Too Many Flowers

The bee loomed tall in the evening sun: 25 feet long, with a black and yellow frame and wings of molded plastic.

“Cool, huh?”

“You sure get worked up about your ichthyology,” Bann complained.

“Entomology. How do you still not know the right word after twenty years?”

Bann shrugged.

“It reminded me of our first date… Remember the bees at the orchard?”

Bann nodded.

“Where’s the stinger?” he asked, but then his eyes went wide Read the rest of this entry »

Bees

Lane braced his palms in the beach rocks and studied the hive.

“Maybe it floated from Africa?” he said. “Killer bees.”

“Don’t joke,” Warren complained with a pout. “Is anything in it?”

Lane thought he heard a faint buzzing, and even smelled a sweetness like honey, but there was no movement in the golden lattice.

“Nah…” he began, but suddenly he felt a sharp pain and he jumped. When he pulled his hand away, blood began to pour from a deep gash in his palm.

In the rocks, a thousand stony carapaces turned, and Warren sprinted down the beach. Read the rest of this entry »