Our 2015 Contest Winning story is
“Fun and Wonderful Toy”
by Joseph Young
She was about to come—eyes back, knees up, chin toward the ceiling—when he heard it.
“Shhh!” he said.
He put his palm across her teeth.
From the wooden steps, the sound of it slinking.
“What is that?” she said.
“You know.”
It reached the bottom, and there was quiet again.
“Should we call the police?”
He shrugged, pushing off her and onto his own side of the bed.
“On whom?”
“I don’t know,” she answered.
“This goddamned house?”
It did seem to be the house, because whenever they heard it, whenever he went to check, it was only the empty house, silent and pregnant with silence.
“Well,” she said.
“Whatever then.”
She quivered and he thought of her unfinished, tumescent. He was embarrassed, even if it had nothing to do with him.
“Must be some damn kid,” he said. “Lurking all about.”
Joseph Young lives in Baltimore. His book of microfictions, Easter Rabbit, was released by Publishing Genius in 2009, and another chapbook, 5 drawings of the maryland sky, by Ink Press in 2012. More of his writing can be found online and on his website. He also makes art, which can also be found on his website and on his Tumblr too.