"…his stories are always sharp and compact and interesting." ——Angel Martinez "(One of) the hottest authors in the independent horror scene…" —-Hellbound Books
Every week we post six lines of a story of ours, a work-in-progress or from someone else’s work we recommend that has LGBT characters on Rainbow Snippets here https://www.facebook.com/groups/963484217054974
You know, I remember your Granddad showing me how to do this. He used to cook the turkey overnight, just like this, I remember when I was a little kid. You woulda liked him, I think. Yeah, when I was a kid we ate around this table a lot. It’s still kinda scuffed up in a few places. And you’ll like your Uncle Enrico when I get him out here.
Awwww! Can’t leave it there!
He had to work on Thanksgiving. I’m just glad your Grandma and your folks are okay with it. Wow. I haven’t been back to this house in over a year. Live too far away. This house is about a hundred-and-twenty years old, I’m twenty seven and you’re about…oh, seven months? Something like that.
My Dad showed me how to do the turkey but I haven’t done one in a while. And there are a couple of houses in my family like the one I mention here!
Next week, something not as Thanksgiving-Themed. (Meaning I’m not sure what!) —-jeff
There’s nothing like small-town High School football. And our team usually played nothing like small-town football. We didn’t have the worst record in the state but some people were surprised to hear we even had a team.
The D’Artagnan High School Knights games did bring out the town, there wasn’t a lot to do on Friday night in Western Kansas but our cheer should have been “better luck next time.” That’s probably why they let my younger brother Scotty Turner on the team, even if he usually just warmed the bench. Me? I was a year older than Scotty and had been on the bench all the time, okay up in the bleachers. I was a tuba player in the school band and we usually did better than the team. Not that William Gaines Turner Junior was planning on a musical career. Nope. Community College, Economics, that was the idea.
Anyway, right before Halloween and our Homecoming game we were playing the Millington Dragons and my buddy Mickey Mayak nudges me and says since our director wasn’t paying a lot of attention (flirting with one of the pretty teachers in the front row) we should start something. So, Mickey kicks Mark Lebsack, sitting in front of us with his trombone, and tells him what’s going on. In another minute, word has spread through the whole band and we kick into a march and the crowd cheers.
And somehow, Scotty thought that was a signal for him to run onto the field. This was during a play and I guess it meant they had too many players out there and the referees blew their whistles and the coaches for both teams started yelling and Scotty stood there with a “Wha’d I do?” look on his face.
Me and Mickey were laughing and the director looked pissed.
The gist of it all was they had to run the play again. Scotty stayed on the bench but since Millington stupidly was doing the exact same thing they did before we grabbed the ball and Martin MacFly (No kidding! That was really his name!) ran for a touchdown for our side! Maybe that gave us some momentum because we won the game, just barely. It didn’t mean a lot in the grand scheme of things but it meant our record for the season was 3 and 0 and not 2 and 0. And MacFly got the nickname “Flypaper,” for holding onto the ball (he’d dropped it on the very first play of the game.)
When it was all said and done my Dad had us stop in at Casey’s for a couple slices of pizza. There were a couple of employees carrying a couple of stacks of pizza out to a customer’s car and a woman with her bicycle leaning against the wall selling tacos. Yep. Small-town football. Gotta love it.
Somebody said later the school paper had wanted to run a story calling it “Marching Band Wins Football Game” but the Journalism teacher nixed it. And Mickey and I got a stern lecture from the director next Monday at band practice.
But my Brother Scotty got the last laugh. He went off to college, fell in love with this girl and married her. Yeah, the Coach’s daughter.
So now, every other Thanksgiving or Christmas, I have to hear “Hey, Billy! You remember your Brother’s bonehead play that saved the game?”
—end—
NOTE: And that’s me reflected in the bell of the tuba! —-jeff
AUTHOR’S NOTE: The draws for the November 2023 Flash Fiction Draw Challenge were: Historical Fiction, set in a Railroad Car involving an Antique Cola Bottle.
I realize that the term used for First Nations People in this story is out of fashion today, but it is what my narrator would probably have used about one hundred and fifteen years ago. I offer my apologies. —-mike
It was the middle of the night. The train car was rocking back and forth. I was starting to breathe easier; we were halfway there. The old man, wrapped in a blanket with ancient designs sat in the seat facing me. I was just glad there weren’t that many people in this railroad car and that most people couldn’t tell one old Indian from another.
