SHAWL PATTERN — MELANIE DUNBAR

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—This Piece was awarded First Place in the 2015 Micro-Fiction Contest—

He is determined to make the six hour drive to the Christmas party without stopping.  She is knitting; it’s a new pattern, with a skein of wool the color of November’s leaves rotting in the gutter. She has to pee.

“You’ve been pissed off for the last six months. What’s the matter, you goin' through menopause?”

She doesn't say anything then. She counts stitches, self-soothing with the rhythm of knit 2 purl 1 yarn-over and repeat. At some point between the car and the party she says some words that he understands. The rest of the night he drinks gin.

Melanie Dunbar lives in Southwest Michigan with her family and their rooster, Mr. Beautiful. Her poetry and flash fiction can be found at Your Impossible Voice, Silver Birch Press, CHEAP POP, and also is forthcoming in Gargoyle and Sweet: A Literary Confection. 

2015 MICRO-FICTION CONTEST — JUDGE'S STATEMENT & FINALISTS

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Phillip Sterling
October 2015

For me, a successful work of flash fiction must integrate three C’s of narrative impulse: character, conflict, and conciseness.  Characterization, of course, is the foundation upon which a story’s make-up is applied; with flash fiction in particular characters must be immediately recognizable and convincing (in the sense that their conflicts and resolutions stem from their circumstances).  It is in this regard alone that I can distinguish flash fiction from prose poetry: while a poem may have a narrative context, its primary intent is meditative or reflective, more the nuance of an emotional or intellectual moment than of story, more language than luggage. In a poem, a character may be presented; in fiction, a character develops.  And in the process of development something happens.  Call it what you will—conflict, complication, rising action, plot—the narrative evolves from a unique character’s personality and circumstances (which, for a reader to be convinced, must be clear).

A successful fiction, then, is a unity of characterization and circumstance that is unique to that narrative.  In addition, a successful “flash” fiction requires that uniqueness to be fully articulated in its smallest form; it demands conciseness.  The make-up must be applied so sparingly as to appear not to exist at all, a process more often associated with poetry than prose (and may be one reason for the on-going micro-fiction/prose poem dialectic).  Rather than selecting what narrative details are to be included, the writer of flash fiction selects what must be left out.  Thus, in a successful—or effective, or good—work of very short fiction, what is left out—what is implied or understood—is vital to the integrity of the whole.  It is not information or detail withheld from the reader in order to execute a kind of statement or climax—as is often the case of a “punch line” story (where we learn in the final sentence that the narrator is a dog, for instance).  Instead, it is a kind of negative space that—like a sculpture by Henri Moore—serves to define the body of the story (upon which the make-up can then be applied).

There is a fourth C, to be sure: Comic. The conciseness and density, the speed with which we read a piece of flash, lends itself to humor. Like a good riddle or joke.  But subtly:  more in the way of a pun than of slapstick.  More epiphany than guffaw.

That being said...

First Place:  “Shawl Pattern” by Melanie Dunbar

A small gem (emphasis on small) in the starry, metaphoric sense that its conciseness is brilliant.  Characterization captured in one or two sentences; the tension between what’s [thoughtlessly] spoken and what’s [thoughtfully] not; the conciliatory relationship implied in the resolution (that it is tenuous and momentary).  This story is remarkable in its understatement and subtlety.

Second Place:  “Anna Karina Floats in the Ocean” by David Joseph

What might have become just another story about the fatalistic and reckless decision-making of youth—another metaphoric take on being left “afloat” or “cast to sea”—is redeemed by the depths (sorry) and breadth of characterization, rendered in uniquely sensory detail.  

Third Place:  “Arch Made of Codfish” by Linda Nemec Foster

Playful and funny, in the manner of Russell Edson—a fabulist look at domesticity, in a dense and pun-ful manner, with its blatantly fictive (“Don’t-take-me-serious!”) and ironic tone.

Honorable Mentions (in no judgmental order):

“Saturday Night” by Bernard Grant

I like the nudge of this piece—its Carver-like minimalism and use of dialogue.  While there seems to be a tendency in recent short fiction to try and capture the big conflicts—the drama of death, disaster, destruction, dystopia (in 500 words or less)—here is a small domestic moment of huge significance and understanding, the moment a character discovers and defines himself in his relationship to the world.

“The Before” by Amanda Chiado

To describe people we love in terms of their “natures”—their predilections and obsessions—is to define ourselves.  We become the resolution of their antithesis—something that is often over-dramatized when it comes to stories about family.  But here is a new way of reconciling the dichotomy—through sensory language with a unique perspective.

