Blog Archives

Had to Come First, by John M. Carlson

29/9/2023

What happened to September? Greg wondered, as he entered his classroom. It felt like yesterday was Labor Day. Now it was almost October!

Greg had a feeling that this year would really pass quickly. He’d reluctantly decided that this would be his last year of teaching.

He’d miss teaching. Teaching was a calling, not a mere job. But it was also about time he retired. He was getting older. He had health issues. He’d decided he wanted to retire before he lost effectiveness in the classroom. He’d miss this life—but the students’ interests had to come first.

Disquiet Solitude, by Penny Tan

29/9/2023

Silence. Waiting. Nothing. The response I was hoping for never came. Desperate to find a way out but finding none. Time passes by as minutes turn into hours. I try not to glance at my phone once more but couldn’t resist. We don’t live in the same part of the world anymore and our lives don’t cross like before. I feel like a fool for wanting to talk because action speaks louder than words, and we each have to get on with our own separate lives; even the best of friends have more practical things to deal with.

Tired, by Malvina Perova

29/9/2023

Neither for the first time nor for the last, we wake up in the middle of the night from an infernal racket. A hiss, then a blast trembles through our windows, shaking our homes like a miniature in a snowball.

“Bloody Russians,” comes the grumble from my sister’s bed as she takes her phone from under her pillow to check on the news.

The heartbeat settles down in a while. In silence, we imagine who might have died tonight, then doze off.

I can’t say what scares me most: the hell outside my house or this hollow, cold indifference inside.

Portrait, by Sue Clayton

29/9/2023

A blank canvass waits for life’s brush strokes to paint a portrait.

Each fine delineation, etched with care, remained visual over time, but the once deep palette of colour is now bleached and faded.

The portraiture remains unchanged, yet its shape has morphed. Fine lines have deepened into the canvass.

Many have held the canvass: admiring, caressing, stroking, but now fear holding it. They might impair its fragility, damage the pale, fading lines.

But it is held, gently, tenderly, cautiously, by those who love it still.

My withered, arthritic, venous hand with a portrait of life painted on its back.

Celebration, by Jon Hunter

29/9/2023

A tickle of breeze grants no relief from the sun smarting Stefan’s neck. His mouth, dried by stale heat from the flagstones, hangs ajar. The nasal buzz of her moped, distant yet climbing, drifts up the hill.
Only jittery butterflies escape the arid weight that cleaves him to a wicker chair. His right-hand searches for the whisky bottle that lies on its side, sending a peat-coloured stream in among the scarlet geraniums.
The groceries she’s bought for the meal, the special meal, cooked just how he likes it, to celebrate the 50th day sober, will never reach the plates.

That's the Way It Grows, by Rani Jayakumar

29/9/2023

Joseph couldn’t watch movies anymore. Scenes of Ecuadorian forests had California wildlife, clearly shot in Hollywood. He could barely shop, the scientific names of ingredients popping into his head. Friends stopped meeting him because he only spoke of plants, until even he grew sick of it. He’d wore only synthetics, furnishing his home with unidentifiable composite, and was nearly an agoraphobe. Then Ana knocked on his door, selling rainforest grown products for her troop. He remembered that sugar, coffee and shampoo were unavoidable, and threatened. She was trying to save the rainforest. He brought her botany. She brought him life.

Green with Envy, by Ian Willey

29/9/2023

Can you believe it? She only started writing a few years ago yet she’s already managed to sell her first book. The title is Dumb Things My Husband Has Done: Volume I.

She says it’s a work of creative non-fiction, and I shouldn’t read too much into it. She laughed at the pun. Ha ha.

It’s selling amazingly well and she’s already started working on the next one.

I wrote a negative review on Amazon, outlining my every criticism, but I accidentally used my real name when I posted it.

She just laughed, and thanked me for the new material.

The Old Days, by Allison Symes

29/9/2023

‘We wasted our time going. We are plenty old enough to have known that.’ David handed a champagne glass to Kathy. ‘What would we all chat about after twenty five years?’

Kathy raised her glass to him. ‘Well, we do now know school reunions aren’t for us.’

‘Did you see how many dyed what was left of their hair? Who are they kidding? Let’s toast our escape!’

Kathy grinned. ‘Did you see their faces when we fled after two minutes, out of the double doors, as we always did when school finished? They forgot we were the best school athletes!’

Anticlimactic, by Antony Püttschneider

29/9/2023

Pause.
My father walks in. “What’re you watching?”
This is it. “Just some new show I found.”
“Mhm.” He studies the plastic case, turns it around, squinting. My hands are drenched.
“’Queer’? That means gay, doesn’t it? And you’re interested in that?”
Innards twisting, eyes glued to the giant pause label. In a pathetic attempt of indifference I manage to blurt, “I guess so. It’s—it’s good.”
“Mhm. So, are you…?”
The three men on the screen are frozen in an eternal dance.
“M-maybe?”
“Well. Dinner will be ready in a few minutes.” Then, in leaving, “I love you.”
Exhale.
Unpause.

