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Interview, by John Ivan

30/8/2020

-Can you state your full name, just for the record?
-No, I can’t. But if you allow it, I would like to be called blossom.
-Actually, we will require your name, can you write it down.
-Of course not, I am illiterate. There were no schools for girls of my age, any age, any girls, half a millennium ago.
-How did you end up in the midst of all those events?
-I was minding my own business, walking the woods, picking flowers, staying away from dubious men, any men if you know what I mean.
-You were a virgin?
-Yes, and very proud, only one man for me is our Lord. He addressed me that day in the forest.
-You have seen him, in your vision?
-First of all, it wasn’t a vision, he was there in all of his might. Not really he, but one of the deputies, as I discovered later. God can’t take the shape which we assume. He needs some other creature to pass on his message.
-How is it up there?
-It would be fine if there aren’t restrictions. Don’t do that, don’t do this. Stand up straight, walk with one leg after another and so on. Borriiiiiiiiiiiing.
-But you have unique human experience?
-I would prefer it not to be so unique. Going to a mall on Thursdays and Saturdays for a change would be … amazing. Little Pilates, instead of kneeling on cold and rough floor for ages until the bishop finishes Morning Prayer. No time to rest, as Noon one is immediately after. I wish I am Muslim man, they only have five short prayers.
-Your finale here on Earth didn’t go that smooth? Instead of fireworks it was just fire and smoke.
-You are a very cunning inquisitor. All men are. I am just a poor girl. They tricked me, as we are living in men’s domain. Girl power is what I can say to women worldwide.
-You should be careful or you will be returned to the bonfire!
-Apparently, nothing has changed.
-Tell us something about your trial?
- Well, something, ha. They tricked me of course, as I was a poor, simple, country girl. It wasn’t really a trial, it was, how to put it, with my humble vocabulary…
- It seems very good for me. Maybe, you are the one with the tricks. The witches of your time, of any time, use their pretty eyes and lovely hair to mislead reluctant men.
- I could tell you, how it is quite the opposite, but that won’t be good for me, right.
- No, that won’t be good for anybody, especially you, child.
- Anyhow I hope you are satisfied with my answers, I need to go, they are waiting for me. Another huge Mass is on the cards.
- No girl, you aren’t going anywhere. Nobody will ever hear about you. You are France’s ultimate humiliation. You must come with me, down to the pits.

Zulu Maid, by Tommy Tarken

30/8/2020

“Cannibal King on a south sea isle making love to a a Zulu maid,
Til one night, in the south sea light, this to her he said...
I'll build a bamboo bungalow for you...big enough for two, my darling, big enough for you.
We'll be married, happy we'll be, under the bamboo, under the bamboo tree.”

“And you'll be M–I-N-E mine, I'll be T-H-I-N-E thine, and I'll L-O-V-E love you all the T-I-M-E time...”

Linda's crying, and so then am I, as the sun rises and smacks me in the face. Another day, another race.

The yard wasn't a big one then. But Linda was home. Maybe with Lassie, maybe in the VW bug. I was small then. I loved Linda, so of course I ran to her and wrapped her in my biggest boo bear hug. She swung me in a circle, tightly in her boo bear arms.

I can't count the days that I haven't missed my baby sister. From my earliest day's, all I wanted was for Linda to come home. Of course nothing has changed. The greatest challenge in missing my sister was everyone else was missing her too. Everyone.

Of course she wasn't my baby sister, she was the sister who caught me as I came into the world. And the only thing she ever did wrong was not putting me back, getting rid of me, or otherwise saving me from this. But I can't blame her, the game seemed worth playing at the time.

But this day, Mom was wresting in the hospital. I had driven down from the big city, a successful puff of hot air. I knew I wasn't anyone, but the thought still gave me a grift. Mom was dieing, but no one would admit it. She was in a hospital for mid-landers. Not here, not there.

Linda was there. Of course. And then so was I.

I remembered the love Mom and Dad shared, the times in the car singing, the joy we shared in the simple things, and I started singing a Cannibal King.

