Eyeliner

Contributor: Anthony Merklinger

- -
But sleep won’t come the whole night through...

There is a rapping at the door.

She turns her head from the bathroom mirror and listens as each knock fills the void in her apartment.

“Marra!” calls a voice from behind the door.

She refocuses her attention to the mirror. Behind the lipstick stains and fingerprints, there’s a beautiful young woman.

The rapping continues.

She picks up a stick of black eyeliner from beside the faucet and removes the cap. She inhales and tightens her face.

“Marra,” says the voice again, “I know you’re in there.”

She tilts her head and applies the liner.

The rapping continues.

She closes the cap and places the liner back on the sink. She reviews herself in the glass.

When tears come down like fallin’ rain…

She walks into the living room and lifts the needle from the turntable.

“Marra,” says the voice.

She puts on a pajama robe and tightens the belt around her waist.

“Mar-”

She opens the door.

“Thank you,” the man says, lowering his clenched fingers to his side. He stands back and reviews her.

“Well?” she says.

“I, uh… I need your rent money.”

She tilts her head. “I thought...”

“Not this time.”

“You say that every time,” she says, running a finger up his torso.

He tightens his posture. “No. I need the money.”

“I don’t have it.”

“What do you mean?”

She loosens her belt.

“Look, Melissa…”

She wraps her left hand gently around the back of his neck. Her fingertips nestle in his hair.

“Melissa…” he says.

She presses herself against him.

“Stop!”

He pushes her against the doorframe. “That’s it. I can’t do this anymore. You have a week to clear out.” He wipes his mouth and walks down the hallway.

She looks up at the ceiling and exhales like a teapot ejecting steam. She runs her tongue against the inside of her cheek and walks into the room.

A gust of wind surges through the hallway and slams her door shut. The needle on the turntable falls.

You’ll walk the floor, the way I do…

She walks to the turntable and snaps the needle off.

Static fills the void in her apartment.

She removes her robe and collapses onto the air mattress. Her body fills the sweat-stained sheets.

A pigeon flies onto her windowsill.

She stands up and overturns the mattress. She grabs her pillow and swings it across the coffee table, knocking capsules of lipstick and fashion magazines across the room.

She stumbles and breathes heavily.

A second pigeon flies onto her windowsill.

She walks into her kitchenette and opens a box of cereal. She tilts the box and a wave of Cheerios crashes against her face. She opens the fridge and empties the remnants of a carton of milk into her mouth.

She stumbles around. Her feet crush the cereal against the floor, and milk trickles down her legs.

A third pigeon flies onto her windowsill.

She takes a vase of flowers and throws it against the wall. The glass shatters and the flowers spill onto the floor.

There is a rapping at the window.


- - -
Anthony Merklinger is a full-time undergraduate student pursuing a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree at Full Sail University in Creative Writing for Entertainment.
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Knockout

Contributor: Robert Bates

- -
“Mark wants to beat your ass,” Julian had warned me at the beginning of the school day.

More like Mark is going to beat my ass. Everyone knows I can’t fight. I sit in my seat wondering what will happen next.

Julian sees my worried face and says, “Relax, I got your back.”

The teacher walks out and I can feel Mark watching me.

Rachel whispers, “It’ll be really funny if you win,” into my ear from her seat beside me.

I turn and Mark is in my face. He pushes me and I instinctively push him back.

He hits me. Then I’m on the ground. Completely disoriented.

I wait for another punch to come but it never does. I finally regain my senses and get up to see Julian holding Mark with his arms pinned behind his back.

“If you are going to do something, do it now,” he says, struggling to hold him.

I hit Mark three times with my left hand then he elbows Julian and breaks free. He charges at me and before I can react his fist connects with my jaw.

I wake up with Rachel in my face.

“That was pretty funny too.”


- - -
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Vengeance is Mine

Contributor: Stephen V. Ramey

- -
It was on the anniversary of my son's death that I set out to right the wrongs in this world. I freed prisoners wrongly convicted like my son, for justice is the heat that burns my arteries. I shot the payday loan shark who collected interest on his interest, for fairness is the blue that floods my veins. I tore out the tongue of the liar who turned on him at trial, for truth is the beating heart that fuels a man.

