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Logo Long Story Short Award - Fall 2020
Short Fiction
 5 min

Apostate

Sarah Rowe

The crowd thronged around Larry as he shuffled forward. Its members shoved past him like a rushing current, heedless of courtesy in their excitement. He forgave the jostling, of course, for his mind ...  [+]
Short Fiction
 2 min

The Tree House

Nicole Morgan

Ricky looked up at the ladder and swallowed, nervousness mingling with excitement. The tree house he’d been asking Dad to build for almost three years now was finally done. Well, all except the rope ...  [+]
Short Fiction
 5 min

Enough

Emma Kirby

“We wake with haunted eyes, waltzing through life as though we’re puppets. We are entirely aware of our strings, of their relentless pull on our aching joints and our stretched skin, but we make no ...  [+]
Short Fiction
 3 min

In-Between Symphonies

Divya Muniyappan

This looks like it could be a scene from a really sad movie. One where the girl is sitting next to the window seat, staring. The viewer watches in shallow focus. Although she knows which stop she ...  [+]
Short Fiction
 5 min

Fear In Disguise

Rebecca Philippe

My life has been conditioned in a way that I can’t explain. I’m deep in a hole that I can’t dig myself out of. I ask myself, what is life exactly? Is it all about surviving? Is it just a waiting room ...  [+]
Short Fiction
 2 min

Fey

Adrienne Powell

Just before the snow falls, the fairies lay their eggs. To you, they look like plain white berries, hanging on little green-leafed branches of shrubs. But go out at night and you will see them hatch ...  [+]
Short Fiction
 5 min

Trading for Dishes

Leorah McGinnis

I truly hate doing the dishes, Tati thought as she regarded a teetering pile of plates and pots and coffee mugs. It was one of those insufferable, Sisyphean tasks of life that never really gets ...  [+]
Short Fiction
 4 min

A Short Horror

Lillian Davis

Late into the night you finally return home. You open the door and step into the unlit blackness of what should have been your home. Instinctively you reach out to flick on the lights, but the light ...  [+]
Short Fiction
 4 min

I, Public Enemy

Jeremy Ng

Long story short, I became Public Enemy Number One.

The last 24 hours had been surreal. I, a 22-year-old college student, was declared by the state as the “the most vicious vermin eve ...  [+]
Short Fiction
 3 min

Refuge

Annie Nguyen

Your dichotomy of reality and transcendence destabilizes as you breathe in the image before you. Ribbons of sunlight seducing piney branches into a dance. The solemn army of trees expanding far beyond ...  [+]
Short Fiction
 5 min

Untitled

Taylor Fischer

Tapping her left foot onto the cobblestones, J’s nervous tick is heading into full overdrive. She takes a sip of hot coffee to attempt to calm her nerves. The sip is just a bit pre-mature, and the ...  [+]
Short Fiction
 5 min

Heaven Or Limbo

Marlene Uscanga

lim·bo-intermediate state or condition.
“What do you mean Billy disappeared?”
“Well, it's as I said sir, we were all sitting in his living room, discussing different ways we could sneak past the ...  [+]
Short Fiction
 4 min

Wildfires

Rebecca Araten

Grandma was the first one who let me hold matches. Mommy and Daddy were such scaredypants, they would yell at me just for sneaking out of the kitchen when the oven door was open.
“You could burn ...  [+]
Short Fiction
 1 min

As Petals Drift, We Walk Away

Katelyn Savard

The chrysanthemums were striking in their glory. Yellows and whites, kissing softly, heads bent together in reverence. Oh, Ria wished to be one of those flowers, heads bent in secret with another. ...  [+]
Short Fiction
 4 min

Promised Love

Connor Jones

Hey, I’m. . . um. . . I’m not sure what to do. I never thought this would actually happen. What to do, what to do. . . I guess, ugh, this is awkward. Did you hear that? Do you hear? Or do you see what ...  [+]
Short Fiction
 1 min

Boomerang

Hannah Hardy

He stood, leaned against the jeep, toes pointed toward the desert horizon, breaths filtered by dust. His eyes moved over the still, illuminated sky. He glanced down and began examining the oddly ...  [+]
Short Fiction
 4 min

The Red Painting

Miriam Arce

It was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen.

A portrait of a young lady, waiting in the garden next to her house. A frozen memory of her face as she sits on a swing behind a tree. I first ...  [+]
Short Fiction
 4 min

The Taboo in the Jungle

Emmalisa Horlacher

“Do you know what happens in the jungle?” the Grandfather asked.
Little Kendi shook his head as he fluffed his pillow and laid his head down.
“Too many children have gone into the jungle and not ...  [+]