“XXX Marks the Spot” by J.L. Delozier

Ella flounced from the theatre, her diamond earrings scattering angry slivers of red light down the deserted street. Not a cab in sight. Not at this hour; not in this part of town. He’d planned it that way. She stomped one glittery Louboutin against the curb and turned on the lanky man hovering at her […]

“Wasn’t Tomorrow Wonderful?” by Melanie Dante

This piece is shared in memory of Greg Teetsell. “Oh, darling!” she exclaimed. Her blue eyes lit bright, lips tinted pink like an old photograph. “Wasn’t tomorrow wonderful?” Sparkling confetti fell through the air. “Wasn’t it just extraordinary?” They were dancing on top of the world. Band music played softly in the background. The moment […]

“The Orth-Daly Case” by Ben Himmelfarb

Part 1 This was supposed to be a simple lookup. A “lookup” was the general name for the work I did. People called or emailed the library almost everyday asking me to do research. Even though I couldn’t always find the answers they wanted, I was duty-bound to try. I was the local history librarian […]

“Down Solo” [excerpt] by Earl Javorsky

Charlie Miner wakes up looking down at his body on a gurney at the LA County morgue. When he moves closer to the body, it pulls him in and he is able to make it get up and walk around. Charlie, a down-on-his-luck, heroin-addicted insurance fraud investigator, leaves the morgue with two priorities: to get […]

“The Hard Summer That Laura Made Harder” by Brian Greene

I’ll always remember Laura as the woman who made one of the hardest summers of my life harder. It wasn’t enough that the nation-wide recession took its toll on our town and that the restaurant at which I’d been bartending was forced to close, due to lack of business; that I had to turn to […]