By Mary Higbee

Margaret ate her peanut butter toast, leaning over the sink. By the third bite, she remembered that peanut butter toast had also been last night’s dinner. She shook her head as she chewed, as if warning herself. If the kids knew that peanut butter toast was her go-to meal, they would have one of their serious talks with her. She didn’t want their solicitous tones and worried expressions when they explained why she shouldn’t be living by herself.

She brushed away the crumbs stuck to her fingers and took her coffee cup to the dining table. Sitting very straight in her chair as if the task before her was an important one, she wrote the week’s to-do list on the back of a used envelope. The list turned out to be a grocery list rather than a litany of things to be accomplished. The truth was, Margaret didn’t have a clear notion of how to spend the endless hours before her on this Tuesday morning, let alone make plans for Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday.

What would a Tuesday look like if Sam were still alive? Margaret closed her eyes and in the gray-blackness behind her lids, she saw them studying the grocery store ad and talking about what would taste good. Sam’s request was always for her special meatloaf with mashed potatoes. Maybe they would pick up a Subway sandwich to share for lunch—black forest ham and Swiss cheese—and eat it sitting on a boulder by the river. If they were lucky, they would spot the river otter that had a den somewhere on the opposite bank. They always watched the evening news and discussed the stories while eating dinner with a dish of rocky road ice cream for dessert. “Sam, I don’t have any practice doing life alone. I’m not good at it.” Margaret said aloud in the direction of the framed picture of her and Sam camping at Crater Lake.

In the seven months since Sam died, her tears had dried up, and so had she. Her mind felt like a vacant house, full of echoes and footsteps of the past. The new worry Margaret was keeping to herself was the alarm clock she had heard for the last two mornings. The muffled ringing seemed to come from somewhere inside the mobile home, yet at the same time, it sounded like it was coming from outside. It rang for about fifteen seconds at 6:15 and then stopped. The second morning it happened, Margaret got out of bed to peer outside to determine if the noise was coming from the yard, as if she expected to see an old-fashioned alarm clock sitting on the lawn chair. “Don’t go all crazy on me, old gal,” she laughed, but with a touch of concern that she might be hearing imaginary things.

On Wednesday morning, she stirred herself awake at 6:07 and lay watching her own clock’s digital numbers turn until they hit 6:15 when the mystery alarm found its voice somewhere nearby. Margaret was so curious about the daily ringing that she was up and sitting in her chair in the living room before 6:15 on Thursday. If she listened from a room other than her bedroom, it might help guide her to the source. But hearing from the living room did not offer any new insight. “Well, whatever it is, I do love a good mystery,” she muttered to herself and got up to make her coffee. She stood at the counter waiting for the coffee machine to stop sputtering and gurgling. “At least, I’m not hallucinating. It’s a real alarm clock,” she told her favorite mug before she poured herself a cup.

She was turning away from the kitchen counter when, out the window, she caught a glimpse of a young man wearing a plaid shirt and jeans, carrying a backpack. He moved quickly and kept to the shadow created by the oak tree next to the deck. In the few seconds Margaret saw him, she noted his lanky silhouette and estimated his age to be in his twenties. His appearance in her side yard was yet another mystery on top of the alarm clock. 

Early Friday, Margaret slipped out of bed quietly and padded barefoot down the hall. She didn’t turn on the kitchen light and stood by the window watching to see if the young man would appear again. From her post in the kitchen, she heard the alarm, and just when she was about to give up her vigil, the plaid-shirted man walked by. This time, he turned his head and looked in her direction. When he realized she was watching, he ducked down and picked up his pace, but not before Margaret had seen his dark eyes and shaggy, brown hair under a baseball cap. From the size of his khaki-colored pack, it looked like he was carrying all his worldly possessions on his back.

Startled, Margaret stepped back from the window. “Well, Marg, put on your big girl pants and go outside and figure out what is going on,” she told herself in a no-nonsense voice. In the back corner of the double-wide, Margaret discovered the decorative skirting around the crawl space was askew. In the dim light under the trailer, a rolled-up sleeping bag was visible. It was proof she had a boarder, one who awoke at 6:15 and went off for the day in a plaid shirt. Was she in any danger? Margaret decided that being startled by seeing a man outside her window was different from being afraid of him.

Her son called to say that he would be over on Saturday to mow her yard. Margaret was sure Jason would discover the skirting and repair it, eliminating access to the space under the trailer. She knew she wouldn’t be able to explain in a way that Jason could understand that her intuition had assured her that the person sleeping under the trailer meant her no harm. It would be best not to mention the trespasser.

Margaret was up early on Saturday, and at 6:25, poured a cup of coffee and set it on the deck chair just as the young man rounded the corner of her mobile home. It was his turn to be startled. Margaret nodded to him, and he came up two steps onto the deck and reached out to take the cup. Standing only a few feet from her, he reminded her of her oldest grandson.

