genre: Fiction

Alien Hand

By Grace Talusan   

Before he left the Philippines to move in with his son, the American doctor, Titong made a bargain with himself: He would burn cigarettes on the tip of each finger before going back to his old ways. Yet, here he was, in his granddaughter’s room, beside her bed, in the middle of the night.

Decker

By James Sprouse   

We peeled off our rain gear at the back door of the Grant’s Pass Hotel, wrung the water out of our gloves, and traded our muddy boots for sneakers and moccasins. It wasn’t dark, but it might as well have been.

Street Theatre

By Louis Panagotopulos   

When I was in college it was known as guerilla theatre. I saw a lot of it in Harvard Square – activists in mawkish costumes dramatizing social and political issues, small crowds of curious pedestrians stopping to hear diatribes like . . .

Pomegranate

By Helen Elaine Lee   

(Excerpt from Life Without)   Choosing, it’s like a pomegranate fruit. Maxine talked one up once and when she did, I could almost taste it, almost hold it in my hands, like this.

Teggin

By Karima Grant   

The yard was noisy, the women’s voices rising in unison, rising in dissension, rising sharply into the gathering night that had long ago chased away the men.

Zazz Zu Zazz

By Wesley Brown   

I’d stopped at a drugstore on 125th Street after school to buy some bubble gum when I heard a scuffle break out and a woman scream…

Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right

By Curtis Tompkins   

When I asked Bird if she would stay for good, she laughed and said You should know by now. Don’t you know what I’m thinking? This was after the fire…

Long Gone, a Tamara Hayle Mystery — Chapter One

By Valerie Wilson Wesley   

I was Pet Hayle’s one and only call, which shocked the hell out of me…

Season of Giving

By Roland Merullo   

It was the humblest of hometowns, but in a secret place inside himself he liked to think of it as The City By The Sea…

One Last Time

By Tanya Whiton   

“Danny died Tuesday,” Parker’s tight voice announces.

“I’m not having a good day,” I tell the answering machine, refusing to pick up…

Funeral Detail – April 2009 from We All Fall Down

By Brad Watts   

As the rain poured down, Justin was not looking forward to getting out of the van. He was not looking forward to playing the fake, electric, bugle for the hero that he was being paid fifty bucks to honor…