Fiction – Page 5 – Jessica Barratt

Stage? Right.

Alone in the middle of a dark stage, our night’s starlet looks out over a quiet crowd of empty seats, listening to the faint echo of future cheers. Every night’s show will begin with her, there, dramatically poised against rows of wooden beams and branches centre-stage, these meant to look like trees and buildings andContinue reading “Stage? Right.”

American Airlines

He’d said two days. We are hungry. We have shirts wrapped over our noses from the smell. This life is very different, far from Papa’s old brown recliner or Mama’s familiar smell. Plus, no one knows how long the dark man with the white eyes has been gone.

All-You-Can-Eat Special

A short fictional commentary on red and blue politics published in 2020, relevant again now in 2025.

Second Monday

Joshua. He likes me, but I don’t like him because his fingers are always cheesy. So are his teeth. He pulls up his socks too high and is always breaking bones. When he was in a body cast I used him as a coat hanger. Another time, I found my school picture in his geometryContinue reading “Second Monday”

Reversal

Slowly, to consciousness, come and find your face crushed on pavement viscous. Dirt falling from eyelashes, blinking it away, gradually bringing your mind around. On a long-stretch of road, nose full of tar, all movement meagre, your energy’s long fallen from bones. Use your dwindling strength to bring back what happened. Raise hand to foreheadContinue reading “Reversal”