Fiction - Year II - Number 7 - Volume I - June 2017

CARNIVALBy Shayna Boisvert  The evening was approaching midnight; outside, an owl let out a haunting call, and darkness bled in from the stained glass of the ballroom. Rosaline continued to search the room for the...

ASH WEDNESDAYBy Vince Barry Save for the black pig she was walking, nothing struck Aschenbach as unusual about the woman he passed while on his daily constitutional along Maiden Street, careful, as always, to return...

GOODWILLBy  Tony D’Aloisio  I remember laying there for a few minutes right after waking up that morning, feeling all hazy and out of it.  Like that was all I could do once I'd kicked off...

THE MAN WHO DID NOTHINGBy Amr Mekki The idea came to him as he sat behind his desk, staring at a thick stack of papers.  He hesitated to start going through them for fear of...

LEAVING KARACHIBy Neil D. Desmond Elise was not looking forward to her next "assignment."  He did not give his name, saying only that he was from Karachi but had lived in London for nine years. ...

SOUPBy Rachel Cohen Tali stared at the fish, and the koi looked back at her. A red, a yellow and a green, eyes bulging in the arid shop window, the three plastic fishes ogled Tali’s red...

EVERYBODY NEEDS SOMETHINGBy Melanie Pappadis Faranello Thanksgiving was in a couple of months and Sal considered who he might call on the occasion he’d ever have his son for a holiday—Christmas, or New Years, or...

NO EXPERIENCE NECESSARYBy Ed Meek In the summer of 1985, I was painting triple-deckers in Roxbury, Massachusetts. I came up from Carol, Pennsylvania, which is where I grew up.  People ask me where Carol is...

CHECKMATEBy Laura DellaBadia Towering as high as the old, weathered castle’s stone walls, the veins of prickly crimson red roses climb. The rosses have run wild in the years without a proper caretaker and have...

SANCTUARYBy Heide Arbitter They took the birds away.  That was the last hint.  They were unattractive birds, loud and sad looking, with feathers plucked bloody and wings hanging helplessly. But, these birds were his joy,...