The croissant had just the right crispness to it.
” Yes, they brought the towels and thank you for doing that, but I need soap for the sink.”
The views from the 22nd floor were stunning. From the East you could see the Silver Cup Studios sign and from the other side of the atrium you could see the Empire State Building already lit up red and green for the holidays, vibrating amidst a vast New York Cityscape.
I wanted to be cosmopolitan, so I redecorated my veranda using a sea green, vinyl bus seat, and I hung a Chinese lantern as my muse. I drank only the bitterest coffee sent directly from Jamaica through a friend of a friend’s ex.
I felt no different.
Continue reading “A Cosmopolitan Epiphany Regarding a Certain Cecil by E.K.”
The tiny clearing off to the side was cooler than the obscenely voluminous garden with its organized cacophony of colors – massed vermilions and oranges alongside indigos, violets, and fuchsias, eye-popping yellows and the occasional calm of white or cream. Cedars bent over an exquisite pool, granite lined, with water more crystalline than glass. Almost lost between moss-padded banks that nearly met, a miniscule stream fed the pool, dribbling over mammoth slate slabs stacked like pricey leather-bound books resting on deep emerald velvet.
Vernon looked at the menu. He saw
Breakfast Special
$2.95
in a box in the lower left-hand corner. That included orange juice, eggs, grits, coffee and a pastry. But he was in the mood for a proper chowdown. A matronly waitress came over and said, “What’ll it be, sweetie?” Vernon said, “I’ll have the pancakes, then the eggs and sausages. Fried eggs. What kind of pie you got?” The waitress said, “Apple, cherry, blueberry, pecan, lemon meringue.” Vernon said, “Yeah, give me blueberry – no, no, make that lemon meringue.” The waitress poured his coffee and brought him the pancakes with a small pitcher of maple syrup and a few pats of butter in a dish.
In the kitchen of a cottage nestled among oak trees they waited – for neighbour, for colleague; for broken doors and strangers with zip-lock bags. Jay was long gone, whipping across fields, toward the blockhouse he’d carved with nails and fire. He crawled into peace and wished he could stay, wished he could curl up on the soft, wet earth and sleep. But if he did they would find him, find him without looking and he wasn’t ready for that medicine, for any medicine – just now his liberty was a sickness he refused to cure. He dug up his plane ticket, kicked things quiet and headed toward the airport.
“Hey, nigger, you about ready to die now, or you want to put that shit off until the sun look you in the eye?”
Big Smoke’s loomin over me sweatin and hackin open coconuts with his keen machete. He stoops to hand me a half a coconut full of milk. I lean back against the palm tree and try to accept the natural bowl but my hands start shakin, and the shakin ripples up my arms, across my shoulders, and my whole frame’s throbbin and bobbin.
Continue reading “The Milk of Human Kindness by Frederick K Foote”
Her chiming phone, the ring tone meant to be soothing, shattered their sleep. Alice sat straight up. “Yes-yes, what is it?”
It was Mrs. Johnson, two doors away. Her daughter had not returned from last night’s party at the beach. Did Keith know what beach? Could he go down there? It was almost light.
I shiver in the darkness and clasp my precious cigarette in my fingers. It is the last of a carton bartered the hard, humiliating way and purchased with filthy favours given to foreign men with sweaty skin and dark complexions in the twilight shadows of the prison latrines. I dropped my self-respect into a volcano long ago, where it burnt to cinders. I have no possessions, and no assets to bequeath the wife and children I don’t have. Time is the only property I have left, and it is soon to be foreclosed. Days are the only currency I hold, and they are wasting away like the British pound. Time is just an empty word, drained of its relevance. Getting to the end of each day is my raison d’etre now, because I am a death row prisoner waiting for my summons.
Continue reading “Profiteers of the Second Chance Saloon By Titus Green”
We’d been drinking for hours when he asked me about her. Normally we talked about the rugby or pussy. It’s not that we didn’t have anything meaningful to say to each other; it’s just that when most guys get together they need an hour or two to talk shit before getting to anything real.
The small Hyundai coupe crept around the church parking lot. Obviously anxious, Jason Halpnuscht peered about as he drove, his head swiveling back and forth. He surveyed the area around the dumpster and the large hot air outlets on the rear of the building with care.
Pastor Penn Benner hated to see homeless people on the property.
Continue reading “The Business of Saving Souls By Mitchell Toews”
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