Stories tagged flash-fiction

Anchovies

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Grandfather was surly. Everything angered him. He’d play solitaire at his table, blow cigarette smoke, eat canned anchovies, complain about grandkids drinking his bottled Coke.

Some Girl

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No matter how many times I brought someone home, down into the basement, after awhile there came the knocking on the door at the head of the stair: “Jerry, what are you doing down there? It’s ten o’clock already, for heaven’s sake. Dad and I are

Dance 'round an Invisible Fire

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“Do we really want to treat her? Is she even really sick, or does she live in a country as real as ours, but one we can never visit?”

The Captive

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....sees the beginning of a new day through the closed shutters, hears the guard washing up at the sink, feels the beginning of a cry in his throat.

Just Kidding

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Your place is extra. No it isn't. It is, baby. The man was as aroused by her discomfort as he had been annoyed by her laugh. She wasn't laughing now.

In a bar

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You read Latin? Drink vodka at ten in the morning? What are you?

Fleet Week

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One year it rained, and no one wanted to go. You were sick another year. Mom called it monkey pox, which Dad and I thought was hilarious. I went with Annie, who told the naval…

A Brief Meditation on Smoking

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There are two kinds of stupid in the world of smoking. The first kind includes anyone who smokes – knowing well that it is likely to cause terrible pain at a later point in their lives. The second kind includes the people who tell the first kind that sm

A Story About Glass

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That day I was going to write a story about glass but instead stopped and listened

Trying to get drunk in Los Angeles

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Getting the beer was easy enough

Pie

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Some folks say your hands can tell the story of your life. Well, my hands cain't talk, but they've made so many pies, I bet they could do it themselves if you cut 'em off and gave 'em the right ingredients, I sure do.

Flash Before Your Eyes

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It was the dead of winter. I took my father's shotgun from his closet. He kept it wrapped up in one of those khaki-colored gun tote bags that had a zipper running the whole length of the gun. It was a 16-gauge, single action shotgun. Anyone could tell wha

Our Stop

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With the pernickety finesse of an ageing cat, she waits for the bus to go, then circles the bus stop before pressing down one of the seats with a cautious finger. Only when she is sure it is clean will she sit. [394 words]

Bread

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The car inching along, she repeated, bread, milk, cake, over and over, so not to forget.

Aurora Borealis

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I recalled the one night stand I'd had with the girl one balmy summer night in Minneapolis. We lay on my bed in the moonlight, and I touched the nipples of her tiny breasts with the thumb and pinkie of one hand.