The Third Party
by Sylvia Math
There is a particular kind of woman I hate. This kind of Tracy Flick/Gwyneth Paltrow type. You know who I am talking about; I know you do. They are joyless players, constantly calculating how to become president of the asskissers association of whatever social arrangement you have the misfortune to be stuck in with them. They don’t even want to be president of that, but it’s female auxiliary, which is why I said asskissers association…
The Lifespan of a Long Fuse
by Ben Bird
I’m staring at the baby blue paint peeling off the back of our house, daydreaming about blowing up the neighbor’s pool. Fat John and I have been going to the library once a week, reading up on how to build pipe bombs. Truth is, it’s not that hard, but we’ve never been able to get enough firepower to do any real damage. We tried putting one under Fat John’s stepdad’s car after he ran over Fat John’s foot and didn’t even apologize. All it did was mess up the tire a little bit and get Fat John a nice belting. He showed me at school the next day, his big, bruised ass spilling out over his pants as he pulled them down. We got in real big trouble for that. When I met Fat John, in second grade, he was a skinny little kid, just like me, but even more thin, even more wiry. That’s how he got his name. People could see right through him. They thought it would be funny. As we got older, Fat John filled out a little bit more each year. Almost like he had to catch up to his name.
Cheesequake
by Joel Henry Little
Seated alone in the back of Grace’s dad’s hatchback, Stella kept her chapped fingers curled beneath the hem of her skirt on the off chance June or Kara should catch a glimpse in the reflections that flickered across the dusty rear windows. She didn’t mind it like this, facing the wrong way while the cracked parkway and the charred trees and the low gray hills blistering up from behind the endless gray distribution centers unfurled before her like the conveyor belt of the world. She didn’t mind being alone in the other girls’ company while they blathered on about defunct sororities and the legendary wastrels of the class of ‘14 – there was nothing so unusual in it for her, being there and being apart. She didn’t like their company much anyway, though she hoped they wouldn’t say the same for her.
Possibly Goldenmouth
by Andrew Farkas
“There will be no explanations.”
That’s what the Villain might have said, when the corpse of the Superspy lay sprawled out before him. That’s what he might have said, if he spoke at all.
But he doesn’t speak. Ever.
In February
by Meg Yardley
February is the worst month of the year for teachers.
In February, Avery Williams knows with absolute certainty that her students are ungrateful, entitled, hormonal monsters whose attention spans have been atrophied by their screen addictions, who are learning nothing from her class, and who will go on to lead miserable lives with no genuine human connection and no ability to think for themselves.
In February she calculates her salary for all the possible retirement timelines (it should be in five years, but with the budget cuts…).
Girl Scout
by Elise Jeanmaire
Evie matched with Brad. His face was skinny, softly bearded, and kind. There was no brooding, flexing, signs of a fraught relationship with masculinity. Brad’s hair was perfectly coiffed, like a soft wave, poised to deliver a surfer back to the beach safely. In every photo, no matter what, his hair remained perfectly shaped. On top of a mountain, coiffed. Playing frisbee with his friends, coiffed. Attending a work conference, coiffed. At the barbershop, dazzlingly coiffed. What kind of miracle hair product was he using? Evie needed answers! The last picture she scanned was of Brad on a beach with his shirt off. His body was solid and hairless, which was nice because she wasn’t sure if she was ready to handle body hair. She wasn’t even sure she was ready for a man.
Inheriting It
by Garrett Crowe
I have to call an 800 number cause my father’s oxygen machine starts buzzing. Lights go red. The whole alert. My father tells me he thinks the machine has “blown a rod.” He’s just breathing tube-air. Turns out, the machine’s been acting this way for weeks. My stepmom hasn’t done a thing except power the machine off, then power it back on, she’s fighting her own cancer, has her own cigs to smoke. My brother is nowhere to be found. And my father assures me he’s breathing just fine, even when his oxygen machine whines in a high-pitched frequency. I eventually track down a service.
For a Pint of Plum Liquor
by Arjun Razdan
In puffs the kettle on the old oven sends the smoke. Pictures of elders have moist frames from the heat generated in the room. He sits at his desk, trembling hands, hands trembling from having drunk a little bit too much of his cherry brandy yesterday. Outside, the apple tree has shed its foliage. The pear tree is nearly bare rising into the cadre of the window, piercing it. Beyond, you see the bare mountains now almost brown from the gone sheen of the sun and a year past. He looks at his mother in one of the photos, sheepskin coat and turning over the beads, and then he looks down on the desk in front of him, at the square pocket of brown paper that is the postcard. He lifts it from his desk, takes a stamp and puts his saliva to the back of the tampon, before