PORCELAIN by Nicholas Claro
The couch is more of a loveseat. It hardly seats the two of us. On it is the pillow and blanket I’ve been using. This is the longest conversation we’ve had in over a week.
JACKFRUIT by Gwen E. Kirby
Now that your precious jackfruit is out in the world, latch the angel onto your body and let nature take its course. She held her jackfruit to her breast, to her arms, her neck, rubbed it against herself until she was raw.
HOBBIES by Robbie Herbst
She’d say that it’s not enough for a man to create a life; he must sustain it. Protect it. Sufficiency means safety. It means contingencies. It means insurance.
IF SHE WERE AN ANIMAL by Cameron Darc
He fondles a piece of charcoal and looks at me before touching the paper. The line makes a limp imitation of a spine. A nose appears.
COMPANY MAN by Jeff Karr
The lord’s light is a fathomless null. Sometimes you’re afforded a glimpse and it’s a tunnel on the other side of which you crawl on the accordioned car’s ceiling.
SMOKE AND FISH by Uyen P. Dang
At first everyone blamed the smoke on the war, then the steel plant, and, finally, the water. But Ong Hai says it’s not water but grief at the bottom of the sea.
AT THE VERY CENTER OF YOU IS NOTHING by Alice M.
The masks were thin, pliable. They attached to her skin, seamless. They emoted for her, always appropriate, guaranteed to fetch the reaction she wanted.
HEARTLESS by Alex Sullivan
Those twins out of St. Paul are doing some live podcast tour about living without lungs but that’s easy, the no lungs thing.
WHEN IT FIRST STARTED COMING DOWN IT WAS BEAUTIFUL by Billy Irving
The Weatherman describes the snow as dumping. Feathery bundles fall against all things and accumulate against all things, and besides that: the grey, and the cawing of invisible birds.
HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS by Aaron Burch
It was exciting and sad and over too fast and underwhelming and amazing, all at the same. It was all of it. It was beautiful.