Short Beasts

They sprint up the dusty stairs.

Nestle their bodies into a damp bed where he strokes the mole on her left hip as she kisses his YOLO tattoo.

Soothing familiarity.

After twenty-seven years they love each other just as much as they love their spouses, but not more.

Not yet.

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Julia McNamara is a working-class writer and poet from the wilds of rural Cork in Southern Ireland. She received her MA in Creative Writing from the University of Limerick and is exceptionally skilled in the ancient Japanese art of Tsundoku.

Counting photos, I have three or four. First, a picture of sea stars, purple and glistening, then a field of flowers—both of which I’ve framed. Then, there’s the same family pose: just our heads, mine barely in view, my son and husband making faces, and they wonder why I never frame it or place it on my desk at work—why they’ve been replaced by sea stars and a lone flamingo at the zoo.

“Can we please try?” I beg, but the effort is just the same. Strangers have offered to take our pictures on vacation, but a stranger’s gaze will always be a stranger’s gaze: temporary generosity, the lighting off, a blurred line, my hair whipped into a frenzy, the stain I didn’t know was on my shirt.

But then, I’d heard that families were snapping photos on the ferry, timed just right with an orca pod, down the strait at around 8 a.m. on Sunday, so I booked a trip. Melvin, my husband, and Ross, my son, wander about, looking for tater tots or popcorn or both. The cabin fills with wayward coughs, and I’m regretting having done this. The price of the trip might cost us our health, but I wait, and hold my breath, while in between fits of coughs, a man tells his wife about a terrible creature—all scales and claws and the sharpest of teeth—and it lives here, in the strait, waiting to surface. And I wish he’d stop talking because it’s making him choke on phlegm, and I’m sure I’m breathing it in.

When the boat starts to round the bend, to where the strait comes into view, I find Melvin and Ross and push them onto the deck outside. There are a number of us, all lined up for photos, our backs against the rails, our camera phones pointed at our faces. We’re waiting for the first splash, the first orca breach, and I point my phone behind me, tilting my face just so, asking Melvin and Ross to really try this time.

I can hear the squeals and oohs and ahhs. The orcas are far off in the distance when I focus my camera, but in the foreground, I see something else. Something tall and scaly, with impossibly long arms and sharp nails, reaching just for Ross and Melvin, pulling them from the deck of the boat, just as I snap the picture.

But I’m still there, with them, in that final moment, and it’s far from perfect, but it’s the photo I frame and place on my desk to hold my family near once more.

---

Cecilia Kennedy is a writer who taught English and Spanish in Ohio for 20 years before moving to Washington state with her family. Since 2017, she has published stories in international literary magazines and anthologies. Her work has appeared in Bright Flash, Tiny Frights, Maudlin House, Tiny Molecules, Meadowlark Review, Vast Chasm Literary Magazine, Kandisha Press, Ghost Orchid Press, and others. Follow her on X @ckennedyhola or Insta: ceciliakennedy2349

1: “The heart can continue beating even when disconnected from the body.”
Our stepmother Angel’s scarlet fingernail hovers above the page as she reads to us. My sister and I, sleep-eyed and curious, watch her intently. Then, Angel snaps the book shut, gives a dramatic yawn, and drifts off to bed.

2: “Tomatoes contain lycopene, which is good for the heart.”
At the pizzeria, Dad orders a Neapolitan, makes a sad face with the tomato crescents, watches us eat. Later, we stop by the butchers for that nice jam. “Unbreak My Heart” comes on the radio and Betsy, the checkout lady with cinnamon curls, turns up the volume and winks at him. It’s the first time I’ve seen Dad smile since he and Angel separated.

3: “A man’s heart is bigger than a woman’s.”
I read this fact aloud to Angel as she cleans the bathroom.

“That’s clearly a lie,” she declares, rolling her eyes, says “you know the spider that lives behind our toilet? Well, your father’s heart is smaller than that spider’s tiniest eyelash.” She pauses, looking thoughtful. “You know Ash, when your Da left, he took my heart with him.”

“Spiders don’t have eyelashes,” I say, pulling my mouth to one side. She sighs, shaking her head.

4: “It’s possible to die of a broken heart.”
On the weekend, we weave daisy chains in the park and I whisper Angel’s secret to the dandelion puffs. Later at the butcher’s, Betsy hands Dad a plastic bag, leaning in close, her curls brushing his shoulder. Dad’s laugh is a windchime. I wonder if it’s the sound of his heart unbreaking. I try to imagine what Betsy would look like with a shaved head. Miles better, I decide.

5: “Most heart attacks happen on Mondays.”
On Tuesday evening, Dad visits. We race upstairs, stick our ears tight to the doorjamb. A scream—we tumble down the steps, fear dripping from our fingertips.

“Your father’s a comedian,” Angel says, smiling, tears like tiny crystal balls rolling down her cheeks. Dad winks, holding a beef heart wrapped in butcher paper. “Brought her heart back,” he jokes, giving Angel a playful nudge.

Later, I pull the book from under the pillow and in giant capital letters, add my most favorite fact of all: HEARTS ARE STRONGER TOGETHER. Me and my sister stick our fingers down our throats and make gagging noises before I slap a steaming cheese sticker next to the quote, sink back onto the bed, and grin like a fool.

---

Julia McNamara is a working-class writer and poet from the wilds of rural Cork in Southern Ireland. She received her MA in Creative Writing from the University of Limerick and is exceptionally skilled in the ancient Japanese art of Tsundoku.

Raindrops fall like knives, hitting the roof. It’s been coming down in sheets for days now, while Mom sobs and Dad tells her she didn’t need the job, anyway. It was just making her tired. Puddles in the yard separate me and my sister from the lake, and Dad says the last thing Mom needs is a muddy floor, so we don’t play in the puddles or go outside—and Dad says the lake’s no place to catch the lightning, when he sees us wrapping aluminum foil around a cardboard paper towel rod.

We tell him we’ll be quiet. We’ll leave our shoes by the door, but he hands us sheets of paper, and we draw the rain for hours, coming down in slants, making boxes out of horizontal lines: Mom in the kitchen, Dad with us on the other side of the house in the living room, the lightning splitting the difference, making a box of us all.

The rain slows down to something like pellets, and Mom is singing now, and the kitchen smells like it used to—with cinnamon and apples, and she says it’s pie-baking season—no matter what. A strong wind whips past me and Dad and Mom as we sit down to eat the pie, and something like drops seep into our box on the plane—but we all take a slice and call to my sister up in her room—to come down and join us. And when she doesn’t, we don’t seek her out because we don’t want to miss out, either—until the wind slams the door shut, and we realize it’s been open this entire time—and the aluminum foil rod my sister and I made is gone. But oh, the sky! Fingers of lightning likely plucked my sister up by her hair and placed her face-down on the lake, where we found her in the morning—after we’d left the dishes in the sink.

