Month: August 2021

I was almost asleep, worn out by my girlfriend’s passionate lovemaking. We had been together for the last year at university and a year since then, but this was the first time we had been able to be in a bed together since I had moved out of my parents’ house into this basic flat above a shop in Orpington […]

Tessa sat on the big overstuffed couch in her grandmother’s living room. She had been there three days and was bored out of her mind. Her grandmother lived on a farm out in the country. There was nothing but national forest all around it. Woods, woods, and more woods. She had been raised in the city. Malls were her thing, […]

“Shaun, what the fuck is — are you alright?” someone asked. Bleary-eyed, I looked up and wiped tears away with the back of my hand. I blinked and saw my little sister, Amanda, looking at me with a great deal of concern. She had good reason to be. Two empty bags of potato chips, the Nelson’s wrapper, half a dozen […]

I glared at the sun. How dare it shine so brightly? I covered my head with my blanket and tried to reclaim sleep. Instead, I laid awake, staring at the dim green light that managed to leak through the sheets. I closed my eyes and saw the whole terrible drama again, playing out before me like a movie. Pain, tears, […]

Though it wasn’t yet ten in the morning, the air inside the house felt stifling. Sweat beaded on my forehead, and I tightened my ponytail, keeping my hair off my neck. My parents and I stood in the living room, and Mom waved a hand in front of her face, her fair skin flushed. Dad picked up their large suitcase, […]

Family Vacation “Checking in, reservation for Kincaid,” “Yes, Mrs. Kincaid, welcome to the Grande Marine resort, how was your trip down?” “Fine,” came the response, but it had been far from fine. The reality was that eight hours in the minivan with boys ages 5 and 8 was never a good time.

Mary was the CFO of a Fortune 500 company. She was also a beautiful woman. She had also once graced the cover of PlayBoy. Little did she know that her appearance in PlayBoy had stirred the desires of Mary’s former classmate, Tina. Unfortunately, for Tina, Mary had gotten married right out of college to a NFL player.George left Mary unsated […]

“Damn it, Bill — just admit it. You’ve been a corporate whore for the last ten years! You know what you’re selling does nothing, it’s just pablum to make the customer feel good, and you charge a small fortune for it.” It was an argument we had at every conference; as far as I was concerned, Bill had turned into […]

Where James grew up, the soil was tanned dirt, the grass a parched brown that went undrunk like winter leaves. When he saw those first patches of dirt each year, he would watch his window as night after night the jellyfish-blue moon squeezed by, counting down the remaining days of spring. Then, when the summer heat arrived, they would load […]

It should not have come as a surprise to me when the podcast I had been listening to cut out as my phone lost reception about 20 kilometres from my destination. I tried flicking through some of the radio stations and found either drawling country and western or cricket, neither of which held my attention.