Bravely, he sits at the piano, hands going through the motions. He feels every note of his last performance, his swan song.
Nine-thousand nine-hundred and ninety-nine people rise, applaud. One stays seated, head down, emotions too much to bear, crying.
“Dad, I’ll always miss you,” she says under her breath.
David Maher is an aspiring writer trying to gain the confidence to complete his first novel by sharing stories, viewpoints, and his attempts at writing fiction.
“Happy birthday!”
“Thanks!”
“Happy birthday, sweetie.”
“Thank you!”
“Happiest of birthdays! Older and wiser?”
“Thank you. What a hilarious card you sent!”
The number of people was overwhelming. Gratitude intoxicated the ego and spirits soared. What warmth they—oops!
The fall of the mobile phone echoed in the empty room.
MJ Torres currently lives in Barcelona. A complete novice in writting matters.
Armed with her vintage Leica camera, she is convinced she can stop the passage of time, moments forever captured on film like flies in amber.
But despite her efforts, the clock persists.
1 day
Click
1 month
Click
1 year
Click
Nest now emptied, she seeks solace in eighteen years of yellowed photographs.
Johannah Lipscher Simon is a professional ideator who writes and speaks on the power of living a creative life. See more at thewritingtype.com.
She gazes into the abyss, a gnawing itch tickling the back of her brain. A wisp, a puff, a shroud of a notion keeks through the fog—before vanishing in an instant. Her eyes glaze, her mind blank.
“Why did I come in here?” she wails, glaring into the pantry.
Haley M. Hwang is a writer living in the Chicago area. Her career spanned working as a newspaper reporter, medical writer, and online entertainment editor. She has a bachelor’s and master’s degrees in journalism from Northwestern University. When she isn’t writing, she is drinking coffee, eating pastries, and thinking about her next meal.
The hole was deep, whispery, Hell itself, saying, “Don’t listen to these words! Be advised! Be advised! Don’t listen to these words.“
Hah, such pitter-patter from a hole, daring strong me, nonbelieving me, by trickery, challenging me not to listen. Such balderdash.
I leaned closer, and it pulled me down.
Tom Sheehan’s 37th book was Alone, with the Good Graces and soon comes Jock Poems for Proper Bostonians, both from Pocol Press, and just received the first copy of his latest book, Small Victories for the Soul VII from Wilderness House Literary Review. In submission process is Beneath My Feet this Earth Slips into the Far-end of Another’s Telescope and Poems Found from Fallen Pages. He has multiple works in Rosebud, Literally Stories, Linnet’s Wings, Frontier Tales, and many sites/magazines. He served as a sergeant in the 31st Infantry in Korea 1951-52.
When she died, she left behind her stunning wardrobe, rows of hangers full of brand-new, high-quality clothes, silk scarves, designer handbags and shoes, most still with the tag on.
Most of the exquisite pieces had been hanging there for years, still unworn, being saved for later, for a special occasion.
Caroline Couderc is a multilingual writer and translator living in Switzerland and the UK. She has degrees in French Literature, Linguistics, and Cultural Anthropology. Her work has been published or is forthcoming in Boston Literary Magazine, War, Literature and the Arts, Shotgun Honey, The Airgonaut, The Antigonish Review, and more. You can find her online at beautyisasleepingcat.com.
Impatience reigns
In this hostile environment
Where all are trapped, and none can escape.
Children wail,
Grownups mutter,
And a mob’s slowly forming
To strangle that jerk
Blasting 70’s pop out his window.
Meanwhile, most sit,
Comatose,
With fingers drumming
For all eternity…
…until the stoplight changes,
and civilization returns.
Nelson Scott is the pseudonym of a student who has occasionally wanted to travel to New York City–and then has promptly remembered the crowds, traffic, and sheer degree of expenses that would likely greet him there.
The child therapist gave me a box of Crayola markers, told me to match the colors to my emotions.
“This is stupid.”
He said, “I know.”
I grabbed the black marker and discarded the rest.
He sighed. “Your mother is going to die.”
Without looking up, I said, “I know.”
Avra Margariti is a queer Social Work undergrad from Greece. She enjoys storytelling in all its forms and writes about diverse identities and experiences. Her work has appeared in Wolfpack Press, The Writing District, Dime Show Review, and Page & Spine.
Way back when, I’d lure the dog up into the indent on the empty side of the bed, where he’d arch his back along the comforter’s fold, sigh, slump, and twitch through sheep meadow dreams. His heart beat through my skin. I’d imagine him gone, you know, in self-preparation, pointlessly.
A Wallace Stegner Fellow at Stanford University, J.P. Grasser is a PhD candidate at the University of Utah, where he edits Quarterly West.
The story of the week for February 11 to 15 is…
Finger by Ryan Borchers