Short Story

You Don’t Read This in the News

Mengyin Lin -

The old bus cruises out of Shanghai with a low hum. If it attempts to accelerate, its belly will groan, and the speeding wheels...

The Emily Problem

Mandy Berman -

Emily stood on the sideline of the seventh-grade soccer game watching a daughter who didn’t belong to her. Though she had to be working...

Blue Smoke & Running Elk

Autumn Fourkiller -

In this dream, she is at a pow wow and no one will look at her. Everything smells like flesh, fry bread, and beer....

Owl and Mouse

Anna Marschalk-Burns -

We had come to the house for the promise of sex. Our arrivals spaced out by a carefully timed thirty minutes so the neighbors...

The Night Prairie

Sean Sam -

Silhouetted against the Norwegian coast, a figure stands outside the Mørk Verden bar, a humanoid shifting its palm sidelong against the glass as if...

Sex is a Leisure Activity

Max Delsohn -

Before this, Gene was just a stand-up I knew, a good one, he had headlined a show in a bookstore that I’d featured for...

The Petting Zoo

Jade Song -

The West Coast girl was elevated. Royalty above the crowd, throwing back a glass of clear liquid. She danced on a table placed at...

I’m a Fan

Sheena Patel -

Excerpted from I'm A Fan, forthcoming from Graywolf I live in the world of mass consumerism, picking out kitchenware and furniture from Ikea, pining for...

Like a Cloud, Lighter than Air

Kate Doyle -

After Christmas, as she tries to swim up from her sadness, things which had always seemed laughable to Helen become comforting: Fate, for example....

Peek-a-Boo

Naomi Wood -

One evening in July, when I couldn’t sleep – the baby was pressing down on my bladder – I received a call from Carin...