Category: Fiction (Page 2 of 5)

Magpie

7 June 2023 / Editor

Fiction by Andy Larter

First of all I hear their harsh clacking. There they are in the cherry tree, two of them, thank goodness, ying-yang, bold and brash. I hold a cup in one hand, towel in the other and, despite their reputation as nest robbers, I love their brilliant whiteness, their dark, glossy tails and wings.

They cackle me back to that time we heard a thud on the window, the one I am looking through now. We turned to see what made the sound and there on the window was the shape of a bird like an old photo negative–vague, ghostly, wings and all. Yvonne locked the cat away as I prowled into the yard. Under the window, stark against the earth lay the bird. I thought it had died but it quickened in my fingers.

Dad said they were evil birds. Yvonne said it’s not all black and white. “Look at that green and blue shimmering in its tail,” she said. He pointed out the cruel dark bill, the way they frighten smaller birds. Mum told us how they often taunted Patches, perching and cackling just out of the cat’s reach. Yvonne thought them clever creatures. She brought a shoebox, some cotton wool and a couple of writhing worms she’d collected from her bed of herbs, placed it on a shelf by the window in the shed.

“I’m going to take care of him,” she beamed. “Make him well again.”

Back indoors I saw the image of the bird remained on the glass and I gazed through it to the yard outside. I took a photo of the pattern, saw that moment through the bird’s eye, tried to focus on what it had seen.

The following morning, when Yvonne went to the shed, the bird had gone. Dad said he had found it on the floor of the shed pecking at crumbs and dust. “I thought it best to let it go,” he said, “and it flew to the aerial. Another one joined it and they went away.”

As I watch the antics of the magpies in the tree today and listen to their bold, aggressive chatter, I shrug and salute them. Then a vision of her magpie reappears in my mind’s eye and, beyond that, some blurred movement in the shed.

Andy Larter is a retired teacher, who, since retiring, has taken writing more seriously. He has had a few pieces published in local magazines and a couple online. He probably doesn’t submit enough but some friends encourage him to do more. He lives quietly in UK with his wife.

The Smart One

21 May 2023 / Editor

Fiction by Lexie Kauffman

“Does anyone know what a heuristic is?” My professor’s voice echoes throughout the expansive biology lab accompanied by the chittering of critters living in the dozens of glass terrariums that line the room. The projector pull down screen shows a stark white PowerPoint slide with only “Heuristic,” written in black text, at the very top. The fluorescent overhead lighting beams onto the class full of unfamiliar faces. Everyone looks older and wiser; they look like they know what they’re doing.

It is my first class on my first day of college and no one knows me. I sit alone at a table meant for four, palms sweaty in the humid room, debating if I should answer the question; but this is my blank slate, my chance to make a first impression on my class and professor. This moment creates my new identity, completely separate from high school.

I can picture the definition of heuristic, painstakingly written out in my AP Psychology vocabulary journal. It sits on the second page of Unit 7.5, nestled between “Algorithm” and “Trial and Error.” The word “Heuristic” is written in red pen, quickly underlined to make it stand out. Underneath lies the definition in black pen: “A rule of thumb problem solving strategy. It makes a solution likely, but it does not guarantee it.” Below that, written in blue ink, is the example: “i before e except after c.” The journal lies forgotten in my bedroom 100 miles away. The black and white composition book with only my name on the cover sits abandoned on an empty desk in an empty bedroom.

I know what a heuristic is. I could easily raise my hand and explain it, but a quick glance reveals that the room full of upperclassmen is confused. No one else knows what a heuristic is, so I stay quiet.

This silence is my new identity. After thirteen years as the “smart” one, I can’t do it again. I owe it to little second grade me who sat suffocating in an observation room as administrators watched her perform academic tasks to test her IQ. I owe it to that outcast that was the only student from her grade in the gifted program.

The silence is synonymous to my response when I was asked at eight years old, “You play video games? I thought you just went home and read textbooks.”

I deserve the silence after teachers called on me for thirteen years, regardless of the status of my hand, because they knew I could answer or ask a relevant question. I revel in the silence, this moment where I am choosing to take control of my intelligence and who knows about it.

It’s powerful, but why does it make my stomach sour?

In my head, I hear the screeching voice of my psychology teacher begging me to raise my hand, insisting that this exact moment is why she filled her class with so much passion.

I imagine my high school gifted teacher’s disappointment that I am letting myself stay silent. If I was in his classroom, I would be teaching the class for him.

