Velu had an uncanny resemblance to his mahout dad. Even his voice was the same.
But he was a wastrel.
Until Dad died and the elephant refused food.
When Velu patted him and gently asked him to eat, the noble animal rose to oblige.
Velu’s status, too, rose with that.
V.R. Shankar is a retired engineer from India with a zest for creative writing.
Vicious attacks plagued the sleepy town.
Victim after victim, each unable to defend themselves.
I made the journey to walk the darkened streets alone.
Finally it was my turn to face the flashing blade,
but the paltry criminal did not count on my maniacal nature
and rapacious taste for blood.
Kristyn Mass lives in Iowa with her husband and three cats. She is a professional voice actor and aspiring writer.
Mom warned me not to look in the mirror between the hours of 2 and 4 A.M. “If you do,” she said, “don’t ever look your reflection in the eye.”
How childish.
I caught my eye and she winked, and yanked me by the collar. My head cracked the glass.
Olive Richardson is an unknown but human adjacent creature made of spite and caramel lattes.
The bumpy pumpkins all listed. We chose a large one with no redeeming qualities, just attitude.
Lid cut, insides scooped, a jagged face took shape. It grinned a lopsided grin.
On a street where every house had a perfect Jack-O-Lantern on its porch, ours was the one children loved best.
Candace Kubinec posts her stories at storydribbles.wordpress.com and her poetry at rhymeswithbug.com.
After twenty years of a thriving marriage, long-term financial planning, and reading many books and manuals for new parents, it was the perfect time to take the next step. After a special dinner, they looked excitedly at each other and said: “I think we are ready to have a puppy!”
Bruna Rugna is an English student from Brazil studying at South Florida Bible College. This story was one of the assignments requested by her teacher.
It was the color of fall, when the gilded sun rises warmly in the southeast corner of the sky. It was the time of beautiful death, when all the trees catch fire, awaiting the spiteful winter chill to put them out.
I didn’t always hate the fall. Not before her.
Andrew is an unpublished fiction writer in the Washington area. In his spare time he enjoys pens, pads, word processors and pudding.
When the girl found me, I carried no traces of humanity. Unremembered, I became smooth as an egg. Seeing me should have killed her.
Though blind, she could hear my stories. As she listened, my limbs and features reappeared.
I kissed her eyelids and dissolved, tethered to Earth no more.
Becky Kjelstrom watches the night sky and ponders, what is light without dark or the known without the unknown?
They stopped listening when the truck hit us. From the back seat I’d been explaining Three- and Five-Act Structure.
The side door crumpled and I realised my mistake: this was Act Five of my story, not Act Two.
Maybe the Midpoint of the lorry driver’s arc, Point of No Return.
Tom O’Brien is an Irishman living in London. He’s been published in numerous places across the web and has short stories printed in Blood & Bourbon, Blink-Ink, and DEFY! Anthologies. His novella Straw Gods will be published by Reflex Press in 2020. He’s on Twitter at @tomwrote and his website is tomobrien.co.uk.
Withering from within, she huddled her hunched-over spirit through the imposing church doors.
In her closed fist was enough shiny and dull copper, grubbed from the streets, to pay.
Perhaps crumbs of kind words. Or drops of holy water from the priest’s aspergill.
Just enough sustenance to survive another week.
Una Nina Nine loves to read and write.
Football ruled his weekend. College all Saturday and pros all Sunday. This was his just reward for a hard week of work.
He turned the television off after the last weekend football game. The house was eerily quiet.
He wondered, idly, when she’d left and whether she would come back.
NT Franklin has been published in Page and Spine, Fiction on the Web, 101 Words, Friday Flash Fiction, CafeLit, Madswirl, Postcard Shorts, 404 Words, Scarlet Leaf Review, Freedom Fiction, Burrst, Entropy, Alsina Publishing, Fifty-word stories, Dime Show Review, among others.