Mom was dieing of bladder cancer. Slowly, every day, bleeding out. And everyday they fixed her. Cauterizing her, stopping the bleeding. She was in the hospital with pneumonia, and bleeding. I remembered as they stuck the needle in her back to drain her lung. I remembered waiting to see how the procedures went as they burnt her bladder.

That day, I think she was low in blood. Her lunges were ok, I think. I started singing that song, and Mom joined in, weak but happy. She was my Zulu maid. Singing, she had a heart attack, but she never missed a beat. That was my Mom.

A few months later I kissed her good bye, but in my mind she'll always be singing that song.

If I'd asked for a better Mom, well, there just couldn't be.

An Ill Wind, by NT Franklin

29/8/2020

Charlotte shivered as an ill wind blew through the park. This was the day that lives would change. Less hers that others, but change it would.

Randy, her husband of 12 years, was a cheat. This time with a baby-faced floozie from a hotel. While that was bad enough, their last time was in Charlotte’s own bed. She came back to a crisply made bed with tight hospital corners. Like Randy would even know what hospital corners were. In a defiant act to her upbringing, she refused to make hospital corners on her bed.

Her overnight conference wasn’t that far away and not that interesting. However, the ice sculpture centerpiece to chip away at for mixed drinks was a festive touch. She felt a little more festive when she pocketed one of the icepicks.

The darkness of the late-night drive from the conference to her home was somehow reassuring. Quick, quiet, she was unobserved.

Finally, the intruder car left her driveway. The nosy neighbors that called her in the past would surely notice the intruder car again. Randy would be sound asleep and dead to the world in less than 15 minutes.

After 15 minutes, Charlotte rose from the park bench and walked across the street and into her house. Soon after, she left. Quick, quiet, she was unobserved.

Something about an icepick sticking out of Randy’s ear spoke of finality. Who even has an icepick anymore?

The wind died as she crossed the park to her car. Perhaps the conference would improve.

It's Down Again! by Deborah Shrimplin

28/8/2020

Barb poured her cup of coffee, walked over to her desk and booted up her computer to check her e-mail.

"What a way to start the day! The internet is down again!" she complained to her cat.

After searching for the phone number for the internet provider customer service, she growled and punched the required buttons.

"Press 1 for *****, press 2 for *****, press 3 for *****"

"Where is the human?" she scowled into the receiver.

"Press 4 for *****, press 5 for *****" the machine continued.

Finally, a human voice......"May I help you?"

"I can't get on the internet!"

"What is your name? Can we contact you at this number? One moment please."

"I lost my human!" she said as she tightened her grip on the receiver.

"We have no problem on our end. It must be your computer." the voice said.

"You need to talk me through this. I'm a dinosaur." she warned the voice.

After ten minutes of clicking on a dozen icons, they found the problem.

"I've been in quarantine for five months! I haven't left the house. How the heck did this computer slip into airplane mode?" Barb said.

The human voice laughed.

The Birth of an Idea, by Sankar Chatterjee

28/8/2020

Prof. John Durham, an infectious diseases expert at MIT looked outside through his third-floor office window. Another glorious day was slowly turning into dusk transforming the empty campus below appearing like a surreal ghost zone. The restrictions related to ongoing pandemic sent the students back home, taking courses online. He noticed masked Ms. Margaret Robinson from nearby neighborhood walking her two dogs. While on leash, the pets were exploring all kinds of objects, especially smelling them thoroughly. Prof. Durham suddenly remembered reading a scientific paper of Prof. Melanie Shepherd of Max Planck Institute (Germany). She theorized that some animals like dogs and pigs must have byzantine nasal passages that could trap and retain tiniest natural molecules, thus making them biologically “super-smellers”. Prof. Durham wondered why that theory suddenly appeared in his thought.

With no effective vaccine available, the current pandemic was spreading globally like a blazing forest fire. Citizens had been advised to wear masks and maintain a minimum “social distance”, while outdoor. But the repeated utilizations of the same masks followed by decontamination especially in healthcare facilities were making them vulnerable to failure. On the other hand, the inferior qualities of the currently available regular masks within many countries were not preventing new infections, allowing aerosolized virus to enter, hide, and then infect victims.

