How I remember the day we met: my beagle strayed into his yard; Christmas lights; strains of music!
We became friends. Then lovers. He promised more.
Years later, his eyes welled as he took wedding vows. I stood behind his bride; relieved at not being deceived by promises twice over.
Mandira Pattnaik writes in India. Her work has appeared in Eclectica Magazine, Lunate, Runcible Spoon, FewerThan500, 50wordstories and elsewhere. She tweets at @MandiraPattnaik.
Travel had been costly, the funeral a blur.
He couldn’t recall why they’d become estranged.
A tug on the lead prompted him to release the Yorkie to belt along the lane and off into the snow-trimmed shrubs.
Movement snatched his eyes to the starkly camouflaged magpie.
Its croak seemed commiserative.
Irish writer Perry McDaid lives in Derry under the brooding brows of Donegal hills which he occasionally hikes in search of druidic inspiration. He even finds it on occasion.
The scream rips from my mouth, taking dark shape, all hairy legs and teeth and talons. It lands on the bed, gutting the mattress. It assaults the walls, clawing chunks of drywall away. Then it shatters the window, escaping.
I stand in the wreckage, horrified.
I long to escape, too.
Kristin Fast likes the shape words make in her mouth, and enjoys corralling them on the page.
He comes home late, breezes through and reminds me of that song. He smiles; this is how it’s done. How he’s always done it.
You are my trophy, that smile says. You are my possession.
I try to remember the day but I cannot. Time is endless. Back, forward. Now.
M. Blackmars is a writer in New England.
He took a can of beer from the fridge and shook it. In the living room, concealing a smirk, he handed it to Nora. She pulled the tab. The beer exploded. He licked it off her face, neck, shoulders while she giggled, and that was the end of their argument.
Kay Rae Chomic is a published novelist (A Tight Grip). She has flash writings published in Crack the Spine, Five:2:One’s The Side Show, Writer Advice, Two Sisters Writing, Hysteria 6 (UK), and The First Line. She had a story shortlisted for the flash fiction contest sponsored by Hastings LitFest-2019 (UK). Kay lives in Seattle, loves to travel, has a passion for ping pong, and is a Motown fan forever.
It was the color of fall, when the gilded sun rises warmly in the southeast corner of the sky. It was the time of beautiful death, when all the trees catch fire, awaiting the spiteful winter chill to put them out.
I didn’t always hate the fall. Not before her.
Andrew is an unpublished fiction writer in the Washington area. In his spare time he enjoys pens, pads, word processors and pudding.
He banged the door behind him without replying. She melted.
After nineteen years, her husband didn’t need a reason to be annoyed.
Giving up, she commissioned a humanoid. Same looks, his smile–the way he once was.
Now she could let him go,
and still have him to her liking.
Mandira Pattnaik writes in India. Her work has appeared in The Times of India, Editor’s Pick Juggernaut Publishing, Microfiction Monday, Fiftywordstories, Paragraph Planet, FewerThan500 and (Mac) ro (mic).
He had so many abilities to bestow, my dad. He could tie shoes, tell time, build tables, fix carburetors, throw, catch, hit. But for all his superhuman powers, he contained almost nothing else, and he withheld most of it.
And stoicism, I’ve since learned, is far less heroic than advertised.
Robert Hoekman Jr. is a writer and editor, and part of the Litmus Collective. His nonfiction work has been featured by Fast Company, WIRED, Huckberry, and many others.
Columns of raindrops
trailing from the parapet
They skip
and dance
into oblivion
Like faces in the crowd.
I scan
the busy sidewalk
For that one face
Him
Who meant the world
I’ve lost forever
My
Chronicler of pain
Exultations, ecstasy
Melted to the soil.
Faces stare back
Hollow, disconcerted.
Mandira Pattnaik writes in India. Her work has appeared in The Times of India, Editor’s Pick Juggernaut Publishing, Microfiction Monday, Paragraph Planet, FewerThan500 and (Mac) ro (mic).
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.