Goodbye, Mr. Regret

Timothy stared at the message on his phone, his dark eyes fixed on the glowing

screen for a long while.

[Do you like it?]

He typed a reply.

[Yeah, just like Happy and Lucky.]

He pressed his lips together, thinking.

If Sheila liked them, there was no harm in giving her one too.

There were twenty-two left.

He bought them all, though he only intended to keep one.

The rest, he'd throw away.

It was just an excuse to set one aside for Sheila.

[If you like it, keep it.]

Capital City.

Jessica was too afraid to sleep. She huddled in the corner of the hotel room, knees pulled to her chest, shivering so hard her fingernails nearly broke the skin of her palms.

Every clap of thunder struck like a hammer against her heart.

storm had knocked out the power, plunging the room into total darkness. Only when lightning ripped across the sky did the world briefly flicker into view. The wind

memories crashed over

evening, the sky was heavy and gray, rain threatening at any

the corner store for a bottle of soy sauce, and

spent ages picking out candy, even choosing a

practically skipping on the way home, swinging her bag of groceries, when she reached the foot of her

a sickening

she finally looked, she saw it

mom's gentle eyes stared wide and unseeing, blood

in dark, snaking rivulets

eyes, nose, mouth, and ears.

shouted that a woman had

surrounded her

groceries crashed to the ground.

call out, to

parted, but no

the thunder and

their apartment, and

darkness, the image of her

and rolling thunder outside never stopped, battering

never understood why her mother had

regretted, with every fiber in her body, the

only she had come home earlier, maybe

her teeth, hands shaking as she

was

Her lips trembled.

thunder nearly made her drop the