Contributor: Jerry Guarino

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Joey and Sam were watching his sister Susan through the window of Sam’s house next door. They used the telescope Sam got for Christmas; Susan left the window shade open to get some natural light as she got ready for a date.

“What’s she doing now Joey?”
“I don’t know. Putting some kind of cream on her face.”
“I thought she already did that.”
“This is makeup, I think. It’s different.”
“How long does it take?”
“Once last year during prom it took two hours.”
“Two hours! Impossible.”
“I swear it Sam. On my baseball card collection.”
“Well, where is she going?”
“Some dance at the college.”
“The college? But she’s still in high school.”
“What can I tell you? Some guy saw her studying at their library. I don’t think he knows she’s in high school.”
“Do your parents know?”
“No, they think she’s going out with her friends to the high school dance tonight. They would never let her go to the college with a guy. They’re afraid…”
“Afraid of what?”
“You know.”
“No, what?”
“Remember what your Dad told you about how babies are made?”
“Ew! That. Think she wants to do that?”
“I don’t know. It seems that’s what college guys do with college girls.”
“But Susan’s seventeen. Isn’t that against the law?”
“Not if she wants to. I think. How should I know? I’m eleven.”
“Wait, she’s left the room. Probably to get dressed.”
“Sam, you have that Playboy, the one with the college girls?”
“Yeah Joey. It’s under my bed. Why?”
“Those girls, you know. They do it. Let’s see what they wear.”
“That’s some funny underwear. Why is it shiny?”
“I guess that’s so the boy can find them in the dark. What’s that thing?”
“I don’t know. Looks like a dog collar. Why does a girl need that?”
“Beats me. Has a nice pin in the middle, but no way it would hold a dog. It looks more like ribbon.”
“Look, see here. That’s the same dog collar, black with a white pin in the middle. Oh, now I get it.”
“What?”
“Never mind. I thought it was something to hold on a cape, but here’s a girl with just the collar and underpants on.”
“Man. You’re right. Wait, she’s wearing shoes too.”
“Oh, yeah. OK. I didn’t see that. Don’t look like shoes I’ve ever seen before, more like something from a fairy tale.”
“Yeah, like Cinderella. Don’t look comfortable though. Too high off the ground.”
“Hey, your sister’s coming back into the bathroom. Whoa!”
“What, let me look.”
“She’s wearing shiny underwear and one of those collar things. Now she’s putting on a red dress.”
“My turn. Give me the telescope. Oh. This isn’t good.”
“What?”
“She put the collar in her purse. Guess she doesn’t want your parents to see it.”
“Wow. That’s some dress.
“Let me see. Uh oh. That’s the red dress she wore at junior prom, the night she got in trouble for staying out too late.”
“Did she wear shiny underwear that night?”
“How do I know? We were camping in the backyard that day, remember? And we didn’t have the telescope.”
“Yeah, the telescope was a great Christmas present that year.”
“Yeah.”
“So, is she done getting ready?”
“Nope. Now she has to do something with her hair.”
“Her hair is already dry. I saw the hair dryer.”
“Yeah, but now she curls it with some hot thing and some spray.”
“How long does that take?”
“Another half hour. I timed it.”
“No wonder she started at five. It’s six now. When will she leave?”
“Probably not until seven. After she gets dressed, she talks on the phone with her friends. They talk about what they’re wearing and boys and other stuff. I don’t listen too well.”
“And what time is she supposed to be home?”
“Eleven o’clock, a half hour after the dance ends.”
“But she’s not going to the dance. She’s going to the college.”
“I know. But she would be foolish to be out too late, not after prom last year.”
“I’m going to get dinner. You want to come over? We can see her up close when she leaves.”
“OK. Let me hide the magazine first. Mom doesn’t know I have it.”
“Yeah, they never look under the bed.”
“If she did, she would have talked to me about it.”
“All right. I’m going home. Tell your mom you’re coming over to my house for dinner.”
“Hey! If I ask her to sleep over, we can wait till your sister comes home.”
“That’s great. Yeah. Maybe you should bring the magazine, you know, in case we get bored.”
“Yeah. I’ll roll it up in my sleeping bag.”
“Bring two, OK?”
“Yeah, two.”


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Jerry Guarino’s short stories have been published by dozens of magazines in the United States, Canada, Australia and Great Britain. His latest book, "50 Italian Pastries", is available on amazon.com and as a kindle ebook. Please visit his website at http://cafestories.net

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Author: Jerry Guarino

Contributor: Peter McMillan

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Day 1
There was a different guy on the corner. I wondered what happened to the old man.

