When I was a boy, my grandpa threw baseballs to me. Later, I threw baseballs to my granddaughter. I can’t throw baseballs anymore, but she still puts one in my hand when she visits. I like the feel of it. It makes me wish I’d done it for my grandpa.
Ben lives in Dallas where he is viewed with tolerant amusement by his wife and two small boys. He likes writing micro-fiction because people he knows are more likely to read it.
She cut herself falling off her bike. Instead of blood, wires spilled out.
She wondered if her childhood was a lie, fake memories coded into her psyche. If her parents were androids too.
The last one was easy to test.
She taped a metal detector to the doorway and waited.
C.M.F. Wright (@cmf_wright) is an avid fantasy reader and sentence wrangler. Her short stories have appeared in Fifty Word Stories, Syntax & Salt Magazine and the VSS365 Anthology.
The story of the week for September 28 to October 2 is…
Mourning Mama by Yash Seyedbagheri
Mom wears a tight smile now.
But give me Mama and fairy tales about overthrowing rich kings.
Mama, an open curtain, waltzing under moonlight after fights with Dad.
Mama, drowning fatherly fusillades with dirty jokes.
Not Mom who draws curtains, slinks through bills and empty rooms.
Mama.
A cracked word.
Yash Seyedbagheri is a graduate of Colorado State University’s MFA program in fiction. His story, “Soon,” was nominated for a Pushcart. Yash’s work is forthcoming or has been published in WestWard Quarterly, Café Lit, and Ariel Chart, among others.
Sissy’s behind gray walls, the day of competition. Singing occasionally with radios in quiet rooms, I find some courage. As poison takes over her brain, doctors with false hope insert silver needles.
But I sing, dizzy, from worn out bones, my only sister, broken.
Behind velvet curtains, I let go.
Angela Carlton lives outside Atlanta with her husband and two daughters. Her fiction has been published in EWR, Every Day Fiction, Pedestal Magazine, Long Story Short, 6S, High Noon and Friday Flash Fiction among others.
We’ve got the Lockdown Blues. Every day feels the same. Nothing but coronavirus on the news. No work, no school, no social life. No leaving home except for rushed, masked trips to the supermarket. No church, but endless prayers that don’t wait for Sundays. Vague memories of a different life.
Juliet is an adult education tutor, crafter, and conservation volunteer based in Edinburgh, UK. She blogs at craftygreenpoet.blogspot.com and tweets at @craftygeenpoet.
Is it the moon or sun bookended by the trees on either side of the road? The fiddler’s been walking so long he’s lost track of night and day. Dusk or twilight, the orb marks the crossroads, and he promised to play the devil a tune a long time ago.
Pippa Phillips wrote this story.
“Daddy, can you hear the ocean?”
I put the conch to my ear.
A gift sent from her new home, miles from this dusty dirt pit her mother couldn’t wait to escape.
The video cuts out. Again. Bad connection.
I keep the shell pressed to my ear until night falls.
Jane Brown is a web programmer and short fiction writer who lives by the beach in Australia.
He sits before the door expectantly, tail swishing. The door doesn’t open, will never open. Inside is off limits.
I sigh, empathy swirling through me. “Come on, bud,” I mutter, lifting my protesting cat up and away.
He’s not the only one to obsess over what he can’t have.
Maria is fascinated by the similarities of emotion across species, time, and place. She misses her cats a lot.
The sound of the piano playing always keeps her awake at night, especially now that she is alone in the house. She steps quickly down the stairs, but by the time she gets there the music has stopped. Gently, she brushes her fingers over the keys and closes the lid.
Reb Elkin writes science fiction and fantasy. She has no plans to buy a piano.