by Cathy Ulrich Gregory Upper I’m writing a story where you grow up in a blue house. Periwinkle blue, with white trim and a green yard and sprinklers that make a sound like chk-chk-chk. And every morning, you wake up to chk-chk-chk and the chitter and rustle of fluttery birds with round black eyes and soft brown wings. And there are flowers of course, in this story I’m writing. Pretty little flowers that bow in the wind and shine with morning dew. Your neighbors wave when the

by Scott Neuffer Someone gave me an Amazon gift card for Christmas, and I spent it on books. I’m sorry. Amazon is a monster, but if I didn’t spend it on books, I would’ve blown it on Nintendo 64 games, and then I wouldn’t be reading at all. The books I got were written by trampset contributors, all collected works of short fiction, all written by ingenious women…. Every Mask I Tried On by Alina Stefanescu, Brighthorse Books, 2018 This story collection bristles with restless

by Cathy Ulrich Viktor Talashuk There is a ghost in this story. You will find it spiderweb-strung in the spaces between the words you can see. You will find it in the unspoken, soft things. Remember the first time you kissed someone, or the last. Remember waking in the night, twitch of shadow on the wall, your voice a ragged whisper, mom, mom, mom , how small your hands were then, how you slept in piles of stuffed animals so the killers, when they came, would never be able to

by Cathy Ulrich chuttersnap The weather girl at the end of the world starts throwing bottles at billboards bearing her face. She collects them from convenience stores in ten-cent plastic bags, tea bottles, beer bottles, cheap pink wine. The clanking they make as she carries them is louder than anything left. It is so quiet, she thinks, so empty, throws bottle after bottle after bottle, the crackle of glass-shatter and split, till they are gone, all used up, sun-sparkle on the