In which a well-off white girl falls for a starving African boy.

stories left behind by burnt out souls. [trigger warning: suicide. viewer discretion advised.]

A girl. A train. A delay. [Cover made by rigor_samsa]

I just want you to know that i never really like you either. Short Story #134 12/22/13 Romance #562 Copyright © 2013 Perspective_

Ice and Fire. Two elements that were never meant to mix. Arleigh Frost is ice, and Nathan Sparks is fire, but when the two clash, there’s instant attraction. It’s complete bliss when both their identities are kept secret from each other. But when a second occurrence leads them to reveal that one is a member of a team the other is supposed to destroy, they know that their love is forbidden and very destructive. And that’s only one of the many reasons why they shouldn’t be together. This isn't Romeo and Juliet. This is Nathan and Arleigh. And they're about to rewrite Shakespeare's classic about love.

“I would never like you unless pigs started flying, the satellite crashed onto Earth, aliens invaded town and it started raining marshmallows!” Alyssa Evans—the school’s reject and nerd is patiently waiting for the return of her best friend. Life couldn’t get any more boring and normal, whatever normal is. But she gets a shock of her life when she’s informed that the mysterious intruder in her room was to be her new brother! Throw in a shocking confession from her childhood best friend, two wacky parents, a big secret, and a pop star, could Alyssa’s life ever be normal again?

Imagine the second you're born, a consultant removes you from your mother's grasp and runs a battery of genetic and physiological tests on you. Thirty minutes later they give you a score out of one hundred which denotes your level of perfection. If your score is above eighty and you work hard to maintain that score you will have a charmed life; well fed, well-rewarded, spoiled. But fall below eighty and you're labelled Flawed, and life will not be so kind. Hannah is adopted by a Flawed family when her birth parents choose their social standing over their daughter and endures a life of struggle, hunger and service. One day Hannah is escorted to the regional government office and told that the Consultant who delivered her, who labelled her Flawed got it wrong! Now, she is being relocated back to her birth parents, to live as one of the Ninety-Five- all medically and legally judged as perfect. Entering this new life Hannah has an impossible decision to make which puts not only hers, but the lives of everyone she cares about at great risk. "The Numbered- where no one wants to be number one". Authors notes: -This is a first draft of my story and will be edited soon. -2013 Began writing Flawed -2015 Watty Winner/ Named changed to The Numbered -2016 Completed The Numbered -2019 Optioned by eOne for development into a TV show.

Delaney Escott lives in a world where popularity reigns supreme. If you want to be noticed, social status is everything. The government is run by the Superiors: a very exclusive group of individuals who are virtually flawless. They are smarter than us and stronger than us, and to join their ranks is the highest honor. The Superiors pay an annual visit to the top schools in the nation and evaluate the students, choosing one boy and one girl - the most Popular in the school - to go the Capitol and train for Superiority. Delaney thinks that she's the only one indifferent to (and perhaps even suspicious of) the Superiors, until Caleb Payne, the most popular boy in school, approaches her with a request. He has a task for her, one that he believes she is uniquely capable of completing. And as she helps him, Delaney discovers that the government is hiding many secrets - and that the truth of the Superiors is far from what people believe it to be. [Watty Awards 2012 Winner, Science-Fiction: On the Rise]

I fell in love with a physicist, and then we lost ourselves. Maybe there are places we can all be happy. We just need to find those places. Or maybe they don't exist.