Fiction
An Evening with my Father
I noticed the paint coming off the white iron table in the lawn. I had made two steaming cups of coffee, baked some shortbread for..
Section
Short Fiction
Showing 193-216 of 304 pieces
Fiction
Catacomb
The soft, wet grass beneath our rain boots made squelching sounds as we straggled behind the tour group led by a small, dark-haired, Italian woman…
Fiction
In Those Days
In those days, there were no wheelie bins, there was no recycling: you put the trash out in round metal cans of the sort you..
Fiction
The Architect
“I need three Model B’s by this afternoon,” said George Oxburn, “And Harrison, nothing fancy.” Oxburn pointed to a sign posted above Ronald Harrison’s cubicle:..
Fiction
Cats
‘I have been thinking about getting a cat for some time,’ my husband said between sips of tea. I looked up in surprise. I had..
Fiction
The Incandescence of Boredom
Nandu turns five today. I’m given a list of things to get for the birthday party. Crayons, extra paper cups, Scotch tape, board pins, apples,..
Fiction
How To Converse With The Dead
When he was five years old, my grandfather discovered how to converse with the dead. It was a time for believing in Argentina. The Man..
Fiction
Still the ‘A’ Train
Not too many memories here, in these chic walls caught in the daily grind. But between the walls there are those truths—whistling through the subway..
Fiction
The Mosque
“You shouldn’t wear red. It’s not slimming. You need dark colors to minimize your weight. Are you listening to me?” Margie walked away from Vivian’s..
Fiction
Pretty
Kyle used to be pretty. He used to stop them in their tracks. He pretended he didn’t notice how mouths hung open and brains whirred..
Fiction
E-Love
What you seek is seeking you, Sara reads, a languid smile on her 26-year-old lips as she flips through a faded blue notebook and pauses,..
Fiction
Mother
It rained all through May in Fruili Venezia Giulia. One Sunday they ran the marathon wearing raincoats and windcheaters. Sidrah put her one-person moka pot..
Fiction
Epiphany
I turned seventy-five yesterday. Maxine, this alluring intuit from Mexico, told Sanjay last year, that I would wake up on the morning of my seventy-fifth..
Fiction
Fish Prints
I’m inking up a fish, concentrating on each scale. A faint breeze tickles the back of my neck. “Stop sneaking up on me, Emilio,” I..
Fiction
First cut
Elijahu, a word please. She leaps from the birth bed faster than a woman who has spent the last 40 hours sweating, heaving, grunting, shifting..
Fiction
The Best Stories
New York City in the winter is a difficult place for a three-year-old. The sidewalks are small, packed with snow and tourists, and slippery with..
Fiction
Novena
I.Buy the lotion. Buy the oil. Take the homeopathic vitamin mixtures. Drink the tinctures. Sweat lodge. Meditation. Cleanses. Wheatgrass so thick you choke. Teas so..
Fiction
The Girl on the Roof
She arrived in Buenos Aires with the story born of her travels so fulsome in her that she felt like a woman she’d seen in..
Fiction
The Reincarnated One
1956 was an especially poor monsoon year, the drought which had gripped our region intermittently over the past few years was now starting to take..
Fiction
Arcs of Memory
I No one in Bodhi’s village had expected an ascent of the Mount Everest. It alarmed his mother. Men had trespassed on an abode of..
Fiction
Remarkable Fall
On an otherwise ordinary autumn day, I killed a three-year-old boy. One might think that the air held some hint of warning, but it didn’t—just..
Fiction
To The Horizon
The wind blows the dust and dry dirt across the plains, ceaselessly lifting it from the earth only to set it down again elsewhere. The..
Fiction
Rabbit Bone Pink
“One of us should live here some day,” Dinesh says, gazing up at the ceiling in the living room of 42 RC. His sister, Sathya,..
Fiction
They’ll say it was an Honest Mistake
“Yo, J, Got a light?” I pulled the convenient store lighter from my pocket with finger cutoff gloves. My nails were blackened from the shop,..