Leona stared, unseeing, at the small grungy duplex. Her eyes fixed upon the fading gray door and penetrated through the walls to her past. That night so long ago came rushing back like a tidal flood and nearly drowned her once again in the pain of it all. She could see the others—homies, out for a good time and looking for themselves. They couldn’t abandon her fast enough when the cops showed up. Continue reading “Become New”
The headlights glared through the rain. The trucker blasted his horn. Carter tried to swerve back into the right lane, but the bike laid down and slid across the wet, cliff-side road. The truck roared past him. The bike plummeted off the ledge and Carter followed it. Helpless to stop his descent, he plunged into the darkness of the canyon below. It was four hundred feet to the bottom. He knew he’d be dead on impact. His arms flailed, vainly trying to grab hold of something—anything. Continue reading “When Dawn Breaks”
WWII in Color –
http://www.ww2incolor.com/news/site-updates/15-astonishing-world-war-2-photos-that-bomb-your-senses
Christmas Eve. 1941. Hong Kong.
A continuous bevy of shots from assault rifles and machine gun fire filled the air like a devilish percussion straight from hell. Mortars and grenades exploded around them like thunder cracks of mass destruction. Bullets, dirt, and shrapnel shot through the air. Men shouted and screamed as blood poured out upon the earth.
“Danny!” Joe yelled as he saw his friend take a bullet.
Crimson blood stained the front of his olive-drab field jacket as he clutched at his stomach. His knees buckled and he fell to the ground.
Joe bolted forward from the protection of the foxhole. Continue reading “Show Me Peace”
“She’s a pretty little thing,” Eve said as she watched the young woman.
“She looks so tired,” Sarah commented.
The girl’s pale face and heavy-lidded eyes undershadowed by dark circles clearly reinforced the statement. Continue reading “Especially Now”
Doug made his way through the crowded corridors of O’Hare. His bag hung over his shoulder and the pain in his back letting him know that his body didn’t appreciate the long flight. He wasn’t so young anymore, but the sleepless nights had taken their toll and left him feeling far older than his sixty-two years. He trudged outside through the doors and a rush of cold air blasted him in the face. He pulled the collar of his coat tighter and glanced around. The sun had long-since set and the city was lit by street lamps and neon signs. Cold flakes of snow were just beginning to fall from the black night sky.
Doug waited for a cab, trying several times unsuccessfully to get one to stop. When he finally he got one, he slipped into the backseat and set his bag down beside him.
The young driver glanced at him in the rearview mirror. “Hey, where you goin’, pops?” Continue reading “Prodigal Christmas”
She felt the blood trickle down her leg and the scent of raw earth whispered in her face. Pine needles pricked at her hands and agonizing pain shot through her knee.
Racing through the dark woods at breakneck speed with tears raining down her cheeks, Lana hadn’t seen the patch of rocks.
Trip, fall, and she smashed her knee on one of the jagged boulders.
A sob escaped her lips, followed by a primal scream that rose up from her gut and rang through the air, muffled in the forest like a wild thing trapped in a cage. Continue reading “How Far the Light”
I raised my hands up above my head as I stared down the business end of the .45.
Come on. Are you kidding me? I just wanted to make a deposit!
The hand that held it trembled and I looked up into the kid’s eyes, the only part of his face that showed through the black ski mask he wore.
What I saw there wasn’t what I would have expected to see in the eyes of an armed bank robber. Continue reading “Do You Believe?”
Whitney L. Schwartz 