This was nothing like how I knew the ditch water reason for Lobo’s summer sores, how every summer he got the sores and every summer the ditches filled with water. I knew about that now.… more
Category Archives: FICTION
All is Forgiven
FICTION by Delphine Gauthier-GeorgakopoulosI ruled the underworld for too long. I am bored, & wish to come home, retire. There is little for me to do; it’s hell on earth & I had nothing to do with it. I blame God (He was never a good boss) for failing humanity. Yes, I know the rules: I forgive him. Can I please come home?… more
Elvis was my dad
FICTION by Tom HarveyElvis is singing to me. Straight into my soul. He knows all about Sharon, how shit school is, how tough it is being a weirdo, with a brain exploding with new ideas, like burying pennies in the vegetable garden and digging them up a year later when they’re worth thousands of pounds as treasure. Elvis knows, and I know, that our friendship is our destiny.… more
It’s Really You
FICTION by Tom RothI wondered if I was like him. Even if I loved my children and my wife, it didn’t matter, because I had already abandoned my first family in my own way. Just like him. I studied the picture of Dad again. I just wanted him to turn toward the camera and look my way one time.… more
Goldfish
FICTION by Dan SandersThe other day my wife bought a painting at a thrift store. It’s a fish. It’s a fish underwater. It’s really a good painting. It’s nice. It’s a goldfish. It’s the idea of a goldfish, it’s blurry like you were underwater with the fish. It’s hard to make it out, but the second you look at it, you know it’s a goldfish, and it looks straight out at you.… more
Recalibrate
FICTION by Veronica KlashWhen the satellite was young, it thought only of the way bluegreen oceans slid against sandy brown shores and of how river arteries sliced through dense forest sheen like a lizard darting in haphazard lines though, of course, the satellite had never seen a lizard but it had seen life.… more
DNR
FICTION by Michael Hammerle“Like death, the violence was just where the thing ended,” Grandma said. “Your grandpa loved the training, the starving, the heat, the cold, the purpose. I know his least favorite part was the violence.”… more
Banana Republic
FICTION by Matt KendrickMy daughter Jenny is glaring now, so I tell her that chocolate ice cream is full of E-numbers. I tell her that E-numbers are nasty chemicals. I tell her the E stands for European. Then I go on a mini tirade about the bloody Europeans who’ve foisted us with rules for everything from the correct number of toothbrush bristles to the acceptable curvature of bananas.… more
Sunk Costs
FICTION by Erik Harper Klass“Pain, we know,” he tells me, “has a much more complex grammar than pleasure.” He holds up the book. I guess it is a quote.… more
A Subway Mitzvah
FICTION by Nadim SilvermanNow, he is in the subway, waiting to transfer from the F to the G. His wet swimsuit is sweating dirty water at the bottom of his New Yorker tote. He is distracted—worried about ocean acidification and the ecological cost of clean green energy—and doesn’t notice the “freshly painted” sign. His back slides down the subway column, the green paint comes with him. He’s not too bothered by the new stripe on the back of his suit. Without evidence, he believes there are Native American warriors in his bloodline. They wore paint on their faces to battle. Now painted himself, he is honoring his history.… more
