All Bets Are Off
It’s all grit and no grace in this week’s throwback, ‘Wager’ by Bob Thurber. Enjoy the excerpt from Issue 3, Summer 2014, and keep reading for your chance to appear in the pages of Pulp!
Wager
by Bob Thurber
I’m in this story, though only because I have to be, and I’ve taken liberties to keep my appearance to the barest minimum. The truly important people are Tony and Phil. You’ll need to excuse them both, especially Phil. The poor bastard’s a wreck, jittery from lack of sleep, fuelled by too much coffee. He hasn’t bathed, shaved, or eaten since Thursday’s late afternoon breakfast, when he was chewing on a slice of rubbery bacon, commenting to Tony, his roommate and life partner, how premium quality, centre-cut bacon really should not be cooked on a paper towel in a microwave.
That’s when the phone rang and Phil answered.
The caller’s voice was flat, cold, nonchalant to the point of sounding breezy. It was a voice right out of a Hitchcock thriller, in that moment right before some woman screams. After a brief, rather one-sided conversation full of ugly and melodramatic references to shattered bones, torn flesh, broken teeth, the caller said, “Imagine how it’s going to feel to have both your eyes scooped out with a soup spoon, you deadbeat!”
“Is this about the money?” Phil asked.
“Yeah,” replied the caller. “It’s about the fucking money.”
To find out what happens next, pick up your copy of Issue 3, Summer 2014!
Now It’s Your Turn …
Start the new year with some short fiction of your own: the 2022 Bumblebee Flash Fiction Contest opens January 1st!
Craft some flash and take a chance at the $300 top prize and publication in Issue 35, Summer 2022. Enter by January 15th and pay the earlybird rate of just $10. Add on an editorial critique for only $20 more.
For more information and to enter, visit the contest page.
And, for some short-fiction tips on technique, read what Bumblebee judge (and flash master) Bob Thurber has to say about the anatomy of microfiction and resources for getting started.
Bob Thurber grew up ‘dirt poor’ but taught himself how to write short fiction. He’s now a major voice in microfiction, with a long list of nominations and awards, and his widely published work has been selected for countless anthologies. He is the author of If You’d Like to Make a Call … Please Hang up, Paperboy, In Fifty Words!, and other books and stories. His work appears in Pulp Literature issues 3, 6, and 12. And we are delighted to have Bob join us twice a year as final judge for both our Bumblebee Flash Fiction Contest and the Hummingbird Flash Fiction Prize. For more of Bob’s work and his writerly insights, visit his website.
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