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Cecilia Kennedy is a writer who taught English and Spanish in Ohio for 20 years before moving to Washington state with her family. Since 2017, she has published stories in international literary magazines and anthologies. Her work has appeared in Bright Flash, Tiny Frights, Maudlin House, Tiny Molecules, Meadowlark Review, Vast Chasm Literary Magazine, Kandisha Press, Ghost Orchid Press, and others. Follow her on X @ckennedyhola or Insta: ceciliakennedy2349

My toes may have been hurting already when I stepped out of the taxi, but I do not remember. All my attention was away from my flower-patterned shoes. I was focused on the composure of my back, the regality of my neck, on faking a calm breathing so the porters at the Plaza did not notice my reverence, my choking anxiety, the deep canyon of ecstasy parting the chambers of my heart.

I pushed the revolving door with the talon of my hand wondering if, in a parallel curl of the infinite universe, Grace Kelly was doing the same. But I am sure that even in her most inelegant days, the laziest porter would have opened the lateral door for her and her halo of Chanel No 5. I stood stoically in the lobby, trying to guess the bar domains beyond the tall floral arrangement on the centered round table. I thanked my five-inch heels that allowed me to get a glance of the solemn stained-glass ceiling through hyacinths and oriental lilies without stretching my neck, while women with towering hairdos and men in grey suits performed their elegant parade toward the elevators or the reception counter.

I am sure my toes hurt, but how can I remember when my full attention was invested in keeping natural the cadence of my blue dress, on the syncopation of my tense calves on the chessboard tiles, and the torrent of blood breaking the dam of my chest as I discovered you at the end of the bar?

You were so irredeemably you at that moment, Henry, with your scotch in your left hand and your right fingers holding the invisible cigarette that you yearned for but was forbidden at the Plaza or any bar in New York. As you had warned me, the two older gentlemen were still there, laughing, having martini-infused fun at the prospect of so many millions and future afternoons of golf with you and the other partners once the deal was closed. I was petrified again because looking at you performing your best act has always cast on me the spell of Bluebeard. I become a statue of adoration against logic, will, or wisdom.

You raised your green eyes as if you knew I was standing there and extended your right arm in my direction. As my feet resumed their deliberate procession, I realized that you had not been holding an imaginary cigarette but a thread made of desire that you maneuvered slowly with expertise to bring me to your side. I started walking toward your small table as the two men admired me with the ancient regard of older kings who find themselves defeated in their own kingdoms by a younger knight that will eventually dethrone them.

I wasn’t ready to be invited to join the party or to accept the pink cocktail you ordered for me. The tickets I had bought for John Pizzarelli’s tribute to Gershwin at the Bemelmans Bar were crumpled between the foldable flats I had been able to stuff in my diminutive purse. My silenced plan had been to get drunk with you while listening to my favorite American composer, while the rabbits and giraffes drawn by the master witnessed our secret from the walls like the matrons of hidden fado restaurants had whispered about our affair in Lisbon.

“Gentlemen, you will have to forgive us, but I promised my foreign friend here to take her to a famous New York spot. Is kind of time, isn’t it, Andréia?”

I looked at the clock above the bar, we had only twenty minutes to be punctual, but they shrunk speedily into fifteen and twelve after so many handshakes, remarks, and a subtle magic pass of a corporate credit card.

I followed you in a daze of gin and frustration. I did not want to be late to a show that had cost me half the monthly salary of my grandmother at the Castelo. You held my waist and pulled my body to yours while we squeezed into the same section of the revolving door. You grabbed my hand so I could go down the stairs without falling.

“We don’t have time to find a taxi that can turn North in this mess. We need to run. Ready? It will be fun!”

I looked at you with incredulous eyes. I am not sure if I closed them during the seventeen and a half blocks we just ran, holding hands, passing awnings and poodles and puddles, piercing the eclectic smells of mulch and wet stones from the Park and the stale waters of hotdog carts. We turned East overlooking the French Embassy building where the day before I had bought five books under the fake constellations of a magical bookstore, where I elevated to the painted stars my monotonous wish about you, me, and both of us.

Later that night, the tips of my toes throbbing at the rhythm of your oblivious snoring, I tried to understand why I never stopped you so I could put on my flats before our demented race. Perhaps it was the price I would have to pay for all the fun of the evening. Because you know, Henry, even good people had to pay an obol to Charon if they wanted to have a peaceful afterlife. I paid with an open heart for your genuine smile, for your fingers around mine, and for your jokes about being surrounded by childish cartoons in a hotel where clandestine love stories are replicated every night. I paid with honor because we punctually crossed the door of the Carlyle Hotel with elegance and without breath. I would give those three toenails to the Charon of happiness again, one thousand times, seventeen blocks of running by your hand multiplied by all the notes that Gershwin ever wrote.

---

Fabiana Elisa Martínez was born in Buenos Aires and has a degree in Linguistics and World Literature. She is a linguist, a language teacher, and a writer. She authored the short story collections 12 Random Words and Conquered by Fog, the short story Stupidity, and Spanish 360 with Fabiana. Other stories of hers have been published in five continents in publications like Rigorous Magazine, Ponder Review, Rhodora Magazine (India), Writers and Readers Magazine (UK), Libretto Magazine (Nigeria), Automatic Pilot (Ireland), Lusitania (Buenos Aires), Egophobia Journal (Romania), Defunkt Magazine, the anthology Writers of Tomorrow, and the Manawaker Flash Fiction Podcast. Website: 12randomwords.com • Insta: @Fabielisam

She saw him almost every night. Not just him, of course, she watched all of the cast. She also had to keep an eye on the audience and blink her torch at people talking or on their phone. Sometimes she had to tell someone to stop singing along. That was the worst.

But she saw him, knew all his scenes, his lines, each turn, each smile. It was easy when the stage lights flooded his every movement and they were so big and exaggerated that even the people in the cheap seats could see them.

The first couple of times, she hadn’t seen him at all. It had been seamless but after a few more times, she knew what to look for – the little head nod he gave himself before he walked through the audience to make his grand entrance, the beginning of an exhale as the curtain fell on the first act, that last smile after the cast all bowed.

He was handsome as all leading men are but that wasn’t the reason her eyes found him when they should have been focused on the audience.

He just seemed so there, like a rush of sunlight in the dark theatre.

Being on stage would be her worst nightmare but for him it was clearly a dream come true. She could feel his elation even as he sang a mournful ballad to the leading lady.

