The headline says “Amazon clearance,” yet this isn’t an online sale but an example of the indifference of greed.
If trees could talk, they’d say: love us as we are, for gone is gone, and blackened earth and scorched ground will be no more than a footnote for future generations.
Henry Bladon is a writer of short fiction and poetry based in Somerset in the UK. His work can be seen in Fewer than 500, Pure Slush, Truth Serum Press, and Flash Frontier, among other places.
The curator stands next to a tall glass case filled with a dark liquid and pauses a moment, before flipping a switch to illuminate the creature inside it.
The visitors recoil in shock at its bare flesh, piercing eyes and white teeth.
“I present to you our predecessor: homo sapiens.”
Daniel doesn’t visit museums much these days.
When I was little, they tried to teach me to eat spaghetti properly; twist it round and round my fork, then stop. I always froze, mesmerized by the spinning.
Anxiety’s like that, too. They tell you to worry, worry, then cope. But I just get stuck watching my mind whirl.
Maria attends college in the Midwest, and loves that microfiction fits neatly into her study breaks.
“You wear earplugs?”
“What?”
“You know, so’s you don’t lose your hearing. I mean, it’s real loud, right?”
“What?”
“When you do someone. It hurts your ears, the bang.”
“You think I use a gun?”
“Don’t you?”
Legion shook a smoke from the pack. “You gotta lot to learn, kid.”
Willie Carr wrote this story.
An office drudge’s gloom always characterized James’s daily commutes.
Today, he smiled as he slid into City Station’s unisex washroom. Jaimie emerged, boarded the train and bypassed his regular stop.
At line’s end, she gazed across the sun-dappled street at New Beginnings’ help-wanted sign. Perfect place to restart my life.
Alan Kemister is a retired scientist experimenting with more fictitious writing. Get the gory details at alankemisterauthor.wordpress.com.
On what I didn’t know would be our last vacation, I wanted drinking and dancing; you, museums and cathedrals.
I craved fun and abandon, a pretense there was still joy between us.
But you embraced the passage of time, beheld the mold and the rot, unflinching, preparing to let go.
Maura Yzmore is a writer and science professor based in the American Midwest. See more on her website and follow her on Twitter at @MauraYzmore
One time we sneaked in a dozen birthday cupcakes.
The nurses smiled. Grandpa ate the paper part. I watched him reach for another.
I said, You can’t eat the skins.
He gagged and choked. He was just being a goof. That was grandpa.
He’d eat paper to get a laugh.
Bob Thurber is the author of “Paperboy: A Dysfunctional Novel” and two collections of stories. A celebrated master of Flash and Micro Fiction, his work has appeared in 60 anthologies, received dozens of awards, and been used in schools and colleges throughout the world. He resides in Massachusetts where, though legally blind, he continues to write every day. Visit his website at BobThurber.net.
Down on one knee, I produced the ring. “Will you marry me?”
My heart raced as I looked up at her perfect features.
Her face went blank as her eyes rolled back inside her head. “Please stand by,” she said. “Software update in progress.”
My timing has always been lousy.
Bill is from Aberdeen, Scotland. Read more of his scribbles at northeastnotesblog.wordpress.com.
He whispers, Stay.
I give a languid smile and leave my cigarette to burn on the nightstand next to his grandmother’s old lamp. I adjust my wig and slip on my red heels. The door closes behind me, as smoke curls around the bed.
I won’t be seeing him again.
Karin Osterberg grew up on the prairie where she transformed dreary winter landscapes into faraway lands. Now living in Oregon, with BAs in Biology and Chemistry, she analyzes chromosomes by day and creates worlds of fiction by night.
A State trooper approached a stalled auto with caution. The stranded motorist—already outside of his vehicle—was walloping a highway marker with a tire iron.
“What’s going on here?”
“When I called my roadside assistance provider, a recorded voice told me to enter my membership number and pound sign.”
John H. Dromey’s short fiction has been published in Mystery Weekly Magazine and over one-hundred-fifty other venues.