Celebrate the end of the year with a new flash fiction piece from our Writer of the Month, Gessy Alvarez. Countdown along with "Twelve Grapes".
It’s tradition to eat twelve grapes the last twelve seconds before the New Year. For luck, Nick says. I hate countdowns. This anticipation for the end is a cock-block. The cat sits on the sofa. I push my feet under her furry belly. She whips her head around, but Nick brushes her away before she can nip my ankle.
Daniel Crocker with the short story "Grown Ass Men".
Blackbeard was fluidly working the nunchucks behind his neck, under his arms, between his legs. Crabby raised the chainsaw, pretended to pull the cord, and yelled as loudly as he could, “Nun nun nun nun.” It sounded nothing like a chainsaw. If anything, it was more like a kid trying to sound like a motorcycle, but Blackbeard's eyes widened and he nearly dropped his nunchucks before Corey said, “it's not on.”
Our Writer of the Month, Gessy Alvarez, returns with a very honest look at marriage without children in "Childless".
He tried to be a good husband, to wash the dishes, do the laundry, and clean the toilet, but for years I did what I wanted, and sometimes I told him what I did, but most times I pretended to be too tired to talk.
Linda Boroff with the short story "Roller Palace".
“Back when I started, this place was called the Park Avenue Roller Ballroom, and it was class, let me tell you. You got all duded up to come and skate, like ladies and gentlemen. None of that.” He jerks his thumb at the teenagers, now rocking back and forth, arms entwined.
Writer of the Month Gessy Alvarez stuns with a tough short story, "Lunchbox".
Every afternoon, for the last three years, we’ve followed Blue to the gas station across town. He likes to slide inside a dented, rusty phone-booth there. The phone company ripped the phone out years ago, but left the booth behind.
Carina Bisset on the price of perfection in her short story "Plastic".
There are questions you want to ask and stories you want to tell. You think a bottle of chilled tequila and late night conversations next to a fire would be the best way to start the next chapter of your story, so you ask Barb if she wants to get out of this place, maybe draw up a titillating business plan for a new line of undergarments. There are other things to talk about, but those topics would be best discussed behind closed doors.
Legend and delusion intersect in Davis Horner's short story "Things My Uncle Saw".
“Ah, well I remember the futility of playing in a Braves’ uniform. The 1935 Braves were one of the worst teams in the history of baseball.” he sighed. “You knew I played my last season for the Boston Braves?”
“Uncle George, you’ve never been out of Georgia.”
“Why Barry Barstow! Did your mother tell you that?”
“I think I just sort of knew it.”
For her first selection as our Writer of the Month for December 2015, Gessy Alvarez of Digging Through the Fat shares the bad ass flash fiction piece, "Herstory".
They say, without destruction nothing is born. They forget to tell you that sometimes what's born is already dead.
An unexpected visit has divine implications in Josh Rank's short story "Son of God".
He was not my son. I knew that right from the start. But the question of who the father was had haunted me for years. Who was the son of a bitch that ruined my marriage, my chances at living the happy life I had wanted for so long? Now I had my answer.
Peter Clarke with the unique flash fiction story "Southside Park".
Most kids, I’ll admit, started out with pictures of hearts and flowers and smiley faces. But these kids, I knew right away, were independent thinkers if I’d ever seen any. When no one was looking, they’d sneak a hand down their pants or up their nose and scribble an explicit sex aphorism they couldn’t possibly have understood.