Day 5
On the second day, the new guy greeted us pedestrians by humming loudly, "Hi ho, hi ho, it's off to work we go!" At first, it was funny, especially for the morning rush, but you were still torn between chuckling and wanting to throttle the mockingbird.

In passing, something about the new guy—I called him Panhandler Pete—reminded me of a homeless guy I met when I was in college. I was visiting D.C. It was on the Mall and we happened to be sharing a bench. He told me his life story, at length and without any prompting. He'd been a psychoanalyst before getting blacklisted. He said he had no regrets though, not of any duration anyway, because he got rid of them by shouting through the fence at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. This, he said, served the additional purpose of securing short-term food and lodging. I dropped a couple of bills in Pete's coffee cup.

Day 6
Monday morning—worst time of day on the worst day of the week—and again we're serenaded past like Disney drones. Not really thoughtful, this new guy. Quite insensitive really. “No money today,” I shouted as I ran past. He had to learn the rules.

Day 26
After a brief settling in period, Monday mornings began to look less miserable and gray. Panhandler Pete's "Hi ho, hi ho" thing didn't vex any more. And he'd taken to entertaining. Last week, he introduced magic tricks. At first nobody stopped, but day by day we got more curious, and we moved closer. By week's end, some of us stood and watched, mesmerized by Pete's show. Meanwhile the traffic light changed again and again. I was late for work three days and missed my performance review ... twice. “Train delays,” I said.

Day 31
Pete showed off a new set of tricks ... making stock picks. He would run through 10 stocks and give his buy, sell, and hold opinions. A beggar predicting the market? It was laughable, except that as he spoke, the language of the Street fell so fluently and melodiously from his lips, he had to be in the know. I couldn't swear it was him, since we'd only ever talked over the phone, but listening to Pete evoked images of my former stockbroker, the fellow who helped me see the need for a second mortgage and a moonlighting job. However, even if it was him, I couldn't exactly beat up a homeless guy. It would be me that got mobbed. Instead, I approached Pete and whispered, “It’s good to see you again.” He smiled.

Day 40
It was brutally cold. I don't know how these people do it, but there he was day like the postman ... of yesteryear. I hadn't forgotten about our possible history, so when I dropped change in his cup, I greeted him by name. The first couple of times he was taken aback, but he got used to it, likely judging me to be no real threat. However, he did stop picking stocks. The magic tricks were out, too. Come to think of it, it might have just been the cold. Now, he was shrunk into a ball to give the wind less to cut into. You couldn't see flesh. It was all tucked away into this snow-encrusted human ball. As I came closer to drop my coins into the coffee cup, which was nearly hidden in the snow, I saw a yellowish stain on the ground. My god! All of a sudden, I forgot everything about why I thought I should hate this man. I reached down and asked whether I could take him someplace warm. He raised his head slowly and choked out words to the effect that I should smile, because it wasn't as bad as it looked.

Day 41
All weekend I hadn't been able to get the image of Panhandler Pete out of my head. I brought a blanket, and not wanting to humiliate him, I gave it to the little girl in the private school uniform I'd seen watching the magic shows. I asked her to give it to him, and when she took it over to him, he turned his head graciously towards her, and I was speechless. It wasn't Pete.

I shuffled over through the snow, and asked what had happened to Pete, and the old man said that Pete was just temporary. The old man had collected a lot of money—he wouldn't say how much—just to give up his spot for 40 days. Pete, he said, had a bet on with some hustlers at the Exchange.

All that was left of Pete's turn on the street was a half-empty Lemon Gatorade bottle.


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The author is a freelance writer and ESL instructor who lives on the northwest shore of Lake Ontario with his wife and two flat-coated retrievers. In 2012, he published his first book, Flash! Fiction.

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Author: Peter McMillan

Contributor: Jessica Schmitt

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He cracked his knuckles like an instrument. The muffled pops of individual releases was void here. His efficiency culminated in both hands simultaneously flicking away the tensions built in the minutia of his joints. He had that accuracy and efficiency in all that he did with his hands. Today these hands played chess across the room from her. Her knuckles were thin, curved in the bony way that lacks comfort. Not a motherly hand. She clearly played the piano, long fingers like that, it had to be. They didn’t appear to go together and yet they had. Married couples seem to fit after a while. Not in a puzzle piece way but in the way that Sunday afternoons and reruns of your favorite comedy go together. It just fits. You can inhale the comfort, the knowing closeness of two people so in sync.

