I saved my little sister’s life.
She had a bad case
of deadly Arphidarfilus.
She sought a second opinion.
Mom was busy in the kitchen.
Dad was, as always, on the road.
I prescribed gumdrops.
(Gumdrops is the only cure.)
Half a century later
she says I’m still her hero.
Ron. Lavalette has been widely published in both print and pixel forms. His first chapbook is now available from Finishing Line Press, and a reasonable sample of his work can be found at EGGS OVER TOKYO.
Being us is coming home, slipping into PJs, and pressing soft, weary limbs together under grandma-made quilts and old sheets. It’s absence of words while my nose is tucked inside your neck. Then it’s singing “Hallelujah!” with our eyes because we’re home, together, in the tender place of being known.
Alyssa Minaker lives in Africa with her husband.
I didn’t know what it was at first, wings folded, very still. A bat expert told me I couldn’t get rid of it. “It’s a protected species.”
Veronica left after a week. She wasn’t prepared to share a house with a creature like that.
It’s just me and Boris now.
David Mark Williams lives in Scotland and writes poetry and short fiction. He has completed two poetry collections to date: The Odd Sock Exchange and Papaya Fantasia. See more at davidmarkwilliams.co.uk.
The story of the week for October 29 to November 2 is…
Sabbatical by Khalilah Okeke
and
Closing the Loop by J Bradley
I don’t mind what you call me
Mum, Mummy, Mother
but I care how you treat me.
Have respect for me.
Care for me.
I am dying and time is running out.
There’s no going back.
So much wrong.
Too much to heal.
I’m your Mother.
I am Mother Nature.
Jean lives in Bath in the UK. She is trying to care for her corner of the world.
What makes me feel really sad is not that I am a sick old man and every part of my body is aching. Nor is it the thought that I am going to die sooner than one may hope.
It is my son’s assurance that his youth will last forever.
Victor is a Russian that could be thought of as a literary anglophile.
Whenever I enter the teacher’s lounge, the schoolmarm starts loud-mouthing about maintaining standards. She smells like mothballs.
Spying me, she blames the Blacks, non-native speakers, and once even the feminists, insisting she doesn’t care what we think.
She makes everything smell of mothballs, but we don’t say anything about that.
Nkosi Ife Bandele is a storyteller who has worked as journalist and has written for stage, TV, and film. His two novels, The Ape is Dead! and The Beast, are published by Crimson Cloak Publishing and can be purchased at crimsoncloakpublishing.com/nkosi-ifebandele.html. See more on his website: eshubandele.com.
Another Raksha Bandhan. He had always wished for a kid sister, who would tie him a rakhi.
“Mom, why can’t I have a sis?” he queries.
The mother gives him a blank expression. She has just undergone her third abortion.
“Can’t afford daughters,” her husband, a rickshaw puller, would say.
Vijai Pant is a school teacher in India. In his free time he lets his creative juices flow in the form of stories and poems.
You failed your haunting final, so you are relegated to watching professionals do what you’re not licensed to do: lure the rest of your family to the shack in the woods, the one where you had your first kiss with your second girlfriend, the one where they found your body.
J. Bradley is a two-time winner of Wigleaf’s Top 50 (Very) Short Fictions. He’s the author of Neil & Other Stories (WhiskeyTit Books, 2018). He lives at jbradleywrites.com.
It wasn’t often you’d see Tillie without her broom.
From sunup to sundown she’d sweep the sidewalks, the streets, the floors of the little shack she called home.
After dark, she was nowhere to be found.
But on quiet nights, you could hear laughter as she streaked across the sky.
Susan Gale Wickes is from Indiana. Her only mode of transportation is her trusty SUV.