The plan for now is that there is no plan. She isn’t in immediate danger. She’s low priority. She’s to sit tight, over and out. The sun rises again. Josephine takes a second to look at it, inhaling deep through her nose. Number forty-five alone, and counting. “Are you still there?” The question makes her […]
Someone’s trying to get into my coffin. Their shovel scratches through the dirt above, and clangs against the stones, resonating into my osteoporotic bones. You’d think such an expensive cemetery would have given me six feet of smooth soil, but no, I’ve got rocks up there. I guess it’s too late to lodge a complaint. The […]
My brother, Ben, rebuilds Mother out of leather, gears, and compressed steam. Iron plates, for her face. A cylinder with bearings, for a spine. Her brain is the only organic part, suspended in syrup within smoke-colored glass, with a shred of spinal cord dangling below, connected to wires and tubes.Ben spends hours tending to the […]
Andrea sits across from her dead father in an airport bar, their table a red square rimmed by black. Dad’s recorded hands cradle a frosted beer from 2020, and his recorded lips part to ask, “Does he make you happy?” “He does,” she says quietly, meeting her father’s gaze across two decades. “He is a […]
On Sundays, I help my son time travel. I place him in a cardboard box, a contraption of recycled parts. Aluminum foil antennas stick out from the top and the words “Time Travel Machine” drip down the side in runny red paint that accidentally stained the carpet. My son, Vincent, is a chubby-cheeked rascal, too […]
The Christmas card arrived late. It cost 599 rubles and played “Holly Jolly Christmas“ for thirteen seconds, until the “this yeeear” bit. Merry CHRISTmas Jae Pastor Ivanov says “Jesus is the Reason, for the Season!!” Your Father and I pray together every day Come home soon She meant well, but none of it rang true […]
He’s the only Indispensable on staff at the high-rise’s coffee shop, and it’s easy to see why. It’s not just his looks; companies claim that outward appearances don’t factor into job permanence decisions, but have you ever seen an ugly Indispensable? Yeah. Me, either. Personally, if I had to guess, I’d say it’s because of his smile. […]
The day was sliding into the night when Dint tightened the last rivet, swiveling her wrist until that final washer squealed against the wood. By the time the stars flickered on, she had replaced her tools in their storage tins, locked the hangar doors, and tucked Father’s key into the notch above her elbow, where […]
The facility is state-of-the-art, all swooping balustrades and huge panes of glass. Mom’s dozing in her wheelchair, and as the lift rises to the clinic on the thirteenth floor, Alyssa brainstorms how she’ll start her article on the procedure. She still can’t shake how excited her editor was, how he’d barely apologised when she pointed […]
“It’s me,” Phil lies. “It’s Phil. It’s Daddy.” Mira and Christy — Phil’s wife, Phil’s daughter — stare at him, daring themselves to believe. Mira puts her hands on Christy’s small shoulders: holding her back, or pushing her forward. The door to Phil’s room is open and, in the corridor outside, one of his doctors […]