“Oology” by Elodie Olson-Coons 

The title alone works the mouth, the tongue . . . the poetry of this story (language, again) becomes a character in its own right, taking shape from the details of the oologist’s obsession and pathos.  The densest in terms of involving the reader in poetic experience (tastes, smells, sights, textures), it is the most understated in terms of narrative sequence and cause.  For that reason alone—it’s uniqueness—I’m attracted to it, and wish to share it with others.   

NOTE:  While observers may argue a certain watery theme among all six selections, I would contend that it is more reflective of the selections overall than of any thematic preference on my part; if I lean, it is toward the use of sensory (poetic) language, which, in the greater group, emerged from characters in affinity with oceans, ponds, lakes, rivers, puddles, rain, snow . . . or [politically] the profound absence of...     

 

STUD — ANNA PRUSHINSKAYA

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Maggie called again to check on the animal, who scurried around the yard, unaware of the good life he’d enjoyed. His dysfunctional bodily functions and the onset of dementia would end that shortly. That’s where Blanche came in.
             The animal in question, Stud, was a dog. Maggie got the dog when she moved away from her parents; she’d traveled the country with him. Stud saw the vet as a puppy, then again, when Maggie’s then-boyfriend backed into him in the Volvo, and finally, when his balance went, and he began to move through the house backwards. “The growth,” said the vet, “was it.”
             Two weeks ago, as Blanche drove home with Maggie after their shift, Maggie had asked for help, distraught, and Blanche offered. That day, a group of college students came in with lung fungus. They’d all inhaled contaminated hot tub fumes. It is funny, Blanche thought, as she pulled away from the driveway, that we live at the boundaries of death and still refuse to confront it.
             She picked up Tim. He was the kind of person who wanted to be there for the end. Blanche was often there for the end, and the end was nothing to write home about. She’d bring coffee and crackers to the grieving families in the hallway and say, “I am sorry that this is all I can offer you.” This statement seemed to help.
             “The market is hot,” Tim said. “The realtor’s seen nothing like it.”
             “He’s got issues,” Blanche said.
             The clinic parking lot was full. They carried Stud to the lawn near the entrance. The grass was wilted yellow, exposed from an above-freezing stretch of days that had melted most of the snow. Blanche held one of Stud’s paws. The wind went through all the layers.
             “Lay down,” Tim said.
             They filled out a form in the lobby with pleasant, pastel trim. The veterinarian, a balding, otherwise youthful man invited them into the room. He explained that the technician, a friendly woman named Lou, would take it from there. Lou explained that unconsciousness would be followed by respiratory, then cardiac arrest. Blanche knew. Stud flopped his ears to the right.
             Lou prepped the solutions. Blanche remembered her training after nursing school, which had taken place in pediatric intensive care, the arrhythmic cadence of the ventilators and the monitors, new parents losing track of night and day.
             The house wasn’t really a house. The house was their future, their children, and their marriage. She had tried to materialize it with a mortgage. Lou offered tissues to both of them, but said nothing to offer comfort.

After, they got ice cream. Tim had rocky road, and she opted for peppermint. Even so, were they really such different people?
              “Let’s have a baby in the future,” Tim said. “In the future, we could have a house.”
             She had seen the future. Tim handed her his napkin, which was sticky and smelled like chocolate. In the future, she thought, dogs go to heaven.

Anna Prushinskaya is a writer based in Ann Arbor, Michigan. She is also an editor at Joyland Magazine. More about her at annaprushinskaya.com

NOT MADE MANIFEST — ROBERT LEEMING

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A sea breeze blew the music charts from a horseshoe of silver stands sending pages of yellowing staves and treble clefs slicing through the air.
             I told Greta that clothes pegs might be needed but she begged me to stop concentrating on the tiny details and consider the larger picture. She ordered me into the undercroft of the hall to carry out several stone heads of musical notables that I had to arrange on a four tiered table top, each head facing a different direction, to create the impression of a gaggle. 
             Nothing is more disheartening than the giving of a concert to an audience that isn't listening and as I weaved my way around the cabinets at the reception for the Governor of Barbados, the talk was of anything but the music.
             Maria, leaning against the curve of the curved room, she said was only there because an empty Sunday would have left her with too much time on her hands and I said I was tired of working. So we took on our roles and she started to talk about flirting, while I adopted the style of a connoisseur, as the cable car ticked from tooth to tooth in the thin mountain air.
             The air was cold, we sipped in the cold air, as the sculpted miracle, garlanded with fairy lights, was guided down the steps. The patriarch passed guarded by lines of green dragoons. The sensation in the flesh is never as fascinating as a sensation in the air and nearly everyone saluted as the man of the moment moved through the crowds.
             It’s strange, but of all the things I learned that night, the fact that carousel means little battle in Spanish is what still sticks in my mind. The magic of life is in the skirmishes.

