You mix ten pounds of pretzels with two pounds of cheesy goldfish, dumping everything into an enormous plastic bin and then stirring with your hands. Salt leaches the moisture from your skin, and, later tonight, tourists will sit at the bar, pick out the fish, complain that there are too many pretzels.
No one wants the pretzels.
Continue reading “Think About What You Did by Shane Borrowman”
I have no friends but the words talk to me. They don’t say what I read, they say something else.
When I was young I read what I heard. I was diagnosed as being dyslexic but I ignored everyone and concentrated on listening to the words. I hid in that diagnosis for many years.
Sometimes the words make me smile, sometimes they make me cry but most of all they make me curious.
[TEXT: You’re not going to hurt yourself…are you? ]
Philbrick B. Mussellwhite thought over the text question from his best friend Santander Diaz for a moment and then replied.
She closed her eyes and looked.
In all her years of seeing she had never looked quite like this. This was seeing.
The ‘accident’ was now over ten years ago, and she was resigned if not reconciled with the state of affairs. The impairment to her vision had been absolute. The ophthalmologist had been kind and empathetic but quite definite in her assessment. 100% sight loss and not a chance of recovery. The diagnosis was certain. And so, began a new life.
Someone stole my caiman hide boots from underneath my styrofoam homeless shelter mattress. My boots are a rich polished brown with chunky scale nubs rising from the foot area. My Dad gifted the comfy caimans to me as a 27th birthday and university graduation gift, he purchased them online from Leathers of Louisiana. It took me seven years to obtain my BA in General Studies due to my schizoaffective brain problems, though my measured IQ is 132. Psychosis is eating away at my cerebrum. Sometimes it’s hard for me to tell what is real and what is illusion, but I know for sure my boots are missing.
He told me he was Special Forces. I thought it was a lie; sounds so sexy, I’m Special Forces. I imagined legions of girls in soaked underwear.
Me, I didn’t care. My daughter was one year old, I moved to Manhattan to a 5th Avenue apartment believing in a Cinderella story, only to find Lelle’s car seat in front of my door one morning with a “Sorry!” note. The prince paid the $12,000 monthly rent to fulfill the lease and told me to keep the 3 carat Harry Winston engagement ring.
I first met Jim when I was working in a food bank. He came in to ask if he could get some food. He was reeking of Buckfast. I told him that he had to be referred.
He laughed, “Take your referral and your food bank and stick them right up, and I mean right up your fucking arse!”
Continue reading “Skye Jim McKay by Hugh Cron – Warning Adult Content.”
Oh Oh – Can open – worms everywhere:
Ha! Versatur Circa Quid! Has any fable (feeble or otherwise) been told in the first person? Methinks not. For those of you unlucky enough to be unacquainted with my humble works of genius, behold the vainglorious splendor of, I, Judge Jasper P. Montague, contentedly, fruitfully, and most certainly deceased. The unwashed refer to me as a common household poltergeist, but, in fact, I am a Quillemender.
From outside the coffee shop across the road, Julia watches Charlie Miller leave the diner. It starts to snow again and if she narrows her vision to exclude all else, she can almost believe that she is looking at an idyllic scene. Snowflakes drift softly through the golden glow emanating from the diner window. Waitresses move about inside with coffee pots, amid the chattering, happy diners. Charlie Miller, in jeans and cowboy boots, plaid flannel shirt poking out from a nondescript brown jacket, completes this perfect portrait of nostalgic Americana. But then he pauses outside the diner and crosses his arms in a tight knot across his chest. He stares straight ahead, as if he is viewing hell. The image of blood and clotted brain-matter leaps up before her eyes. She stuffs it back into the box too small to hold it, only to wait for the demented jack-in-the-box to spring again.
literally stories 