Ex-President Fenk by Steve Gronert Ellerhoff For Eunice Tiptree, Royal Historian of Upper Ozgur, Ohio James, doubled over on the stool behind the practical jokes counter, sat like a slinky stopped between steps. He drew defensively with one arm fortifying his Moleskine. Meant to be illustrating the poster for the store’s Fifty-Ninth Annual Silliest Sneakers Contest, he instead sketched an idea for a strip he’d been working on. He had to work fast because Edgar, manager by birthright, was in […]
Sunday Stories: “Visiting Pluto”
Visiting Pluto by Sean Ulman After six years of false starts and cancelled plans, Joel, a bank broker, brought his wife and son from Chicago to visit his siblings, Rhonda and Peter, and Seward. His sister cared for their pained brother ever since his nervous breakdown eight years ago. Her mental health, daily subjected to her patient’s futile fixations, alien alliances and riptide rationales, had, staggeringly, only faintly deteriorated. While his older brother half hugged his sister nurse, who stayed […]
Sunday Stories: “The Huffer”
The Huffer by Sean H. Doyle There was this Mormon kid in my neighborhood that had a half-pipe ramp in his yard. The Mormon kid’s parents had spent a lot of money to get it built for him. Because it was the best ramp in our zip code, everyone was always there just hanging around — every now and then guys from semi-famous bands like Jodie Foster‘s Army would show up. Most of the time I would just go over […]
Sunday Stories: Beaches
Beaches by Daniel Morris Coney Island A guy calls, “ICE COLD WATER, ICE COLD COKES.” Then quietly: “beers”. His white shirt is sweated through and he’s wearing jeans out here at the seaside, sand in his socks. “Hey buddy, some of those.” The drinks are in two plastic bags, the bottoms heavy with ice. It probably costs him 4 for a 6-pack. He charges 3 a beer. 6 beers, that’s 18. 14 for profit. “Keep the change and keep ‘em […]
Sunday Stories: We Must Move Forward to Regress
Hey Y’all, One of the projects I’ve been working on these days is a book called “Danceroom Balling” about why, though I played in a million bands for a million years, I was always on the wrong side of music. The essay below is the proem I plan on kicking it off with. Enjoy. We Must Move Forward to Regress (A Jerk’s Defense of This Book) by Chris Leo As both a leader and a follower, I find myself stuck […]
Sunday Stories: Coma
Coma by Shelagh Power-Chopra When I think of Arthur falling into the coma, I imagine him diving headlong into a mud puddle. Slip sliding down a dark abyss and drowning–his hands like stunted flippers, getting him nowhere. But he’s like that; a beautifully angular man, all sharp corners but clumsy as hell as if his body were carved by an amateur puppeteer. Noisy in life but an avalanche of man when unconscious: heartbeats that galloped across monitors, cacophonous wheezing and […]
Sunday Stories: Chocolate Milk
Chocolate Milk by Jon Reiss The beginning of my senior year of high school was a really great time. I was getting a lot of acting work and kids who I didn’t even know would come up to me in the hallways at school telling me they saw me on TV. People wanted to be my friend, I had more money than I understood and girls were fond of me. Every month I got a haircut and every day seemed […]
Sunday Stories: The Dead River
The Dead River by Jéanpaul Ferro Jack Linton had been floating down the Dead River for three long months now. Early in the morning, the sun would turn the crown of each wave a different hue of golden-brown, turning a flat black as each swell slouched down and became a rapid at Elephant Rock and Mine Field. The river was ancient compared to a man, and each morning it seemed to get older; but at thirty-eight, Jack felt this enormous […]