❤️ Before—everything mattered. Now? Nothing does. 🜋 🜋 🜋 “It seems excessive—” the new angel says, eyes brimming with tears. “Grief descends on them so quickly.” He looks down again, keenly feeling each pang of despair, pooling in black waves around them like a treacherous sea. “It does,” the old archangel agrees. “But in their…
Category: Stories
Short Stories
❤️ Lizzy liked nothing better than walking over to the public library immediately after school. As the other schoolchildren had collectively decided she was weird, she ignored them in return, preferring to go down Oak Street, turning left on Maple Avenue, and taking a quick right on Sycamore Lane. On her way to the library,…
“Well, I appreciate your kindest regards, gentlemen—but I must get back to work,” he said graciously, standing up to leave the café, affixing his silk top hat and holding his calfskin gloves. “Oh, don’t leave yet, COVID,” Flu said. “You’ve been so busy this past year, and we haven’t heard all of your plans for…
They prepare no lessons, carry no papers, and instruct no one. They spit unrelated facts, regurgitate irrelevant dates, and monotonously spew textbook drivel. They strangle curiosity, stifle a love of learning, and murder both classroom discussion and critical thinking. Most egregiously, bad high school teachers spend far too much time at the photocopier, endlessly printing…
What better way to beat the endless boredom of immortality than watching women fight over who is the most beautiful? Eris had always found ways to amuse herself, usually sending her minions to antagonize the sons of men, but watching Athena, Aphrodite, and Hera go at it was exceptionally wicked fun. Each one of those…
“So what do you do when your personal values clash with those of your family, your friends, your loved ones, your society?” The classroom went silent. Expected. I gave the prerequisite wait time—counting the slow seconds needed for my high school seniors to digest my salient query. Their pensive expressions belied the fact that they…
“That’s the thing about this city,” said Detective McMurtagh. “It’s impossible to discern what is real—or just a Mardi Gras illusion.” Maretha shook her head. “I just don’t like the South in general. Voodoo. Fried foods. And that peculiar institution left its stink on everything. The New Orleans slave pens trafficked more people than anywhere…
Seems like drowning oneself is harder than it looks. Embarrassing, really, as worried Bahamians attempt to haul me out of the Caribbean Sea into their rusty tugboat in response to the cruise ship’s clarion call. I feel my earlobes and note one of my diamond earrings is missing, lost to the depths. A treasure for…
What happens when a Nevada brothel tries out a full-service android? Why would any self-respecting brothel employ an android—especially a Japanese one? We have veterans that frequent our establishment, Troy.” “Not any vets from World War II, Chet. I think we are over Pearl Harbor,” his young business partner replied, looking for something to open…
“Jillian? Jillian—” Jax said tersely, knocking rapidly on the bathroom door. Silence. “Jillian, I know you’re in there. I can smell Ben & Jerry’s Cherry Garcia through the door,” he said firmly. “You need to open this door.” He crossed his arms and waited. “Go. Away.” “I’m not going away, Jillian. I’m never going away.…
“Oh-Jillian-I-can’t-believe-I’m-doing-this,” Jax said frantically. He finished his blueberry scone and used the Starbucks bag to slowly breathe into. “Calm down. You are not hyperventilating,” Jillian replied, driving with both hands on the wheel. “How scary can substitute teaching be? Just let the students play on their phones all day. If their teacher were there, they’d…
“I’m not sure if I’ll recognize her—” Jillian said, biting her fingernails, holding on to Jax’s arm. “I haven’t seen her since my younger sister’s wedding.” “From what you’ve told me about your mother, we’ll just walk around until we smell sulfur,” Jax replied, looking down his nose, over his glasses. He was at least…
What happens at self-empowerment conferences? “Who are all these people? And why are most of them wearing cheap DayGlo hoodies?” Jax asked, pursing his lips in mild disgust. “Our fellow conference attendees are wearing Safe Hoodies,” Jillian explained carefully. “They are available in a variety of aura-lifting colors and body-acceptance sizes. Wearing Safe Hoodies shows…
