Three Stories to Pick One

When I awoke, I was tied with my hands behind my back around a post in the ground. My head hurt like hell and it took a minute or so before I could get my eyes to open and focus. I heard the voices first. The same strange language as before, but this time there were more than just the […]

The Party

The party was for you. It wasn’t your birthday, in fact you had no idea that the party belonged to anyone, least of all yourself, but I’d only thrown it because I thought you might come. The first guests showed up in loud, staccato bursts before a steady stream flowed into my apartment. Each time the door opened I climbed […]

Pick Up/Drop Off

Five o’clock was time to pick up the kids from day care. Always a good time of day, for some reasons that I would admit… and some others that I wouldn’t share so readily. On the public side, everyone will tell you that watching your kids’ eyes light up when they see you have arrived to pick them up, and […]

California

I carried the truth onto a crowded Delta Boeing, folded inside me like an overpacked suitcase, praying the zipper could handle the strain just a little while longer. I held it close during the two hour layover in Houston, and on the final plane to California, crammed between the window and a man who didn’t understand that I was saving […]

Thunder and Lightning

“Fuck. This heat is unreal.” I think to myself. The sun has been relentless today, baking the heavy, dead-calm air into miles-high thunderheads. I can feel the air around me growing ever heavier with humidity. Electricity is building in the clouds west of the pool where I’m lifeguarding. Making ten dollars an hour, sitting in a lifeguard’s chair, yelling at […]

My Old Man’s Gone, Wana Get it On?

I was a teaching assistant, in both the Sociology and Anthropology survey classes. Hence, I had a lab class to teach with approximately 20 – 25 students. Most of the students in these intro classes were freshmen and sophomores, occasionally there were juniors and seniors who needed a class to fill out their schedule for graduation. A paper was required […]

Hotel

You were surprised when you got the invitation. It was from a friend you’d met traveling, more of an acquaintance than a friend by the time he sent it. You would have RSVP’d with your regrets and best wishes, but you knew I’d never been to that part of the country before, and thought it might be fun to take […]

A Vacation for Sam

Cassie Blackstock peered into her ensuite mirror, carefully examining her smooth unblemished complexion and the curves of her naked body. She was bone tired and utterly burned out. It had been a month since her last decent night’s sleep; even her eyes ached. And it showed. Frowning, she leaned closer to the mirror. In the bright white light of her […]

She Cleans More than The House

I had this woman who cleaned my house for 15 or so years. She was both attractive and nice, but her home life was a wreck; verbally abusive husband and a problem child, and it seemed like that was all she wanted to talk about, so I usually just left her alone. After 10 years, she finally dumped the loser […]

Adventures of a Private Eye

I’m Lew Carver. I’m a Private Detective, recently retired from the Chicago Police Department, and recently divorced. My former wife got just about half of everything I had before the divorce, and now she gets half of my retirement pay. That’s not enough for me to live on – at least not how I want to live, so I’ve started […]