We Lost A Room Last Night

We found a house out on the dunes, beyond the golf course. The conservatory had crumbled already but soon a jagged fissure opened up across the living-room floor. Soon the front door burst from its hinges and other people started to show up. A tramp slept on the wrong side of the crack one night; he was gone in the morning but we didn't know where. You know we'll have to leave here soon, she said one night as she held me. Maybe head up the coast? I squeezed her back and we watched a window slip from its frame.

From Guest Contributor Geoff Sawers

Afternoon Tea Party

“Eat this, Mom,” she said, handing me a plastic donut.

“Mmm,” I said, pretending it was delicious. I put it down and asked for more tea. Giggling, she poured air into a pink cup.

Someone pounded on the door.

The pot dropped to the table. I slid our pre-packed bag out from under the bed. She clung to me, like a baby monkey to its mother, and reached for her doll.

The door was giving in. Soon, it’d be off the hinges. I hoped we had enough time. I opened the window and my heart clenched.

The FBI waited below.

From Guest Contributor Bethany Cardwell

To The Sci-fi Gazette

The SciFi Gazette--shining beacon of non-cliché speculative fiction. Submission guidelines had listed discouraged themes; ‘dystopias’ were number one: bad news for a pessimist like myself.

The state of the world sank home for me when The Gazette’s most hackneyed theme changed to ‘utopias.’ Still, they never published my bleak predictions.

I’d intended to kick down the door, but it already hung on its hinges. Scattered papers decorated shattered furniture. I luckily bagged a tatty anthology edition for later reading.

The editor was, of course, not there. On her desk, I deposited my latest story. I had high hopes--my first utopia.

From Guest Contributor Tris Matthews

The Passing Of A Friend

Migrant storekeeper Piero Altobelli met word of his old friend’s recent passing with great consternation. Upon hearing, he leapt from his desk in the backroom of his little grocery and flew into a rage. He swatted the week’s receipts into the floor, ripped the telephone from the wall, and yanked the office door from its hinges. All the while bemoaning at the top of his lungs. So uncontrollable was he, not even his wife Maria, could calm him.

“Somebody better tell that summabitch next time he pass a by my store,” cried Piero. “He better pay me what he owes.”

From Guest Contributor Russ Sparks

Russ is currently an MFA student attending Lindenwood University.