“My son, Jason, is going to fix the skirting today,” Margaret explained, not wanting him to discover it after dark with no plans for the night.

“I’m pushing on today,” he told her, and she noticed that his sleeping bag was tied to his pack.

“Will you be okay?” 

“Yes, ma’am. I’m meeting up with my brother.” He met Margaret’s gaze and continued, “Thank you for your hospitality these past few days. It helped a lot.”

“You’re welcome,” Margaret replied. She wished she could explain to him that his presence had broken the recurring pattern of her sadness. For the first time in months, Margaret didn’t feel empty.  

*   *   *

Mary Higbee is a retired middle school English teacher living in northern California. After years of encouraging her students to write, Mary enjoys applying what she taught to her own work. Her writing has appeared in the Barnstorm Journal, The Coachella Review Online Blog, The Scarlet Leaf Review, and Change Seven Magazine. She self-published a memoir, Lessons from Afar, about opening a secondary school in South Sudan.

 

By Erin Jamieson

It was a Wednesday when a small seaside town erected tents. 

The town had always been quaint: rolling hills, a coffee shop, a thrift store.

 An omnipresent aroma of hazelnut coffee and autumn leaves. 

But no one could have expected this.

A tent city, with the children absent from school rooms and instead learning in meadows. What they were learning, no one outside of the city knew. 

Nor could anyone explain the abandoned homes and storefronts. 

A middle aged woman, fresh off a divorce, passed by the tents. She was traveling, traveling without a true destination. The tents —magenta, sapphire blue, royal purple —reminded her of the county fairs she used to show her rabbits at as a girl. Here, too was the undeniable warmth of freshly popped kettle corn, the excitement and irritation of so many gathered in a small space. 

She stumbled upon a girl, dressed in a curiously long tangerine orange dress. Her eyes were the same muddy brown as the woman’s. She had the woman’s slightly crooked nose, high forehead, and stocky build.

“I was waiting for you,” the girl said, taking the woman’s hand. 

It felt natural, as if the woman was always meant to take this girl’s hand, always meant to return to somewhere far away from the congested city where she’d lost her love for others, for herself.

She headed further into the tent city, the little girl leading the way. The mass in her abdomen tingled, growing smaller and smaller. 

*   *   *

Erin Jamieson (she/her) holds an MFA in Creative Writing from Miami University. Her writing has been published in over eighty literary magazines, including two Pushcart Prize nominations. Her poetry chapbook, Fairytales, was published by Bottlecap Press and her most recent chapbook, Remnants, came out in 2024. . Her debut novel (Sky of Ashes, Land of Dreams) came out November 2023. She resides in Loveland, Ohio. Twitter: @erin_simmer

By Fernanda Sarti

She met him in the liminal hours of travel, suspended between departure and return, when everything felt possible and nothing promised. 

At the bar, he leaned against the counter, sleeves pushed to his elbows, his white shirt catching the glow of the lights. His smile was easy, unstudied, and his blue eyes—clear, startling, beautiful—found hers before either spoke. 

One drink became two and laughter spilled between them as if they’d waiting for years. His hand found the small of her back, tentative, almost questioning. She didn’t push him away. Instead, she leaned into his touch, closing the space between them. 

Their words flowed like wine, but when conversation gave way to silence, it wasn’t empty—it was charged, alive, brimming with what came next. She felt it like a current under her skin, as if some hidden part of her had known him before—across oceans, across time. 

Around them the music throbbed, lights flickered, bodies pressed close. Butterflies drifted from the ceiling, their delicate wings catching the shimmer of the room. And then, they kissed. 

The moment cracked open: slow, weightless, infinite. The bass vanished, the crowd dissolved, and there were only the two of them, lips meeting beneath a constellation of wings.  

The kiss tasted forbidden, impossible to refuse—her body had already chosen for her. Time faltered, stretching into something softer, as though the universe itself wanted to hold them in that kiss a little longer. 

The night unfolded in a borrowed hotel room, desire blazing reckless and bright, as if it knew it couldn’t last. Their bodies learned each other without hesitation, as if language were unnecessary. 

Every kiss was hunger and release; every touch a reminder that life was more than schedules and departure gates. Between breaths and laughter, they collided fully, surrendering to the urgency of being alive on that fleeting night. 

They did not pretend it would last. They were honest in their impermanence: she would return to her world, and he to his skies. Different places, different lives, each pulled by their own gravity. But that night, those hours, they belonged entirely to one another. 

When dawn came, she traced the curve of his jaw one last time, committing it to memory. He kissed her like a promise not to forget. And then, as quietly as they had found each other, they parted, carrying the ache of goodbye. 

