Flash Fiction Magazine

By Ulises Amaya

We moved it into the corner where the fronds could stretch out a bit. It was early March but the weather had been so nice for weeks and weeks that we’d grown certain spring was reaching out to us. And when we first laid eyes on the bushy fellow, there was opportunity. “Take me, take me,” it seemed to say, like a pup running corner to corner in its cage and licking at you. That was how it felt at first. We thanked its seller and brought it home. A green palm in our partially lit apartment, fed by late afternoon sun from a westward window. That’s the first and most permanent step. It’ll go hungry for weeks and months to come.

[Read more…] about How to Kill a Plant

By Rita Plush

An outgoing kind of guy, game for anything, he used to say of himself, my father was lonely and at loose ends after my mother died; they’d been married 63 years. So it didn’t surprise me when I learned he was heading into NYC for a night on the town with Lenny, his 40-something neighbor who lived in his parents’ basement.

“I go to the Waldorf all the time,” Lenny had said. Did my father have a tuxedo?

Done up to the nines, they hopped an E train.

[Read more…] about A Dancing Man

By Tashpix

I can relax now, close my eyes and take refuge in the train rocking back and forth as it moves over the rails with a rhythmic clatter.

Getting here was tense. The faceless crowds in the station, milling and jostling, the acrid mix of sweat and piss and diesel fumes, the anxious line of people waiting to buy a ticket.

“Why didn’t they buy one in advance?” I could not help wondering, annoyed that they were in my way.

[Read more…] about Next Stop, Smyrna

By Emma Raymond

During the summer, when I was eleven, we played marbles on the school field at lunchtimes.  My technique was good, better than most anyway. You had to gauge how much force to use according to the length of the grass between you and your target. That was what I understood and my opponents didn’t.

Once, on a day that was too hot for football or cartwheels, a crowd gathered around my adversary and me. I chose my weapon: clear with orange spaghetti swirls. There was a hush as my smooth, gleaming orb hurtled towards that of Chris Winch. The satisfying clink of glass on glass. I stepped forward, swinging my bag as though careless, to claim my prize, a sphere of iridescent green.

[Read more…] about Losing Game

By Elaine Cohen

Brian came to her home at exactly six-thirty as Marie knew he would. With Brian, you never wondered if he would show up—always, always on time. God, she loved that, that never wondering.

Good evening,” Brian said.

She smiled. “Good evening.” She was tired of the casual men who muttered, “Hey babe,” as they brushed by her. She loathed their stained t-shirts and ripped shorts and the sound of sandals flip-flopping dirt across her tile floor. She liked Brian’s formality, his coat and tie and that, on the hottest day, he never perspired.

[Read more…] about Dinner With Brian

By John Slayton

Leyland grips the chair’s armrests, half logs of birch, slick with lacquer and yellowed. He shifts his weight to relieve the ache in his body. Above him, on the mantle, a row of framed photographs. Old friends. His mother and father. His sons. A black and white of his first dog: Smokie. On the end, the closest to him: his wife. All now gone, separated by death or distance.

A dull wind whistles at the back window of the house, and the chimney damper shifts, squeaking to a hollow clunk. A cold draft bears the scent of ash from the fireplace. It’s mid-afternoon, he wonders if he should start a fire. He glances to his dog, Blue, on the rug in front of the window. But there’s something he may need to do today. He doesn’t want to leave the fire untended.

[Read more…] about Beyond the Woods