Suddenly a novel idea hit Prof. Durham like a lightning. He contacted Prof. Shepherd to get an update on her “super-smellers” theory. She informed him that she was able to collect data applying advanced computer tomography (CT) scans technology on the nasal passages of both a dog and a pig. Subsequently, she sent those data to Prof. Kim Lee at the Seoul University (Korea), an expert in feeding that kind of information into computational modeling, generating three dimensional (3D) image of an object. Prof. Lee was successful in generating and printing out desired 3D models. Both displayed torturously complex nature of both animals’ nasal passages.

Three days later, three scientists from three different continents met in a virus-free virtual world. Prof. Lee displayed the 3D model of a dog’s nasal passage, reminiscent of an ancient complex Mayan art object. Prof. Durham proposed that Prof. Lee ship several copies to him so that his research group could attach antiviral laden fabrics on those computer-generated passages, followed by attaching the medicated mask to a regular mask. The idea was to trap and annihilate the virus particles on complex passages of the detachable combo-mask, followed by decontamination and recycling the outer part only. Prof. Shepherd reminded both of them of the recent protests in different southern states in the US for not wearing a regular mask even in a pandemic, as part of one’s constitutional right. She wondered whether anyone would agree to try on this kind of pseudo dog-mask.

Fortunately, the human trial has just begun in a northern liberal state. So stay tuned for the outcome.

The Writer, by Doug Bartlett

28/8/2020

“Here we go again,” Johnny thought as he stepped on campus for the first time
not knowing how long he would be attending.

He had attended more schools this past year than he had candles on his last birthday cake.

Johnny really wasn’t a bad kid. Some would say just the opposite. He had high morals and was quick to take a stand for what was right. However, at times that could cause him problems.

The week wasn’t even halfway over when he found himself in the middle of a skirmish. Half a dozen boys were picking on a small, scrawny youngster and had taken away his sack lunch. Johnny had gotten his lunch back for the boy and had stood up to the bullies.

Realizing there was no teacher in sight the number of bullies quickly doubled. They were encircling Johnny, drawing themselves closer and closer to him. Adrenalin was coursing through his veins when the angry mob was about to pounce.

He drew back his fist when he first noticed it. His fist began to disappear into thin air. In reality, it was his entire body that was fading away.

“Oh no, not again,” he thought.

Unbeknownst to Johnny, in an alternate dimension, was Gordon, sitting in front of his laptop.

Gordon, ever the perfectionist, was reviewing his latest story which he was currently composing. He noticed something in his story he thought he could improve upon. He began his modification by highlighting a section and then hitting the button labelled “delete”.

Shelle's Rise and Shine, by Kim Favors

28/8/2020

Locals didn’t know what to make of the huge paper sign on the empty storefront. In rainbow hues: “Coming Soon — Rise and Shine.”

Bakery? Hair salon? Head shop? Even vacant, the place already had this small town abuzz.

Then, one sunny morning, the paper was gone, the door wide open, and the Rise and Shine revealed.

It was a feast for the senses:

Yellow daisies in jars atop odd-shaped tables. Mismatched chairs. Aromatic coffee and baked delights. Items one might find at a flea market covering walls and ceiling. Couches and floor cushions surrounded by shelves filled with books. Board games to play.

Then there was newcomer Shelle, the owner. With grey curls and bohemian style, was she a transplant from the 1960s? A reimagined Earth Mother?

Rise and Shine opened early, closed midafternoon, then reopened at night. It attracted townspeople of all ages. And because Shelle had no employees, customers began assisting — serving food, washing dishes, cleaning tables and floor.

The place quickly became locals’ home away from home. No one was turned away. Political discussions were taken outside. The few squabbles — mostly among family members — resolved with hugs.

“I want to live here,” a burly teen told his friends.

“Wish my childhood home had been like this,” a woman whispered to her female companion.

Still, Shelle remained an enigma. “Oh, I’ve lived various places,” she said once about her past. “My cats loved me,” when asked about family. And when Rise and Shine closed on holidays, she declined customers’ dinner invitations.

They celebrated her with biannual Thank You, Shelle potlucks in a park.