They boarded separate flights. And though they might never meet again, each carried the quiet hope that the skies might cross for them once more, somewhere beyond this night. 

*   *   *

Fernanda Sarti is a Brazilian-American writer based in Minnesota. Her work explores themes of love, longing, and the in-between spaces of life. She is submitting her first flash fiction for consideration. Outside of writing, Fernanda is a crisis leader and cybersecurity expert. In her free time, she volunteers as a private investigator for missing person’s cases. She is currently working on her debut novel and is the proud mom of two Siberian huskies. 

By Leftie Aubé

I always thought we’d be five. Five’s a good number. We were three when I was growing up and it felt too little. I daydreamed about us being five. An older brother and a baby sister. I always got mad when my parents told me it was impossible. My partner’s are five and they are the happiest family I know. My sister-in-law’s are five and my brother-in-law’s are five so we had to be five too, that’s just how families work best. But before we even got to three, I got sick. Then even more sick six months after we became three. But three isn’t a good number so even if I was sick and getting sicker when we were becoming more, we kept going. And while we were becoming four, I got even more sick. So sick we feared we would remain three. But by some miracle, we became four and becoming four with my sicker body scared us so much that we decided “that’s it, we’ll stay four.” Even if four isn’t as good as five. It was better than trying to become five only to still be four or even worst, go back to three but without me. So four had to be enough. And for a while it was. But six months after we became four I got sick again, way too sick to get better this time around and they had to remove the sick organ from my body. For two years after that, being four was way too many. But somehow I made it through every day of those two years and through two additional reconstruction of my organ, and surprisingly on the other side of all of this was being not sick. Then there was becoming healthy, something I had stopped dreaming about even before I stopped dreaming about becoming five. And then, slowly but surely, as I was becoming more myself and more healthy every day, five seemed like a good number again. Like the best number again. Despite everything. Four felt more and more like not enough again. Too much symmetry. Not enough adequate imperfection. But by the time we all four were ready to maybe become five, we had been four for too long. We had started to dream other dreams while we were getting used to being four and being five would be too much with those new dreams. And what if becoming five somehow made me sick again? Becoming more as greater risks than we dare to admit. Would it be worth it to maybe be sick again just to be five? Or is four enough? For now, four sure feels good. Feels right. And we’ll see. Maybe five one day, who knows. But for now we’re four, and happy, and healthy. That’s more than enough, right?

                                                              *   *   *

Leftie Aubé is a horror writer who lives near Québec city. She’s a supporting member of the Horror Writers Association. Her flash fiction, “Can’t Stand It Anymore,” was published in the collection “Wherever We Roam,” where it was chosen as an honorable mention. She’s the host of Leftie Aube’s Writing Podcast, where she shares her writing and publishing journey with vulnerability and positivity to help other writers navigate their own journey. She is represented by Ameerah Holliday at Serendipity Literary. You can find her on Instagram, Bluesky and TikTok @leftieaube.

By Emma Rowan

I didn’t want to be the guy always writing about how the city bus filled with fish. But I was the one alone at the bus stop when it drove up Fifth and reached Sunset Park, stopped at the corner of Fifth and Forty-third and flooded with saltwater. And, as if dropped right out of God’s hands through the emergency hatch, filled with various marine life. Angelfish and yellow tangs and moon jellies and lion-fish and snowflake eels. Plumose anemone and barrier coral and red string seaweed sprouted from the seats. Abalones slid across the windows where sea stars weren’t stuck while stingrays slid by. All of it happening in seconds. 

I was standing at the doors waiting for them to open before realizing they couldn’t without drowning the whole block and committing mass ecological murder. My mouth fell open, and I walked slowly around the side trying to get a better look. Inside, a loggerhead sea turtle drifted by like a blimp. It was a bus filled with fish alright. Sunlight rippling through the water. And then, just as soon as it arrived, it left. Pulled away from the curb, disappearing into Manhattan’s pulse. 

I’ve called the MTA seven times since then. Made thirteen online reports—at least I think I did, it’s not so easy on the computer. I’m writing letters too, got plenty of stamps. But man, you wouldn’t believe how many buttons I have to hit on the damn phone until I get to the other-est of other options and can finally speak to a real human being. They always tell me the same story. They have no idea what I’m talking about. They say no bus was scheduled to come up Fifth and stop at Forty-third on Thursday, June 2nd at approximately 2:30 in the afternoon. That the usual route stops there at 3:05 on a perfect day. That there was actually a terrible delay due to mechanical issues, and a bus did not come through Brooklyn up from Bay Ridge for another hour or so. They think I’m nuts.

So, I started writing to news outlets. ABC, NBC, Fox, News 12, PIX 11, you name it. I’ve tried the Times, the Post, Newsday. None of ‘em would hear it. Nobody believes me. I tried personal ads in the local paper, tried to post on something called “Craigslist” too. That reeled in some real weirdos. 

