Rock and a Hard Place, Issue 9: Winter 2023

Rock and a Hard Place, Issue 9

Winter 2023

Rock and a Hard Place Press

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF: Roger Nokes

MANAGING EDITOR: Jay Butkowski

CONTRIBUTING EDITOR: Albert Tucher

ASSOCIATE EDITOR: Paul J. Garth

ASSOCIATE EDITOR: Libby Cudmore

ASSOCIATE EDITOR: R.D. Sullivan

ASSOCIATE EDITOR: Rob D. Smith

GUARDIAN ANGEL: Jonathan Elliott

COVER ART: Heather Garth

ON THE WEB: rockandahardplacemag.com

ON FACEBOOK: @RHP_Press

ON TWITTER: @RHP_Press

BY EMAIL: [email protected]

Rock and a Hard Place Magazine is a labor of love, produced by a team of volunteer editors to showcase the best in dark fiction, crime, dystopian fiction, and noir. To learn how you can support the mission of Rock and a Hard Place Press through tax-deductible donations, or by subscribing to the RHP Patreon, please visit the website, and click "Support RHP" through the main menu.

ROCK AND A HARD PLACE, ISSUE 9: WINTER 2023

Copyright © and ™ 2023 by Rock and a Hard Place Press, LLC

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews or certain other noncommercial uses permitted by U.S. copyright law. For permission requests, contact the publisher via the contact methods listed on their website.

ISBN: 979-8-9852904-7-9 (Paperback)

ISBN: 979-8-9852904-8-6 (eBook)

All associated characters, logos, and the distinctive likeness thereof are trademarks of the publisher, or of the respective authors and are used with their permission. This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental except where noted.

Published by Rock and a Hard Place Press, an imprint of Rock and a Hard Place Press, LLC, Woodbridge, NJ.

rockandahardplacemag.com

amazon.com/Rock-and-a-Hard-Place-Press

DEDICATION

Issue 9 is dedicated to the word no, in whatever language it’s spoken; to the defiant ones who shouted it in the face of social injustice and institutional cruelty; and to the powerless ones who ignored it and eked out survival in the face of

systemic oppression.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS:

Creation is rarely a solo enterprise. Even when there’s just one person credited, there’s usually a community that’s been built up around that creator, that supports them through thick and thin, that stokes the fires of imagination, and encourages them to engage in that next great creative act.

At Rock and a Hard Place, we are so fortunate to have built up a community of authors, artists, and readers, who get us. We hope you enjoy this latest issue as much as we’ve enjoyed pulling it all together.

A special thank you to our Patreon subscribers who continue to show up in so many ways to support the mission of RHP:

Victor De Anda

Rob Smith

Jay Bechtol

Todd Robins

Susan Jessen

Richard Risemberg

Ted Flanagan

Chris Rhatigan

Ryan Citron

Contents

Foreword: Read Globally, Act Locally

R.D. Sullivan

PHOTO: Les Trois Boissons by Jennifer Sciortino

1. No Wrong Way to Grieve

C.W. Blackwell

PHOTO: Bad Kids of Bratislava by Karen Boissonneault-Gauthier

2. Respect the Shemp

Mike Zimmerman

PHOTO: Shining Light by Allison Renner

3. The Last Ruined Night

Mike McHone

4. Fried Baloney Sandwiches

Richard Risemberg

PHOTO: A Natural Waste by R.D. Sullivan

5. Darker

Elena E. Smith

6. Strangers Who Aren’t

William Kitcher

FUN w/ ROCK AND A HARD PLACE

Missed Connections

7. The Monster in the Wall

Jennifer Bernardini

8. Cost of Living

Nick Kolakowski

9. The Politics of Snitching

David Hagerty

PHOTO: Dart Away by R.D. Sullivan

10. Sunshine State Private Investigations

Michael Penncavage

11. Twenty Questions

Emilee Prado

PHOTO: There's a Light by Jay Butkowski

12. Good Harvest

Archer Sullivan

Contributors’ Biographies

Landmarks

Cover

Foreword: Read Globally, Act Locally

R.D. Sullivan

There’s a distinct terror that lies in my heart, as an avid reader, that my child will not grow into a person who reads books. We’re told they’ll become the opposite of us as an act of rebellion, but there are so many more paths I hope he takes to do so.

It’s not the books themselves I care about, really. It’s how they grow the world we live in. Filling your mind with as many different perspectives and stories as possible shines a light into dark corners and foreign lands that your own singular, limited experience couldn’t otherwise. Reading broadly, I firmly believe, shapes us into more compassionate, better people. It’s harder to judge a person a continent away, or merely over on the other side of the tracks, for desperate decisions they made when you know they were made in situations even more desperate.

Those desperate decisions are a huge part of why I love the fiction we publish here. When I’m poring through submissions and find a piece that adds a perspective to my worldview, or leaves me emotionally devastated and needing a moment to recover, those are the stories I live for. To have tales that transcend the page and tap into something deeper within your own chest, well . . . that’s something incredible.

And yet, time and again, we are privileged to receive amazing story after amazing story, trusted with authors’ vibrant and gut-wrenching works.

Here we find ourselves, once more, with issue number nine. In the pages that follow you will read of grief-driven action, of desperate attempts to get well in a society that addicts people for profit before blaming them for their addictions, of a system stacked against people just trying to survive on the fringes. Stories of being powerless in the face of forces greater than your own, forces that will not lend you a hand if it doesn’t line someone else’s pocket.

