“What’cha doing?”
“Hunting deer.”
“Diana! Why? We have more than enough meat in the larder.”
The thirteen year old put down her bow and glared at her little brother.
“They keep coming up to me every time I go in the forest. Oddest thing. Big white deer, with one horn.”
Eliza Archer is writing a novel and drinks too much coffee.
A pushchair on its side; something’s not right.
A car hastily parked, askew.
An unfamiliar brown (everybody knows blood is red) sprawling stain on the road leads to a lady sitting hunched on the pavement, cradling.
I later discovered it was a dog, fatally wounded.
Relief, yet someone will mourn.
Steve Gardiner is an accountant living in the UK.
My grandmother says, “Words are your air and, to keep breathing, your pen must move forward. Immortality exists only on paper.”
I’ve paused before, but never stopped. Still, my hand tires. After endless inked pages, words lose their gravity. So I pen the last letters that mean anything anymore: goodbye.
Salena Casha’s work has appeared or is forthcoming in Bete Noire, The Adroit Journal, Fifty-Word Stories and others. Her picture book will be published by MeeGenius Books this summer. Follow her on twitter: @salaylay_c.
The parts of the sea floor pushed against each other, none strong enough yet to have their way. Years pass and humans thrive.
A piece pushes its neighbor and the ground begins to shake. Days pass and humans investigate.
A mountain of water rushes outward. Minutes pass and humans die.
Suzi Harris is a retired technical writer working on her first novel with the support of her crazy Canadian husband and two psychotic cats.
She treated him like dirt.
She showered him with gifts. Soap-on-a-rope, shampoo in a bottle, deodorant in an environmentally friendly container, cologne strong enough to go one-on-one with a sewer rat…
He didn’t take the hint, or a shower either, for that matter.
She dropped him like a used tissue.
John H. Dromey has had a short story published in Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine, a mini-mystery in Woman’s World, plus fiction online at Liquid Imagination, Mysterical-E, and elsewhere.
“Hey little girl,” said the hospital clown, pulling out a red balloon. “What can I make you?”
“How about a heart?” said the little girl.
“Easy.”
“Not so easy,” she whispered.
He pulled out another red balloon.
“Why not so easy?”
“I need a heart,” she said. “A real one.”
Eliza Archer writes fiction and drinks too much coffee.
We step out into the warm night. The humid sea air is filled with smells of Mumbai street food and coconut. Your eyes are filled with wonder.
A street urchin sells me a lovely red bouquet of roses. I offer it to you. A card drops. “RIP Anna,” it reads.
Pratibha Kelapure is a real person who lives in an imaginary world. She intends to update her blog soon.
Chewy sniffed his master’s leg before biting it. Who could blame him? He was a hungry dog. His master beat him more often than he fed him.
His master could not beat Chewy now for biting him. All he could do was keep lying on the floor, feeding his dog.
Chris Griglack was born and raised in Massachusetts where he has lived for 23 years. He graduated from the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth in 2012 with a degree in Writing, Rhetoric, and Communications.
A man convulses in the grass, fire licking at his nerves. The pain is exquisite but familiar. He grinds his teeth to stay quiet. When his molars crack, he bites his tongue. Clothes split over gorging muscles.
Under the light of a full moon, a wolf convulses in the grass.
Niccolo Skill is an author of flash and micro fiction. He currently lives in his home state of New York, where he attends Paul Smith’s College.
A cold draft hugged my form as I made my way to the door. The house was wiped clean. Even the spare toothbrush he used to use, gone.
I watched him drive away, more bemused than saddened. I would have given him everything.
But Andreas only ever wanted my shoes.
Deepa is a full-time writer in India who occasionally gets to write for herself.