A part of him was happy to see her. She was hard-wired to scrub. The much bigger part of him was wondering how in the hell she found him.… more
Author Archives: BULL Author
Clove Cigarettes Are the Fountain of Youth (If they Don’t Kill You First)
CREATIVE NONFICTION by Mary SenterIf I remember correctly (and who can remember anything anymore) I smoked my first cigarette on the lawn of a church down the street from the school gym, after escaping the insufferable first dance of 9th grade, when I decided that school dances were lame and I’d rather be doing cool shit.… more
Youth
FICTION by S.F. WrightOnce, after I shot up in a pizzeria’s bathroom and the owner glared at me as I walked past him, I went outside, lit a cigarette, took a drag. I had nowhere to go, nothing to do—except to find ways to get more dope.… more
The Eye
FICTION by Mark RogersLuis watches as a Mexican rides up on an agitated horse. He reins his horse in at the edge of the hole and next to the dead sea lion. The frightened horse kicks and bucks a foot away from the grave’s edge. Luis thinks: The horse can smell death in the air.… more
We’re Proud of You, Darling
FICTION by Jake WilliamsI take the handle of the vice and turn it clockwise. It’s so close to my eyes it’s out of focus. The screw turns a little and the sliding jaw presses against the left side of my head. I breathe out as much as I can in one go. I hold the nothing as long as I can before I breathe in again. It’s part of the ceremony.… more
Lemon Tree
FICTION by Keith J. PowellDani says she’s not worried. One day she’ll go somewhere warmer. California, maybe. One day she’ll just be gone. “Just like that?” you ask. “Just like that,” she says. “People like us vanish all the time.”… more
Chalk Outline
FICTION by Patricia Quintana BidarThe downtown lights blazed in the evening air. Slouched behind the wheel, Ismael watched as Loretta’s staff—the few whose physical presence was deemed “essential”—broke at the lobby door and hunched to their cars. Loretta, gone for 15 cold days.… more
Pearls
FICTION by J. Edward KruftI told the priest about the tent sleepover in the backyard, about the bag of Funyuns and the Cherry Cokes and my suggestion that we zip our sleeping bags together to keep ourselves warmer and how his Funyuns breath made me giggle and how that caused my hand to brush closer to him than I otherwise might have.… more
TWO STORIES
FICTION by Eric TwaOur father told my brother, Justin, Everyone forgets regular people. So Justin declared his birthdays to be festivals for unregularity and then irregularity after being corrected, then back to unregularity for the sake of being unregular. He celebrated his 8th birthday by standing on his head, only to come down when our mom scolded him for not participating in duck-duck-goose.… more
Dad’s Can
CREATIVE NONFICTION by Booz UllreyDad has to pee right now. He can’t pee directly into the toilet, he needs to pee into the can and then pour it. How dare you touch his can? Well, it’s hard to tell which of the things in the bathroom are “trash.” He also objected to us removing the orange juice containers that were filled with yellow pee, the 2-liter generic Mountain Dew bottle that was filled with black pee, and the floss collection that spun out from the towel rack like God’s pubes.… more