Then came the day Rise and Shine didn’t open. “Sorry” read the sign. No daisies. No lights. For days.

Where was Shelle? Worried customers pestered town officials for her home address. Her secluded mountainside cottage was locked up.

They kept pestering: She had been hospitalized. They caravanned to visit. No patient by that name. They refused to leave.

Finally, a man who looked to be a relative emerged. Shelle was there but not seeing anyone. She was having “psychological problems.” He would meet them back at Rise and Shine to explain.

“I want to respect my sister’s privacy. But I will share these newspaper clippings — they’re public record.”

Gasps, shouts and sobs filled the Rise and Shine as Shelle’s regulars read the accounts of horrific childhood violence and neglect. Now they understood why she had been so secretive about her life, even changing her name.

And the likely reasons for Rise and Shine’s loving home-like vibe.

They spent the evening planning. And the following day returned to the hospital.

“You have visitors — they’re out on the lawn. They’re insisting they won’t leave until you look out the window,” Shelle was told.

Nurses helped her up.

Outside were her regulars with a huge rainbow-colored sign, yellow daisies painted on both ends.

“We’re your family now. Come home. Rise and shine, Shelle.”

Song to the Siren, by Antonia Rachel Ward

22/8/2020

My father killed himself on his twenty-eighth birthday. It wasn’t until I turned twenty-eight myself that I understood how short his life had been. Each subtle change I saw in myself reminded me that every day I lived now would make me one more day older than he had ever been.

It felt like a transgression.

Two years have passed since then. I came to the lake house for solitude, but the loneliness of this place is overwhelming. The only movement is the moonlight flowing like quicksilver over the water’s inky surface. The only sound is the gentle lap of the waves on the pebble beach. There is no phone line. No internet. I could drive for miles and pass nothing but an empty gas station.

The water sings to me. A siren’s song.

I never knew him. My parents had me young. Things didn’t work out. I was eight when I learned he had died. The loss was formless, yet infinite. It made barely a pinprick in the fabric of my life, but the more I tried to examine the hole, the more the edges frayed, until the emptiness became too vast to comprehend.

When I reached twenty-nine, I thought I had escaped. I met you and became lulled by your warmth. The last time I was here, you were with me. The house - my inheritance - had been boarded up for years. You gave it life. I remember you standing knee deep in the lake, golden hair shining beneath the sun, turning back to me, inviting me in. The light glittered over the water like scattered diamonds. But the heat wouldn’t penetrate my skin. I couldn’t bring myself to join you.

“You could be his reflection.” Growing up, it was all anyone ever said to me. Old friends of his would catch their breath. When I found the photographs hidden in the attic of the lake house, I understood why my grandparents could hardly bear to lay eyes on me. Their grief was still too raw. I clung to the pictures; took them home; added them to my own.

Sometimes I forget which photographs are me and which are him.

Did I push you away, after that visit to the lake? I know that’s how you tell it. Really, I think you were only protecting yourself. You sensed the inevitable. Now, everyone else has begun to detach themselves too. They look straight through me, to the space that he left behind.

Genetic memory. The ties that bind me to him are deeper than blood and bone. I sit by the lakeside, feeling the foam wash over my feet. Tomorrow I turn thirty. Each stolen day is another weight.

I watch the waves, each ripple an echo of one that went before.

The siren’s song rises to a wail.

We Are Obituaries, by Claire McKernan

21/8/2020

“Avery Taylor died of strangulation in 1908”

They say a blotchy red line had always been imprinted upon his neck. He became acquainted with the circumstances of his death in a hedonistic drunken brawl when a stranger gripped his neck so forcefully. This regressive discourse was common. Our modern society familiarised itself with reincarnation; our birth marks were physical proof of how we died in our past life. Those born without birthmarks may never comprehend their previous existence. For me, my past life came back to me in nebulous waves. I was tremendously seasick in this life without any anchor. I had my own island etched into my skin above my heart; a penumbra of my skin. Was it a heart attack? Presumably, yes.

