It’s like sitting in a cozy lamplit living room. A couch. A loveseat. Two cushioned chairs facing a mounted screen. Instead of a coffee table, though, a desk stands in the center, and instead of our favorite sitcom, we scroll through an electronic contract.
Funeral Agreement with Authorization to Prepare a Decedent for Burial
Continue reading “The Cost of Dying by Kayla Cain”
The last time Dave showed up clean, he brought bagels and a joke.
“I had to use the car key to spread the cream cheese,” he said, holding it up like evidence. “Don’t worry. I wiped it on my pants first.”
It was early—gray morning light, barely six—and we sat on the hood of his rusting Civic in the driveway, steam rising from coffee in mismatched mugs. He wore a collared shirt that still had fold creases in it. His hair was damp. He looked awake in a way I hadn’t seen in years.
Continue reading “The Summer He Let Me Be General by Jacob Alexander Cohen”
Dean cradles the pint glass like it’s the only thing holding him together. I don’t know how he survived losing Sophie and the baby in the same night, but eight months later he’s made it to The Lantern on Christmas Eve.
Continue reading “One for the Road by Neil James”
William stands on the upper level of a parkade leaning on a shopping cart some employee had forgotten to rack up with the others. He’s waiting for a friend to pick up a jug of organic milk. He knows his friend will be forever and come up the elevator loaded with ‘two-for-one’s’ and any specials he can find on pasta, ice cream and pineapple juice, not to mention a stack of car magazines. William doesn’t mind waiting. It’s two in the morning and a beautiful night in San Francisco, the concrete rooftop a checker board of symmetrical parking spaces, the only vehicle on the horizon his friend’s sky blue Dodge Caravan, clean and American in its loneliness.
Continue reading “Man With a Shopping Cart by Tom Bentley-Fisher”
I was looking out the front window, watching the snow fall, waiting for the mailman to come with my disability check. Jesus, the snow is sticking now, and my tires are bald. I needed to deposit that check today. I was out of food, running low on whiskey, and I still owed Mrs. Schmidt half the rent for this little shithole of a duplex. Fuck my life. Then, I got the call.
Continue reading “Alterations by JD Clapp”
Fluttering canvas frames a view that has tugged at Ralph Nilsen’s dreams. The mountain is dark against the star-smeared sky, curved like a sickle, beckoning. Ralph permits himself a few moments to glance upwards, to watch the spindrift pluming across the Milky Way. Moments are all Ralph has. He will not be back, not for another season, not when he is within three hundred vertical metres…
Continue reading “The Silver-Lined Ridge by Matthew J. Richardson”
White clapboards and wooden slats nailed across double windows peek through a veil of house-high ferns, maples, and elms. Leaves caress the places where shutters may once have been. Along the front in red and white reads a sign: Private Property No Trespassing. A vacant driveway sits to the south, marked off by a heavy chain, its endpoints hidden by foliage.
Continue reading “The Persistence of Ruins by Barbara Krasner”
An autumn evening, 1950
Along the Grand River, Ontario, Canada
Yes, sir, she’s a mighty fine mansion. And an unusual style for this neck of the woods. Looks a bit like a bank to me with that porch and pillars. The first owner built her back in 1845. She doesn’t get the attention she deserves these days. You can see that by the peeling paint and the boarded-up window. The brothers don’t live here full time now, but they do come down on occasion. Separately, always. That’s why they have the wife and me looking after the place as caretakers. We live in the house and keep an eye on things. The two brothers don’t speak to each other anymore. They send messages through me. They haven’t talked since the blowup they had over the repairs to the roof.
Continue reading “Not For Sale by Guylaine Spencer”
Foreword
In honor of Remembrance Day (Veteran’s Day in America), and to honor those who served, currently serve and to those who gave all, we present a reworking of a story by Tom Sheehan first published in November 2017. Tom served in Korea and knows as much about the suffering of war, and its after-effects, as much as anyone.
Since it is an altered version, we will forgo the usual link and present the work right here and now.
All the best to the veterans and those who appreciate their sacrifices.
Diane, Hugh, Leila–Eds. Literally Stories
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Continue reading “Literally Reruns – A Boy Once Known by Tom Sheehan “
The sun is too hot for May, and my arm is starting to burn. That’s what I’m thinking of when I’ve missed my afternoon bus. That and my sister, Julia. My name is Elijah William Scott. And I am the reason my sister is dead. There’s a shortcut you can take off of Sawmill Road to get to our house. I don’t take it anymore. I don’t need to look at the drawings, the flowers, the “We Miss You” signs. It’s all bullshit. It doesn’t mean anything. She won’t know.
Continue reading “Julia by Chloe M. Dehon”
literally stories 