Mouthful of Stones

/

We can only hold those stones for so long.

————

…hate it when that fat spic runs the vacuum cleaner right outside of my room first thing every morning.” Mr. Bluebird is, hands down, the most annoying ‘guest’ in this sad excuse for a hotel. “Can’t she jest say no to the Mickey D’s? Hell, I can’t hardly get past her in the hallway.”

Marjean’s enjoying the breeze coming in the front door; smells a little like rain. There’s some good, old Motown playing on the radio and she’s got a cup of Brenda’s coffee. Be nice if that new one…

By Remington Write

Read More

The Marijuana Mafia

/

My Life: Reimagined

————

PART I

…see there are some things that you must understand about me. Not that you must understand but I'm going to tell you anyway. Some things I'm going to tell you about happened to me and then there are some things that happened to me in just the way that I remember they happened to me. Because my memory isn't all that good, to begin with, and that's before I got sick. 


So sometimes the story is in order and sometimes it's out of order and the reason is... I'm like a storytelling carousel. Remember the carousel at…

By RayFed

Read More

Ashes of A Fleeing Life

/

This short story was inspired by the work Junji Ito, a Japanese author who relishes the freedom of horror stories that thrive on not answering every question the reader might have.

————

…had been a week since Max’s funeral. His family had chosen not to have a casket. Our guess was there hadn’t been enough left of him to put in one after the accident. Instead, his grandmother had him cremated and put his ashes on display. I remember noticing the box then. I’d only ever seen urns used for ashes, and a box didn’t seem like it would hold them…

By Nick McCusker

Read More

Martha.

/

…journey continues into the cold, empty void of space. Martha's voyage takes her far beyond the scope of what we have explored.

She leaves another mark faintly with a pencil on the metal of the cockpit wall. One for every 24 hours she is contained in this cage.

Space is a horrible place to be left alone. She started this voyage in hopes of finding someone, or something. When traveling at 95 percent the speed of light with no objects nearby, one loses track of everything: speed, direction, purpose and reason. Her metal sarcophagus continues to drift through the great…

By Jason Garden

Read More

Fallen Apple

/

Some writers have great skill and determination. Some just have luck.

————

…the daughter of a famous suicide is a valid career path. One bullet and no door has ever been closed to me.

On the last Tuesday of October in 1962, a jewel of a day with the kind of blue sky that makes you want to cry, my mother put her notebooks in order, chronologically, and sent a final draft of her last poetry collection to her agent. My sister and I were at our babysitter’s so the only one to hear the report of the pistol was our…

By Remington Write

Read More

Comrade Commissar

/

…the little town of Netrizovo, in a 3 room dacha lived Comrade Commissar Pietrov. It was his duty today, as it had been every Tuesday since joining the Party, that he patrols the rabochiye polya and make sure all was well and all the happy children of Comrade Stalin were working to their hearts' content.

Comrade Commissar Pietrov was a rather handsome fellow if you asked his babushka, and he had a pleasant if not stern look about him, as all good Comrade Commissars should. He stepped out into the crisp morning air taking a deep draught of the smell…

By RayFed

Read More

Mind Numbing

/

…broke my first neck when I was eight. I didn’t even know I had done it when it happened. I just stared at the stupid PE teacher who was yelling at me and I wanted him to lie down and die. And he did. Just like that. It was the first of many neck breaks. And car crashes and plates broken. But, like I said, I wasn’t even aware that I had done it. Ost of the kids were just scared and screaming as the blood escaped from the corner of Mr. Brightman’s mouth. His eyes were wide open staring…

By T Gamache

Read More

Into Lightness

/

Previously published in Shirley (issue 2, 2015)

This story is about a dog that escapes into his dreams.

————

…air was warm and the ground beneath me was soft, and wet, and I was running. 

The earth was moist, and I was sniffing the earth, letting my nose guide me to the answers that lay underneath the ground. 

Maybe I had escaped my kennel, or maybe someone had unlatched the door, but that ceased to matter to me once I scratched the ground and found earthworms, chicken, twigs. The smell of food was thick enough to chew on. I heard barking in the distance, and ran to meet…

By Monica Macansantos

Read More

Ninja Nun

/

A zombie invasion threatens a fictional American city and Sister Mary is the only one who can stop it.

————

…Sister Mary, how ya doin t'night? It's always good to see ya. Say, if you see Mr. Thomas would you tell him his dinner is gettin cold? He's been acting kinda funny lately.", says Mrs. Thomas, a short round woman.

"Yes, Mrs. Thomas I'll do that. Have a good night now."

Minutes later Mary rounds the corner of some industrial buildings. There she sees a figure crouched over a dog, looking suspiciously like he's eating it. In fact he is…

By Sanfmo

Read More

The Room

/

…room was empty. He sat by the wall staring at its blank surface. The white, unadorned, uncovered slab of drywall before him was easier to deal with then the emptiness behind and inside of him. He sighed, knowing he'd have to face it, all of it. The hollow shell of what his life once was. Still he sat, cross-legged not sure as to why. The wall wasn't going to change, the furniture wasn't going to be placed back. He was alone, he always felt alone, but it seemed worse now. There was no escape from the…

By Wil R. P. McCarthy

Read More