August 2020

  Carl held his wife’s hand and listened until her last breath escaped from between her lips and the machine monitoring her heartbeat registered nothing. She had signed a Do Not Resuscitate order, and he knew no one would be coming. “Why?” he demanded of the universe. Amy had been …

  In pursuit of excitement, not all nights out on the town are going hit that fever pitch you’re looking for. In fact, some end just like they begin, depending on your company. Some people just live on a loop until the circle finally cracks for them. “Bottom’s up!” hollered …

  I stared at the yellowed photo, a before shot. In it, we were coordinated. Us boys wore blue shirts, and the gals wore green. Ma held me against her belly, and the rest of our clan, including Pa, tangled around her like puppies. I supposed one objective of the …

  2051 Harlan found us in an abandoned foodbank. My sallow reflection looked distorted in his cracked visor. My eyeballs looked piss-yellow, my beard resembled long-dead roadkill. “Are you going to kill us, Mister?” I asked. He crouched in front of me, his ventilator groaning, his expression inscrutable. “No, son.” …

  Gina expected a corpse, but the man she found in the trailer was only half-dead. Fresh blood on the mattress. Hair matted to the sweat-damp pillow. Three days ago, Marco sat at death’s door. Now it looked like death had chewed him up and spit him out again. “I …