Peach Tree Grove

      There she was-the weird girl from the other day, he recognized her pale hair and orange cardigan.      He almost raised his hand and shouted a greeting, but she had jumped a good six feet when he'd done that last time, and then run off before he could say anything. He'd wait till he got a little closer and say hello in a normal tone of voice. Keep the volume down. Like Mom said, judge the situation, curb his enthusiasm accordingly, all that good stuff. And it sounded like she was already talking to someone too.      "Yes I know that I need to take care of it, but I also have to go to school! People start asking questions if you don't go to school!" she hissed.      "Would they? In all truth?"     "Yes!" she clutched the handle of her cello case close to her. Who was she talking to?      "But it is not their business what you do. And this is more important." That other voice was weird. It was kind ...

       The thief paused with one foot on the balcony and smiled out at the view before her, the dark sky above and the bright streets lighting her way below. She savored the night breeze on her face and her smile only grew wider as the door burst open behind her and the shorter of the two detectives rushed out.      "Alright crazy, I've caught you now!" she grinned breathlessly, and held out her taser in front of her as she approached, cuffs in one hand.      "Well, I suppose you would think that at first glance." the thief nodded in acknowledgement, and then stepped up onto the balcony with both feet and a smile.      "What-" The detective went slack-jawed as the other woman turned to face the city, arms spread, coat flapping in the wood, and enjoyed the breeze for a moment more.  Then she turned and winked.     "Good luck deciphering my note Miss Lily." And she jumped.      Lily scrambled fo...

      There is a place that is split in two.       On one side of the divide sits a town half-buried in dust, barren open plains, and dry, wind-stripped canyons. The sun beats down with a hateful, constant heat there. There the beams that make the people's buildings are bleached and splintered under the sun's intense heat, and the people who live there are sun-creased and wily as coyotes, their senses of humor and of honor as stripped to the bone as their towns. They only know the heat and the dusty dry; they thirst there, thirst for cool, for fertile ground, for water in abundance.     The towns on the other side have never known that hateful heat. All they know is rain. Rain that pours in never-ceasing sheets from the black sky and drips down their flickering neon bulbs and wet-blurred windows. They walk through dark streets under an inch of water with their heads down, the rain sliding off the hoods of their ponchos and their sleek coats, ...