Before The Words, There Were Echoes

There was silence in the universe. Words were nowhere to be found, as if all existence had stopped and all that was left was a void of utter disbelief and confusion. How can there be something, and yet it means nothing?

She had many words inside her, words that boiled into nothingness and brought about the vapor of insignificance. She remembered “in the beginning was the Word,” but instead of feeling any sense of security, she lost heart.

In that loss, she grasped the emptiness of whispers and asked the vast expanse:

“What is needed to be compassionate?”

“A soul.”

From Guest Contributor Aida Bode

The Final Body

Once the police left with the final body, the reporters scattered their separate ways, much like vultures after a dinner party. I headed to my favorite diner, hoping some scalding coffee and room temperature pie would scrub away my lingering sense of insignificance.

Denizens of a past-its-prime diner also tend to be past-their-prime, but on this night, the man staring at me from across the booth reminded me of an aging but still dangerous predator, albeit one missing his front teeth.

Staring back at him, I had no way of knowing I was about to be embraced by eternal irrelevance.