December Park

by Ronald Malfi

Yet summer was hesitant. As if tempered by the events of the past year, it was reluctant to push the gray and mild spring away, letting it linger like bad memories. Highways shimmered with a mixture of rainwater and oil while flowers refused to bloom, disillusioned by the terminal skies.

His voice sounded like gravel sliding around inside a cardboard box.

I imagined giant grubby worms eating through her brain, indiscriminately brushing up against the cranial switches that controlled her speech.

From the hall windows, rapiers of bruised light speared through the leaves of maple trees. Thunder rumbled. I felt an aching nostalgia.