Catharsis
by Daniel Seifert
“That hurts,” whined the old man as she brushed his thick white hair.
She sighed and stroked it through the wisps even more gently.
Still he complained. “Too hard. Too loud. Too fast.”
Sunday Stories: “In despair? JESUS is your hope”
In despair? JESUS is your hope
by Elise Arancio
In despair? JESUS is your hope
reads the billboard from the side of the highway.
The billboard has reached its target audience. I am in despair. I am driving to my mother’s house for Easter, which is located thirty minutes south of nowhere. I have to drive six hours to get there, because I live somewhere.
The highway stretches in front of me, gray and impossible, like it’s being theatrically unfurled from a magician’s sleeve. Except there is no magic here. There is only the maroon Buick riding my bumper, and the middle finger its driver gives me when I press on the brakes to piss him off.
I think about close to nothing for a while, let the thick hum of the engine fill the space between my close to nothing thoughts.
Sunday Stories: “The Body Politic”
The Body Politic
by Laura Shaine Cunningham
The mood of pre-dinner optimism had not yet dissipated; the soup still simmered on the stove, and one place remained empty at the table. “We have a mystery guest, a volunteer who needs a place to stay until the election.” I set down an extra bowl and two glasses, one for water, the other for wine.
Sunday Stories: “In Giron”
In Giron
by Melanie Pappadis Faranello
I wake at 5:15 am for the Fiesta de Torros, the festival of the bulls—an annual sacrifice in Giron, Ecuador, about an hour’s bus ride south of Cuenca. The moon is still out, and the night dogs are fighting over garbage in the street. A drunk man stumbles on the cobblestone as I make my way toward the bus station. The rising sun casts an orange glow off the station’s tin roof. My gringa friends are easy to spot—a silver-haired woman from New Mexico wearing a fanny pack and her zoom lens camera; a twenty-two-year-old blonde from Iowa who is taking a semester to learn Spanish; and a lively red-head, the most fluent of us, who has been in Cuenca the longest and works in the hostel.
Sunday Stories: “I try to find the pieces”
I try to find the pieces
by Ahu Aydın
Baby in my arms, I sit on the living room carpet with my back against the sofa. I watch the wind invade through the window, from the setting sun. Dust particles catch the colors. The baby boy and I sit still. The breeze lifts the tips of our hair. I’ve never felt this light in my life.
Sunday Stories: “A Story for Submission”
A Story for Submission
by Jacky Stephenson
NEW NEW NEW– write something NEW you dusty brained bastard. Something they haven’t seen. Something pouring out of you with the precision of articulated prose and the whimsy of Dadaism, but not the Fascist kind– God forbid we leave room to credit Ezra Pound as an influence. Something, something, black petals on a bough? Was the bough black? I would Google it if I gave more of a shit.
Sunday Stories: “Frankel”
Frankel
by Francis Levy
It was November, the weekend before Thanksgiving. Sunset came earlier each day so when the soccer team got back from the playing fields above the reservoir at 100th street, it was already dark.
Sunday Stories: “Seek and Ye Shall Find”
Seek and Ye Shall Find
by Shawna Ervin
Lost
1984. Scott Hamilton won the Olympic gold medal for men’s figure skating in Sarajevo that February. He trained at a rink near where I lived with my parents and younger brother. I was nine, in third grade. I hadn’t paid attention to figure skating before, and probably hadn’t paid much attention that year either. My parents were conservative Christians. TV—like the radio, movies, alcohol, smoking, dancing, and anyone outside of our small, fundamental world—was to be feared and avoided at all costs.