The pub had closed, the last bus still hadn’t arrived, the thin drizzle gave way to rain of biblical ferocity. Jimmy stood sheltering in the entrance to the dress shop, like a novelty dummy, while Willie (his tongue loosened by seven pints of IPA) explained about the likely existence of A Deid Agnostics’ Processing Panel.
Continue reading “Late-Night Theological Breakthrough by Michael Bloor”
I’d never been blown up before.
We were patrolling in the middle of nowhere during the late afternoon of another 110 degree day, with nobody around except a goatherd in the distance, tending a few scrawny goats. The IED must have been under a pressure plate in the road.
A slow-motion movie sort of thing is how I’d heard survivors describe explosions. Not me. One minute, I was in the Humvee’s right rear seat behind the vehicle commander, Staff Sergeant Bennett, getting my kidneys pureed on the rough road. Then I heard a roar like the sound of a passing locomotive. A white light filled the cabin like some nuclear camera flash and I felt a searing wind on my face. Then I was somersaulting through the air with my synapses flashing, envisioning how hard I might land. Pretty hard, it turns out. The ground rushed towards me, and I heard a crunch as I landed face-first in the dirt. And then the lights went out.
Continue reading “We Two Soldiers by Mark Schafron”
On this first day of May, I return to the abandoned farm I once owned and stand in a pasture now overgrown with creeping jenny vines and clumps of brilliant yellow buttercups. Slatey gray clouds collide above me and fold into each other in a birdless sky. A whispering breeze ruffles the tops of the leafing red maple trees. Half a century ago, I found an abandoned narrow-gauge rail track set on hand-hewn locust ties at the back of the farm. I was unaware of their presence until months after the purchase and could only guess their purpose. Shuffling several ideas, I thought they might have been used to bring wheeled carts of fieldstone or firewood to the bottom of the hill. Or, perhaps maple sap to boil in large vats for spring syrup. I enquired at the local historical society and asked my neighbors, but no one had an answer, only more guesses.
Continue reading “The Narrow Gauge by Ed N White”
March was a bitter month for everyone involved. Jodi was born into one, like Eric Clapton, her childhood idol. In another March, thirty years ago, Clapton’s four-year-old son ran into a hole in the wall. The hole was supposed to be a window, but it had no glass on it. A scream tore through the house, and the mother understood right away that it didn’t come from the boy; the boy was busy plowing through the air, down fifty-three floors.
Continue reading “March by Sarp Sozdinler”
They found me floating face down in the motel swimming pool, a seedy place off the Sunset Strip where we’d been partying. A janitor heard the splash. He dragged me up to the patio and slapped my cheeks, which was funny. I was already blue, and now some random guy was hitting me. We kissed. His breath choked me. I woke, briefly. Curled over, shivering on the lip of the deep end, my reflection rippling beneath as my lungs spasmed dry.
Continue reading “Emergence Delirium by Danielle Altman”
When Garf opened his refrigerator, he saw a jar of purple pickles beside the carton of expired milk. This was strange as, only yesterday, they were green. Garf stood in his itchy annoyance before the refrigerator, his red, black-striped robe hanging off his slumped body like an old, worn-out curtain.
Continue reading “Garf and the Purple Pickles by Landon Galliott”
“She was reckless and calculated. Sharp but dreamy. I think she was lost. Overcome by the world’s endless configurations.” A wave of chills swept over me. Papa was only eloquent when talking about her, so I tried to soak it all in–every syllable, hand gesture, intonation–to paint a picture of her in my head. Papa never even showed me photos, because as he said, “It’s in the past.” I had stored a few features such as angular nose and fair skin in my reservoir until then, but those were surface-level. I had been yearning for characteristics to vitalize the shell of a person in my head.
Continue reading “Remnants of a Silence by Saul Brauns”
Russell Freeman, long white hair tied back, dressed in jeans and white cotton shirt, got off the bus and walked down a side street of the city he grew up in. He looked around and shook his head. Urban renewal in the late sixties had taken much of the character out of the center of the city and replaced it with parking ramps, cheap prefab buildings and fake facades. According to city elites the old sturdy brick buildings of the past were obsolete and old fashioned. We must look to a bright new future said the politicians as money flowed to demolition companies.
“Renewal my ass,” Russell mumbled.
Continue reading “Cheap Whiskey and a Crumpled Dollar Bill by Lee Conrad”
He took a swing at me. I braced for impact as it battered my jaw.
Big mistake, I thought, as I got low, latched on, picked him up. Buddy laughed; guy was having fun with me. Fine. I spun around and took him down.
He snatched my beard, mashed his face into mine. I tore free, pinned his arms, prepared to strike. His feral eyes widened; he knew his fate.
I put my lips on his bare belly and blew. My son squealed and flailed, then stiffened and vibrated. Electrocuted by elation.
Continue reading “Death on Rotation by Brandon Nadeau”
Wildlife
I have either finished turning invisible or the local wildlife considers me as threatening as Jane Jetson. The wild things are taking advantage of our slipping sense of surrounding and are slowly, yet steadily organizing. I present three instances for your examination. (And although some of you will not detect acts of duplicity in these seemingly random events, I say that is what they want us to believe.)
Continue reading “Week 503: Further Adventures in Wildlife; Six Pack of Encouraging Words; and “Like, Boo, Dude”–PDQ Peety’s List of 80’s Halloween Horror Films”
literally stories 