Some people choose to look away. I appreciate that you’re here, mind open, ready to take a walk in shoes that might have pebbles in the soles and holes in the toes. Things aren’t always pretty, but neither is life. Though they are ostensibly fiction, the roots of these tales feed on the truth found outside all our front doors, whether we choose to see it or go about with blinders on.

What I want for our readers is not the darkness and desperation. I want you, dear reader, to see the people at the root of it all. It’s what I strive for while I ply my child with books he didn’t ask for. Instead of the crime committed, in place of the tent city bemoaned about and vagrants decried, is understanding and compassion towards the humans at the center. Reading broadens the world beyond us, even if we can only practice our broadened compassion in our own towns.

I hope you find all that and a little love besides in this issue. And as always, thank you for reading.

R.D. Sullivan,

Associate Editor

February 2023

For the RHP Editorial Board: Roger, Jay, Al, Paul, Libby, Rob, and Jonathan

I always felt a dumpster fire was an appropriate metaphor for American gun culture — but tonight it was literal.

No Wrong Way to Grieve

C.W. Blackwell

We waited for May at Bull’s Cantina, a little wood-paneled dive on the corner of P Street and Nineteenth. Bull’s had a decent TV and two-for-one deals on PBR drafts every Thursday afternoon, and it was directly across from the library where we had our weekly meetings. When May finally wandered through the door, she didn’t say a word—just held her phone out, eyes fixed on the screen.

Glad you made it, I said. May liked to sit by the window and watch the traffic on P Street, so I stepped out of the booth and let her slide in. Tough one today, huh?

It took her a moment to respond. She glanced at Dante and me and let her eyes drift to the window.

Tough? she said. "It was brutal."

Dante rose from the booth and gestured across the bar with one hand on May’s shoulder and the other tilting an imaginary drink in the air.

Can we get both two-for-one pints at once? he asked.

The bartender looked up and down the bar as if doing a headcount. There were two old men in grease-stained T-shirts watching TV, a couple sitting in the booth closest to the door. Typical for a weekday afternoon in midtown Sacramento. He uncradled a pair of pint glasses from a stack behind the bar and filled them.

I’m not supposed to serve both at once, said the bartender as he settled the beers in front of May, foam sliding down the glass onto the lacquered tabletop. But I don’t like being the bad guy, either.

We know a thing or two about bad guys, I said. You’re practically a saint in our eyes.

We sat in silence and drank. Cars passed on the street, sun filtering low through the oak trees in the park across the way. May was halfway through her first pint when she flipped her phone and showed us her lock screen photo.

It’s a sunset now, she said. From the last trip we took together. We wandered out to the cliffs somewhere north of Santa Cruz to watch the sun fade over the water. Ellie spotted a whale so we took a bunch of pictures, but you can’t really see it here. She started telling everyone that whales were her new favorite animal.

I set my phone on the table so she could see the lock screen.

Changed mine a few weeks ago, I said. Just after Diaz suggested it. I didn’t know what to change it to so I just had my sister do it for me. I think she just used the default setting. I like yours, May. I think I have a few sunset pictures if I scroll back far enough. I think it helps. But then again, my life keeps falling apart anyway.

Dante took his phone out but kept it screen-down on the table. He had a bit of beer foam caught in his mustache and it added to his look of vulnerability.

You don’t have to show us, buddy, I said.

May reached across and held Dante’s hand. They sat like that for a moment, eyes getting wet, nothing spoken. He patted May’s arm and flipped his phone over. The lock screen was a Halloween photo of his son, Calvin, in a Spider-Man costume. His hair was in box braids and he was missing two front teeth.

I changed it back, he said. I missed looking at him every day.

Diaz says there’s no wrong way to grieve, I said.

Yeah. Just feels like I’m a little behind the group.

Buddy, we all feel that way sometimes. I know I do.

Another round of drinks came and went. We always joked that our support group required its own follow-up support group, and it wasn’t far from the truth. At least the happy hour version came with cheap beer and well drinks, something to numb the raw nerves Diaz exposed.

One of the old men shouted something at the TV and we all looked up.

Usually, it had to do with sports, but this time was different. The bartender had the remote control in his hand, turning up the volume. CNN breaking news. They were zooming over a map of Denfield High School in Arizona as the chyron cycled through the bottom of the screen. The anchor repeated the words GUNMAN and SHOOTING in a maddeningly calm voice.

I don’t fuckin’ believe it, said Dante.

It’s too soon, I said. Medford happened just a few weeks—

May pushed me hard, both hands on my shoulder.

Let me out, she said.

I started to inch out of the booth, but I wasn’t fast enough for her. She slapped her hands on the table, hard enough to make the pint glasses rattle on the tabletop. She was telling me to move my fat ass. When I climbed out of the booth, she shouldered past me and went straight through the front door and into the daylight. We could see her through the window, dodging the cars on P Street as she fled into the park and disappeared under those big sprawling oak trees.

I locked eyes with Dante.

Go on, he told me. I’ll settle up here.

May lived in a little two-story walk-up in Curtis Park that was just big enough for an adult woman and an overweight tabby cat. Not the best neighborhood, not the worst. I spotted her Ford pickup in the carport, engine ticking as it cooled.

I called Dante from the parking lot and he picked up on the first ring.

You find her? he said.

Yeah, she drove home. I’m outside her apartment now. Gonna give her a second, then I’ll go up and check on her.

What about you, buddy?

Me?

Yeah, you, he said. Don’t get in the habit of checking up on everybody without nobody checking up on you.

It’s true what they say: when things fall apart, you find out who your real friends are. I’d drifted away from just about