I’m parked on her street in front of the house. Hesitating. It’s just my third day back. What will Francesca do? I might have waited even longer if it weren’t for the thought of her sister, Lisa, who always greeted me with a hug and a smile.
Continue reading “Dry by Christopher W. Hall”
Translated from the Korean by Bruce and Ju-Chan Fulton
“Hey, Odol! School’s out?” We were on our way home when we heard this. Odori’s grandfather, crouched on the roof of their home and framed by jumbled white clouds streaming through a blue sky, was looking down at us. The prickly autumn sunlight glanced off the orange slate of the roof.
Continue reading “Odori’s Grandfather A miniature by O Chŏnghǔi”
Dr. Dylan Harrington removes the tubed mask from the nose and mouth of Kieu Nguyen—or Katie, as she calls herself on social media pages he’s visited. After shutting off the delivery machine, he gazes at her for several heartbeats. Her blue eyebrow stud matches the stone in each earlobe. Short black hair, upturned nose, bow-shaped mouth, unblemished skin with just enough color to make her exotic. She looks delicious without the thick black glasses now on the counter, atop her Animal Farm paperback. The faint slant of her closed eyes testifies to her mixed parentage. At last the uninsured high schooler reclines in his chair, under general anesthesia. She will stir in ninety minutes, jaw throbbing, wisdom teeth gone, a stitch or two in place, and dental cotton packed around four extraction sites. But before she wakes…
Continue reading “Hunting Ground by Gary Earl Ross”
Three months to Election Day
“Mazie Tanner has a real likability issue to contend with,” said the slick, over-Botoxed TV pundit. “Folks just aren’t that into her. Polls show her earning a paltry thirty-two percent if the election were held today. That’s no bueno in a gubernatorial race against Robert ‘Mr. Charisma’ Sturgill, who’s got well over sixty percent. Now, if the lady tried smiling once in a blue moon—”
Continue reading “The Likeability Problem by Kirsten Smith”
It is said that one doesn’t get old until regrets outnumber dreams. I don’t know if that is true, but The Flight of Time by Yashar Seyedbagheri certainly states the case in a most persuasive fashion.
Continue reading “Literally Reruns – The Flight of Time by Yashar Seyedbhaheri”
Here we are at Week 465.
I honestly think that January seems to be one of the longest months in the year. It drags on for ever. It is like the two minutes is to a cat when it’s food bowl is empty.
I know we don’t advocate talking animals but this little section emphasises my point:
‘It has been thirty seconds since I had food. The human is pretending to wash my dish whereas I know that they truly mean to starve me to death. I feel the life force draining from me. If I do survive this day, I shall make them pay. I will be as vocal as my weakened state allows until this matter is resolved or more likely, I die. These may be the last thoughts of me ‘Satan-Shoe Shitter!’
Continue reading “Week 465 – Colonel Jessup Said It Best, You Don’t Want To Be Able To Hide In Budgie-Smugglers And ‘R’ Will Always Be Their Favourite Letter.”
SUNDAY 7:00 p.m. … Cynthia closes the door. She earned the privilege. Privacy. The quiet of the dayroom after hours. She turns on the lamp and positions the green upholstered chair, its back to the wall of windows and next to the table with the telephone, completing the ritual she’s performed every Sunday, Wednesday, and Friday evening for two months.
Continue reading “Evenings by Joanne Parsons”
It was early Thursday afternoon on Halloween. The sound of an email alert on the other side of his studio apartment made Wally Ray Tucker sit up beside the pale redhead drifting off in his bed. Their extended nooner had given them enough time for a double play, but there would be no hat trick. A lifelong friend who recently added with benefits to their relationship, CC had to get back to her office in Rockville. He nudged her, slid out of bed, and went to his desktop computer. As she washed and dressed in the bathroom, he checked his email and printed out an attachment. Then he read it. And felt his throat constrict.
Continue reading “One Known Drop by Gary Earl Ross”
She comes every June to set us free. Zooms into our neat little neighborhood, somehow boiling a cloud of dust from Grandma’s swept asphalt, brakes squealing like a stunt driver. Grandma’s jaw works but she forces the corners of her mouth up, tries to smile a welcome. The car fishtails in, parks crooked as a middle finger. A brown foot, naked, toenails the color of a freshly skinned knee, heels open the driver’s door and a cardboard cup in a long-fingered hand appears. Immediately upends. A brown waterfall of liquid and half-melted ice splatters the driveway, and as it rivers down to the street I hear it: that wonderful voice. Yuck, flat, Aunt Glory announces, and summer begins.
Continue reading “Dirty Summer by Jennifer Maloney”
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Meanwhile, “inside” a song playing in the fantasy multiverse….
A middle aged man dressed in late 18th century finery stood pensively at a window. It was late in the evening and he was gazing across the wily, windy moors at an ethereal, yet extremely familiar young woman in a fleecy white dress. She was singing (incredibly, accompanied by an invisible orchestra) and steadily progressing toward the window in an artistic dance. He heard his name in her song, “Heathcliff.” (The lyrics also contained some character observations that Heathcliff could have done without.)
Continue reading “Wuthering GOAT by Leila Allison”
literally stories 