Fiction
“We’re Not So Different, You and I”
“We are both strangers to this world,” Death Skull intoned. “Maligned, misunderstood. We make our own paths, live by our own rules.”
By Simon Rich
“Pulse”
He felt a pure, infantile fear. The smell of pencils. The cold metal smell of the ladder. There was a static crackle above him. And it froze his blood.
By Cynan Jones
“Finistère”
A man travelling alone in his morbid fifties does not talk to a girl in her teens without family or guardian in sight, especially not in this black romantic mood.
By Kevin Barry
“Bozo”
I wanted to invite him to my place, to ask when his shift was over. But he probably got questions like that every night.
By Souvankham Thammavongsa
“Allah Have Mercy”
I was aware that my daring escape had made Uncle look like a fool, and I knew that from that evening on I would be in the crosshairs of his vengeance.
By Mohammed Naseehu Ali
“Neighbors”
Here was his chance to descend the stairs and exit the house. But he didn’t do it.
By Zach Williams
“The Time Being”
It had never been my ambition to be rich. My fortune came into being almost against my will.
By Joseph O’Neill
“Hostel”
All the time there was a stranger in the house with them, a girl who might have been anyone, whose name they didn’t even know.
By Fiona McFarlane