The first kiss was unexpected. They loved each other that much they knew yet neither could grasp their togetherness. The idea of marrying this person or even being with them seemed foreign and still it happened. Warmth from that authoritative first press of his lips warmed her from her hips up through her shoulders. The core of her being felt solid and bold while her skin became alert to every move his fingers made. The weight of his presence meant more to her than his actual touch. She reached around for him, she had him but it wasn’t nearly as good as when he had her. She thought he could have her forever and really should.

She lay there in the still morning across from his eyes. He looked so different to her lying there. It was as if he was a different creation, one that wanted her no matter how different he looked at seven in the morning with beams of the October sun kissing his nose in much the same way she had done the night before. He couldn’t really know that he had changed in her eyes even though she had done the same in his. It was what he had wanted for as long as he could remember. He chose her long before she knew she had been chosen. This clarity of mind he employed resided kindly in her conscience allowing her to peacefully exist in what he was.

She married him in the rain. That late August storm was ominous. Steel toned skies guarded the heavens against them. Nature disapproved of their union; still they danced in the park. Incompatibility was not their problem. The tension of so much connection scared the natural order of life. When she said yes he grinned. When he said yes she chuckled silently to herself. It was never supposed to be him and yet there she stood having made an agreement with someone she couldn’t not be attached to. Sure there were better matches but none elicited the love that wishes to provide copious amount of unsolicited affirmation to another for eternity.

He looked at her across the car. She was angry with him. He could tell by the way her chin wrinkled that this was anger, a deep and hurting anger. When she was disappointed her eyes sunk deeper into her face than usual and frustration led to a quick darting look followed by quickly raised and lowered eyebrows. A wrinkled chin could not be repaired with a kiss of his, in spite of her fondness for those. She fixed her eyes on the yellow line of the road as each section slipped underneath the wheels. Those wheels gave them another four minutes and seventeen seconds of each other.

He buried her in the sunshine. He had made all the arrangements for that sunny Wednesday as if it was a staff meeting complete with bagels and coffee. On that day he didn’t bother to ask why she was taken from him. She liked little moments. The ones so full of everything that they pulsed in anticipation waiting to combust. He would allow those moments to be her, now that her legs would no longer carry her from their bed to their coffee machine. Her hands would no longer tap out memorized melodies or be thrown up in exasperation with his forgetfulness. Her voice would no longer squeak at the idea of finally taking that trip they had been saving for or murmur kindly over his ear while he avoided leaving their bed to go to work.
He felt it; the feeling of sharing the same coffee mug, not caring that someone else’s lip had touched it. He had already had that lip in all sorts of ways. Scanning that mug for the remnants, the touch of that familiar feeling as if all the ways in which she had loved him would come rushing back to him with the steam. She didn’t come back to him, of course she couldn’t.

He started sleeping on the couch. He thought about the kids they couldn’t have, how just one fraction of her breathing into this world would still make it a worthy place to exist. He waited at the dining room table like a dog waits at the door waiting for the return of someone so necessary to the balance of the world. He wanted the world to turn faster as if going faster could bring them any closer. He wondered if she was somewhere wandering about looking for him in some distant afterlife. Some other dimension where they still existed together is what he hoped for during the day. During the nights she was there. He would hold her memory in his arms and smell her drugstore shampoo on her pillow.


- - -
Jessica Schmitt lives in St. Paul, Minnesota. She currently studies at Concordia University as a double major in Interdisciplinary Studies and English Literature.

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Author: Jessica Schmitt

Contributor: Samantha Seto

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Water brushed the current, greenery invaded my imagination, the sky had perfect clouds, soaring. Sunshine glazed overhead, pond water was murky, diluted filled with colorful fish and spiders. A white heron stood on drifting grass patches, explorers came to gaze down the water, looking for tadpoles. Quietness of pine trees and willows rustled in leaves, cold wind hit my skin. Shadows lined the dock, I could see my reflection in the water, traced the outlines, blueness in my eyes. Sunbathe burned, warmth to soul, frogs croaked, blowing bubbles in gentle blueness. Listening to wind chimes, wooden dock swiftly rocked back-and-forth, like a baby cradle.

The moon caved in. The earth grew dark and dirt flew everywhere. My first instinct: I thought it was a natural disaster. But then people started to disappear into thin air as their bodies evaporated. I ran to seek shelter. Soon enough, I found myself drifting away.