I feel my mom’s sadness that I am hiding my intelligence: the part of myself that I place most of my worth in.

But, behind the loud wall of those that have helped me grow and learn, are the sobs of younger me, wondering why she doesn’t have friends, asking why she’s always bored, questioning why the only time she’s chosen first is for group projects.

Everything I’ve ever done is for her. The fancy plaque from graduation was earned by my hard work and dedication, but it belongs to the lonely smart girl that nobody understood. The gold-plated name applies to both girls, but it truly belongs to the one alone in the tiny closet of a gifted classroom, doing group activities alone with the teacher, completely isolated from her peers. I earned that plaque for the girl who sat by herself on a bench engrossed in a new book every day at recess because no one shared her interests. I had to make it mean something, because otherwise all of the pain and heartbreak that public school brought would have been for nothing.

So, I say nothing. The professor proceeds to explain the definition of heuristic and how it applies to the particular slide of information. I’m only half listening because the definition is already scrawled in black pen in my new college-ruled notebook.

He changes the slideshow to the next topic. Text fills the screen accompanied by a grainy black-and-white photograph of Charles Darwin. I let out a little sigh before lifting my pen and starting to write. For the rest of the class, I remain silent.

Lexie Kauffman (she/her) is a Creative Writing and Publishing & Editing double-major at Susquehanna University in Selinsgrove, Pennsylvania. When she’s not reading or writing, she is most likely watching Netflix with her friends. Previously, her work has been featured in Rivercraft.

The Phone Call

25 April 2023 / Editor

Fiction by Laura L. Feldman & Stephen M. Feldman

I willed my phone to ring. The literary agent had scheduled the call for 2:00 p.m. Not yet late, still one minute before the hour.

I had dreamed of being a writer since junior high, when I’d written my first story for an honors English class. The A+ didn’t hurt, and neither did my mom’s encouragement.

My novel manuscript had consumed two years of writing and rewriting. Before contacting agents, I devoted a month to crafting a query that pitched the story and my writing background in three flawless paragraphs. I sent it to fifteen agents. Three requested the full manuscript.

A month later I received an email scheduling this phone appointment. Soon I would be talking with an agent who wanted to represent me and sell my novel.

I would be a writer. ‘Yes, I’ve published a novel,’ I would say. No longer a poseur.

I checked the time again.

Two minutes late. It didn’t mean anything. I needed to relax, act as if I spoke to agents all the time.

I glanced at my list of questions, lifted from several books about landing an agent. Prepare for the phone call, they all instructed. Don’t immediately say, ‘Yes, yes, yes! I want you to be my agent.’ Ask questions. What did she like about the manuscript? What were the weaknesses? What changes would she want to see before submitting it to publishers? Did she have a plan for the submission process?

Act like a professional writer.

Three minutes late.

Had I gotten the day wrong? Was the call scheduled for tomorrow rather than today? I opened the agent’s email.

I’d already read the brief message at least a dozen times. But I reread it again, twice: “Can you talk about your ms. this coming Thursday at 2 p.m., ET?”

No mistake. It was today.

The phone buzzed. I checked the screen and my stomach hardened into a knot. This call would change my life.

The phone buzzed again. I took a deep breath and answered.

“Hello,” I squeaked. “Sorry.” I cleared my throat and tried again. “Hello, this is Sara Klein.”

“Hi, Sara,” said a sweet lilting voice.

“Hello,” I said, for the third time.

“Just so you know, I’m not calling to offer representation.”

“What?”

“I want to be clear at the outset. So you’re not disappointed. Or confused.”

The ice cracked and I crashed through. Panicking, I opened my mouth to scream and freezing water rushed in. I was drowning in the darkness. Which way was up, which way was down?

“Some writers,” she said, her voice muffled and distant, “think this first phone call is to offer representation.”

“No,” I croaked. “Of course not.”

I glanced at my list of questions. Nothing there suggested an appropriate response.

“If you’re amenable,” she said, “I’d like to discuss your manuscript and some changes I’d like to see.”

I squeezed my eyes shut, holding in my tears.

“If you rewrite it,” she continued, “I’d be willing to take another look at it.”

“That would be great,” I managed to say.

“No promises of course.”

“That makes sense. You’ll have to read the—”

“I don’t want to mislead you. I plan to read the rewrite, if you do it. But at this stage, I can’t promise I’ll have the time.”

