Category: Fiction

Stealing the piece of Evander Holyfield’s dismembered ear that was bitten off by Mike Tyson from a rich man’s safe was my best friend Aaron’s idea. He wanted Real Deal’s ear back. He’d lost it in a poker game.... Michael Nye is the author of the story collection Strategies Against Extinction (Queen’s ... Read More

Jesse shuts his eyes to the hotel room’s stark white décor. Imagines he is in a French bordello. Thick velvet drapes framing the window. A soft canopy above the bed. Brass table lamps with beaded shades. He leans back on his elbows, kicks off his sneakers. He likes a good ... Read More

The red velvet curtain rises. Music plays, a piece heavy with woodwinds, flittering flutes set off by the depth of oboes and clarinets. The lights above the aquarium shoot rays of violet and neon pink through the water. The smell of chlorine is strong, but it doesn’t bother the boy; ... Read More

When the dolphin appears in Ava Long's swimming pool, she thinks at first it is a shadow, the gray outline of a zeppelin circling above her house. Then, the gray sliver flicks its tail and dives to the bottom of the amoeba-shaped pool, and Ava thinks the neighborhood kids are ... Read More

The kickback at the Carmichaels' was not Riley's idea. It was Liz's, of course, part of her obsession with losing her virginity to Frank Marshall. A little over a year ago, Frank had been a skinny drama nerd in ill-fitting polo shirts with an unrequited crush on Liz. AIDS, Liz ... Read More

Before the locals knew Isaiah to be a man of good faith, he first became popular for being the man who collected the rainwater in large tin tubs which he placed all over his property. These tin basins were shiny silver, favoring summer solstice cauldrons. It would look like the ... Read More

Tonight, Sarah didn’t want to get drunk with her parents. There had been too many nights of the same thing, and instead of finding comfort in the routine, it only made her feel increasingly worse about what had happened. Her parents had started drinking early and were too lost in ... Read More

He’s written about this too. He’s almost sure of it. Or at least thought seriously of writing about it a number of times and jotted the incident down in his notebook as an idea for a story. That every time he sits down at his typewriter for the first time ... Read More

She could be sitting up in bed, studying her lines; she might, at any moment, fling off the covers and pass by the window in stunning silhouette. She doesn't. But thirty minutes later I'm still watching when the light goes out. I am close enough to see all of the ... Read More

He could stay in the car a few more minutes, or even make a few rounds in the neighborhood, perhaps stop by the grocery store or hardware store and get something; they always need something. Instead, he shuts the car door behind him, the slam echoing. Inside, the air smells of Parmesan ... Read More

If I were a suicide I wouldn't have become a punchline. Budd Dwyer kept his dignity. "Don't, don't, don't" were his last words. "This will hurt someone." The way he says "Don't, don't, don't" is careful and controlled. A man who knows exactly what he is doing. He's incanting, summoning up the ... Read More

Scribbling this down to tell you later… Renée is sitting and eating a lukewarm bowl of banana oatmeal. She’s hunched over, clenching her spoon in her whitened fist and refusing to make eye contact. She glides the spoon around her bowl, eating strategically, and only periodically does she actually lift ... Read More

Goose bumps are taboo; her skin must be smooth and even. Last summer, he cracked open the windows for a breeze and let two fans chase away the heat.... Claire Polders is a Dutch author of four novels with a debut in English on the way. Her short prose appeared ... Read More

Marty realized that he had never once purchased a box of Corn Flakes, not ever in his life. The thought was very frightening. He wondered how he could've stepped on a Corn Flake in his own apartment without ever having purchased a box of Corn Flakes before.... Michael J. Coene's ... Read More

It was not uncommon for babies to show up at the door of the church. Whenever a woman had a baby she did not want, it appeared here so the Sisters could take it in the orphanage. Most mothers of these children, unable to care for them, took them personally ... Read More

They wear devilish waders and fly-fish in the creek at its most dangerous flow. They mainline Art, sip rattlesnake venom in the nude. They balance tea cups on their bosom and dare you to notice. They borrow your boombox and never give it back. Father says I can track them, ... Read More

You can’t remember the name of the guy sitting to your left, but you’re pretty sure the girl in the back is Jenny. When you told them about the boat and that the rest of the trip consisted of someone else’s directions, they assumed that someone else would be here ... Read More