She didn’t have a dream. She’d read an article about how finding a purpose in life was still part of a capitalist need to be productive. The article had then gone on to talk about a tribe who believed people were like flowers – placed on earth to grow and bloom and be beautiful for the short time they had.

She liked that.

She didn’t know what flower she was but she knew what flower he was. Definitely a sunflower, big and bright and happiest in the light.

His movements and voice never wavered. No slumping or lazy twirls. He was a professional after all but she wondered what he would do after the run ended or his contract was up for renewal. Would he renew it or do something different?

Perhaps something angsty and bombastic like Phantom? She could see him leading an ingénue into his candlelit lair as the guitar solo peaked.

She would have to see whichever production he did next. Work gave her discounted tickets – maybe she could splash out for the great seats. Maybe she would make a night of it – dress up, treat herself to dinner at that bistro round the corner from her flat and then slip into the velvet seat.

She’d get to focus on him then, no having to make sure the audience behaved.

Maybe she’d order ice cream at the interval.

Despite being terrified of setting foot on stage, she loved the theatre. Especially this one with its columns, plaster flowers and flourishes on the walls and ceilings. She loved the deep red carpet. This theatre was from a bygone era of glamour and indulgence and by working here, she could press her nose up against the glass every night except for Mondays.

Her left hand held the little torch and her right hand smoothed the front of her black and white uniform. She loved the ushers’ uniform, it went well with her goth sensibilities.

Most nights she pulled her dark hair into a severe french braid but this evening it hadn’t dried in time so she had clipped some of it back. It slipped like a heavy curtain down her back and she had to keep tucking a piece behind her ear because she’d lost a bobby pin somewhere between the middle of act one and the interval.

The performance was coming to an end now and her favourite bit was coming up.

She didn’t know exactly why she liked the bowing so much.

Perhaps it was seeing the happy relief on the actors’ faces, their exhales because they were out of breath and grateful there hadn’t been any noticeable slip ups.

They looked so pleased and she wondered if it was because of this feeling that they did this, that they loved it so much. Perhaps it was addictive, perhaps it was a need.

Whatever was going on in their lives, whatever person they became when the curtains closed, this moment, standing on stage, listening to the claps and the whoops – this was all theirs.

That accomplishment couldn’t be taken away. It was the truest moment in the whole thing.

She watched him take a bow and shake his head, smiling, as if he couldn’t believe it.

She smiled for him.

He would never see it but that was fine – perfect, even.

She hoped he knew the joy he brought people, the joy he brought her. Seeing him be so happy was the highlight of her day. It was vicarious and possibly tragic.

She didn’t think she was capable of feeling intense happiness – it wasn’t sad to her though because she also wasn’t capable of feeling intense despair.

She thought about that sometimes. If he felt this beatific high every night he performed, were his lows just as visceral and burning? She hoped not.

But she would never know. She had never spoken to him. There was nothing she could say.

She couldn’t tell him he was doing a great job because that felt redundant and words couldn’t describe how she felt seeing him on stage – well, no words that could comfortably fit into a quick exchange and did not make her sound like a creep.

So she was content to just watch him. Getting to see him do what he loved was enough, she didn’t need anything else.

---

Esha Khimji is a new writer living in Scotland. She graduated from the University of Glasgow with a degree in Economic and Social History. She currently works a 9-5 and writes to stay sane.

There is a cat in the doorway.

She stares at you. You stare back. Neither of you move.

#

She maintains eye contact with you and blinks slowly.

Cats are said to be majestic beasts. Royalty, even. Goddess Freya led a chariot of cats into battle. Ship-cats brought good luck to a voyage. Your moms talked about a cat who would sleep at the foot of people’s beds before they died. Intelligent, graceful, light on their feet, fierce hunters.

Just yesterday, you watched this cat walk into the leg of a dresser. Then again. Then a third time until she finally changed her trajectory a little to the left.

Whoever said royalty had to be smart?

#

Her tail flicks against the ground.

Throughout your whole life, tail wags meant friendship, but you learned fast that cat lingo is unnatural. Maybe she’s happy to see you and will let you pass. Or perhaps she’ll slap you in the face. Or hunt your long, fluffy tail. Her favorite game.

Through the silence you can practically hear the wind whistling through the space between her small, pointed ears.

#

Your moms named her Calliope, like the muse of epic poetry, mother to the tragic and foolish Orpheus. Like this small idiot could write poetry.

You decided Goblin is more fitting. You’ve seen firsthand how she shambles off like a creature of the night having seen light for the first time in centuries. You’ve heard the weird uncatlike noises, the quAEEEEee, like some demonic, nasally duck on cocaine. You’ve heard the thunk of her jumping (falling) off tables, chairs, beds, sofas.

You remember the dumb look on her tiny little face when she sniffed your butt. Her dumb, tiny, little jaw dropped, the little pink spots on her philtrum making her pig-like, her eyes almost completely green with mere lines for pupils. Like she’d been stunned or stoned, or maybe both. Your sophisticated friends never made faces like that. They showed proper etiquette. The appropriate snort, the correct tail wag, the respectful reciprocal butt sniff.

She is a goblin trapped in the small, patchy colored body of a gravity-philic cat.

#

You shift your weight on your feet. Your joints feel stiff. The buffoon doesn’t care. She’s now cleaning her face, taunting you.

Your prize is in sight. Your favorite bed. Your moms’ bed. It smells like comfort and family and home. Nap number four always takes place on this bed.

The couch behind you and your floor bed are available, but those are for naps one and six respectively. Your moms are not home to intervene, and based on their fading smell, they won’t be home for at least another two naps. By that point you’ll be starving, waiting for one of your favorite meals of the day (dinner, not to be mistaken for your other favorite meal of the day— breakfast).

If you were someone else, you could break the routine, sleep on the couch another time. But you’re not.

The routine must be maintained.

#

You take a step forward.

The beast stops cleaning mid-swipe to her face. Her marble eyes focus on you again, waiting for your next move.

You remember when you visited your grandpa’s forest. He and your moms sat out on the back porch, drinking something vile-smelling and laughing. You made eye contact with a lone deer in the woods. To you, it looked like a mutant hoofed dog, unnatural and bony and way too large. You let out a low rumble in your chest, testing a warning to the monster. Your muscles were tight with potential energy, waiting to burst into speed after it. It had been so much larger than you, and yet frightened of you.

Just like you and this tiny moron in front of you.

#

You take another step, and her speckled paw returns to the ground. Her tail flicks pick up speed. Other than these subtle changes, the rest of her body is as relaxed as before. You are not a threat to her. She rules every inch of this house.

Royalty. Stupid royalty.

