Ink and Brine
Emily stared at the wrist tattoo while the ink gun hummed on the counter next to her.
Matter-of-fact nonhuman stories
Stories in NonHuman tagged matter-of-fact, ranked by how many readers finish them. Reads run 19 to 26 minutes. Writers to know: Harbor Engine, Twilight Epilogue and The Rose Phrase. Readers usually start with “Ink and Brine” and “Trucking with the Sky Thing”. Some are free to read in full; the rest open with a free preview.
Matter-of-fact nonhuman stories, ranked by readers
01 02 Trucking with the Sky Thing
Thirty-one years I been driving freight.
03 Chime and Claim
Erika had a rule about herself, and the rule was this: she was never surprised.
04 The Key Under the Stairs
Alyssa had plans for her Saturday, and none of them involved standing in a parking lot behind a bookstore at nine in the morning, staring…
05 Paddle Shift
Bethany found the basement door on the third try, because the second one she pushed turned out to open onto a mop sink and a smell of…
06 The Soundkeeper's Body
The bus dropped me at the end of Fore Street and I stood there with two suitcases and a bad feeling about the weather.
07 Monastery Dance
Robby Kramer was thirty-four years old and had taught history at the community college for nine years, and in all that time he had learned…
08 She Was Never Human
The skiff bumped against the dock and I grabbed the piling before I went in the water, which would have been a fine way to end fifty-four…
09 Blood and Stone
The bet happened because of a water stain, if you can believe that.
10 Choir Practice
Nick tells himself it was a practical move.
11 The Estimator's Visit
The agency had said seven o'clock.
12 Protocol Alpha
Noel Oakley was fifty-two years old and had spent the last five of those years eating dinner alone at his own kitchen table, which was the…
13 Poured Over
Zahra woke up on a mattress that was not hers, in a room she did not recognize, with one shoe on and one shoe off, and for a good thirty…
14 Heat Above the City
Regina Reyes was twenty-eight years old and lying flat on her back on a warehouse roof in the middle of July, and she was thinking about…
15 The Last Blend
I've been coming to the Lunar Convention Center for eleven years now, and it still smells the same every time, like recycled air with a…