Daily Flash Fiction Stories
Wrinkled hands strike—
Once placid, the viridescent sheen of the loch erupts with frenzied movement. The oldest dance: predator and prey in a deathly waltz. Hands seize hold of the fish, fingers slipping on stippled scales, but in a second, the struggle subsides.
Rory lifts his hands above the water to display his prize. A brown trout summoned by aquatic rapture, a beast of dusky gold.
Continue Reading This StoryBy J. Paul Ross
Derrick Crosby was following 127 people online, and all of them were women.
Every morning between five and six, he sat in his picture-filled townhouse and scanned their feeds. He would sip his coffee and nod at their joyful announcements and happy memories, frown at their tragedies and heartbreaks, and coo at the photos of their pets. He would admire their children’s graduations and their birthdays, and whisper “congratulations” at their new jobs, or new babies, or personal triumphs. And though he would smirk at their clever observations, and sigh when they were purposely divisive, he never interacted with them; he would not remark or criticize, condemn or agree, would not post a single thumbs-up, wow, or sad-face emoji.
Continue Reading This StoryBy Casey van der Lee
“I told him, I don’t want your dirty drugs. Those are Little Ray’s drugs, and I ain’t messing with Little Ray,” said the witness as he fidgeted on the stand.
“Interesting.” The slick prosecutor walked over to the jury. “Earlier, you declared that you did not know who Little Ray was. Stenographer, please read back when I asked the witness about Little Ray roughly fifteen minutes ago?”
Continue Reading This StoryBy Jonathan H. Smith
“Welcome aboard,” Dr. High says before turning back to a huddle of white coats. He invites me to call him Jerry, but I don’t and probably never will. It’s my first day flying solo as a doctor, and I couldn’t feel like more of an imposter.
Derrick is here too, poor guy. I guess he would have been starting as an attending now, too. His face is pale, like you’d expect, and there’s a hickory furrow imprinted on his neck where he had hung. I wonder what he’s thinking.
Continue Reading This StoryBy Lucas Flatt
At the big basin sink I ask Janey, “Where does the bucket go?”
She’s at the table drafting and/or posting lesson plans on some kind of side hustle site. Her back’s to me. “Be more specific.”
“The food processor bucket.” I like to call un-bucket things “bucket.”
“It’s fine.” These words are meaningless; she’s focused.
I kind of want a new food processor, so I put the bucket in.
“I’m thinking about expanding my penis.”
“Huh.” She types rapidly, whereas I type slowly. It’s that kind of vibe. She barrels through some kind of itemized bucket list every day of her hard-charging life; I sharted in this very kitchen days ago, ill and only in boxers in a false-dawn recovery, looking in vain for some Froot Loops. I cleaned thoroughly, then pretty much gave up for the week.
Continue Reading This StoryBy Reese Alexander
It is autumn again. The cold surprised you when you stepped out of the library last night: it grabbed your nose and slipped its fingers down the length of your neck, stopping to trail a nail over the first vertebrae of your spine. It did not make you feel sick, or scared, as things often do these days. It just surprised you. Last year, you thought autumn would never end. You were nailed down onto the back of a perpetual November. But one day, when you crawled out from between quilted blankets, you noticed that the trees were bare. And just like that, autumn was gone. But now she’s back.
Continue Reading This Story