Royalty has a throne, and this weirdo’s throne is the bare lap of whichever mom is on the toilet. Or observing them shower between the curtains. You know they also find it weird, but have grown accustomed to it. You know she’s just asserting her place in the family when she watches you from their lap.

You find yourself relaxing backwards.

#

There is a cat in the doorway.

She stares at you. You stare back. Today could be the day your routine changes.

---

K. A. Sweitzer is a queer fiction writer living in NYC with her partner, her smart, anxious dog, and her dumb, confident cat. When she’s not writing, she’s spouting bird facts at her critique group, playing ttrpgs, and trying to find the next best chocolate chip cookie in her neighborhood.

It’s amazing the amount of drivel that fills a TV screen after 1 a.m. Stephanie thought to herself as she pumped the channel button on her remote and watched a series of dismal choices roll by. This was no trivial matter. She had always had a problematic relationship with night time silences, and so finding the right distraction was essential. Several decades earlier, she could overcome the night through the strains of New York City’s last great progressive rock station. She spent so much time listening to one overnight DJ that the two of them used to exchange Christmas cards. Somewhere along the line though, the radio lost its magical nocturnal powers. The rock station went Top 40. The sports talk station that replaced it on her playlist was a constant reminder of the failings of the only sports team she really cared about. Eventually, she had abandoned the radio and returned to finding nocturnal solace the way she had when her anxieties were fewer and her life experience shorter— late night television.

Of course, tonight was different. On this rarest of nights, she was seeking a way to stay awake rather than to fall asleep. She had a task to fulfill and time was running out. An unmet challenge, evinced by a mostly empty page on her laptop, had been mocking her for the past four days. So far, all she had been able to produce was a total of six words. “What can one say about Will?” With only hours to go before she was scheduled to speak at his memorial service, she still had no idea how to answer her own question.

Once upon a time, the challenge would have been to tame the torrent of words she could say about Will. Over the course of about 15 years, he had played so many roles in her life, including three years as her lover. When they separated, for reasons she now refuses to recall, it wasn’t rancor that created a chasm. It was just the humdrum shifting of priorities that occur when people part.  For the past decade or so, their relationship consisted of vague exchanges on social media that were replete with promises to “get together one day.” Though Stephanie had gradually acknowledged that “one day” was never coming, it seems Will never made that deduction. The fact that he had requested she speak at any memorial that might be held after his passing confirmed that. Now she grieved mostly because, once Will was erased, any incarnation of “one day” had been erased as well. How could their priorities have gotten so out of sync?

Stephanie hit the television remote another time. She was seeking not just adrenaline, but also a way to stave off the toxic bile of regret rising within her. Yet, it seemed late night TVs ability to be a soothing voice in the darkness had also gone the way of the pet rock and Tab. As a teen, she could tune into the black and white films screened on “The Late Late Show,” a program that featured a signature opening graphic of lights going off within an apartment building. She smiled briefly in the knowledge that, just like in that graphic, hers might be the only light still on in the spare brick building where she lived.  It’s like she managed to take refuge in the fleeting image of that building. However, “The Late Late Show” had also left her and now she was truly alone in the dark.

Click. Would listening to NY1 discuss the Met Gala help her get this task done? Probably not. Before red carpet shows became television staples, she and Will did enjoy poking fun at some of the more outlandish fashion looks at awards shows, particularly those worn by celebrities whose fame we couldn’t fathom. But, as much as she loved Will’s acerbic wit at moments like those, this was not the side of him she wanted to share. 

Getting up to stretch her legs, Liz stopped to look out the window. The thickest part of the night was upon the city, a time when fears often melded with dreams, and the darkness could be warm and inviting to nocturnal creatures like herself…and Will. Before their shifting relationship navigated them into the same bed, they would often chat on the phone in the wee morning hours, usually about which rerun of the Mary Tyler Moore show was on that night, or what interesting observation Tom Snyder had just made on the “Tomorrow” show. Their standard closing words to each other at the end of these calls were “Turn off the set.” Those words acknowledged more than the powering down of a mechanical device. It mourned the sad temporary break of the connection between them, thus making the phrase resonate more than “I love you” ever could.

Now, remembering those words in Will’s warm baritone sparked the direction she had been seeking. With a final click on the remote, the set went blank. The silence of the night she usually worked so hard to avoid suddenly hummed with memories of Will and the ticking clock beat of the old “Late Late Show” theme song. “What can one say about Will?” might be too broad a question to answer, but she could share who Will was at 1 a.m. on a random morning. And it made her miss him just a little bit less.

---

Lois Anne DeLong is a freelance writer living in Queens, New York, and is an active member of Woodside Writers, a literary forum that meets weekly. Her stories have appeared in Dear Booze and DarkWinter Literary Journal. In her free time, DeLong enjoys going to the theatre, singing show tunes in piano bars, and suffering along with her beloved New York Mets.

Kristina removed the letter from her apron pocket and gingerly unfolded it. She had read its contents often enough that the paper was already starting to fray at the edges. If she closed her eyes, she could see the words in front of her. But, they were still like so many snowflakes melting on contact.

She shook her head as if to dislodge whatever was affecting her usually sharp perceptions. Her education to this point had been less than formal, but it had enabled her to sniff out the liminal spaces between what is said and what is meant. She had learned these lessons while eking out a living in this guesthouse, where the owner was happy to turn a blind eye to her age in exchange for untold hours of cheap labor. Till now, it was an exchange Kristina had been happy to make. Yet, she feared the heightened sense of what is not said that she learned within these walls had somewhat dulled her responses to plain words. Or, perhaps she was just too invested in the impact to her life the letter’s text could make possible to let herself comprehend its meaning. Too much was at stake, so she needed to find a more visceral way to connect with the significant sentiments on the page.

Tentatively, she placed a finger on the greeting. “Dear Kristina” meant this letter was for her, so she continued to trace words, like a sightless person reading braille.

“We are happy to welcome you to our freshman class,” it read. “Happy” and “Welcome.” These are words of greeting and good cheer, she thought to herself. So far, so good. “Freshman class?” She searched the internal dictionary she had painstakingly created by spending countless hours in the tiny library of her tiny town. After a few seconds of somewhat strained focus, the definition came to mind. “Freshman: a first-year student.” Or, she quietly acknowledged, a student at the beginning of her education.

Downstairs, she heard the kitchen crew cleaning up breakfast. She was due to change the bedding on the third floor and knew she shouldn’t be lingering. Yet, as the light through the window temporarily illuminated the darkened hallway, she felt the need to stay right where she was for just one more minute.

The snowflakes melted away with the morning sun. “Welcome,” she said out loud to no one. The beds could wait. She was expected elsewhere.

