by Clive Aaron Gill In the spring of 2019, my good friend, Nicholas, texts me, Come to a cool party. With cool women? I text back. You’ll see. I’m known as Jay. I share an apartment with a friend in Oceanside, California, and I’m twenty-eight years old. I have a long
by Wayne Rapp I am the Director of Photography for a large Midwestern film and video production company, and how am I spending my time? Not that you’d have reason to know, but I’m redesigning the crew section of our budget forms. And this for the second time in the last quarter. I should have
by Leeore Schnairsohn CHAPTER ONE In the beginning it was all machines. Excavators dug channels through the wrecks of hotels and restaurants that coated the beach. Drones picked through the smaller pieces, hunting human remains before the waves or seagulls could get them. Bulldozers organized the concrete and plaster into hills the size of apartment
by Lydia Tai When I was seventeen, I knew a boy who told me a story that I’d never believe. His name was Ebright, and his eyes were a starry deep blue, bluer than the ocean during a storm. Ebright was taken from his parents at the age of seven. This might have had something
by Martin Toman The sun beat down. Hot air blasted into the cabin through the open windows. It was a long drive back to the vineyard from town, made dangerous by the rutted road. William bounced around on the bench seat, concentrating on avoiding the channels carved out of the surface by heavy winter rains,
by Allen Sherman My girlfriend Nicole spent most of her childhood in Italy. Her mother still lived there. After Nicole and I had been lovers for three years, her mother wanted to meet me. So, to celebrate Nicole’s twenty-fifth birthday, she sent us plane tickets to Milan. I arrived jetlagged, disoriented, and overjoyed to be
by Richard Squires Hana just had to sample the shit before we got to the park, before we’d even gotten out of Newark. “We can bump it off my science book,” she said. “I’ll set it up and you roll the joint.” “What’s the rush?” I asked. “Shit’s gonna bounce all over the place.” “Fine, Sammy.
by Maxim Matusevich —Hello? —You have exactly twenty seconds to guess who is calling you! —Excuse me? I really… —Come on! GUESS! —I can’t… but you sound… familiar? —Well, thank you, that’s at least something… FAMILIAR… And you sound so FORMAL. Is it because I’m calling you at work? —No, it’s because I’m still trying
by J. Paul Ross UNNATURAL OCCURRENCE ON KLONDIKE STREET [From the Weekly Standard Gazette, September 15, 2019] In all my years covering the important goings on in our fair city, never before has this reporter witnessed a tale like the one I am about to describe. It is so amazing, so unbelievable that it may
by Francine Witte One day, Elm Street turns purple. Amethyst, lilac, and mauve. Everything, everywhere licked with it. Mr. Jones, from what used to be the yellow house, steps out on his mulberry lawn. This is the work of hoodlums, he says. He drives away to find the police, his car leaving deep orchid fumes.