stephw's profile

Dated This wasn't where Nina was supposed to be at 24. She had had it all planned out, and at 24 she was supposed to be getting married, planning every last detail. Persuading a reluctant Scott into a tux. They had agreed, or so she thought. Thinking back now, she probably just talked over him, ran over him with her words like an eighteen-wheeler. Of course, at seventeen when she met Scott that wasn=t what she was thinking. She was thinking nice butt. Her girlfriend Amanda introduced them, an...

The Hasty Highway Where I grew up it’s not easy to get lost. The streets are numbered in order from 1 to 6, with Main cutting a slice between 3rd and 2nd. The avenues are numbered as well; but 1st Ave. is almost always called “railroad” because the railroad tracks run right beside it. If you stand looking at those tracks you can watch a train go off into the distance until it disappears. Sometimes I would watch the train and dream about leaving. Even though the farthest I h...

Maura McCarthy remembers the hands of every man she’s ever loved. When she sees Matthew’s hands, it’s love. His nails are rectangular, cut straight across, not too short. His fingers are long and straight. His skin looks juicy and ripe; she wants to bite the mound under his thumb. Most of all, she longs to touch those hands. She knew before she met him in person that he was perfection on paper: educated, career-minded, loves kids, and is just the right combination of handsom...

Maura McCarthy can remember the hands of every man she has ever loved, including every boy she ever had a crush on. When she sees Matthew’s hands, Maura knows it is love. His nails are rectangular, cut straight across, not too short. His fingers are long and straight. He has no swollen sausages, or knobbly knuckles. His skin looks peachy soft, and the backs of his hands are free of gorilla-like fur. In short, the perfect hands, and in that moment, it is love. There is little he could do...

At 3 AM alarm sounds, a wailing siren, barely stopping for breath. Sleep-drugged, stumbling, struggling to lower the side rail, wailing surrounds ringing in my ears. This face unrecognizeable, a Munsch-like scream, glowing alien green in the nightlight.  3 AM is the darkest hour or so they say, before the dawn, it feels the loneliest. No cars pass, no birds chirp, snoring through the wall the only sound. My eyelids fight for closure, but the litle ones resist me, star...