Worthing Flash

Being a medieval reenactor is a fantastic hobby. You can dress up in armour, fight your mates and have a feast afterwards. Well, that’s the theory at least but it doesn’t always work in practice. Sometimes you end up in A &E with broken bones, struggling to explain to a harassed doctor that: yes. someone hit you with a sword; yes they meant to do it; no, they’re not a psychopath and no, you don’t want to call the police. All you need is patching up and a chance to attend the feast to show off your hard-earned war wounds! Josie Gilbert

Herman was hand-raised and released into the wild. It had been another case of humans swarming over a planet and decimating nearly all of its fauna before they realised the ecosystem was out of balance. Now Herman felt the inner movement of protoplasm that meant it was time to reproduce. Soon two smaller, amoeba-like bodies would go their separate ways. But something was missing. Slowly Herman shape-changed into the form of his human carer and picked up the item he had smuggled out after seeing Matt use it so often. “Playboy Magazine” fell open to the centrefold and Herman began. Susan Cornford is a retired public servant, living in Perth, Western Australia. She/her has most recently had pieces published or forthcoming in 2024 Anthology Invasion of the Saucer-Men From Mars! 42 Stories Anthology Presents: Book of 42, Arzono Publishing Presents The 2023 Annual, Banksia Journal, Metastellar, Stupefying Stories, The Suburban Review Hills Hoist V. 3 and WELL READ.

Red, orange and yellow leaves surround gaudy plastic Gerberas and teddy bears more fitting for a child than an adult. You loved, you danced, you worked hard for that degree and would soon have been a dad, although you didn’t know. I didn't know either. Your mother's only son. She never wanted to let you go, having lost her husband , your father , so young. All that dark trapped inside you . I thought we’d turned a corner, moved towards the light. What happened that morning to change your mind? I haven’t told your mother yet. She banned me from the funeral. Lauren M Foster Bio: Lauren is a writer and musician from Charnwood. Published in Ink  Pantry, DIY Poets, The Journal, 81 Words and more. Drummer and  vocalist in The Cars that Ate Paris, a garage-punk band.

I always see him. Whether on a stroll with my wife, a nightly jog through the highstreet, or as I drive  by the wide pedestrian bend — he’s there, on the corner. “They must be a profitable enterprise,” I told my wife one evening, her petite nose behind a coffee  cup. “How else could they afford him to stand with a sign all day?” I cut short my midnight run from my usual route to the bleak, personless bend. Slouched on a  roadblock, “Superstore” sign in hand. I asked, to no avail, what he was doing; Then panted home for bolt-cutters. by Ryan Finnerty

Suraj spends his time visiting the holy places now! I remember hot-headed Suraj talking about his fights with his dad. “I wish the bastard’s dead!” He concluded. Uncle wanted his only child to step into the family business. Suraj, to be an actor! Uncle died a dissatisfied man.  ************************************* Ananya, hysterical, came out of their son's that day. She'd caught Aryan hooked onto that obscene video game again.  Later, Aryan held his dad's raised hand, menacingly. Suraj could do nothing! The painful face of his late father came back to haunt him.  He missed his dad sorely.

I am not sure how old I was when dad gave me the music box. My fingers were strong enough to turn the small brass key, but I did not recognise the tune it played. Inside there were pieces of her costume jewellery: a letter D fixed to a black-ribboned bracelet, a brooch in the shape of a leaf. I took the box to college, filled with beads, chunky resin rings from market stalls. Now it holds the tiny footprints of my baby daughter, a w isp of her hair, the hospital bracelet cut at the end from her lifeless wrist.