And now I lay myself upon Your mercy, Lord. Is it truly wrong, what I have done, what I mean to do? One bullet in the chamber, one wrongdoer left unresolved. Please, Lord, tell me that this is not a sin. Did You not see Your only son unjustly crucified? Did he not weep and beg you to intervene?

Here, I'll spin the cylinder. Now it's truly up to You.

Click.

Click.

Click.


Please, God, show me a sign. Anyth--


- - -
I live in beautiful New Castle, Pennsylvania and my work has appeared in various places, including Apocrypha and Abstractions, Prick of the Spindle, Gone Lawn, and others.
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Colony

Contributor: Yonathan Teferi

- -
The journey back home would be dreadful, for only I knew the ventures that awaited me. As a common worker, it was my sole purpose to fulfill my Queen’s commands, and this journey would serve as just that. Even if it was my first time away from the colony, I knew what needed to be done.

I left the foreign tree, carrying the would-be final piece of a new parent colony. The responsibility weighed my body down, but us common workers have always carried the burden of our hierarchy.

While heading back to the colony, I noticed a frail creature. Long legged, with a body smaller than mine, it headed in my direction. Eye contact was difficult, considering I had two and it eight. That foreign beast wouldn’t get a word out of me. My eyes betrayed my mind, and for a split moment, I felt lost in this world.

My tree was my world. It was rare for my kind to travel alone, but this mission only required a single worker. Although it was only a single item that was asked to be retrieved, I could’ve benefited from an accomplice. The world was larger than my colony, and only in the face of conflict could I come to terms with that.

Approaching the tree, I headed to the base where my colony was located. The colony was massive, divided into multiple satellite-colonies, with a governing parent colony where my Queen was located. I headed down a gallery that I personally carved out, to the parent colony. The gallery, which was usually dense with worker ants, was as vacant as the neighboring nests that housed the eggs.

I held a key piece that was required for our colony to completely flourish, but upon my return, there wasn’t a single worker around. The missing piece to an extension of our vanished society, carried by me, a common worker. I was a single worker, alone in an empty colony, exposed to any threat called upon me. Fear struck my core and rattled my senses, causing an unexpected panic attack.

The moment I exited the colony, I knew what had happened. Occasionally, meaning every few years, the colony would become threatened by a foreign beast. I couldn’t help but imagine that eight-eyed creature reeking havoc on my home, on my people.

I ventured away from the colony, in search of the others. I still carried the key item on my back, in hopes of still pleasing my Queen. If that opportunity still awaited me.

I felt a drop of water on my antennae. The velocity of the impact informed it was rain. Without a proper colony for shelter, I was as vulnerable as the tall grass protecting the dirt underneath.

In the distance, I could see the eight-eyed beast. He was up in a foreign tree, spinning something together. Whatever it was, it stopped the incoming rain. I crawled up the tree cautiously, for I knew what monstrosity these foreign creatures could cause.

I approached, slowly edging myself under the creature’s contraption. It worked as well as I observed. The creature fixed himself next to me, all eight eyes examining my fragile exoskeleton.

“Get away from me, you foreign beast,” he said.


- - -
Yonathan Teferi is a writer that is currently enrolled at Full Sail University. Originally from Buffalo, NY, he currently resides in Orlando, Fl.
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The Screaming Armadillo

Contributor: Kristina England

- -
Danny and Joe hiked up the mountain trail. Danny nervously balanced from one rock to the next.

Joe shook his head. "Pick up the pace, man."

"Listen, I am accident prone and have asthma. I warned you ahead of time. Go ahead without me. I'll catch up."

"No, you never leave another hiker behind. Besides, you aren't supposed to hike by yourself."

"Says who?"

"Says the official hiking association. Although, I suppose people do it."

