The short fiction of j hardy carroll
Clive had made a little clubhouse in the attic from various chairs and lamps. We would sometimes play at marriage. We lay on the floor. I looked over at him. He was a handsome boy, in the English way. Blue eyes and creamy skin. I rolled over and kissed his pink lips. He flew into…
She opens a drawer and finds dozens of photos taken with her long-ago Instamatic. Her children, trapped forever by the flesh-bleaching flash, their expressions frozen and stunned, reddened eyes demonic and glowing like coals. By the time electronic pictures came along she was no longer on speaking terms with any of them. Years ago her…
She looks so pretty, but the martinis are a bad idea. She hasn’t eaten all day and is already halfway through the second one before the waiter comes by for our order. She’s in her ebullient stage, laughing out a story I’ve heard before. I laugh along, watching for the change. I know it’s coming.…
“Your coffee is getting cold.” “Thanks.” He picked it up, sipped it. “I had the strangest dream. I was Superman’s son. They named me Superman, Jr. and made me dress in the red and blue suit. I had to wear it to school. The cape was always in the way.” She started laughing. “That is…
Dear Father, Firstly, you must not believe what you have read in the papers. I am no mastermind. That said, I was not unwilling in this venture. You know me. I am not a fool to jump with both feet into crazy schemes. You also know how desperate the times are here. General Malgawe’s men…
Tsou-Tahi burns with shame. A simple task usually relegated to women, the gathering of medicine herbs. But even at this Tsou-Tahi fails. Time and again he returns to Yatoyenh with an empty sack. The old man shakes his head and retraces Tsou-Tahi’s trail, always finding the plants with ludicrous ease. This time he shows Tsou-Tahi his…
In January 1946, Corporal Stuart Dulley was discharged from the United States Marine Corps in which he had served since September 1940. His wounded arm had healed as much as it was going to, which wasn’t much. Other men at the hospital were aching to get back to something. Wives, jobs, hometowns. Stuart’s parents had…
He flicked on the light. The room had a musty, disused air about it. Stale air and dust, dull and windowless. “What is this place?” she asked. “It used to be a barrel house. Bootleggers would store their whiskey here until they could ship it upriver.” He pointed to a trap door in the floor.…
“Red leader, rendezvous angels ten over grey beach.” Angels ten? Far too low. He had no intention of repeating yesterday’s disaster when ops sent them over Dunkirk at 10,000 feet. Three dozen Messerschmitts dove out from the sun and cut the squadron to ribbons. But arguing with ops was like kicking a rubber wall. “Red…
I didn’t listen because I never listened to him, but I saw he didn’t care, his gaze drifting past my face to the construction on the street behind us and back, then down to the beer I bought him, talking the whole time. I couldn’t wait to get out of there. It was the last…