Short Stories

Fiction

The Obscure Bird

It was late. Gwen spent ten minutes helping Andrew tidy up the kitchen and then put her arms out for a hug and said she was going up to bed. “I won’t be long,” Andrew said as he released her with a kiss. Gwen smiled. “Of course not,” she said. It was a ritual. She knew it would be at least an hour, probably two, maybe more, before he joined her. Outside, an owl hooted. Andrew’s eyes were dark behind the round lenses of his glasses, unfathomable. He turned to the sink as she walked towards the door to the hall, where she stopped and looked back at him.

In Dec. 2020 (Issue 99)

Fiction

The Wrong Girl

by Angela Slatter

Author spotlight

“The problem is,” she says as she spears a piece of crispy bacon skilfully enough that it doesn’t shatter, “you’ve got a revolving door for a heart.” He doesn’t like hearing things like this, mostly because she’s generally right. Ilsa’s clear-eyed about him. and that makes their friendship remarkably unfraught (apart from these moments). Unlike his other relationships. She sees him for who he is, but doesn’t stop talking to him, doesn’t judge him, not really, or if she does, she’s still friends with him. His father used to say he was his own worst enemy.

In Dec. 2020 (Issue 99)

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- Narrated by:
  
  Stefan Rudnicki
- Duration:
  
  28:45
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Fiction

The Ones Who Got Away

by Stephen Graham Jones

Later we would learn that the guy kept a machete close to his front door. That he kept it there specifically for people like us. For the chance of people like us. That he’d been waiting. I was fifteen. It was supposed to be a simple thing we were doing. In a way, I guess it was. Just not the way Mark had told us it would be. If you’re wondering, this is the story of why I’m not a criminal. And also why I pick my pizza up instead of having it delivered. It starts with us getting tighter and tighter with Mark, letting him spot us a bag here, a case there, a ride in-between.

In Dec. 2020 (Issue 99)

Fiction

The Book of Drowned Sisters

by Caspian Gray

Author spotlight

They lived on the last street that had been constructed before investor money ran out, and behind their row of seven houses was a long unfenced field marked KEEP OUT, within it a little hill and little retaining pond, and a row of three streetlights along an unpaved road that stopped abruptly at the foot of the hill. Trees rimmed the field, and the streetlights still lit up, so there was a touch of Narnia in every evening. Even in the brilliant summer sun, the trees were thick enough to give the woods an inviting fairy tale darkness. | Copyright 2020 by Caspian Gray.

In Dec. 2020 (Issue 99)

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- Narrated by:
  
  Judy Young
- Duration:
  
  46:50
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Fiction

White Mare

by Thana Niveau

April was the cruelest month for grownups, but for kids it was definitely September. The wild ride of summer came crashing to an end and the return to school was like being dragged back to prison after weeks of freedom. Heather had never minded, though, because September gave way to October. And October was her favorite month. The air turned crisp and the leaves were at their most vibrant and colorful. And best of all, there was Halloween.

In Nov. 2020 (Issue 98)

Fiction

Introduction to the Horror Story, Day 1

by Kurt Fawver

Author spotlight

Welcome to Introduction to the Horror Story. This is an upper level course with extensive reading and writing assignments as well as a practical component. It has no prerequisites other than existence and consciousness, which I believe all of you possess, though I may be wrong.

2020 Stoker Award Finalist Stoker Award Finalists

In Nov. 2020 (Issue 98)

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- Narrated by:
  
  Stefan Rudnicki
- Duration:
  
  32:47
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Fiction

Night Doctors

by P. Djèlí Clark

My arrival in Durham comes on a sweltering August afternoon in 1937. I am here on work with the Federal Writers’ Project, tasked to conduct interviews of former slaves, to collect their stories, memories, and folkways, as that generation is daily dying out and will soon reach its end. Securing lodgings comes with its usual difficulties, as Jim Crowism is as rampant in this city as any other in the South.

In Nov. 2020 (Issue 98)

Fiction

Tiger’s Feast

by KT Bryski

Author spotlight

Every day after school, Emmy feeds the tiger with her sin. Deep in the park’s brush, past poison ivy and a rotting lawn chair and dented beer cans, the tiger dens under a dead tree. No matter what time Emmy arrives at the park, it’s always late afternoon in the tiger’s grove, tired light decaying to dusk. Under the tree gapes a great black mouth riddled with grubs. Yellow eyes gleam in the darkness. They would gobble Emmy up if she let them.

In Nov. 2020 (Issue 98)

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- Narrated by:
  
  Kate Orsini
- Duration:
  
  57:21
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Fiction

The Secret of Flight

by A.C. Wise

SETTING: The stage is bare except for a backdrop screen showing the distant manor house. The lights should start at 1/8 and rising to 3/4 luminance as the scene progresses. AT RISE: The corpse of a man lies CENTER STAGE. POLICEMAN enters STAGE RIGHT, led by a YOUNG BOY carrying garden shears. The boy’s cheek is smeared with dirt. The boy points with shears and tugs the policeman’s hand. POLICEMAN crosses to CENTER STAGE and kneels beside the corpse.

In Oct. 2020 (Issue 97)

Fiction

The Monkey Trap

by Adam-Troy Castro

Author spotlight

Amber needed a book. It was The Estates of Sarah Holliday, a delicate comedy of manners following a young woman’s trials and tribulations in 1870s New England, and it was the most obscure novel by one Charlotte Winsborough, a fussy and now almost completely forgotten nineteenth-century author Amber had chosen for her dissertation. Winsborough had enjoyed three decades of critical and commercial success in her own time, and was by about 1900 lionized as a female Twain.

In Oct. 2020 (Issue 97)