Literary short stories by established and emerging writers Julian Zabalbeascoa
Gernika
Near us, a woman held her dead child as though it was only sleeping. Nobody approached her to tell her differently.
Stephen Langlois
Uncle Jerry
At least once a week she called each of her five brothers, relaying various bits of insignificant information from one to the other. My uncles probably dreaded these calls, but for my mother it created the illusion of unity.
Shannon F. O'Neill
The South End
There, she felt like the future could happen. Before she met Edvin, she almost tasted it once, as a part-time telephone operator at a law firm in Beacon Hill. A place where you could wear nylons and men took notice.
Paul Crenshaw
Uniform
Matt Lawson's brother John got shot through the throat in Afghanistan in early September while Matt watched out the windows of his biology class as the first leaves fell.
Robyn L. Strong
Rhomboifungdombobumbla-groofscurrlaliadiscoprulate
I opened one once and the man yelled at me. I opened one again and he yelled at me again. It's a very yelling place here.
M. Sean Rosenberg
Southern Candyland
Carson made the mistake of telling us in advance that Savannah lacked an open container law tennis without the net so by the time we got there we had no conscience whatsoever.
Caro Beth Clark
The Kind I Really Am
He's old and quiet. The city has been threatening to evict him for years, at least as long as Mindalee and I have lived next door. Everyone is trying to get rid of everyone around here.
Melanie Lefkowitz
The Mango
Let me just spend a minute describing this job for you. Let me tell you there were so many roaches in this ice cream store that we had a special button on the register for roach-related refunds.
Geoff Wyss
The Dissimulator
I didn't know whether Boyd was his first name or his last name, and after calling him that for two days, it was too late to ask.
Jo Lloyd
Uganda
They taught me how to tie a tie, how to shave, the importance of thinking big (which they took mostly on hearsay), how to drink a pint, where to take a girl if you happened to have been a teenager in the sixties.
Stephen Dixon
Flowers
We always had Plymouths. "The Jewish Chevrolet," my father called it, though I'm not really sure why.
Douglas W. Milliken
Blue of the World
He does not understand yet that a kind person can be hard sometimes and still not be a mean person.
Matt Bell and Benjamin Percy
Interview by Jeremiah Chamberlin
Percy: "I had a spear I always carried with me." Bell: "This is the manliest origin story of a writer I've ever heard!"
