Mr. Jamison spittles at the slightest outrage until his face turns red. Mrs. Hathaway displays a particular shade of pea green–reminiscent of the Sunday soup–every time her medication’s late. Mr. Dunn has lived so long in the grips of his melancholia that even his clothes radiate the same empty shade of gray.

However, don’t mention these harlequin insights in the presence of Dr. Straithorn. She would never admit to her color-blindness, but it’s really the only explanation for all the torture. Even the idea of color is abhorrent to her. The patients all suffer for her jealousy.

The open expanse frightened more than exhilarated him. He often dreamed of what it would be like for a snail, firmly enclosed inside the safety of its own home. Or for a prairie dog, living in the tight spaces of its underground burrow, surrounded on all sides by dirt.

Such is the life of a cockroach living in an airplane hangar.

Every morning, Tom Hopperwell awoke to find his garden in disarray. It looked as if a miniature battle had been fought among his tulips and vegetables.

Tom first set fire to the house, making sure the blaze completely incinerated the garden. Then he and his wife relocated to Florida. Some might call him extreme, but Tom had a hunch Florida would be too hot for the ants.

Detective Stephens surveyed the scene, trying to make sense of it. He could be certain of only one thing. The man was dead.

The mystery was never explained, but the man’s ghost never did leave. At least it was well-dressed.

She had only one weakness, but as with others of tremendous power–Achilles, Samson–it would be that weakness that would be her undoing.

In the end, it was a bucket of water that occasioned her demise. Once she had tasted water, it was impossible to continue life as a witch.

These are the dog days our grandparents warned us about. So it is that the canines now rule the streets. They rollick and bark and go alpha male on anyone they see.

Most will not be so lucky.

Brad saw her the first day of class and immediately fell in love. She was cool. She had tattoos on every part of her body. The tattoos made her an outcast as much as her attitude, but Brad loved her for both.

Brad loved her all the more. As he told his friends, “True love is not concerned with surface things.”

Chet’s father was mercilessly slain by the evil usurper. Chet himself was spared, spirited away to a remote hideaway where he was raised with only one aspiration: revenge.

Nor did Chet know anything about the evil usurper. There was no map to lead Chet to his kingdom. No instructions on how to defeat the evil scourge. There was simply the name: Congenital Heart Disease.

It was another one of our awkward silences. We stood their staring into the distance, afraid to make eye contact. We sedulously avoided entering each other’s personal space. We danced around each other with delicate steps, on tiptoe, a deeply ingrained choreography learned after years of rehearsal.

The question always hung between us, why we ever agreed to marry.