Incensed

The crumpled notebook paper can’t be hurt, no matter how hard it’s thrown. An anemic crackle sounds at impact, a lazy, pointless attempt to uncurl is its sole achievement. The lopsided wad sits atop the unburning end of a Duraflame log. Mercifully, black char ashes the paper’s edge, further loosening the ball until gravity pulls it down to hearth. Still misshapened, I see blue ink, evidence of the second worst opening line in the history of writing. The winner is in my fist, ready to toss to the flames. It’s the only way to bring fire to my words today.

From Guest Contributor DL Shirey

DL Shirey lives in Portland, Oregon, writing fiction, by and large, unless it's small. He has been caught flashing at Café Aphra, 365 Tomorrows, ZeroFlash, Fewer Than 500 and others listed at www.dlshirey.com and @dlshirey on Twitter.

Lost

I'm tramping through the parking garage, briefcase in hand, searching, again, for my car. Stopping at a sign that says "Level 3", with the word “Remember” under it. As if that’s an easy thing. As if by putting "Remember" there that will make me remember where the damned car is. First or second time maybe. But, after that, it’s like all those other things that you filter out and forget. The trick is to remember to remember, otherwise you're lost.

As I am. Staggering up the parking ramp, wondering where all those things went that I can no longer find.From Guest Contributor Mitchell Waldman

Mitchell's fiction, poetry, and essays have appeared in numerous publications, including The MacGuffin, Fictive Dream, Corvus Review, The Waterhouse Review, Crack the Spine, The Houston Literary Review, The Faircloth Review, Epiphany, Wilderness House Literary Magazine, The Battered Suitcase, and many other magazines and anthologies. He is also the author of the novel, A Face in the Moon, and the story collection, Petty Offenses and Crimes of the Heart (originally published by Wind Publications), and serves as Fiction Editor for Blue Lake Review. (For more info, see his website at http://mitchwaldman.homestead.com).

A Philosophic Mind

He returned the edition of Kant to the library, unread again. He came out bearing Sartre’s “Being and Nothingness.” Surely he could make a last effort to master existentialism.

He decided to sit down on the bench in the high street to watch the passersby.

“How foolish they are,” he mused, “going on so unreflectively with their trivial business.”

“Not a philosophic mind amongst them,” he scoffed.

“They probably think I’m just an elderly man sitting here with nothing to do,” he surmised.

How wrong he was, for, unnoticed by the passing multitudes, no one thought about him at all.

From Guest Contributor Ian Fletcher

Last Dance

Rain blackens the windows, dime-sized water balloons of toxic ash. We haven’t had sun in months, and now this. You look up and say, Think it’ll stop? I love how you still look up, that instinctive angle of hope, of God.

It doesn’t matter since ration deliveries have ended, but I don’t say that.

We stand on the porch and watch the rain. Our last neighbors emerge from their house, wave, then slow dance down the street. By the time they reach the corner they’re convulsing like punk rockers. I ask you to dance but you pull me back inside.

From Guest Contributor Charles Duffie

How It Was Is How It Will Be

No one claims to know how the Hebrew slaves came to be heaving the shriveled bodies of the dead into raging furnaces. Soon their throats swelled from the smoke, and they couldn’t swallow or eat, and then their eyes turned red, and everything looked blurry, as if seen through the sting of tears. I feel less certain every day about my own chances. I go to sleep afraid, and I wake up afraid. Sometimes I’m even chased down the street, shoes slapping the pavement, but when I glance back, I can’t quite see who it is that is chasing me.From Guest Contributor Howie Good

Howie is the author most recently of Stick Figure Opera: 99 100-word Prose Poems from Cajun Mutt Press. He co-edits the online journals Unbroken and UnLost.

Breakfast

8:45, he gets up quietly. While the coffee’s brewing he takes two cups and two glasses and places them on the kitchen table. He takes the orange juice and the butter from the fridge and the butter knife from the drawer, then slips English muffins into the toaster. He pours himself coffee and orange juice and switches on the radio for the news.

When he’s done, he trudges to the living room and does a crossword puzzle in the armchair, facing her photograph. Later, when he puts everything into the dishwasher, he’ll place her cup and glass next to his.

From Guest Contributor Xavier Combe

Xavier is a freelance conference interpreter and translator. He teaches at the University of Paris X. He has authored two non-fiction books in French as well as op-eds in the French press. His story The Games People Play won 3rd Prize at the October 2019 Bath Flash Fiction Award. He writes and produces audio fiction with 2-time Peabody award winner Jim Hall on their website muffydrake.com. He has two adult sons and lives in the Paris suburbs with his wife, their two teenage daughters and their dog Zelda.

Requiem For The Unappreciated

“Did’ya hear blah died?” the barman had imparted, rather than asked, punctuation notwithstanding.

“Names don’t stay with me,” I’d admitted, and lifted my pint – eyes pointedly on the telly.

“Used to be regular – face all scarred.” Hint not taken.

I’d shrugged and adjusted my angle to him.

“You know him.” It was a slow day ­– the other customers had wisely chosen not to sit at the counter.

“Probably,” I’d ceded, thrusting my annoyance deep beneath a façade of affability.

It must have leaked, for the subject was dropped.

Two weeks later I noticed that an acclaimed local poet had died.

From Guest Contributor Perry McDaid

Humbug New Year’s

On the television, the ball in Time’s Square dropped. “Happy New Year,” the crowd shouted. I gulped my wine, not a fan of champagne, and shut the TV. After all, I detested New Year’s Eve. It’s a lonely holiday for some, myself included, and I’d rather get drunk on wine in the comfort of my own home, warm by the fire.

Tired, I took off my robe, climbed into bed and turned off the lamp. I told myself, tomorrow would be just another day.

Instead of spending the first day of the new year relaxing, I typed my resignation letter.

From Guest Contributor Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher

Love Triumphal

Mother hides me in the closet.

You won’t go back to that school. I’ll deal with that asshole father.

She smells of lavender perfume and sweat. Not like Dad with his Old Spice, calculated aroma, who mocks Mother. Arranges my future with Headmaster Edgar. Harvard, law.

Men bang at the doors. Buzzwords waft into my musky space: “Custody arrangement,” “Legal orders.”

Fuck off. Mother’s words hold firmness, edge.

Footsteps draw near, unpleasant pounding.

My mother tells them I’m her son. I’m someone who needs love.

I absorb that word, so foreign, while she spars, words rising.

Love. What beautiful form.

From Guest Contributor Yash Seyedbagheri.

Yash is a graduate of Colorado State University's MFA program in fiction. His work is forthcoming or has been published in journals such as 50 Word Stories, Silent Auctions, City. River. Tree. and Ariel Chart.

Christmas Morning

Ben watches the kids open their presents. Sharon's smile is frozen in place. His too. It's like a hard layer of snow has settled over everyone, precluding self reflection.

He remembers the frenetic joy that would build as his presents got bigger, even as they became fewer. After the last one, a shameful disappointment set in, a feeling he refused to acknowledge even to himself.

His phone buzzes in his pocket. He slinks to the bathroom to read the texts in solitude. Sharon already suspects.

He uses the holidays as an excuse not to say anything. Let's wait until January.