A mummy works Macy’s gift wrap counter. He told the boss he has 2,000 years in wrapping. Sometimes his hands get confused and he realizes he’s using bandages from his arm. Unspools. Starts over. Customers curse, but he isn’t bothered by curses, and he has all the time in the world.
Graham Robert Scott’s stories have appeared or are forthcoming in Barrelhouse, Nature, Blink-Ink, and Pulp Literature. See more at hemicyon.wordpress.com.
She had attempted to ignore him, hoping he wouldn’t approach her as she stood alone in the aisle of the bookstore. He was the persistent kind, though.
After approaching her, he mustered a polite smile and blinked twice.
“Excuse me,” she said by way of introduction, gently fanning behind herself.
Ran Walker is the author of seventeen books, the most recent of which is PORTABLE BLACK MAGIC: TALES OF THE AFRO STRANGE. He teaches creative writing at Hampton University.
I met this intriguing woman on an internet dating site, fascinated by her profile line that said she was a welder on a deep-water offshore oil rig.
We’d been hard at it for three months and two days.
The Texas authorities dubbed her the “Ninety-nine-day killer.”
I was that close.
Ed N. White is a writer of Mysteries. A teller of Tales. A graduate of the University of Iowa with an M. A. from the University of Rhode Island. An unapologetic self-publisher of Thrillers and Middle-Grade mysteries. A New Englander trapped on the Suncoast of Florida hoping for a little snow.
A youngster came home from school with scraped knuckles and a torn shirt.
“Fighting again? I think your classmate Donnie is a bad influence on you. Have you been playing violent video games at his house?”
“No, I haven’t. Donnie won’t let me. First I have to win a fight.”
John H. Dromey’s short fiction has been published in Mystery Weekly Magazine and over one-hundred-fifty other venues.
The sign says “If you see something, say something.”
Today, on the subway in Boston, I saw a man wearing a black sombrero with a live parrot sitting quietly on his shoulder. No one paid the slightest attention to either one of them.
How I love living in the city.
Jeri Quinzio is the author of Dessert: A Tale of Happy Endings.
Three blocks away, someone asks how much for the Czech wolfdog.
Strangers have inquired before, but this is the first she stops to think it over. Four years pet-minding, and his owner refused to write her a reference.
“Ten bucks,” she says.
The chocolate brownie gelato is cool and sweet.
Graham Robert Scott’s stories have appeared or are forthcoming in Barrelhouse, Nature, Blink-Ink, and Pulp Literature. See more at hemicyon.wordpress.com.
He was quite sure they’d met before. Her smile, though noncommittal, seemed at least familiar, and somewhat welcoming.
It faded, though, as he approached her and sat down beside her on the subway.
He knew that he’d mistaken her as soon as she pressed the button on the Mace canister.
Ron. Lavalette has been widely published in both print and pixel forms. His first chapbook, Fallen Away, is now available from Finishing Line Press, and a reasonable sample of his work can be found at Eggs Over Tokyo.
In the event of:
1. Flood – Assemble food and first aid kit. Be ready to evacuate.
2. Fire – Leave immediately. Once out, call emergency services.
3. Earthquake – Stay indoors. Prepare for cracks to appear in foundations. Do not involve passers-by. Subsidence is inevitable.
4. Marriage – Follow procedure in step 3.
Jo Withers writes micros, flash, and poetry from her home in South Australia. Recent work has appeared in Molotov Cocktail, Ellipsis Zine, Flashback Fiction, Spelk, 24 Unread Messages, and Mythic Picnic.
“What’s wrong?”
“I don’t know. Everything was fine and then nothing, no calls, no messages. She’s ghosted me.”
“You must have done something to upset her.”
“Well, she didn’t like me driving fast.”
“That must be it.”
“Anyway, I’m going out.” Then he walked through the walls to the street.
Connell still writes a bit from time to time.
Margo used to wonder about her friend Ellen’s strange requests.
“Would you mind picking up some industrial-sized trash bags?”
“Can I borrow your duct tape?”
“Wanna hold my new pistol?”
“Just take my phone.”
Now, sitting here in prison, it all made perfect sense.
Ellen wasn’t her friend after all.
Susan Gale Wickes is a writer from Indiana. She claims nobody was harmed in the writing of this story.