🏅 Alana’s mother had warned her about the rocks covered in ice near the edge of the lake. The Johnson boy had slipped and tumbled headlong into murk. In 40 degree water, he quickly sank in his heavy winter coat, started to hyperventilate, and drowned before anyone knew he was gone. “He’d only have lasted…
❤️ “There you are,” he said, making his way through the crowd, walking over to kiss her. “The fans are very loud today,” she replied, laughing amid the clamor, folding herself into his bear hug. Luckily, she had secured the last two barstools. “It’s the playoffs. They’re entitled to a little noise,” he remarked and…
“The family wants us to sort this out—” “Stop speaking in the collective. You want to sort this out,” she spat. “Of course I do,” he said sharply. He took a breath and exhaled dramatically, looking at his younger sister. Her jaw set. Eyes ablaze. This was never going to be easy. “Look, it’s not…
3.1688739 x 10^-10 Millenia In ten seconds you will break my heart. In a thousand years, I will never recover from the words that will come out of your mouth, from this serious conversation you want so desperately to have, from your dead shark eyes that fail to hold my gaze. I will get up…
Although he loved her from afar, she sized him up fairly quickly, determined him to be reliable, then volunteered him to watch her cockatoo for the holiday break. “I’ll be back next week. Its food is in the plastic bag. If you could, give it some fruit once or twice a day,” she said breezily…
T.S. Eliot was right, Harrison thought. This is the way the world ends. Not with a bang, but with a whimper. Although his English bachelors degree had been useful in law school, now Harrison James Pellingham, III needed it for a job. Yes, he knew that 100,000 new lawyers graduated every year from varying degrees…
❤️ Five days after Yom Kippur, David Jacob Tomaschewitz counted on Sukkot’s challah sales to ensure his foundering bakery made a profit for the year. Although business had been brisk for Rosh Hashanah, the weekly sales of his bread for Shabbat had consistently diminished as other Jewish bakeries in Boca Raton had far more offerings—cookies!…
I just don’t understand what went wrong. This is his second apartment, not including his freshman college dorm. Remember when I told you how the college demanded he vacate the dorm’s premises in 24 hours? It was only his second month of college! You would think they would understand 19-year-old boys better. It’s ridiculous. Oh,…
“You don’t hate me,” my older brother smiled slyly. “You admire me.” With that, he slapped down the queen of spades on top of the pile of cards, adding another 13 points to my score. It was the third hand in a row he’d gleefully beaten me. Roy was only half right. I admired him;…
❤️ 5:00 a.m. — Lauds or Dawn Prayer “St. Benedict had too many rules for the clergy,” he said, rolling over in her big wide bed. “Awakening at this ungodly hour was probably the most demonic,” he sighed and burrowed back into the crisp, white sheets, cool in the morning air. The sheets had been…
🏆 ❤️ “We saw your poor Rick,” they say in the grocery store aisle. I smile, unconvincingly, and compare jars of spaghetti sauce that I don’t even want. “We heard about your poor Rick,” they say, half turned on the pew in front of me at church. I sit alone and nod at their thoughtful…
“Where do you think you’re gonna go?” her husband sputters, blindsided by his wife’s packed bags at the bottom of the stairs. “It doesn’t matter,” she replies, dead-eyed and somber. She puts on her coat, the black one, the one for special occasions. “The kids—” “The kids are thirty,” she says, turning away from him…
🏅 ❤️ Twenty five years in, she found herself a ghost. She stood unseen in the living room, stupidly holding a large bowl of homemade caramel corn. The noise from the widescreen television washed over her, the whistles and calls, the screaming of the fans, the roar of the crowd. The men in the room,…
“You can’t keep me here.” “Please, Mr. Van de Kamp. Take your seat,” ordered the imperturbable headmaster, black eyes narrowing over his hawkish nose. The boy stood in his office. Out of uniform. Insolent. “You can’t keep me here—” the boy repeated. “I assure you, we can,” the headmaster flatly stated. “Your father—” “My father…
