Category: Fiction

by Dylan Thompson On Yellowjacket Lake, the rippled reflections of tall ponderosa pines stain the glassy surface with the spilled colors of a bright desert morning: blues almost white and greens almost black. A mountain hovers over the water’s shoulder, bluer than anything else. It is a secluded spot – tucked away behind the Blue…

by George Uriah Everywhere he went in Nashville, Joe felt the presence of ghosts. He swore he could almost hear their voices, which sounded something like a whispered opera chorus, though something tragic or sinister, something in a minor key, like the devils of the underworld were coming to pull him down. At best, this…

by Marco Etheridge He sits at the kitchen table staring at a triangle of toast held between his fingers and then beyond, through a blurred field of vision, to his wife across the table. Just the two of them and no sound save their breathing and the tick-tock passing of time. He drops the toast…

by John Abbott The Gluskers were the only Jews in the neighborhood – at least that Scott Glusker knew of. All of his friends were Catholic, like his mom had been before converting to Judaism. This meant that on Sunday mornings Matt and Sam couldn’t ride bikes or climb trees or search for bottlecaps down…

by C.W. Bigelow The notification by registered mail was a shock to me. My grandfather died almost two years before at the age of ninety-six, and I had totally swept that memory clean. Because of the length of time, an inheritance was reason for the first surprise. The other was that we hardly knew each…

by Michael Chin Halloween 1996, Mike was thirteen and Shermantown was haunted. Sara Dogwood went missing on the bike ride home from school and the town lost its mind, witch-hunting up suspects, reporting and debunking sightings of the girl. Breaks in the case rumored all the time. Dead ends. The specter of some child abductor…

by Grace Jaycox Your father ushers you up on the stage with three other people, one of which is your mother. You look up at her as she adjusts the microphone so it’s the right height for her. The fact that you’re too small to reach any of the microphones was supposed to be a…

by Abhishek Udaykumar It was when she said ‘subliminal,’ one afternoon, that I found myself quite still. Once again – in the cool corridors, like a mired leaf still staggering after autumn. She had said nothing after that. I listened to the carpeted choir that rose to the ceiling. Fitting myself perfectly in a zeitgeist…

by Devin James Leonard It was after midnight and had been storming since the start of Buckley and Teale’s three-hundred-mile drive across New York State. Two hours into their journey, just outside the Winona State Forest, the snow blanketed the road, causing the wheels to lose traction and slide unpredictably. This was dangerous weather for…

by Gary Zenker “It’s not whether it actually works or not,” my cousin Seymour explains enthusiastically, “but whether it has the possibility of working.” That was the basis for all of his success and for the failures of anyone whom he encountered. Possibility and faith. “I know it will work given the right conditions.” I…