Rain hammered the roof of St. Melrose Hospital like it was warning the world that something big was about to happen. In Room 402, a 22-year-old Black woman named Zola clutched the sides of the hospital bed, sweat running down her forehead. Her long hair was tied in a loose ponytail, and her hospital gown clung to her trembling body. She was in labor with her first child. Standing beside her was her husband, Marcus. He had deep brown skin, cropped hair, and the quiet intensity that once made Zola fall in love with him. He held her hand, but…
Author: town gist
I still remember the morning he left. It wasn’t a fight. It wasn’t screaming or plates smashing against walls. It was quieter than that. Chris woke up, got dressed in his best jeans and sneakers, kissed the babies’ foreheads like a ghost, and walked out the door carrying nothing but a battered duffel bag. No note. No goodbye. No promises to call. Just the soft click of the door and then silence. At first, I didn’t panic. You don’t panic when the house still smells like pancakes and six little bodies are pulling on your legs asking if they can…
The church was glowing. Sunlight poured through the stained glass windows, casting kaleidoscopic reflections on the marble aisle. A soft chorus hummed in the background. Every pew was filled friends, family, old neighbors all gathered for one reason: to witness the union of Naomi Bennett and Christopher Wallace. Naomi stood at the altar, radiant in white. Her smile was real. Her hands trembled only slightly as she reached for Christopher’s. And when she looked into his eyes, she saw the man she loved. The man who had made her laugh during her hardest days, who brought her coffee every morning…
Nia and Malik had once been the picture of happiness. Their love had been the kind people sang about under the stars. In their small village, where dusty roads wound between huts and laughter floated on the warm breeze, they were inseparable. Malik would often find ways to surprise her. Sometimes with a wild flower tucked behind her ear, sometimes with a carved trinket fashioned from the heart of a tree. Nia in return adored him with all she had. When Nia found out she was pregnant, she cried tears of joy into Malik’s chest as he lifted her high…
Derek was 37 when he first saw her. It was a cloudy afternoon during a local outreach event at the edge of town. Volunteers had gathered at a foster care picnic to play with the kids, hand out sandwiches, and take photos for brochures that never really changed anything. That’s when Derek noticed her. A little girl around 8 years old sat on the edge of the field alone. Her shirt was a faded pink, slightly too big for her small frame. Her hair, light brown and straight, was tied into two short pigtails. She had light skin and features…
Before he could even speak, they called him cursed. Amecha was born during a thunderstorm in a remote village named Umuke. His mother, Adas, gave birth to him alone in their mud-brick hut because her husband fled when he saw the baby’s eyes—blue and glowing faintly, even in darkness. The midwife gasped, crossed herself, and whispered, “This is not a child. This is an omen.” From that night on, whispers followed him everywhere. Children refused to sit next to him in school. Elders warned their kids to stay away from the boy with the storm in his eyes. His own…
The fog curled like ghostly fingers across the wet highway as the red semi-truck rumbled down the deserted road. Jack Carter squinted through the windshield, the wipers beating a steady rhythm against the drizzle. He had been driving for hours another long haul, another night of stale coffee, and the lonely hum of tires on asphalt. But then, something unusual made him ease off the gas. A figure stood by the roadside, barely visible through the mist. Jack leaned forward, heart instinctively tightening. It was a girl young, maybe in her early twenties wearing a tattered white wedding dress. Her…
The walls of St. Matthews Children’s Hospital were decorated with cartoon murals and pastel colors, but none of it could hide the ache that lingered inside those rooms. Room 308 was no different except for the silence. The kind of silence that only exists where hope has nearly run out. Dr. Alan Prescott stood at the foot of the hospital bed, his shoulders slumped, eyes red behind his glasses. He was one of the best pediatric oncologists in the country. But this this was the case that had broken him. In the bed lay Leo, his eight-year-old son. Pale. Bald.…
Her name was Amina a radiant Black woman in her early 30s who lived with nothing but love in her heart and deep trust in her husband, Peter. They lived in a quiet village just outside Johannesburg, where the sun painted golden edges on straw rooftops and children ran barefoot through the dusty streets. Everyone in the village knew Amina. Her kindness overflowed like spring water, and her laughter, the elders would say, could heal the soul. Peter, a white South African businessman, had moved to the village five years earlier to oversee a solar energy project. But it was…
Her family abandoned her. A billionaire adopted her. What she did next is hard to believe. The baby girl was born on a humid evening in a small village nestled between thick groves and red clay paths. Her cry was soft, barely louder than the breeze outside the window. But when the midwife lifted her into the glow of a flickering lantern, silence fell across the room. A deep bluish-purple birthmark stretched across her tiny face, from brow to cheekbones. It was symmetric and haunting, like a shadow that had settled over her eyes. Her mother, Miam, recoiled in fear.…