The Accomplice | Debbie Hudson
My mate Callum had a broken family. When his mum dived headfirst over the eighth floor railing of the Headrow carpark, then ricocheted off the bin outside the McDonald’s as though she were a bouncy ball, his dad found love down at The Dog and Pond pub, snuggled in the mechanical arm of the bandit. […]
The Pile | David Reiersgord
Each day, The Pile of rubbish in the middle of town grew and grew, as if it were alive or some kind of urban mushroom in the dead of night. For as long as the teenaged Mikal could recall the heap had been there, sticking out amidst the dilapidated buildings of the community he called […]
The Girl in Denim | Eddie Generous
“Communicate with aliens. Putin owes me money,” the woman in the huge mascot suit said under her breath. These were things she’d read on the wall of the referees’ locker room toilet that morning. Other things were written there, too, but mostly dealt with blowjobs or hockey players’ wives. She stood next to a small […]
- Best of the Net Nominations: 2021
- Alien Stories | E.C. Osondu
- Skin Hunger: Part 2 | Paul Daniel Ash
- The Accomplice | Debbie Hudson
- The Pile | David Reiersgord
Three Poems | Chisom Okafor
In another life, I am twenty-two, gifted and curious and dreaming of fleeing the world, while perched on the transom of a stallion of the sea, breathing stale evening air off the waterline, an entanglement of sodium chloride and ancient seawood. The boy on the other side is waiting, arms outstretched, as though to receive […]
Four Poems | Natascha Graham
WAR’S ORPHAN AND THE SOUND OF SILENCE There is a stillness, even now, a silence of a night stretched too long over and above a world stretched too thin, too black – liquorice. All sorts of silence, the sweetness of it left at a train station between hanging baskets of primroses and daisies, to the […]
Losing Sharon | Sarah Gundle
I was chopping carrots to make soup when I returned the hospital social worker’s call about my patient, Sharon. I had made calls like this many times before. At 78, Sharon had multiple medical conditions and was often hospitalized for brief periods. But this time was different. The social worker said brusquely: “Your patient; she […]
