The hydrangeas were bent under veils of snow. Irritated at late spring snowstorms and disorder, Ethan Crick had his broom to the bushes and the sidewalk before the fat flakes had stopped falling. He noticed the oddity right away, standing up out of the drift, pointing to heaven.
Continue reading “The Finger by Joy Oden”
Today she is wearing yellow. Yellow dress, yellow hat, and a buttercup yellow scrunchie around her ankle. Today is a good day.
Continue reading “Tiny Squares by Shannon Murdoch”
I hear the curlew flying low over the misty bog on a late summer’s evening. The air is damp with dew and the shadows are black beneath the tall whitethorn hedges. A lone cow calls out for her calf in a field beyond view and then stops suddenly as her charge drains the pressure from her elder.
Continue reading “Over the Top by David Lyons”
Mamaw don’t want to lock you in a cage, but I got no choice,” she apologized to her wailing granddaughter as she extricated herself from the overwrought child, both covered in spittle, snot, and tears, an ectoplasm of bodily fluids. The child desperately reached for her, arms stretched, fingers twitching, head thrusting.
Continue reading “Caged by R H Nicholson”
The seagull cocked his head and purred. He dropped his beak into the sand but didn’t seem to find anything worthwhile. He put his head back and squawked loudly at me.
“Sorry buddy,” I said. “I don’t have anything for you.” It was the same way I used to talk to Jeter.
Continue reading “Crime Wave by Simon Nadel”
Without thinking, she started smoking the day he left, nearly thirty years ago. It was just something to do when he walked away. She constantly sat at the window, hoping, peering, and smoking. One cigarette lit from the other, with the smoke dragged deep into her lungs. Everyone said that was a bad thing to do, but she still smoked, and most of them had passed away. She kept her hand outside to let the smoke drift into the clouds and considered it a signal, a beacon he could follow home. The ash burned close and scarred her fingers, so little pain remained. The pain was all in her heart.
Continue reading “Patience by Ed N. White”
On those windswept weekday mornings, asphalt driveway crusted with snow, my father would get up early, put on his secondhand boots and an old coat, and exit through our front door into the blue hour to get the motor running. That fifteen-year-old station wagon would stall if not warmed up properly and might not start again. My father would sometimes have to push it down the hill to get the engine going, my younger brother Bill and I sitting quietly in the back seat, the smell of alcohol already on my father’s breath.
Continue reading “Those Snowy Mornings by Gil Hoy”
Returning from the bathroom for the second time that night, her eyes heavy with sleep, Helen squinted down the dark hallway at the faint white glow coming from the kitchen.
Did I forget to turn off the light? she wondered.
Continue reading “Helen’s Kitchen, 3:30 a.m. by Brian Clark”
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”
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