But honestly I’m not doing it to have my name in the papers or to get on Good Morning America talking to Joan Lunden like some schmuck. I just think people should know about this. People should know about the absolute miracle that is the Fish City Bus. 

See, I’ve come to realize what a blessing this is. An honor that was bestowed upon me, that sorta thing, you know. Who would’ve been better than me to be standing at the bus stop at Fifth and Forty-third that Thursday afternoon? No one else would’ve been able to name all the exact species of oceanic life. Would’ve recognized that they all originate from vastly different marine ecosystems. Me, an expert, a custodian at the Museum of Natural History who’s been sweeping and studying the Hall of Ocean Life for the past thirty-three years, don’t forget it. Best job in the world, I tell my daughter that all the time. Now it’s really paid off. 

I haven’t told her about it yet—my daughter that is. Hailey, light of my life. Best thing I’ve ever given this world. I haven’t accomplished much in my life ‘cept for her. Look, I can’t lie, I’ve messed up a lot—with her mother…you know how it goes. It was a long time ago. 

Hails just had a baby boy, about four months, name’s David. I’m a grandfather, can you believe it? If you told ‘70s me that, when I was a dumb kid, too busy smoking dope and getting blasted at the Loft in the South Bronx ‘til sunrise, I’d be knocked right on my ass! She’s moved out of the city into the suburbs now, her and her husband, but I miss ‘em like hell. She always says she’s gonna bring the baby around, but I haven’t gotten to see him yet. I guess it is a bit of a hike for them to take the train from Jersey. But she’s gonna be so proud of me when she sees what I’ve found. I just have to show her. 

I bought one of those outdoor chairs—those canvas ones with the mesh cup holders that I used to bring to Hail’s soccer games—and have been sitting at the bus stop for two hours now. Most people have minded their business, walked right by. One person bought me a coffee from the bodega, that was nice. One kid tried to ask me something with a tiny microphone, get me on some video, but I politely shooed him off. I need to stay focused. I’m not the best with the phone, so I have to be ready for when the Fish City Bus comes back. And I know it will. I’m gonna send Hails a picture. Then she’ll have to bring David, and I’ll get to show him, point his chubby, little hand at the saltwater windows as that sea turtle’s fin grazes the steering wheel. Look, a little miracle, all for you. 

*    *    *

Emma Rowan is a writer from New York. She is currently pursuing an MFA in Creative Nonfiction at Miami University where she is the CNF Editor for Ox Mag. She is also a Prose Editor for Temporal Lobe. She has work published or forthcoming in Hominum Journal, Spellbinder, Beaver Mag, and other places.

By Shanti Chandrasekhar

With words or with things, you always find a way to hurt me, even though you love me. Over the years, I’ve treasured the clothes from you, new and hand-me-downs alike. But that pashmina shawl you’d used only once? Are you sure, I’d said. You’d slipped it into my luggage and hugged me. Later, unfolding it before a party, I saw the stain concealed within the folds. Visible or invisible, stains find a way to remain un-erasable.

I’m that little girl—dark, skinny, bespectacled—with two long braids, hiding behind the curtains, peeking out at you and our other sister, your look-alike, twist to the songs of Beatles and I, the shy one as Mummy says of me, watch, because chatting with the guests is unthinkable, dancing unimaginable. They throw a glance at me, the visitors, and turn back to the two of you with bob-cut hair and pretty skirts, impressing them with your fast-spoken English, though from behind the curtains I can tell where you make a mistake, which our more-fluent-in-Hindi guests don’t notice and I don’t dare to say that’s wrong English and you both jabber-jabber-jabber and they laugh, tickled. When Papa-Mummy are in the room, the visitors call to me in their mock-sweet voices, Come here, but I don’t, and no, the mock-sweetness doesn’t sadden me, not like the skirts sewed with the fabric Mummy’s Anglo-Indian friend brought me from England because I share the same birthday with her snobbish-blue-eyed-son—the first blue-eyed boy I’d ever seen in person, not in English textbooks or movies. But our eldest sister said to Mummy, She’s too dark for these colors, and ran her hand over the cloth saying, It’s so soft you can tell it’s foreign material, and Mummy lets her take the material and get skirts tailored for you two, my fair-complexioned beautiful sisters, and you twirl the skirt and twist to the songs playing on our record player, songs I love, the new-plastic smell of His Master’s Voice discs I love, Nipper-the-HMV-logo-dog I love, the soft-colored skirt I love, but you wear it. My birthday gift.

That memories are unreliable is untrue. I may not recall the size of the pink flowers on the gray textile, but I remember you wearing the skirt.

