Snippet Saturdays - Hourglass

Hourglass by Myra McEntire

1. "Please don't misunderstand...I'm only trying to..." With his fingertips still on the edge of the dresser, he closed his eyes, struggling with words.
Seeing an escape, I ducked under his arm. There were some advantages to being short. "Trying to what? Scare me? Piss me off?"
"I didn't mean to do either of those things." He pushed away from the dresser to face me. "I'm so--"
"Stop." I cut him off before he could say anything else. "Whether you meant to or not, you did. And now you should probably go." (p. 74) 

2. I flattened myself against the wall until the light went off again, then I took off in the direction of the car, flinging the door open when I reached it.
I let out a scream.
Someone was already sitting there. (p. 138)

Snippet Saturdays - Scarlet

Scarlet by Marissa Meyer

    "Get your things," said Wolf.

      She and Wolf moved at the same time. She thew her portscreen into her pack while Wolf crossed to the window and flung it open. The ground raced beneath them. Beyond the tracks, a dense forest stretched out, dissolving into shadows.
      Scarlet checked the pistol in her waistband, "Are we jumping?"
     "Yes. But they might be expecting it, so we have to do it before the train slows too much. They're probably prepping enforcement androids right now to round up runaways."
      Scarlet nodded. "If it is letumosis, we've probably already become a quarantine."
      Wolf thrust his head out the window, looking both ways down the length of the train. "Now's our best chance."
       Pulling inside, he heaved the bag onto one shoulder. Scarlet peered down at the ground fleeing beneath them, dizzied by a moment of vertigo. It was impossible to focus on any one spot as the speckled sun flashed against the trees. "Well. This seems dangerous."
                                                                "We'll be fine."
                                                                She peered up at him, for a moment expecting to meet 
that crazed madman again, but his expression was stone-cold and clinical. He was focused hard on the landscape that whizzed by them. "They're braking," he said. "We'll start slowing down faster now." Again, it was a few seconds before Scarlet sensed it too, the subtle shift of speed, the way they were decelerating fast, no longer just coasting to a steady stop.
         Wolf inclined his head. "Climb onto my back."
         "I can jump myself."
         "Scarlet."
         She met his eyes. His youthful curiosity from before was gone, replaced with a sternness she hadn't expected.
         "What? It'll be just like jumping off the barn into a haystack. I've done that a hundred times."
         "A haystack? Honestly, Scarlet, it'll be nothing like that."
         Before she could argue, before she could cement her defiance, he bent over and scooped her into both arms.
         She gasped and had just enough time to open her mouth, ready to demand he put her down, before Wolf was on the windowsill, the wind whipping Scarlet's curls against her neck.
         He jumped. Scarlet yelped and grabbed on to him, her stomach somersaulting, and then the shock of landing jogged up her spine.
          She dug her fingers into his shoulders. Every limb trembled.
          Wolf had landed in a clearing eight steps beyond the tracks. He staggered into the tree line and hunkered into the shadows.
          "All right?" he asked. 
          "Just like"--she caught her breath--"a haystack."
          A laugh reverberated through his chest, into her, and before she was ready Wolf settled her feet onto a patch of squishy moss. She scrambled out of his hold, caught her balance, then punched him squarely in the arm. "Never do that again."

Snippet Saturdays - Splintered

Splintered by AG Howard

       He's right I remember. "Envision where you wish to go," I say, using his words from years before. The key is a wish granter, and will open the mirror to my desires. Letting the backpack fall to the floor, I dig out the sundial brochure and study it. When I look up again, it's the picture from the brochure staring back at me from the cracked reflection. I insert the key into the hole and turn.
       The glass becomes liquid and ripples, absorbing my hand. I jerk back, and the key falls against my chest, suspended on its chain. I hold my fingers up. They look the same as always...completely unaffected. They're not even wet.
       A crackling sound snaps my attention back to the mirror.The splintered glass begins to smooth, forming a watery window instead of a reflection. It's a portal that opens into the garden bright with sunlight and flowers where the statue sundial waits.
      "Want it with all your heart." The command swims in my head, so quiet it's an echo from my past. "Then step inside."