What we were doing was a mercy. “The One Who Yawns,” to translate his name, was being held prisoner by the government and was no danger to anybody. He told me the Spirits had let him know that his time was short.
And maybe the spirits had told me the same thing.
There was a loyal old man in his tribe who felt moved by the spirits to pretend to be The One Who Yawns and take his place so The One Who Yawns could go home.
It wasn’t that difficult to swap one old man for the other. As I said, most White people weren’t going to bother looking too close. Not in 1906. So I was taking him to his home to die in the ways of his people.
I reached into my coat pocket. I had forgotten about the small bottle I had gotten from the ice chest on my way back to my seat. I handed the bottle to the man who (for the duration of the trip) was calling himself “Fire on the Prairie.” I pried open the lid and indicated that he should drink.
“It’s something new,” I said. “It’s really good. It’s fizzy.”
Suspiciously, The One Who Yawns smelled it, sipped it and then took another sip. He gave me a slight smile.
We rode on in silence.
Just before dawn we stopped at a little town and stepped off the train. As the train pulled away two more Indians walked up, much younger than I was. They explained that they had brought horses and that The One Who Yawns was going to ride with them. Home.
The One Who Yawns nodded at me slightly. “Thanks,” he said quietly. Then he handed me the empty cola bottle and gave me the biggest smile I had seen in a long while.
Then they rode off.
My own friends, with a horse, would arrive several hours later. I couldn’t go back to Fort Sill, so I planned to hit the Oregon Territory. Which is where I was when I heard that the man the world thought was The One Who Yawns had died a prisoner of war and had been buried at the cemetery there.
Last I heard of the real The One Who Yawns, he had outlived his double and was awaiting the call of The Great Spirit.
Maybe that same spirit allowed me to live to be 103 years old, to tell you the story I’ve kept to myself for over sixty years and explain why I have an empty soda bottle set on the mantle, in a place of honor.
—end—
AUTHOR’S ADDENDA: Oh, and The One Who Yawns was a real person. He is believed to have died in 1909 and to be buried in Ft. Sill, OK. —–mike
First, here’s the prompts for the November 2023 Flash Fiction Draw Challenge. Then my usual long-winded explanation:
Historical Fiction
Involving an Antique Cola Bottle
Set in a Railway Car.
Now, on to the details.
Hi! I’m Mike Mayak, I also write as Jeff Baker and I’m the current moderator for the monthly Flash Fiction Draw Challenge, which was started by ‘Nathan Burgoine a few years ago and carried on by Cait Gordon and Jeffrey Ricker. It’s a monthly writing challenge mainly for stress-free fun that anyone can play.
Here’s how it works: the first Monday of every month I draw three cards; a heart, a diamond and a club. These correspond to a list naming a genre, a setting and an object that must appear in the story. Participants write up a flash fiction story, 1,000 words or less, post it to their website and link it here in the comments. I’ll post the results (and hopefully have one of my own written!) the week of November 13th, 2023.
As I’m no good making videos I did the drawing offstage and the results were the Eight of Hearts (Historical Fiction), the Six of Diamonds (A Railway Car) and the Queen of Clubs (an antique cola bottle.). So we will write a historical fiction, set in a railway car involving an antique cola bottle.
So, get to writing and I’ll post the results next week!
Local Wichita Artist Matt Johnson has an art exhibit coming up on Monday December 4th, 2023 at the Clayton Staples Gallery on the campus of Wichita State University. The exhibit lasts until December 15th
Johnson is seen above at his night job, tending bar at XY Bar in Old Town.
Every week we post six lines from a work of ours, a work-in-progress or published or a recommendation of someone else’s work with at least one LGBT character. Posted at Rainbow Snippets here: [LINK]https://www.facebook.com/groups/963484217054974
This week’s snippets (running a bit over six lines) are from a work in progress, actually a horror story for an anthology. On that, much more later.
I got a used camper truck, packed some necessities, including a road atlas of all fifty states, took Ricketts and off we went.
