In a pinstripe suit he appeared at dusk, holding a white rose like the one he’d offered her in the café, sitting across from each other, the candle’s flame between. He’d laughed long and deep, the fire dancing to his cadence, foreshadowing all that might be—and still she beckoned.

Chella Courington (she/her) is a writer and teacher whose poetry and fiction appear in numerous anthologies and journals including MoonPark Review, The Los Angeles Review, and New World Writing. A Pushcart, Best Small Fictions, Best of the Net, and Best New Poets Nominee, Courington was raised in the Appalachian south and now lives in California. She’s published five chapbooks of flash fiction and five of poetry. Her recent microchap of poetry is Good Trouble, Origami Poems Project, and forthcoming is Hell Hath, Maverick Duck Press.