“Oh.” I squeezed my temples. What were we even discussing, then? “I understand.”

“Do you still want to proceed?”

“Please,” I wanted to hang up, throw my manuscript in the trash, and cry for a month. “Go ahead,” I said.

“Wonderful. The first thing I noticed was a problem with the plot.”

“The plot?” Shit. Shit. Shit.

“That’s right. After the first plot point—”

“Hold on,” I said, clicking my ball point pen. “Just one second.” I flipped the page where I’d jotted my useless questions. “Sorry. I’m ready.”

And she was off and running, tearing the manuscript apart. I couldn’t concentrate, couldn’t comprehend enough to ask intelligent questions. I tried to take copious notes, nearly transcribing the conversation. Later on, after I calmed down, I might be able to learn from my notes and benefit from this torturous experience.

If an agent, any agent, was willing to critique my manuscript, I should consider myself lucky—that’s what I reminded myself. Despite my disappointment, I would rewrite and send the manuscript to her again. Of course I could do exactly what she wanted, and she could still reject it. Or I might not even hear back from her. She hadn’t even committed to reading the next version.

As she talked, I decided to send the rewrite to other agents as well. Why not?

The phone call ended abruptly. She had another appointment. Maybe with an actual client? I didn’t ask.

Hollowed, drained of motivation, I riffled through my three pages of notes without comprehending them. My gaze shifted to the desk drawer on the lower right. I didn’t want to do it. But I couldn’t fool myself any longer. Neither this agent nor any other would likely offer representation.

I swallowed, my throat dry and raspy. Then I slid open the drawer and pulled out a stack of law school applications. I’d put it off long enough.

Laura L. Feldman writes and edits for the Wyoming Survey & Analysis Center. She has degrees and certificates from the University of Oregon, Stanford, and Harvard. Stephen M. Feldman is the Housel/Arnold Distinguished Professor of Law at the University of Wyoming. He has published several short stories and nonfiction books.

Photo by Kateryna Hliznitsova on Unsplash

Picnic on a Plane

9 April 2023 / Editor

Fiction by Serena Burman

“Pilot to copilot, are we ready for takeoff?” Mom looks in the rearview mirror and back at me. I roll my eyes because I’m 16. She laughs, “It’ll be nice when you start liking me again.”

How did I almost miss it, austere letters on neon yellow plexiglass: AFFORDABLE CREMATION & BURIAL. I swerve into the lot. Inside, it’s 1978. I pause, my eyes adjusting to dim light. Faded shag carpet flatters the persimmon pedicure I got on the way here. Stuffing pokes out of the olive paisley couch. It smells like a mix of mothballs and barbecued pork.

“Hiya, how can I help?” The man who emerges behind the wood-paneled counter looks like the emu guy in Liberty Mutual ads. Hank, his tag says.

“I’m here to pick up my mom. Well, her remains.”

“You mean cre-mains. Common mistake. Sylvia?” I nod. He lifts a small cardboard box from behind the counter.

“Here you go. She’s a heavy one! Gotta be over five pounds.”

It looks like the box of spare batteries in my pantry. Timidly, I reach out. My hands drop a few inches with its weight. One of the flaps is untucked. What did I expect, an ornate urn? Shit, was I supposed to bring one? Mom would have thought of that—an old vase from Goodwill she’d decoupaged with gold leaf or something. She knew how to mark moments.

“Men usually weigh in around six or seven pounds, women, more like three or four. You get real good at guessing without a scale around here,” Hank chuckles.

I pull on the loose flap. Inside, a plastic bag stuffed with chunky gray powder. I hold it up.

“Is that amber?” Hank asks, pointing to my ring. The stone is loose in its silver setting. I constantly thumb it like a loose tooth. It’s nothing special, but Mom never took it off.

Hank leans in, says amber is really just resin. Tells me he used to collect jewelry. Launches into a soliloquy about his favorite precious stones. Through the wall, I imagine an ornate wood-fired oven, giant pizza peels on wheels for sliding corpses in without a hiccup. How do they gather ashes? How do they know these are Mom?

I could probably give him five minutes of water cooler talk. I want to go. I dig for my wallet and he takes the cue, asks to see my ID. I can’t think of a joke about stealing cremains. I pick a ballpoint pen from the cup, sign the papers and hurry out the door. What now.

I walk in circles around my red jetta. Open the passenger door, close it. Open it. Swipe an old sandwich wrapper to the floor and set the box against the black leather. Resist the urge to reach for the seatbelt.

