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The Swan and I

In Issue 90, December 2024, Issues Archive by Ella Karoline Hendricks

I often imagine if people were to ask me what I was feeling the day Zeus came to me, I doubt they would anticipate my reply. I prayed, not to Zeus, not to Hades, not to Apollo, nor Poseidon or any other god. No, I prayed to Hera.

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Lunch in the Squad Car

In Issue 90, December 2024, Issues Archive by Seth Foster

Walking back to the squad car carrying two fresh wrapped pastrami sandwiches, my heart is pounding and hands sweating, the growl in my stomach doesn’t drown out the voice in my head that scolds me, “See. You should have listened to your old man, you idiot.”

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Pen Sketch

In Issue 90, December 2024, Issues Archive by Grace Halden

It took me three years to read your letter. Back in 2018, when I didn’t really understand the process, I thought ‘pen sketch’ meant an artist’s drawing of the sperm donor. I didn’t look at it as I didn’t want to see you. Not then. I didn’t want to choose a donor based on looks and I didn’t want to identify a stranger on the faces of my prospective children. Later, when I joined groups for donor assisted families, I discovered – by chance when reading a Facebook post – that the so called ‘pen sketch’ was not a picture, it was a letter.

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Othello and the Courageous Pierre

In Issue 90, December 2024, Issues Archive by Sandro F. Piedrahita

When Othello first arrived, my grandmother declared that he should be called Prince, but she soon changed her mind and named him after the Moor who killed his wife Desdemona because he was sure that she had betrayed him. When I asked her why she had changed the dog’s name to Othello, she responded that it was an appropriate name because his hair was black as vicuñas wool and because he was fiercely jealous.

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Lady of Sorrows

In Issue 90, December 2024, Issues Archive by Augustine Himmel

Blessed Margaret of Castello was a blind, hunchbacked dwarf whose aristocratic parents could barely stand the sight of her. Born in Metola, Italy, in 1287, she spent her childhood isolated from the world because her parents found her so repulsive that when she was six years old, they had a small cell built in the forest next to their chapel and locked Margaret away like a lunatic.

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One Hand in My Pocket

In Issue 90, December 2024, Issues Archive by David Stern

What now?
Rose.
Rose was the only person I trusted, the only one who was kind to me that day. I went for a long walk and wound up at a quiet park where bushes exploded with red and yellow flowers reaching for the sky. Too late, I noticed three guys closing in behind. The last thing I remember was the smell of their sweat and the red mud caked on their boots.

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The Matron

In Issue 90, December 2024, Issues Archive by Edward Ruiz

Elonda stared out of her window, squeezing her face into the entire frame, and her breath began to fog up the dew-struck glass. She quickly used her sleeve to wipe away a near perfect circle. The winter was visible again.

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Arthur’s Secret Show

In Issue 89, November 2024, Issues Archive by Ashley Christopher Leach

Miss Beulah was not worried about a few dead feral cats, especially the ones that had lived for years in her woodpile before they met their sanguinary demise. She had discovered them gruesomely slaughtered with violent gashes to their necks just after a weak, late autumn hurricane had wreaked havoc on her yard and flooded her collard patch. Apart from believing that a bobcat had done the killing, her only real concern was removing the corpses from her yard. But a week later …

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Better Than Fine

In Issue 89, November 2024, Issues Archive by Christine Marra

June 1941
“Get up,” I whisper, crouching on the concrete, grasping the bars with fingers picked raw and bloody. I consider rapping the bars with the key — the precious key!— but I don’t dare. The guard might be a light sleeper.

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The Violinist

In Issue 89, November 2024, Issues Archive by Randy Kraft

Bill returned home after a particularly strenuous workday to find Loretta in the living room nose to nose in conversation with a stranger. Rather than interrupt, or inquire what was going on, he observed from the doorway.

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DEADline

In Issue 89, November 2024, Issues Archive by Renee Roberson

Cordelia Cates stepped out onto her deck overlooking the lake as she cradled her coffee cup, which had more than a splash of Bailey’s Irish Cream added in for good measure. She sighed as she wrapped her cardigan around her with the other hand and surveyed the red clouds overhead.

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The Real Story

In Issue 89, November 2024, Issues Archive by Douglas Nordfors

The situation was this: Bret’s ringing phone had woken him up just before daybreak. Jeff, his once fairly close, but now hardly close friend, sounding frantic, had asked him to meet him. Bret had said he would and asked where, and Jeff had calmed down enough to give him clear directions.

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Mothers and Monsters: Adapting to Queer Immigrant Trauma in On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous (2019)

In Issue 89, November 2024, Issues Archive by Celeste Bloom

Due to historical persecution of queer individuals, trauma pervades queer lives, communities, and literary representation. Given the prevalence of trauma in queer narratives, can queer protagonists define themselves beyond the atrocities they face? In his epistolary novel, On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous (2019), Ocean Vuong demonstrates that while trauma fundamentally shapes the queer Vietnamese American protagonist, Little Dog, he is equally defined by his response.

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A House of Cards

In Issue 89, November 2024, Issues Archive by Peter Newall

When Nataliya had finished the last crumbs of her cake, I paid the bill and we left the café, the bell tinkling as the door closed behind us. At half past four, the grey winter afternoon had already turned to night. I offered Nataliya my arm, as the cobbled street was slippery with frozen snow.