The skirt, after you shot up, sat in my closet, untouched. That shawl lies somewhere in my basement, unused. Those hurts and memories, to my blue-eyed husband’s relief, I put them all away—to heal, unhindered.

Yet how it crumples, the stubborn-but-soft boundary I now erect between you and me. Intertwined threads, diverging, converging, like the double helix strands, always find a way to keep our fabric from unraveling.

                                                                   *   *   *

Shanti Chandrasekhar is a Maryland-based writer whose words have appeared in The Sunlight Press, Bright Flash Literary Review, and Persimmon Tree, among many other publications. Writing gives her a deeper understanding of life, human relationships, and her own self.

By Andrea Damic 

my hands covered in colors / green for the grass / blue for the sky / red for the tulips swinging in the wind / the purple I inadvertently created on my tiny palms, when red and blue touched, was fashioned into butterflies fluttering around the red hot tulips / butterflies don’t like tulips, my older sister exclaimed looking at my artwork / she was of course right / she was a bit of a know-it-all / and a teenager / the worst combination / I was nine going on…much older / dreaming up my own world / our art teacher showed us some famous collages during an art class in school / she asked us to create our own / I cut and cut and cut / I cut countless pieces in all shapes and sizes / and a beautiful abstract artwork blossomed in front of me, beaming back / my craftsmanship / my own Picasso / I was told he was very famous, and dead, which was unfortunate as I had questions / my sister disliked Abstract / why wouldn’t my butterflies like tulips, I asked her / why wouldn’t they like my bright hot red tulips / I continued my monologue, stubborn and argumentative / she rolled her eyes and left me be / the next morning in school they told us our teacher died / pneumonia / it was a middle of the summer / I remember her being fragile like the butterflies embroidered on her bag / I remember them trembling in mid-air as if planning a take-off / it was a closed casket / we knew she was there, underneath the heavy oak cover, alone in the darkness / we avoided each other’s eyes afraid of what we might see / we were stuck in a beleaguered spot without an exit / the procession was long / my thoughts drifting away / I was at my grandma’s funeral / she was also in a closed casket / I was a couple of years younger / I couldn’t comprehend Grandma being trapped inside / I thought they made it up to scare me, to make me behave / I was a restless child / staying motionless went against my nature / I was once told I’d taken after her—she was an artist too / I remember that day vividly / being so very quiet—a teddy-bear quiet / I didn’t cry, afraid to make a sound / my Mum’s touch brought me back to this new reality / to yet another casket / six feet under / my classmates and I walked single file throwing down white roses / one by one they fell with a thud / I was the last one in line / I opened up my school bag and before anyone could stop me, I scattered my butterflies into the hole / a silent gasp bouncing around as they twirled in mid-air, waltzing gently in the morning breeze before peacefully settling atop the dark oak / there was something soothing about them / when I finally looked up, I saw a faint smile in her son’s eyes / he remembered her butterflies as well

*   *   *

 Andrea Damic (Sydney, Australia) wears many hats, as her daughter frequently reminds her. She’s an artist, writer and contributing editor for Pictura Journal, currently working on her first hybrid chapbook. She’s also an accountant with a master’s degree in Economics. Her literary art has been recently published or is forthcoming in Bending Genres, Does It Have Pockets, JMWW, Roi Fainéant Press. She has also recently won the SmokeLong Quarterly’s Trainwreck Micro Competition (Sep 2025). In her imaginary free time, you can find her fiddling with her website https://damicandrea.wordpress.com/.

By Darren Condron

One day, like any other, a great lump of a man went down the town as he usually does, to see his friend, to sit with her as always. But she was not there. He waited. She did not arrive.

They had spent many days together on that bench, talking, laughing, judging, sitting in silence.

Sylvia never said much. A soft laugh, a quiet “hmm,” a simple nod of the head. Perhaps that was why they got on so well. Big Lump was a large, heavy man, known to be contrary and quick to snap. People kept their distance.

But Sylvia was a newcomer, quiet and peaceful, sometimes called harmless. She never argued. She only sat and listened and so their friendship grew. She was slight, always in a long coat, always with a gentle smile.

Every day, her presence was the highlight of his day. Rain or shine, if she was there, he was glad.

The townspeople noticed a change in Big Lump when they started sitting together. He still ignored them, as usual, but there was something softer about him now. One woman said she saw him offer Sylvia a chip and she accepted.

A week before, the butcher across the street had seen him pass by, gripping his old wooden walking-stick in one hand and something else in the other. The butcher, ever nosy, had leaned out of his door. It was a rose, thorns intact, rough and jagged, picked from a garden, perhaps a Valentine’s gift. Sylvia smiled and took it.

*

Big Lump sat on the bench. Waiting.