---

Lois Anne DeLong is a freelance writer living in Queens, New York, and is an active member of Woodside Writers, a literary forum that meets weekly. Her stories have appeared in Dear Booze and DarkWinter Literary Journal. In her free time, DeLong enjoys going to the theatre, singing show tunes in piano bars, and suffering along with her beloved New York Mets.

She patiently lies on a blanket of marble. Her shot mother’s face on a bodiless skin splayed out on the floor beside her.

Still as the other exhibits which adorn the room. Extensions of a two-legged ego.

Her motionless tail pretends:
I have forgotten who I am.

Her silent lips reassure:
You are my father. You are my master.

As a chunk of death is tossed her way the metal arm that holds her chain wriggles like blades of grass in the wind. An emerald paradise that for two tiny months had belonged to her. She knew it never would again. Self-emancipation always had a cost, and the world had so many guns, and so many people who were yearning to use them.

But she would rather die as a tiger, than as his plaything―and leaping above into a higher air, she makes a first and final kill.

---

Amy Akiko is an educator, artist and writer from South London. Her writing predominately gravitates towards the themes of nature, love and (all too often) heartache, and has appeared in East of the Web, Litbreak, The Tiger Moth Review, Cosmic Daffodil, Isele Magazine and elsewhere.

He watched the train come into the station, little flashes of blue electricity snapping on the overhead wires as it hissed to a stop. He waited for passengers to get off before he swung himself up the step and entered the car. It was early evening and he was tired, it had been a long day already. He shook his wet coat in the aisle before selecting a seat, then tucked it in the overhead slot and sat next to the window. He looked at the station lights, deep haloed orange, until they passed into the outskirts of town, under a bridge picking up speed and then the last houses gave way to fields and neat parcels of forest. Rain was streaking across the window, shivers of wet trails that pooled, then formed little rivers at the edge of the glass.

He stretched his legs before opening the newspaper and placing it on his lap. The paper he had no intention of reading, preferring instead to stare unfocused on the passing landscape, one he knew well.

A woman slid into the seat next to him. She was breathing hard and seemed anxious.

“You don’t mind, do you? There is a man back there and he has been bothering me. He frightened me.” The man turned to look behind him, but the woman grabbed his chin and and directed him to look at her.

“Don’t look back, please. Just pretend we are a couple. Lovers on the evening train.” She smiled, then looked out the window.

He couldn’t help but notice that the woman was quite beautiful, her long brown hair framed her face in such a way that it reminded him of a living portrait. He sat back and tried to relax but found himself folding and unfolding the newspaper on his lap.

“I’m Claire. I’m sorry to barge in on you. I know how nice it is to get two open seats.” She laughed and he saw her eyes brighten. She looked even more attractive when she smiled.

They talked for a while, a pleasant rambling conversation. He was surprised to hear himself telling her stories from his childhood. He rarely talked about anything personal. She closed her eyes, the steady rhythmic motion of the train seemed to make her drowsy. Her head moved to his shoulder and her arm fell to his leg. She smelled wonderful and he sat still, not wanting to disturb her rest. What he really wanted was to wrap her up in a hug, but he was not that sort of man.

The train slowed as they entered Banford station. The change of movement woke her and she reached across him, her hand pushing against his chest until she rose to a sitting position. She yawned and looked into his eyes before standing up.

“This is me. Again, thank you for helping. You are a true gentleman.” She kissed him quickly on his cheek and rose to leave. He watched her walk to the door then saw her standing on the platform. She waved to him and blew him a kiss, then turned and went into the station house. He turned his attention back to the paper on his lap. The last passengers wandered down the aisle to choose seats and the train lurched as it pulled out of the station. He rolled his wrist to check the time on his watch, but his watch was gone. Then he felt in his pockets for his cell phone and wallet. Everything was gone. He pictured the woman who sat beside him before reaching into his boot for his other phone.

“Mills here. Can you patch me through to the duty sergeant?” While he waited for his call to go through, he wondered how the woman would react when she opened the wallet and found the neat stack of cut paper bingo forms.

“Hey Gerald. She got off at Banford station. Five foot ten, long brown hair, attractive. She has my cell so you can trace that. Cheers. I’ll circle back.”

He leaned back and watched the streets flash by, car lights splintered by the rain.

---

Christopher Porter used to travel the world shooting films until M.S. robbed him of most of his mobility. He now lives next to the Atlantic ocean and writes stories. His first novel won the Arthur Engle award and he is almost finished editing his next. Learn more on his site.

B,

I’ve been thinking about this a lot. Do you remember that night on the retreat, where we stayed up late sitting out on the porch? The kids were all asleep. Do you remember how everything felt alright for a while?

The stars were out. It was the first time I had seen them since I moved to the city. We had only known each other for like three weeks.

I’ve been thinking about everything that came after. Making love in your room under the glow of your Christmas lights. How you cried and I held you until you stopped shaking. Our argument in the park, and how I apologized and how it wasn’t enough. How all around us were people enjoying themselves, skating and playing volleyball, happy.

But on that night, we were close. We were in it together. You put your chin on my shoulder and cried because the day had been so hard and we hadn’t had time to breathe. And you hugged me and it was like we were one for a moment, like there was barely anything separating us, just a thin wall, just our skin. And the night was just starting to get cool but it wasn’t cold. And we watched the flashlights going by on the path, so dim that we weren’t sure if they were real. They could have been kids sneaking out, or nightwatchmen, or ghosts. And we worried that someone would see us with my arm around you and we would have to hide.

So much has happened since then. And sometimes I feel this blackness inside me. Like the winter night is sapping all the heat from my body and making me shiver and shiver and be unable to stop. Has so much time really passed? Has the summer really ended? And it makes me wonder if the night will end.

I wrote a poem that I never finished, and the first line was “I know that I’m in love because I’m afraid.” And I thought then, love is stronger than fear. Love will overcome fear. It has to. And I kissed you as the cold was coming in.

---

Ed King is a writer based in Colorado. His stories can be found in the Colorado’s Emerging Writers series, Synchronized Chaos, and Cultured Vultures; his plays have been performed in China, and his storytelling has been featured on KUNC. He wants to write stories that broaden the possibilities for joy in life. He is sometimes successful.

The sugar glider took a few halting steps in the box, trampling a typed note. The few people Ronald knew wouldn’t leave an animal on his doorstep. Perplexed, he picked up the sheet of paper.

“He was too much work for us. The exotics shelter was full. We know you’re a trustworthy person.”

