Lydia played the piano hoping that would make her parents smile. Her daddy broke some furniture. He bought an accordion and she took lessons. He kicked the dog. Her parents came to see her dance recital. Her daddy yelled at her mama for flirting with a man. He gave her a black eye. Lydia took swimming lessons. Her daddy took her fishing and threw her in the lake yelling “Swim.” She went down down down to the murky bottom where a huge whiskered catfish blinked at her. It was very peaceful. She came up and swam away from the boat.

From Guest Contributor Sandra Ramos O’Briant

The doll sat dirtied and broken, ripped from the hands of the little girl, as they took her parents away. Screaming and reaching for her parents’ hands, the guerilla yanked them away. The young girl, Naba, cried out and ran after them, blurry eyed from tears.

But the truck was long gone leaving nothing but tire marks in its haste. Naba, alone and frightened, picked up the doll, the only present her father was ever able to give her, and walked the dirt road in hopes of finding a home.

From Guest Contributor Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher

Whenever he did curls on the bench, he had to resist the urge to look at himself in the mirror. He was always disappointed.

The gym was not an addiction. It was a fight against oblivion.

As the floodwaters receded, Thompson entered what used to be his home. The structure had once stood proud at the top of the hill. Now it was in shambles, the storm having carried it off its foundations and depositing it several hundred yards away.

With stooped shoulders, Thompson shifted through the remains. His friends would say he should count himself lucky that anything survived at all. At least he was alive. But it was hard to think that way with Jessie’s waterlogged doll in his hands. He was not one of those parents who looked at their children as disposable.

Worst thing about having a drunken Da who pissed people off was that Malachy tended to suffer from ‘trickle-down’ syndrome: friendships nurtured in his own child-like manner evaporating as parents infected would-be playmates with their contempt for his father.

Still, it was quiet, and the symphony of wind and wildlife was wonderful.

From Guest Contributor Perry McDaid

As far back as anyone can remember, Lulumak stole. When he was young, the elders told Lulumak’s parents that this was a sign of intelligence but once he matured into warriorhood, the elders warned Lulumak that he would be punished if he stole again. A day after Lulumak was warned, Chinoon caught him stealing fish from Yellow Hair’s net. The next day a few elders told Lulumak they discovered a rich fishing area and invited him to fish with them. When the elders returned without Lulumak, they told the tribe that Nanal, the monster, had eaten Lulumak for his sin.

From Guest Contributor Dave Harper

Dave, a recovering software developer, now finds himself addicted to writing fiction.

Dana wasn’t allowed to walk the beach alone, even in broad daylight. Her parents never gave a reason, but she’d heard them whispering about the men who lived in the sea.

When the sea men came for her, Dana did not scream. Perhaps this was what she wanted all along. She would not miss her family. She would not miss the earth.

Her father had come out a year before he died. Her parents had been divorced more than a decade by then and the news probably shouldn’t have comes as such a shock. At the eulogy, she lamented not handling his announcement with more compassion. She would never be able to understand what it had been like for him, growing up in small town Indiana.

She left the election viewing party early. She needed to cry alone. It was the first time she was glad Dad had died. He was spared having to see the wheels of progress start rolling backwards.

The man in the black coat turns around, long ears dangling, striped vest pink-and-white, smiling. The children have followed him into the woods against their parents’ warnings, but just for a minute, not very far they say, as he pulls the golden ivory box from inside his pocket’s silk lining, lifts the top and their eyes grow wide for they are each inside, two inches tall, ceramic dolls he’s carved on a carousel winding round-and-round the emerald mound on tiny white ponies they’re riding, cymbals in their hair, penny whistles singing, ‘til they no longer hear the dinner bells ringing.

From Guest Contributor Kathy Miller

Kathy is a writer of poems, stories, songs, and screenplays. She lives in Michigan and has a B.F.A and an M.F.A. in Writing. Her publications include HarperCollins’ It Books, Universal Music Publishing Group, and The Aviator.

Lillith’s earliest memory is of her nail poking at her father’s love handle. As if her finger was able to inject happiness, and heal the month-to-month worries that emerged as dollar signs in his eyes, just around his pupils.

On her thirtieth birthday, Lillith’s parents pulled up to her one-hundred-and-forty-four-square-foot tiny home. As Lillith washed the sand off her feet, her mother whispered to her father, “When’s she gonna grow up?”

From Guest Contributor Susan Shiney

Susan is a writer, painter, and teacher originally from Southern California. She is now living in Lille, France.