People came and went. The butcher stood in his doorway, smoking. A woman with a pram passed, caught his eye and then looked away.

Sylvia did not come to sit that day. He waited and waited.

A tap on his shoulder. He turned. It was the butcher.

“Big Lu—” the man began, then paused. The name had been used mockingly by the townspeople.

“Eric,” he said, using the name he’d nearly forgotten.

“Where’s Sylvia?” Big Lump grunted.

The butcher hesitated, eyes downcast. “Eric,” he said softly, “Sylvia, she is gone.”

The words did not land.

“Where were you the last few days?” the butcher asked. “We thought you’d vanished. Sylvia missed you terribly.”

Big Lump looked up. “Sick,” he muttered. “I was sick.”

The butcher sat beside him now.

“Eric,” he said again, more quietly, “do you understand?”

A jolt of the shoulders. “Sylvia,” Big Lump demanded. “Where is she?”

The butcher exhaled, rubbing his hands together. “Right,” he murmured. “You didn’t know, then.” He sighed, as if weighing whether to say more, or to say anything at all.

*

Weeks passed, Big Lump was unseen for a long time. Some said they had seen him buying bread in another town. Others said he had died of a broken heart, like swans do. None of it was true. He was at home.                                                                                            

Looking out at the town would not have been the same without his good friend, his only friend.

Spring came, as did the early misty mornings. The town was waking up, some heading to work, some walking dogs, others grabbing coffee. Through the clearing fog, a figure sat at the top of the town, looking out like a watch-guard.

That morning Big Lump had left his home for the first time in weeks. He made his way through the town and took his seat.

That day, he was the talk of the town.

Big Lump was back!

The butcher, opening up that morning, looked around with a cigarette in his mouth, nearly smoked to the butt

He took the keys from the shutters, tossed away his cigarette, and walked over.
Big Lump barely acknowledged him as he did. 

He took a seat beside him, leaving a space between them. Big Lump pulled a frowning look, his expression wordlessly questioning the moment. The butcher said nothing. He simply sat, and watched as the town stirred awake, heads turned from moving cars and walkers glanced in passing. They sat in silence, all that was heard was the town’s murmur.

*

On days when the butcher could not sit with him, someone else usually sat, in silence, the woman with the pram. Sometimes the postman, if only for a minute.

In time, Big Lump returned mostly-to-himself, laughing at those drifting through the town, judging, sometimes mocking. Those who sat beside him listened to his low, mumbled words. 

People rarely spoke of Big Lump now. They spoke of Eric.

                                                                 *   *   *

Darren Condron is a Multimedia Graduate at Dublin City University, with a background in fine art and art history. Passionate about storytelling across film, literary fiction, and emerging media. His writing has appeared in The College View and online literary journals.

By Louis Kummerer

His name is Antonio, but Krista calls him Tone. She assures me, over the phone, that I’ll like him.

But so far, I don’t like him. He’s smug, arrogant, dripping with the kind of unwarranted self-confidence that only the young can pull off.

The bar is his choice: Frosted-glass front doors with large brass handles; hip-hop music thumping from hidden speakers; bartenders in white shirts and black bow ties—an upscale establishment frequented by twenty-somethings who flaunt their early success as if it were an immutable harbinger of how their lives will turn out.

Without asking what I want, Tone orders for both of us: Glenlivet at $18 a glass. He pays for the drinks with his American Express Platinum Card,and I suspect he does so not because he wants to ingratiate himself with me, but because he wants to make sure I understand that this is the level he lives at, which is different from the level that I live at.

Ordinarily, this would be awkward—me, my daughter’s boyfriend, meeting for the first time, struggling to ignite a conversation. But Tone doesn’t strike me as the type of person who’s given to awkwardness. He seems quite comfortable as he yammers on, completely absorbed in his own self-importance, totally oblivious to my role in the conversation, which consists mostly of me nodding my head and smiling.

He calls me “Sir” in the condescending way that police officers use the term when they pull you over for a traffic violation. “Sir, can I see your license and registration?” “Sir, step out of the vehicle, please.” “Sir, may I have your daughter’s hand in marriage?”

Krista flies in to town to discuss the wedding details with me. She doesn’t bring Tone along. 

“Just the two of us,” she says at lunch. “Just like the good old days.”

I’m not sure what she means by the good old days. Sixth grade, the year that Jennifer divorced me and ran off to Seattle, leaving me to raise Krista alone? The uncomfortable crutch I became as Krista struggled through the emotional jungle of adolescence—her first period, her first kiss, her first boyfriend, her first heartbreak? The difficult conversations about puberty, about sex, about friends, about boys, the kinds of conversations that should only occur between a girl and her mother? Those good old days?

“Just so you know,” Krista says, “Mom will be at the wedding.”

