Cyndy Muscatel is the 1st place winner of Streetlight’s 2024 Flash Fiction Contest Dressed only in her pajamas and Ugg slippers, Rebecca grabbed the parka off the hook and flung it over her shoulders. The weather had turned cold right after Thanksgiving–outside the wind had picked up, scattering leaves and tossing snowflakes hither and thither. She shivered, castigating herself for leaving her book bag in the car. How forgetful could she get? She must have been in a hurry last night when she came home from work. She knew better than to leave anything … Continue reading Midnight by Cyndy Muscatel→
Dominik Slusarczyk is the 2nd place winner of Streetlight’s 2024 Flash Fiction Contest We stay up all night drinking. When we eventually crawl into our tents the sun is already half way up. the rest of our party are getting up, ready to start their day, as we finish ours. —- “Being awake during the day is better” Jim says. There are multiple sizzling frying pans on the fire behind him. We are cooking bacon, eggs, steaks, anything the people cooking could find. The smell of the food fills the air and makes my … Continue reading Holidays by Dominik Slusarczyk→
Jo Riglar is the 3rd place winner of Streetlight‘s Flash Fiction Contest I reached the waterfall as the rain started. Little vicious drops. A breeze bothered the trees. An angry dog in the distance. I rested on a flat rock, no moss, but cold and damp under my thighs. A summer sun was thwarted in its mission by the grey of the clouds. When I was a child I used to chase clouds, sat in a light chair and raising my face in worship. I remembered that now. It was a hopeless enterprise. ‘Nice day … Continue reading Waterfall by Jo Riglar→
Sheri Reynolds is the 2nd place winner of Streetlight‘s Flash Fiction Contest The garbage disposal made a horrible racket, a gritty, grinding, clonking commotion. Avocado pit, she thought, and reached for the off-switch just as a knife flew up from the sink’s black hole. It was a paring knife, the one with the slender purple handle, silver blade so thin and sharp that the gleam still shined in her eye as it hit her throat, bull’s eye, like her throat had been its one true target. She’d been making guacamole to take to book club … Continue reading Unzipped by Sheri Reynolds→
P. W. Bridgman is the 1st place winner of Streetlight‘s Flash Fiction Contest She told the story about him, but only once. About how she found him on a chair, pushed up to the kitchen window leaning out over Baskov Lane from their second-floor apartment in Leningrad. He was holding between the thumb and forefinger of his left hand the bloom of a Siberian Fawn Lily, plucked from her window box. His little hand was steady, his gaze was too, as he waited. She dried her hands on her apron, bread rising on the … Continue reading Little Vova* by P. W. Bridgman→
Kay Rae Chomic is the 3rd place winner of Streetlight’s 2022 Flash Fiction Contest Stephanie climbed her porch stairs, nodded at the two pumpkins with carved misshapen noses, mouths, and teeth. One smiled, one frowned. Both held cigars in place by incisors. Inside the house, she hung her purse on the coat tree in the foyer, stripped off her clothes, and dashed to the shower to wash off the day. Judgment day. Wrapped in her robe, a towel coiled around her hair like a turban, she mixed a Manhattan, sat on the sofa next … Continue reading The View by Kay Rae Chomic→
John Adinolfi is the 2nd place winner of Streetlight’s 2022 Flash Fiction Contest All the times of their lives happened at the shore. She was a lifeguard. He was beach patrol. He tripped over her rescue board and she bandaged his wounded leg. Six weeks later they were married at sunrise, with ocean foam slapping at their feet. Soon, she was building sandcastles with their youngest while he taught the older ones how to surf cast. Later, grandkids would overrun their beach house every summer. Then, when it was just the two of … Continue reading Down the Shore by John Adinolfi→
Margaret Watson is the 1st place winner of Streetlight’s 2022 Flash Fiction Contest I try my best to ignore the telephone vibrating in my back pocket. I focus on what I am doing–massaging Stephen’s feet. Using lotion, my fingers like feathers, caressing the skin that is now so delicate. The vibration stops and starts again. Whoever this is, they aren’t going to use voice mail. “I’ll just get this,” I say to Stephen. I can’t be sure if he’s heard me. I step back, tap the answer icon, already knowing who it is. Barbara, … Continue reading Thank You For Calling by Margaret Watson→
Nancy Ludmerer is the 3rd place winner in Streetlight’s 2021 Flash Fiction Contest Before the pandemic, the desk had been his province exclusively since only he worked from home, but in their forced togetherness, they had to share it. He bragged about how he and Marnie, his ex-wife, rescued the desk during a snowstorm, when the Northwestern Law School Library replaced its wooden desks with metal ones. Had they not taken it, the desk would have been brought to the town dump, to be scavenged by humans or animals unknown. The desk was not without … Continue reading Susceptible to Scratches by Nancy Ludmerer→
Richard D. Key is the 2nd place winner in Streetlight’s 2021 Flash Fiction Contest In this episode of PTGTTS I’ll be talking about Earth, a little planet out at the edge of the galaxy, not to be confused with Erth-Ra, the much larger and more popular planet destination that you may be more familiar with. Earth (pronounced URTH) is off the beaten path, but worth the effort if you’re headed in that direction. Time on Earth is divided into “months” based on the one orbiting satellite, called “the moon.” Most of the inhabitants believe that … Continue reading Places To Go, Things To See by Richard D. Key→
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