My heart has shattered and the shards are everywhere.
Each shard a memory, each memory most precious.
Goodbyes were said, tears were shed, hugs gratefully given and received.
The end of the school year; I will never see most of these students again.
China is a long way from America.
Daniel Quillen is retired and living in China, teaching English at a Chinese university. He just wrapped up his final semester there.
Glass shards sparkled against the flagstones in the light of stark realization. He repented and reversed time, erasing the mess and its memory.
The crystal ball sank heavily in his hands and glimmered darkly, foreboding.
He could bear no more. He hurled it down.
Glass shards sparkled against the flagstones…
John Samuel Anderson lives one nautical mile from the beach and five light-milliseconds from space. When not speculating on human colonization of the stars, he enjoys life on Earth with his wife, seven kids, a cat, and a bunny. See more at twostarshipgarage.wordpress.com.
Hans watched from the observation deck as the ground fell away.
In his mind he imagined the look on Dieter’s face when he checked their company bank account and found it empty. He grinned with spiteful delight as the Hindenburg rose and began its fateful journey across the Atlantic Ocean.
Bill lives in Aberdeen, Scotland. His parents were time-travellers from the 22nd Century and he knows the result of every single significant sporting event for the next hundred years. Watch out for Soviet Union II winning the 2046 World Cup.
Eventually the man who’d been our son-in-law remarried.
Regrettably his new wife didn’t want us in her life.
She connived and ultimately influenced her husband to keep our grandchildren from us.
Despite this extreme cruelty and betrayal, grandma remains no less “grand.”
Defined by her enduring love, she waits patiently.
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.
Yosef was the family exterminator. Marie was Buddhist—didn’t want to accumulate bad karma through killing.
A new insect appeared daily. Yosef stomped them, swatted them, drowned them. Crumpled chitin and ichor crowded his nightmares.
When he left for work, Marie scoured the garden for the next victim to plant.
Tim Boiteau lives and writes near Detroit with wife and son. Follow him at @timboiteau.
With pride in his stride, Anthony marched the entire parade route, thankful for the supportive cheers and hugs.
He checked his watch; his parents’ curfew was firm and Anthony had a bus to catch. He donned a sweater over his rainbow t-shirt and waited for the bus, headed to Closetville.
Roberta Beach Jacobson is a humorist from Iowa / USA. She writes tanshi (short poetry), greeting cards, and flash fiction. See more at RobertaJacobson.com.
Gravel bit through Joel’s paper-thin soles. Sweaty tears blurred the image of the child he held and the imposing wall 1000 yards ahead.
A cage or a bullet: odds weighed.
Joel put his father’s rosary upon his only living kin. “Recuérdame, hijo mío; y reza.”
They walked. A thousand yards.
Dr. Adrian L. Cook is a humanities professor at Tarrant County College in Fort Worth, TX. He is also a semi-pro musician, specializing in the electric washboard. He lives with his wife—children’s book author Cristee Cook—their two kiddos, their pancake-colored dog, and lots and lots of books.
The stench, overpowering. Trash, furniture, newspapers piled to the ceiling. Cats everywhere, alive and dead, some scooting through holes in the screen doors.
We held our noses, bought rock-bottom, sandblasted until the smells were gone, subdivided the lot into three, made a killing as the cats watched, waiting their turn.
Jim Doss has published two books of poems: Learning to Talk Again and What Remains. He also published a book of German translations entitled The Last Gold of Expired Stars: The Complete Poems of Georg Trakl 1908 – 1914. In his spare time, he is an editor for the Loch Raven Review.
Grief is sneaky,
Grief hides.
It is bedside arguments,
Squabbles over small things,
Tussles over funeral hymns,
Who visited most? stayed longest?
Grief simmers,
Bubbles beneath,
Constantly ignited until the pan boils dry.
Grief encapsulates,
Fills the room like oxygen,
Compressing every surface.
Grief devours,
It does not let go.
Jo Withers writes poetry, flash and shorts from her home in South Australia. Recent work has appeared in Molotov Cocktail, Reflex Fiction, Spelk and Ellipsis Zine.
The story of the week for June 24 to 28 is…
Her Glorious Face by Laura Besley