Though the note was unsigned, this moment seemed to bulge with fate. Ronald had never had a pet before, much less a sort he’d only seen in pictures — never thought he could justify one, the work, the expense, mostly the downright self-indulgence of demanding something love him. But now the responsibility had been given him, and he would care for the wide-eyed little creature wholly. He cupped tender hands around the sugar glider.

It lifted too easily. Ronald turned over the hollow animal. There was a battery compartment. He dropped the lifeless thing.

Two teenagers giggled. Ronald glimpsed too late the camera of their mobile phone lowering, and the youths darted down the street, laughing at their prank.

So quickly had a space within him been created, filled, and emptied! He ran after the teens, though whether he caught them or not, he didn’t know what he would do.

---

Kimberly Y. Choi often writes speculative fiction, but not this time. Her writing of late tends towards themes of mental health. She lives in the United States.

Homage to “Gas” by Edward Hopper

Today we should think of what a dented orange gasoline can would look like somewhere on a road in New England.

It is sometime in the 1940s and it is Halloween and there is a blue and white gas pump at the filling station where the can sits next to a yellow wooden rest room.

It is Halloween night on a country road and the office window is open and there are soft waves of big band music coming out of the large brown radio next to the red cash register.

We should recognize the thundering paper as cavernous empty old shopping bags.

Five children have already cried Trick or Treat!

The manager smilingly dumps heavy clusters of candy into each child’s bag, echoing the kettle drum from the jazz orchestra while his helper augments the effect by giving the empty gasoline can several rhythmic taps.

The brightly lit office is a gigantic geometrical owl and the children follow their father’s flashlight as it slices up the breezy black road.

---

Peter J. Dellolio was born in 1956 in New York City. Nazareth High School and New York University. Graduated 1978: BA Cinema Studies; BFA Film Production. Poetry, prose-poems, fiction, short plays, art work, and critical essays published in over 100 literary magazines, journals, and anthologies. Poetry collections “A Box Of Crazy Toys” published 2018 by Xenos Books/Chelsea Editions; “Bloodstream Is An Illusion Of Rubies Counting Fireplaces” published February 2023 and “Roller Coasters Made Of Dream Space” published November 2023 by Cyberwit/Rochak Publishing. His novella “The Vigil” by Type 18 Books and his novel “The Confession” by Cyberwit/Rochak have been recently released.

It happens in a flash, a blip on the screen of life. The first day the numbness wraps itself around your chest, compressing until the last gasp of air escapes from your lungs. Rational reasoning does not quell the loneliness, and your memory tumbles backward to deter the coming of tomorrow, to protect against the present, to preserve the past, so the truth does not consume you, never to listen to the words of encouragement, endearment, or the flippant teasing of your weaknesses which brought a smile on a sullen day.

You attempt sleep, but the sadness evaded for the moment slams you in the face with its cold, hard fist and you cry out, even with the knowledge that this time comes for everyone. Celebrate the life, you tell yourself, a life filled with hardships but outweighed by the joy of being surrounded by love.

The light of a brand-new day welcomes you, reminding you the invitation does not extend to everyone. You struggle through the kind but meaningless words of those who knew him superficially, or not at all, and the intimate reminisces of those he held close. Some may know a darker side of him, shades of gray which you may have witnessed, a side he did not share with you, a side you convinced yourself did not exist.

You refuse to wear black, which represents the Reaper’s hand and the color of his work. Tomorrow, all physical connections end, and you have no preference what form his remains take. It is not your choice.

As the sun rises and greets you, this final farewell crushes you and erases the last vestige of the brave front you put forward. You march behind the vessel, but he is already on the other side. His presence engulfs you, and you swear an oath to hold tight, to imagine the expression he would make at an utterance of folly that you are capable of committing.

They ask you to say a few words, an anecdote, a tribute, but you possess neither the strength nor desire to deliver words that hold meaning only to you. Today the sky is clear except for a white streak splashing across the blue canvas. It disappears into the heavens. Your feet sink into the soft earth and your legs cannot support the weakness of your heart, as your swollen eyes cower behind dark glasses, your throat parched, your lips quivering, and you want to let the ground swallow you as well.
You release the red rose into the abyss. A snippet of wind brushes your back, and you smile against your tears, a gentle hand encouraging you to continue the rest of your journey.

---

Greetings. Laurence Williams writes after many years in the Bronx court system. His work appears in the First Line Literary Journal, Read650 Magazine, Sunspot Literary Journal, and Two Hawks Quarterly Magazine. He is a member of the Hudson Valley Writers Center and the Gryphons Writers Group. Born and raised in the Bronx, he resides in the Hudson Valley with his wife Claudia and their cat Charlie. X: @Williams1Lau

As I walk down the alley, torn tights under my umbrella, I ponder how I look to passersby on the street.

Split-second decisions are the best decisions.

I suppose, even if only best in the moment. But each moment is all we have.

The street juts out from the crumbling alley. Streetcars pass alongside me like ghost ships through heavy fog. The same fog fills my brain. I try to clear it, lay a hand on something concrete, something simple and true. Something logical. I need truth, one truth. But there are too many.

Addiction. Those afflicted with what they once began and now regret. Billowy drug addicts. Philandering men and women out in the nightclubs, when it’s dark enough to hide themselves between streetlights. Those who are so burdened with a mind of strong idealism they can’t let go of what they hoped was real.

Yes, I was addicted.

A memory, unwanted. From the party.

“Do you drink a lot?”

I hesitate before I answer. “These days, yes.”

“You shouldn’t drink. It’s not good for your health.” He pulls the long roach out from between his lips and twirls it around his finger.

What’s the word?

Hypocrite.

I have never met someone so conflicted.

He smiles. It’s the regretful smile of one who has lost hope in ever returning to the way things used to be. I’ve seen enough people like that. I was on the road straight for it, if not already there.

“I tried to quit last week,” he says, his voice soft as butter.

But he didn’t need to speak this. I could see inside him as if there was no wall. As if he didn’t build it up—year after year, using hand after blistered hand—growing taller with every injury-inducing, painful blow. Oh yes, how I knew that all too well.

Tonight, his walls were molten lava, cascading down before him—scalding but endearing. And I was attracted.

I could see every little bit that he tried to hide. And I loved it.

“I’ve heard that split-second decisions are the best decisions,” he says. But he doesn’t move. I don’t move.

We read each other silently. I know he won’t do anything, won’t try anything. No, it’s too early for that.

I know him, though I have only just met him. Even before he ever glanced in my direction, I knew him.

I knew how he saw things, how he idealized, and what he had been through. We are both people that will never be happy being happy. He knows as well as I do what is to become of this if we start.

But no matter how many times we make the same mistake (or call it what you like), no matter how much we learn from it and know what we aren’t supposed to do, we will still do it.

And we do it.