It was a crisp and cloudless autumn evening that begged me to believe it was winter. My body was bundled up in a layered fashion; a thing of practical purpose and not beauty. This life was a solitary one for me, characterised by solo pursuits for hot whiskey and when the world caved in on me, I would trade it for tea. This was not the city, but the city like lights lured me down a cobbled path to a decrepit, archaic pub. In this life, I inhabited a strange contentment with my surroundings and sought solace in my own company. The fire, lit by a very disillusioned bartender, set the scene for a string of dismal melodies; neatly presented. This place rented out my heart that night and I was so in love with it.

You will know

Without warning, my birthmark stung piercingly. I surveyed the room freely until I was aware that my heart beat again with purpose in this life. There he stood in all his vivacity as if his surroundings were green screened and he; the only tangible, resplendent being, as though everyone else were merely concepts or figments. It was a look of knowing he cast to me and I returned it so painfully. These memories seized me; paralysed me. It was me in a straitjacket, anchored to this tableau and me, being the receptor of his mournful gaze, I remembered.

I remembered when the world started again with him in it, when growing old seemed like becoming a child again. I remembered adorning his graveside, when I resembled death more than him. And when I looked into those eyes he owned now, I felt a requited yearning for a life gone by. And it registered how in this life, I was subconsciously filling a void I never knew I had. In our disguises, this moment was both engulfing and miserable. In this life, I was a perpetual stranger to love but not death. Here we were, two figures knowingly estranged. Walking, living, breathing, but not loving anymore. We are obituaries.

“Debonaire Taylor died of a broken heart in 1909”.

Haste, by Ellie Rose McKee

14/8/2020

Mama always said, “Lest haste, more speed.”
“Now, Genevieve,” she would say. “Don’t go rushing around so much. It’s unladylike. And, what’s more, the bad men will get you.”
Genevieve chose to translate the advice as, ‘don’t get caught.’ Which was all together much easier to follow, because there wasn’t much danger of that. Little time jumps weren’t all that risky, really, and Geni was good at them.
What Mama didn’t understand was, certain situations just called for supernatural intervention. Like right now, as Geni headed to the bakery and could see there was only one peanut éclair left. Kristen was a little way ahead of Genevieve up the street, destined to reach the bakery first, and Geni just knew she would take the treat for herself.
Well, not on her watch. There was only a matter of meters in it, surely not enough of a displacement to set off the trackers searching for magic use.
Geni made the jump, arriving at the front door just ahead of Kristen. She couldn’t help but do a little dance. That éclair was hers!
She ran up to the counter and placed both hands on the glass, her mouth-watering. Then she looked up, expecting to see the baker stood there, tongs in hand, awaiting her coin.
Instead, Geni was faced with the leader of the Wild Hunt. He stood behind the counter, grinning through his skull mask at her.
“I have travelled for millennia, across many plains, and this day I finally come face-to-face with the mighty Chosen One!” He laughed, deep and throaty. “I knew you could not resist the pull of your magic for long. What is it you have to say to me now?”
Geni crossed her arms and blew her fringe out of her eyes.
“Well, crap.”

