“He was terribly injured, you know, in the boiler accident — ” “ — lost both legs, I heard. You can hear the machinery when he walks — ” “ — such a handsome boy. Cecilia is beside herself — ” Sitting stiffly at the long table, Hector tried not…

Ocala, Florida The heavy night air amplified the cries of the loons and the harsh bark of an alligator, somewhere deep in the swamp that lay behind the motel. Reid woke and rubbed a hand over his face, glancing down at the girl lying next to him. He couldn’t remember…

Jagged The blinds were half-open, moonlight and street lights mingling to tiger-stripe the bare tiled floor. It wasn’t you… She stared at the barring of black and white, feeling the silence get closer and closer. Nerve endings were numb, her fingers rubbed restlessly against her skin but felt nothing. I…

Another night. Another too-tight dress. Another glass of Moët and aching feet. She leaned on the railing of the gallery and stared down. The glitterati filled the cavernous space; a flock of sleek cranes in shimmering fabric. Every possible hue and tint of white, cream, gray and black was represented…

I’ve long wondered about Medium’s Payment Program, but this month had proof that their algorithms or whatever convoluted system they use to measure reader engagement on stories don’t apparently register small numbers. Perhaps as a cost saving measure? One of my stories, a Member Only story, was read and clapped…

The first long night had been forty-eight hours. Those who made it through to the dawn that followed discovered their world had gone. Something to do with the darkness, the original scientific consensus had been, Callie remembered, chewing on the end of her pen as she leaned back, the journal…

Lit Up Summer Holiday Prompt — The warm breeze that slipped by her cheek as she walked over the dunes carried the scents of the beach and the harbour across the bay; salt and the faint mud smell from the river mouth, fish and fainter still, diesel. …

Light, blazing through her eyelids. The burn of vomit and bile in the back of her throat. Pain in the side of her face, down her neck, into her shoulder. Another Saturday morning. Marianne lifted her head from the concrete kerb, cursing as the hand placed to lever herself into…

Reba shuddered as the emanation in the house prodded at her, a touch on her mind that echoed the cold and greasy feel of the ritual candle in her hand. In the corner of her vision, the home’s owners clung to each other at the open door, their eyes wide…