Category Stories

Adrian sat back down slowly, like the chair might not hold him. Three hundred people were still pretending to look at their plates. His mother, Margaret, had both hands flat on the […]

The door swung wide and hit the wall, and two faces turned toward me like a photograph of guilt. Bryce stood with the bourbon halfway to his mouth. Vivian’s reading glasses slid […]

“Not now” is the only thing my mother has ever said to me with total consistency. So I didn’t stop. “Hi,” I said, to my cracked little phone, to my two hundred […]

The lanyard said WALTER COOMBS — FOUNDER. Roland read it twice. I watched the color leave his face the way it leaves a check when you void it. Walt — the printer […]

“Trevor,” I said, warm as anything, “do you still have the photos from that weekend? I’d love to see Mark young and dumb.” Trevor lit up. Of course he had them. Men […]

Tyler’s smirk vanished. The cardboard tray tilted in his hands. A single drop of hot coffee fell from the edge, hitting the polished steel floor. Drip. The sound echoed in the small […]

Julian’s eyes darted from the scar on my wrist to the hallway. The heavy oak door to the dining room was propped open. At the end of the hall, the black-and-white photograph […]

The word hung in the antiseptic air. “Richard,” she whispered. The voice was raspy, unused, but sharp as broken glass. Richard froze. His hand stopped tapping the briefcase. Leo’s fingers hovered over […]

David’s chair scraped loudly against the hardwood floor. He didn’t sit down. He took a step toward the coffee table, his face flushing a deep, angry red. “You’re putting ideas in his […]

The heavy steel doors shuddered and stopped, leaving a six-inch gap. The fluorescent lights in the hallway flickered, casting long, jagged shadows across the polished linoleum. The hum of the vending machine […]