This flash won first place in Backchannels Journal‘s 2022 fiction contest. The story mixes an airport with a cabin, adds a splash of nostalgia, and garnishes it with a shitty marriage. Give it a try, maybe it’s your kind of cocktail.
A shortish, darkish tale about allergies and social media, and how the sudden escalation of one impacts the other. In Bourbon Penn #28.
An executioner serves justice to the traitor who murdered the beloved princess. Published September 30, 2022 at Daily Science Fiction.
Listen to “Smilers” at Podcastle now! It was originally published in Bourbon Penn #20 in March 2020. Science Fiction World will also be translating “Smilers” into Chinese in a future issue. “Smilers” also received an Honorable Mention in Ellen Datlow‘s Best Horror of the Year Volume 13. The Smilerverse is spreading!
The restaurant was empty, the lunch rush over,
and I was buffing down tables in hard circles—Ryan
had just moved in with some stupid cow he met at a
club—when a heavyset middle-aged woman
sporting gigantic shades came in.
I’m sitting against the flaking bole of a laurel tree, cooling down after hiking up the mountain, when a little man drops from the canopy above.
We’re loaded down with tampons and pads, and Mom’s heading straight for the cute checker’s lane. Seriously? I’d die if I had to stand there while he rung us out. It’s obvious, right? I totally get it, she’s distracted, sad about Lance and all that, but right now we’ve got bigger issues. I steer her toward the old lady’s lane.