The sky brightens slowly, an eternity, as I flatten my skirt down to sit on the edge of the bus stop bench. It’s too cold for a skirt. A seemingly endless winter is approaching. And there is something beautiful about it all.

Addiction. It’s in the things you keep coming back to, despite knowing better. It’s the cigarettes you can’t quit, the numbing feeling of a hit you can’t seem to shake. It’s going through the motions. The tossing turning turmoil of up and down emotions. The highs and lows, the pick-you-ups, and the deep steep drops. The feeling in the beginning, of hope and perfection. The feeling in the end, of hopelessness and desperation. Albert Einstein said, insanity is doing the same things over and expecting different results.

It appears our sanity has depleted. But did I expect different results?

I watch the bus drive off.

Split-second decisions are the best decisions.

I step onto the wet side street and into the sunrise. Toward his place.

---

Robin Nemesszeghy enjoys weaving fantastical elements into realistic settings and exploring the complexities of the human mind. Living a stone’s throw away from a quiet wooded cemetery and park, when she’s not writing you can often find her wandering the area and dreaming up her next big adventure. Read more about her journey.

This would be a good time to wake up, I think, realising that Síofra’s blue Fiesta has vanished from where she had parked it less than two hours before. But I’m sure I saw it less than five minutes ago when I carried the harpist instrument to her van. I’d felt obliged to help after she’d woven a sublime backdrop to the reading which had brought us to Dublin in the first place.

Thanks to Síofra, the poet had addressed our writers’ group a few weeks before and had then invited us to the Dublin launch of her new collection. We are a motley collection, mostly female, ranging from two girls in their twenties to a pair of spritely eighty-something-year-old sisters. I am one of only three males in the group, but the other two are rarely seen and, even then, only as a couple. Our present incarnation has been running for about eighteen months, but some of our members had been writing long before Síofra’s arrival in our midst.

I’m not the only one who fancies Síofra. She is our anchor and hasn’t only brought vibrancy to our little group but is already fine tuning our first collaborative of poetry and prose. After the poet’s invitation, the excitement in the pub was infectious. Everybody was going to Dublin and, had the launch been on the following evening, we would have booked and paid for a coach right there and then. As days went by, however, the numbers began to dwindle, until only Síofra and I remained. All thoughts of a coach forgotten, Síofra offered to drive to the city and, as my wife was away visiting with her parents, suggested that we stay for the post-launch drinks party and then overnight at her sister’s city centre apartment.

A figure hovers in the mouth of the alley, furtively glancing right and left, its hands apparently hidden in the pouch of a dark hoodie. At a distance of some fifty metres, it’s impossible to tell whether the person is male or female, young or old, friend or foe. I feel the hairs stiffen at the back of my neck. I’m not familiar with this part of the city. If I were to turn and walk in the opposite direction, would I emerge into a well-lit thoroughfare and find safety in the anonymity of strangers, or end up trapped in a totally blind alley? Waving her thanks, the harpist had driven back in the direction from which we had come, over the exact spot where the figure now loiters. The sound of barking dogs comes from somewhere behind me: large dogs. Is this my reward for assisting the harpist, or my punishment for harbouring hopes of sharing Síofra’s bed in her absent sister’s apartment?

The shadowy figure approaches; a street light reflects evilly from something clutched in the slender hand. I know it’s not a gun; neither do I think that it’s a knife. Could it be an ice pick? I’ve only ever seen ice picks in American movies, but whatever it is; it’s getting nearer – and fast. I glimpse a flash of face beneath the hood. It’s a young face, fresh – a teenager? My confidence surges.

I move forward, my laptop bag held like a shield before me. Why is the bag so light; what has become of my laptop? I can see the weapon more clearly now. It looks like a wire coat hanger, wound around the wrist; a six inch spike clasped between thumb and forefinger. I feint with my bag, and then feel the weight of the power pack in the pocket. I rip the Velcro open, pull out the apparatus and swing the heavy adaptor towards the head of my nemesis. I miss, but the evasive action causes the hood to slip back, baring the aggressor’s head. Watching her golden curls flow free of their restraint, I gasp Síofra’s name. Landing with a thump on my bedroom floor, I decide it might be for the best if Síofra were to attend the Dublin launch on her own.

---

From Listowel, Ireland, Neil Brosnan’s first publication was in 2004. Since then, almost 100 of his stories have appeared in print and digital anthologies and magazines in Ireland, Britain, Europe, Australia, India, USA, South America, and Canada. A Pushcart nominee, he is a winner of The Bryan MacMahon, The Maurice Walsh, (five times) and The Ireland’s Own, (twice) short story awards. He has published two short story collections: ‘Fresh Water & other stories’ (Original Writing, 2010) and ‘Neap Tide & other stories’ (New Binary Press, 2013).

It was my turn to count the money. Usually between one and two million on any given day.

Jane: don’t mess it up.

I never do. The ten key calculator was like an extension of my arm. I had a little wooden desk inside the vault, which felt closed in. Bags of money on the floor, coins, bills, everything. It all had to be verified. It took most of the day.

Jane: has to be done by four so I can get home to the kids!

We got an hour lunch and I took every minute. The taco spot was only a short drive and my friend Jenny worked there, but I didn’t like to talk to her wile she was working and I was in my dress up clothes for the bank. It felt odd. Like I was making fun of her or something.

Her car was there, and she usually worked at the counter, so I went through the drive through and sat in the parking lot eating in my car and I see Jenny coming out and walking towards the car. I roll down the window, summer air enters, humid.

Jenny: what the hell?
Just eating lunch.
Jenny: if you came inside I’d give you free nachos.

She brought the nachos and cheese over and sat with me in a booth. The air conditioning was cold. She was on her break.

Her: I’m so tired of this stuff, I usually bring a salad.
Me: sometimes I go eat at my grandma’s.
Her: why didn’t you come in?
Me: I feel weird in my shirt and tie.
Her: You know I make more per hour than you do right?

The nachos were hot, salty, crunchy, the cheese tasted of nothing mixed with fat globules. It was very orange.

I’m thinking about dropping out.
Me: Oh yeah?
I’m eighteen. I can right? The manager here said I could transfer.
Me: that sounds good.
Mom said she don’t care. Just do what you want. It’s your life.

My hour was almost up and I knew I had to get back to the vault to finish counting the money so that Jane could get home on time.

I’ve got to get going.
Jenny: yeah, sure…sure. Want a refill?

She brought me a refill of soda and she kissed my cheek.

Just in case I don’t see you again.

---

Jesse Dart is a writer and photographer living out west. Influenced by his studies in anthropology, he is attracted to ideas about adventure, travel, society, and culture. His work has been featured in Monocle, The Guardian, Roads & Kingdoms, The Art of Eating, Vice, and Whalebone. He publishes short stories and photos at Art of the Escape.

