All that was left of my father were his journals, musings of a simple man. Pages of ordinary until I reached the final one: red cracked leather much different than the others. My heart stopped upon reading the first line.
First time I murdered a man, I was only 12.
Andrea Allison resides in a small Oklahoman town. Her work has appeared in 50-Word Stories, Sirens Call and NoSleep Podcast. See more at andreallison.com.
The group stood waiting under the trees. Around them the sky dimmed to an ombre sunset. The mother rocked her daughter, staring at the sea.
This time, surely, the boat would come for them.
The two brothers and father scanned the bleeding horizon.
In the distance, their town burned red.
Alyson lives in the UK with her family including her rescue animals. She works as a tutor/editor. Her dark stories have appeared often on the Horror Tree, and varied anthologies, most recently ‘Night Frights’, ‘Were Tales’ and ‘Don’t Break the Oath’. She’s often roaming the moors with her Labrador, Roxy.
Extreme heat and hurricanes in summer. Heavy rainfall and flood warnings in the fall. Insufficient snowfall in winter to replenish aquifers in the spring.
How do our politicians react? Platitudes and aspirational goals for solving climate change while carbon emissions increase relentlessly.
Enough to turn a septuagenarian into a revolutionary.
Alan Kemister is the pen name of a retired scientist experimenting with more fictitious writing. He’s currently working on a climate change trilogy. First book is published. Get the gory details at alankemisterauthor.wordpress.com.
We stroll around casually, taking it all in, and we can hardly believe our good fortune. The grass is greener, skies bluer, the sun shines bright, and food grows in abundance. Its inhabitants seem clueless, but this Earth place is exactly what we’ve been searching for.
Let’s make our move!
Pamela is a writer and a poet who loves to travel.
After Jill’s tasty crantaloupe demo and Olivia’s savory cramato, Ted roiled with second thoughts.
The students in his berry-splicing class turned to him.
“Pass,” he said.
Under the sheet, his project pecked its cage.
“Can’t pass,” Jill said tartly. “What’d you make?”
Feathers ruffled. “I’m afraid you’ll laugh,” he said.
Graham Robert Scott’s micro-stories have appeared in The Arcanist, Blink-Ink, The Drabble, and others.
I can’t help my grandkids with their math homework.
Farmer Brown is no longer involved with his milk cans and baskets to fill. Now they struggle with Boolean algebra, whatever that is.
I think Boolea’s in the Middle East somewhere and just had a revolution.
Maybe it was about algebra.
Gene Newman wrote this story.
Over my shrimp fried rice, I eavesdrop on the flutter of conversations drifting from surrounding booths. Friends lunching and laughing.
Dining alone, I write about future undiscovered friendships in my journal. I’m in no rush to finish my meal, so I sip my jasmine tea and anticipate my fortune cookie.
Roberta Beach Jacobson wrote this story while dining solo at her neighborhood Chinese restaurant. Her fortune: ‘Investigate new possibilities with friends. Now is the time!’
The same hemisphere always faces Earth. When they chose us for the mission, I said I’d cover any station. They sent me to the dark side, out of sight a year. My life depends on the heater and the halo of light from the lander. Let me tell you what absolute quiet sounds like.
Todd Mercer’s short collection, Ingenue, was a winner of the Celery City contest. Recent work appears in Blink Ink, Friday Flash Fiction, and Six Sentences.
Lois’ son, Miles, finally came home, promised to fix the leak under the sink. On his last night, he took out his dead father’s tools, went to work. “What would I do without you?” Lois asked.
Long after Miles left, Lois lay in bed, listening for the drip, missing it.
Maggie Nerz Iribarne practices writing in a yellow house in Syracuse, New York. This year, she won first and finalist prizes from Dead Fern Press, Zizzle, and Honeyguide Literary Magazine. She keeps a portfolio of her published work at maggienerziribarne.com.
As she rode across
The desert
In deep December
A million stars lit
The evening sky;
She wrapped the night around her
Like a cape:
The moon was
A beacon
Boulders were on either side
Coyotes echoed their
Songs
The Rio Grande
Wasn’t far, and that hope
Remained her sustenance.
Katherine Darlington has articles in many publications including literary journals, poetry anthologies, and has several published novels. When she isn’t riding horses or hiking on some mountain trail, she’s working on a story. See more of her work at katherinedarlington.com.