The Victim, by Gordon Lawrie

29/9/2023

You don’t understand, I’m the victim here. It’s a co-ordinated assassination of my character by the media.

I don’t deny that I was promiscuous, that I’ve had sex with hundreds of girls in my life. But I was in proper relationships with each of them. Even the very young ones.

Rape? Sexual assault? Rubbish, it was all consensual. Sure, there were the times when I got a bit carried away but I said sorry about those.

It’s me that deserves your sympathies. I’m a drug addict, a sex addict and a porn addict. I couldn’t help myself.

I am innocent.

Buddy Chatbot, by Cheryl Dahlstrand

29/9/2023

Kitty chatbot jumped up on the sleeping form. “Get up, get up,” she purred. A hand appeared and stroked the silky fur. Rhonda was gently awakened, just as she liked it.

She got up and plugged Kitty’s charger into an outlet. The purr of anticipation changed to a mournful meow.

“Not another carbon brownout,” Rhonda observed with frustration. “My poor personal buddy.”

Kitty commiserated. The proliferation of personal AI buddies had resulted in increased emissions from expanded data centers.

“I’m woke and green,” Rhonda seethed. “But I’ve changed my mind. Kitty must have carbon free energy. Kitty must have nuclear.”

Conductor, by Michael Barbato-Dunn

29/9/2023

They board his 6:05 each morning. The tatooed man with close-cropped hair, thin tie and sunglasses, enveloped by enormous headphones. The frantic woman carrying a canvas bag of lipstick, eyeliner and blush, tools for 30 minutes of artistry. The gaunt man wearing gloves and a surgical mask. The readers and the knitters. The newspaper snappers. The phone scrollers. The laptop tappers.

He imagines the train derailing. Strangers trapped together for hours. Would they become allies? Would one emerge as leader? Would their fear give way to relief? Would friendships or wild romance result?

His hand hovers over the emergency brake.

A Reason to Live, by Sandra James.

29/9/2023

I was secretly glad his team was defeated in the semi-finals although I commiserated over our adjoining fence.

Jack was ninety-three and my neighbour for more than twenty years.

After a disappointing season two years ago, Jack confided. ‘I don’t think I’ll see us win another premiership.’

Last season they improved, but still… ‘It would have been good to see another flag before I die.’

‘Next year,’ I said.

But it wasn’t to be.

‘You’ll have to stick around for another year,’ I told him.

‘Perhaps.’

But I saw the glint in his eyes.

He’ll still be cheering, next year.

The Wedding Anniversary, by Lisa Williams

29/9/2023

He’d made her a cuppa almost every morning during the twenty five years that they’d been married. He made it before he had his breakfast. His routine was unchanged: cereal and a read of the paper before taking the drink upstairs to his wife in bed.

She preferred a slower start to the morning and hated the sound he made when he chewed his cereal. She never drank the tea. It was always cold by the time she got it. She tipped it away and then used the cup, without cleaning, to make his mid-morning coffee.

They didn’t swap cards.

The Collaborator, by Robert P. Bishop

29/9/2023

Thomas sat in the dark room in the shattered building, looking out the broken window, waiting for the collaborator to come out of the courthouse.

Collaborator. Thomas considered the word; someone who cooperated with the enemy for personal benefit. A turncoat. It was a new word for Thomas, one he had not heard until his country was defeated and occupied by an invading army.

The collaborator stepped into view. Thomas recognized him, knew his name, the intimate details of his life. Thomas shouldered the rifle, centered the crosshairs on the collaborator’s chest. “Goodbye, Brother,” he whispered, then pulled the trigger.

Evidence, by Carolyn Martin

29/9/2023

Saturday: Grandma called the cops again, not for the drunk–– her husband’s dead –– but for the local scum who cased her yard, bagged two hens, snagged his pants on her wire fence. He claimed the browns were his. Grandma spewed obscenities, uniforms blushed, and hauled the thief and cluckers downtown. They nested the two in The Ladies Cell until Sunday when the custodian huffed about unruly occupants and sent them to roost beneath basement steps. Monday: The gavel slammed the perp with ninety workhouse days. Grandma grabbed her hens, slapped the court with a bill for eggs the sergeant ate.

Your Honour, I was Sleep Deprived, by Sandra James

22/9/2023

I was tired. Exhausted. A busy week at work, family commitments and housework.

I just wanted sleep. A long sleep. But he had other ideas and as soon as I lay down he began whining. Louder and louder, more and more insistent. I brushed him away. Again. And again. He refused to take the hint.

