Category: 1. Edited Stories

  • To The Editor

    May 8, 20XX To the Editor: Yesterday, my class had to stay late after school. My teacher said it was because a bear was in my neighborhood. After they let us go home, my dad wouldn’t let me play outside because a bear was in my neighborhood. Last night they caught the bear down my…

  • Until Death

    Brad’s parents were always fighting. He hated it. He’d wake up to the sound of the screaming spouses and come home from school to the same monotonous noise. If it wasn’t bills, it was senseless jealousy. He had started to grow accustomed to it, but had never become immune. One day, Brad got off the…

  • Tick Tick Went the Crocodile

    The world rippled above the heat of the mid-day tarmac, and even the clouds had fled the sky for cooler climes. It was in these dog-days that even the living began to move like the walking dead — slumped, shuffling, and groaning through their duties. If he had been given the choice, this is exactly…

  • Saved by the Bull

    A.C. was in his junior year of high school when The Panic happened. He was in love. Jessie was the love of his life. They had been dating for just over a year when Zack stole her away. A.C. swore that he would have his revenge on Zack for stealing his girl. At seventeen, he…

  • Set for Life

    It was only natural that hobbies would arise in the Zone. Once you got past the terror, the malnutrition, the lack of privacy, the cold, and the despair, there was the boredom. There was plenty of all six to go around. A few people tried knitting scarves and sweaters, some played cards, most just shivered…

  • Eight Times Over Miss October

    I hate Magritte. I never understood why until I was an old man, felt like an old man at least. Then I figured out just what a smug son of a bitch he really was. When the outbreak hit I ran, like everyone else. I ended up deep in the mountains. I found a cabin.…

  • Black and White

    Slater stood outside of the command tent. He had just debriefed his battalion on the mission and was taking in the sunset. The cool May breeze washed over him; it was relaxing. The stress of late was taking its toll. The never ending headaches and late nights were prying at his willpower, but he remained…

  • Zonexistentialism

    “Neither need you tell me,” said Candy, “that we must take care of our garden.” “You are in the right,” said Glossy; “for when we were put into this garden of Eden, it was with an intent to dress it; and this proves that mankind was not born to be idle.” “Work then without disputing,”…

  • Unforgiven

    John sprinted down the street of a once quiet suburban town. Now all hell was unleashing around him. He ran past a white station wagon that had been pinned between a red truck and a Pontiac Grand Prix. The two children in the back pressed themselves against the seat as hard as they could, just…

  • Tagged

    It was seven feet tall, bright orange, and aesthetically unpleasant. Whoever did it put it halfway between the entrances to the A & B concourses. Whoever did it had never bothered to burden his or her talents with anything as inconvenient as an art class. Slater looked at Asher. “When I find out who did…

  • Ain’t She A Beaut!

    “Take a look at this one! Ain’t she a beaut!” Larry whispered to himself as he lay in the cold wet grass of Burnet Park. “Crikey! I’ve never seen one so close.” Larry dreamed of one day having his own nature show on television. In reality, he just impersonated his idol, The Crocodile Hunter. Larry…