by Sarah Toney (This story contains suicide.) The air was thin and icy. Breathing it in felt like swallowing shattered glass. The city was beautiful from this height and the boy wanted to reach out and feel the warmth of the setting sun. The heaviness in his chest felt a…
by John P. Kristofco Sometimes she remembers those who come;sometimes she does not,her dreams blur with world she really sees: “I made doughnuts at the stove last night, before the men crawled from the pantry with their guns.”She sits inside the complex of a hoarder’s life,storing things forever from the thief who…
by Bobbi Sinha-Morey I was about to see her again, worry a fist pressing at the back of my neck when I drew up to her front door, in my heart still that flicker of home. Inside the only aunt I had left, a dear soul so close to my…
by Bobbi Sinha-Morey On perfect days if you looked through the small oval window you could see an old woman sitting by herself inside her darkened home, a duplex by the road, no front yard but a patch of yellowing grass untouched by the spring. Seldom did fingers of light…
by Vivian Lawry The first person who wasn’t there for me was my overworked, overwhelmed mother. Initially, her body betrayed me. When I was eight or so, she tried—again and again—to give my father the son he so wanted. What she gave him, instead, was a weakened, broken wife. She…
by Holly Day She is a character study of how old I could get if I just stopped smoking and drinking and got a good night’s sleep every once in a while, the old lady smiles at me from across the near-empty bus tells me she’s having another good day,…