Krista tells people that Jennifer and I have reconciled, but what she really means is that she and Jennifer have reconciled. After abandoning Krista during the difficult years, Jennifer has returned to play the supportive mother. Now that the game is won and the trophies are being handed out, she’s back in Krista’s life, and she’s staying with Krista to help plan the wedding.

Jennifer called me a month ago and asked me to send all the photos I had of Krista growing up because she wanted to use them to create a montage for Krista’s wedding. That’s the only contact I’ve had with Jennifer since the divorce. Which, to me, doesn’t feel like a reconciliation.

At the church on the morning of the wedding, the usher seats me next to Jennifer in the front row. She is talking to a couple behind her when I slide into the pew. She briefly interrupts her conversation and turns to kiss me on the cheek, a kiss so light and fleeting that it’s almost as if a fly had landed on my face momentarily and then quickly buzzed away.

“Nice to see you again,” she says with a pasted-on smile. Then she quickly turns back to her conversation with the people behind her.

I walk into the reception hall alone after the wedding. Some of the photos that Jennifer asked me to send are prominently displayed on a large board at the entrance. I stop to look at them: a smiling Krista at her 13th birthday party, gathered with her friends around a cake that I bought at a grocery store bakery; Krista with her girl scout leader, a tall, lanky woman whose name I can’t remember; Krista standing alone with the Grand Canyon in the background; the mother of one of Krista’s friends helping Krista apply makeup before her Junior Prom. I notice that I’m not in any of the pictures on the board, and my first impulse is to assume that Jennifer deliberately excluded me. But I realize that a more likely explanation is that I was always behind the camera, recording Krista’s life, but not really in it.

At the reception dinner, I’m not seated at the wedding table on Krista’s side because that would put me next to Jennifer, which everyone agreed could be problematic. Instead, I’m on the far side of Tone and his parents, an ostensibly unbalanced arrangement that leaves me oddly misplaced, like a dangling participle linked to the wrong subject.

When the father-daughter dance is announced, I slink onto the dance floor, painfully aware that I am not a good dancer. As we begin dancing, Krista senses my stiffness.

“Relax, Dad,” she whispers in my ear, “We’ll get through this.”

Dancing with her now, the most important man in her life for the last time, I realize that what she said pretty much defines her years alone with me. I was the backup player, a substitute just trying to get us through.

When Krista and Tone are about to leave, we guests are each given a small box containing a live butterfly. On cue, we release our butterflies as the newlyweds get into their limousine. Krista doesn’t make eye contact with me as she waves goodbye to the crowd and closes the limousine door. Through the vehicle’s tinted glass windows, I can barely discern the outline of her face.

The limousine pulls away and I find myself alone, stranded amidst a swarm of brightly colored butterflies that flutter around me now like old memories.

*   *   *

Louis Kummerer is an American writer and a lifelong fan of short stories. His work has been published in New Delta Review, The Brussels Review, Bristol Noir, 10×10 Flash, Grey Sparrow, Yellow Mama, Punk Noir, Micromance, CaféLit, Bright Flash Literary Review, Flash Fiction Magazine, The Chamber Magazine, Friday Flash Fiction, and 101 Words. He currently lives in Phoenix, Arizona where he works as a contract technical writer. A collection of his stories can be found at louk247-fiction.com.

By Héctor Hernández

He was an hour outside the city limits when he remembered the boxes in the attic. Everything else—furniture, household items, boxes of memories—had been packed into one big moving van that morning and was already headed toward Salem, Oregon, to the new, smaller house less than two miles from his sister and her husband. He hadn’t wanted to sell his home, but everyone said it was best to distance himself from the tragedy. “Besides,” they said, “what would you do all by yourself in twenty-seven-hundred-square-feet of empty space?”

Did those forgotten boxes hold cherished books, precious photo albums, or just unwanted Christmas decorations? He couldn’t remember. He let out a great sigh. He would have to go back.

An hour later, he exited the freeway and turned right onto the familiar, wide boulevard. He drove along sun-dappled streets. They were lined with thickly branched, leafy trees. When he and his wife had first moved into the new neighborhood nearly twenty-five years ago, those trees had been only thin saplings, their trunks no bigger around than the circle formed by pinching together your thumb and forefinger. Now they were sturdy giants, their branches extending outward to provide shade along the ample sidewalks and quiet streets.

The man turned into the secluded, little cul-de-sac where his house sat and parked in the street out of habit. He always left the driveway for his wife and daughter to park. He turned off the engine and waited. That persistent knot in his chest was flaring up again. He hadn’t told his doctor about it. If it was a heart attack, so be it. He was ready to leave this earth. But after a few deep breaths, the knot disappeared. He knew that was only temporary. He wasn’t fooled. It would be back. It always came back. 

