You Must Be Present To Win by Carl Page I’m sneaking up on the Bluebird Café, which will be on my right any minute now. I don’t want to get out and just stare at the blue awning and the storefront windows like a gawking tourist or some kind of deranged stalker, so...
Good Girls by Kate Brennan The light outside feels punitive, like a cop flashlight. Or God. Nina laughs when I tell her this later because she doesn’t believe in God. Or cops. I haven’t made up my mind about either one, but I do know that that’s what sunlight feels...
Care Package by Ali Morretta I’d been at boarding school for a month when my mother sent me a boyfriend in a box. His name was All-American Alex, and he hailed from a novelty kiosk in the mall. Alex was ten inches tall and made of carcinogens, with silky brown hair...
Carmen by Isabela Sanderson Last Wednesday my girlfriend turned into a fairy. Not the Celtic kind, or Elven kind, or Eastern European or anything good like that—she turned into the pixie kind. With dust and sparkles and diamonds and little wings that glimmer brighter...
Rip and Pinch by John Leh No one else paid attention to trivia. The girls and Ronald were too busy listening to Trevor whine about Rearsborough, Ohio. The mass shooting was all over the news. It happened at a public library scheduled to host a drag queen story hour,...
The El Salvadorean Motorcycle Accident by Michael Fitzer The Sun dipped into early evening as my driver’s rust-marked cab slowed behind a collection of thin cattle, each with its hip bones and bumpy spine pumping up and down like the pistons of a slow-moving tractor...
