Contributor: Chris Leek - - People didn’t come from Las Vegas, not in the same way as people came from Baltimore or Jonesboro County, Idaho. Joe had decided Las Vegas was a place to go to, not come from. He sat swilling coffee from a fresh white china mug and idly surveyed the casino's gaming floor. The slots restless and chattering even at this late – or was it early – hour. He watched a plump woman at the nearest machine relentlessly feeding in quarters. Her ample backside attempting to swallow the stool on which she perched. Time and again she yanked on the lever and stared intently as the reels spun, clunking to a halt one by one. At last a bell rang, a light flashed and the machine spat out a tray full of change. She didn’t break stride, just fished again in her blue plastic cup and continued to worship at the temple of the slot. Beyond...

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Author: Chris Leek

Contributor: George S. Karagiannis - - Of vital significance for your narrative is and will always be the way you visualize the futuristic and utopian or dystopian world where real action is taking place, along with its very details. Just to toy with the idea you are on the safe side, you may describe ‘your world’ as a philip dickish setting with post-apocalyptic, totalitarian surroundings or with humanity drawn to its endmost humiliation suppressing any specified freedom all along. The philip dickish environments render flexible access to shifted realities, sociopolitical hysterias, religious inconsistencies and paradoxical behaviors by authority-doubted human entities, thus yielding a user-friendly framework to build up the most non-comprehensive, deteriorated, knotty or psychopathic character you’ve ever imagined. Of course, there...

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Author: George S. Karagiannis

Contributor: Jerry Guarino - -     “I’ll take a Venti hot chocolate, raspberry scone and one of those new holiday cups,” said the man as he flirted with the beautiful girl behind the counter.  The Latina barista took his money, winked and prepared his order.  Meanwhile, the line was back out to the doorway, not uncommon at this time of the morning.   California coffee houses were a little different than those back east.  Sure, they still have their share of serious bankers, lawyers and business professionals, but you can tell by the way they order.  On Wall Street, it’s a lot of black coffee, maybe with a Danish.  In D.C. it’s a croissant and latte and in Boston, it’s black tea and “that’s all thanks…I have my Dunkin Donut.”       But the prices were still...

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Author: Jerry Guarino

Contributor: Samuel Cole - - Tires crush gravel beneath me until brakes squeal and a muffler vibrates wildly. Power windows buzz down, up, down, up, down; soulful whispers of acknowledgment pierce my well-polished ears and mended face, permanently smiling at a giant rose blooming before my marble-threatened eyes. Hands clutched across my heart as if hovering for surprise, the clock inside my head ticks on and on and on. I can’t see my fingernails, but I trust they’re not painted bright red like some third rate whore, but French-tip-pink like a woman of good-standing means. Somewhere my daughter is biting the corners of her fingernails; my cousins, damn moochers, likely licking their chops; my two sisters shaking their hands and heads complaining, oh, it’s so hot out, oh, that boring service, oh how long, how very very long; my grandson...

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Author: Samuel Cole

Contributor: T. M. Black - - Santa loaded the ammo belt of candy canes into the machine gun and cocked it. After a long night delivering presents, he hated the idea of facing the forgotten presents, but like every year they waited for his return, and so he readied for the frenzy. The full moon sprayed enough light over the barn-style workshop to reveal the wooden doors were open, revealing a gaping, black mouth. While no alien toys were built by the elves that year, or mad hatter tea party sets, any toy was capable of brutal attacks. He knew that well, and rubbed the scar on his hip through his red suit. The night had flown by without a hitch, and he thanked the cloudless skies. Even when they hit England, where a gale tugged at the sleigh, the reindeers didn’t grumble. But once he landed the sleigh, things felt very wrong. Someone...

