Deep Shag

"Barry, is your homework finished?"

Barry started awake. His mom's muffled shout sounded a million miles away. His bedroom lay in total darkness.

He felt for his phone, but immediately encountered large woolly tendrils draped all around him. The only sensible explanation for the complete lack of light and the suffocating fabric was he'd been sleepwalking again and was nestled away in his closet.

Panic set in as he thrashed about searching for the door. He felt like he was drowning in an endless kelp forest.

It would be hours before he realized he'd been completely swallowed by his carpet.

Burt And Argos

The news sent everyone into a panic. Years of cable sensationalism had afflicted society with a horrible sense that by paying attention to world events, they could actually make an impact. With that illusion shattered, the reality would take time to settle over them. Time that was no longer available.

Burt had stopped watching the news years ago. He'd accepted his futility and was the happier for it. Better to spend that time with Argos, his rescue.

So while most people rioted, Burt and Argos sat on the beach watching the sunset together, waiting for the end of the world.

Napoleon In Rags

It was the season of mists. He had been forced by necessity to pawn his one good pair of pants. Now that he couldn’t confidently appear in public, he sat sulking in his underwear at the kitchen table. He couldn’t remember, Josephine wasn’t there to remind him, what it was like to live in anticipation of making love. Adversaries swooped around him like moon-crazed bats. If he had had a suicide pill, he might have taken it. The world only ever really pays attention when there is a panic or a traveling guillotine or when all the soldiers have syphilis.

From Guest Contributor Howie Good

Howie is the author most recently of the poetry collection Gunmetal Sky (Thirty West Publishing).

Panic At Sea

Mary attached her life vest to her body, squeezed through the screaming crowd and made her way to the lifeboats. The cold air chilled her body and numbed her feet; she could barely walk. Frozen in fear, she waited. After being placed in the lifeboat, panicked passengers tried to jump in as the deck hand began lowering them down. He took out his gun and started firing at no one in particular and shot a poor elderly man.

Mary, stunned, looked at the dark sea beneath, bodies floating by.

Titanic began to sink, and the lifeboat collapsed into the ocean.

From Guest Contributor Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher

What It Felt Like To Die

I plummet to the earth--the emerald field I stood upon moments before.

The one who injured me was merely a streak of shadows which approached, just as quickly as he vanished.

Below my navel is a tiny puncture. What was once unblemished flesh is now a faucet, bathing soil with my body's vital broth.

I realize my aorta is severed.

Clouds bob and flicker, bearing the faces of my family. I panic, fervidly trying to grasp them--their expressions are indifferent, unresponsive.

Instantly, tranquility engulfs me. Darkness eclipses my vision. I surrender, relishing the divine slumber that beckons me.

From Guest Contributor L. Michelle Corp

Worker

The sparse landscape spread in every direction. There were mountains to be sure, a flat white one to this left and a glass tower to the right, but there was no food within actual reach.

Jim crawled forward, then back, then to the left and right. An observer might think his path random, but Jim's instinct told him that the best way to find food was this haphazard approach.

He panicked when the giant approached. Only its torso was visible above the horizon, but Jim went hurdling in the other direction.

He wished he'd never left the hill this morning.

The Margin Between Here And There

The margin between her final breath and eternity was shorter than she'd been led to believe, barely enough time to comprehend what was happening. She felt herself suffocated by regret and panic and an overwhelming sense of injustice..

There had been one moment when she'd been truly happy.

As her body twisted inside its metal chariot that would drive her forcefully into the afterlife, the airbag slammed away her breath, swallowed up her regrets, bludgeoned her consciousness, until all that was left was that moment.

She wanted to call out to him.

Before she could say goodbye it was over.

The Way Things Played Out

We looked around at each other and it was clear that we all shared the same sense of panic. We'd all been shrunk down to a few inches tall, and what had once been a rather shaggy lawn was now a thick forest. Our pet rabbit, Olive, was one hop away from killing us all.

If this were a Disney movie, my siblings and I would have set aside our differences and we would have worked together to overcome a string of comical obstacles before returning to normal height.

This played out more as a Lord Of The Flies scenario.

Starburst

I remember being hurriedly pushed toward the flying ship by panicked voices howling peril. They spoke of a great heat inside me.

What was happening—?

Somehow, it was too late.

Now, all around me is twisted metal, smoking wreckage. My body throbs. Soot covers my hands and feet. Away from me, the skyscrapers appear spotted and streaked, but near there is only ruination. Debris like leaves. Great buildings that stood here only moments ago are gone. Here I am in the midst of it all.

I’m alone and lost and scared.

And, all the blast lines point to me.

From Guest Contributor Matthew Wells