She drew in her sketchbook and waited for the noodle shop across the street to open. She watched the workers outside. A man walked over and began talking with them. She could not hear, but could see from his expression that he was explaining something. The other men nodded and laughed. He turned his head… Continue reading A Sketch
Tag: stories
Under the Crescent Sun
“Sorry about the tea. I know it’s weak.” Marnie hustled among the dozen or so people, handing out plastic cups. “I’ve relied on my SmartKettle so long now that I’ve forgotten how to make it properly.” A few nodded and smiled. “I thought we could go around the room and introduce ourselves and just say… Continue reading Under the Crescent Sun
Last Halloween
I had been preparing for weeks; months if you count the myriad gruesome drawings haunting my ever present sketchbook. That black, bound codex was my shield against taunts and bullies, ape-ish jocks and unimaginative, authoritarian teachers that populated the terrifying… Continue Reading → Source: Trigger Warning Last Halloween
The Third Act
It was the eyes that did it. Darbinyan could have shut the door in the man’s face but for the eyes. When he had opened the door, he had been taken slightly aback by the man’s height, but it was… Continue Reading → Source: Trigger Warning The Third Act
The Invisible Killer
The braying voice and undisguised hate of Lou Carmody that was coming over the radio were so offensive to Tyler Feasel that he almost went for his hammer in order to smash the radio to bits. But the moment of anger… Continue Reading → Source: Trigger Warning The Invisible Killer
Asleep and Awake On the Man’s Freeway
After almost eight hours of heat, highway and latent hostility, David Long found his options dwindling to two choices; kill a drink or strangle Dianne. Since the latter clearly wasn’t acceptable, Long saw his search for a roadside bar as… Continue Reading → Source: Trigger Warning Asleep and Awake On the Man’s Freeway
Fairy Hunters
When Henry Willis told me he was taking me to a fairy crossing, I thought he was just being a typical homophobe. “Okay, I’ve seen the sign,” I said. “Very funny. If we leave now I can still catch the… Continue Reading → Source: Trigger Warning Fairy Hunters
A Tin Can
I was reduced to crawling through the dirt. My legs and back were done. On the upside, being near the ground meant I could better see any movement among the leaves and trash. Movement meant something living, and that meant food.
I inched along toward a wooded area and my hope grew as I neared a rotting log. I struggled to flip it and saw dozens of larvae and some larger bugs scurrying around. I gleefully reached in and got a fistfull of rotting wood and grubs and picked out the larvae one by one with my lips, as though kissing them. I didn’t chew – just let them slide down my throat.
A Darker Horse
The speaker crackles and a voice says, “Hello Finn. Apologies for the circumstances. You understand how privacy is paramount. Your past assignments have shown you have the skill to erase digital histories and now I need you to erase some… for me. This job will require more… delicacy. I’m prepared to triple your rate.”
Finn smiles. “I’m all yours.”
A New Man
I entered NPR’s 5th three-minute fiction contest, where you have to write a “flash fiction” story in 600 words or less. The constraints were that the stories had to begin with the line, “Some people swore that the house was haunted,” and end with the line, “Nothing was ever the same again after that.”
I didn’t win, or even get into the final round, which is fine because the winning story was quite good. The winning stories in these contests tend to be more “literature” and less “popular”, which is more my style.
Regardless, here’s mine.