All I could hear was chaos. I reached into my pocket for an Advil but my bare skin had bloodstains. The world was crumbling before my eyes.

The dark cold wind outside almost whipped across my face and burned my eyes. I was crossing a gray-stoned bridge and the dark waters below became frightening. My hair grew dark and wet in the rain. My clothes sunk into my skin. I could barely see the direction the road was taking me.

Streaming white light burst in my eyes before I was gone. Spun out of control. Blackout.

The Mayan calendar never predicted this day.


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Samantha Seto is a writer. She has been published in various anthologies including Ceremony, Soul Fountain, Nostrovia Poetry, Coffee Table Poetry, The Screech Owl, and Black Magnolias Journal. Samantha studies creative writing. She is a third prize poet of the Whispering Prairie Press.

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Author: Samantha Seto

Contributor: Lauren Erath

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Two bells and a pearly button on a purple ribbon, the clinking of such has always given me grief. Even so, Katarina insists that her bracelet is more bearable than my biscuits. Yet no guest has bemoaned my breakfasts, unlike the patter of this impatient pest, the trauma of which proves permanent.
“They’re too soft, like Pirouette, and who would crave a kitten like that?” she asks, analyzing the bread as an artist would a brush’s end.
Bored, Katarina places her thimble on her pinky, with which she clanks the candlestick holders. Her twinkly eyes wander about the worn table cloth. Meanwhile, Pirouette parades atop her shoulder.
“Eternal child, take that cat from your shoulder and don’t tamper with the candlestick holders any longer. We can’t afford another catastrophe like last April,” I shrill amidst my clinking dentures.
“How can someone be troubled by something so silly and simple?” Katarina asks, placing Pirouette on an apple.
The pet poses as if such an action were subtle, while Katarina plays with its purple bow. It matches Katarina’s dress in tone.
“What seems simple and silly to you is nothing less than horrific and cruel to everyone else. Have you forgotten the near forfeit of Ms. Erica’s pulse?” I inquire, wishing I’d have hired that ‘antique collector’ after all.
I snatch Pirouette’s new pedestal, polishing and returning it to the table.
“I can’t recall that incident,” Katarina says, fixing her frills and stroking her wit, “common sense states Pirouette and I couldn’t have been there, which Ms. Erica made most clear.”
“Oh, certainly! Certainly! How much longer must such humor haunt my scant guests and me?” I demand, knowing Katarina will reply gaily,
“It will continue until I’m undoubtedly dead.”
Katarina, bold as ever, chances another clank against a candlestick holder, chuckling as the candle crashes into the crepes.
I sigh, apprehending a cloth from my apron with an arthritic hand, muttering “Your naughtiness is why I won’t light its neglected end.”
The doorbell decrees that raw guests wish to request our residency.
“I’ll get it!” Katarina insists as she masquerades into the main hall with mocking innocence.
“Stop your stomping and sit. I’ll greet our guests!” I say, crossing the room as the clock cries noon instead of nine. “Must you meddle with the hour hand?” I ask my little madam as I clasp the door knob.
“Oh my, come in!” I exclaim, letting in a grim, sickly man stricken by rain.
Hopefully, this one’s mundane.
“May Pirouette and I play in the puddles?” Katarina asks, peering through the shutters, “Perhaps our guest should retire in a relaxing atmosphere. Should we remain he may claim we’re...”
“Yes, before your impatience is more severe,” I whisper, wrapping my sweater on the sneezing sir.
“What was that?” he asks, extracting the sweater and seizing a cask from his coat.
“Oh you mustn’t mind,” I entreat, ushering him upstairs to our handsomest of suites. “I converse with myself from time to time. Since I lost Herald to a tuberculous spine I…”
“Hear that?” my guest mutters, concealing a mucid cough.
“Pa-pardon?” I sputter, aloft the aged staircase, cursing Katarina and her childish haste.
“The screeching. How strange,” he replies, straining his rosen ears, “Too strong and rigid to be mice, I fear. Storm-caused? How odd. Should have picked a sturdier stay I suppose.”
“That’s those blabbering demon-birds. You know, they crowd the courtyard in droves,” I assure, snatching his abhorrent liquor. “Now come along and change your clothes.”
“This room’s air is rather stale,” he states, sulking about the suite like a lake-less loon. “Rather like a tomb…”
“Lone chambers are quite lamentable. Surely your wife would make such solemnness less tangible,” I say, dividing the drapes.
“I’m a bachelor,” he barks, “and will bald before I marry, I swear. This mare isn’t fit for matrimony’s reigns. Besides, women are wearisome as an ink stain. Once they appear, there’s no thwarting them.”
“Oh my!” I exclaim, clutching my chest at what I witness beyond the window. “What the screeching is, you’ll never guess! Surely it isn’t the crows!”
“Stop fretting, such frivolity’s grotesque…by God!” he gawps, galloping off, moaning “Demonry! That damned swing is possessed!” while the stairs shudder at his departure.
“I’d rather ingest every screech of someone who is troublesome and sweet than bear the blatant pounding of a presumptuous, drunken poltergeist!” I cry, gazing out the glass and echoing her laughs as thunder blares and bold lighting shows the impossible to and fro of that phantasmal child, forever known as my darling Katarina.


