Common Ground
By Sara Siddiqui ChansarkarMy name is Sara, I say. I’m from India. Never met an Indian with that name, they say. Is it short for something? No, that’s my first name. I say.
It’s Better This Way
By AJ AtwaterThe convertible black as night with straight-up fins and a grille like shark’s teeth comes to rest in the bar’s parking lot among long-bed pickups with pipes and lumber and paint-splattered extension ladders...
Photo Story: Arcana
By Robert KealEach card foretells a fresh doom. She lays them side by side, three perfect slabs, her bridge towards the truth.
Jigsaw Puzzle
By Roberta BearyWhen someone said, I saw your husband eating out with another woman, he said she’s a colleague and I believed him...
Foreign Countries
By Emily FarrantoWhen we fell in love, my future husband wrote: Being with you feels like being in a foreign country.
Lullaby for Mariupol
By Stephen ConnacherI remember the chilly winter carnivals at Drama Theater, and the new green and yellow maternity hospital. Neighborhood babushkas gossip among the falling leaves.
Darling at Dinner
By Ellie PruskoThe waiter was staring at Darling, not me. When Darling admitted she wasn't 18, he left her wine glass anyway. He took mine immediately, probably mistaking me for 12.
Photo Story: Dan Needs Sober Friends
By Patrick GreweShe screams toward him: “There are faces…” points adamantly “…in the lights!”
Your Hair Looks Like Taillights
By Lexi ButlerYou talk to your mother in Spanish, your sister in English, and then in numbers to order Chinese take-out. And you love to talk, especially about how you grew up in a one-room walk-up.
Photo Story: Testing Mom’s Claims During Lunch at the Tail End of Our Final Family Vacation
By Abbie BarkerThey’re arguing again. Mom says she shouldn’t sit in the sun...
Struck Silent by Whalesong
By James ClaffeyThe morning of my mother's last day on earth the nurses didn't notice her waif-like frame slip out the door...
Book Review: Snowdog
By Beret OlsenIn Snowdog, Kim Chinquee’s latest collection of flash fiction, the writing is clean and concise, the language unornamented. “[T]he best time to make fake snow is when it’s actually snowing,” she writes in the opening story.
Photo Story: The Gaps Between
By Denise BayesThey announced on the radio that Freddie was dead. I picked up the phone. “Come over,” he said.
Photo Story: Valentine
By Christy BrothersMom packs us into the car. Billy and Jasmine sleep. I sit up front chewing the corners of my nails until they bleed.
Canadensis
By Corinne SilverThey arrived silently, swiftly during the night and stood present by morning. They flocked the fields, parking lots, and manmade suburban ponds. They were big.
Her Mother, My Mother
By Hema NatarajuHer mother never wore a sari, my mother never did not. Her mother drove a Mustang, my mother walked everywhere, even though I hated being picked up last.
Photo Story: At a speed of 0.5 inches per second
By Nora NadjarianThe heartbeat is fast and sharp, except no one knows where the snail’s heart is.
Don’t Bother, They’re Here
By Meg Pokrass“Guess what, Hon? They’re here!” you said, referring to the clowns. They were pounding on our door.
Gone Hunting
By Binx R. PerinoDanny sucks the wet end of a cigarette, tapping his hand on the steering wheel. Wisps of Maggie’s hair whip around from the rolled-down windows.