Round Trip, by Sivan Pillai

14/8/2020

Sleep is difficult to come by. I have to take an important decision by morning.
Elephants trumpet in the nearby reserved forest. Nearer at hand, foxes scream, owls hoot, and frogs croak. Nocturnal insects chirp, squawk, and shuffle. The breeze suddenly dons the mantle of howling wind, and the swaying trees rustle loudly. They are all singing the usual lullaby, but do I detect a subtle difference in their tone tonight?
My son, sleeping in the next room, is insistent that I accompany him to the city. I suspect it is my doctor-friend and neighbor who has filled his ears with an exaggerated account of my supposedly failing health. Agreed, ‘exaggerated’ and ‘supposedly’ may not reflect the state of my health. I have been having some problems of late, and the doctor says age has caught up with me.
“Stop being adamant and behave sensibly, for a change. Go with your son. You require the services of a good hospital,” he had told me sternly.
Despite knowing that he is my sole inheritor, my son wants to prolong my life as much as possible by providing me modern medical attention. Respecting my deep attachment to the ancestral home, the hills, and woods, he had not pressed me till now.
“Decided to leave me?” my late wife asks me accusingly as soon as I shut my eyes. Suddenly I realize the tone of my friends in the wild is no different tonight.
It was to this house at the foot of the hills that my wife had come as a bride. She breathed her last one evening, after half a century, watching the outline of distant mountains through the open door, with a smile of contentment on her face. Her ashes were strewn from the top of a hillock, as she had requested me one day while sitting in the shade of a giant tree in the compound, eyes half-closed in the gentle breeze.
I wake up, as usual, hearing the cacophony of birds and sunlight streaking through the blinds on the windows.
My son enters the room and places a mugful of my favorite black tea on the table.
“So?” he asks.
I have made my decision. The doctors in the city may stretch my life a little, but I’m least interested. What I want is to kick the bucket right here, but I don’t want my son to feel guilty, either.
“I’ll come with you on one condition. Take a few days to do whatever you want to do about my health. Then I return.”
I expect an explosive reaction from him, but am surprised by his composure. He sips his coffee leisurely, glances at the garlanded photograph of his mother on the wall, and then at the globe of the sun rising beyond the mountains in all its glory. He looks in my eyes for a long moment, and smiles.
“Done,” he says.

P.O.V. Divergence, by Sterling Warner

7/8/2020

The fork in the road promised nothing either way—just different paths into forest darkness. I turned left, merely because I’m right-handed by nature and wanted to be guided by something less instinctual. After driving five miles or so, I pulled over to a lone expresso coffee shop next to a boarded-up fireworks distributor.

“What can I get you?” A woman asked, her bangle bracelets clanging and gypsy headdress framing a face both austere and mysterious.”

“A double mocha,” I replied. “Got a head around here?”

“If you need to take a piss, go stand behind that tree over there; otherwise, you’re out of luck until you arrive in Contesburrow.”

“Never heard of the place.”

“Few have. It’s just a gas station, post office, bar complex—with a bathroom. You can pick up snacks there too.”

“Thanks for the info.”

*****

“That will be $5.28,” she shouted at me as I walked back towards her, having finished my business behind the large cedar tree.

“Here’s six dollars; keep the change.”

For over three hours, I drove down the road, looked for Contesburrow, but found nothing. Granted, I didn’t need the head or gas; nonetheless, I craved junk food and became obsessed with finding the elusive town. Oddly, I neither passed other cars or ran into fellow travelers on the road. Finally, I pulled over to take a nap.

The next morning, tapping on the driver’s side window woke me. Outside, a female cop uttered, “What’s up buddy? License and registration please.”

“No problem,” I assured her, passing along the requested materials.

“You’re a long way from home,” the officer noted, glancing at my driver’s license.

“Lost,” I sighed, shaking my head.

“Just where were you headed?”

“Contesburrow.”

“Where?” The officer seemed genuinely puzzled.

“Contesburrow.”

“How much did you have to drink last night?” she countered.

“I didn’t. Some gypsy chick at an expresso stand on the side of the highway told me to follow the road.”

“Who? “What? Where?” she questioned, a bit perplexed.

“She had bangle bracelets….”

“Of course, she did,” the officer replied and winked, “at least last night! Right?”

“No really, officer!”

“You’re dreaming dude; you’ve just driven through the most desolate part of Washington; what makes you think you saw and talked to anyone?”

“The fork,” I replied in a sudden fit of laughter.

“Say what?”

“Following Yogi Berra’s advice, when I came to a fork in the road, I took it!”

Leaning on the door, the officer smiled mischievously, farted loudly, returned my license, stood upright, and strengthened her white striped pants. Meanwhile, as the odor of her humanity floated silently through the open window, I stopped laughing.

“Just a lost driver lacking a sense of humor,” she uttered into her shoulder mike.

“10-24,” a voice replied through the static speaker.

Perhaps I looked shocked—I really don’t know. Regardless, as the officer walked away, she glanced over her shoulder, winked again, then counseled, “Lighten-up and grin, buddy! Even Mr. Rogers thought farts were funny!”

