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Shriek of the Week, fiction, Nick Mamatas

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J eremy Spokane—a mondegreen more than a pseudonym—had plenty of reasons to dislike metal. To despise it. There was that “Say You Love Satan” guy out over in Northport who killed someone over a drug deal, and how every teenage dirtbag on the island, from Seagate to Montauk, actually loved being implicated. The long-hairs loved it when the cops beat the shit out of them too; chicks dig battle scars and contusions. Jeremy, his hair long in the front, great swoopy bangs over his eyes, was less enthusiastic about being called a devil-worshiper and getting punched in the face. There were the endless guitar solos—virtuosos, sure, but in the service of what? Not even Satan, just baby baby baby and sometimes flowers sad in the rain, girl. Power ballads to play during tearful slow dances at prom in memoriam of Jenny and the Craigster who got their heads chopped off in a drunk driving incident two Saturdays prior while on their way back from Laser Zeppelin at the planetarium. And then there wa...
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Justice Served, fiction by Vinnie Hansen

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  R ay Ray’s feet swept onto South Mission Beach without the rest of him. “ He had huge feet,” his sister Samantha said. She perched on the metal chair in front of my desk, her hands stretched apart. “All the rubber in the soles of his shoes made his feet buoyant.” She scooped up blond hair and draped it over her shoulder to hide a teal strap that didn’t look like it could support a fishing lure. “ Police tell ya that?” She toyed with my desk plaque: Serving Justice Since 1966. “ Maybe a great white got the rest of him,” I said. “ Ray Ray wasn’t a surfer.” Samantha inspected her split ends. “He was a peanut vendor at SeaWorld.” “ There you go. Didn’t the original Shamu nearly bite off a trainer’s leg?” To my way of thinking, a satisfying story. People who caged up animals deserved what they got. I reached for my Marlboros parked by a glass ashtray. “ Shamu’s an orca; great whites are sharks.” “ Right,” I said, squinting, “but orcas are killer whales , right?” ...
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River of Ash, fiction by Tom Barlow

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  reprinted from Odds of Survival M addy slid Ethan's hand off her thigh, painfully aware that Jacob, to whom she had granted groping rights until they broke up while he was in jail over the winter, was watching and had not yet come to terms with the new arrangement. And he had a temper. Not as much as back in high school, where students considered him the most likely to go Columbine, but earlier in the week, at their band's gig at a dive bar in nearby Anderson, California, Jacob had sucker punched an asshole who was making fun of her attempt to channel Courtney Love. Maddy wasn't feeling amorous now anyway, in the aftermath of the last line of cocaine they could afford. After the Slipknot playlist ended, she was about to suggest they abandon Jacob's room in his parent's basement to beg a pity joint from their dealer when she became aware of a loudspeaker approaching down the street. Even from inside they could hear the announcement–a mandatory evacuation. Immedi...
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If They Only Knew, fiction by Mark SaFranko

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 ` W atkins was walking on air. He’d had a thing for Tara Tometski ever since he spotted her behind the flower counter at the ShopRite on Morgan Avenue, and now she was head over heels for him too. After two dates she’d messaged him a naked photo of herself from the neck down, and he knew that they’d crossed a threshold. He’d checked to make sure he hadn’t been catfished, and she assured him that yes, it’s me, it’s real, and I’m all yours. They were already in love, really in love. It was the promise of a new life, exactly what Watkins had been after. __________ But that Friday evening when he came to pick her up at her apartment she was as frigid as an ice queen. “You didn’t tell me about your wife ,” she fumed when she threw open the door of her little apartment. What the fuck? How had she found out? “ You’re not dressed to go,” he protested lamely. “ Didn’t you hear what I said? What about your wife ? You didn’t tell me you had a wife . And that ...
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