Fiction
February Contributors
David Agyei-Yeboah, Swetha Amit, Olivia Ardine, Brooklyn Armstrong, Khushi Bajaj, Sharon Bippus, Sacha Bissonnette, Danilla Botha, Camryn Brennan, Margaret Cahill, Cooper Clarence, Kalan Cordell, Enrique De Alba, Craig Demi, Tyler Efford, Andrew Eastwick, Kate Forbes-Riley, Christian Fuller, Jonathan Daniel Gardner, Delphine Gauthier-Georgakopoulos, Kris Green, David Hinson, Michael Holtzman, Caroline Huckeba, D. J. Huppatz, Jonathan Jackson, Joelle Killian, Tom Koperwas, Jesse Lifton, JP Lor, Lana Lowe, Gracie Lyle, Andrea Marcusa, D.C. Martin, Finnegan McBride, Kathryne McCann, Tom Newcomer, Seth Parker, Christopher Kostyn Passante, Tif Robinette, McKenna Robison, John Sara, Eylie Sasajima, Shawn Scott Smith, Té V. Smith, Jocelyn Szczepaniak-Gillece, Rick Taliaferro, Hayden Taylor, Mary Thorson, Jack Timko, Max Wagner, Essi Ward, and Jon Wesick
February Highlights
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nothing and everything
Flash Fiction by Sharon Bippus
“We’re two guys past our prime looking for a thrill.”
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the creative process
Fiction by John Sara
“I keep a box of ideas stashed beneath my bed; misshapen balls of flesh I cut from my body and mail to my editor. (Um, thanks, but I didn’t actually ask you to do that).”
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camera obscura
Fiction by Jocelyn Szczepaniak-Gillece
“…you know what it makes me think of, those engravings of camera obscura where the outside gets projected in but backwards and upside down, like Plato’s cave…”
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grapefruit
Fiction by Margaret Cahill
“My father’s brain tumour changed everything for me. He collapsed at home a week after my thirteenth birthday and sunk into a coma he never woke up from.”
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foreclosure season
Fiction by Christian Fuller
“When Paul set his shoes on fire, we told him to piss it out. That, like, he’d better hurry. He was only supposed to light up the insulation we’d pulled out from the eggshell walls…but we were sixteen and drunk enough to fist fight god and things just had a way of happening.”
retrouvez le nuit
by Patrick Johnston
“And we were drunk like dead men and fell dead like dead men in the dead street.”
dawn, are you with me?
by Mae S. Ladle
“The window opened wide, and I perch upon the windowsill like an overgrown owl, tasting each spoonful of oats like a special treat. Silky, buttery almost, nutty. Sweet compote a clear bell on my tongue.”
revival tent
by Loren Niemi
“He may have taken me out of the carnival but the carnival was still in me. The devil you know. Church is another kind of razzle-dazzle, but from my earliest days, I chaffed in the pew, choked on the prayers. Even if I could be that revival miracle, why would I?”
a tale of today
by Vincent Barry
“. . .Yes, I suppose you could say I’m a habitué of the subway. Something about the rocking motion of the car keeps my nerves at bay, keeps ’em from twitching and straining . . . What can I tellya? The New York City subway—it flows.”
special delivery
by Marco Etheridge
“Danny Silva slinks down mean streets, heading for a midnight rendezvous at a bad crossroads. He carries a letter addressed to a dead man, an empty heart, and less hope.”
shelter
by Kris Green
“The cruelty of death is not those involved but of those left behind. Trent’s family is dead. If they had listened, things might have been different, but no. Everyone is gone. He is alone.”
thursday, night
by Olivia Cantadori
“He collected me to him, limb after limb, dragged me together. I would have preferred to stay apart.”
the specifics of scars
by Mikki Aronoff
“As he lay quiet in the dawn of his dying, I pressed my ear against his scar. It sounded like hush. When I brushed my frantic fingers over the thick of its tissue, it almost felt like touching.”
on my mind
by Keith Hinrichs
“As he approached the street entrance to the second-floor apartment, a yellow, tessellated glow appeared, superimposed on his head. The yellow glow reminded Connor of the inside of a spaghetti squash: stringy and overlapping.”
a spiritual death in taiwan
by Frederick Schardt
“Ash jumps ahead toward eternity, thinking he is ending his life, but instead he falls onto the edge of some balcony a few stories below. He is stuck with broken bones, most especially in his back.”
unconventional materials challenge
by Joelle Killian
“Panopticunt serves Executive Realness in her power suit sewn from the leathery hides of the Koch brothers. The fashionista judge yells, “She owns 51% of this meat-packing company!”
disappear near me
by Daniel Bailey
“So thank God I’m drunk and alone again. Whoever reads this, I beg you—laugh at it. Publish it. Or at least Venmo me enough for a burrito and a medium Baja Blast. Because at Tulane, that’s considered financial aid.”
plucking
by KJ Hannah Greenberg
“he paid more attention to the lone tomatillo plant that grew on their kitchen windowsill than to the would-be bounty spreading untidily outdoors.”
in the back of the head
by Cristiano Cardone
“…I could visualize the mathematical expressions from days ago. They swirled, converging from the edges toward a central point, vibrating concentrically….they looked twisted. Demonic. Like ancient seals from forbidden pacts—symbols that no longer belonged to me.”
idol dance
by Billy Thrasher
“Sandy programmed the jukebox to play “Rock n Roll Forever” by Jill Jackson and the Bloodhearts three times in a row. She danced to the first song, then strutted between the tables and behind the bar to wash beer mugs, while swaying her hips to the beat.”
two flash
by Jeanne Burns Kett
“Neither sister could understand why the other gripped the beige phone handle, tugged it, and elbowed the other’s ribs to take possession. 911 needed to be called, but 911 could not be called.”
danny orr
by Rob Bailey
“He opens the drawer and removes his gun, a .38 Special. The barrel's as short as his fuse. He spins the cylinder…Then he closes the drawer—see, I did listen—and his roster of bobbleheads nods in agreement.”
i never look at their faces
by Sumitra Singam
“You rub my back, and there is something achingly familiar, a muscle memory of me holding countless vomit bags, rubbing endless revolutions of the clock on all the overdose girls’ backs. “You’re okay,” you say.”
one night
by Chris Bunton
“I never knew they existed, but this one is staring at me…two twin girls: one shy, and the other bold. Apparently that one night in Bangkok was not the end.”
erica’s mirage
by E.S.P.
“I spot my doppelganger at the office luncheon.”