"I'd say so. Thoreau would have never written Walden Pond if he brought along a friend. It's the only way you get real peace and quiet."

Joe sighed. "You know, I'm beginning to see Thoreau's reasoning."

Danny stopped. "I have to take my inhaler. Wait, what was that? Oh my God, is that a bee! I'm allergic to bees. Well, I don't know if I am but I hear if you are allergic to dust..."

Joe held his head. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw something move.

"A baby armadillo!"

Danny was sucking at his inhaler and flailing one arm at a mosquito. He exhaled and stopped moving.

"What do we do?"

"What do you mean? I'm going to pick him up."

"You're what?!"

Joe looked at the armadillo, which returned the same curious look. Joe walked slowly over clucking his tongue. Before the baby armadillo could prepare itself, Joe reached down and picked it up. That's when the poor thing let out a scream.

"Rrau! Rrau!"

The screaming got louder as the animal twisted and turned in his hand, fearing an impending doom.

"Oh, I'm sorry, honey," he said putting down the scared animal.

He heard the sound of tree branches snapping and turned around. Somewhere in the distance he saw Danny flailing down the mountain.

He sighed. "Hope he looks out for snakes."

The armadillo grunted, then shuffled away into the woods.


- - -
Kristina England resides in Worcester, Massachusetts. Her poetry and fiction has been published in Gargoyle, New Verse News, Linguistic Erosion, The Story Shack, and other magazines.
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The Frog

Contributor: João Cerqueira

- -
When Jesus and Magdalene began to cross the sunflower field they met a group of boys, squatting before a rocky outcrop. Covered with lichen and moss, the rock gave off a greenish hue that contrasted with the garnet sweater of one of the boys. Magdalene guessed they were between ten and fourteen years old.
“Look, these country kids can explore nature at their will. City kids know nothing of this fun and games in the open air,” she said tenderly.
Jesus said nothing, but left the path to go to them.
Eager to establish contact with healthy youngsters who didn’t need Playstations to have fun, Magdalene followed him. She could now tell that this was lively play, because she could hear laughter. As she approached, the guffaws increased. At that instant Magdalene wanted to be a child again, to join this group and twirl in the pine needles, to climb trees and explore caves.
Finally they reached the jokers, who, engrossed in their play, didn’t notice their arrival. Magdalene then peered over their heads and saw the reason for their hilarity: The adolescents had caught a frog and had placed a lit cigarette in its mouth, hoping that the creature would burst like a balloon. After stealing eggs from birds’ nests and catching bees in a bucket, they were now amusing themselves with a frog. As the frog had puffed up in defense—not because of the smoke—the boys were now convinced the creature was going to burst at any moment. And if it didn’t burst from the smoke, it would burst under a hail of stones.
Magdalene got ready to give the boy closest to her a couple of slaps when Jesus placed a hand on her shoulder. “Don’t do that.” Her arm didn’t even lift and her muscles relaxed.
At this moment the adolescents noted their presence and disbanded, fleeing through the sunflower field. They laughed again, as amused now as they were before they had been caught. The eldest, believing he was a safe distance away, turned and made an obscene gesture at them with his middle finger. “Screw you!”
When Magdalene looked back to see where the frog was, all she found was the extinguished cigarette. It has vanished in a puff of smoke. The mixed aroma of tobacco and moss made her nauseous.
Seeing her distress, Jesus embraced her. “Forgive them; for they know not what they do.”
Then, some sunflowers began to move towards the east.


- - -
João Cerqueira has a PhD in History of Art from the University of Oporto. He is the author of seven books.
The Tragedy of Fidel Castro won the USA Best Book Awards 2013 and the Beverly Hills Book Awards 2014.
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A Soft Landing for a High Flier

Contributor: Bruce Costello

- -
Another sleepless winter night. The sky is huge from my veranda, the stars luminous, the moon near and motionless. The trees are buried in slumber, not a movement, not a sound. The fields, bathed in silver, stretch to the hills with here and there the gleam of a pond.

It’s hard to believe that nature can be so still. The stars gaze down with tenderness, as if there’s no unhappiness and all’s well in the world.

