Tag: fiction

All Stories, General Fiction

Punxsutawney Elegy by Patrick Winters

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His black containment suit stood out stark against the all-encompassing white and gray of the forest about him. Specks of white swirled through the chilly air, both whipping and wafting against the thick outer padding of the Level A gear; still, he could feel the cold seeping through the protective layers and across his skin. He shivered as he huffed his way through shin-thick drifts of white, his thick boots awkward to trek in, his breather working overtime in the closed hood about his head, and his gloved hands grasping his rifle with determination.

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All Stories, Latest News

Week 120 – Insecurities, Placebos And Goosing Lamp Posts.

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I’ve been thinking on insecurities and what fun they are to write about. You can have a laugh and rip the pish out of other folks and you can do the same with your own but that isn’t funny.

I would rather use it as a self-help exercise, ’cause lets be honest, if you can write about them and put them out there, you will never need to pay a therapist.

Now paying a therapist seems to be something people in other countries do. We don’t. Us Scottish people would never dream of doing this and that has sod all to do with the very false stereotype of us being mean.

We wear our madness as a badge of honour. To be sectioned is the top accolade but it very seldom happens. The only way this can happen is if you sexually assault a lamp-post and it complains to the authorities.

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All Stories, Horror

Merlot is a Monster by Ashlie Allen

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There was water boiling over the pot on the stove the night my niece died. She told me she was craving wheat noodles, so I stopped everything I was doing to satisfy her. I heard the water sizzling as it leaked over the scalding edges of the pot, and immediately ran to turn off the flames. “I’m hungry!” she kept yelling. “Please tell me you did not ruin dinner!” “I’m sorry little love.” I chanted as I rushed the noodles to the sink. I let cold water run over them, but it was too late. The noodles had burnt up and were sticking to the steel. I could see the shadow of her bowing in the doorway, her tiny body shuddering with hysterical sobs. I scratched out the charred noodles and handed them to her. “Wipe your tears.” I whispered. I was crying too. She grabbed my leg and cuddled it when she noticed. I leaned against the wall like a ghost watching his loved ones play on without him, expression doleful and hateful at once.  I knew she was drying when I felt her grip loosen around my limb. “It’s okay dear. Go ahead, die. I cannot take care of you the way death can.” Her body dropped from me, carefully sprawling across the floor. I stared at her, face white with grief, eyes bulging as if I despised her, and kneeling at her side, I lifted her over my shoulder and carried her upstairs.

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All Stories, Horror, Short Fiction

Who Weeps for Cthulhu? by Douglas Rudoff

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Concealed just beneath Pier 63 on the Seattle waterfront, Rob and Lonnie await in the open 16 foot aluminum boat. Between them face down on the boat’s floor is the mock bride, a mannequin wearing a white wedding dress slowly absorbing the moisture of the inch and half puddle it lies in. Lonnie looks at the mock bride, the veil and the blond wig fluttering in a cool breeze. A bouquet of spring flowers, freesias, peonies and daisies, is duct taped to her rigid right hand, the best they could do to make the flowers appear they are being held. She wears a pair of scuffed white leather pumps. Within the fiberglass body of the bride is a six -gallon polypropylene bladder full of Trader Joe’s brand tequila mixed with red dye and corn syrup, based on a recipe Lonnie used twenty-five years earlier for the blood needed for a community theatre production of Sweeny Todd. Three leftover bottles of tequila lie in the puddle beside the bride. Beneath the tequila-filled bladder, in the mannequin’s lower torso is a jumbled pile of twenty-one and a half pounds of turkey kielbasa, also bought at Trader Joe’s, a decent enough imitation of entrails for the Wedding.

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All Stories, General Fiction

Luisa by Tim Gorichanaz

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Every day Luisa left a new piece of art at the foot of his bed. They were washcloths shaped like animals, a different one each day. She was very talented.

He knew it was Luisa because she signed her work. She left a card that said Your Room Was Cleaned By ____________. It’s my pleasure, and Luisa wrote her name on the line. He suspected she left those cards in all the rooms she cleaned, but maybe she was reaching out. She’d written her name there, by hand, just for him. She dotted the i with a circle.

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All Stories, Humour

Pooboogle by Adam Kluger

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The delivery guy from Arturo’s Italian Restaurant had a sixth finger. It waved about like a little pink antenna. Horace always gave him a big tip and tried not to stare at it. They would link eyes and smile at each other. There was a tacit agreement not to stare at the unusual little digit —and to tip big…and move on. Every time that Horace ordered from Arturo’s he forgot about the delivery guy. The chicken parmesan was so outstanding that the gross-out factor at the door was but a minor inconvenience.

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All Stories, Latest News

Week 119 – Sleep Deprivation, Stewart Granger And Brain Scooping.

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I’ve been at a loss this week what to write. I thought about Brexit as I haven’t mentioned that but I thought there is no way that I want to hear any-more about it. We have two years of listening to professional pish talkers talk pish. Any debate only encourages them to debate so I won’t be going down that road.

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All Stories, Romance

We Need Nothing More by Romana Guillotte

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Within the breath of the hospital door click, he was both alive and dead. A Schrodinger’s situation. He insisted on the glass of water and I had not wanted to go. But I did. He didn’t like me seeing him in that state–which seemed so unlike everyone’s perception of him, he was not the regular vain sort of actor one would think of. Or at least I never saw him that way.

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All Stories, General Fiction

Carson by Caleb Harvey

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I don’t really know Carson. I mean I know him, everybody knows him but he’s not my friend. It used to be that I wouldn’t be caught dead spending time with him. Now… I dunno, I wonder if he’d take me.
Carson is one of just three retarded kids at Robert F. Kennedy High School. The rest are too retarded for public school; they go to Strathmore Academy which is a “Special School” just up the street from where I live.

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