Five Minute Observations

Category: Fiction

  • When Nobody’s Watching

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    by

    Joe Class III
    in

    The afternoon sun hit her face. Keys in hand, she did the math. Rent in nine days. Electric past due. Javier needed new shoes. Not wanted. Needed. Forty-three dollars in checking. Then she saw it.

  • The Fog Rolled In

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    by

    Joe Class III
    in ,

    Friday morning. That was the day I resigned. Three sentences. Three cardboard boxes with seventeen years inside. Pastor Dan walks in while I’m wrapping the African violet Martha Hennigan gave me when my husband died. “What’s happening, Hannah?” Concerned. Pastoral. I try to explain. The church feels less like a community and more like an…

  • The Weight of the Keys 

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    by

    Joe Class III
    in

    Warren liked order. He liked knowing where things went, how they worked, and who was responsible for what. He liked unlock-and-lock routines, the satisfying click of certainty at the end of the day. That’s why he’d said yes when they asked him to join the committee. Not because he wanted authority. He told himself that…

  • White Paint

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    by

    Joe Class III
    in

    Pledge wood cleaner. The scent of lemon washed over Marla the second she stepped through the church doors. A sharp citrus scent and underneath it, something much older, mustier, harder to scrub away. Old hymnals. Wool carpet. The smell ancient churches accumulate whether they want to or not. It’s a smell Marla notices because she…

  • The Woman at the Intersection

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    by

    Joe Class III
    in ,

    I didn’t sleep the rest of that night. I tossed and turned, staring at the ceiling, replaying Oliver’s voice. What if she’s been watching ever since? 6 AM. Sitting at my kitchen table, coffee within reach, and my laptop open, scouring all the public records I could, looking for Patricia Denton. It didn’t take long…

  • The Last Conversation

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    by

    Joe Class III
    in

    Margaret sits across from her best friend Elena in Elena’s kitchen, smelling both the hot cinnamon rolls and the fresh-brewed coffee. Twenty-five years of marriage, and it comes down to this. A Tuesday morning, sitting at Elena’s worn oak table. Alone in her car, she practiced these words. They’re tougher to say out loud to…

  • The Witness

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    by

    Joe Class III
    in

    Oliver walked out of Henderson Hardware into the late May afternoon, a plastic bag in one hand and a crowbar in the other. He wore what he always wore for weekend projects: khaki cargo shorts, a faded Cardinals t-shirt, and the old New Balance sneakers Sarah used to tease him about. She’d been gone four…

  • The Weaver’s Last Gift

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    by

    Joe Class III
    in

    “That’s it?” The princess stares at him as if she finished drinking poison. The Weaver shifts in the chair, making a terrible creaking noise, as if it would fall apart at any moment. The slight movement sends a sharp pain shooting down his spine, making him grimace. His joints and bones creak like the chair,…

  • The Thursday That Slipped

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    by

    Joe Class III
    in

    Thursday vanished from Des Moines without so much as an apology. Me and Oliver Finch? We noticed. Everyone else? Forgot. But Oliver watched time misbehave before. And he never trusted it twice.

  • The Missing Building – Part III

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    by

    Joe Class III
    in ,

    The shower didn’t help. Twenty minutes of hot water, and I still couldn’t figure out what to say to Agent Johnson. Or whoever he really was. After eight men show up at 3 AM looking for my cousin Ruby, I need answers. But when I dial the number on his business card, nothing is what…

  • The Missing Building – Part II

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    by

    Joe Class III
    in ,

    An impossible photograph and a woman who knows too much. A grandfather dead for thirty years, alive. Paul’s quiet retirement? It’s over.

  • The Missing Building

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    by

    Joe Class III
    in

    One unexpected photograph lands on the table at Dan’s Drive-In Diner, and the building in the picture? It might not exist anymore.

  • Lorne Michaels Pauses

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    by

    Joe Class III
    in

    The room goes silent when Lorne Michaels says he wants to change a few words. Blood rushes to my ears. My heart pounds. In seconds, I’ll make a choice changing everything.

  • The 9:47  

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    by

    Joe Class III
    in

    Miles knows how far the window opens, but Nancy believes his doctor more than her own husband.

  • Hemorrhoid Cream and Death Threats

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    by

    Joe Class III
    in

    The phone rings on the other side of the cubicle. “This is Johnson,” the voice answering it sings, like he’s on a Broadway stage. No. Probably off-Broadway, because it’s Johnson. He’s my suitemate with a penchant for various types of musicals, but opera singers like Pavarotti? That’s where his passion lives. That, and anything musical…

  • He Knows My Name

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    by

    Joe Class III
    in ,

    A stranger in Pioneer Square quotes lines from banned books. Ink-stained fingers. Knowledge of old stories makes him dangerous. But it’s what he knows about me that turns my blood cold. In a world without books, how does he know my name?

  • The Year We Made Our Own Rules

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    by

    Joe Class III
    in ,

    George Orwell wrote about 1984. I lived through it. They weren’t the same thing. Junior high was worse.

  • Foam and Blood

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    by

    Joe Class III
    in ,

    Frank Kellerman watches the con unfold. Thirty years on the force taught him to read setups. Tonight’s different.

  • Bad Math

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    by

    Joe Class III
    in

    The foam hits my knees. Two linebackers line up their play. Someone’s going down hard tonight—and it ain’t gonna be me. Where’s Jessica?

  • Whiskey Before Blood: A Frank Kellerman Story

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    by

    Joe Class III
    in

    Frank Kellerman watches the con unfold. Thirty years on the force taught him to read setups. Tonight’s different.