He hates this about Beardy Man, always making plans without him. These decisions need careful planning. Not only that. They are best friends. Supposed to do things together. And here he is, making big decisions. So independent, so annoying.… more
Category Archives: FICTION
Safety Plan
FICTION by Brian GreeneHow did his “moving girl” 3-year-old turn into a 17-year-old who never leaves her bed for whole days? He thinks partly there’s a thousand different reasons for that, thinks partly there’s no reason at all, just something that happened organically and can’t be explained.… more
Hair of the Dog
FICTION by Bob KelsoeHe picked up a strip of bacon and dragged it through the yolk until it bled. He took a bite and let himself enjoy it. For a moment, he quit thinking about failure and divorce and dead-end towns. Just ate his breakfast like a man with nowhere else to be.… more
Of Gods and Men and Those Who Dance
FICTION by Stan KemptonIt was a tragedy of what-if’s: a lifeline not particularly interrupted but partially rubbed out to continue as what? a sideshow always placed on the peripherals and pitied? He wanted a girlfriend and wore this search like his disability wore him.… more
Sole
FICTION by Trista Hurley-WaxaliThere is no going back. I found the break in the flesh. I resharpen the knife to be sure I don’t have any parts caught in the blade. The parts left untouched for show are the gills, where it worked hardest to live.… more
A Narrow Bridge
FICTION by Wim HylenLenny puts away his copy of The North American Actuarial Journal and basks in what he’s done. Little red-haired Leonard Reister, detester of gym class and organized sports, human punching bag at Harrison Elementary School, has become a hero.… more
THE BLENDER
FICTION by Jeffrey M. FeingoldSometimes it’s too much, just too much. Really, God, if you’re up there, I just don’t know what’s wrong with you, sometimes. Can’t you give a Jew a break?… more
please don’t leave me
FICTION by Erika SpadavecchiaI was suicidal and bored like every summer in Portland, barely alive. Jonathan had a blonde wife who wanted a new kitchen. I gave him head after he bought me a burrito from Taco Bell and before he told me his wife was pregnant with his third child.… more
Flipped
FICTION by Sheldon Lee ComptonThe movie took on a dissolving pattern, the square screen going soft at the corners, rounding off and he thought not of what he’d done, but what he hadn’t done. And more about what he still could do to balance all that had happened.… more
Curve Ball
FICTION by Joshua D. WetjenAll these years on the road and I’ve never done anything like that before. What really unnerves me is how I barely feel guilty.… more
