Free Fiction

First Published In Ink for the Dead, A Collection: 2003

A plain, friendly waitress brought me the pie, cookies, and coffee I’d ordered and put my credit card receipt face down on the table.

“Brewin’ up a big one,” she said and pointed out the window, where snow was already clogging the sidewalk and sticking to the glass. “It'll be a white Christmas.”

First published in The Stolen Island Review: 2003.

My body lay motionless on the operating table, arms tucked under the white cotton blanket, eyes closed in the drugged illusion of sleep. The artificial surgeons whirred around me as they made the final preparations necessary to cut into my life. This procedure was never trusted to human hands; it was far too delicate. If anything went wrong I would be wasted and so would the money paid for me.