Ricketts was a healthy two-year old dog of mixed and uncertain lineage. He was of a size where he could sit in the passenger seat, look out the windows and then curl up to nap without getting in the way. Ricketts had been a gift from my nephew Chris; he’d been given Ricketts at a Rock Festival and said the dog would be good company.
“I know he can’t replace Matthew, but you two won’t be alone, Uncle Marshall.” Chris said.
Ricketts and I hit it off. Our needs were simple; Food, walks, a place to sleep. And with him I formulated my plan to travel.
That’s all for now! The Kansas City trip went well—I even did some writing (not on this snippet story which is due in two months!) ——jeff
I was standing in front of the mirror, admiring my legs in those basketball shorts I’d kept from High School and didn’t notice Mom & Dad coming into the downstairs bathroom.
“I think you look great, Jake!” My Dad said.
“Awww yes! So handsome!” Mom added. “And nice legs!”
I blushed. “Aw, c’mon, Mom! Besides, these aren’t my legs, you know.”
“Enough of that!” Dad said. “They’re yours. You’re getting along on them okay now.”
I nodded. The Medical Team had said it would take a little for me to acclimate to this different body. About a week before I was using my hands and arms the way I used to but it had taken a month for me to walk without a cane.
I stared at the face in the mirror. Brown hair, a few freckles, nose that looked like it might have been broken once but otherwise kind of nice-looking. I was still getting used to it.
My air scooter had been rammed by a wayward shipping van whose programming had gone haywire. I was lucky to be alive but much of my body was pretty much “shattered,” they explained. In the week they’d kept me in a preserver Mom and Dad decided on a transfer, even if the only available body belonged to a convicted murderer who was facing execution. The shipping van company was paying for it, anyway. All that was left was for the owner of the other body to give his okay, with a possible promise of being given physical form again after he had served “his sentence.”
So I was now in his body and his essence was in what was described as “an old-fashioned microchip player.” I had to wear a medallion around my neck that identified me as a Transfer in case one of the original guy’s buddies ran into me and decided to settle a score. It took some of my friends a while to get used to my new look, and I had realized that this body was 26, that’s two years older than I actually was but losing two years was better than losing my life.
I’d tried to get them to tell me who this guy was, but they said I wasn’t supposed to know and my folks said I should let the dead stay buried.
Well, this guy wasn’t dead and besides I had some connections.
Guy I had made out with a lot when we were in High School was working in one of the official Medical Departments now. He owed me a favor or two. That’s how I wound up standing in a back basement room of the facility while a technician plugged a small speaker and camera into what looked like an ancient portable CD player.
“I can give you five minutes,” the Technician said walking out of the room.
I stared into the camera. It would let him, his essence see me and hear me through the speaker.
“Hi,” I said. “I’m Jake. I’m in your old body now. It’s really nice. I just wanted to tell you. I appreciate it.”
There was a tinny voice from the speaker, sounding like a mechanical reproduction of a voice.
“You’re-me-now.” the voice said. It was a statement, not a question.
“No,” I said. “I’m me. You’re still you. Even in there.”
“This-place-worse-than-jail.” said the voice. “Am-nowhere. Swirling-around. Doing-nothing.”
I realized that his essence was trapped in that device or chip or whatever.
“I just wanted to introduce myself, and thank you.” I said. “I…I mean, you saved my life.”
“Never-saved-life-before.,” said the voice. “Only-took.”
“Yeah, I know,” I said, My throat felt dry. These hands I now used had killed.
“I’m Jake McGrath,” I said. “I just wanted you to know that.”
There was a long pause from the device. I just stood there.
“I-am-Scott. Scotty.” the voice said.
I grinned. “That’s my middle name.”
I sighed and looked around the room. What else could I say?
The Technician came back into the room, precluding the need for more conversation.
“Okay. Gotta put him back,” he said.
“Yeah, thanks,” I said with a small wave at the camera. The voice didn’t react.
The Technician unhooked the device and placed it back on its shelf.
“Can he hear us now?” I asked.
“Not without the hookup,” the technician said.
“How long before you put him in someone else or something else?” I asked.
“He’s not a high priority.” the Technician said. “Anyway, he’ll dissipate without stimulus in about three years.”
