We surveyed our house’s carbonized skeleton.
“Remember our wedding night?” Marla said. “Dancing in the living room.”
“Right here.” I pointed to a depression in the charred floor.
“The beginning of our new life,” Marla said.
I wiped her eyes and held her, then whispered, “Can I have this dance?”
Tim Boiteau is a Writers of the Future winner and author of The Nilwere (Grendel Press). See more at timboiteau.wordpress.com.
He must have seen me a mile away, free falling. Now I’m on the ground, lines tangled in the oak above, money scattering like feathers. And a fractured patella.
Yellow talons, big as a fist, coming closer. Eagles are good luck, no?
No.
Stern, cocky countenance, punishing eyes.
Divine judgement.
Steve Saulsbury lives on Maryland’s Eastern Shore. A writer of flash fiction, his work has appeared in many online journals and several printed collections. Most
recently, his piece, “The Field,” was included in the Halloween anthology Flash of the Dead.
Your precious smile is a rarity. What ails you cannot be remedied. You eat less and weaken, growing pale and gaunt, clutching your crucifix tight. Your family despairs. Only you can hear my voice, growing stronger. You spurned me in life, but soon, my love, we will be together forever.
Paul lives in Scotland. Sometimes he writes stories. Sometimes they’re even published.
Nitrogen, oxygen, argon, carbon dioxide, neon,
helium, krypton, hydrogen, and xenon
are the gases which make up
the Standard Dry Air.
And it’s air, but also love, and faith,
and trust, and warmth,
and friendship, and thoughtfulness, and courage,
and everything we can’t even see
that which keeps us alive.
A marketing specialist at a Romanian national radio station, Teodora Vamvu lives in Bucharest, Romania. Her microfiction and short prose have been featured on 101words, Spillwords, and MetaStellar, and her first non-fiction piece was a finalist in F(r)iction’s Creative Non-Fiction Spring 2024 contest. She is also part of two prose anthologies published through Amazon, available in Kindle format and print-on-demand, and an upcoming poetry one.
The story of the week for November 25 to 29 is…
Spring ’89 by Charlinda Banks
and
Abduction Sarah Gane Burton
He recognized the tape recorder in his childhood bedroom. He rewound the tape and pressed play, listening to his young voice chattering about whatever came to mind. When his mother’s voice joined in, he paused the tape, heart aching with nostalgia and loss.
He had forgotten. How had he forgotten?
Janelle Seabock is a writer with a love for horror, fantasy, and animals of all kinds. She currently resides in Florida.
They said I did it for money, or clout, or spite.
It’s true. I envied you, sprawled out maned and muscled as a sleeping lion in my bed. How I wanted it, a golden tassel.
But no one ever guessed the truth: that I wanted your strength for my own.
Elizabeth Wing is a writer and trail worker based in Portland, Oregon. Her work has appeared in 7×7, Hanging Loose Magazine, The West Marin Review, and other venues.
I can hear the mountains whisper, the rain clouds call.
Come home.
I can hear the subway, heels click on Manhattan streets.
We do not need you.
I close the plane ticket tab on my computer.
Sometimes you don’t have to like it, you just have to do it.
Seven is a writer living in Brooklyn (for now), who knows there is more for them to do before they can find their way home.
He manages to sleep through the ruckus and wake up on time. In the morning, he retreats to his safe place: his friends, a hot breakfast, and his books are there, waiting for him.
His parents have that same argument over and over, every night. It is their safe place.
Cecile lives in Northern California where she enjoys writing to the sound of the gentle rain.
Marilyn went to sleep next to her husband of sixty-nine years and woke up next to an alien. White eyes. Grayish skin. She pondered the imposter.
Carefully, she laid down and covered them both with the blanket. Perhaps the ship that had taken her husband would come back for her.
Sarah Gane Burton is a freelance writer living in Michigan with her husband, two children, and a dog. Her poetry has been published in “Medical Literary Messenger” and “Third Wednesday.”