Read by Russell Norman ❤️ It wasn’t like Dr. Stevens to spend $4.38 for coffee. Not coffee—a latte. A latte was essentially a fancy espresso with a thin layer of foamed milk. Either way, $4.38 was an egregious amount of money to spend on a beverage for a young professor with crushing student loans. A…
When I’m gone, finally gone, our children will find this. Behind the wainscoting. I remember you’d insisted on this—this tacky beaded white wall paneling, always insisting on what you thought you knew was best. Did it matter if I wanted the interior of our home decorated in rough sawn oak or weathered pine to create…
Of course Missy was making a scene at the registration table. Thirty five years had not blunted Missy’s expectations that her very presence should cause red carpets to unroll and doves to be uncaged. Over her carefully coiffed blonde head read a welcome banner: “Class of ‘85 – Still Alive.” Black and gold balloons attempted…
❤️ It was Evie who wanted the kids, Orville remembers. Orville would have been content drinking coffee with his Evie in the mornings, looking out the window, watching the birds at the bird feeder, quietly listening to her go on about this and that. “When does the school bus come, Ollie?” Evie asks. “About 3:30,”…
“Hey—that looks like quite a load! Do you need any help?” It’s the new guy from account services. Is he coming into the elevator with me? He’s even better looking close up. Much better looking. Did I put on antiperspirant or deodorant this morning? Either way, this might be a problem if he stands too…
And here is the resting place of your great-grandfather, Salvador Earnest Forth. The renowned Sally Forth. Found dead in his cottage with an iPhone in his hand at the age of 96. Yes, I am aware you didn’t get to meet him while he was alive. He was an interesting man. Well, maybe less interesting…
“It sounds like hell.” “You’ll be fine. Now, the women stay stationary in the circle while the men rotate around the perimeter. You’ll switch to a new partner every three minutes,” he carefully explained. “It sounds like square dancing,” I protested. “Do I allemande right or left?” “It’s not square dancing. And you will not…
“There he is! Come in here, big guy!” My father throws me into a headlock hug, causing me to drop a duffle bag full of filthy laundry. It’s too cold out to snow and we quickly retreat inside. “Hey Mom!” I call out. “Mom?” The smells emanating from the kitchen trigger every one of my…
❤️ Read by Russell Norman “Your wife’s confusion is partly due to salicylate poisoning,” the young doctor explains. Orville waits patiently for him to continue, holding his wife’s sweater while she dresses in the examination room. The doctor’s office is too cold, as Texans like their air conditioning glacial. It hurts his knees. “Essentially she…
“One of you is sleeping with my husband,” Issa says matter-of-factly, just before the sticky toffee pudding is served. “Issa—” her husband protests, but everyone knows Jude is a womanizer and a fool. The truth of his wife’s declaration shoves his objections right back into his lying mouth. “What I cannot figure out,” Issa languidly…
🏅 ❤️ In nómine Patris, et Fílii, et Spíritus Sancti. Amen. Things sound so much better in Latin, don’t they, Father Connolly? I guess that’s why my parents splurged on the whole two-hour deluxe wedding package. The TLM, baby! Total. Latin. Mass. I’m sure you would have been fabulous with the Gregorian chanting. Father, do…
❤️ No one really explains to you that only after your cervix dilates to 10 centimeters that the true horror show begins. The mounds of maternity pamphlets, handouts, and books you dutifully study and the endless streams of websites, blogs, and postings you devour will all allude to bearing down, but they don’t really convey…
❤️ The minor Greek gods hung out in suburban fern bars, claustrophobically furnished with wood paneling and phony Tiffany lamps. Places where a Reuben sandwich would set you back $12.99. As for the Olympians? They seldom fraternized with the lesser gods, preferring the occasional rowdy roadhouse or ironic dive bar. Any place a random abduction…