- - -
Lauren Erath studies Creative Writing at Concordia University Saint Paul. She enjoys writing fiction, creative nonfiction, and poetry

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Author: Lauren Erath

Contributor: Nick Keller

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If ole J.C. could handle getting spiked to a tree, I guess I can handle sitting in this cell for a few years. They say he did it for us. Even for me. Sacrificed himself to save our dumb asses. I never really felt all the redemption I was supposed to feel from that day, though. Oh well, maybe it’ll be different for my brother. After all, I’m sitting in here for him. But that’s our little secret.

He was always the smart one. Real clean cut guy. Went to college, got a degree, snapped up a job making some heavy dough, got himself a little wifey. Hot piece of poon, too. Good for him. Now they got a big home and two little girls. Real slice of the American pie, my brother.

But me — shit, I’m the drop out. Rough around the edges. Tough as rust and don’t take no shit. A little stupid, I guess. Suffer from chronic unemployment, too. Growing up people called us identical. But today, hell, we ain’t nothing alike.

So when I saw Candy approach him at the bar my balls shriveled. That bitch was trouble. And we all knew it. But Ted was new to the place. High class guys like him don’t ever go to Barney’s. Only reason he was here was to meet his brother for a few pints. Why he left with her, I couldn’t tell you. It’s amazing what a little cleavage and micro-brew can do.

We all knew her reputation. Candy was one of those rough-riding types. She didn’t look it, but get her in the sack and she’ll hump like a gorilla. Serious. She liked being pinned and cuffed, too, or smacked around, even whipped with a belt. When she orgasmed she liked being choked out to the point of asphyxiation. Had a fetish for bruises, I guess. Made her feel like an animal. Damn, this end of the world burps up some real psycho-bitches, man. And Candy — she was one.

So after my brother’s tussle with her, all the evidence was there. At first it was just blackmail. But then came the threats. Ted did everything he could to cut it off with her. Changed his numbers. Had a P.I. track her in case she ever found out where he lived, which she did. He had to hustle home from work a time or two to intercept her. I watched his whole life become a series of lies. He was on the verge of losing it all. Shoot, it was his fault. Maybe he deserved it. But my brother was always one for learning his lessons. I knew my sacrifice would be worth something.

So I rented a suit with my last dollar, cut my hair, shaved my face; made myself look like an upstanding milk-toast A-hole, just like Ted. And I met her clean. She was happy to see me, even called me by his name. I told her I’d give her what she wanted. She was all-too-happy to oblige. And boy, I gave her what she wanted. When I strangled her, I strangled her.

I was charged with 1st degree murder. But everyone at Barney’s testified on my behalf. Hell, they all knew her. Painted her up to be a violent lover. Almost insane. A real sadomasochist. But me, I mournfully claimed it was an accidental death. I only wanted to love her the way she wanted me too, I said. Didn’t know it would kill her.

The charges got busted down to 2nd degree manslaughter. When my brother came to visit me in prison that first time, I had a gift for him. The Holy Bible. I told him to read it and give me the full report. Especially about ole J.C. I was curious.

Man, it’s a real bitch being the bad twin. Or maybe I’m the good one. Who knows? I will say this, though. I sure saved his dumb ass.


- - -
Nick has been slinging short fiction for two years, though he's been dreaming about it for much longer. In that time he's nabbed a number of publications as well as several, "Hell no"s. He's a graduate of UNT's film school, has a son that's about to go to UNT's music school, plays the hell out of air hockey and loves a good cheeseburger. He lives in Dallas.