Whenever we traveled, Mom brought a reed basket as her carry-on. While everyone around us ate bland airplane food, she’d unpack a full picnic: classic calico napkins, water crackers, brie. And mini apple pies she’d baked in a muffin tin expressly for the flight. Pielettes, she called them.

I yank a sweater from the backseat and slide the cream wool under the box. Across the parking lot, a splash of golden wildflowers. I gather a small bouquet. Tie it with an asphalt rubber band. Drape it over the box. I start the engine. Put the car in reverse.

She usually wouldn’t tell me where we were going until we were on the plane. As we checked bags, walked through metal detectors, cinched our lap belts tight, I’d beg to know. She’d just smile.

I’ll tell you once we’ve left the gate.

Serena Burman lives on a small island in the Pacific Northwest. Her recent work appears in The Audacity, Pithead Chapel and Invisible City. She received Honorable Mention for The Pen Parentis 2022-2023 Writing Fellowship for New Parents (in flash fiction) and was a Semifinalist for Ruminate’s 2021 VanderMey Nonfiction Prize.

photo of a fish in the aquarium — Photo by imsogabriel Stock on Pexels.com

Fish Tales

21 February 2023 / Editor

Special Selection for One-Year Anniversary Issue

Fiction by Foster Trecost

Boredom lurked like a silent companion, sometimes causing him to see things that weren’t there, sometimes causing him to miss things that were. Such was the case when he caught sight of something he’d never noticed before, though it had been there all along. He moved in for a closer look, so close his nose nearly touched the glass, and what he saw, in the language of his age, was an assortment of creatures, some big, some small. They moved about the confined space and he wondered if they were bored, too.

His brother, a bit older and much wiser, knew things and knew how to explain them. “Where’s my brother,” he asked.

“With his friends.” The answer was always the same, just like everything else. But the creatures through the glass were trapped, they weren’t going anywhere and neither was he.

“What are you looking at?” His brother had returned.

“Them,” he said, then streamed a series of questions so fast, each was asked before the prior could be answered.

“Slow down. One at a time.”

“That one,” he said, pointing to a large figure hovering in the back. “Why is that one bigger than the others?”

His brother presented a different view: “She’s the biggest because she’s everyone’s mother. All the others are her children.”

“All of them?”

“Not the skinny one. He’s the father. He worries all the time, that’s why he looks sick. They’re just like us.”

He believed every word and should have because every word was true, or at least the truth as his brother believed it. He spent the following days matching his newfound knowledge with what he saw, and concluded, just as his brother had, that they weren’t so different.

“You still thinking about them?” asked his brother. “Don’t waste too much time. It’s hard enough understanding our side of the glass.”

“You’re right.”

“Not always, but most of the time.” The two boys laughed, then his brother said something he’d never said before. “Come on, let’s go play.”

“I can come?”

“Sure, the others are waiting.” They turned away from the glass. “You want to race?”

“Can I have a head start?”

“Okay, but you better take it now before I change my mind.”

Without another word he swam away, his fish tail all that could be seen, swishing from one side to the other, and his brother swam after him just as fast as he could.

Foster Trecost writes stories that are mostly made up. They tend to follow his attention span: sometimes short, sometimes very short. Recent work appears in Potato Soup Journal, Halfway Down the Stairs, and BigCityLit. He lives near New Orleans with his wife and dog.

Thumbing a Ride

12 February 2023 / Editor

Fiction by Alison Arthur

She shifts uncomfortably in the deeply upholstered seat. Perhaps she should not have accepted the ride, but it’s too late for second thoughts now.

He pilots the car down the country road, the sun escaping below the horizon in the rearview mirror. There is a smell. Mints and something else she can’t quite place. Perhaps shaving cream or soap. Desperation? Can you smell desperation, she wonders?

The conversation is cordial, but cautious. He wants to know where she is going, where she came from, why she is on the road thumbing a lift. She answers politely, but minimally, not sure of her situation. But he seems more paternal in his concern than intrusive. She begins to relax, sinking into the plush upholstery, her sense of dread subsiding.

He tells her he is a distributor for car parts, traveling between stores. Often with only his own thoughts to occupy him, he is happy for some companionship. When they stop for gas, he returns to the car with packaged sandwiches and juice that he shares with her. “You look a little hungry,” he says with fatherly concern. The conversation is lighter now, and she dozes for a while, hunger satiated and fear assuaged.

