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Latest Stories

March 19, 2024
Fantasy Stories Wondering Monk

Just My Imagination

The alarm clock went off and started playing an awful tune. Tom opened his eyes and closed them back, squinting. He reopened one eye and stood up to stop the torture. The phone was on the desk, in the furthest spot from the bed. Although he changed his way of…
March 19, 2024
Science Fiction Stories Ocelotlzin

Earth Is Dead

Recording… It doesn't matter who I was; I probably lived a long time ago, and I am now just a voice someone added to the audio-visual records. What is essential is the recollection of events that lead to the current state. So, a little history needs to be…
March 08, 2024
Flash Fiction Benoit

Some Enchanted Evening

It was a rugby tackle with tears: Chrissy burst in, sobbing and babbling, hugging James. Her face was all wet, eyes wild. What…? My parents split up, Dad has moved in with his boyfriend and I cannot join them. I am shut out. I have lost my dad. Torrent of…
March 08, 2024
Horror Stories Marvel Chukwudi Pephel

In The Hands Of My Legs

The car pulled up in front of the large salon. The neon sign, that sexy broad thing, on the salon'sroof read "Mr. Gil's All-night Salon". The exhaust pipe of the car was pumping solid smoke, theswirls moving from the car and towards the salon.…
March 07, 2024
Mystery Stories Vanessa Leigh Giles

Casualty of Love in the Time of Coronavirus

Chapter 1 Until Death do us Part ‘Ring, ring!’. I answered the telephone and asked, “Hello, good evening. Who’s this? “Hello.” This is Dr. Smith from Red Cross hospital. “Is this Mr. Locke, John?”, he asked, hesitantly scratching his bald head. “Yes, doctor.…
March 07, 2024
Crime Stories Robert Pook

Bar Room Trigger

Another return journey on footpaths so familiar. He strides across each crack in each paving stone. Regular loose drain covers sidestepped. Mapping long ago mapped in Richard’s desolate mind. His pace hastened by the sight of the oncoming storm. Quickening…
March 04, 2024
Horror Stories Ano Chinemerem

Sanctity

Where should I begin? I could begin by telling you about this comely boy, whom every notable person around the streets agrees his smile could charm the bills off one. Between one smile, there was his goodness, his dreams and humanity—a little far ahead?— but…
March 04, 2024
Flash Fiction Emanuel Diaz

Et Mortui Partium

As Rafael stepped out into the rain, it wasn't the ordinary drops that fell from the sky. Instead, it was a storm of souls, each one taking the form of shimmering jewelry as it cascaded toward the ground. Rubies, diamonds, and sapphires twinkled amidst the…
February 29, 2024
Poetry Jing Li Ava

London

‘Am I in London?’ "I am." Where is Elizabeth? Happy living story All of your chapter Bounlance joy Please my heart Power hand Wise mind Our baby Vow vow Love all love Miss I miss Endless wonder Bring us together Love all love Miss I miss For everything My…
February 29, 2024
Flash Fiction Rob Pook

Life Sentence of The Smith

Born nine months after his country won the World Cup.A child prodigy.Cast off at age twenty-four.Husband, father, emigree, away on the other side of the world.The blue-collar life.The dreams of success.The search for fulfillment.The long years of empty…
February 29, 2024
Mystery Stories Joshua Lowther

The Operator

Jason looked over to his right, his eyes barely able to focus themselves on the subject of his attention. His neck ached terribly from the strenuous movement. He was tired. The captain’s gaze came to rest on the rookie sonar operator sitting tense at his…
February 29, 2024
Flash Fiction Salvatore Difalco

The Chute

At dusk, we left our unit with a soft pink bundle. I carried it through the wet streets and into the black woods. I said I’d take it all the way, the bundle, but that we had to drop it in together. My wife’s green eyes flashed. “Don’t make me do that.” I…

They were shrieking in distress, not squealing, like pigs usually do. It was as if they knew what was about to happen to them.

McCormack hadn't heard shrieking like that since he was a boy and he found himself trying to remember that kid's name.

Billy... Billy Pendergill!

That was him. Man, that kid was a total shithead.

He never came to school after that day and all Billy was doing was showing off a bike trick on his BMX.

He wasn't the most popular kid at Claymore Public School, because he was bigger than other students, a repeater, knew he was older, and liked to show kids like McCormack that he could hurt them. He sometimes punched girls in the arm, too.

His friends were some older boys, his age, and they rode around on trashed out bicycles, like a BMX gang, trying out tricks, modifying their bikes with pegs on the axles. Some of them, like Billy, didn't even have seats, or seat poles. They thought it was tough to coast around, sprouting their pubes early, standing tall on their bikes, when in truth, they just couldn't afford to fix them, or get new ones.

Sometimes, though, McCormack and his friends wished they could ride a BMX like Billy,   fearless, and accurate, until the day came, during the Summer holidays of nineteen eighty-four.

They were riding their bikes at a building development compound that day.

The older boys were jumping their bikes full speed from a ten step downward stretch, getting air, landing, flipping the handlebars, and rolling in backward, wheels whizzing in freespin. They dared Billy to try it out and full of confidence he rolled to the top step, then made his run up.

McCormack wasn't watching when Billy got air, but he heard the boy land. There was a neck snapping clank and thud and scrape of metal and flesh on concrete. Then, there was a rising cry that became a squeal, then a non-refundable shrieking, like the pigs before McCormack now.

Billy was clutching onto his bike, prone in the position he had landed, just shrieking in pain, but not only that, he was shrieking in fear.

His friends gathered around him and a boy named Josh – McCormack remembered – warned them not to touch Billy, to go get help, but they didn't listen

McCormack watched them pull the bike away, watched the spreading of blood, then the squirting, watched Billy twitch, and gasp, and very suddenly lose conciousness. He had cut his ear and lost some teeth, but he had landed so hard he slit his scrotum, and sliced and forced his entire left testicle into the pole housing.

When they moved the bike, they'd separated the testicle from his body.

It was very quiet in that compound then.

Nobody knew what to do, so they all climbed on their bikes, rode home, and left him there, some thinking he'd be fine. Josh was the one who called the ambulance and went back to wait with his friend's body. Billy died that day.

“ Hey! Hey, Mack! “ a voice called. “ You good to go, or what? “

McCormack placed a cartridge in the gun and put it to a shrieking pig's head, the pig making eye contact. He thought of Billy Pendergill, closed his eyes, and fired.

 

The End

BIO: I Live in Orange, NSW, Australia. I have an only child, a daughter, we LIKE Penny Dreadfuls, James Herbet, and Ripley's Believe It, Or Not. And all kinds of other fucked up shit.

 

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