They say you should close the clinic door and switch off to the voices of the day.

I was a high flying psychotherapist, well-known and in demand. I thought I was forever. But my brain became a sponge for the pain of troubled people. Day after day with patients, night after night with a troubled husband whose needs I failed to satisfy, whose constant, punishing putdowns were badgering me into becoming what he accused me of being.

My mother died. One straw too many. I gave away my practice, left my husband, fled the city and came to live in this ramshackle cottage that I bought over the internet one sleepless night.

Here there are no discordant voices. The dishes sit on the bench and dry themselves. There is no carpet to vacuum and no lawn to mow. I see few people. I have no telephone.

I took up writing. My computer and I created a new world of fictional people that I can change or eliminate with one stroke of a finger. Back space or delete key, my choice.

Each morning I make syrup for the birdfeeder. Some days I sit for hours watching and listening:- blackbirds, thrushes and waxeyes, in tune with their world as I have never been with mine.

A black dog visits. He rolls onto his back, stretches out his legs, so big he fills the room, wall to wall. I rub his tummy. He licks my hand.

Yesterday, a woman called Lynette knocked on my door. Said she’d heard about me and wondered if I’d like to serve on some committee. For the community. No thank you, I said, as I hurried her down the garden path.

From my veranda I watch as the stars dim and the sun rises. Over the river hovers a haze. A streak of sun touches the trees on its bank and races to the far-off hills. I see a grassy meadow. I would like to lie on it or touch it with my hands. Today I will walk there.

*

Summer arrives and I am starting to feel human again.

On a stroll one day, I came across that woman, Lynette. She was gazing up into a tree, while her dog on a pink leash was peeing against a gatepost.

“Hello,” I breezed. “Look, I’m really sorry about how rude I was that time you called around, you remember?”

Lynette stared at me.

She was about my age with blonde hair and intelligent blue eyes. It was early in the day and we were on a country lane, miles from anywhere, but she was smartly dressed, and her breasts stood out perky and attractive in a tight, red sweater.

I had been slopping around without a bra for months.

“Oh, it’s you, Jennifer,” she said, pointing to a pair of pigeons flapping up from a branch. “I was just watching those birds.”

“Lovely, aren’t they!” I answered, and we began to talk.

In the weeks that followed, Lynette and I became friends. She was a gentle soul, the first person I’d felt safe with since my burn-out. We shared meals and went on walks. She loved to read the stories that I wrote. Her comments were perceptive and encouraging.

Lynette had separated from her husband after twenty years of marriage. It took her that long, she told me, to figure out that no amount of love and forgiveness was ever going to make him better or stop him abusing her.

She studied for a teaching degree, then landed a job as a college English teacher. After three years she suffered a major depressive episode. She went onto an invalid’s benefit, left the city and bought a country cottage, close to mine.

Lynette took charge of her own recovery. She kept herself busy in the garden and in community affairs. To maintain morale, she told me, she liked to dress well. She walked lots, both for health and for the sake of her figure. Her cottage garden was a wonder.

“It would’ve been so easy,” she told me one day, when we were strolling through the forest, looking for mushrooms, “to let myself go and turn into a frumpy hermit.”

“Like me?” I said to her.

Lynette laughed and whacked me on the backside. She was fun like that.

*

We were on my veranda one evening, sipping red wine, watching the sky as the peace of night enveloped the earth around us. The conversation had lapsed into cosy silence. A bird called out as it flew low overhead.

“Do you recall,” I said, “that first time we met, months ago, when you came to my door, and I chased you away?”

Lynette nodded.

“Was that very upsetting for you?” I asked.

She glanced at me, then looked down and turned away. I moved across to her, took her hands and pulled her to her feet. We hugged.

“I’m so sorry,” I said, my voice breaking.

Lynette sighed. We held each other. For the first time since mother died, I experienced the soft intimacy of another woman.

The moon smiled and the stars gazed down tenderly on our world.


