Quitting Time
A sharp horn sounded behind Mary as she headed up the steps to her duplex in the hot May sunshine. She turned towards the older model Buick, unable to see who was driving the car, but gave a friendly wave. As a rule, she waved to anyone. Fairly certain the father of her grandchildren belonged to a gang, she wanted to stay on good terms with everyone in the neighborhood. Tossing her keys on the antique stand near the door, she entered the kitchen and opened the freezer. Inside, she found a frozen glass mug that she filled with ice and edged with a lemon slice. She stepped through the back door and retrieved a large jar of sun tea off the back stoop. It’d been brewing since 4AM, when she’d left for her job at the Dollar Mart—just about ten hours of steeping....
Read MoreShort: Blackout
Black Out by April McGowan ‘Singleness is a state of mind’ the sign read. Well, not only was Tracy single, she was also an orphan. Could you call yourself an orphan if your parents died after you were eighteen? It didn’t matter. No matter how old you were when your parents died, you still felt like one. In any case, she was alone on all counts and facing the day she’d dreaded most in her life. The doctor said the news wasn’t good. Wasn’t that just like a doctor? It’s not good, but we won’t tell you how bad it’s going to be until you come in for an appointment. Then you had to wait six weeks to for an appointment and pay exorbitant fees to be finally let in on the news. What was that about? The overhead lights flickered as the...
Read MoreComing in June
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