Fiction
August Contributors
Aditya Bhatia,Cooper Clarence, and Kenton Sage Schmidt
two divided by one
by Enrique De Alba
“The wheels on the bus go round and round. I hummed the song against the window, spinning the world into a blur of green.”
a shade of quiet
by Jonathan Daniel Gardner
“We sat on one of those molded plastic benches in the quiet wing…The air smelled like citrus cleaner. Every few minutes the ceiling speakers released a single chime. It made me look up, like someone had entered the room.”
the flickering of white blonde eyelashes
by Danila Botha
“Someone told him he looked like Ed Sheeran once, a few years ago, and I saw his lip curl, like he wanted to say something mean about pop stars who look like lawn gnomes instead of looking like Harry Styles…”
muddied eyes
by David Agyei-Yeboah
“He pushes his weight onto the floor and lies prostrate, then kneels and lifts his eyes to the ceiling, mumbling for his sister to return from the dead.”
the parting
by Andrew Eastwick
“Seized one morning by an impulse, Joel parted his hair on the right instead of the left…Though a little uncertain, he convinced himself he liked it. Maybe it was a long-overdue change.”
slay
by Andrea Marcusa
“Slobbery flesh suddenly crushes my mouth. Cigarette tongue, whiskey and greasy pepperoni breath. He didn’t leave? Why are you here? So heavy. Get off me! Leave!”
grapefruit
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.”
imposter
by Essi Ward
“I had never felt so comfortable in my skin. I looked down at my sloughed, humanoid exterior and felt with astonishment and my brand new pebbled, green skin.”
a moment in limbo
by Brooklyn Armstrong
“Darla could no longer feel where she was. Still, she persevered, she ran, until there was nothing. Nothing at all.”
telemachy
by Cooper Clarence
“Telemachus froze. Here was an obstacle he had not foreseen—already this morning he was dangerously over-budget on exertions, and now he was expected to haul his own dry goods?”
thing impossible
by Kate Forbes-Riley
“He’d quizzed her on her favorite Otis song. Put her on the spot…”
meeting organically
by Gracie Lyle
“Maybe I hadn’t summoned Mitt from the app—maybe I’d made him. Maybe I’d used Tim’s profile as a jumping off point, and then I’d stuffed jpegs with organs. Blown breath into text messages.”
next year’s holiday
by Hayden Taylor
“In the backyard, another hole paraded around, consuming plants and fallen acorns. It moved quickly toward the cat. Just as it was prancing around with vibrancy and intention, it was nothing in an instant.”
sundays are longer
by Lucian Cubric
“The dog follows, keeping distance, eyes fixed on the shape clinging to his master’s back. He waits for it to release its grip before he attacks.”
severed
by Chelsea Cutler
“We buried his hand under the willow tree in his back yard. It was an intimate ceremony; Link hadn’t bothered inviting his parents.”
two paintings
by Zia Musgrave
“And there we hang. I fall and I rise, but at least I never have to look away from her beautiful face.”
body interest
by Carolyn Bennett
“She'd add the stub in her scrapbook as a souvenir. She almost skipped as she entered the exhibition, excited yet repulsed to be seeing her mom.”
late night cinnamon rolls
by McKenna Hutchinson
“Late-night baking isn’t just my stress relief anymore, it’s our ritual, a bond forged in sugar, butter, and the soft hum of an oven at three in the morning.”
social medium
by Gerald Lynch
“Whatever, I am now paying the price in instant isolation and threatened anonymity. What can be done?…Upset over the absence of responses to my post, I turn to PornPlanet.”
becomes the dream
by Greg McKinney
“the leaf goes unnoticed. Its fading is out of step with the normal order and expectancy of things. It is trapped by the wind…That wind has been blowing since my earliest memories.”