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Author: Nick Keller

Contributor: Brent Rankin

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“It’s just not right! Him making all the rules.” The kid, his hands in the pockets of his jeans and his shoulders bent over, skulking in circles, kicked a brightly colored ball that exploded into orange glitter. He down sat cross-legged. Pulling the hood of his windbreaker low over his eyes, covering the skewed ball cap cockeyed on his head, he huffed.
Whining alone, he said, “Can’t do that! Can’t do this! He doesn’t know everything. ‘I’m your Father and you work for me.’ Nay, nay, nay…what does that make me? Your slave?
“Do as I tell you, not as I do! What an asshole….” Something white flittered out of the corner of the kid’s eye. He quickly reached over with both hands and crushed it in a clap. “Damn.”
Then he heard that voice. That awful deep baritone. “Just what do you think you’re doing? You’re on the clock, you know.”
The kid stood and crossed his arms. ‘Yeah? So?”
He said, “Oh, don’t start with me, not now. Not ever.”
His chest inflated almost twice its size when the kid inhaled…and held it, his cheeks all puffed out and red. He finally exhaled. “Stop telling me what to do! I can make trouble, you know.”
He said, “Trouble? For me? That’s a good one.”
“Hey…I can, like…get an army together. Take over everything. You know.”
He laughed, “An army? Who’s going to join your army?”
The kid dropped his crossed arms and made fists with both hands. “There are some of the others working here that are pretty pissed off, too, you know? We’ll get together and toss you out on your ass.”
“Watch your language, boy.”
“See? See what I mean? ‘Watch your language, boy.’ Who are you to tell me what I can say? What I can do?”
“You forget who I am, don’t you? You dare me?”
“Who are you? Like I really care. You’re just a…bully. Yeah, that’s all you are. Pushing us around. Ordering us to do things you don’t want to. Or you can’t.”
He laughed. “What can’t I do?”
The kid hesitated. He rolled his eyes and shoved his hands back in his pockets. “See? See? ‘What can’t I do?’ What? You think your perfect?”
He said nothing.
The kid pointed to the broken ball. “Yeah, I busted it. It was crap anyway.”
“A perfect world. And you crushed a cherub. Make you feel tough?”
The kid re-crossed his arms and stomped his foot down twice. “It just isn’t fair, because, yeah. I’m tough. Tougher than you.”
“You conceited, self-absorbed little brat! I can do things to you, you know?”
Pouting, the kid said, “Well then do them, stupid old man.” He saw malevolence and disgust in the kid’s eyes.
Enough. He said, “And to think I used to call you The Morning Star, you little devil. Why don’t you go to hell?” He raised his hand and the kid vanished in a yellow flash of sulfur and stink. “Shame he became a bad egg, but I should have known Lucifer wouldn’t end up right.” God rubbed his nose, turned, and went back to creating the Universe.


- - -
It all had to start somewhere, I suppose.