“Can you give him this, stimulus?” I asked.
“He didn’t want it,” the Technician said. “This is just a slow form of execution. If he’d realized that before, you might not be standing here right now. So count your blessings.”
As I walked outside I realized that even the chilly breeze felt good.
—end—
NOTE: Written while attending the World Fantasy Convention, October 26, 2023.—-jeff
The luminous white blob, dark smudges for eyes and mouth, surged up out of the floor, emitted a low moan and hovered between the tall young man and the customer at the register.
“Hey! Scoot! Shoo!” T’amec said waving his hand through the blob. He and the customer watched as it rose up to the skylight of the Food Garden Court and then glided back down the mall.
“Hey, did you call me?” said the shorter, more muscular young man opening the swinging doors from the kitchen.
“Naw, Skid.” T’amec said. “Just shooing more ghosts.”
“Oh, yeah.” Skid said. “I got some back here too. Hey! Get! I said get!” He snapped a towel at the shimmering blob drifting behind him.
T’amec sighed and went on taking the customer’s order. At least this wouldn’t go on much longer and this year the end wasn’t hitting on the weekend.
A few minutes later, T’amec was making the customer’s bierock when Skid came out of the kitchen with another canister of broth.
“We sell a lot of this during Octobrus,” he said.
“Yeah, it’s getting colder and…hey! Get out of there!” T’amec said, grabbing the ladle and swatting at a ghost that had shimmered through the wall over the grill next to the broth tub.
Behind them the customer was laughing. “I know how you feel, guys,” he said. “I work in the Coaster Shoppe in the parking lot and we have a couple of those things zipping around that we can’t get rid of.”
“Yeah,” T’amec said, wrapping up the bierock and handing it across the counter to the customer. “We’ve got them all over the kitchen.”
“At least we only have a couple more hours to go,” the customer said.
“Hope so,” T’amec said.
There was a rhyme Skid and T’amec remembered from school:
“When Days of Months are Thirty-Six/The Days of Years Must Soon Be Fixed/Thus Octobrus Came to Be/Five Days When Spirits Must Roam Free.”
Changing the months to lock ghosts into only appearing one week a year was pretty powerful magic, T’amec’s Father had said.
Some people wanted nothing to do with this and stayed in their homes, terrified, doors locked. (As if that would do any good against ghosts who could zip through walls, T’amec had thought.) Others looked forward to it and even partied. There was even a banner hung up proclaiming “All-Hollowed Eve,” the name someone hung on it because the mall felt like an empty cavern late at night with ghosts flitting about.
The Mall did a brisk business during Octobrus, especially at night with a lot of people who usually didn’t go out showing up, some wearing ghost emblems on their tunics. The cavernous Mall seemed to attract more ghosts who seemed to like soaring around inside and were more active at night.
But as a result, a lot of the Mall’s regular employees didn’t want to come in after the sun went down. So Skid and T’amec worked double shifts during Octobrus, lots of overtime and almost as much money over the five days as they made during a regular month.
Skid glanced up as he wiped down a counter top there in the Food Garden Court. Ghosts were more active right now, some of them in small groups flying around the upper floor and the skylights. He glanced at the wall clock. He didn’t know why the Mall insisted on being open until Midnight on the last of Octobrus. Probably good for business. Not so good on the nerves.
A pair of ghosts dive bombed Skid and he ducked. He could imagine them laughing.
“Maybe next year we’ll have the sense to be closed.” Skid said.
“Yeah, or I’ll be home hiding under my bed,” T’amec said. “Or under your bed,” he said with a grin.
One of the security people stopped by for a cup of broth.
“They’re getting more active,” she said looking up at the pale swarm. “At least they aren’t congregating in the restrooms anymore.”
“Yeah,” T’amec said. “Thankful for small favors.”
Skid had read an article online about how the ghosts seemed keyed to local time and local Midnight. The guess was that was part of the magic that had separated the five Octobrus days from the rest of the year.
It was eleven-fifteen when they noticed a real change.
From every corner of the mall the ghosts flew, swirling around each other as they rose in a group towards the glass skylights over the Food Garden Court.
