Congratulations to the winners of our first flash fiction contest! And thanks to the University of Arkansas – Fort Smith Center for Lifelong Learning and the UAFS Bookstore for providing prizes. 

Beginnings (1st place)
@story  LEA ANNE BROOKS

“Do you know…”  He shifts uneasily, his shadow stirring the night’s silvery light around you.

His eyes lift to yours, burning with pieces of himself he’s not shared before now, and in your astonishment you forget to breathe for a few moments.

“Do you know how I…” he tries again, his voice fading as his eyes implore yours to understand.

Then his hand slides hesitantly into yours, fingers knitting, sending sparks skittering up your arm, into your chest.

His face slowly begins to shine like the sun.

Your face answers like the moon.

Onward (2nd place)
@story  MARY SOBHANI

One hundred years. She hardly recognized her hands anymore, once hardworking, now so bony in their stillness, skin fragile as tissue paper. The time was near. She could hear it in the voices around her, see it in the presence of the children who weren’t really there. She smiled although she knew her face didn’t respond as it used to. Her daughter held her hand. Her grandchildren and great grandchildren kissed her. Immense love, sweet as summer sunshine. Okay, then, she’d never been one to dawdle when she knew something had to be done. Big breath. Ready, set…

Missing (3rd place)
@story  RANDI BOMAR

Her silver-haired husband was sorting music like a teenager ready to party.

In the morning a thirty year marriage would end. He would move in with his girlfriend.

His wife only asked that he be gone before she returned from work, and that he find their dog, missing for three days.

He called and reported flatly that he had found the dog dead, that he would return to bury her later.

That evening she came home, unlocked the dark house and entered her longest night. An owl cried eerily from the sycamore, and sodden walls collapsed upon her dreams.