When she wakes, it is dark. She is unsure where they are. A backroad with no street lights, swirling mist caught in the headlights in the chill night air. Noticing that she has stirred, he chuckles and says, “Nice to see you are feeling so comfortable. Guess you have decided I’m not a serial killer.”

She straightens herself in her seat, shaking off sleep, and turns her face to him. “Oh yes, quite sure,” she replies. “After all, what are the chances there would be two of us in the same car.”

Alison Arthur is an emerging flash fiction author residing in Nova Scotia, Canada. Read earlier work from the August 2022 Issue of The Bluebird Word.

leafless tree on grass field — Photo by Johannes Plenio on Pexels.com

Rooting

30 January 2023 / Editor

Fiction by Elodie Barnes

The wind is strange tonight. Sharp-edged, soft-howling. Icy tendrils carrying pinpricks of stars from the north. Leaves lie half-rotted, frozen mid-tumble. The soil is hard, unyielding, the solstice opposite of summer’s rich dampness. I soaked it up then, drank in the warmth under skies that darted with birds, their feathers inking songs onto blue that then faded with dusk. I can hear them rustling now, no longer singing, as uncertain as I am. Their claws grip my branches; branches that are naked now from the onslaught of winter, but no longer tender, no longer bloody with bursting buds and the rough scratching of owls. There is no skin left. Still, this wind makes me shiver. None of us are used to wind coming from the north.

At one time, I barely knew the wind at all. I was a child, knowing only that one day I would be gifted a seedling. A seedling that would grow as I grew, each of our bodies mimicking the channels and contours of the other until one day there would be no difference. One day I would take root in a place called home, a place from which I could never stray. I didn’t want it then. I didn’t want a home away from my mother; she never settled, so why should I? I never questioned the small plant of my mother’s that always sat on our kitchen windowsill, green and sickly and yet still trimmed every year by my father. Pruned, shaped, stunted. A tree smothered to a sapling.

She comes, sometimes, and I try to offer her the shelter I never could as a child. A blanket of branches, a waterfall of sunlight cascading through leaves. She talks, and I no longer understand. There are some words I remember – home, strong, love – but I don’t know whether those words came from her or me, and I’m even less sure of what they mean now that the north is gusting, ripping against my roots on their weakest side. The side that faces backwards; the side that knows there are too many questions about survival I never knew I needed to ask; too many questions I never dreamed she would have the answers to. Like why the winds suddenly change direction. What to do when home no longer feels safe. How to hold on, when it feels like winter will never end.

Elodie Barnes is a writer and editor living in the UK. Her short fiction has been widely published, including in the Best Small Fictions 2022 Anthology. She is Creative Writing Editor at Lucy Writers Platform, and is working on a collection of short stories. Find her online at elodierosebarnes.weebly.com.

silhouette of fishing rods during sunset — Photo by Nayla Charo on Pexels.com

Rapid Transit

12 January 2023 / Editor

Fiction by E.H. Jacobs

After some consideration, I decided to move from Town X, where I had dwelt for many peaceful, if uneventful, years, to Town Y, a neighboring municipality with which I had only a vague familiarity. I had been feeling for some time that my life had become stale and routine. I had many acquaintances but few, if any, friends, and social conversation always returned to the same topics, like a planet on a fixed orbit: that week’s golf game, the latest baseball trades, and who was meeting up with whom at which expensive restaurant. Nobody seemed interested in discussing, say, the audiobook of Hemingway stories I had been listening to. I heard that the citizens of Y were a livelier lot and that interesting things went on there.

I awoke the first morning in my new home after sleeping so deeply that my memory of the move seemed suspended in a hazy semi-conscious fog. I was surrounded by boxes neatly stacked with no markings to indicate their contents or the room in which each belonged. Perhaps the strangest thing of all: there were no flaps or openings. On top of the highest stacked box was a note that appeared to be in my mother’s handwriting, although my mother had been dead for some years, which simply said: “Don’t open anything you’re not sure of.”

I went outside to see if the newspaper had arrived and a gust of cold wind – quite unexpected in July – hit me in the face, freezing my nose and slamming shut the front door. In my pajamas, I hugged myself tightly to keep warm. The sky darkened and small, white objects began drifting lazily from above, like snowflakes. They soon multiplied and I was in the middle of what appeared to be a squall. As the objects got closer, it became clear that they were not snowflakes, but loose pages from a notebook. I grabbed a handful as they twisted and torqued around me. They were from stories that I had written. A dry, rustling sound, barely audible at first, rose in volume, morphing into laughter. It was the sound of my pages laughing at me. I was hit on the head by what felt like hailstones. After each hit, I saw fall to the ground a book. Each was written by an author whom I had grown to admire: Saroyan, Woolf and Styron. The books flipped themselves open and shook their pages in laughter.

