The story of the week for October 19 to 23 is…
A feather and a boy by Anne Catherine Vassallo
All posts by Tim
LISA CHAMBERS: A Cover Story
Sam can be so stubborn… most recently, his refusal to wear a mask.
I begged him. He scoffed, said it was silly, too confining.
“It’s not all about you!” I snapped. “Think of our friends. It’s expected, after all.”
Grumbling, he finally relented.
He’ll make a great Yoda this Halloween.
Lisa Chambers is a Texas girl who loves writing (and reading) short stories.
Editor: But actually though: wear a mask!
PIPPA PHILLIPS: Pygmalion
He painted her better than real, caught her in magic hour light, at an angle implying dimension. Mindful of the power of the unknown, he draped her with shadows to keep her secrets in. When he offered her a glass of wine, she reached through the canvas to accept it.
Pippa Phillips is a recovering academic whose words have appeared in Failed Haiku, Paragraph Planet, the Drabble, Pink Plastic Houses, and forthcoming in The Tide Rises, The Tide Falls, Akitsu Quarterly, and the Asahi Shimbun. You can follow her at @IpsaHerself.
ROBIN BISSETT: Second Chance
This morning, the winter rain hammers away external stains.
Yesterday, after the incident, my friends walked me home, and we built a pillow fort. They currently lay beside me, asleep and dreaming. I snuggle under the covers, warm in their company, and wait for the delivery of a new day.
Robin Bissett is a Teaching Artist and Writer from Central Texas. She enjoys absorbing and sharing stories and strengthening her surrounding literary communities.
HAMED MANOUCHEHRI: Brief Third-Person Bio
Hamed Manouchehri was the middle child for 18 years. He became the last child after his older brother avenged their father’s honor.
Mathematics.
“Do the math, sir,” lawyer said. “You can forgive your daughter’s blood, but the boy’s family wants compensation or retribution.”
Hamed’s mother is lost in this equation.
Mohammad Hamed Manouchehri lives in a small town in Iran. He is a veterinarian and an award-winning photographer though his first love is reading and writing. Also, he is a two-time sharia law champion.
MIYA YAMANOUCHI: Behind Closed Smiles
Barbecues were hardest.
“When are you two going to start a family?” they always asked.
“When the time is right,” she would reply, smiling.
“Don’t wait forever or it’ll be too late.”
She would nod politely, before returning home to an empty nursery and calendars red with a thousand crosses.
Miya Yamanouchi is a journalist in South Eastern Europe. Her poetry has been published in Poets and War and her fiction writing in Friday Flash Fiction.
DON NIGRONI: A Gruesome Problem
We were disoriented when some blue objects miraculously turned green and various green items inexplicably turned blue. We weren’t able to differentiate blue from bleen and green from grue before that happened so what else are we misinterpreting? We can only wait in trepidation for the next shoe to drop.
Don Nigroni has a Bachelor’s Degree in Economics from Saint Joseph’s University and a Master’s Degree in Philosophy from Notre Dame and worked as an economist for the US Bureau of Labor Statistics.
ANNE CATHERINE VASSALLO: A feather and a boy
The shuddering wind
plays strange music,
____carrying away the feather
________fallen off that seagull.
____________Unaware
it glides
____following the currents
________like it drank too much wine.
A pale, gracile boy
picks up the feather
in its dance,
looks at it,
smiles
and puts it away in his box of treasures.
Anne Catherine Vassallo was born in Malta but lives in Tuscany, Italy. As a child she dearly wanted to paint but seeing that her efforts were all in vain, decided to “paint with words”. She teaches English in a private language school and writes with a group of poetry-writing friends, all expats.
BEATRICE RAO: Stories
“Can you see the baby elephant in the sky?”
“Here’s a wild horse galloping.”
Mum taught me to see stories everywhere.
In the clouds. In the waves of the sea. Chipped paint on the wall.
Wreath in hand, I stand outside church, straining to hear her say, Look up, girl.
Beatrice Rao has just discovered flash fiction and is working on the art and the craft of it.
MICHAEL B KEANE: Monsters
Waves lap the shoreline. Palm trees rustle, muffling the snores of the men round the spit-roast, whose spices linger in the salt air. Logs flicker. The last captive looks out from his cage and prays.
Then clouds part, and the full moon’s light glides over him. He grins, fangs lengthening.
Michael B. Keane is a London-based writer of dark fiction.