Soon after we were married, Natasha and I took a road trip out west. We had no particular plan besides, “Head west, young man!” and stopping at as many cool places as we could find before we hitting the Pacific. Eventually, we were driving into Wyoming, toward Devil’s Tower. The…
Dennis Darling, dressed in full business attire, sat at the corner table of Old Joe’s. It was a quaint little coffee shop with more patrons than table space. Quaint, in this case, also meant fashionably dilapidated. The local photos on the wall were badly faded, the paint chipped, and Dennis’s…
Okay, I confess, the blog title is a lie. We do exist. (I do, at least.) It is, however, quite in style to wonder if maybe, really, we don’t. All sorts of super-smart tech people, like that eccentric inventor Elon Musk, wonder if we aren’t just simulations in a giant…
I am blinded by uncounted lightless days, by a half mile of stone, by walls that do not yield and cannot listen. My wide open eyes have absorbed darkness until I dream black and wake and know no change. When food comes, scraps, I hear nothing or I hear their…
“It looks like a video compilation of epic fails.” “It’s not that–” “No, seriously, dude, it’s like something out of a 80s kids’ movie. There’s no way it’s flying.” Michael shook his head, bemused. His friend’s insults didn’t bother him. He’d been saying the same thing for weeks. “Does that…
The nymph returns. I see her bare, dirt-smeared feet as she flits away. Her eyes peer at me through the bushes. They are wild, fiery eyes. My work calls, but I think to catch her, moving slowly, tentatively. She runs, howling with laughter, her lanky form slipping through some crack…
She was weeping, and he could not bear her weeping. Royal Advisor Antony Sculton loved the Queen dearly, having sacrificed decades in raising and training and guiding her. Nothing–not his grey hairs or failing body or lonely existence–made him feel as helpless as when the Queen cried. He stood just…
Today I woke at 6 am. I didn’t want to. My alarm went off and I hated it with the wrath of a thousand suns. But I woke. Today I ate off-brand Lucky Charms. There were not enough marshmallows. Today I drove to work. My car was nearly out of…
Robert shuffled onto the front porch, pulling the wooden door shut with an ancient creak. Patches of the floor boards were still painted, having survived another winter of freeze and melt. His chair, as weathered as the porch, he had brought out that morning, one item of a very short…
Bed: sheets (disarray), cover like an empty shell (two blankets from the closet layered within), pillow (hair-stained), nightstand. Nightstand: alarm clock (off), tissue box (empty), cup (empty, dried residue), thermometer, trashcan (filled: wadded tissue (mucus-encrusted)). Trashcan original location: bathroom. Bathroom: toothbrush (dry from lack of use), shower (dry from lack…
When she was a baby, I could just cover her eyes with my hands and then take them away. Peek-a-boo! It astonished her. I disappeared and then reappeared. Magic. When I first taught her to play hide-and-seek, she would hide under the desk. And then, before I had finished counting,…
In my continuing effort to put online short stories from “The Archive,” I present today “The Madness of Franz Agapa.” This story is a spin-off, of sorts, from “The All-Seeing Prophet of Fortune and Love” and exists in the same world as “The King’s Shield.” Pierre Agapa is a adventurer/treasure…