Category Archives: Fiction

by hipacificreview | 12/05/2013 · 2:45 pm

Sunny’s Last Game

by Ruvanee Pietersz Vilhauer

On the day of the last game, Sunny climbed into the car with a black eye. The discoloration was barely noticeable on his skin, which was only a couple of shades lighter than mine, but I could not miss the bruise because of the puffiness of his right eyelid.

I pretended nonchalance, although there was a compressed sensation in my chest. Sunny tried to heave his backpack onto the back seat, panting, his breath smelling of orange soda. It took seven attempts because the pack was heavy and almost as big as his torso, and because he had to contend with his coordination skills. I gripped the steering wheel to curb my urge to help. Continue reading →

Curves

by Mitzi McMahon

I watch my friend from the doorway and think this was a mistake. I should be at home working on my marriage or at the dry cleaners or at the grocery store, anywhere but here. But Claire called, crying. Said she didn’t want to be alone while her ex-fiancé is tying the knot. I didn’t think it was a good idea for me to come, not now with my own shit so messed up, but I couldn’t say no.

Claire stands in front of the full-length mirror, a shot of whiskey in her hand. I take in the rumpled bed covers, the discarded t-shirts and argyle vests and jeans heaped on a chair, the costume jewelry scattered along the dresser top, and sigh. Continue reading →

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by hipacificreview | 11/14/2013 · 6:00 pm

Finding Your Place

by Katie Darby Mullins

Because you are a stepmother, maybe your laugh is a little louder than the other moms. That’s fine. You laugh even louder when you realize it. Look at how much fun this is, you’re saying. I love being a mom.

But you know you’re not a mom, don’t you? It doesn’t matter how drunk, how high, how fucked up your child’s mother is, you’ll never be her mother. Continue reading →

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by hipacificreview | 11/07/2013 · 12:04 pm

When J.T. Received the Letter

by Tim Parrish

(an excerpt from the novel The Jumper, Winner of the 2012 George Garret Prize for Fiction)

J.T. barely noticed it among the stack. He tossed the mail onto his kitchen table, then sat and skimmed the rental ads for the tenth time. He had two-hundred fourteen dollars and no car. Even the smallest garage apartment in this neighborhood started at one-fifty a month and that didn’t include deposit or utilities. Plus, he’d been in this spot for two years and it was beyond sweet for the price. His only hope to pay off Mr. Charley and stay here not too far from the college was a blackjack game tonight, actually a pretty good hope since blackjack was his game. Continue reading →

Cutting the Trap Lines

by Kyler Campbell

His father steered the small skiff across Sanborn Bay and into the grey Maine morning. He used an oar to glide across the north Atlantic swells so as not to produce any noise among the reverberating waves and dawn-treading pelicans. In the rear of the skiff, the boy peered into the bright red cooler again. He wanted to see the lobsters tumbling over top of one another. Their claws swirled around, opened and shut. The boy let the lid close. This was his first time out on the boat, and his father was teaching him to poach traps. Continue reading →

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