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Weekly Contest #360
"If you can get past the bone box, you'll probably ace this class." Terry Mason bared his teeth at us as he handed around the course syllabus to the nineteen students in his Anatomy class. "Otherwise, you might as well take up Macrame 101." I looked around at the other students who sat on lab stools at benches around the room. They seemed to range in age from about eighteen to middle age, by their looks. One guy looked over the hill, with a gray ponytail and crows' feet around his dark eyes. I was twenty-five and hoping to get into nursing s...
Weekly Contest #356
If you could bring your loved ones back from the dead, this planet would collapse under the weight of all the souls. But I do believe they’re all around us, in the wind and the rain, in the morning gold and the twilight blue. We can’t see them anymore but the veil between the worlds is thin. Every now and then the veil tears open and a soul slips through. How else can I explain what happened to me and those around me, changing our lives forever? I don’t know, but I’ll try. One steamy night in July, my eight-year-old daughter and I took a dip...
Weekly Contest #353
(Contains sexual and physical violence)There they go again, squirming and hissing on my pillow. I feel their hot breath on my neck and their tongues flicking against my skin. I don’t dare turn over on my back for fear of crushing them. Every time I try to fall asleep, they crawl across my skin and my stomach churns. Do you know what it’s like to live with snakes on your head instead of hair? No, I don’t suppose you would. I don’t think anyone would. I’m the only one cursed by that jealous goddess who thinks I asked to be violated by a lecher...
Weekly Contest #350
I don’t remember being adopted. It’s just a story, part of the family folklore to make me feel special and wanted. When I was a kid, I never got tired of hearing it. Before I started school, I would buzz around my mother like a bee while she ironed our clothes. “Mom, where did I come from?” “Jasmine, I’ve told you a hundred times.” “Katie Cronker says you got me from a dumpster.” “Katie is a silly goose! Dad and I adopted you from Hong Kong when you were almost two. We met your plane at Kennedy Airport and brought you home. Now you’re a Gree...
Weekly Contest #348
Joseph Merrick awoke in the light of Easter dawn, already excited. All through the dark days of Lent and Holy Week, he’d been looking forward to this day. While he loved Christmas most of all, nothing held more promise of eternal joy than Easter.In his short twenty-seven years, Joseph had already suffered more than most had in an entire lifetime. Jeering derision and cruel mockery had dogged his steps all through childhood. Then there were the years of horror in the workhouse, and traveling in the sideshows, baring his twisted body to gawkin...
Weekly Contest #345
On her first day at her new job, Joanna Fan stood at the front door of a white clapboard church in the shadow of its soaring steeple. She raised the brass knocker on the red front door, and let it fall against the wood where it clanked like Marley’s ghost, echoing in the pit of her stomach.No answer. She knocked again, swearing under her breath.Still no answer. She peeked in a side window and saw a shadowy form flitting about. She made a fist and rapped on the glass. After ten minutes of fruitless effort, she sighed and returned to the front...
Weekly Contest #343
One steamy night in July, a nurse and her daughter took a dip in their local pond, not expecting to find anything new and strange. They were wrong.A car honked. Stefanie shifted gears and reflected that changing gears described what she and Mai would have to go through now. It had been hard to say good-by to Mai three weeks ago, but now Stefanie could feel distance between them. "Sweetie, Cornwall Pond is practically in our back yard. Let’s take a quick dip and get some pizza after.”They left the highway and headed to the pond, past a rus...
Weekly Contest #342
Bettina Brentano said to Joanna, “ I know of an author you might enjoy hearing. She’s an adoptee like you.”At first Joanna rolled her eyes. Everyone seemed quick to remind her of her origins. Born in Hong Kong to an unmarried waitress, Joanna had been given up for adoption at six weeks and left on the doorsteps of a police station. They had turned her over to one of the royal government’s orphanages. The Poh Leung Kuk had a mere two nurses to take of sixty babies. Their bottles were propped on pillows, and during the day they were tied to ch...
Weekly Contest #332
She’ll be comin’ around the mountain When she comes…She’ll be comin’ around the mountain when she comes…” The old folk tune went round and round in Joanna Fan’s head as she peered through her car’s windshield, the wipers slapping an irritating rhythm that didn't quite fit the music. Rippling sheets of water on the glass made the road nearly invisible as she crept along at barely ten miles per hour.She’d been comin’ around the mountain long enough. Time for a hot supper and cozy bed.The day had started out warm and clear, but towards lunchtim...
Weekly Contest #329
The Ghost Adagio: Emily Choy slogged through Boston’s gray drizzle and black slush, and made her way to the side door of the Kenmore Conservatory, shivering in the March cold. She wished she’d worn her winter coat, but the weather app on her phone had said 40 degrees. It felt a lot colder than that. Oh well, this was New England. If you didn’t like the weather, wait five minutes and it would change. She tugged open the drab pink door and stepped into a solid wall of heat and noise. The stairwell echoed with ghostly instruments and voices. As...
Weekly Contest #319
I am a monster, but I wasn’t born this way. I know the very thought of me fills you with horror and disgust. But spare me a moment and I will tell you my story.Do you know what it’s like to live with snakes on your head instead of hair? No, I don’t suppose you do. I don’t think anyone does.There they go again, squirming and hissing on my pillow. I feel their cold breath on my neck and their tongues flicking against my skin. I don’t dare turn over on my back for fear of crushing them. Every time I try to fall asleep, they crawl across my skin...
Weekly Contest #317
A LOVE FROM BEYONDDedicated to my Uncle Paul, whose singing cello led me into music If you could bring back your loved ones back from the dead, this planet would collapse under the weight of all the souls.But I believe they’re all around us, in the wind and the rain, in the morning gold and the twilight blue. We can’t see them anymore but the veil between the worlds is thin. Every now and then the veil tears open and a soul slips through. How else can I explain what happened to me and those around me, changing our lives forever?It began last...
Weekly Contest #313
Contains implied racial epithets. On my first day of first grade, I was too excited to eat breakfast. I bounced around my room until Mama made me sit down and drink some chocolate milk. I couldn’t wait to put on my new Keds sneakers. I wished they were Air Jordans but she told me those cost too much.After breakfast, we walked up to the bus stop. Mama said the driver wouldn't go down to our house. The air was warm and Mama was soon out of breath. She was on the heavy side, but people said nice things about her shiny black curls. Even then, th...
Weekly Contest #257
Part IOne fair breezy morning in the time of good Queen Bess, a ship called the "Dover" made its way towards land after nearly being shipwrecked on a desert island. The sun warmed the sailors’ bare backs as they hauled on the ropes and raised the sails, singing lustily. A party of well-heeled passengers strolled along the deck and exclaimed at the wide expanse of clear blue sky and glassy water.Among their number was a former magician and his soon-to-be-wed daughter, a king and his son, and other assorted nobles. Prospero, the magician, had ...
Weekly Contest #221
In the basement of the Kenmore Conservatory of Music, the practice rooms are dark and gloomy, with radiators that clank like Marley's ghost and steam that clogs your lungs like molasses. Room 8 is the worst of all. The fluorescent lights flicker constantly, giving you a headache. But that's not the main reason no one wants to go in there. They say it's haunted. Year after year, some unfortunate students have to use that room when the rest are being used. They stumble out wild-eyed, barely able to talk. “It’s foggy and there’s a terrib...
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