Lying in the driveway was a black high heel shoe with the bottom of the heel roughly shorn off. I looked at my feet, as if the shoe were mine, and I marveled that I could be capable of switching identities so fluidly. Alongside the shoe was a book authored by my favorite workshop leader. The wind blew the book open to a page that read: “Lesson Five: Raise the Stakes.” At that moment, blood started dripping out of the shoe.

I walked into the house in some distress only to hear a knock at the door, commanding and insistent.

Standing with his back to me was a man, broad shouldered, in a gray turtleneck sweater. He turned, holding out two fishing rods and smiling broadly with a self-satisfied, I wouldn’t exactly call it a smirk, but with an expression that definitely showed that he knew who he was and was going to tell me who I was. He had a well-trimmed, salt and pepper beard framing a very familiar face. I opened the door.

I managed to squeak: “Ernest? Is that really you?”

Hemingway let out a hearty laugh. “I’ve come to teach you to fish!” He said a little too loudly, but with good cheer.

“F-fish?” I stammered.

“Well, it was either that or bullfighting, and I didn’t think you’d be up for that.”

“But why’d you–?”

“Somebody had to. Come on, you don’t want to end up like those pansies – Saroyan, Woolf and Styron. You’ve got to learn how to fish for yourself!”

I hesitated, not knowing if I should accept his invitation or invite him in for tea. After all, how often does one get to spend time with Ernest Hemingway?

Hemingway looked past me into the house.

“What’s with those boxes?” he asked.

“I don’t know how to open them.”

Hemingway pushed past me. “What’s in them?” he asked, as he leaned his fishing rods against the tallest stack.

“Secrets?” I said uncertainly.

“What kind of secrets, man!”

I shrugged. “Don’t know.”

Hemingway took out a fishing knife. “Well, let’s find out then. There are stories in there! Let’s get to work.”

Before he could start cutting the boxes, I blubbered: “But my mother—”

“Your mother? Do you always listen to your mother? I’m sure she was a lovely woman, but still, you know – fish for yourself!”

I nodded and, with shaking hands, pulled down the first box.

E.H. Jacobs is a psychologist and writer in Massachusetts. His work has appeared in Coneflower Café, Santa Fe Literary Review, Permafrost Magazine, Hawaii Pacific Review, Storgy Magazine, Streetlight Magazine, Aji Magazine, and Smoky Quartz. He has published two books on parenting and book reviews in the American Journal of Psychotherapy.

cooked turkey on black round pan — Photo by EKATERINA BOLOVTSOVA on Pexels.com

Help?

25 December 2022 / Editor

Special Selection for the 2022/2023 Winter Holiday Issue

Fiction by Kraig Kiehl

She knew this was going to be a terribly busy day. They always were this time of year. Gail took off her wreath earrings, since they got in the way of the headset, and accessed the call database. Her day began.

Gail answered the first call, “Emergency Hotline, what is the location of your emergency?”

A woman on the line whispered, “I’m in the garage.”

Gail knew the steps that followed: she had handled many calls like this in her almost 40-year career.

“Ok, sweetie, please stay on the line with me. Is anyone hurt?”

“No, not really – just my feelings.”

“Ma’am, what is the nature of your emergency?”

“I’ve never cooked a turkey, and my mother-in-law says I won’t be able to do it. And I can’t cook a turkey, but I want to.”

“Can you help me?” the woman pleaded in a whisper.

Gail could help her and did. She had worked in this role since the early 1980s. There was no one better in the business. She was armed with a degree in home economics from the state college, a teaching certificate, and over 30 years’ experience as a teacher at the largest high school in Blair City. The kids called her Mrs. G – short for Mrs. Gail. She was retired now and spent more time with her kids, grandkids soon hopefully, but the community needed her today.

She was the lead dispatcher for the Butterbaster Turkey Hotline. It was Christmas Day and although Thanksgiving kicked her butt each year, it seemed like people needed her more on this special holiday.

She completed her notes for the last call, took a sip of water, and reached to pick up another call. The room was buzzing with activity; over 50 other good citizens, in cubicles, in a large room were busy at work; the people needed them.

