Soundscape Daniel Webre __________ Ted was no more interested in the sound of his own voice than construction noise or babies crying. So when Eleanor suggested recording him for posterity’s sake, he was literally dumbstruck, unable to utter more than a faint croak. To his dismay, Eleanor was not the…

Apple Slices Tess Woodhouse __________ Sometimes she thinks about her mother. A house in Scotland, goats, cats, the warping edges of an idea of a man. Her mother tells stories. ‘We had these three little goats, I would go out in the early mornings to milk them, and laugh at…

And She Still Has Her Christmas Lights Up in June, Too Chelsea Stickle __________ The dogs noticed first. They yapped at every passerby, so none of the neighbors noticed for awhile. It was when Ivy was late to walk her dog that she saw a woman in ballet flats—her face…

Olives Lori Sambol Brody __________ In our hotel room overlooking Marrakech’s Djemaa el Fna, you feed me olives you bought in the Medina. Reaching into pink plastic bags bulging with fruit. Green olives cured with lemon, olives seasoned with harissa, wrinkled black olives desert-dry, olives tart with vinegar, olives brined…

The First Rule Alex Morrow __________ Hélène stares blankly out of her suite window at the fortified steel cage that sits at the edge of her compound. It has been nineteen days since her prisoners were locked away, and six since the stronger of the bunch had begun to consume…

The South Rim Ashley Graegin __________ On the mantle sat a framed photograph: my family and I standing on tri-colored sedimentary rock, behind us, an endless landscape of canyons. Well, most of us were standing. Reese sat on a layer of rock, and my other sisters leaned in so that…