Nothing

The engine gives out and we’re about to crash. I guide the plane as best I can and brace for impact. Then there’s blackness.

When I wake, Ted has a blank stare, and his head is twisted in an awkward position. He’s dead.

The bone in my left ankle is protruding from the skin and I’m having trouble breathing. I’m sure I’ve ruptured my ribs.

The door is jammed and I can’t walk. The airplane will soon explode and there’s nowhere to go. I say a silent prayer and close my eyes.

There’s a crackling noise, flames and then nothing.

From Guest Contributor Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher

Fire In The Sky

As Henry steered the plane toward the bombing area, he said a silent prayer and kissed his wife’s picture. Bullets filled the air and planes dropped to the ground crashing into enemy lines.

Henry grasped the control and took a deep breath. He ascended and dropped the torpedo onto enemy territory, and then his comrade yelled in hysterics.

“The engine was hit. We need to jump!”

Henry grabbed the picture of his wife Maggie, attached the parachute and together he and Stan jumped into the air just in time before the plane exploded into pieces, creating fire in the sky.

From Guest Contributor Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher

First Time

I have waited for this moment since childhood. Now as an adult in my car with the engine running, I’m thinking of excuses to put my foot to the accelerator.

I remove my sunglasses and shut the radio in the middle of “You are the Wind Beneath My Wings,” and turn the car off. This song brings back memories of my wedding. I wish Melinda were still alive.

As I approach the porch and knock on the door, I hear footsteps stomping down the stairs.

Would it be my mother or father who’d I’d be meeting for the first time?

From Guest Contributor Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher

“There Is A Light That Never Goes Out”

Blessed Morrissey. Everyone sings. Jennifer’s a junior and she has her own car. She starts the engine and on the summer night highway she says, “Wanna get kicked out of the Hilton?”

I’m in back on the hump, a hand on each front seat. Her hair, her piercings, her red glitter black lipstick shimmering in streetlights, so close. I want to whisper in her ear something so funny and sexy she just has to kiss me and we crash and I fly through the windshield but everyone who sees my body sees my black lipstick glitter mouth and knows.

“Yeah.” From Guest Contributor Brook Bhagat

Brook is the author of Only Flying, a Pushcart-nominated collection of surreal poetry and flash fiction on paradox, rebellion, transformation, and enlightenment from Unsolicited Press. Her work has won contests at Loud Coffee Press and A Story in 100 Words, and it has appeared in Monkeybicycle, Empty Mirror, Soundings East, The Alien Buddha Goes Pop, Anthem: A Tribute to Leonard Cohen, and other journals and anthologies. She is a founding editor of Blue Planet Journal and a professor of creative writing. Read her work and learn more about Only Flying at https://brook-bhagat.com/.

My Only Friend

There is a breeze blowing west. At the top of the biggest tree there is a blue jay bracing in the wind. In my peripheral vision I see a black and white figure below me walking towards the bird. As I realize it is my tuxedo cat, I hear the sound of an engine struggling to drive up towards us. I look to the East and see a truck, I look to the North and see my cat. Then there is blood on my face. As I wipe it off to make myself recognizable, my cat is no longer recognizable. From Guest Contributor Ina Rose

Ina is a student with a passion for writing.

April 1912

It is never quiet in the engine room of an ocean liner. I am on the night shift; the lights are bright and the boilers noisy. Suddenly I feel the ship shudder and hear a grinding noise on the starboard side. Something is very wrong. I make my way to the telephone to call the bridge, but no one answers.

Now I notice that water is beginning to flood the engine compartment. I order the bilge pumps activated but they cannot handle the incoming sea water. The sea is a fearsome master; I elect to remain with the foundering ship.

From Guest Contributor Janice Siderius

Happy Halloween

I’m driving home from Lori’s Halloween party when the car engine dies. It’s after midnight, the road is desolate, and I’m tired. I reach into my purse for the cell phone, but it’s not there.

Leaning back in my seat, taking a deep breath, I close my eyes. A knock on the window startles me.

“Miss, are you okay?”

It’s a man dressed as Count Dracula, his fangs scarily realistic.

“My engine died.”

“Let me look at it for you.”

As soon as I exit my car, Count Dracula grabs my purse and drives off in his truck.

Happy Halloween.

From Guest Contributor Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher

Sunday Morning

Polystyrene-on-glass calls pause. Unknown bird waits. Magpie’s hoarse rattle bobs upon chill breeze, followed by one clipped caw. Wind and distant slumber.

Dog yelp, muffled by intervening streets, punctuates keyboard-click.

Repeated.

Nothing.

Wheeze of diesel engine and hiss of pneumatic tyres upon Tarmac cue pair of voices in garbled conversation, growing as they near.

The dog dips paw into arena of proper barking before relenting, wounded by unanimous indifference.

Then...timeless chorus of seagulls.

All cede to a hesitant wind under sombre sky.

Footfalls.

Children’s voices shatter tableau, announcing subdued urgency of Sunday morning.

Bleakness prevails, yet wind chimes sound.

From Guest Contributor Perry McDaid

Ignominy

The oppressive dryness from the onboard heating joins forces with the mid-carriage intensity of the bus engine to agitate my Nor Loch-purchased nausea. I glare up the aisle at the convex miniature of the driver’s face trying not to think of anything stomach-related...or liquid...or food.

My teeth are Publius Horatius at the Sublicius Bridge: facing off against a more dreaded force than that of Clusium.

But bridges span rivers, and the guy next to me sipping spring water from a bottle of ostentatious brand summons images of the Tiber and spilt blood.

Bile breaks through and brings friends.

From Guest Contributor Perry McDaid

A Renter's Market

It has been over two hundred years since any citizens of Sleepy Hollow, NY, have stepped outside at night.

People lock their doors at dusk and turn their TV's to maximum volume. Yet even the thickest walls aren't enough to keep out his screams or the roar of his engine.

He no longer rides a horse, though he's still called the Headless Horseman, and with the continuing advances in vehicle technology, no one dares try to outrun him to the bridge. But with property values in the neighboring vicinity so expensive, no one cares to move to another suburb either.