Robert Leeming is a writer, journalist and photographer from London (via Manchester). His writing has been featured in The Belleville Park Pages, theNewerYork, Rasasvada, Flux Magazine, Port Magazine and GQ. A collection of his work can be found here: www.robertleeming.com.

NOMINATIONS — 2016 PUSHCART PRIZE

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We are pleased to announce our nominations for the 2016 Pushcart Prize (nominees are for stories published in the preceding year—2015, in this case):

We owe everything to all of our wonderful contributors, and it was a challenge to narrow the field, but we felt these pieces really highlighted our focus and drive here at CHEAP POP.

We wish all of our nominees good luck, and if you haven't already, now's a great time to read these stories!

THE SERIAL KILLER'S GHOST — ERICA MOSLEY

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We asked the serial killer's ghost, did he bury the bodies in the crawlspace?
             “No,” he said. “That was Gacy.”
             Would we find bits in cupboards, under bricks? Had he threaded petals of human lips onto the window blind cords?
             No. “That was that other one. I was much more creative.”
             It took a long time to get the serial killer's ghost to talk. At first he only jumped out at us from hall closets. Once, I woke up and saw him with the kitchen shears, practicing his serial killer pose in the full length mirror. We coaxed him with a trail of brandy shots down the stairs and into the kitchen. We used paper cups; our snifters weren't unpacked yet.
             The townies told us the serial killer had been suspected but never charged, had lived here all his life, had died in the attic. That's why we got the place so cheap.
             We finally got him to sit still in a kitchen chair but he balked at our curiosity.
             “You sure are some sickos,” he said. (Imagine! The nerve!)
             He disappeared for a while, but we brought him back with cigarettes. Across the table late at night we watched his lungs expand with swirls of smoke as he told us his stories.
             He told us the puppy story: once, as a child, he mowed the grass wrong, and as punishment his father made him watch while he sawed the ears off the new puppy with a bread knife. We thought we understood then why the lawn was always so nice. It was a pretty good story. But then he told us more stories, predictable stuff about bullies and dead cows and his mother's stockings. It went on and on. The serial killer's ghost followed us up the stairs when we got tired, sat on the foot of the bed, and kept talking. The serial killer's ghost didn't know he was boring. He did not know he was a disappointment.

Erica Mosley lives in the Missouri Ozarks. Her work has appeared in Alaska Quarterly Review, The Austin Review's online Spotlight, A cappella Zoo, and elsewhere. 

SUMMER OF THE MAKEOUT QUEEN — GEORGIA BELLAS

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The only trip she takes these days is back in time via the Google satellite image of her front stoop. She types in her address and zooms in with the mouse. The picture is a little grainy because it was dusk and thunderstorm-dark but there is enough light to illuminate the two bodies glued together in summer heat. You can see the back of her neck where her hair curls damply below the barrette holding up thick brown waves. If you squint you can imagine the pixels are drops of sweat.

If you look closely you can see his left hand cupping her right breast, her nipple poking between two fingers, the ruched edge of her sundress tugged down below a tan line.

If you look closely you can see her right hand digging into his left shoulder. Her fingernails are red.

If you look closely you can see the pale white of her right thigh, dress pulled up to her hips, his hand between her legs. If you look closely you can see her foot on the cement, red toes curled over the top step.

If you look closely you can see her tongue down his throat.

You can't actually see that she knows. Their faces are pressed together, indistinguishable. No space for a breath between their lips let alone a glimpse of tongues. But she can taste the salt of his lips still and it is almost the same thing.

The only thing you can't see, no matter how closely you look, is her heart.

Georgia Bellas is the Fiction Features Editor at Atticus Review. Her work appears in Split Lip Magazine, People Holding, Lockjaw Magazine, Synaesthesia, Sundog Lit, Cartridge Lit, Bird’s Thumb, WhiskeyPaper, The Collapsar, and [PANK], among other journals. She is one of the poetry winners for Sundress Publications' 2014 Best of the Net Anthology. You can follow her teddy bear, host of the award-winning Internet radio show "Mr. Bear's Violet Hour Saloon," on Twitter @MrBearStumpy.
 

WELCOME HANNAH GORDON — ASSISTANT EDITOR

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We are pleased—nay, excited!—to welcome Hannah Gordon as our new Assistant Editor!

Hannah brings a wealth of experience, both front of the house and back of the house in the publishing world, and we're so delighted she'll be joining the CHEAP POP team.

Get to know Hannah below. She rocks.

Lots more excitement to come. Stay tuned.

Hannah Gordon is the author of Almost Love Stories: A Collection, and her short stories have appeared or are forthcoming in Vagabonds: An Anthology of the Mad Ones, The Vignette Review, Synaesthesia Magazine, WhiskeyPaper, and more. She can be found online here and tweets here.