When she last slept, she dreamt of a great lizard taking shape from the side of a building, a dinosaur that started out as a mural but which roared to life from the brick facade. Or did dinosaurs hiss? The poor monster couldn’t sleep either, she supposed.... Cezarija Abartis' Nice Girls ... Read More

The following day, he hung himself in the guest bathroom of the Deardorf’s two-story, five-bedroom house. Because he was so tall, it was perplexing to the police how he managed to accomplish this in such a small space. The conclusion was that he must’ve bent his legs or touched his chest with his ... Read More

Pretend you’re on a dating show not because you want to be (unless you’ll get a book deal, that happens sometimes) but for ulterior motives, say as a government spy or as a budding sociologist with a thesis deadline. Argue with your not-too-gruff-to-cry spy boss or with your stern-but-hip professor ... Read More

He prepared well for the debate: waxed the skin of his face, his mustache and the bald spot on the top of his head, trimmed his beard, and rubbed frankincense essential oil on the bottom of his feet and on his neck to help alleviate nervous energy and for the pleasant smell ... Read More

Weird dreams are Angie’s favorites. Dreams about eggs jumping off frying pans and skating around kitchens. Dreams of waltzing with long-dead aunts on bright cruise ship decks. Randomness was easy. It can mean anything.... Nathan Tavares writes fiction, sometimes about benevolent frauds, young immortals, and the terrible and/or wonderful things ... Read More

Granny Clery blamed my lack of the family eyes on my Italian father and Hazel's on her wicked spirit. But neither of us, not a one, ever fit in since..... Kristie Smeltzer's writing has appeared in So to Speak, The Florida Review, Eclectica Magazine, and The Apeiron Review. Her story,  "Bridges,"  was a ... Read More

These women were accomplished musicians, cooks, athletes, painters and scholars.  But none before Margaret was particularly known for her physical attractiveness. Rie Hyosaka had been bullied as a young girl as the result of bulging eyes and broad-rimmed glasses. Nobuko Funatsu’s face was pulled wide and taut as by invisible ... Read More

...If my Dad knew that I was crossing the picket lines – and for Pittston, those bastards, he would lose his mind, he would. Lose it. He would be screaming about Buffalo Creek in ‘72 from back when I was just a kid and how he’d survived that only to ... Read More

Happiness is a simple thing, you said. Happiness is a cool shadow and you looking at me. But we don’t have cool shadows in Trun. In summer there is no grass like the grass you see in your picture books. The dust is knee-deep and it is so hot your ... Read More

I see it playing out in front of me all the time.  Kinda like a movie.  I was real young when it happened.  A good several years younger than you boys are now, and a little small for my age, too.  My parents were fine with me being out, though, ... Read More

There was a town overrun by rats. They spoiled everything. They stuck their tales in the butter and shit in the soup and committed date rapes, but the girls imagined it was a mark of prestige to be chosen, so they said nothing.... S. Graber is an Assistant Professor of ... Read More

2007: #racism #nofaithinhumanity It was an old image. Two black men—you could tell they were black because they were in the light, clothes torn. They hung from a large pendula dogwood tree. Below them a crowd of whites stood, shaded. In the foreground, a man looked, eyes wide, into the camera ... Read More

I hadn’t played golf since high school and knew I’d be way out of my league in a threesome with budding law partner Matt and Dr. Dave.  They both owned custom-fitted clubs. Still, Night Golf sounded more appealing than my insurance adjustment gig. And it was fun until the zombies came ... Read More

Lynn turned the pages of Tehran Daily as she sat behind the counter at Hafiz Hotel. Day after day, for a year now, she had been waiting for the news about the arrest of the person who put the bomb in the station wagon her husband was driving. What had ... Read More

Maribel tried to picture her parents' graves. As a child, she had the notion that if you imagined something hard enough it was like actually doing the thing you'd imagined. She saw how the frosted grass sat as stiff as on the back of an old man's neck. She saw ... Read More

His name was Dario. He came into class and slipped between the desks, like he wasn't hauling a load of grief. He was nineteen, tall, bean-thin, dark face like a blade, vigilant eyes, patchy beard. The buttons on his pink Polo dress shirt were fastened to the neck. He set ... Read More