Her palate was broader than her father’s. On her thirteenth birthday she ate the entire cake. But she’d still not spoken. Too much sky up here?
I led her to the nearest cave and she clattered inside with a thunderous, visceral bellow. I feared it was the sound of hope.
Tamsin and Mark Farley decided to write sequels to each other’s most recent 50-word stories. This is a sequel to Fostering the Minotaur’s Daughter.
She carries
ten limestones
to the ocean,
each wrapped
in vine leaves,
and throws one
every minute,
counting the
seconds
between.
Today
it takes
seven
before he
crawls
from the water –
slimy,
salty,
steaming
in the sun.
His arms
are green
with algae
but all she needs
is his kiss.
Mark Farley writes novels, flash fiction and the occasional poem.
Every night on a crag a half-day’s climb above the foothills, a crooked little man dances by a campfire, whispering “Guess my name,” and the echo carries across fields and valleys, streaming into the dreams of children, who grow to believe they’ll someday be able to spin straw into gold.
Over the years Bob Thurber’s work has received a long list of awards and prizes. His most recent book is a collection of brief stories titled “Nothing But Trouble.” His first novel, “Paperboy: A Dysfunctional Novel,” was recently rereleased. Visit BobThurber.net.
In the morning fog, the ocean bleeds into the sky like a watercolor painting. Below, Daeidra walks the sandy shore alone. She has forbidden me to accompany her.
A solitary tear trickles down my cheek as I watch her embrace the waves and dissolve into a spray of sea foam.
Devon R. Widmer is a grumpy graduate student by day, a scribbling daydreamer by night, and a sleep-deprived parent full-time.
My greatest loves have all been in my head.
Safe from failure, I dive into passion; into romance; into perfection. I know things will go as I plan; I am planning them all.
Sometimes I wake from these daydreams, longing for them—struggling to remember their lips are not mine.
Rebecca Milton is a writer from London, England who was once described as “cute like a polar bear sliding down a rainbow”. Coincidentally, that has always been her aspiration in life.
My stomach flipped with each dip of the gargantuan vessel. I stood at the bow of the black ship, letting the howling wind crawl through my short hair.
I watched my kingdom drift farther away and that’s when I intensely regretted my promise to the captain of the Tenebris Ignis.
Ashton Morris has been writing a book called The Kingdom of Magic for a year and a half now. She plays the piano and trombone.
While I explore the famed Loch Lomond, an insect darts over my head, and whispers. “Hello, mortal.”
It’s a she: wings and tiny antlers. “Am I crazy?”
“No. You entered a haunted zone.”
“You’re a ghost, then.”
“Only sprites and water fairies, here.” She whistles softly. “And I’m your guide.”
Russell Hemmell is an alien from Mintaka snuggled into a (consenting) human host. His fiction has appeared on Gone Lawn, Not One of Us, Strangelet, and elsewhere. See more at earthianhivemind.net.
I could smell her rat’s nest presence when no one could. Of course, no one was a bona fide witch hunter like me. Every victory made me sense their presence even more.
She smiled demurely. A school counselor; what a great cover.
I’d run her out of town by Monday.
Since Lin Jenkinson was introduced to 50 Word Stories, she has been addicted. But only micro-addicted. Hopefully Zoey will have many witch-hunting adventures in the future.
The streetlight and trees conspire to turn my ceiling into a dance floor every night, a masquerade of ghouls and long-limbed shadowy dancers flailing arms and legs. His legs drape across me, stop me from floating to whirl with them, my bedsheet a bridal gown, the pillow my swelling belly.
Mohini Malhotra is from Nepal and lives in Washington, DC. She runs a social enterprise that promotes contemporary women artists from emerging markets and invests profits to better women’s and girls’ lives. She loves words, she loves flash, and she has had several stories published (in Blink-Ink and 50-Word Stories, amongst others) and several forthcoming.
In this new world, the colors carried their own sounds, the air tasted like gingersnaps, and birds tweeted the blues.
A gruff gnome told Philip, “You are the chosen one.”
Nancy from HR hovered above, frowning. “We know you’re on drugs. We have to let you go. Get some help.”
L.L. Madrid lives in Tucson with her four-year-old daughter, an antisocial cat, and the occasional scorpion. Her work can be found lurking in places like Flash Fiction Magazine, Dali’s Lovechild, Literary Orphans, and in shoe boxes under her bed.