“Grandad,” I said one evening, sat across from him in front of the fire. “Could you tell us a war story?”

“No,” he replied without a moment’s thought. He then turned away from me and stared into the flames, looking for something like an answer, or maybe for a face.

Harris Coverley has fiction published or forthcoming in Curiosities, Planet Scumm, and The J.J. Outre Review. He is also a Rhysling-nominated poet, with verse in Star*Line, New Reader Magazine, Better Than Starbucks, and many others.