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Author: Brent Rankin

Contributor: R.A. Conine

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She woke to a sort of fog. She had that sometimes. The world was blurred over, covered in an unnerving mist. It made her think of a particular old aunt who had milky cataracts, a woman long dead and gratefully so, from a childhood barely remembered. She wondered if the gauzy morning haze wasn’t some potent harbinger of her own future. She could see herself grown old and doddering, slowly going blind, a lifetime of scrabbling for hard cash wasted. She envisioned dying with the question “why” still framed by her wrinkled lips.
The air in the room was warm, musky. She shook her head and the fog cleared, as it always did. That future, if it was hers, was far away. For now there was sun and warmth, freedom and the road. There was shame too. It was always with her no matter how far away she ran. Along with everything else her old shadow bought to the table, shame was a cheap date. He always took her to places like this one, cheesy hotel rooms in dead end towns with names like Winnemucca, Nevada.
She threw aside the ancient paisley patterned coverlet, rose naked and dropped her feet over the edge of the bed. The carpet beneath her toes was threadbare and gritty. She shivered a little. She didn’t remember much. The night was a blur of roughened flesh, sweat and tequila. His beard was harsh and prickly. He laughed too much.
She couldn’t recall his face or name. She hoped he was gone. But he probably wasn’t. He’d left behind a soft-pack of Marlboro Reds, a faded “Dear Hunter” ball cap and a thumb-worn paperback book. He was a reader. That impressed her.
She rubbed her teeth with a finger, blinked the sleep away and stood. In rooms like this one, she had slept in a hundred or more, there was almost no space to move around. Step out of bed on the right and your tits would be pressed against the closet door. Get out on the left and your hips were flat against the wall. In this case, the left side contained a window covered by white linen curtains. Well, they weren’t actually white, not anymore. If she had to associate a color with dusty age, cigarette smoke, bad sex and booze, then it would be the color of those curtains, more or less.
She pulled them aside and peered through old glass fogged by years of accumulated automobile exhaust carried on the wind from the nearby interstate. She could hear of the rumble of the big trucks but she couldn’t see them. Beyond the window lay a magical verge of thick, brilliant greenery. The colors were as vivid as old Fuji Film images. A bush had clawed its way up the rough red bricks of the hotel wall. It seemed to be trying desperately to open the window and get in, to say hello, to ask for a cup of coffee perhaps. Beyond the leaves she saw grass blades packed so densely together that she doubted she would sink if standing atop them.
Her face was pressed so tight to the window that her breath was fogging the glass, dimming the beautiful vision in a way that made her sad. She pulled back her chin and considered inviting the plant to share her company. He’d have so many tales to tell of loud one-night stands and drunken gardeners who had tried to mow him down. He would probably make a fine traveling companion if permitted to dip his roots in wet soil for a while each night.
The door rattled in its frame and opened on complaining hinges. She didn’t turn immediately. She was reluctant to face him. She was nude. He was probably ungainly, at best. She tended to pick the low-hanging fruit. Her ex-boyfriend, who dubbed himself a “spiritual psychologist”, explained that it had “something to do with her sense of self-esteem”. This probably explained why she wanted to hit him, always, all the time.
“Hey,” he said in husky but altogether pleasant voice, “Gotcha some coffee from the diner down the street. Figured you could use a wake up.”
“Yeah,” she answered blithely. This one had manners. Maybe…
“Nice ass,” he commented.
Maybe not.
“The tat you got on your lower back; s’posed to be the sun rising over the moon, right?” He chuckled.
Surprisingly bright. He was a reader and a thinker. Maybe…
“Goddamn, girl. You ever gonna turn around so I can see them tits?”
No. He was none of those things. He was just another body, another traveler on the long sad road she walked.
She turned…


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Please visit my website to discover more of my work. I enjoy vignettes, horror, science fiction and combining the three into interesting soups with unexpected ingredients.

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Author: R.A. Conine

Contributor: Gary Clifton

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Old Captain DuPree, fifteen years the commander of Dallas Homicide arrived early as always, had four cups of coffee, then waddled down the hall for his morning constitutional. He dropped deader than last Years Christmas spirit. They pried him out of the stall, funeralized the remains, and began looking for a replacement.
The Conga line of kiss-ups and related types nearly trampled each other in the fervor to crowd to the front to do their best work to land one of the most coveted jobs in the DPD. By the magic of the voodoo cop promotional process, the fools promoted Billie "Zero" Grifford to the job. Billie Zero was now Captain Zero.
Zero was a total jerk - the world was home to many. Look up the word in Webster's - Zero's photo would appear. His career was meteoric. Proper maintenance of his public relations and brown nose campaign and he was a future contender for the Chief's spot. Zero was already monitoring the Chief of Police's trips to the john, praying to the God of Sorry Flakes for the miracle of deja vu.
Zero decided as commander of homicide, he needed to lead a mission. We had squeezed up an arrest warrant for badass biker Cletus "Bag" Bonelli. Cletus had beat his ol' lady, Rosa "Barf Bucket" Garcia's brains into mush with a tire iron, then ran her through a tree shredder. Rosa was certainly very dead.
"Everone got vests?" Zero asked. But, hey, management didn't need no stinkin' vest. He'd hide and watch.
Bag was holed up in a junk yard office inside a concertina-wire topped fence in west Dallas. A pit bull, accustomed to eating at least one human daily, patrolled the perimeter.
Bag's name stemmed from his colostomy bag, courtesy of a cop's gut-shot. What we didn't know was a Louisiana prison guard had shot off his left foot. He navigated on a wooden replacement.
Maggs Washington maced the dogdung out of the pit-bull, literally, Red Harper cut the gate-chain, and in pitch blackness, we were on the door in seconds. But Bag had wandered to a corner to take a leak and heard us coming.
Big problem - the bag had another skel in that little camper with him. Bag broke for the fence. The other guy, a biker named "Gator" popped out and cut loose with a little .25 pistol. Harper .12 gauged Gator into that great rehab center in the sky, his head innards sprinkled over a three yard circle.
With the agility of a fleeing rat, Bag scurried over the fence and down the alley in a sort of side-straddle-hop. Maggs, who had run for Texas Tech and Harper, who often ran his mouth, pursued. Zero appeared from behind cover. In the name of fools everywhere, he was filming the chase with a video camera - a career booster sure as sundown.
Out of camera range in the dark, in less than a block, Maggs snagged a leg as Bag tried to top another fence. Harper, big as a barn and half as smart, lumbered up still clutching a nasty cigar in the corner of his mouth. He bear-grabbed the other leg and Bag came down in two pieces.
"Maggs, we tore this sucker in two," Harper held up the wooden foot in the dark.
"Prosthetic device, Harper," she studied the foot.
"Damn tootin' it's pathetic. Faulty construction."
Shortly, the trio appeared within Zero's camera-strobe, the Bag leaning on Maggs, Harper packing the foot. Zero would never have walked down the alley to meet the odd trio - too dark.
"Tore off my damned foot," Bag wailed.
"It's okay, Captain," Harper waved the prosthesis aloft. "It's a pathetic device."
"Great Scott," Zero sputtered. "My career. This can't be happening, Harper, you stupid son-of..."
The camera lights went dark. I flash-lighted Captain Zero's last known position. Our leader had fainted into the alley mud. Zero languished in the psycho ward, then with the shrink's recommendation he was assigned to park cars in the visitors lot. Zero had found a home. And oh, yeah, Bag got the always popular three cocktail needle.


