Charm
Noa Covo
When we were seven years old, Dave bought a levitation charm from the candy store on our street. I was a nickel short, so I got a sour gobstopper instead. He hovered a few inches off the sidewalk and I rolled the gobstopper around in my mouth as we walked in the afternoon sun.
This Would Be The Part Of The Movie
Giles Montgomery
This would be the part of the movie where I say, “I love you,” and it wouldn’t matter that we’re soaked through from the rain because your eyes are telling me that you love me too, that you’ve loved me since the moment we first met and you’ve only been waiting for me to work through my flaws and see what was right in front of me all along.
Wassamotta
Robert Boucheron
Located north of the Arctic Circle, where the frozen tundra meets the ice-capped ocean, Wassamotta lies in a white wasteland, a desolate place of packed snow, where winter lasts nine months of the year. Human habitation is out of the question. On the darkest days, the sun lurks below the horizon, and all you see is a gleam.
The Offspring of Your Dreams
Franco Amati
Deanna, expectant mother, looked up at her doctor. Her eyes were wide and her mouth slack-jawed.
Dr. Pearle explained: “We use statistical modeling to create the most accurate simulation of your child’s neuronal development from conception to age twenty-three. That’s roughly when synaptic pruning is completed. It allows us to make predictions about your child’s cognitive profile. Do you have any questions before we proceed?”
A Theatrical Romance
Linda McMullen
In the spectral glow of the ghost light, he kissed me upstage and down…
By day I fed him lines; by night, strawberries; he declaimed my infinite variety. He bore a charmed life as the sole survivor of every tragedy. I knew him as Horatio.
I Hate Vermonica F.
(And You Should Too)
John Adams
Vermonica F., current darling of Madison Elementary, twirls her cold and greasy hair between pudgy, gray fingers. “Beauty is a construct,” she says. But because she’s a mad scientist’s reanimated laboratory creature, her words sound like “Booyays curnstrurn.”
Baggage
Zach Murphy
Claudia and Mark stand bewildered in the refrigerator section of the local market, gazing at the vast varieties of milk.
“There’s so many to choose from,” says Claudia.
“Let’s just get the regular one,” says Mark.
“What does regular even mean anymore?”