20 Minute Fiction
Emma
“I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.” Billy laid in the forest with Emma, and Emma sighed a bunch and dug her paws into the earth occasionally and nuzzled herself a little bit closer when Billy’s scratches paused. When the scratches stopped she pushed her nose at him, and Billy would scratch a little more and…
Read MoreAn Old Start to an Old Story
When the fires started they started in the nice houses of Kaleden, a small brush fire lit by a homeowner in the kindling dry month of July that spread up and over the neighboring hills, carried along by the grasses of the grassfields dry and brown and engulfing a home nearby, flattening that home to…
Read MoreThe Lady of Bark Lake
At the end of the road and the end of the driveway and then further into the bush and further along again along the trail that passed the cabins on the south side of the lake and then just beyond the ruins of the cabin around which so many ghost stories began, William and the…
Read MoreThe Boys
“Why aren’t you two sleeping?” “We are.” “No, you aren’t. I can hear you goofing around up there. Don’t you lie to me.” “We’re not mom. We’re just getting ready. William has to brush his teeth.” “Go. To. Bed.” William and his adopted cousin William sit still on the floor of their bedroom and watch…
Read MoreThe Untitled Document
Teneya and Billy in bed in the morning, Teneya with her leg draped across those of Billy and her foot tucking around his ankle, moving softly over his feet and her head on his shoulder and her fingertips spinning through the hair on his chest, lowering to stroke his stomach. Her body is young and…
Read MoreIn the Morning
Billy opened the sliding screen door and the young dog bolted out and turned and stood waiting. The old dog was the one Billy had on a leash so that it’s knee could heal, and they stepped gingerly out of the door and onto the earth and started walking around the house and up into…
Read MoreBury Me Alive
Promise to bury me alive not deeply, and only from the neck down Just a thin layer of rich beautiful soil to pin my body against the earth in a forest that’s far away and then just let me be I will be alright Leave my senses in full bloom so I can witness the…
Read MoreThe Gas Station, et al.
Everything goes away, everything goes away. I always have music in my head. Never a full song, but a couple of lines or two. Tonight while I’m sitting on my boulder behind the house that sits in front of the forest, I hear the refrain from a Radical Face song. I don’t remember the name,…
Read MoreA Half Full Moon
The boys stood in the clearing behind the house before the first trees of the forest, a darkening sky above. Wow, that moon is exactly half a sphere! Half a circle. What? It’s a circle. What you can see is a circle, and only half of it. A sphere is an orb, like a ball.…
Read MoreBilly and Jim and You and Me
I’ve been asked on occasion who Billy and Jim are. It’s clear to most that there are elements of myself in both characters, but in my own mind, I am Billy. I’ve always been Billy. Who Jim is remains a mystery to me. I’ve written for years about the both of them, using their beings…
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