Category: Short Story
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It’s Hard for Me to Tell My Brother I Love Him, So Instead I Write a Story by Alice Kinerk
The word addiction comes from Latin. It means to surrender. A drug addict is a person who has given over his or her life to a substance, who has given drugs the helm. The first time my brother went to rehab, he was fifteen and I was six. I…
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The Blue Binder by Jonathan Ferrini
Victor grew up inside a trailer park with dilapidated trailers packed together like tuna in a rusty old can. His grandmother’s trailer smelled of cleaning supplies; the scent she brought home from cleaning offices overnight. She raised Victor alone after his mother abandoned him for a life as a hippie…
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Johnny Ace at the Pearly Gates by Jeffrey Hantover
Johnny Ace (John Marshall Alexander, Jr.)December 25, 1954 The last week in December was always a busy period for St. Peter. Many of the infirm and the aged who willed themselves to make it to Christmas expired a day or two after the holiday having triumphantly crossed the finish line.…
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Two Black Dresses by Jonathan Ferrini
Every day at three o’clock as the afternoon sun fought through the dusty windows and the high school down the street let out, a teenage girl would slip quietly into the boutique. She never spoke, never bought anything, just wandered to the same rack and lingered over a particular black…
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Devotion by Huina Zheng
She used to believe. Obedient, gentle and considerate since childhood, Ling washed dishes, mopped floors, folded laundry, and cared for her younger brother, doing everything her parents expected. But now, for the first time, she began to doubt. She stared at the phone in her hand. Her mother’s voice still…
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The Jump by Jim Bates
I didn’t expect so many people to be standing around on the cliff overlooking the Yellow Knife River, but there were, maybe fifteen or so, mostly young folks in their twenties just hanging out, joking around and having a good time, everyone looking tan and fit. It was honestly not…
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Un ‘Ecrivain Français by Michael Grignon
Deep into a meditative journey, I find myself perched at a table in the back of Café Le Rêve. Tucked underneath a crimson awning, I have a partial, but adequate view of the boulevard that stretches in front of me. The restaurant is silent except for the sounds of another…
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Starless Skies by Bethany Webb
“You know, there’s a star in the sky for every wish on the ground,” her grandmother whispered, her wink not visible by the eye, but easy to hear from her voice. Alesia and her grandmother lay in the grass of her parent’s pasture, looking up at the sky dotted…
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Unlearning Him by Huina Zheng
My father was once the person I feared most and tried hardest to please. He ruled our home like an emperor, and we all learned to read his face before speaking. When I began excelling academically in middle school, he finally noticed me, which was remarkable for a man whose…