Category: General Fiction

All Stories, General Fiction

Giving Thanks by Michael Ellman

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Holidays were just days that Stan, our father, didn’t go to work. Ever since mom ran off with Uncle Rob, we didn’t do much celebrating. Fourth of July was dad drinking beer all day until my brother Corky and I took off his shoes, removed the lit cigarette dangling from his lower lip, extracted the Budweiser from his clenched fist and let him down easy on the sofa. He’d sleep the entire night, tossing and muttering a little, out of this world. Labor Day, Christmas, New Years, and well every holiday was pretty much the same. If Corky or I wanted a special dinner, we’d arrange to get invited somewhere.

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All Stories, General Fiction

A Noise the House Makes On Its Own by Jack Caulfield

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A NOISE THE HOUSE MAKES ON ITS OWN

 

Alone with his longing, he lies down on his bed
and sings a lament; everything seems too large,
the steadings and the fields.

                                                                  Beowulf

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All Stories, General Fiction, Short Fiction

And There Was That by Adam Kluger

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She pulled out the Nuclear option and tossed it on the table like the Ace of Spades.

Nothing to do but bluff.

He then called her back and said “Let’s not ruin three lives here. Stick to the current agreement. ”

“Ok, but you better make your payments every month. Get a job at Starbucks.”

“Yes. I will,” he replied not knowing exactly how he was going to do that.

And that was it.

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All Stories, General Fiction

What Gloria Said By Jon Beight

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It just sort of came out.

They were sitting on the couch. Dave was watching and laughing at a screwball comedy where, during their honeymoon, the hero and his wife get their signals crossed. She winds up in Bermuda at a four-star hotel while he finds himself with the Inuit eating muskox somewhere near Greenland. Somehow, they reunite.

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All Stories, General Fiction

Abide Sister by Paul Lewellan

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I stared at the black homespun dress, large bonnet, prayer cap, and starched white apron that covered her from neck to ankles. She held the hand-lettered sign that read, IOWA. I pulled off onto the shoulder. “You’re not from around here, are you?” I asked.

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All Stories, General Fiction

Theatrical Spirits by Kilmeny MacMichael.

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In this year of unrest, Daniel Luis was sharing a small house with his mother, sister, his pregnant wife, and daughter. He needed work.

“You will be the new janitor at the Municipal Theater,” his uncle said, “It pays little, but the work is easy. Clean up after every performance. Do your work and be invisible, and maybe in time, I can find you something better. Here is the key to the door. They say the theater is haunted, so wear your crucifix.”

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All Stories, General Fiction

Standing-to at Denby’s Creek by Tom Sheehan

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Willard Joseph Lord Pufferton, late colonel of the 1st Regiment of Hodson’s Horse and later 10th Regiment of Bengal Cavalry (Lancers), India-released, Asia-departed, separated from the British Army in 1870, reined in his horse at the head of Denby’s Creek as it flowed from the heart of Earth in America’s Rockies foothills.

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All Stories, General Fiction

Misguided by Frederick K Foote

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There’s a quick double rap on my apartment door and my son, Elijah, opens the door and walks in like he’s paying the rent. He ain’t. “Pop, what’s up dude? What’re you watchin? Why don’t you have the game on? You got beer? I know you got beer.”

He goes directly into my tiny kitchen and comes back with two bottles of beer. He flops on the couch beside me.

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All Stories, General Fiction, Horror

Under the Same Sun by Astrid Ann Larsen

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Geneviève Gueron was as French as one could be. And while her peers were riding up and down the waves of hormonal instability, lamenting one second, rejoicing the next, she was simply and unequivocally in love with her life on the French Riviera. It had taken her some time to get used to the fierceness of the sunrays of the South, as the lack of obscuring buildings or tufts of sky made them bounce right off her white skin which would respond instantly with sizzling red spots. And with each day that passed, the deep yearning for her favourite dusty bookstores in Paris gave way to the undisputable dogmatic truth proclaimed by her parents, who had convinced themselves their new hometown would be kinder to them.

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