I Can't Explain

I know things look bad. I can explain the blood. I was playing with my dog and he scratched me pretty bad. He can be rough.

What about the witness who saw you going into the house?

I was just dropping off the divorce papers. They should be in the filing cabinet.

I see. And the threatening emails from your account?

Someone's trying to frame me.

Very good. That just leaves the matter of the security camera. How do you explain that someone who looks remarkably like you was recorded beating your ex to death with a field hockey stick?

Debunking Resolutions

As the clock ticked towards the ending of a year, Ted was fast asleep.

He got up at noon to have brunch and catch up on emails.

“What are your resolutions for 2025?” asked a friend. Another asked similarly and another…

Ted closed his tablet.

Why should he stress himself about resolutions? Life ought to simply evolve, problems solved along the way.

He got up to make coffee. What, no coffee? Okay, he’ll have some tea. The canister usually filled with various teabags was empty.

Ted decided he would start the next New Year differently, with his kitchen well stocked.

From Guest Contributor Krystyna Fedosejevs

This Message Cannot Be Delivered

Old friends’ emails become inactive, enveloped by electronic monsters. My message cannot be delivered, electronic gatekeepers proclaim.

I can’t tell them of being alone. I can’t hear their off-color jokes about paraplegics and suicide, youth at its most delightfully stupid. Tell them of empty, sterile walls. I can’t confess I absorbed their stories of family, an electronic voyeur.

I keep trying. Messages come back.

I drive to distant homes. But staring through lit windows, I feel like a magazine, an obnoxious knickknack among order and precision. I imagine them discarding jokes, smiles replaced by starched replicas.

This message isn’t delivered.

From Guest Contributor Yash Seyedbagheri

Yash is a graduate of Colorado State University's MFA program in fiction. His story, "Soon," was nominated for a Pushcart. Yash’s work is forthcoming or has been published in WestWard Quarterly, Café Lit, 50 Word Stories, (mac)ro (mic), and Ariel Chart.