Lavish

by Emaline Delapaix

Editor's Warning: This piece contains explicit sexual content. It is not for children. Read more.

Time of Her Life

by Beverly Tjerngren

It was a quiet weekend for Rachael. It was Marc's weekend to have the girls and the house felt big and empty without them at home. Rachael usually spent these days feeling at loose ends, so she was thankful today to have a customer's party dress to alter and get finished. With two days free, she expected to be able to have the dress ready to deliver on Monday, even taking into the account the possibility of unforeseen complications (assuming, of course, that "complications" didn't come in the form of a last-minute design change). Read more.

The Golden Years

by Cylithria Dubois

Annie sat near the side of her husband's bed. Gently she held his hand as she watched him sleep. The cancer had spread rapidly after it was diagnosed. Eric fought it the best his old, frail body could but it hadn't been enough. The doctor and the hospice volunteer said the end could come at any time. She wasn't leaving Eric's side, not now, not until he left her. Read more.

In Orbit

In Orbit

by Adam Jeffries Schwartz

My brother looks like an alien. His hair is gone,
eyebrows also. Morphine and other poisons have made
his eyes transparent; it's painful to look at him. Read more.

Bud and Esther

by Kisha Geijer

I.

"Thirty-six years I've owned this shop," the old man muttered to the cash register. "Lilies, carnations, those bloody roses and their Valentine sweethearts ... it makes me want to puke."

A loud sneeze reverberated throughout the store. "Bless you!" said a small old woman, approaching him with a pot of silk flowers. He sneezed again, and thanked her curtly. Esther had been a good customer throughout the years, but he still didn't like to socialize with his patrons. Familiarity, contempt, that old thing. Plus, she had red hair, or well, she did before it faded to a respectable gray.  Read more.