- - -
New Zealander Bruce Costello semi-retired from his profession in 2010, retreated from city to seaside, and has now had forty stories published in literary journals and popular magazines in five countries.
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Hilda's Family Reunion

Contributor: Donal Mahoney

- -
Paddy didn't want to go to his wife's family reunion. He told her that in the same nice way he had told her in years past so as to avoid other reunions over the many years they had been married. Hilda had always given him a pass, telling her relatives his job required that he stay home. After he retired she'd tell them he wasn't up to the trip--a case of the flu or something. No one ever believed her but many were happy not to have Paddy there. It wasn't that he caused a problem. He just stuck out among the Ottos and Hanses. He would forever be an Irish interloper at a German family reunion. But this time Hilda was adamant about Paddy going with her.

"Everyone's getting older," Hilda said, "and we should see them before someone else dies."

Hilda was right, of course, Paddy had to admit, as she usually was. He was part of the family whether they liked him or not.

"I grew up with those people, Paddy, and I may be seeing some of them for the last time. They may be boring to you but they're my family."

Unlike Hilda's relatives, Paddy's relatives, the ones already dead and the ones still alive, didn't hold family reunions, confining contact to cards at Christmas with signatures only, free of any personal messages unless someone had died, and that was just as well, Paddy thought.

At any gathering of his people, the angry ones, and most of them had been angry since birth, would, after a few drinks, start picking scabs off old problems and fresh blood would flow. Hilda's folks did the same thing but with more discretion. You'd be bleeding and didn't know why.

There was a real din the last time Paddy's family had a reunion and that was 30 years ago.

"It was a catastrophe lost in cacophony," Paddy told Hilda as he tried to recapture the ambience. Nevertheless, Paddy still saw his relatives at wakes. And the wakes were more frequent in recent years.

"Hilda, the odd thing is the angriest ones look the most peaceful in a casket with or without a boutonniere or corsage."

A few in his family, however, still hoped there would be one more family reunion despite the debacle at the last one. They hoped that Paddy's cousin, Margaret Mary O'Mara, who'd been going to Mass every day since puberty, and was once a contemplative nun, would hold a final family reunion.

"Everybody likes her corned beef and cabbage," Paddy told Hilda, who was wondering why anyone in Paddy's family would want another reunion after the last fracas 30 years ago.

"Hilda, the problem at the last one was Timmy served tankards of Guinness before, after and during the meal and the Guinness prompted inevitable arguments about the past. Liquor and grudges are a bad mix. One of my cousins knocked another one out with one punch. We were lucky another cousin didn't count him out. He was once a boxing referee."

Hilda's people, however, weren't like his loud Irish relatives. Paddy had to grant them that. They were somber Germans who drank as much as Paddy's people did but they were steady drinkers, not given to jokes and laughter. They were quiet even when drunk, so Paddy couldn't tell which one of them would rip the first scab off the past and that was always a problem.

He knew from the start Hilda's family didn't want her to marry him, an Irish Catholic from the wrong side of the theological tracks. He never fit in well with their German Lutheran culture beyond liking some of the food. They were serious, pious people not given to the frivolous, everything Paddy's family was not. In the beginning Paddy had tried to fit in but he had enough trouble keeping up with his own faith, never mind trying to understand everything Lutheran.

This time, however, Paddy silently decided he would go to his wife's reunion unless one of her kin died beforehand and everyone would go to the wake instead. It had happened before and could happen again but it's not the kind of thing Paddy would pray for. That would be bad form. Besides Germans take death seriously. None of the uproar and laughter that can occur at an Irish wake, especially if there were a tavern next door to the funeral home, which in Paddy's experience there always seemed to be.

Truth be told, both families were moving closer and closer to the end of their life span and the lines on both sides were getting shorter. Every year it seemed someone else would drop out.

"All right, Hilda, I'll go," Paddy announced. "But I'll never go to another one even if all your people die first."

Hilda thought something didn't sound right about that. Why would there be another family reunion if all of her relatives died first? But as long as Paddy was willing to go to this one, she thought she'd be wise to say nothing and leave well enough alone.