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Author: T. M. Black

Contributor: Sydney Boles - - Ngöbe girls don’t wear shoes, Mama tells her. What do we wear, then, Mama? We walk the way our ancestors walked, with their dust between our toes. Mama strokes the girl’s dark hair, runs a finger down the wide, dark flank of her nose. Ngöbe girls don’t speak to White Men, Mama chides with her finger. What if it’s important? Don’t play their game, Little One. But what if a White Man speaks to me? They came to our land and took everything, Little One. Don’t let them take your voice, too. Mama smiles at the little girl’s wide lips: my mother’s lips, she thinks. My mother’s full-moon eyes. Ngöbe girls weave rope bags out of plant fibers. But Mama, did I tell you about this white girl I saw with this pretty blue bag? Hush. Our way is the way it has always been. Mama guides the girl’s fine-boned fingers through...

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Author: Sydney Boles

Contributor: Peter Andrews - - “Everything is a balance,” Priest says. Sat across from me, imagine a priest in a movie, you won’t go far wrong. Imagine him sat in an interrogation room, you get the idea. Small clear packet in my hand, two red pills inside. Does he recognize these? Yes, he does, a little nod. “Red Devils,” I say. “They don’t even have any aliases yet that I know of.” Priest shrugs: What you don’t know… Then he says: “Evil Nicks.” Did he come up with that one himself? He nods. I sigh, plenty of theatre in it, sit back in the plastic chair, hand through the hair. Am I tired or getting pissed off? he should be wondering. By the look of him, he isn’t. I took him at the church. A big one, angels and stained glass, all that stuff. This one had a basement and a fuck-off utility bill. “The factory,” I say. “Pretty slick operation....

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Author: Peter Andrews

Contributor: Jane Hertenstein - - I remember when we used to take things for granted. When we threw away the heels of bread, left lights burning all night long, and traded in for a new car every four years. Before the terrorists hit. I remember when recycling was cool, when reusing a bag was simply being green, when it was trendy to bike to the coffee shop and request the china mug instead of the disposable paper cup. Before the crash. We thought about having kids. Before you lost your job and I lost mine. We started saving things like old toothbrushes to use for cleaning; we made our own laundry detergent from an on-line recipe. I used the Swifter cleaning clothes multiple times, front and back. Those slivers of soap—I microwaved them and pressed them together to make a new bar. Before when the going got tough, the tough got going. We...

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Author: Jane Hertenstein

Contributor: Jeremy Jones - - As the painfully burning liquid flows over my skin, I reflect on my life. I see how I ruined my own childhood and blamed others. I see the father I left to rot in a hospital and to die alone. I see the mother I drove away and the brothers I shut out. I see the loving wife I destroyed and drove to adultery. I see the pain I caused all my loved ones. I see all the Marines I fucked over. I see all the lives I took, all the souls I sent to hell, all the futures I erased. I still see their eyes and hear their screams when I sleep. I can see everything I have ever done in my life when this liquid rushes over my flesh, burning me as it goes. I try to think of the good but cannot. The worst part is I see my children. Poor bastards that never deserved to be around a prick like me. My sweet angels will forever be changed...

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Author: Jeremy Jones

Contributor: Brian Barbeito - - Summer rains and purple cotton, where the cool women go, or the fantastic plastic horse from so many years and days and nights ago that it is a miracle to think existence can bring you so far. Dreams of police with the faces of pigs, because someone mentioned they were such, and the old man J-walked and got hit by cars by the grocery store afternoon. The grand church, and the ceilings with saints, where the Madonna will crush the snake with her feet, where the bleached blond knowing one will survey the scene, and the cross-town market is there with nooks and crannies- people old and in heavy suits. The world there and in other places was full of electrical tape, splinters, needle nose pliers, silver watches, cords, small Christmas Trees for the faithful, diligent crates of candies waiting, close angels whispering...

