We are finally back to present our long-awaited micro prize winners, picked by Steve Almond! Huge congratulations to our winners and thank you to everyone who participated! First Place: No Voltage on a Quiet Road by Maxwell Orsen Second Place: Burial at Sea by Eileen...
The 90-year-old producer had a hole in his heart. A shaky, unpatchable hole. He wanted me to fill it with kisses, candy, and jokes. I handed him a travel-sized Mars bar that I got on the plane. "Only a monkey," he said, "would offer this old sack of bones a gift from...
It was like she’d gotten sober all over again; everything started to make sense after Daniel’s arrest. Like the occasional odd scent on his clothes that she’d always assumed was because of his commute, emerging from the train...
I hold on so tightly I lose my grip. The hubcap clatters to the floor like a platter thrown during a lovers’ spat. “Go to hell!” I yell, then, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it.” I pull on a pair of gray sweats and a dirty white T-shirt. Four red lines bleed through the...
The setting sun made a fire deep in the amber of its eye, unblinking and somehow changed. Blood shone like tree sap inside a dark nostril. The body lay on its side. The older of the two boys grabbed one leg and the younger the other, and with heels digging and...
Back from our journeys yet again to present the shortlist, which will be judged by Melissa Llanes Brownlee! We're so excited to see who the three prize winners will be! Congrats to all our finalists, and thank you to everyone who submitted! Wooden Wolf The Changeling...
When we were just teenagers, this friend of mine bought a suit of armor. To get it, he worked an extra job and saved every penny. And he could talk of nothing else. Before I ever saw it, I knew how thick the plating would be, how the various pieces would connect and...
It’s a deer in the weeds at the side of the road, or maybe a golden lab? Something that makes sense of all that yellow in the late-afternoon sun. Too late, my brain trips over the bright blue shirt, and I’m already down the highway when I take my foot off the gas. A...
We looked for stories of ghosts, fables, and fractured fairy tales and were transported from the here and now to a new land of discovery. And now we're back from our journeys to present you with the longlist for this contest! Be back soon with the shortlist! Evening...
When we saw the hot pink Barbie-branded Corvette sitting in our neighbor’s trash pile, we hesitated. Aggie and Tim were our summertime neighbors, kids who lived next door three months out of the year with their grandma, our full-time neighbor. Aggie liked to say their...
When you approach the bridge, you will hear her moans. The teenagers go to Dead Woman’s Crossing, in search of love and destruction. It’s darker there, on this church hayride night. Flatbed truck with wooden benches and a scattering of hay. Driver crawls to the spot...
A box sits broken down across my lap. I slide out of the car into the garage and slip the box behind the tool bench—it’s there with nine other empty boxes. Dozens more pile up around me. My husband says it’s time to get rid of my collection. They’re not hurting...