Fiction - Year V - Number 31 - December 2019

TREASURE MAP TO SUCCESS by John Califano MY FATHER WAS meticulous about his appearance and always left for work wearing a pressed suit and a starched white shirt, his tie knotted perfectly. He carried a leather...

SOBER RIDERby Michael Hetherton They watched them come. Summer monoliths plodding relentlessly toward the city on the plains. The birds silent. In the pre-storm stillness sunlight lit the houses on the streets above the river...

EULOGY By Spencer Storey Johnson Pine leans on his gravestone, dressed as he always was when we were young: artfully torn denim jacket, dark curls swept back teasing the glint of a gold earring. His feet...

MADE TO DECAYby Tom O'Brien Hugh sat on a bench in Cavendish Square Park, hearing a police siren wail along nearby Oxford St. The crumbling statue of the Duke of Cumberland that shaded him looked...

BABY ON BOARDby Rachael Biggs Deliberately inhaling and exhaling the crisp morning air with force, Jane noticed one of the first leaves turning yellow and felt grateful that Autumn was not far off and that...

CHICAGOby Emily Sullivan Andrea shifted the gear into park on the side of the dim lit street. She reached for the volume dial and turned it to zero. Her thumb pressed into the red release...

INSIDE OUTSIDE                                                                              By Geoffrey Heptonstall She had not expected it to happen.It was no use calling out to ask who was there, although it was obvious that someone was inside. An intruder was not going...

DO YOU DO HITS? by James Hanna I am a magnet for strangers. They approach me in airports, subways, and bars, and they tell me their most compromising secrets. I never solicit these revelations; in fact,...

  IT WAS HIS HABIT TO GO TO BED EARLYby Toni Morgan Following a supper of potatoes fried in an iron skillet with two pork chops and three eggs, he carefully scraped his plate then threw...

THE DAY IT ALMOST SNOWED By Richard Risemberg I think of it as the day it almost snowed. It really did snow, leaving traces for an hour or so here and there in the hills, even...