Fiction

December Contributors

Richard Alured, Alfredo Salvatore Arcilesi, Arthur Aronstein, Jennifer Benningfield, Andrew Rai Berzins, Ace Boggess, Courtney Burten, Kayla Cain, Luanne Castle, Ronita Chattopadhyay, Tulip Chowdhury, Megan Chunn, Ben Connell, Kyle Cox, Jake Creps, Roger D’Agostin, Harry Del Monaco, K. Uwe Dunn, Zary Fekete, Ryan Frye, Steve Gerson, Benjamin Goluboff, Katie Goto-Švić, Richard Grayson, Dee P. R. Kay, Joe Kilgore, Hank Kirton, James A. Knight, Nolan Knight, Alejandro Gabriel Leopardi, Lior Locher, River Lucero, Mark Luebbers, Lindsey Maple, Shrutidhora P Mohor, Guinevere Ngozi Morgen, Faith Murri, Joseph Quilindrino Niduazu, Mika Nadolsky, Susan Brink O’Flaherty, Steve Oehmen, Seth Parker, Randall Perry, Timothy Petkovic, Rachel Racette, Arjun Razdan, L.G. Reed, Nicolas Rivera, Hil Schmidt, Gahl Shattan, Sumitra Singam, Melvin Sterne, Elizabeth Sundstrom, Amir Szuster, Jack Uppling, Derek Waulet, Walter Weinschenk, CR Widen, Jacob Wrich, Brandon Yu, Dodge Zelko, Kit Zimmerman

December Highlights

erotomania

Flash Fiction by Nicolas Rivera
“The trick is to do the opposite of convention. Lighting, video quality, the flattery of a flirtatious angle are important details, but the key to social media is delivery.”
all the kooks

Fiction by Ace Boggess
“The fight started right in front of her in the pasta aisle. Mary Ellen wasn’t close enough to hear if words had been exchanged…Everything was political, even the act of picking out linguini.”
the pain master

Fiction by Lior Locher
“Neutral face, clean-shaven. Eyebrows neat, hair lined up like a platoon. He doesn’t speak. He doesn’t have to. You both know the deal.”
the day she swalloed glass

Fiction by Ronita Chattopadhyay
“She was done with being quiet and submissive. “I will become tough,” she said out loud. She gulped down the remaining water. And then she noticed it – a crack at the bottom of the glass.”
dispatch

Micro-fiction by Nolan Knight
“The detective flashes his penlight over a slick of blood. Eyes the busted back door, scans the yard. Body was moved. That’s three this week. Or was it last week?”

David Estringel 11/8/25 David Estringel 11/8/25

waiting

by Walter Weinschenk

“The sea is a tumult, a terrifying process, and I’m too scared to venture out, too afraid to move, but too afraid to be alone…”

David Estringel 11/6/25 David Estringel 11/6/25

katabasis

by Elodie Ashcroft

“the ugly traffic lights remain, the lights that stop and start us, that take our choice away.”

David Estringel 10/23/25 David Estringel 10/23/25

the sandlot/event horizon

by Eric Angal

“I met the guru last year at Wildheart: The Mid-Life Retreat For Men. He led the program’s transcendental meditation seminars and worked individually with retreat attendees to prescribe unique mantras to us, and to help us understand the uses and benefits of TM.”

David Estringel 10/22/25 David Estringel 10/22/25

ringing the island belle

by William P. Adams

“Kirby and the Market were so closely linked that no one on Belle Island could remember when there was one without the other. “

David Estringel 10/16/25 David Estringel 10/16/25

clam guts

by Susan Flint

“I LIVED IN A CITY WHERE THE MONEY FESTERS LIKE MOLD. I HUNG AROUND THAT CITY’S NECK. I ATE THE SCRAPS IT FED ME…I ENDURED THE SIGHT OF HOMELESS PEOPLE ON THE SUBWAY AND I THOUGHT IT MADE ME SPECIAL. I SWALLOWED CIGARETTES WHOLE.”

David Estringel 10/15/25 David Estringel 10/15/25

bodies

by Emily Buli

“It starts with a video of two women kissing, which intrigues me in a way I don’t fully understand. Megan watches on the bean bag beside me. Her eyes are like glass—red and distant as she takes swigs of hard lemonade with one hand and pets her dog with the other.”

David Estringel 10/8/25 David Estringel 10/8/25

the work of a queen

by Emmi Khor

“The votes were in; she would soon be Queen and her words finally matter.“

David Estringel 9/29/25 David Estringel 9/29/25

roger lamb

by James Zoller

“I was born into a family of great failures.”

David Estringel 9/27/25 David Estringel 9/27/25

grape covers

by Eray Erkek

“He held the ladder steady. The damp floor with hose water covered his surroundings, green and brown like bruised skin.”

David Estringel 9/23/25 David Estringel 9/23/25

just an idea

by Michael Czyzniejewski

“So, my idea, for down in the station, in the background, is we have the shoeshine booth, yeah, but instead of shoeshines, guys polishing shoes, we have guys polishing teeth.”

David Estringel 9/16/25 David Estringel 9/16/25

woman in the coral

by Rebecca Karas

“Someday I would join her, intertwined on the ocean floor.”

David Estringel 9/5/25 David Estringel 9/5/25

protection from the gods

by Emmi Khor

“The Menshen Gods guarding the house were not pleased with the arrival of three new deities.”

David Estringel 8/29/25 David Estringel 8/29/25

lik-m-aid

by Madison Ellingsworth

“If miracles were real, God would have cured our daddy, and that dog would have lifted the telephone pole off itself. But it was us who saved that dog, and it was God who let our daddy die.”

David Estringel 8/23/25 David Estringel 8/23/25

if she knew how to be honest with her therapist

by Amber Budd

“If she knew how to be honest with her therapist, she wouldn’t drop her bundle of shadows at the edge of the sidewalk, like how a mother might leave an infant at a convent.”

David Estringel 8/21/25 David Estringel 8/21/25

one more thing i need to say to you

by Tom Andes

“Is he going to coldcock his friend? In his jacket pocket, the weight of ten years lifting, Simon slips the knucks off.”

David Estringel 8/19/25 David Estringel 8/19/25

when it rains

by Adam J. Galanski-De León

“It is the boot and the breaking of bone. Skyscraper fists swiping Gods from the heavens.”

David Estringel 8/14/25 David Estringel 8/14/25

a centaur’s blood is always poison

by Mario Aliberto III

“The preposterous size of his legs, pumping up and down, striated where the muscles met and sweat ran in rivulets, had dominated her fantasies the last few weeks.”

David Estringel 8/12/25 David Estringel 8/12/25

“hello, I must be going.”

by Dimitry Partsi

“You can catch my primetime special every third Tuesday at 3:15 AM, though you'll need a special satellite dish pointed directly at the moon. My sold-out world tour continues nightly in my kitchen.”

David Estringel 8/11/25 David Estringel 8/11/25

fishing at olive garden

by Travis Flatt

“And you’re just staring. I didn’t realize, getting all worked up for the punchline, that my mask has begun to slip and some of my horns are showing..”