch in his office.”