Archives

THE WHALES WILL THANK HER by Julie Chen

August 17, 2021

She seeks to save water when using the toilet. If it’s yellow, let it mellow, though she knows that can lead to malodor, so she makes sure to flush before she goes out or to bed, or if she hasn’t hydrated well and her pee is a deep autumnal mustard, like her favorite sweater. When she goes grocery shopping, she uses tote bags, of which she has many. The real challenge is to also bring those plastic bags in which one weighs produce. One can avoid them with fruits like bananas, whose peels are thick enough to shield from germs,

TO RIDER STRONG by Jade Hidle

August 16, 2021

You won’t remember me. It’s been twenty-nine years since my last letter. I always did my homework alone, because my mother didn’t know enough English to help. I always finished it early, so that I could watch you on Boy Meets World. Your gapped-tooth mischievous grin, your chokers, your hair-flipping. I knew bad boys at school, but we didn’t have any like you. You were a white bad boy, which is a good bad boy. And you made being wounded look so cool. I thought you would understand and that you would then elevate me to your level, turn my

BOY CRAZY by Lauren Barbato

August 13, 2021

The young married women at the conference upstate agree that it’s nice to be around someone so boy crazy. That’s how they say it: boy crazy. The young married women help you flirt with Ben, the writer from Seattle via Georgia. They accompany you to the pricey cocktail bar downtown and conveniently leave early. Ben walks you down a sleepy street with few lights to your tiny cabin rental. You show each other your tattoos as mosquitos nibble your ankles. In three years, you’ll be married, the young married women say. We want to come to the wedding. *** Lawrence

STRAWBERRY by James Jacob Hatfield

August 12, 2021

It’s not because I have Alzheimer’s, I’ve always been like this. The most fun I get nowadays is when I find things I lost. But I do remember her journal is underneath the couch. Before I’d never think to read her journal. But now that she’s gone I’d better retrieve it or else I’d forget about her completely. Reaching under our couch is like sticking your hand into that ominous hole in the wall of a cave. Feeling for a lever. Pencils. Dog toys. Remotes. Items that are sorely missed only when they’re needed. And are treasured only for the

GAY BROMANCE 2011: TROUBLE IN PARADISE EDITION by Unity

August 11, 2021

After a five-month stint as an unpaid “gardening intern” at the Tennessee trans sex cult compound outside Smithville, after a month or so helping my sister catch painted buntings for science in the ruralest part of backwoods South Carolina, and, finally, after a month’s worth of dogsitting, also for my sister, in beautiful coastal Wilmington, NC, I went back to New York. Forrest, Hannah and Zibby picked me up in Baby Scribbla, Forrest’s antique Mercedes Benz – his first, to my knowledge, but certainly not last. The car couldn’t shift into fifth and so we skirted the Interstate wherever possible

SIMPLE ANSWERS TO ESSENCE QUESTIONS AT THE INTERNATIONAL PAPERWEIGHT FESTIVAL by Pat Foran

August 10, 2021

Long before the wildness of fire engulfed their town, and well after self-winding watches had become a thing, the townspeople thought of themselves as a simple people who enjoyed simple pleasures. They saw light in paper moons and love in the soft ridges of the infinite arrowing of the universal “recycling” logo. They believed in paper planes and in the notion of shared paper routes. They spent their evenings pressing paper roses between the pages of 1959 Buick Le Sabre brochures. The townspeople took particular pride in the International Paperweight Festival they hosted each summer in the paper mill parking

PLUCKERS by Amanda Anderson

August 9, 2021

I was in the bathroom that fateful day, my butt cheek hoisted up in one hand, tweezers zeroing in on the mole with the other, when my boyfriend walked in. His eyebrows pinched together in disapproval. He asked me what I was doing. I stuttered, searching for a more attractive explanation, then finally told him I was plucking the hair out of the mole on my ass. He asked cheerfully if he could step in and take over. I handed him the tweezers, glad he wasn’t repulsed, only to see a sizable boner emerge in his pants. And so a monthly

“STORMS OF ENTHUSIASM” by Michael Seymour Blake

August 7, 2021

NOVELS_IM_GOING_TO_WRITE.DOCX by Aatif Rashid

August 6, 2021

Space Battles (1999) Like Star Wars, but from the perspective of a ten-year-old kid. He has a sword and a laser gun, and he and his friend save the galaxy from a group of evil aliens. Space Battles II (2000) Sequel to Space Battles I. The kid is now eleven, and he saves the galaxy again from an even bigger group of aliens. Space Battles III (2001) Sequel to Space Battles I and Space Battles II. The kid is now twelve, and he and his friend have a falling out. The first group of aliens comes back, though, so they

SHAGGING FLIES IN BALLARD by Alexandrine Ogundimu

August 5, 2021

I resolve to confess my feelings on Saturday. You take me to the batting cage up in Mountlake Terrace but the machines are so awful they eat our tokens and give us nothing back, no high-arching softballs or baseball bullets. I would never say anything because I am meek and unmasculine but you get a refund because you are handsome and friendly and always get what you want and I am jealous—of your confidence and looks and talents and physicality and how much sex you have. There’s a bucket of baseballs in your trunk so we drive to a park