Five Feet into the Grave by Gareth Spark
She walked into the bar as the fire burned in the night beyond, and for a moment, the flames framed her. The guys drinking in a row in front of me, the usual losers who hang around Salou until the rum takes them, turned as one and fell into a grumbling quiet. They’d lost interest […]
Bone Creek by Gareth Spark
There ain’t no sun today; hell, there ain’t ever much of a sun, not the way my eyes have rotted out their sockets. I sit my bones out on the porch most days, stare into the cold Colorado wind, and wait on the Lord as I have been forty something years. Some days I head […]
Crowbait by Gareth Spark
There was snow in the wind’s teeth. The boy rubbed the stinging cold from his eyes and squinted up at the bare trees tearing at each other in the gale. He moved forward, elbows squelching in the sodden earth, settled at the bluff’s edge, and watched the rider approach from Table Rock to the south. […]
Demon’s Road by Gareth Spark
The fire came over the prairie as if the anger of a God gone mad and every living thing in the whole world ran before it; Coyotes, deer, antelope, all rushing mad through the night, like Hell’s own children. Rye Lee dashed back from the well too hastily and tripped. The bucket he held crashed […]
Regal King Size by Gareth Spark
Emma stood by the window of the caravan looking over the dry field at the distance. There was a chime as the text sent and she swore, jammed her thumb over the speaker and looked to the open door. Curtis laughed. She flipped her phone shut, slid it into her jeans pocket and breathed out […]
Red Spanish Night by Gareth Spark
Just before he died, Salvador thought of the girl from the club; the way she’d dragged him out to this place with a smile; her red hair caught dark with the night’s weight. He felt the ligature tighten, and then the pops and sparks of light at the borders of his sight played brighter and […]