I couldn’t take any more. I hit him. Hard. And again and again. I was so angry I couldn’t stop. Finally, his lifeless body lay before me. And blood. Who would have thought there would be so much blood?

From one tiny mosquito.

Cuppa Joe, by Indira Sammy

22/9/2023

I savour my Blue Mountain coffee as though I drank from the Holy Grail.

Two policemen escort Joe, my ex-fiancé, to their vehicle with his hands cuffed behind his back. He stumbles, and his head connects with the car door as they open it.

I smirk and sip.

I still have to visit the doctor and take his report to the police station. Someone with a purpling eye, split lip, and bruises peppering their torso gawks at me in the bathroom mirror, and I glare back.

I pour the coffee down the drain. “No more Joe for me. I quit.”

A New Record, by Teri Wright

22/9/2023

I ease the 7 inch vinyl out of the sleeve. The latest single of my favourite group. As the melody begins, I imagine I am the lead singer. Hairbrush in hand, I mouth the words whilst strutting across the carpet.

The record jumps on the turntable, the needle jerks.
I inhale sharply.
Gently move the needle back to the edge. Cross my fingers that there are no scratches.

I start my routine again, but with softer dance moves.

I repeat this process another seventy times before Mum bangs on my door to tell me it’s bedtime.

Seventy!
A new record.

By the Riverbank, by Bill Cox

22/9/2023

By the riverbank, where first I held your hand. By the riverbank, where I first uttered the words ‘I love you.’

By the riverbank, where I saw you kiss my best friend with a passion I didn’t recognise.

By the riverbank, whose storm-swelled waters raged and churned in sympathy with my tempestuous emotions.

By the riverbank, where I pushed you into the frigid waters and watched you vanish downstream.

By the riverbank, where I walk with our son each day, teaching him to be a better man, free from the sins of his parents.

Same Old - Same Old, by Virginia Ashberry

22/9/2023

Five quiet, slumped old men clutch cups of cheap, weak, but milky sweet coffee. All stare out the narrow slit of window before them, from their usual stool seats along a shallow orange counter. They each contemplate the same brief field of concrete, at the same time every day.

Then their once, or twice a day treat. A young bare belly-button sashays past their limited view.

All, to a man, push shoulders back, rise slightly, reach behind, and hike up their pants.

Stilted conversation about weather and sports then ensues for at least two minutes before their comfortable quiet returns.

Our Time Will Come, by Brian Taylor

22/9/2023

Sometimes after work, but usually on weekends, she and I'd sit outside, hold hands, drink beer, and look towards the stars.

I'd say, "Our time will come." She'd smile.

Our marriage seemed strong, but the money wasn't. Everything got more expensive; bills, groceries, unreliable vehicles, etc.

Despite this, she still wanted a baby. I'd answer, half-heartedly, "Maybe someday."

We divorced last year. Mostly friendly, but it still hurt. Several of our friends tell me she seems really happy lately; almost glowing.

I never wanted to know that.

I told her our time would come. Turns out I was only half-right.

Playing Away, by Tom Baldwin

22/9/2023

Jason’s phone hummed but he was too preoccupied to look at it. As he and Sonia relaxed afterwards, she said, ‘Is that from your wife?’

He glanced at the text. ‘No. Just a reminder for a dental appointment.’

While Sonia showered he opened it again. ‘I want us to…’ Jason’s wife spared no details about exactly what she wanted them to do.

Jason drove home, hoping he would have recovered enough to satisfy her. To his surprise she seemed ready to go out.

‘I got your text, babe,’ he said.

‘Text? I never sent you a text, Jason. Uh-oh…’

The Friendly Neighborhood Market, by Azmi Nehad

22/9/2023

On my first day in a foreign country, hungry, alone, and language-confused. Hunger drove me to a small market. Holding out a $20 bill. The man shook his head, misunderstanding my intention. He thought I sought to exchange my Dollars for the local currency. Desperately tried to clarify. "Do you speak -my native- language?" his wife inquired. They exchanged my dollars, despite being a small neighborhood market.

I bought groceries and ate my first meal in this foreign country thanks to them. Until that day, I buy from their small store, and sometimes, I chat with the kind wife.

Simulation, by Ofir Oz

22/9/2023

In the beginning, God programmed the heaven and the earth.
And the earth was a singularity, and darkness was upon the light.
And the Spirit of God was hovering upon the code lines.
And God said, Let there be a Big Bang: and there was a Big Bang.
And God defined quarks and leptons, electrons, protons, and neutrons.
And God encoded atoms and molecules, suns and galaxies.
And there was the earth.
And God said, Let us make Man, encoding them with reason. Let them dance for us, entertain us.
And there was light and there was darkness, one second.

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