Special Issue: 2022 New Flash Fiction Prize
Morse Code by Elizabeth Cabrera

The old man fell asleep in his car, his nostrils pressed softly against the steering wheel, but the car kept going, because the old man’s foot was not asleep, was still pressing down hard, and later they would say, it’s not really his fault, he’s such an old man.

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Electric Storm by Kathryn Aldridge-Morris

It’s been twenty minutes since the first bolt of lightning ripped a scar through the purple night sky. Since my mother said to swim in the rain ― it’s fun. Since her boyfriend Colin said he’d join us― to check we’re ok.

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The Wonder of a Sea Sponge by Marina Hatsopoulos

Offstage, I pick flowers from my curls and accept congratulations from soccer team-mates, AP Bio geeks, the francophones from Spring Break in Paris, the overachievers from the boat I cox, and other groups to which I sort of belong, but not really. 

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From Zero to Infinity by Carol Ann Parchewsky

You can sit there as long as you want. On top of a pixelated mushroom in a fir-filled forest. Singing a song like a Eurovision vixen or dancing as loud as a Disney princess in fuschia or lilac embroidered tulle dresses.

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The Watchtower Seasons by Rosaleen Lynch

Summer High—Before dawn in the summer high off the dry and cracked ground we scramble up the watchtower’s wooden struts, hand after hand, bare feet following, replacing one with the other, like climbing clavicles you say.

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Little Red Riding Hood by Katerina Kishchynska

Grandma gets her episodes at least once a month. She’ll grow out her jaws and if it happens on a rainy day, claws will tear out of her fingers.

Hermit & Bleeding Faucet by Ana María Shua

With the population now well aware of the physical and mental benefits of asceticism (low cholesterol, bradycardia, a delicate sense of happiness, spiritual fulfillment), everyone wants to become a hermit.

Initiation by Stuart Dybek

The doors snap open on Addison, and the kid in dirty hightops and a sleeveless denim jacket that shows off a blue pitchfork tattooed on his bicep jogs forward beneath a backward baseball cap and grabs the purse off a babushka’s lap.

Café Mozart Dreamin’ by Tracey Meloni

Judie bangs on my hotel door. “The dressmaker is here! Hurry! You have Christmas lunch with Noah at Café Mozart at 1PM!” 

Their Closet by Pamela Painter

“What are you thinking?” her husband asked her. In their twenty years of marriage he had never asked her that.