contemporary-fiction

I__ really enjoying my solitude after feeling trapped by my family, friends and boyfriend. Just then I feel like making a resolution. A new year began six months ago but I feel like the time for change is now. No more whining about my pathetic life. I am going to change my life this very minute. Feeling as empowered as I felt when I read The Secret, I turn to reenter the hall. I know what I__l do! Instead of listing all the things I__ going to do from this moment on, I__ going to list all the things I__ never going to do! I__e always been unconventional (too unconventional if you ask my parents but I__l save that account for later). I mentally begin to make my list of nevers. -I am never going to marry for money like Natasha just did. -I am never going to doubt my abilities again. -I am never going to_ as I try to decide exactly what to resolve I spot an older lady wearing a bright red velvet churidar kurta. Yuck! I immediately know what my next resolution will be; I will never wear velvet. Even if it does become the most fashionable fabric ever (a highly unlikely phenomenon)I am quite enjoying my resolution making and am deciding what to resolve next when I notice Az and Raghav holding hands and smiling at each other. In that moment I know what my biggest resolve should be. -I will never have feelings for my best friend__ boyfriend. Or for any friend__ boyfriend, for that matter. That__ four resolutions down. Six more to go? Why not? It is 2012, after all. If the world really does end this year, at least I__l go down knowing I completed ten resolutions. I don__ need to look too far to find my next resolution. Standing a few centimetres away, looking extremely uncomfortable as Rags and Az get more oblivious of his existence, is Deepak. -I will never stay in a relationship with someone I don__ love, I vow. Looking for inspiration for my next five resolutions, I try to observe everyone in the room. What catches my eye next is my cousin Mishka giggling uncontrollably while failing miserably at walking in a straight line. Why do people get completely trashed in public? It__ just so embarrassing and totally not worth it when you__e nursing a hangover the next day. I recoil as memories of a not so long ago night come rushing back to me. I still don__ know exactly what happened that night but the fragments that I do remember go something like this; dropping my Blackberry in the loo, picking it up and wiping it with my new Mango dress, falling flat on my face in the middle of the club twice, breaking my Nine West heels, kissing an ugly stranger (Az insists he was a drug dealer but I think she just says that to freak me out) at the bar and throwing up on the Bandra-Worli sea link from Az__ car. -I will never put myself in an embarrassing situation like that again. Ever. I usually vow to never drink so much when I__ lying in bed with a hangover the next day (just like 99% of the world) but this time I__ going to stick to my resolution. What should my next resolution be?

His jaw was clenched. His breathing became labored, like he was carrying something heavy. She watched the muscles in his throat working, Adam__ apple bobbing as he swallowed, hard.Victory.At that moment, she knew he wouldn__ try to stop her. She stepped forward, raised herself up on her tiptoes, and kissed him. Softly. Then she pulled back, challenge unspoken.Come on, Sam. Fight for me.

sametimes people don't understand the promises they're making when they make them

Talk to me. Say something, anything," he pleaded quietly as if he was trying to tame a wild animal."There's nothing to say."He looked up and lowered his eyebrows on his eyes. "Why did you kiss me?

You're very different from the man I pictured you to be."I smirk at her, amused. What, so she didn't think I'd be a fucker with a drinking problem who is obviously very much into casual sex and reckless driving on a classic bike? I arch an eyebrow at her and run a hand along my square jaw. "I hope you find me sexier.

Could I be jealous of the way he was touching my horse? Yep ... I was.

He watches the shadows cast by her hands as she sorts through their clothes scattered across the floor. The shape of her arms as she reaches up, slipping his black T-shirt over her head -- like victory. He considers the triumph of this moment, the slick of sweat on his chest. A small clatter, then the sound of a striking match. Her face glows. he reaches for her. She blows the match out, darts across the room, lights another one, glows, blows it out.

Quick, somebody call the caretaker!_ Gemma__ stage voice rang out loud and clear. __here__ some trash here that needs to be taken out._ She earned a chorus of laughs as she walked towards us, then came to a standstill right beside me. __hrist, it reeks, too,_ she said, pinching her nose. __hat did you do, Malice? Douse yourself in the whole bottle? Oh, never mind. I don__ expect you to have heard of the adage __ess is more_.

In no mood for one of her silly games, I snatched it off her and scanned the page. It turned out to be a list of names, all of them boys, and some of whom I recognised. And then I noticed the title: __peration: Popping the Cherry_. I leaped to my feet and fired a glare at each of them in turn, trying not to shout. __re you shitting me?

It feels like the city is telling secrets down here, privy only to those who think to listen.

Dear Diary: I have a confession to make: I__e become a total idiot over French pastries. They__e my new favorite food. My new-found edible souvenir. My new favorite sin. Dunkin Donuts is so yesterday.

I just want to know__re you rooting for me? Are you hoping I pull this off?"Cath's eyes settled on his, tentatively, like they'd fly away if he moved.She nodded her head.The right side of his mouth pulled up."I'm rooting for you," she whispered. She wasn't even sure he could hear her from the bed.Levi's smile broke free and devoured his whole face.

...We were pulling into the next station, when the woman suddenly got to her feet and made a move to squeeze past me. As her knees made contact with mine, she turned towards me. Her eyes locked straight onto mine, her eyelids pinned back, with a look I could only describe as sheer dread. In the next second, deep tram-lines formed between her eyebrows and her expression shifted. It was as if she was silently imploring me, entreating me. To do what? I had no idea. I was immobile, her gaze pressing me into my seat by some centrifugal force and I held her stare, unsure of how to react. Just as swiftly, she dropped her eyes and the moment passed. With one final glance behind her, she was swallowed up in the bodies at the door. She was getting off. Something wasn__ right.

The past is always with us. It echoes through every living moment, giving it depth and meaning beyond itself. Sometimes the past is so powerful, those echoes threaten to overwhelm the present.

She had been lying there, facedown in the water long before the tide had turned at 3.04 that morning. Her eyes were staring into the river, her blonde hair first fanning out, then drawing back under her head with the wash of the water, like a pulsating jellyfish. The belt of her raincoat was caught on the branches of an overhanging tree and she__ been hooked, destined to forever flap against the corner of the broken pier with outstretched arms. She wasn__ going anywhere now; she was simply bobbing up and down with the rhythm of the water - and she hadn__ blinked in a long while.

The damage and destruction from the soft brush of pen on paper, a minuscule twitch of muscles at the end of manicured fingers, and people's lives forever altered.

It feels like someone is gripping my heart and twisting it. It feels like I can't breathe. I shut my eyes tightly against the memory that is threatening to surface. I can't br

Perhaps forgiveness wasn__ a singular event, but a progression, or better, a dance that took some figuring before you could perform the steps.