Jim sat in the living room with his gun on the coffee table staring at the wall. He had just locked her in his bedroom and was contemplating his next move.
Tag: death
Between First and Final Breaths by Kathryn H. Ross
The first thing Miguel became aware of was the blistering sun on his cracked lips. He could feel the great white eye of the earth staring at him, taunting him to fully wake and confirm that his recurrent nightmare had once again followed him into morning. He opened his eyes and blinked slowly, taking in the brilliantly white-washed blue of the sky. It was day five. He felt death in his bones.
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The Scene at Scott’s Mill by Tom Sheehan
Old Scott’s Mill had given off odd sounds since the day it closed down. Now it gave off a sense of passage.
Crawfish Prayers by G.A. Shepard
Tommy lay in the middle of the train tracks looking down between the railroad ties. It was fifty-feet to the shallow river that ran underneath the trestle. A low growl made the wood and metal shudder.
Reflections Aft by Tom Sheehan
Eight years locked in bed by an accident, his wife’s life an obscene penalty, Peirce Keating was left with only imagination. And little hope, though today might prove different. He loved his wife May, the sea, and bright company. Old pal Gary Mitman was this day’s gift, this day where hope might gain one foothold. That and viewing mirrors he controlled by head movements.
The Banshee’s Bargain by Suzanne Murphy
The first time I heard the cry of the banshee was three days before the full moon. My blood ran cold because I knew exactly what it meant. In my youth, my grandmother entertained us with fantastic fairytales and spooky stories. The haunting tale of the banshee had been one of my favorites, so when I heard the strange keening, I immediately recalled the legend. The story about a witch who announced the imminent death of a loved one was common throughout Ireland. There was even a poem that children sometimes chanted in the schoolyard, often around Halloween:
Hail Caesar! by David Louden
I had been at University six months when I got the call to tell me my old school friend Eamon Donovan had died. Drug overdose. He wasn’t the partying kind; it was a different kind of drug overdose. An entirely intentional one. Eamon was from the north of the city, like me; The Bone. That particular stretch of hopeless home-front had given rise to a nasty habit of suicide. In the years I had been out of my working class no-man’s-land I’d stopped counting the amount of associates who had taken the off-ramp. It had become so frequent that it had been dubbed the North Belfast Green Card.
Dead Man’s Last Home by Michael Glazner
6:47
Clint’s sleeping body takes a breath, stretches and rolls over. The large man wearing a white coat scribbles notes on his pad while the dim sunrise light peeks through the window. Clint’s body rolls back to its original position. The white coat checks his watch and then checks off a box on his notepad.
Falling Stars by James McEwan
Dressed in mourning suits, they listened to the minister as he read out the eulogy. My name is Benjamin Carmichael and at fifty-two years old this was my funeral. To me, it seemed surreal as if floating around in a euphoric haze viewing my coffin draped in the clan tartan shawl and adorned with white lilies. Peeping through a small gap I could see the faces of the congregation and by their demure I sensed an impatient acceptance. Were they saddened by the tale of a tragic loss as imposed on them by the monotonous voice of the minister or were they merely bored by the ritual? Surely, this was the day they had been expecting for years and eventually their long suffering would be over. Soon, the body would be cremated to ash and the soul free to flutter heavenly in a plume of white smoke, and they will be able to continue their lives free from guilty retributions.
Standard Delivery by Claudine Cain
The ache my father left fled one day when I wasn’t paying attention. Perhaps it’s because we didn’t bury him. We couldn’t afford priority shipping so after a thirty year absence he arrived via USPS, on a Saturday morning, in a box sealed with tape that read “human remains” in blue block letters. I didn’t know they made tape for marking the packages of dead people. I didn’t know they put the incinerated bodies into a plastic bag inside of the box. It was dark grey and heat sealed as if someone had manufactured what was returned to us. I didn’t know that human remains were so heavy, or that when you lift a box containing the dead you’re acutely aware that this is something you once longed for; that this as close as you will ever again get.
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