Grandma cooks with me beyond her years. But I’m not always up for her antics. Pots boil over, spice jars spill, and eggs crack inexplicably. Mostly though, I enjoy her presence. Especially today. It’s her birthday. I’m making her favorite: Devil’s Food Cake. She would have turned 107 years old.
Elizabeth Zahn writes from Long Island, NY, for now. Please visit ElizabethZahn.com.
The girl would romp at the edge of the swamp,
for they were quite poor and lived near the moor.
Her beauty attracted a prince who enacted
the role of a frog to entice dialog.
They shared her first kiss—
that’s when his sweet miss
became his betrothed princess frog.
Ken Gosse prefers writing short, rhyming, humorous poetry. First published in First Literary Review–East in November 2016, he is also in The Offbeat, Pure Slush, Parody, Home Planet News Online, and other publications. Raised in the Chicago suburbs, now retired, he and his wife have lived with their dogs and cats in Mesa, AZ, over twenty years.
How amazing to discover colors existing in the grey of end times. It’s been ages since I’ve seen a flower, let alone a garden. I pick one, then another, unwittingly collecting a bouquet.
I pause.
Lovely as they are, they mock me. I can’t smell them from behind a mask.
Pontius Paiva’s flash fiction doubles as complementary pieces to his post-apocalyptic visual novel, DoomsDaisy. More at pontiuspaiva.com.
Beneath a brochure blue sky, listless waves scrape the slipway as sunlight dapples the hull of a bobbing sloop. From a hotel balcony across the bay, your binoculars focus on the headsail, pan down to the foredeck, and fixate on the corpse. Contract fulfilled.
You transfer the payment, as arranged.
“Biographical notes are fine,” said Andy Hedgecock, “unless they use contrived exposition to reveal the subject is, for example, a freelance writer from Nottinghamshire, UK.” commapress.co.uk/authors/andy-hedgecock.
Vince blubbered about not having what it takes to join the order.
We talked some sense into him, left him in the bedroom, standing before that scratched-up mirror.
Waited by flashlight on dust-covered furniture, tree branches scraping against the windows.
He never came back downstairs.
Turns out Vince was right.
Tim Boiteau lives in Michigan, is the author of the dark fantasy novel The Drummer Girl, and a Writers of the Future winner. See more at timboiteau.com.
The skeleton under our porch knew us all. Its secret harmed no one until a detective knocked at our door. We answered his questions.
No, sir. Yes, sir. Never, sir.
We double-locked the door, loaded the shotgun. We knew how to deal with threats.
The skeleton need not be lonely.
Kay Rae Chomic has been published in 50-Word Stories, Cabinet of Heed, Ellipsis Zine, Retreat West, Every Day Fiction and other publications. She lives in Seattle dodging raindrops and is a Motown fan forever.
Maybe my wife wasn’t as sharp as she looked.
Despite a suitcase full of cash, she’d left a long paper trail, charging meals, motels, car rentals.
I gave the info to my number one.
He promised to bring home her head in a box.
I never saw him again. Touché!
Bob Thurber is the author of six books. Regarded as a master of Flash and Micro Fiction, his work has appeared in Esquire and other magazines, been anthologized 60 times, received a long list of awards, and been utilized in schools and colleges throughout the world. He resides in Massachusetts. Visit his website at BobThurber.net.
Venus looks up at empty nothingness. Every night she lays on her back and blows bubbles.
This night, an old, somber man meanders by. He looks up at the iridescent orbs floating up towards the sky. “It reminds me of before,” the old man whispers, “when there were still stars to see.”
Ava Bales is a 13-year-old Creative Writing student. She reads and writes short stories in her spare time. She has won zero awards and her writing has yet to be published.
You did everything else right: tended the immaculate coop twice daily, fed only Noland’s Layers’ Blend. I grew fat on bugs, seeds, eggs, and finally, chickens. You suspected, but my luck held as not once, but twice, you released me from the trap, your sights set on an imagined fox.
Susan Heisner is the recipient of a 1st Place Big Write 2021 Award for her short story, Tales of the Wyoming Wordslinger. She favors flash fiction and wishes she could tap the everyday as well as Billy Collins does.
“They did it, dad,” Chris Borman said. “The Alcubierre Drive. Faster-than-light travel. Your grandchildren will go to the stars, like you went to orbit.”
Colonel Borman’s palsied hand shook. Chris held his astronaut father’s bluing fingers, knowing he had told him the last lie he would ever need to hear.
Matt McHugh was born in suburban Pennsylvania, attended LaSalle University in Philadelphia, and after a few years as a Manhattanite, currently calls New Jersey home. See more at mattmchugh.com.