“Tiburon, CA” by George Masters

Tedesco was dead, frozen and wrapped in a tarp in the back of the Chevy Suburban when Berlin stopped for coffee in Tiburon . . .

“First Time, Last Time” by Robert M. Detman

Harry glances around the room, the trim freshly painted. Someone with money owns the place. Maybe Christiane’s family.

“Does anyone live here?” Harry asks.

Gem sneers at this pretense of familiarity.

“You ask too many questions, man . . .”

“Hana” by Frederick Foote

Hana Irene Carter is showing her fourteen-year-old Asian-black ass this afternoon. She walks through my house and into my kitchen, ignoring me, her grandmother Irene, and four of her other relatives, only smiling at and kissing Emma, my black sheep cousin, on the cheek. She then opens the refrigerator and takes out a beer. She pops the top, takes a long swig, and burps, looking directly at me with an in-your-face, self-satisfied grin.

Before I can act, Irene is up. She pulls the can out of her granddaughter’s hand and dumps the beer out in the sink . . .

“Orange Crush” by Siobhan Lyons

Mondays Are Murder features brand-new noir fiction modeled after our award-winning Noir Series. Each story is an original one, and each takes place in a distinct location. Our web model for the series has one more restraint: a 750-word limit. Sound like murder? It is. But so are Mondays. This week, Siobhan Lyons takes us back […]

“Friend” by Nancy Nau Sullivan

Tater. His real name was Willam Francis McKinny III, but he got the name Tater because he was about as useless as a potato on legs when he drank. His best friend Nick Plakowitz named him that soon after the two of them started stealing Jim Beam from Nick’s dad’s liquor locker in the basement that was set up like a pool hall. Nick poured water in the square booze bottle so his dad wouldn’t know.

Tater said, “He’s gonna know.”

“Nah, he don’t want to deal with it. He too busy with that paint business of his.”

Tater shrugged. Nick’s dad never said a word . . .

“Surrounded” by Brian Lance

Are you a parent going through the Terrible Twos? Did you live through them and survive? Terrible Twosdays is a place to commiserate over the unending shenanigans of your Darling Children (as the online parenting communities say). Nonfiction stories will be considered, so long as names have been changed to protect the guilty. Inspired by […]

“Living the Dream” by Sarah M. Chen

The wind won’t stop banging the bougainvillea against our fence, and the tap tap tap is beating into my skull. My eyes dart around the bedroom, but all I see are hulking shapes. I know they’re our dresser and bookshelf, but at night they look meaningless.

“Little Bear’s Apgar Score” by Caroline Bock

The baby is beautiful, but then isn’t every baby?

But it’s not really beautiful. Its face is red, and its head is oversized, swollen, and dripping with newborn hair and blood . . .