Mother Nature’s Bagful of Tricks, by Sankar Chatterjee

7/8/2020

Past January, Laura and Dan embarked on a cultural trip through several South-East Asian nations. They flew from New York to Bangkok, Thailand with a stopover in New Delhi, India. As they disembarked in Bangkok, they noticed many arriving passengers wear wearing facemasks. Medical volunteers were instructing them to pass through erected yellow tents where their body temperatures being measured. Soon the couple learned that majority of those masked tourists were from China. They were traveling en masse celebrating the beginning of their festive lunar calendar. However, a novel flu-like respiratory virus just appeared in that country sickening people with hallmark symptoms of coughing and breathing troubles. No more detailed information had come out of the country yet.

Being on a rush to catch a connecting flight to Siem Reap, Cambodia, the couple didn’t pay much attention to this medical news; they were scheduled to join a pre-arranged travel party to explore famous Angkor Wat Temple complex over next few days. While exploring the ancient temple site with multitude of international tourists, they noticed that the majority were now using the facemasks, while avoiding close contacts. It appeared that the news spread globally forcing the arriving international tourists to take precaution. Meanwhile no new characteristics of the infection came out from the country of origin.

After exploring the temple complex while mingling with thousands of tourists over next few days, the couple took a regional airlines flight arriving at scenic Luang Prabang, situated next to the Mekong River in Laos. Next morning, the couple rented a local pickup truck to take them to cascading Kuang Si falls, a natural wonder, thus a must-see tourist attraction. While returning from the trip, a severe chill descended on Dan while he began to shiver, alternately between falling asleep and waking up. Laura felt his high body temperature and requested the driver to stop at a roadside local market to buy a thick blanket to wrap him up. However, Dan had no sign of life-threatening coughing and breathing troubles that had been reported as the hallmarks for the infection by the new virus. Dan occasionally complained about a severe sore throat as well as loss of his sense of smell and taste, thus stopping any food consumption. Laura remembered reading the new virus only caused severe coughing and breathing trouble. So, she assured Dan that he might have caught a regional bug that affected different parts of his body.

After spending next several days for Dan to heal, the couple flew back to the US. By this time, the virus created a pandemic throughout the world. In new guidelines, medical authorities acknowledged that every symptom that Dan exhibited in Laos could be a potential symptom of the infection.

As of this writing, only 20 (with no death) Laotians have been reported to be infected by the novel virus. Dan wonders whether his “karma” had anything to do of him catching the virus not in New York that got devastated by the virus.

The Traffic Jam, by Bruce Levine

7/8/2020

The Long Island Expressway was jammed – as usual… He tried to exit, but was stuck between them and the next exit was three miles ahead. All he could do was wait as the traffic inched along. He’d gone a total of two tenths of a mile in the last twenty minutes. At that rate it would take five hours just to get to the next exit. He was supposed to be at his relatives for a surprise birthday party in an hour and he still had forty miles to go.

Damn, he thought as he put the car in “park” and waited for the next time the traffic moved. He was even tempted to shut off the engine and save the gas.

Finally, and suddenly, everyone started moving again.

He inched further along and then he saw what the problem had been – two cows were standing across the lanes and the drivers had to maneuver around them to pass. Of course everyone also had to look at the cows which made the whole mess even worse, but that didn’t seem to matter to anyone.

As he passed the cows and the traffic returned to a normal speed he reflected on how he’d never seen cows standing on Broadway in Manhattan. He wondered what effect that would have if it did happen.

Then he remembered – it was Manhattan – no one would notice.

Interview, by John Ivan

Zulu Maid, by Tommy Tarken

An Ill Wind, by NT Franklin

It's Down Again! by Deborah Shrimplin

The Birth of an Idea, by Sankar Chatterjee

The Writer, by Doug Bartlett

Shelle's Rise and Shine, by Kim Favors

Song to the Siren, by Antonia Rachel Ward

We Are Obituaries, by Claire McKernan

Haste, by Ellie Rose McKee

Round Trip, by Sivan Pillai

P.O.V. Divergence, by Sterling Warner

Mother Nature’s Bagful of Tricks, by Sankar Chatterjee

The Traffic Jam, by Bruce Levine

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Longer Friday Flash Fiction Stories

Archives

Longer
Stories