Category: General Fiction

All Stories, General Fiction

Washing in the Adige by Evan Massey

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Emilio is sitting across from me. I can barely understand his broken English as it mixes with his native Italian tongue. They sometimes overlap. He makes a new language of which I understand very little. He is going on about something, something about a child and a woman. He is talking fast and touching his face and tapping his mouth with his finger. I’m thinking that I am the woman that he is going on about and that he is trying to describe. The child, I do not know. Emilio is talking fast and I’m giving it my best effort.

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All Stories, General Fiction

Braelin Cordelis by Tom Sheehan

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It did not come with electricity or a smash of static on the air, but it was there. Braelin Cordelis, five minutes into the darkness of a new day, a streetlight’s glow falling through his window like a subtle visitor, was caught on the edge of his chair. Knowledge flowed to him, information of a most sublime order, privacy, intimacy, all in one slow sweep of the air; his grandson was just now, just this minute, into this world, his only grandson. He could feel him, that child coming, making way his debut into the universe, and his name would be Shag. And for this life he and Shag would be in a mysterious and incomprehensible state of connection. This, in the streetlight’s glow, in the start of a new day though dawn not yet afoot, he was told.

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All Stories, General Fiction

Testing the Waters  by Fred Vogel

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My Uncle Jonathan was a wonderful writer and an even better storyteller. By that I mean he was gifted with a vivid imagination when recounting events from his colorful past. How much of his writing was accurate has always been up for debate. But if only half of what he swore to be the truth were true, the man lived a rich and fortunate life.

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All Stories, Fantasy, General Fiction

Snakes & Lasses by Christopher Stanley

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Jock’s folding his pyjamas back under his pillow when he hears it. A low, growling hiss. His twin daughters are elsewhere, probably playing in the walls, so it’s just him and the mannequin dressed as his wife in the bedroom. He’s searching for the source of the noise when the duvet shifts on the bed. It’s a slight movement, like wind-ruffled marram grass, but it’s something. Carefully, he pulls back the covers, revealing the green and yellow-chevroned scales of a king cobra.

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All Stories, General Fiction, Short Fiction

The One with the Limp by R.C. Capasso

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Enrique studied the faces around the table. The purchase committee dispensed their limited resources with utmost care. It was no surprise that the investment in another “staff” member should arouse such discussion.  They didn’t object to using androids in schools, especially in the internment facilities, where the headcounts of students exceeded all conscionable limits. Within the southeast sector alone, an android already functioned efficiently as a janitor and two, female in aspect, doled out cafeteria food.  The machine vetting the kids’ thin, government-issued bags at the building entrance possessed some enhanced intelligence.  Three monitored the scrappy stretch of ground called a play area. But to order one with a limp, for the lower grades…

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All Stories, General Fiction

Lessons by Gigi Papoulias

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The first time the piano teacher walked up the two flights to our apartment, my mother rushed to help him. “Thank you, but I can manage,” he said as he tap-tapped his way up.  He wore the thickest glasses I had ever seen. His eyeballs, massive behind the lenses, wobbled and darted – not quite focused on anything in particular. Tallish and round, he always wore a suit. His big shoes were shiny. Before he even entered the room, I could smell his cologne – heavy and manly. When he opened his mouth to speak, he sounded airy, womanly. Sometimes, when I’d play, he’d sing along in a shrilly opera-singer voice.   I’M a yankee doodle dan-DEE…

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All Stories, General Fiction

Stars Burn Out by Fred Vogel

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As a youngster, I watched as my father was electrocuted while stringing Christmas tree lights. I remember his body flopping on the carpet like a gaffed tuna before coming to rest near my little feet. My mom walked in and dropped her groceries all over my little head. I was unable to attend his funeral, having been admitted to Anchorage Memorial Hospital with a head full of lumps and a lifelong fear of colored lights.

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All Stories, General Fiction

The Maestro in the Baggy, Red Sweater by David Henson

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As I walk from the metro station to work one Monday morning, I see a guy at the curb, watching the traffic and sweeping his arms as if conducting an orchestra. He wears a bright red sweater, dress slacks, and wing-tip shoes. But everything’s dirty, and the sweater is far too big for him. He also needs a shave and has greasy gray hair. As I walk past him wondering if I’m going to notice an odor, he glances at me and crinkles his nose.

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All Stories, General Fiction

Why Kurosawa Couldn’t Get Funding by David Lohrey – (Adult Content.)

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I find the cinema just minutes from the busy train station. There’s not a soul in sight, but I am nervous, so I fold my umbrella quickly and creep down the narrow stairs. There is an umbrella stand at the top of the stairs but I can’t risk having it stolen. I like the soiled posters lining the walls, wonderful Japanese erotic noir. I go immediately to the window, where I am greeted by a silver-toothed little man whose boyish grin reminds me somehow of Mickey Rooney. No name-tags in this joint. He is middle-aged.  His teeth glisten with silver and gold like the Mexican lady serving my favorite burritos in La Puente. He doesn’t look up. He reaches for my five-thousand yen note with two hands extended. He smiles wildly, perhaps idiotically. He pulls out some bills. “Just one? Is that right?” “Yeah,” I say. His furrowed brow suggests deep thought. He looks at the fiver I have handed to him. He strikes a few buttons on his calculator. Suddenly, he hesitates and then reaches into a little drawer beneath the counter.  “It’s 2,000 yen at this time, you know.” “Yes, that’ll be fine.” He opens the plastic pouch to his right, pulls out three one-thousand yen notes, folds them and counts them twice before handing them over. We don’t make eye contact. I thank him in my poor Japanese: “Arigato gozaimasu.” He bows slightly, still grinning from ear to ear.

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