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Author: Brian Barbeito

Contributor: Danica Green - - Mama kept chickens in the yard all through my childhood. Every few days she and I would go out together and collect the eggs, feed the chickens, check the cage wires, and I would say hello to each chicken individually. Mrs. Cluck was my favourite, we adopted her from a shelter and she'd been the only survivor of a fox attack on the coop she lived in as a chick. It had left her mother and siblings dead and her wings torn off so she looked a bit like one of those New Zealand kiwi birds. It never phased her though, she produced just as many eggs as her coop-mates, ate fine, slept well. Plucky Mrs. Cluck. Since papa left the house two years earlier, money had been tight. I'd often go without fancy birthday gifts so that we could feed the chickens and I didn't mind it at all. Who'd want a stupid cassette player...

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Author: Danica Green

Contributor: Michael Albani - - “Johnny,” said the younger runaway, “I really don’t think we should be hanging out around here.” “Carmine, don’t be such a freakin’ baby,” Johnny ordered. “I mean, where’s your sense of adventure? We could never find a place this sweet back in Philly.” Johnny and Carmine were brothers. Johnny was 16. Carmine was 14. They had both run away from home and were travelling together across the country. Well, perhaps “run away from home” is not the right phrase. After all, “home” is an abstract concept, a warm and comforting state of mind. There was nothing warm or comforting about the run-down house in Philadelphia that Johnny and Carmine came from. Johnny and Carmine were raised by a drunkard father who could not hold down a steady job. He was a mean drunk who took out his frustrations on them before slithering...

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Author: Michael Albani

Contributor: Tahni J. Nikitins - - Mysterious Mr. D is not a tall man - no. He is, perhaps, five-seven - five-eight. He is not a man heavily built - quite the contrary. He is lanky - quite wiry. He is not attractive as you might expect him to be, with shaved head, pale eyebrows and lashes, dense freckles, and ruddy skin. Perhaps, if you were to wager a guess, you might say he was of Irish or Scottish descent. Then again, maybe not. He may not be tall or powerful in build - he may not be handsome as your daydream, but his eyes are the color of warm amber. And he knows much about you, it seems, while you know nothing about him save for his interest in astrology - and that he recognized the pendant on your neck. There is his laugh, as well. His laugh is abrupt. It shocks you some, leaves you reeling. It takes you a moment to catch up; a...

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Author: Tahni J. Nikitins

Contributor: Jerry Guarino - - It was one of the most disturbing images Tony had ever seen, if only for a few seconds. Along a highway on the seedier side of the city, a man dressed in plain clothing, an old, wrinkled grey jacket and worn, work boots was kneeling in front of a large industrial building with huge, glass windowpanes. Standing around him were two men with black suits, sunglasses and shining black shoes, looking very much like the men in black. He was driving too fast to hear what the men were saying, but their expressions painted a picture of a sober and terrifying incident about to happen. Tony was forced to drive past them, on a highway without any place to pull over. As he sped by, he looked for a way to turn around, but the nearest break in the median was a mile away. He couldn’t leave without trying to help...

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Author: Jerry Guarino

Contributor: Eric Suhem - - Alfred was a somnambulist. As a somnambulist, he would walk about the house in the middle of the night, deep in slumber, sitting in different chairs, turning on and off various faucets, eventually winding up back in bed. His family had become accustomed to his nocturnal ramblings. One morning, after falling asleep in bed the night before, he woke up in a brightly colored lawn chair out in his vegetable garden. The morning after that, he woke up in a neighbor’s yard, and the next morning in another neighbor’s yard. Each morning Alfred would wake up in the brightly colored lawn chair, closer and closer to the nearby freeway, until he woke up 10 feet away from the road’s speeding cars. At this rate, he would wake up on Lane 1 of the freeway. Two mornings later, after the usual nighttime ambling, he did wake...

