Thank God for the dog. If not for her, my girlfriend wouldn’t let me leave the house. When the pandemic got serious, she didn’t care about toilet paper; she b-lined it for the milk. Our freezer is perfectly packed with Swedish meatballs, broccoli florets, and twenty-three gallon-size Ziplocs of milk.

Before she was Jane Hadley, the rock ’n’ roll singer/songwriter—the Goddess of Rock, bigger than Taylor, Adele, and Beyoncé combined, she was Jane Hadley, the folk ’n’ roll singer/songwriter who never sold more than a thousand albums and a few hundred t-shirts. Before she had a #1 album flying off the shelves and being downloaded to the Cloud by millions, and an entire merchandising department, she was just a girl who played in a few bands: the Stargazers, Rosie’s Dream Catcher, Jane and the Jaded Cowboys.

The guy had a silver chain that dangled from his left front pocket to his right, perfectly outlining his brief-less testicles. He looked at The Buff, smiled, and yanked out a pocket watch the size of a hockey puck from his faded Levis and said, “ten… p.m., fat boy.” His droopy white walrus mustache did a lousy job of concealing his shit-eating grin.

Fast & Short is a flash fiction collaboration between eight Literate Ape writers. Each was tasked with authoring one piece of flash fiction that would be combined to create a single short story. The writers’ flash fiction needed to serve two purposes: 1) Stand alone as a unique piece of flash fiction and 2) Serve as a vehicle for building a larger story and driving that story forward. Here is that developing story.

Thank God for the dog. If not for her, my girlfriend wouldn’t let me leave the house. When the pandemic got serious, she didn’t care about toilet paper; she b-lined it for the milk. Our freezer is perfectly packed with Swedish meatballs, broccoli florets, and twenty-three gallon-size Ziplocs of milk.

As loved as we were by the Boschmann’s, we were still a negro family and had to live in the negro part of town. This part of town was not Officer Sweeney’s beat. He being at our door to arrest my Ronnie was strictly a courtesy. At some point during all the celebration, Mr. Stanley had been murdered. Stabbed in the throat three times. Another four times in the chest and seventeen times in his crotch. I nearly dropped Caroline as Officer Sweeney gave us more details while the other cops escorted Ronnie back to our bedroom so he could get dressed before they slapped cuffs on him.

I woke up angry. I always wake up angry. I eat my breakfast toast angry. I get dressed angry and put on my makeup angry. I adjust my hair angry. I reapply one of my damn press-on nails that always falls off in my sleep. Somewhere in the hill of sheets is a mountain of lost press-on nails. I don’t drink coffee or tea or juice. I don’t need a morning pick-me-up because I’m wound up from the start. Anger is my morning fuel and I love how it tastes. It makes me happy.

“When he was done, I stood up and said, ‘Hey! What the fuck are you doing?’ Then I punched him in the face. I almost knocked his ass out and right into the pool.”

“Hang on a minute. You said, ‘When he was done.’ Do you mean that you woke up and even after you saw Cal Keller was giving you a blowjob, you kept letting him? So, you actually finished.”

R.J. stopped pacing. “Well, yeah. I mean, I was drunk. I didn’t know what was going on at first. Not until I blew my wad.”

“Oh, my God, R.J. Okay, so then what happened?”

“I made him take me to the ATM and made him give me all of his money in his account or I’d beat him to death.”

“You mugged the guy after he sucked you off? And how much money did you get?”

Lou and Mark shuffled their way around a line of people, and Lou pulled open the door. A large bouncer pushed it shut in their faces.

“Line forms out there,” the bouncer said.

They turned and looked. “There’s a line? For what?” Mark asked.

“To get in,” the bouncer said.

Mark looked through the window next to the door. “But there’s plenty of space in there. There are even empty seats at the bar. What gives?”

“Line forms back there,” the bouncer said again with even more authority.

Lou picked Michelle up from work on his way back into the city. It was Friday and they were going to try a few a of the neighborhood bars. When they arrived at the condo, they headed straight to the bedroom to change out of their work clothes. Lou could have worn hole-filled sweatpants to the shop; no one would have cared—it’s not like he met with clients on a regular basis. Most days he was the only one in the office with a handful of union workers out in the shop doing whatever union workers get paid to do when not on a job site. But wearing a nice pair of slacks and a tie made him feel a little more professional. His mother taught him long ago that what a person wears directly affects one’s attitude. It helped motivate him to look for other jobs if he was wearing a tie. It also made him feel like less of a degenerate drunk when he would have two scotches for lunch.