“Emergency Hotline, what is the nature of your emergency?”

“Mom, it’s me. Why are you not answering your cell phone?” the female caller asked.

“Tara, honey, I’m at work, and the calls are coming in. What can I help with?”

“Mom, I tried the Supercenter like you asked to get our turkey on points, but they were out of turkeys. Dad’s not helping; he is watching Christmas Day bowl games with Uncle Barry. You know this may be a big night for me.”

“Honey, just go over to Martin’s. I know the manager, and he promised to put a nice turkey aside for us. So just take Daddy’s gas card with you to get the discount. Make sure it’s a thawed bird – we are running out of time. I will talk to you later.”

Buzz, Buzz. “Hi, honey, how’s it going?”

“Mom, it’s terrible. Dad and Uncle Barry are going crazy. State is down by 10 points.”

“No, honey. How did the turkey work out for you?”

“Mom, that’s the thing. Martin’s manager promised to hold your turkey until 11. He had to give it away. Stores are closing. What should I do?”

“Well, well…” Gail stammered.

“You are always more worried about other people’s holidays than our family. I just don’t understand,” Tara said with a sigh.

“Honey, you know that’s not true. What I do is important.”

“Yes, Mom. It is.” Tara said.

“Now, listen. Go down to Sanderson’s and see Joey Rabowski.”

“Who?” Tara asked.

“Joey Rabowski. Your Dad and I went to high school with him. Your Dad always called him Little Joe – not sure he liked that. Joey and I dated before I met your dad. He has always had a thing for me.”

“Oh, Mom, that’s gross.”

“Honey, it’s fine. Joey says he always keeps a turkey for me every year just in case I need it. He also gives me chocolate on Valentine’s Day, but don’t tell your dad.”

“Ok,” Tara said reluctantly.

“Go see Joey. They close soon, so hurry.”

Gail closed her flip-phone and wondered, was Tara right? Did she care more about other families than her own?

I really may have ruined my holiday this year, Gail thought.

“Emergency Hotline, what is the nature of your emergency?” Gail asked, a little less confidently than the calls earlier in the day.

“Hi. No emergency. We just called to get your advice on recipes for side dishes for our turkey. We are cooking a turducken in our outdoor oil fryer.”

“Well,” Gail said, “that is certainly a popular way to cook a turkey, not our recommendation, but a popular way. You are surely going to be fine, as long as you are following the directions.”

“We are…” the caller said and began to trail off.

“Sometimes people don’t thaw the turkeys, and they try to cook them froze– .”

Gail heard an explosion on the line, and the caller screamed.

“Ma’am, are you ok?” Gail questioned.

“Um, um. The turkducken exploded, was shot from the fryer, and is on fire in our front lawn. What should we do?”

“Call the fire department and rush over to Sanderson’s. I hear they have turkeys. They may be frozen but see if they have thawed ones in the back. Little Joe, um, Mr. Rabowski can help you.”

Gail disconnected the call.

“Emergency Hotline, what is the nature of your emergency?” Gail asked.

“Mom, it’s me. We got a turkey. Your old boyfriend hooked us up. He had a 20-pound turkey set aside for you and gave us extra cranberry sauce.”

“Oh, honey, that’s wonderful. We will be fine.”

“Mom, ah, one thing. The turkey is frozen,” Tara confessed.

Her day was not turning out the way she expected. Her husband and brother-in-law had drunk a case of Schlitz beer while watching State lose to Southern. Tara was already at the house.

“Emergency Hotline, what is the nature of your emergency?” the operator asked.

“Ethel, this is Gail. I need some help.”

Kraig Kiehl is an American writer of short stories and fiction prose. Kraig is a retired military officer, a former college professor, and currently an executive for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Kraig lives in Pennsylvania with his wife, Renae, and two needy dogs.

top view photo of pine trees — Photo by Kelly on Pexels.com

Spruce

8 December 2022 / Editor

Special Selection for the 2022/2023 Winter Holiday Issue

Fiction by Austin Gilmore

Do you know who cared where it came from? Absolutely no one.

Most thought, and I admit I was one of them, it was a lightning strike that turned a pile of discarded Christmas trees into one gigantic, murderous Spruce. Others believed a more nuanced story, something about it being born from vengeance, going from being the center of every household’s holiday celebration to being tossed out like a piece of trash. I couldn’t track that one, but now I see my explanation wasn’t much better.