Before exiting his truck, he took in one final, deep breath, filling his lungs to aching capacity, deliberately provoking that pain in his chest, daring it to show itself. But like a crafty fox, it refused to take the bait, so he exited his truck and made his way up the porch. He unlocked the front door, swung it open, and stood on the threshold. He watched as the ghosts of a thousand memories sprang to life: the countless birthday parties for his daughter, Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners, Family Friday with pizza and a movie (just the three of them), his daughter’s slumber parties, her graduation parties—first from high school, then from college. There were no ghosts of her engagement party, though, or her mother’s 60th birthday celebration—nor would there ever be.

He swallowed back a rising lump in his throat before stepping inside the hollowed-out space. As he turned to close the door, he heard the brisk clack, clack, clack of clawed feet on hard wood floor. His first thought was Greta’s ghost, his daughter’s bull terrier. There really had been no other choice except to end her suffering after cancer advanced to the point where food received nothing more than a sniff or two of mild interest and she refused to leave her cage, preferring to spend all day just lying on her mattress, staring at empty space. But it wasn’t Greta’s ghost—far from it. It was the neighbor’s very real pit bull and Greta’s nemesis: Marley.

Before Marley came on the scene, Greta had been top dog—at least in her own backyard. But with Marley’s arrival, Greta instinctively felt challenged. She greeted her new neighbor in a most uncivil manner, charging the fence that separated them with a blatant display of aggression, barking furiously while racing back and forth along the wooden barrier, her back hairs raised like a bristle brush. Perplexed by this most ungracious welcome, Marley could only stare quizzically at his batty neighbor.

“How ya doing, Buddy.”

Marley offered a wide, child-like grin. He wagged his tail furiously when the man reached down to scratch behind his massive head. His short, black fur; broad, muscular torso; and metal-spiked collar were fearsome to behold, but really, Marley was as friendly and social as a Golden Retriever.

The Houdiniesque canine often escaped from his backyard. The first time had caused chaos in the quiet little cul-de-sac with its tidy yards, well-maintained homes, and two cars in every driveway. Police were flooded with calls of a vicious pit bull threatening man, woman, and child. But after several escapes, neighbors eventually came to accept that Marley posed no real threat. They would still yank their kids from the street—you could never be too careful—but they stopped straining the 911 system.

A funny thing, though, the man was certain Marley never entered anyone else’s home, only his. And that, Marley started doing only recently, after the double tragedy—a traffic accident the man still couldn’t understand. It was as if Marley knew the man was missing something, and Marley was there to replace it.

“Well, Marley, I have to go up into the attic to get some boxes. You can hang out with me if you want to.” Marley stretched his childish grin even wider—and sat. “Or you can sit here and wait. Your choice, Buddy.” Marley chose to wait. But when the man began climbing the stairs, Marley rose and fell in behind him.

Inside the master bedroom, the attic ladder was pulled down, and the boxes retrieved. They contained nothing more than broken and mildewed camping gear. They were carried outside to the truck, placed in the bed, and would be transported nine hundred miles and then dumped.

The man cast his gaze up to the sky. It was a mean, wet grey. A light rain would arrive soon from the north. Temperatures were cold enough that the local mountains would be tickled with a feather’s dusting of snow this winter day in “sunny” Southern California.

Marley was more skin than fur. He wasn’t built for such frigid temperatures. The man worried for his four-legged friend. His neighbor, Marley’s owner, was at work and he didn’t have his number. They weren’t close neighbors, enough for a “good morning” or “how’s it going,” but that was as personal as it got.

What to do . . . ?

The hard, double knot of grief in the man’s chest began to stir once again. It had been boxed for too long and wanted out. It seized this opportunity as the moment of escape and tore at the man’s emotional vulnerability without mercy, scrambling out of the tiny space in which it had been forced to hide.

The man, taken by surprise, stumbled along on legs that grew weak with every step. When he could go no farther, he dropped to one knee and threw out a hand to brace himself, finding purchase against the side of his truck. Grief clawed its way up his throat. When it emerged, the man let loose a horrific howl. He cursed the heavens, the world, the living, and even the recently dead. His grief knew no bounds. He sobbed uncontrollably. Marley whined as the man’s tears flowed and the heavens cried with him—the first spatters of cold rain had begun to fall.

*

The man was on the 99, approaching Tulare. He would make a stop there. He had planned on taking the 5 freeway to Sacramento, spending the night, and heading out to Salem the following morning, but that was before. The 99 offered more places to stop and take breaks, more places for his new best friend to run and stretch his legs.

*    *    *

Héctor Hernández received a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering. He is now retired and writes when inspiration demands his attention. His short stories have appeared in Flash Fiction Magazine, After Dinner Conversation, Bright Flash Literary Review, CafeLit, and Literally Stories.