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Gary Clifton, forty years a cop, has over sixty short fiction pieces published or pending with on line sites. Clifton, an M.S. from Abilene Christian University has been shot at, shot, stabbed and sued. He is now retired.

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Author: Gary Clifton

Contributor: Eric Suhem

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“3rd floor souls, Hardware and Lawn Care!” announced the department store elevator operator, a round jovial man with twinkling eyes and a mischievous grin. Helen and her husband Don were in the elevator, carrying boxes of hats.

Looking at Don from under her floppy hat, Helen said, “I had a dream that I was in a lobby of 400 elevators, each set of elevator doors a different color. Every few seconds, I hear the ping of one of the elevators, and I run toward its open doors, which slam shut as soon as I reach them. Then another elevator pings, I run toward its doors, they slam shut, and so on. So I keep missing the doors, but in the dream I’m learning how to miss the doors in style. My spiritual advisor says that all this has to do with issues of abandonment. What do you think, Don?”

Don hadn’t heard her, as his mind was filled with visions of green grass, fertilizers, sprinklers, and various lawn care responsibilities. “It’s not sensible to have so many hats,” he observed, looking at Helen’s hat boxes.

He set the boxes down in the elevator, and stepped out onto the 3rd floor of the department store, suddenly finding himself in the middle of a large expanse of grass. A woman in a blue tunic rode across the lawn on a riding mower, waving to him. “Join me on the mower, Don!” she yelled cheerily, “Adventure awaits!”

“You missed a spot,” said Don, pointing to a patch of un-mowed grass, as the woman in the blue tunic rode the mower around in circles.

“Good observation, Don,” said the round jovial elevator operator with the mischievous grin, his twinkling eyes cutting through him. Helen looked on without much regret as Don boarded the riding mower, deserting her in the elevator as the doors closed.

On the next floor, a man in a yellow tunic entered the elevator and picked up one of Helen’s hat boxes. “Get your hands off of that,” ordered Helen promptly, slapping him with a fly swatter she had bought in the ‘House Wares’ section. The man in the yellow tunic wasn’t bothered so much by the fly swatter itself, but did not enjoy the swats of the hard plastic coating package in which the fly swatter was contained. Nevertheless, he continued to eye the hats with great interest.

The elevator stopped at each floor, but Helen did not disembark, as the level of her soul had not been reached. "You're soul's floor is the roof," said the elevator operator jovially, his twinkling eyes cutting through her. Upon reaching the roof, the elevator doors opened upon a sweeping, colorful sky. The man in the yellow tunic led Helen onto the top of the building. As she stared at an airplane in the sky, she flashed back to when she was 8 years old, waving to her parents on the runway as they boarded their flight, her mother in a floppy hat, her father wearing a fedora, hours before they would disappear from her life in a plane crash.

“Hey, we love your hats,” said the people on the roof, all in yellow tunics, admiring the contents of Helen’s hat boxes.

“You’re the first people who have appreciated my accumulation of hats,” she declared, gratefully. Earlier in the day, she had met with her spiritual advisor, who told her that she was buying too many hats.

In the rooftop community, Helen instantly became known, and thrived as ‘The Hat Lady’.


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Eric Suhem lives in California and enjoys the qualities of his vegetable juicer.

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Author: Eric Suhem