A Puff of Smoke by John Wheway
I thought about his pipe, the way she flew into a rage if he lit up. He used to hold it upside down, pinching the stem between thumb and forefinger like a pen,…
I thought about his pipe, the way she flew into a rage if he lit up. He used to hold it upside down, pinching the stem between thumb and forefinger like a pen,…
[TW: Reference to child abuse] Douglas Keech drinks a pint of bleach, every single morning. Now you’re probably thinking – dude, wtf? A pint of bleach every morning? But the thing Douglas…
The number for the bistro is by the phone. We’re not expecting Sebastian to wake, but you just never know with babies. If you hear whimpering down the monitor, tiptoe into Sebastian’s…
My friend came for tea wearing new red trousers with a smart blue and white top and I knew I was supposed to compliment her but I didn’t, because the colours were…
I find Henry on a soaking day beside the dumpster. He’s on his back in a gathering puddle, his leather legs paddling the fat rain. He has an inch-long crack in his…
In the empty hotel on the slopes of Vesuvius, after they’ve just met again – after how many years is it? Five, seven, more? – they drink one last glass of wine,…
Her name was Destiny and she told me I didn’t have long to live. Carpay something, she said, which I didn’t really get at the time. Car payments? House payments? The car’s…
Megan had been my best friend since elementary school and the way she tells it, I was on the swing by myself, running my jelly shoes over the pebbles, my shoulders hunched…
When they lived in a Victorian terrace, they used to joke that there was a body buried in the cellar, Dr Crippen-style. Now they’d moved to a 1930s semi, Paul said Emma…
Used car salesmen don’t smell like their dealership counterparts. Doesn’t mean we don’t try. We douse expensive colognes and deodorants on our wrists and armpits, but you can’t duplicate a dealership’s newborn…
I didn’t reply to Jacob’s last text message to me, but I did show up to his funeral. I’d spent the entire morning deciding what to wear. A lot of the clothes…
The boy smells of straw and stretches his s’s. When he asssks my name, the gas lamp on my corner hisses do not tell him. From Ssshropsshire, he says he is. And me? From the…