A different boy calling this time—how many were there? Sounded like a party was happening in the background. Were parties so boring now that kids made prank calls to random businesses in the phone book? Or crank calls, was that the correct term? Roger was maybe 12 the last time he called someone as a joke. As a teenager he mostly called Steve. He’d ask Steve what he was doing, Steve would answer nothing, and they’d meet at one of their houses and do nothing. When they discovered drugs, they added drugs to the nothing-doing which made them feel like they were doing something. But they were doing nothing, especially not prank- or crank-calling anyone.
Bad Fruit by Catherine Roberts
Falling in love is like lighting a scented candle. You spend years in the dark and suddenly everything is filled with light and the sweet smell of berries and roses. But before long, it’s snuffed – a part of you forever melted away until the wick is lit again. This can only happen for so long until you’re left with nothing but a pool of cool wax.
After the first few loves of my life, I only had boyfriends I couldn’t stand. Jake with the specks of toilet paper stuck to razor cuts on his chin, or Troy who peed in the sink while brushing his teeth for “convenience”. There was always an urge, squirming, eyeless and hungry, under the surface of that once-sweet fruit. To feel more.
So, I started crashing funerals.
When Sweet turns Sour by Mel Fawcett
I’d often seen the hoodie-clad cyclist in the neighbourhood – forever going too fast, jumping lights, and screaming at pedestrians and motorists alike. On this occasion he attempted to pass on the inside of a car, but he misjudged the manoeuvre, was squeezed against the curb and narrowly missed coming to grief. He shouted abuse at the hapless motorist as she drove away.
Memories of an Island by Ian Johnson
Byron Tatterman pulled open the big church doors and stepped inside. He was early, but Father Holm was already in the lobby, a hand raised in greeting. He wore khakis and the standard black shirt and white collar, and approached Byron with the step of someone comfortable on his home turf.
“Hey there,” the Father said. “Thanks for coming in.”
Byron said, “Sorry to interrupt your day.”
Even the Dawn Needs Help Breaking Sometimes by Patrick Meeds
The human handhas six striking surfaces.That is good practical informationto have when you considerthat most of the mysteryleft in the universe is microscopicand yet at the same time, there are stillmany immense things still left […]
Movie Magic by George Nevgodovskyy
I could always spot the look. That glint of recognition. A sideways glance, a tinge of embarrassment. Most people crumble – unable to separate fiction from reality. You’ve thrilled them. Aroused them. You’ve made them sob violently in an empty theatre. A matinee.
They’ve even modelled themselves on the characters you’ve played. The way they speak. The way they dress. That’s why most can’t resist the urge to approach you. Make sure you know they exist too.
Aren’t you that actress from –
I just loved you in –
When Henry Ford Hired The Invisible Man By Maureen Mancini Amaturo
I am invisible. As yet, I have not been able to reverse that. I need money to continue my optics research to discover the remedy, and my resources will not last to fund equipment, chemicals, a place to conduct my experiments. This apartment serves me for the moment, but I will not be able to afford it much longer. A classified I saw in the morning paper seemed a timely opportunity.
“Ford, here.”
I could tell by his voice he was a man of little patience. I got right to the point. “Griffin calling. Your classified for an opening on the assembly line, the night shift, has it been filled?”
How to inherit storytelling by A.J. Akoto
*All italics in parentheses are excerpts from Unmothered, A.J. Akoto’s debut poetry collection, published by Arachne Press in July 2023.
My mother dreamed me before she even knew she was pregnant. The message of me came from her grandmother. Her dead grandmother. Woman to woman, across realms, whether real or in the imagination-soaked field of my mother’s subconscious, they communicated. I sometimes wonder if my mother and I would talk more if one of us were dead (Dreams are a gathering place,/ after all. Is she meeting me/ where she can?). Then again, the silence between us is so populated – by memories, stories, aunts trying to push me into contact – that it makes me question what it really means to no longer talk to someone. Especially when that someone is your mother.
Hands Up Who Wants To Die by Sonya Vatomsky
I didn’t think anything of it when the mail arrived. Or rather I thought about the mail arriving, about the spoils of my latest shopping spree. I had, you see, a moderately popular YouTube channel and was in a perpetual state of buying and receiving perfume — samples usually, tiny vials always turning up under sofa cushions and between the pages of magazines. Mail, much like my life, could be exciting but was under no circumstances unusual. X led to y without dilly dallying; events brushed the crumbs of chance off their no-nonsense cardigans. My flat smelled of vetiver and old habits.
Idle Ink 