Short Stories

10 MINLily stared at herself in the mirror. She reached for the makeup remover and slowly wiped it across her face. She stared at the blush and foundation that had disappeared from her face, and now…

8 MINThe shriek of the metal vent for the stove was the soloist against the backup of frenetic wind chimes and the violent roar of wind. The Santa Anas were at it again. Emma looked at…

9 MINHer husband had listened to her, once. In their early years, his attention to her words could only be described as rapt. She was sure she remembered accurately: his dark eyes glazed by a mindless…

10 MINOne summer day when Alicia’s bedroom ceiling cracked open and a strange man burst through, no part of her body—not her dimpled buttocks, not the freckles on her ample breasts, not her thighs, moist and…

4 MINIt shouldn’t be spring.   Our last picnic together shouldn’t happen on this perfect May evening, with the softness of new grass under our blanket, and fireflies blinking in the shadowed woods around the clearing.  A picnic…

8 MINGas lamps in the streets blurred by the rain, and the party was in full swing when the carriage pulled up at the front door of my friend’s London house. As I disembarked, looking over…

3 MINWe never imagined we could be quite like her, but she was everything we hoped to be. Honora and I adored our much-older sister, Mary, our somewhat-surrogate mother. She taught us how to pray and…