Speaking From Beyond

The spirit spoke.

“Water is wetting my house.” Trevor woke up from his dream puzzled. He wondered what his dead aunt was trying to tell him from beyond the grave. He waited for the sun to rise and then rushed down to her burial spot to investigate.

Examining the sepulcher, he saw a gaping hole in the roof of the structure and as he looked down he could see the coffin below. He took out some cement and sand he had in his car trunk and sealed off the spot.

“Ok,” he said, “That was what the dream was about."

From Guest Contributor Dennis Williams

Dennis is an emerging poet/writer from Sandy Hill, St. Catherine, Jamaica. His writings have been published in agape Review, the American Diversity Report (ADR), Alchemy spoon issue #7, the Health line Zine #1, the independent literary magazine Adelaide #54, EgoPHobia # 74, and the livina press issue # 3, Blue Pepper Magazine.

Soldier

The soldier’s leg is broken in two places, but he’s courageous and doesn’t scream. As I’m cleaning the wound, he grabs my arm.

“I won’t be fighting again, will I?”

I gently remove his hand. “I’m afraid not. You’ll be heading home. Your mother will be overjoyed to see you.”

He kisses my hand and looks into my eyes. “At least in this hell, I got to see a beautiful nurse to remember.”

I follow his stare, then lean in and kiss his forehead. “Take care, soldier.”

The sepsis will soon kill him, and he’ll return home in a coffin.

From Guest Contributor Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher

Addiction

Juliana knew it was psychological. But the distress of withdrawal was real.

Her travel wanderlust was more than an indulgence. It was a craving deep in her cells. Journeys broke the shackles of the mundane and had become the embodiment of her independence.

Her last fix was fifty days ago. She kept distracted with work and avocation diversions. Yet, her mind would drift to the need, and normally steady hands would tremble.

When the seductive siren called, Juliana’s immobility became a shrinking coffin. Claustrophobic and suffocating.

As the taxi dropped her at the airport, she was able to breath. Freedom.

From Guest Contributors A.L. Gabriella and Billy Ray

Decree 349

Five naked women had been lined up against the wall. Something about the one in the middle caught the captain’s eye, whether a tattoo or the way she shyly covered her breasts with her hands. “May I offer you some candy?” he asked. It was only then she remembered that Kafka was buried in a plain wooden coffin, a stray fact that under other circumstances might have been interesting to share. That’s just the sort of place this is, no time for a chat, not even about who it was that tracked in blood on the bottom of their shoes.From Guest Contributor Howie Good

Howie is the author most recently of What It Is and How to Use It from Grey Book Press. He co-edits the journals Unbroken and UnLost.

Personal History

Adulthood in Texas means being old enough to get the electric chair if you kill someone. In 17th century England offenders sent to the pillory were pelted by the crowd with dung, dead cats and dogs, rotten vegetables, and, in extreme cases, stones and even saucepans. Some, though, flung flowers in Defoe’s face. It’s the difference between weather and climate. The least you can do is pretend to care. In Jewish tradition a righteous man is buried with 144 prayer books atop his coffin. When my Uncle Lou was buried, they put the books in cardboard boxes labeled Kitchen Utensils.

From Guest Contributor Howie Good

Howie is the author most recently of What It Is and How to Use It from Grey Book Press. He co-edits the journals Unbroken and UnLost.

Thrill

“Not healthy,” Jan whispered to her surviving brother, peering into the darkened parlour where her mother sat, eyes fixed on the flickering screen of Brian’s cracked Smartphone.

Tom lifted and dropped his shoulders helplessly and returned to the closed-coffin wake in the other room.

Jan herself had only been able to watch the footage once: the glee of Brian hanging from a spar changing to terror as his grip had slipped.

The phone had been lucky enough to fall back onto the bridge.

Jan stared as her mother hit replay again. She’d even stopped sobbing.

“Friggin’ selfie generation,” she muttered.

From Guest Contributor Perry McDaid

Just A Cigarette

Sometimes I wish I smoked just to have something else to do. While I watch you paint the bodies of other women with your electrifying and magical fingertips, it feels almost natural to have a cigarette between my fingers. Yet I do not set my lungs on fire. I suspect it has something to do with your disapproval. You say smoking is a sign of suicidal behavior. You will not go out with a mental patient. So I quietly sit and watch as you caress and trace the contours of other women, happy not to be in a coffin instead.From Guest Contributor Suhasini Patni

Suhasini is a second year undergraduate at Ashoka University, in India, studying English literature. She has previously published a book review in The Tishman Review and a micro-fiction piece with A Quiet Courage, and hopes to publish many more. She is new to the publishing world but loves to write.

His Name Is Death

Tears flowed down her face.

The chain broke as the coffin was lowered.

She gasped and covered her face. She wanted to run, but her love for him kept her standing in front of his grave.

The grave-keeper struggled with the chain and the casket. He pulled the chain, causing the casket to drop into the grave.

The lady fainted when the casket entered the grave.

The grave-keeper said, “Carry her and put her into the hearse. I’ll bury him. Then, we will go to the hall.”

She woke up and said, “Death.”

“That was his name?”

She nodded. “Death.”

From Guest Contributor Larry Sells

Imprint

Larry unloaded the wood from his pickup and hauled it into the workshop. Both facades, the truck and the shed, were as worn down as he was.

Larry did most of his thinking while he worked. It was always that way. He could look at a piece, even twenty years later, and remember what he'd been thinking while he built it.

Now he was thinking about his wife. There had been a time when he'd think about leaving her, but that was many years ago.

He was glad he staid. That's what he was thinking as he built her coffin.

Blaze Of Glory

In the gloom a solitary light illuminated the Führer’s portrait.

“Two minutes oxygen left.”

No one responded.

Cross-legged like the Buddha, Steiner seemed at peace, thinking of his wife and son. Even Müller was becalmed, resigned to an iron coffin at nineteen.

Captain Mayer had himself fired the torpedo that sank the British battleship.

Submerging, a destroyer had detected them, the depth charge fracturing the hull.

They were the only three to survive, closing the hatch of the control room.

Losing consciousness, Mayer looked from the Führer’s eyes to the light. Ah! The explosion of the torpedo finding its target!

From Guest Contributor Ian Fletcher

Ian is originally from South Wales. He studied English Literature at Oxford University many years ago. He lives in Taiwan with his family and is a high school teacher there. He has also been a freelance writer for over 14 years, writing articles for Taiwanese educational textbooks. He has had short stories published in various genres in Schlock! Webzine, Schlock! Bi-Monthly, Short-story.me, Anotherealm, Under the Bed, A Story In 100 Words, and in anthologies by Horrified Press and Rogue Planet Press. He is an Affiliate Member of the Horror Writers Association.