Flash Fiction Magazine

By EJ Dahm

Shadows skitter across the newsroom walls, in sync with the video monitor lights. Hattie Barton watches the screens. A woman in a crisp suit waves to the crowd. Kess, Hattie’s business partner, whoops and leaps up from her pedestal. “Congrats, Hattie! She won by a landslide, thanks to your brilliant algorithms.” Kess high-fives her friend.

Hattie bows playfully, glancing at her Louis Vuitton heels. She quickly sits and pushes her feet under the desk, out of view. “No, Kess. She’s your creation. We did it.” Kess blushes.

Hattie leans back. A mix of happiness and disbelief radiates from her. Her mouth opens, closes. Like a fish pleading for water.

[Read more…] about The Reformation of Idaho

By Chris Kok

Dear Michelle,

Hello and welcome! First of all, thank you again for house sitting while Terry and I are on our tenth-anniversary trip (OMG HAWAII YAY!). I know I’ve been an absentee sister lately, but I promise I’ll make it up to you when I get back from my (hopefully) relaxing holiday.

Like any house, ours has a few quirks. You know what it’s like. To-do lists get longer and longer as problems pile up, and you just learn to live with them. Don’t worry, though, in the accompanying binder, you will find everything you need to know.

[Read more…] about Quirks

By Vicki Berger Erwin

Sophie had said nothing about feeling poorly, so it came as a complete shock when William woke and found her dead in their bed. At first, all he could do was hold her cold hand. Finally, he knelt at the bedside and laid his head on her silent, unmoving breast, and soaked the sheet covering her lifeless body with warm tears. Tears, he hoped, would wash away his despair.

They had no children. Most of their friends had died, as had their brothers and sisters. William felt empty, alone, and adrift without Sophie to anchor him. Who would prepare his breakfast? Lay out his clothes? Sing silly songs with him? Kiss him goodnight? And where would he find the money to pay her burial expenses?

[Read more…] about All Part of the Job

By Nancy Wade

The grocery store parking lot was a sea of white cars. Seems like I can never find mine since I bought that damn Honda with the platinum white pearl paint. I tried to look nonchalant pushing my cart through the slush and melting snow, hoping to locate the Honda. When a cold breeze whisked through me, I zipped up my coat. Should have worn boots. My feet were getting soaked. Ever since I hit my seventies, whenever I couldn’t find the stupid car, I figured that, like my mom, I was a step closer to the demise of my frazzled brain.

The idea of losing my mind made me sick to my stomach. Then I spotted my car and remembered that I’d intentionally parked on the other side of the lot. I’d been downtown and had come in from the north side instead of the usual south entrance. I headed home, relieved that the end was not quite as in sight as it seemed. And Mom didn’t have signs until well into her eighties—did she?

[Read more…] about Not Yet

By Carol Lewis-Powell

Facing the picture window that overlooked the sodden garden, Jonathan’s focus was not on the rotting leaves and the bare branches, but on the gray apparition of his wife. She flitted around the kitchen, her clogs creating a clunking tattoo of sounds which nudged his burgeoning headache further into existence.

The aura of affluence that she liked to project to neighbors was never more evident than in the kitchen. She drained him on every level, but most notably, his bank account. He knew that upstairs, hanging from the wardrobe door, was a new dress. Another one from the boutique in the village. The dress was beige, bland hessian and looked like a sack-cloth, not that he could describe his wife as a penitent.

[Read more…] about Cheese Board

By Stephen Duffin

I hated cats.

Last week a tabby scratched my arm. Blood everywhere. Scarred for life.

Savage twisted monsters.

And now I had another cat staring right at me.

It’s only a cat. Get over it.

The Persian spat like a psychotic white bundle of fluff with claws.

I willed it to disappear. Why don’t you get lost? Or drop dead?

[Read more…] about Picasso