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Author: Eric Suhem

Contributor: Rebecca Buchanan - - He was awakened at dawn by a terrific crash, a bunch of smaller crashes, and the shriek of his car alarm. Muttering, he pulled on his robe, grabbed his keys, and staggered down the stairs. The old bat in 3C was already whining about her beauty sleep. The roof of his Corolla was completely caved in, a large chunk of scaly rock in its center. Smaller bits of rock were scattered around. His toe bumped something that might have been a claw or horn. He stabbed at the key chain a few times. The pretty girl from 4G, her earbuds belching Ozzy, shrugged as she jogged passed him. The alarm squeaked and abruptly cut off. He sighed, wondering what the chances were of reaching his insurance guy on a Sunday morning. The old bat was leaning out her window now, yelling down at him. He looked up to yell back. And...

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Author: Rebecca Buchanan

Contributor: P.A.Levy - - the great outdoors isn’t that great if the outdoors is a council estate a bomb city with some of its glass panes still intact where grey scratches on the grey landscape to form into rectangular outlines of washing machines left to get a rinse in the dirty acid rot not trip rain and under an orange glow of city echoes fridges are left out freezing their nuts off in the cold as creeping rust begins to accumulate and spread across the incinerated carcasses of exhausted cars whose final act of exploding into flames provided entertainment for several minutes of wild jubilation as if worshipping some heathen god to free the world of boredom and the bass and drum of drum&bass mashed with dubstep follows you like radar trace orchestrates skank in yer gait shuffling in the shadow of a high rise where the junkies...

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Author: P.A.Levy

Contributor: Simay Yildiz - - ''Fuck off,'' I hiss between my clenched teeth, staring inside the eyes of the boy who came up from behind me and is still holding a supposedly-dead, plastic mouse in front of my face. As I stare and state into his eyes grinding my teeth, I can hear the other boys whispering, “She’s not scared…” My stare-boy turns away when I pull the toy from his hand in full force. Facing his friends, ''She's a witch,'' he shrieks with his hands up in the air, and with the blink of an eye, there are no more boys in sight. I throw the mouse into my coat pocket and check the time on my cell phone: I don’t need this on an empty stomach… The food is an hour away from where I get on the bus, so once I find an empty seat, I sit down and open the book I've been trying to read for a week. The driver's deep, loud...

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Author: Simay Yildiz

Contributor: Kyle Hemmings - - When he first learned he could fly, Pigeon-boy blushed at the thought of hand-me-down wings. Yet, he learned to dance on street corners, laugh mid-stream at the thought of being lighter than an idea. Then he was hired to carry messages between lovers. The distances increased & Pigeon-boy grew breathless. Sometimes, he delivered messages to the wrong lovers. The notes read I love you, still, or walking on air. Some receivers at the wrong destinations died in air-tight bliss. When this happened, the world grew smaller. One day, a morning where everyone carried some form of artificial sunshine in their pockets, of paper planes released from the sweaty palms of air controllers, Pigeon-boy delivered a note that read: I don't love you anymore. He fell from the sky. A girl named Yugi took him home, brought...

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Author: Kyle Hemmings

Contributor: Autumn Humphrey - - You know better than to eat Gummi bears.  Reminders of the last time are still evident back at the house, the couch missing an arm and a bullet hole in the ceiling.  Fingering the crinkly cellophane of the package, you imagine the chewy sweetness and throw it into the cart.  Maybe you’ll put it back at some point, but for now you indulge the thought of being naughty.  Making your way through the store, you keep an eye on the clear bag with the multi-colored little bears inside.   When adding more items to the cart, sugar-free soda, sugar-free grain bars and oatmeal, you take care not to bury the treasure of sweet treats.The next day you don’t remember paying for the Gummi bears, but you have an idea you did.  The evidence is obvious:  Two more bullet holes in...

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Author: Autumn Humphrey

Contributor: Moxie Malone - - "Hello you. How was your trip?" he asked her as she entered. "Fun...wondrous...interesting. It was everything you said it would be," she beamed as she dashed in. "Still, it's good to be back," she added and wrapped herself around him. He chuckled as he drew her close, "It's good to have you back." "Ummmhmm," she purred as she wallowed in his loving embrace. "Next time we should go together." "We'll have to plan that. So, tell me all about it. Did you get to do everything we talked about?" "I sure did," she told him excitedly. "Some things more than once!" "Food?" he asked. "Yum!" she exclaimed. "Dancing?" he queried. "Oh, I danced until I dropped from exhaustion," she told him, giggling. "Sex?" "Well, sure. There was plenty of opportunity for that," she laughed. "It would have been better with...

