David Himmel 10/7/19 David Himmel 10/7/19

Hope Idiotic | Part 11

In the dining room, the party was getting more and more raucous. Music was blaring as it competed for dominance over the laughter. One sixty-year-old woman referred to one of the women in her quilting group as “a total cunt.” Gifts set aside, Lou, Michelle, Chuck and Lexi joined in.

Sheri Reda 10/4/19 Sheri Reda 10/4/19

Nothing

Louise walked out into the waking morning with an ache in her throat and neck she identified as the desire to cry.

David Himmel 10/3/19 David Himmel 10/3/19

Hope Idiotic | Part X

Two days later, Lehman Brothers Holdings collapsed, causing a massive wave of panic throughout the financial world. The Great Recession had begun. That day, with no companies to call on, Lou’s entire team was glued to streaming videos and news stories about the collapse. Lou played online Tetris.

David Himmel 9/30/19 David Himmel 9/30/19

Hope Idiotic | Part IX

Chuck regularly passed out wearing his glasses and just as regularly would lose them in the middle of the night. He’d either pull them off his face and throw them across the room or lose them in the pillows and sheets of his bed or cushions of a couch. But they weren’t in the cushions.

Jenni Thurston 9/27/19 Jenni Thurston 9/27/19

The Last Generation

I don’t want this. I’m too afraid. I don’t think this is the answer for the human race. I don’t want us all to suffer and die, but it is our fault we live in a destroyed world.

David Himmel 9/26/19 David Himmel 9/26/19

Hope Idiotic | Part VIII

Lou finally began making a little bit of money when he broke through to the Chi Star, a free daily paper owned by the Franklin News. It was designed to be a newspaper with training wheels in hopes that as the young readers aged, they would make the switch from the free commuter rag to a more mature newspaper subscription. It was the struggling newspaper business’ effort to survive by adapting the drug trade’s tactics; get ’em hooked for free when they’re young.

MT Cozzola 9/25/19 MT Cozzola 9/25/19

Nanny Fire

When I was three years old my mom said, “If you don't start shaping up we're going to have to let you go.”

David Himmel 9/23/19 David Himmel 9/23/19

Hope Idiotic | Part VII

By mid-November, Lou had been living with Michelle for two months. She provided half of the dresser for him and cleared out space in the bathroom cabinets and her closets for him in an effort to make her place his place, too. But she refused to let him hang any photos of his friends or family. And there was no way he was putting his film trophy on display anywhere.

Guest User 9/20/19 Guest User 9/20/19

Lotusland

"Saw a car accident there in meditation today." She pointed at an indeterminate northeast locale below. Nodding up at me in the pause as if I didn't believe her. "That's right, over coffee. I always stand right where you're standing for about fifteen minutes each morning while I break off a piece of the hottest joe I can possibly do, watching an interminably slow rush hour. The frustration is… transporting.“

David Himmel 9/19/19 David Himmel 9/19/19

Hope Idiotic | Part VI

The week that Lou arrived in Chicago, Franklin News, one of the largest media companies in the nation, laid off a thousand people. In the three months he’d been back, many other companies in his field had done the same. He wasn’t picky about whom he worked for, he just needed a gig. But every newspaper, magazine, radio station, marketing firm, advertising agency and public relations agency he could find wouldn’t even meet with him.

David Himmel 9/16/19 David Himmel 9/16/19

Hope Idiotic | Part V

Lou hit the San Francisco city limits just as night was coming down. He used the hostel book as promised to find a well-rated spot with a good view of the city. He’d never stayed in hostels before and was curious. He’d hoped to meet a few strangers he could make friends with for the night and explore the city with, but the place was pretty empty. It was too early in the summer for college students or Europeans to be backpacking their way through the country.

Tom Myers 9/13/19 Tom Myers 9/13/19

Wet Rat

I couldn’t walk away. But most important, I had my pride. I tried to act like I could give a shit, but getting canned would fuck with my ego.

David Himmel 9/12/19 David Himmel 9/12/19

Hope Idiotic | Part IV

Years of overeating and not exercising had finally taken their toll on Chuck’s mom. She collapsed from a heart attack in her Indiana home — the same small, rundown place where Chuck was raised. She was recovering at the nearest hospital a few towns away. It was a massive attack requiring surgery to add stents and to repair the lining of her heart’s wall. She also had a deadly case of type-2 diabetes. Her body was crumbling. She was in a fragile state, and death seemed imminent.

David Himmel 9/9/19 David Himmel 9/9/19

Hope Idiotic | Part III

A MONTH LATER AT WORK, JUST BEFORE LUNCH, CHUCK BURST FROM HIS OFFICE into the area where Lou and I sat. He ran his hands through his short hair, clawing his scalp.

“Fucking Jesus!” he said.

Lou and I swiveled our chairs toward him and leaned back ready for the meltdown.

“Department meeting!” Chuck said. “Now! Cuba Café! Neal, you drive!”

“I can’t. I have to get gas.”

“Good. Get it on the way back.”

David Himmel 9/2/19 David Himmel 9/2/19

Hope Idiotic | Part I

SHORTLY AFTER THE HEIGHT OF AMERICA’S FLAGRANT PATRIOTISM FOLLOWING 9/11, and just before the dawn of The Great Recession, there existed a wonderful Italian restaurant called Bella’s Ristorante. It was built into the foothills of the Black Mountain Range just outside of Las Vegas in Henderson, Nevada, a few short and dusty miles from the Strip at the edge of a wealthy suburban subdivision. My best friends Chuck Keller and Lou Bergman adored the place.

Paul Teodo 8/5/19 Paul Teodo 8/5/19

Termination

Eriksen liked to stand out in red short-sleeve scrubs and extra-long gloves, blasting ZZ Top as he sawed, hammered and sewed on the orthopedically damaged suburbanites hoping to improve their less than stellar golf or tennis games. On occasion, especially in summer, I’d catch him in shorts. “Bjorn,” I’d scold him like a recalcitrant kindergartner, “put your pants on, Infection Control.”

Guest User 6/14/19 Guest User 6/14/19

Sticky Valentine - An Erotic Fiction

Side one ended as the bed started to squeak. We stopped and snickered and shifted and slowed down. We were both super close even before we got started, but when we came we shuddered breathlessly next to each other like open barn doors in a heavy storm.

Jenni Thurston 4/16/19 Jenni Thurston 4/16/19

Roses of Aphrodite

She had the admiration of the gods and mortals alike. But the thorns of the rose were in her heart, and she longed for someone to remove them.

Mike Vinopal 3/25/19 Mike Vinopal 3/25/19

Noble X — Episode 23: Crisis & The Blue Cloud

John hears his father’s foot falls on the landing and he floats from semi-consciousness to fully aware, gaping at the gigantic mess he has made, one his dad would discover any minute.

Mike Vinopal 3/17/19 Mike Vinopal 3/17/19

Noble X — Episode 22: Please Take Me Home

The mixture of things that seem like a healthy everyday John and manic Johnny 5 is making Thomas’ head spin. Thomas keeps thinking “John needs to go to the hospital to talk with some professionals," and in the same moment, “He seems kind of ok. Is the hospital really necessary?” Thoughts of doubt dance through his head as he drives John to his parents.