A single man on a leash, bound, naked, flinging around. His eyes are broken, his soul is red.

BOUND FOR CULIACÁN. GUILTY OF TREASON

Roiling gates and a tiled plaza. Jeering women with heavy breasts and dyed skirts. Boys sell bananas. Fry bread oils. One dog yaps at another.

The man sheds a tear as he is lead through the procession. A seamed face, now pelted with day old fruit.

Up the steps, to a flowering gibbet. He writhes, he wiggles, he’s gone.

A hundred cries fill the air. Hats and humorismo to celebrate damnation.

“Do you think he was guilty?” one man says to another.

“No. I think he believed in something”.

---

Christopher C Tennant is a Denver, Colorado native who mainly writes poetry, short stories, and literary or experimental works. He has previously published in Academy of the Heart and Mind, Atlas Obscura, and Scribes*MICRO*Fiction, among many other places.

Onion could have lifted his foot and pressed the brake. But this was the fifth jaywalker he had seen on the highway that month, and so far, the discomfort of shifting from gas to brake had brought him neither good nor bad. He could have kept doing the same thing, but what would that change? Wasn’t he alive in the first place because God had decided things couldn’t stay the same forever? Didn’t his mom assign him a name by randomly picking a word from the dictionary after growing tired of the generic names she had given his siblings?

Onion felt that familiar feeling wash over him once more as if passed down from his creators—his mother and God. It was an innate feeling beyond reason, a primal force that preceded all else. That force, heavier than gravity itself, anchored his foot on the pedal.

***

Now he was bored, staring at the struggling body of the jaywalker on the ground, thinking about the hours of paperwork ahead—something he wouldn’t have to do if people ever got bored enough of paperwork one day. Almost everything was a matter of time and perspective, both of which were a matter of boredom.

He regretted it all. His conscience weighed on him now, but why? Because it had not weighed on him a minute ago, and that had brought him neither good nor bad. The elections were coming up—a time of change. Which candidate had promised to kill fewer Middle Eastern children? That would be Onion’s choice—he wanted different rewards for the taxes he paid and the points he earned from the gas station.

Did people avoid evil or boredom? Every American knew it was evil to kill innocent children, but were they bored enough of it? Onion knew he was bored; he needed something else. The government had failed to address Onion’s boredom. Perhaps he shouldn’t bother voting this time, since voting had done him neither good nor bad so far.

Onion got back in the car and continued driving. When his favorite song started playing on the radio, he stopped the engine and lay down on the road. He stared up at the stars, trying to pick the most beautiful one of all.

What is beauty? The purposive without purpose. What is ugly? These words that expire by the minute, as they attain their purpose. And who is the culprit? Reason—a corpse with a foul smell, rotten like God. Whenever anyone opened their mouth to speak, Onion could smell the stench of reason, and its constant presence made him sick.

Onion realized all of this thinking did him neither good nor bad, so he stopped. A car came speeding by and cut Onion in half. No more change, no more driving, no more running over others and being run over by others. When Onion died, he brought tears to the eyes of those closest to him.

---

Bora Barut is a Turkish-Canadian honours philosophy student in his fourth year at the University of British Columbia. As a passionate emerging writer, his thought-provoking works have earned him invitations to present at esteemed institutions like UCLA, Northwestern University, and the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities. In addition to publishing both philosophical and fictional pieces, he serves as the chief editor of UBC’s Journal of Philosophical Enquiries. In his free time, he enjoys reading, playing board games, and spending time with his partner.

She was 5’2, maybe 100 pounds. I started taking note a year ago, dark hair to her shoulders, ruddy sun browned face and hands. Dressed in neutral tans, greys – shirt, slacks that looked well-worn, more part of the persona than the outfit. She would be walking near the boardwalk, but just as often five miles inland on the Boulevard. Away from the beach no one walks except the homeless, certainly not for miles, and never in the summer sun. She may have been homeless, but no belongings, her gait seemed determined but not rushed. Power-walker outings are a small part of the day. They dress for the workout, careful to hydrate. I envisioned her legs to be hard as steel, her ventures seemed perpetual. I spotted her daily. As it became ritual to be on the lookout, the frequent occurrences increased. She walked all the time – for a living, or on a mission. A mythic trek, perhaps her monastery burned down – if stopped, or accosted, perhaps martial arts. Taoism emphasizes action without intention, simplicity, spontaneity. The Walker was for me the embodiment of this discipline, achieving perfection, becoming one with the unplanned rhythms of the all. The myth grew with each sighting. I did not approach her or attempt to engage. I’m sure I didn’t want the intrigue to end. I was reminded of the monk’s story of the man who kept running faster to escape his shadow until he died, when all he needed to do was step into the shade.

---

Craig Kirchner thinks of poetry as hobo art, loves storytelling and the aesthetics of the paper and pen. He has had two poems nominated for the Pushcart, and has a book of poetry, Roomful of Navels. Craig houses 500 books in his office and about 400 poems in a folder on a laptop. These words tend to keep him straight. After a hiatus he was recently published in Decadent Review, Chiron Review, The Main Street Rag, Hamilton Stone Review, The Wise Owl, Dark Winter and several dozen other journals.

Holding a candle on the beach, she looked at the circle of lights the others had placed. The thought of the burial came to her. She heard someone crying, maybe her mother. As soon as it came, the crying disappeared into the soft steps of people passing behind her, some looking at her as they walked beside the ocean. She didn’t notice them. Wind moved her hair almost like a forgiveness but did nothing to the flames. The light of the candles warmed her face as she breathed in deeply, her back straight. As she exhaled, the flame wavered. She moved slowly, placing the candle in with the others, the sand falling toward the candle as though it were trying to stop its entry. Standing up she closed her eyes, her head bending toward her shoes. They were Converse, torn by the years. Opening her eyes, her posture began to bend into that of an old woman. She lifted her hood above her head. A cane appeared in her hand. Her hair became gray and her eyes grew heavy and her face was now deep with wrinkles. She shuffled toward the ocean. She wanted a good look at all that water.

---

Cole Hersey is a writer, illustrator, and journalist based in Oakland, California. He is the creator of the weekly culture and essay newsletter Big Little Things on Substack. His feature work has been published in the Pacific Sun, Bay Nature, Earth Island Journal, and elsewhere. His fiction and poetry has been published in many journals such as Parentheses, Wales Arts Review, and 7×7.LA. While his writing often focuses on natural landscapes and ecology, his fiction often grapples with many forms of loss, and how the absences of things shape our lives.