Short Stories

*click* The camera shutter clicks. The picture is saved, soon to be hitting inboxes, mailboxes, and social media alike. An adorable family, arms placed around each other, smiles on faces. Picture perfect. The picture-perfect image sent out to family and friends, convincing them that this life is great—nothing wrong here. And what a show it is. That brief millisecond in time that the camera captures doesn't show the tense moments before. It doesn't show the tears quickly wiped away or the stress of getting the entire family to coordinate themselves. All it shows is what they want it to. And when it doesn't—there's always Photoshop or after-touches. So that the story they want told is the one captured. After the shutter closes, the teen has his dress shirt off before the camera can be packed away and is already on his way to his bedroom, grumbling about friends he had to put off. The youngest member of the family is already holding their hands out for the tablet, just as ...

Chapter 1 How did she end up here? Everything she had learned about fairness, about order said this was not where she should be. Growing up in a small town where everybody knew everybody and a stranger was a spectacle, Sara knew of the Knight family. She saw the children they fostered—rarely. Those kids didn’t attend public school with the other local children. They were always a little…off. Something about them never sat right. Sara was seventeen—almost an adult in the eyes of the law, at least. She had always done well in school, averaging A’s and B’s. She kept to herself. The other kids were always getting into trouble—drinking down at the creek or harassing the late-night crew at the Walmart. Sara wanted no part of that. She kept her nose clean. Or at least she tried to. What landed her here with the Knight family was, as they say, a series of unfortunate accidents. She had been working late, clocking out when a group of troublemaking kids ran through the parking lot. One of ...