Most recent stories

Carver Country

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My first love was a woman of principle. Never deny your man was her motto.

The Other Side of the Wall

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I’m glad they put the wall up. When it gets a little humid around here, I can smell those damn people.

Travis & Jared

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“Now I see clearly my whole life is pointed in one direction — there never has been any choice for me (Travis Bickle, "Taxi Driver").

The Right Thing

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His feet are the size of thumbs, the segments of his toes no larger than grains of rice.

hair

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A strange and unexpected shift has occurred.

I Follow

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Her shoes, left uninhibited below, seem sad but understanding, and she is so in love with something, which makes me so in love with the idea of her.

Fascination

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It rained on the morning of the party, and the weatherman promised it would continue throughout the day. But Marilyn didn't mind. She actually preferred entertaining in bad weather. Her rugs weren't valuable enough to worry about, and the gloomier the sky

Limits on Lint-Rollers Tighten as Illicit Use Spreads

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The latest teen abuse of an ordinary household item? Late-night “lint roller” parties at which boys and girls engage in heavy “feel-up” sessions that can lead to unwanted pregnancies, white slavery and in extreme cases, marriage.

Scoop

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“What about the other groups coming here?” I ask. “Were they asked what they wanted in these houses?” She turns and looks at me, like I've suddenly come onto her radar.

They Come To Me At Night

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I have an appointment set for the day after next; you said you thought you might be firing blanks and then I feel a kick into my chest—two kicks, three, seven at least—my cat is going crazy at the stinky tom outside the window and the birds are waking, sc

Hellgate

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Either it was rescue--if the customer was alive to be found--or recovery, the term for bringing out the dead.

Cat summoned for jury duty in Boston

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Cat summoned for jury duty in Boston Wayward hawk loose inside Library of Congress finally caught (God only knows what happened to the doves) Vacaville roof collapse blamed on bird droppings These are a few of my favorite things Piano mysterio

Oprah's Sister Murdered My Story

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Dear Patricia, You look marvelous. You seem marvelous. You've added wonder to Oprah's life and that's no small feat. But, here's the thing. I was working on this short story about a relative trying to get in touch with O, one of thousands, except, this one, well this one…

Hope's Amanuensis

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I was low on carburetor / oxygen and my fraud protection / had just expired.

A sense that something has happened

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hunting after dark,/ in the quiet they seemed to appear/ with every new poem I read, each new workshop, some hunting carried on/ by both animals.

Remember

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“What can I do for you?” he asks Dan, who then rolls up his shirt sleeve to reveal a list of names etched into his arm, with lines through them, like a scrawled timetable on a prison wall. The last name on the list is the only one without a strikethrough

Can't We All Be Writers?

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Why not just self-publish on Fictionaut and be read by thousands of my peers? Why not release my cherished work directly to my thousands of Facebook or Twitter or blog friends? Can the budding writer that I am realistically expect a larger audience?

End Scene

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In the fall it is especially beautiful with the blazing orange oaks set on fire against a crystal blue sky. It is here that she frequently daydreams of her demise.

The Taming

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N-n-never screamscold a cat.

Section

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In one section of the map C climbs a staircase.

I am not theirs and they are not mine

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My first year I hated how big and unruly the plants got.

Facing Budget Cuts, Schools Hire Samurai Crossing Guards

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“Out-of-work samurai have a choice,” says Bobby Ito. “They can terrorize local peasants at county fairs, or underbid low-skilled workers for menial jobs.”

Percentages

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There’s a problem with falling for a mostly straight girl. And by mostly straight, I mean, when you and I met at the Christmas cocktail dress-up party a year ago, you in red spandex with white fur trim and me in my straight-from-work black slacks and grey

Scars

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Who hasn't got a scar...some flesh wound of memory.

Deaf

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box

for god's sake, come in me already!

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There were others, too, during those years in the Sixties. I remember hooking up with that JAM girl one more time, when she was married and living in Urbana. They were going to swinger parties at the time, so she wanted to have sex with me once more for

Sex Ed With Barbie and GI Joe

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As soon as I discovered that nasty thing the grownups called “sexuality,” I just knew it would get me in a lot of trouble some day—with Jesus, my parents and some yucky boy—so I hid it. But my Mama and Daddy noticed my sinful sexiness way before I knew I

Entering Massachusetts: Please Don't Hug the Republicans

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I omit the names not to protect the innocent--there aren't any--but because you've got better things to think about in the run-up to the Super Bowl, like does anybody ever pull Troy Polamalu's hair in a pile-up?

What She Left

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I'm on Cloud 9.

Good Country. People.

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Initially, she had no hopes about his impending arrival, scrawny as he was, until realizing that, because he was a boy, because he was new around here, he might want to wrestle.