Fiction

THE AMMONIA REEK OF FRANCIS’S BREATH filled the examination room. Jemma forced herself not to pinch her nose, instead gripping onto the sides of her clipboard. Dogs with kidney disease had breath that could make a litterbox smell pleasant. She winced as Dr. Werner forcibly grabbed the schnauzer’s jaw, checking his teeth. “Also want to…

EVERY NIGHT, BEFORE I FELL ASLEEP, my mother would sing it to me: the song of Dahut, the princess of Ys, the Mari-Morgen. She sang it in a low, gentle voice, so that for many years I didn’t realize it was meant to be a sad song. O from where do my city’s bells now…

“WHAT’S THE VERDICT DOC, is this the end of the line?” Dr. Cicely stood at the door to the patient’s room, taking a moment to gather her thoughts while she looked at him. He was taking the situation better than some patients she’d treated, though she knew how quickly the emotional pendulum swung from jaunty…

IF – A WORD THAT FLOATS effortlessly from the lips and fades along with its forgotten promises and takes with it a myriad of possibilities and a wealth of potentially better memories. It has cast its shadow over every misfortune in my life: if I didn’t take that year off in university or if my…

LISA WINTER COULD ONLY SEE the back of Luc’s head as the repurposed school bus descended the steep valley toward Ahuachapan. The transmission whining through its downshifts was very loud. Over the noise Luc was trying to talk to Concha, the Volunteer Director, and the guys from Habitat for Humanity who were building houses at…

THE FIRST TIME someone’s shoes showed up in the toilet, people in class thought it was an accident, or at the least a one-off. Like there had been a vendetta, some score to settle or some shit like that. It was a targeted crime, they said. And it was in truth. Bianca hadn’t let me…

WHAT MADE ME THINK THAT GOING TO MONTREAL in the middle of February would somehow shake me out of my seasonal depression? The free flight from Prince Edward Island? The free hotel room for the two days of this literary conference? The opportunity of networking with other writers, editors, illustrators, publishers, agents and educators from…

JENNY SAID SOMETHING THE OTHER DAY at Elena’s soccer game that I’ve been thinking about a lot. Jenny’s my ex-wife. We get along, not just for Elena. It’s in our natures to keep the peace no matter what’s roiling inside us. I was telling her about my consulting business, StoryTeam, which has branched into internal…

IN 1951, MAX BIELER BOUGHT A FAILED RESTAURANT in downtown Binghamton and turned it into an Army-Navy store. His family members, who were not shy with their opinions, assumed he would call it Max’s Army-Navy Store. But Max was determined to call it Mac’s, and no squawking by his family could alter his mind. Suits…

THE GOD BOX SAT ON THE COUNTER in Burkhardt’s mother’s kitchen, where everything was dark faux-marble lined with white streaks like fat in a steak. Painted pale gold, the box, which was sandwiched between the wall and a trio of LED candles with dust rimming their cupped bulbs, was the kind of thing in which…