NEW Fiction from Cathy Ulrich lets the other woman take charge.
"I want your husband to accidentally call you by my name. I want him to be rough where he had been gentle before. I want you to know what kind of man it is that you’ve married.
All I had to say to him was: I’ll do whatever you want."
NEW Fiction from writer Sarah Szabo: "Awake", a chilling short story of a life spent trapped.
"I spend the hours staring at the inside of my eyelids, sometimes a dark thick sleep mask, sometimes crying, always thinking, always nothing but the words “help me.” ... "
NEW Fiction: Zombies and miracles in Lara Herrington Watson's short story "Cinemagic at St. Raphael the Archangel's Assisted Living Home".
"Wilbur turned off the movie and paced the room, thinking about that three letter word. Sex. He shook his head. He was not supposed to think about sex. How long had it been since he and Franny had even been naked together? Living together, sharing nothing, they were more siblings than lovers. How much of the reason was just old age? How much was her stage three zombosis infection? He leaned over her sleeping form to kiss her forehead, her eyes fluttered open and her dark brown eyes stared at him. She almost seemed herself. She smiled and kissed him: a chaste peck of the lips. Outside, the snow was swirling, but a faint smell of floral perfume washed over him ..."
There are advantages, that’s for sure. I can take a knife to my apple and cut away the bruises, whereas with my heart I had to suffer its accumulated injuries all times and forever. I’ve a little door on my chest now, like a small square flap with a latch that I can open, so I can view my apple every day and check out the shape it’s in. And the skin I can peel away, if the blush on my apple ever gets too deep, too bold, and threatens to spread to my face and give my feelings away. Because my feelings are still centered there, in that spot beneath my left breast, more than ever I think.
NEW Fiction from Laura Ross.
She lights a cigarette. When she is ready, and wearing nothing but the diamond Cartier watch, the aquamarine bracelet, the winged mermaid tattoo, and someone’s Channel sunglasses, she walks past the rumpled motel bed, the thumping flat screen television, and the threshold of the sliding glass door, where she steps out into the light.
