Quan falls into the patient breakfast line at the hospital for the criminally insane, he peers at the kitchen staff through pushed in black glasses, grips his tray in both hands, nose sniffing right over its plastic surface, checking to perceive odors and blemishes. He mentally calculates the time distance between himself and the food. “Maybe ninety-eight and a half seconds.”
Continue reading “Breakfast At The Hospital for the Criminally Insane by Harrison Kim “
He promised to keep me safe.
A promise that turned out to be total and complete bullshit. Brent also vowed to be faithful, stick around in sickness and health and a bunch of other things that went by the wayside the moment he decided to tell me about his ridiculous, “mid-life crisis” indiscretion.
Continue reading “Eternity of Descent by A. Elizabeth Herting”
I know superhero stories are way over done these days and you are looking for new angles, but please don’t point your camera lens in this direction. I am just that guy’s sidekick. Strictly off the record and never to be quoted. Standing to the periphery, sans a speaking role, smiling and happy the blinding spotlight never shines here. The glint off the bleached and veneered teeth of my rich alcoholic narcissist boss is enough to blind even the most skeptical of fans to his deep narrative flaws. Sure, some might say he’s a vigilante. For others he is The Bad Guy, but aren’t we all sometimes? I’m just happy to help and not bothered by your narrow good to evil spectrum.
The groaning and gibbering column of mourners stood over the small, still warm cat. All wept and shook save three. The old man, leaning slightly harder on his left side, looked only at the boy, his daughter’s son. The boy was silent also, though wore the look of the savaged. The third to keep from buckling to the emotion of the scene was the vet who had administered the barbiturates.
(“Please come to read for us from your new book.”)
I want to let the audience enter the cubicle where the work came from. This is what I’ll tell them:
Continue reading “A Dreamt Preface for a Reading at Nahant Library by Tom Sheehan”
Leila has rootled out one of the few stories in the site that features an animal – well a bird actually but – you know- a not human character. Anyway here is what she said.
Continue reading “Literally Reruns – Hugo and Me on the Moon by Pete Able”
I am Mack. I’m writing a letter to my real dad (not to my foster dad-I’ve had 12 so far and I’m not even 13). I’m writing it carefully with their stubby pencil but these people don’t know where to mail it. I tell them his address. They say that’s not a valid address. I say isn’t it close enough? How many damn zip codes does Yakima have and can’t you guys do some research? They tell me to calm down (I hate that the most). They look at me like I’m about to tear their faces off. When I step back from the thick glass they’re behind, their eyes relax a little and they say the usual: we don’t have time right now (which means they won’t anytime soon). I hear them talking about New Admits, guess a ton of them, so they won’t have any time in probably forever.
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A few hours before the Fabulous Felinespy got in, Alice and Jim were abed with their cats, Amy and Battling Maxo. Alice was reading a scantily edited “speculative non-fiction ” book written by a congenial local nutburger named Renfield Stoker-Belle. Although the self professed “authoress” couldn’t hold a narrative if she were Velcroed to it, Alice found Spirits of the Wow-Signal Emoji well worth every penny of the twenty-seven she had bid on it.
Tony was cycling downtown to work. It was the highlight of his godforsaken day. It was freedom. It was control. It was revenge. He clenched his whistle between his lips, ready for the inevitable. The bastards. The lousy bastards. They were everywhere. Total losers. Inconsiderate, unthinking, totally narcissistic goofs. It wasn’t once or twice. It wasn’t the occasional driver making an innocent mistake. It was an epidemic.
I feel the scream rise, but I crush it back down into a solid lump of coal, and then further, harder, until it becomes an imperfect diamond of rage stuck in my throat. I can’t let it out. I can’t swallow it. It sits, laboring my breathing. I shove it down as hard as I can, store it, just like all the others. The rage, the sorrow, the pain. It all goes to the same place.
My life is like a demented fairy tale where the princess barfs jewels and escapes the evil Prince in her shitty Honda. I should be rich from all this.
literally stories 