I didn’t know what to believe after that mountain of thrown out Christmas trees mysteriously disappeared, leaving only a trail of needles leading deep into the woods of Franklin Park. But there it stood, a gargantuan Spruce that wasn’t there the day before.

And do you know who cared? Absolutely no one.

The town gave a collective shrug and went on with their lives. But it bothered me. I call it The Detective Nag. Trees don’t just appear out of thin air. But that’s a soap box you can’t stand on for very long. When I heard myself saying wild things like “Trees don’t grow on trees!” I knew I had to stop and just accept the anomaly like everyone else.

Winter turned to Spring and life went on as usual. I avoided driving by Franklin Park whenever I could. The rare times I had to, when I saw the tip of the Spruce high above the other trees gashing clouds and sky, it felt like it was watching me, like it was watching everyone. Like it was biding its time.

Halloween and Thanksgiving came and went. Christmas lights were hung, Santa’s face popped up in the windows of businesses, and Braxton Sifers was found in the bullseye of our Target, his ravaged body held up by jagged sticks and pine needles.

That was December 1st.

Amanda Girouxi was discovered in her parked LeSabre, a tree limb the size of a light pole kabobbed both body and car.

That was December 2nd.

Larry Atchity was found bobbing face down in his jacuzzi, with a wreath of dense pine needles wrapped tightly around his neck, both carotid arteries expertly gashed.

That was December 3rd.

I went to my old station for the first time since I was forced into retirement and laid out my theory. “It’s the Spruce. There’s gonna be twenty-two more bodies if we don’t do something about it!”

And do you know who believed my theory? Absolutely no one. They laughed me out of the bullpen. And as the next few days passed without another body, I began to understand why they had. It was ridiculous theory, a murderous Spruce.

But I was right, there were other bodies. It just took a few days to find them.

It was like living in a macabre Advent calendar. Every new December day we’d wake to find another loved one torn apart by tree limbs, gutted by bark. It wasn’t until we started using the Super Food Barn freezer as a make-shift morgue, packed tight with fifteen mutilated bodies, that people started to believe my absurd theory.

Like modern day townspeople with torches and pitchforks, we all met up at Franklin Park and waited for some brave soul to volunteer to go in and cut down the Spruce. It was Shane Schefter who finally spoke up, wearing his letterman’s jacket, only a month removed from bringing home his second State championship. That damn Shane Schefter, if anyone could do it, it would be him. He tugged the cord of a chainsaw and heroically disappeared into the darkness of the woods.

We cheered at the sound of the chainsaw grinding into fresh wood. We high-fived as limbs crashed to the ground. We dove for cover when Shane shot out of the woods crashing like a meteorite into the side of his F150, his chest stabbed with so many tree shards it looked like the top of a pineapple.

Some packed up and moved that very night. The rest of us stayed, hoping to ride out the rest of the holiday season, hiding in our basements like we were stuck in a permanent Tornado Warning. I spent those ensuing days listening to Christmas carols, wrapping presents, and formulating a plan, only catching its movement a handful of times. The sounds though, you couldn’t miss. The shimmering shuffle of the needles in motion, the crack of limbs making its attack, the screams of its daily kill.

On Christmas Day, I put my plan into action. I went for a walk, hoping by then the
Spruce had claimed its final victim of the holiday season. I stepped over bodies of friends, with thick branches sticking out of their chests and needles in their eyes. Each step emboldened my plan even more.

I was going to burn it down.

I pulled out the engraved lighter the department gave me for thirty years of service, flicked it lit and tossed it into the darkness of Franklin Park. From a park bench I sat alone, watching my town fill with smoke and ash, dramatically humming Santa Claus Is Coming to Town.

As the sun rose on the morning of the 26th, so did the people from their seasonal hiding places, only to find what I had been staring at since the fire died down hours before. The blackened remains of the woods, with the Spruce untouched standing at the charred center.

And do you know who cared? Absolutely no one.

The town gave a collective shrug, and with the holiday season over, they went back to their lives like nothing had happened. “What about the Spruce?” I’d ask anyone who would listen, the Detective Nag taking over.

“Eh, Christmas is a long way off. We’ll figure something out.”

And there it still stands. Watching us. Biding its time for the temperature to drop, for Thanksgiving to pass, and for its reign of terror to begin again.

Austin Gilmore is an Art Director and gallery artist, who co-ran Kevin Costner’s production company for 7 years. He is passionate about donuts.