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FICTION BY JULIAN DARIUS
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Fiction
Target Practice
The black door needed painting, but only after he had unhinged, removed, sanded and primed it. That wasn’t going to happen. He had intended to renovate his man cave in the basement. Man cave, what… [more]
Happy Trails
Suddenly it felt like I’d been kicked in the head by a mule. That’s all I could remember, that moment of impact. It was like I’d spaced out and just woken up when kicked. There… [more]
Pretty Meat
90 minutes a day and a pretty face… You’d be amazed at what some good looks and time in the gym can do for you. The possibilities are endless: get an agent, get a role,… [more]
Big Deal
A quiet store, Saturday night, ten minutes to closing time. One customer remained, a female browsing the Pop music CD’s. The humming fluorescent lights illuminated her starkly, without shadow. Chuck Disani approached her with loping… [more]
Lamarckism
Jim grappled with his cock, imagining himself transforming into pixels as he thrust it into the image of a woman’s vagina. A mind beyond his penis insisted this could happen. It was the same mind that assured him… [more]
We’ll Take a Lover in the Afterlife
Dreamed on 15 Jan 2013. I was at my parents’ house, helping them move electronics around the living room. Everything we moved had other things behind it, flattened cardboard boxes propped up against the wall,… [more]
The Challenger
After Dad died and we moved in with Leon, everything went to shit. I remember the first night he did it to me. I was fourteen. Mom was–most likely passed out–downstairs on the sofa with… [more]
Ken’s Doll
There’s really nothing wrong with the Valley. People accustomed to Sunset look down on it but paradise has its limits; thinking all of Los Angeles can be a palm-lined mirage of awesomeness is lunacy. The… [more]
Dinner and Charades
It is evening, and the sun is low. I ring the doorbell to my sister’s house. She answers the door, her brown eyes alight with excitement. “Why hello, Mike!” Nicole gushes. “How’s my favorite brother… [more]
Turtle Power
In the Black Hills we went to a replica of the Flintstone’s town where I sat in Fred’s car. My brother climbed Dino while my sister stuck her face atop Wilma’s neck. I was too… [more]
Leopard People
Lermontov got on the plane back to Russia and put the jacket over his face, trying to picture an airport without people for his return. He tried not to think of the people he’d let… [more]
Black and Blue in ’32
I’m the favorite to win. It’s not my foreign policy and it’s not my handling of domestic issues. Nobody gives a shit about the unemployment numbers, job growth, the illusory downward trend of the trade… [more]
Bull
After his tour of duty in Afghanistan, Billy believed he had seen everything. Arm yourself, learn to kill efficiently, develop a nose for IEDs impatient under the sand, pick up severed limbs, embrace a fallen… [more]
AMYGDALA
Deep in the Eureka, Kansas bunker, there still exists one Memory Replacement protocol, invented by the late Hemispheres scientist Hans Geisser. It is a cryogenic dreaming sequencing process known officially as “Foreground Switching.” The main… [more]
In Amber Gehenna
Behind the bar dangles a ribbon of yellow flypaper covered in glass bees, some of them still wriggling. Wings vibrating, antennae twitching. All to no avail. They’re not the only ones stuck, of course. Here… [more]
One or the Other
My best good friend Quiddit got the bike off a fifth grader, nice orange and silver Mongoose from the Wal-Mart down in Bowling Green, with pegs and a handlebar rotor for tricks and all that… [more]
What a Difference a Day Makes
Warren Samuels III was cordially invited by the Imaginautical Turbine to attend A Meeting of Fantastic Importance on the 30th of February. The words were lavishly written in thick cursive ink. The invitation was a singular… [more]
Gallery of the Disappeared Men
She had seen that clouded look before, a determined mix of pity and revulsion and something else she could not define. It was there and then gone in an instant, like that first surprising zing… [more]
Dig Doug, Day 3
Doug didn’t bother taking a shower. Instead, he came into work early as usual. As he stood in front of the building, waiting for Kay to unlock it, he noticed that the others stood away… [more]
1978
She lived alone. She lived many lives. Her name was Jenn. She had several cats. They rarely came out. Jenn barely went out either. Her weekly trips to the store. The cherry wine. The Pall… [more]
Steven Storky and the Case of the Lost Balls
Steven Storky has lost his balls. His wife, Sandy, may have them, but Steven doesn’t have the balls to ask her. It’ll be a lose-lose situation if he asks her anyway. She certainly won’t give… [more]
Just One Look
She looked like the kind of girl who needed to be smacked around a little before the fucking started. She should have said something before. I got taken in and it was the first time… [more]
Dig Doug, Day 2
Doug woke hungry the next day. His stomach rattled and revolted like a prisoner trying to escape. For the first time ever, he wanted to go to work. Not to work on his blog, but… [more]
Road Rage
His red face pocked with dried blisters, the man bent forward in clothes reeking of wine barrels. He looked familiar. Pausing in his work, Billy said “hey, how you doing?” but the man kept his… [more]
Dig Doug, Day 1
The oversized plate glass doors whooshed open as Doug and the other employees pressed inside. Outside, beyond the doors, somewhere out in the pale yellow field opposite the building was a rich, putrid stink that… [more]