“Just glad they aren’t like pigeons.” T’amec said.
“Yeah, we’d have to clean it up you know!” Skid said and they both laughed.
“Getting close to when they fly up to the sky and fade,” Skid said.
“What was it they used to call it?” Skid asked. “The Wild Wrangle?”
“Something like that.” T’amec said. “Couldn’t happen soon enough for me.”
“And they canceled all the Skyplane flights for tonight as usual.” Skid said picking up the trays and heading back through the kitchen doors.
In the kitchen Skid put the trays in the sink as T’amec tossed the towel into the hamper.
“At least it’s gonna be over for another year,” Skid said leaning against the sink.
“Yeah,” T’amec said.
“Where do you think they go?” Skid asked.
“Not sure,” T’amec said. “I guess if they really are spirits we’ll find out someday.”
He draped a towel over his head and made a hooting noise. Skid laughed. Then Skid pulled the towel off T’amec’s head, leaned up and kissed him.
T’amec grinned and kissed Skid. Suddenly a line of white shapes zipped up between them, passing through the floor and up through the ceiling.
“Be really glad when it’s midnight.” T’amec said.
“Tell me about it!” Skid said with a grin. He kissed him again and T’amec wiggled his fingers and went “Booooooo!”
As well as stories by a bunch of excellent authors!
Here’s details and some buy links:
RISE
(Noun, Verb)
Eight definitions to inspire writers around the world, and an unlimited number of possible stories to tell:
1) An upward slope or movement
2) A beginning or origin
3) An increase in amount or number
4) An angry reaction
5) To take up arms
6) To return from death
7) To become heartened or elated
8) To exert oneself to meet a challenge
Rise features 300-word speculative flash fiction stories from across the rainbow spectrum, from the minds of the writers of Queer Sci Fi.
Series Blurb:
Every year, Queer Sci Fi runs a one-word theme contest for 300 word flash fiction stories, and then we choose 120 of the best for our annual anthology.
Non-Exclusive Excerpt:
It’s a simple recipe.
Passed down in whispers and hands tracing hands through flour and faith. Never written down, paper being too precious for such a small spell, some might say. Like something must be loud to have worth.
A common myth, one that serves her quiet magic well.
She sits pretty in commonhalls and houses, empty eye-sockets and a cloak of harmless charm enough for most to dismiss her. Certainly, her weaving or kneading is all her pretty head can handle.
She listens, and her hands move. Each stitch another secret, gossip kneaded into every loaf.
—From Simple Recipes for Small Magics – Ziggy Schutz
It wasn’t the principles that Matt Harden objected to. The principles were fine: Limited planetary resources. Circle of life. The wrongness of playing God.
But, he thought as he spread the herbs on the basement floor in the prescribed way, the principles were bullshit when you were faced with reality. When the only man who’d ever held your heart was stolen from you by a moment’s distraction behind the wheel. When you never had the chance to even say goodbye. When your body in bed was as cold and alone as a corpse in a coffin.
When the night mist was clammy on your neck and the grave-dirt heavy on your shovel.
—From Principle and Reality – Kim Fielding
“He’s here,” Matt said, slamming the door behind him. “You ready?”
“Think so,” Rory said. He’d finished the salt circle, and quickly moved on to placing the candle in the center.
“Will this work?”
“It’s this or nothing.” Once Tiff told them she’d survived a run in with the killer known as The Hook, Rory knew they were as good as dead. Supposedly this bastard had been killed before, but he never seemed to stop. Much about The Hook seemed unreal, but Rory thought it was the only weapon they had – the unbelievable. Besides, they were gay; those characters always died first.
From Best Served Cold – Andrea Speed
“You do realize,” the nurse said gravely, “that without your parent permission form, this procedure can only be temporary.”
“I do,” Sharon said nervously. Sharon. That was a good name, right? Sounded like Shawn, but wasn’t. Was a girl’s name. A woman’s name. She liked Sharon.
“And that given your parent’s lack of support for this, there will be a counselor assigned to your home to ensure your safety?” The nurse continued, checking the talking points on her tablet with precision.
“I won’t need it,” Sharon said nervously. “They think it’s a phase, but they’re not, you know, hostile.”
authorjeffbaker 