CARNAGE HOUSE

Between Everything Alive

by Nathan Grimmer

It’s you and you.

FORK AND KNIFE HELD upright, she stared straight ahead, stifling the scream that brewed throughout her thirty years and threatened to escape with each moment.

She ignored the smell of sizzling fat and the burning sensation on her skin, pressing the utensils to the pufferfish on the plate. As the pain receded and the

Catch a Hot One

by Phoenix Mendoza

Welcome to the kingdom of the flies.

THE FLIES MET in the cornfields, in a hollow they’d crunched down between rows. They called it their clubhouse, but it wasn’t a house or even a shack—just an open-air clearing with a cooler that doubled as a card table and some ratty, sun-bleached lawn chairs they sat in like thrones while us new recruits knelt in the

Savage Mountain

by Nikki Durbin

Pride comes before the fall.

MARCH 8

I’m not stupid. Far from it. In fact, you would be hard pressed to find someone smarter than me. That’s why I’m writing this diary. When I get out of this fucking crevasse, I’m gonna take it and publish it. A tale of survival, told in real time! And I AM goi

Feeder

by Drew Nicks

What looks like horrific murder gets far stranger...

For KW

We’d received the call fifteen minutes prior, just as we were leaving Alaskan Andy’s. Peters responded to the call and tossed his half-empty coffee into a heaping trash can. He turned to me.

“Alright, man, duty calls. Let’s go.”

“What’s the call?�

Absolutely Knot

by Winona Morris

Behind the white picket fence, something was unraveling.

MARRIAGE WAS EVERY WOMAN’S end game. From the time she slid wet and screaming from the warm, tearing doorway of her mother into her father’s waiting arms, every woman was preparing to be a wife.

Claire never learned any different. She spent her time between birth and marriage practicing. She learned how to cook,

The Feculence

by J. Rocky Colavito

In a world gone to shit...

WE’RE UP HIGH ENOUGH to stay away from its touch, but no matter how high we go we won’t ever escape the smell.

It’s a living thing, using the winds to waft itself to the heavens and beyond. Think of a graveyard washed through the overtaxed sewer system of a large city. If you’ve ever wondered if the living d

Diamonds are a Girl’s Best Friend

by Kasey Hill

Who needs brass knuckles when diamonds are a girl’s best friend?

THE SIRENS COULD BE HEARD coming down the street as I sat on the steps of my front porch awaiting their arrival. Sticky, drying blood caked in my hair, on my face, hands, and clothes. I sat there twisting my wedding rings around my finger, leaving tacky fingerprints from my thumb and pointer finger on the sides of the bands

The Night Sam Popped His Cherry

by Daniel R. Robichaud

Who would you sacrifice for $100?

SAM GAPED AT HIS tío’s display of bloody devotion.

Chavez couldn’t hold the knife anymore, so it fell into the mess he’d been cutting off his flank. The flesh and blood and creamy fat had mixed into a red slurry. He looked up, lips moving as he pleaded for painkillers. The crazy Asian chick in the lat

The Blight

by Mike Rusetsky

Some skin care issues go deeper than others.

IT STARTED AS a foul odor. Unfortunate, but there it was. You know it’s bad when you can smell your own funk, and boy, did my body bring it. The stench concentrated in my left armpit. I sniffed and immediately regretted it as my eyes watered.

“What the hell? I showered today,” I muttered to myself. I thought I