"How about a nice dish of pickled pigs feet for supper, Paddy," she said with a smile. "I remember that was one of the few things you liked when you went with me to the other family reunion. And you said the bratwurst and kraut weren't that bad, either."


- - -
Donal Mahoney lives in St. Louis, Missouri.
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Not My Own

Contributor: Robert Forehand

- -
The light blinds me. It always does.

I wait for the accompanying migraine to stop before I blink open my eyes.

Mattress. Pillow. A bed. I'm under the sheets.

I swing my unfamiliar legs out and to the floor.

Painted toenails touch the carpet fibers.

Shapely, shaved legs.

Wearing panties. Nothing else.

Breasts. I'm a woman this time.

I flex my thin fingers. Glossy, acrylic nails glint in the morning light slipping through the curtains. An evening dress lies crumpled on the floor.

I glance into the mirror upon the dresser. A beautiful stranger stares back at me. Lush, black hair. Captivating auburn eyes. She takes care of herself, this one. Not a bad looking body to wake up in.


A soft snore catches my attention.

A man lies next to me in bed. Sleeping.

Judging by his clothes lying scattered throughout the room, looks like these two had some personal relations last night.

I recognize who he is.

My next target.

Take in the scene.

Bed. Adjoining bathroom. Sink. Ice bucket. Landline phone. Desk. TV. Stock paintings on the wall. We're in a hotel room.

No weapons.

Sharp objects?

A pen?

No. I prefer to work with my hands.

Soft skin. No calluses. Prim and proper upkeep of the female variety. With these hands, I'm guessing this woman has no combat training. But that doesn't matter.

I do.

I slam my fist into the man's throat, closing his windpipe.

Most people try to choke their victims with their hands. It's far more effective to crush the esophagus in a single blow.

He wakes up in panicked confusion, unable to draw breath.

He stares at me with terrified eyes. Stares at the woman he bedded last night. His lover. Well, she's not here anymore. It's me. Your assassin.

He falls out of bed, attempting to find something, someone to help him. His balance, his foundation, fails.

A strike to the temple causes the entire building to crumble.

His shocked face buries itself into the carpet.

Blank eyes stare at nothing as his final breath is unable to leave his body.

I watch the man grow cold.

How many does this make now?

Hell if I know.

I can't even remember...

The woman in the mirror stares at me.

I wonder what her name is.

This process always leaves my mind scattered. Perhaps I've done this too many times. At least I remember my objective. For now.

I can only imagine the surprise and horror this woman will find when she wakes up. She'll tell the police that she blacked out. That she doesn't remember anything. And they won't believe her. They never do.

Though maybe she'll escape. Take her things, any evidence, run out the door. Try to forget what she doesn't remember. It doesn't matter. Not to me.

Time to go.

I can always tell by the migraine crescendo building up.

A thousand needles stabbing my eyes.

Sinuses ripping out of my skull with a sharp fishhook.

Tearing my consciousness out.

The device from another plane of existence forcing me to go somewhere else.

A new target.

I wonder who I'll kill next?

It doesn't matter.

The light blinds me. It always does.


- - -
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Eurydice

Contributor: Marc André McAllister

- -
I could not see her, though I knew she was near.
Come closer, I pleaded.
You will have to come for me, she answered.
You know I can’t. Please come to me.
She was silent.
Please. I need you now. I’m so empty.
I sensed her move closer. I felt her all around me. Her warmth without and within. Soothing me.
Is this what you wanted? She asked.
Yes. But you’re not real.
No, I am not.
And then she was gone.
I was alone again in the darkness.


- - -
Marc André McAllister is a French-American author currently living in Northern California where he is completing a B.A. in Philosophy. He relies largely the cross-cultural experiences of his youth as inspiration for his fiction. He keeps two blogs, one featuring artwork at lookingglassscene.blogspot.com, and another that deals with the ethics of Transhumanism at babelsingularity.blogspot.com (to be launched in September of 2014).
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