Fiction

GTFO #1

If you want to get depressed, I recommend the Big City bus depot. There is nowhere better to witness first-hand the ill-effects of broken dreams. Exhibit ...

Please Hold

Venus loomed overhead, a seething red eye, on the night my father placed the call. Ceremoniously, he dialed the eleven toll-free digits, snickering to himself. ...



Neighbor

Neighbor came over in the morning while the sky was still pink and asked Lily Mae about borrowing some salt. Neighbors got just a few teeth left and the ones he...

Floating

“What? He says this as his finger slides down your calf, drops of water from the bath dotting your leg, he eases past the straggly gray hairs, the coffee-color...

La Joie de Vivre

Steve had a dream that night about a man with incorrect anatomy —  or it might have been that the man was drawn with incorrect perspective in his mind’s eye. It...

Liz’s Story

After your funeral, Liz gave the house to Jerry and moved to the suburbs and we figured that was the last we’d hear of her, at least, until Jerry ran himself in...

INVENTORY

The animal next door was whining and sounded as though it had no intention to stop. I wanted to write the neighbors a strongly-worded note, but confrontation ma...

Social

Fifteen years ago this week, Carter Siap and his roommate, the man now known worldwide simply as “Rob,” began programming what would become Social. Fueled by Mo...

We met in Ikea.

I'd just selected a jumbo map of the world, and he was escorting the two conical flasks in which I would see peppermint plants grow over the coming days and wee...

Band Ad

You stumble on the ad in-between case files; a day’s work consisting of ten to twenty breaks for casual internet browsing depending on the weather. If it’s nice...

Circles

I watch reruns of “The Bionic Woman” while Mack attends class, slip into lectures about Venn diagrams, Beyoncé, and monetary policy when I get tired of her supe...

Sight Check

In the early 1800s, a boy named Leo is selected to be the next Pope after he writes an obscene sentence on a classroom chalkboard in a dusty English board...

On Writing

As she walked home from dropping the kids off at school, she imagined checking her email to find something. What would it say? Accepted? Good news? Your submiss...

The Cure!

His eyes locked on the wings of two flies on top of each other outside the class window. Their shaky dance is more intriguing than the text being read. A visibl...

Maxxinistas

“Be back in a sec,” Cathy says. She carries a black, knee-length sheath dress, priced at $14.99, into the dressing room. There is no attendant, but at TJ Maxx, ...