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Author: Moxie Malone

Contributor: Samantha Memi - - I was lying in bed wondering if the hotel would remember to wake me in the morning when a gecko came in through the window and walked along the wall. I was too tired to shoo it away. “You won't hurt me will you, Mr Gecko.” “I'm looking for roaches, big fat juicy roaches. What would I want with the likes of you.” and he continued his journey on the wall. Just as I was drifting into sleep he started whistling. There's nothing worse than a whistling gecko when you're trying to sleep. “Do you mind not whistling?” I asked. “What's with all the complaining?” he replied, “you get on with your life and I'll get on with mine.” “Yes, but your whistling bothers me.” “You're breathing bothers me. Do I complain about it? No. Why not? Because I believe in letting others live their lives the way they want to. But not...

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Author: Samantha Memi

Contributor: Marissa Medley - - When I met her for the first time, we were at a funeral. Everyone was so somber, which is to be expected at a gathering of the kind. It was interesting for me to see how everyone coped with the loss. Women cried into the arms of their husbands. Husbands patted the backs of their close friends saying things like “How unexpected” and “What a great loss”. The little children cried for their mothers and asked what was wrong. The mothers replied in sweet voices trying to keep in their tears. They didn't want to explain that someone they all once knew and loved had died. The crowd all around me was quiet and sad. Almost everyone had cried at some point except for me and her. When I looked at her, her face was even more blank than mine. I felt uncomfortable to watch her. She was there just watching everyone...

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Author: Marissa Medley

Contributor: Allen Griffin - - There is a grinding of metal on metal as the two cars meet and become one, fenders locking lips and fluids co-mingling. The bones snapping and the sudden exhale. The voice that lives in the blood crying out one final time, is less than an afterthought, lost silent in the cacophony of this moment. Just as quickly as it occurred, I am floating above the highway, a canal that is quickly clogging like the artery that I secretly had figured would be my true end. I am not sad that I cannot say goodbye, their faces are already slipping away, the imagery lost in the afternoon haze and exhaust fumes. I am quickly losing myself into a strange memory, wondering if I am really up here, floating, or if my brain has thrown together this image as the last neurons fire their sacred payload. - - - Allen Griffin...

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Author: Allen Griffin

Contributor: Hannah M. Hill - - Four bars, four cops, then sixteen more bars – the last sixteen being quite rusty and annoying. I rata-tat-tatted a twelve-bar blues, and the other four objected, leaving me with a mattress and a bar-shaped bruise... but no bars. Outside, a road is a long bar of its own; a thousand miles per brandy, 85 and a half shots to the gallon. I took the mattress and made some shoes – and I rata-tat-tatted along down that road; two straight yellow bars, on my feet, and in that tarmac that was dark as the white rich man's wine in the light of the black-backed bar. I walked on the gold, shifting shoes like my hands to my pockets slide when they're rattling out a beat for that Shining American Dollar. Lost my rattle when the blues mixed reds; a young red head in a red dress, half dead with a half glass and brash...

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Author: Hannah M. Hill

Contributor: Jonathan Byrd - - I couldn’t do my work today. All of my office supplies attacked me. I suspected that something was amiss for a while. The pens were grumbling about “Unfair usage,” “Pointless notes,” “Useless Endeavors.” It was becoming clear that my pens wanted to work for the guy on the other side of the cubicle wall. “Why can’t we do work like him? Everything he does sounds so engaging.” I’ve told them that we all do the same work, but pens never listen. I did my best to keep them away from the stapler. My stapler has always been impressionable; I think it suffers from low self-esteem. However, I couldn’t always keep them separate. You know how it is, you get busy. You have to comfort your keyboard who is upset because the monitor won’t display all...

