Apocalypse Stories

London’s drowning. Good thing you live by the river.

The World Thins

This is the way the world ends, not with a bang but with a never-ending series of variants and waves.

The Day the World Came to Town

Sunshine, warm and soft, fell through the open window onto Dagny’s face. It was early, and the sun had not discovered what it would be angry about today. It would. It was nearly the end of April. The sun had been angry since the last week of March. But now the sun was still half…

The Forecast is Storms

Maybe it wasn’t fair, but there were only hours left so what did fair mean anymore, anyway? It was outside a CVS, of all places. Why would they keep it? Was it even theirs? Who else could have owned it? He didn’t know a thing about that sort of thing. As the clock wound down,…

Pre-Apocalypse

The song cut out as the radio started blaring a test of the emergency broadcast system beginning with its usual discordant WEEEEEEEEHHHHHH. Mack cut it off and left it. They were almost to the parking lot of the trailhead, anyway. Next to him, in the passenger seat, Lois shifted. Out of the corner of his…

Unfair: A Biddies and Broken Hearts Story

Birdie had spent the night pacing in front of her bed, tossing this way and then immediately getting uncomfortable and turning back the other, pacing some more, being mad at Wendy, and then being mad at herself, staring out the window at the stars like some kind of sad movie heroine, and finally falling into…

Supply Lines

With equal amounts of relief and leg cramps, Roll and Jack waded across the ill-named Lazy River. The icy water rushed by up to their knees, trying to knock them over and carry them away. A couple of times Jack almost let it. It might have been easier to just let the river drag him…

Vibe Check: A Biddies and Broken Hearts Story

Birdie kept herself at a jog as she went through the mall, peering into the stores. If she went any faster, if she started to run, the panic would set in. There was no reason to panic. Not yet. He’d be here, somewhere. The good memories the lit-up mall had brought to her were gone.…

Another Tuesday

She woke up afraid, because it was a Tuesday and for her Tuesdays were historically terrible. It wasn’t every Tuesday. It wasn’t even most Tuesdays. But anything bad that had ever happened in her life had happened on a Tuesday, and now it had been fifty-two Tuesdays since a single thing had occurred. Rather than…

Beach

They didn’t know what else to do. So they went to the beach. It wasn’t far but it was a slow walk. Lynnette’s ankle was twisted badly if not completely broken, and Ronny was just tired. Tired. It seemed like the right word and the wrong one at the same time. It wasn’t strong enough,…

Big John and Roberta: A Biddies and Broken Hearts Story

John Robinson sat at the kitchen table in front of the wood fireplace and wished he had a scotch. Oh, he could have one if he really wanted. He was staring at the bottle in its cardboard case, sitting at the top of the liquor cabinet. No one would say a single word to him…

The Biddies Above Broken Hearts

On the corner of Astoria and Sunday on the ridge above Broken Hearts were four Victorian homes. In happier times this was referred to in the town as the Biddies’ Corner, known for the four old women who had lived there and spent much of their lives together in one house or another, playing bunko…

Broken Hearts

The little town of Broken Hearts in the mountains of Colorado looked very pretty. All of the lights were off, of course, and there were no cars parked along the side of Main Street. But the street and the sidewalks had been shoveled and salted. The trees that lined the street had been trimmed. Most…

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