Arkansas

by Kristen M. Håvet.

She could be Oprah, if Oprah were white. My mind flashes back to five years old and I’m eating Cheerios in front of Oprah, enthralled with the crying women and suffering even then. Cheating husbands, back-stabbing twins – miscommunicated, excommunicated, years gone by, wasted, wasted… [Read more]

The Runner

by Zan Comerford.

The line only started getting blurry towards the end. We pushed it further than most. Keep a job, keep your name on the roster in school. Keep a home, or a place to keep your shit. People started noticing soon enough though. With a pack of cigarettes and about 100 pounds between us, we were daring people not to notice… [Read more]

Lost Destiny

by Susan Williams.

He tried to think where he went wrong, what he did to not keep the favour of the priests. His parents had told him of his destiny. He was to then sit next to his uncles and the great god Ah Kinchel for all eternity. His name H’Ahnun was to be revered for the next 13 precessions around the sun. What was his destiny now? … [Read more]

Return of the Receding Hair Band

by Happy Kreter.

Steel Panther, whose motto is “spread metal, not herpes,” seems to have hit the right high-pitched note with their audience. “Steel, it’s like, really hard, like metal,” says the band’s lead singer. “And panthers are sexy, but they’re also one of the fiercest marsupials…” [Read more]

Green

by Sarah Elliott.

At Oakdale, racism is used by and towards every shade of human. There are Jamaicans, Dominicans, Hispanics, Caucasians, one Asian, and one half-breed, me. Spic, Chug, Chink, Wop, Porkchop, Wetback, Packi and Sand Nigger, are all used without fear or hesitation. At first I comment, but in the end there isn’t much point… [Read more]

John Ford, Tangentially Speaking

by Josh Wiebe.

To tell you the truth, I don’t know what to think, I don’t know what the point is, all I know is that two days ago I’d slept with my arms wrapped around a woman I loved, and today I teared up when Tom Doniphon burnt his house down in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance and fell asleep alone… [Read more]

Palindrome

by Stephanie Chou.

My Polaroid will follow her home to Toronto when she is done with Vancouver like she has been done with it so many times before. She treats cities like one-night lovers; when they disappoint, fulfill, or when she’s in love, she walks out the door – without reason, without notice, without goodbyes…. [Read more]

All Hail the Zombocalypse

by Steve Locke.

Walking dead traipse around the foyer of the building, as if caught in a daze. They wander the streets, bump into abandoned cars and trip over uneaten corpses at their feet. It’s all over. There aren’t any more survivors. The zombie apocalypse has arrived…. [Read more]

The Betrayed

by Alexa Woods.

Sophia didn’t tell him that Paul had never been late. She hadn’t told him about Paul at all, though her wedding ring was displayed prominently on her finger. She twisted it nervously round and round. Mark raised an eyebrow at it but said nothing… [Read more]

Appliance Graveyard

by Nick VanderWoud.

Robin’s grandmother fired a shot and the N.E.C.s trachea tore apart in a gust of blood that sploshed across the coffee table, sending the bone skittering across the table. Everyone froze, hands still clasped even to the lifeless body of their once ally.

“Transcendence is a bitch, isn’t it?” … [Read more]

Sexytime

by Michelle Kaeser.

Mary’s a superhero. But her powers rest on one teensy sacrifice: lifelong virginity. If ever she does the deed, knocks boots, rides the rocket, rolls in the hay, she’ll lose her superpowers forever. Penetration? Forget it. Oral? Verboten. Manual, please? Nope. Poor Mary, she’s horny as hell… [Read more]

Coast Starline

by Claire Gibson.

I dream that I’m back in San Diego and drunk again, on the fire escape of the El Cortez. Ben is sitting on the metal steps with no shoes on, smoking and laughing. He tries to hand me a cigarette with his foot, then falls backwards and away from us, all at once. We’re left five stories up, staring at the place where he was… [Read more]

Breakfast with Bukowski

by Marie-Hélène Westgate.

Kill the crazies, you said so yourself: Even a madman eats too much and needs a place to sleep. You escaped because you didn’t ask anything of the system. You’re a madman, that’s exactly how you put yourself through a lifetime of such formidable alcoholism. It paid your way… [Read more]