Story Excerpts

Falling Off The Edge of The World
by Suzanne Palmer

Sunset is beginning, a sweep of red across the sky chasing the blue over the remains of the ship’s stern, dragging darkness behind it like a thick sheet over the day’s face and declaring it done. Stars, such as they are, will come on soon, one row at a time, perfectly spaced and aligned. Gabe mentioned once to Alis that he thought he remembered stars twinkling, and since then they have, blinking gently in symmetrical, rhythmic, soothing patterns until he falls asleep, and after that, what did it matter? And if some of the ones in the distance that blur together anyway, in Gabe’s failing eyesight, have been turned off to conserve power—that too was nobody’s to notice.

Early on, Gabe had tried to pay attention to the passage of time, believing someone should, and he had kept a journal numbering the days and then weeks. It was only when he lost track during an extended illness that he gave up, and never picked it up again as the months turned into years. “No going back to it,” he’d told Alis. “No forward, either.” READ MORE

 

I’ll Be Moon For Christmas
by Michèle Laframboise

On the stage, four jazzmen undulated like pale algae fronds, sending up blues notes in the stale air of the Ribald Café.

The long moody harmonics spouted from the brass instruments joined the blue smoke ghosts rising from the make-believe cigs most patrons were using. The musicians were playing pitch perfect, of course, an instrumental rendition of “Fly Me to the Moon,” an oldie that always made the younger ones among us smile.

The interior decor was doing its best to make us forget where we were: lustrous vermilion drapes framing the scene, glossy leafy plants in every unused corner, the ceiling painted in a trompe-l’oeil illusion of rising skyrises through a glass roof, even with random flocks of pale gray doves flying overhead. The scents that mingled with the false tobacco were the typical blends of true coffee beans. READ MORE