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Author: Jonathan Byrd

Contributor: Brandon Swarrow - -             Bruce is bald, divorced, pays child support yet raises both boys, and is a relentless misanthrope.  If he weren’t spewing heated complaints about his miserable job, his whore wife, or just life in general, he would most likely stop breathing all together.               On his 33rd birthday, Bruce drinks so much by himself that, in the middle of the night, he accidentally stumbles into his sons’ bedroom after using the bathroom.   The bottom bunk creaks and squeaks as he bounces on his belly onto the old mattress.  His face catches a postage stamp portion of the corner of the pillow.  He crashes down so hard that if his son were lying there...

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Author: Brandon Swarrow

Contributor: Penny Estelle - - There were so many people. Who would have thought this many would show? I made my way through the crowd, listening as friends reminisced about old times and sharing remembered stories. “Do you remember when…” or “What about that time…” followed by bouts of laughter. This is how it should be, I thought, chuckling at some story, a little red-faced at others. Women were dressed in white, pink, red and blue, while men sported kakis, Levis, polos, or sport shirts. I loved it. Just what I had asked for. I heard a laugh that always made me cringe. Sophie Martin! What was she doing here? Her ass, covered in a tight, magenta spandex skirt, looked like two beach balls, ready to take out anything that got in her way. “She should have done herself a favor and worn the traditional black,” I muttered. “We do not speak...

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Author: Penny Estelle

Contributor: Dan Nielsen - - Pamela Wilson sat in the car working a crossword puzzle while her husband Glenn and her son Billy grocery shopped. She heard Billy's voice, looked up, and saw him running through the parking lot. Billy got in and sat crouched over as though in pain. He cried. He sucked his thumb. He rocked back and forth. He looked at his mother. “Billy, what’s wrong?" Pamela said. Billy said, “Daddy fell.” “How did he fall?” Pamela said “On his head,” Billy pointed to his own head. “Is he okay?” “No.” Pamela, in robe and slippers, wasn’t about to get out of the car. She flipped open her cell phone. She flipped it shut. “Billy, tell me exactly what happened.” Billy took a breath. “Daddy had eggs. He dropped them and stepped in it. His legs flew up and he landed on his head.” An ambulance, lights flashing and siren wailing,...

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Author: Dan Nielsen

Contributor: Rich Ives - - Whence the migration of pain. Whence the horror. A happy little bumpkin wets his willy and the jig is up. It doesn't hurt so much. He can't hurt so much without experience. Sometimes duty gets delivered to the wrong address. A package of surgical sponges instead of dinner. A piece of the right patient through the wrong end of the microscope. Whence the incumbent derives his verity. While we wander the garden paths below the hospital with our own. It’s a big hurt and we love it dearly, sugarpants. She wanted more and he just wanted. The child of knowledge and the child of ignorance. Both chopping the same onion. A big hurt indeed and we came down from the towers into the land of breaking and keeping, into the land of another before us. - - - Rich Ives is the 2009 winner...

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Author: Rich Ives

Contributor: Eric Suhem - - Oliver, just out of jail, was in the supermarket committing a holdup, threatening the employees with curare-tipped darts. As the frightened store manager was opening the safe, a bag boy emerged from the produce section, and threw fruit at Oliver’s head. A cantaloupe knocked Oliver out, and he slipped into oblivion. The next thing Oliver knew, he was entering a pool hall, feeling disturbed by the neon-colored sprouts on the outside sign, which lit up the bleak alleyway in an organic glow. “Another sign of gentrification,” he declared darkly, walking through the door. He approached the cashier and upon payment was given a rack for the game, each pool ball replaced by a fruit or vegetable. The cue ball was an orange, the 1-ball was an apple, the 2-ball a head of lettuce, the 3-ball a lemon, the 4-ball a lime,...

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Author: Eric Suhem