A Loner

by M.E. Purfield

He stayed in his house. He didn’t talk to his neighbors. He worked from home. He never had visitors. No one was surprised when the police arrested him for murder. I was surprised I got away with it.

6S

Lady Luck

by Mike Revell

They call her Lady Luck, the girl with the golden hair, but only because they met her on a good day. They remember their promotions or proposals, or love at first sight, and they glow at the memory. But there are bad days. And on the bad days, days when the Lady is bored or tired or hungover; days when she is stung or depressed: you do not want to see her then. Because on those days, looking to all the world like rot, she is far less charitable. On those days, you may sooner find your tire punctured, or your wallet forgotten, than a penny glinting on the floor before you.

6S

Elevator

by Ryan Ridge

Two men waited in an elevator. One man had a shameful secret. The other had a disease but didn’t know it. They nodded at each other casually as the door shut. One man pushed the button while the other looked on. Both were going to the bottom.

6S

Defiance

by Heather Fain

Lauren picked up the heavy scissors, as she gazed into the mirror at the long blonde braid that represented everything she no longer desired for herself. The act of cutting it was simple enough but what it represented, and the statement it would make when she walked into the dining room to join her parents and brothers for dinner, was much greater. Apprehensively she held the length of it out to the side, but after a moment’s pause and reflection, quickly and decisively snipped it off. The vulnerable inner seeds of independence within her instantly quickened, the world grew light with possibility, and she felt a rebellion within that thrilled her. Transfixed by this new creature reflecting back at her, she ran a hand through her chin length tresses. This was an end, and a new beginning; this was life upside down.

6S

Hindsight

by Michael Brooks

I wish I had known how to read her signals, how to interpret the hair touching and smiles from across the crowded party. I wish I had known she was waiting to pull me aside while everyone gathered their coats and prepared for the frosty night. I wish I had known she would grab me by the face and thrust her slippery soft tongue into my mouth, imparting the taste of cheap beer and adolescence. I wish I had known her hands would guide mine, under her shirt then beneath her bra, up the intoxicating roundness of her flesh to the pink and pointy apex. I wish I had known she had a boyfriend. And I wish I had known he was standing in the driveway, waiting to deliver the beating of my young life.

6S

Stars

by Jacob Allgeier

He wanted to be an astronaut. The stars in the vast galaxy were just beckoning his domination. “Shoot for the them,” his mother would say, for she knew he could hit them all. Every one has collapsed, for he has conquered the speckled plain, the veins of constellations in the sky. Floating through the air he sees them, those entrancing lights he always dreamed of becoming a part of, and feels on top of the world. He wishes to never come down from this high, this dream where he can do the impossible, living in infinite joy, and dying peacefully as a shining spark that will never dim.

6S