Category: Bad Survivalist

Bad Survivalist Short Story: “Bear, Flower, Ferryman,” by Margaret Redmond Whitehead

For a long time that morning, the bear occupied herself with a cardboard box. Its walls were plushy and wet—soaked from the night’s rain—but rigid enough that it held its shape. It was on its side, with both ends open, creating a tunnel that was just barely too small for a bear to pass through.…
Steve Gergely: “VanLife,” a flash fiction for Bad Survivalist

For the past two weeks I’ve been living out of my van. It’s not a lifestyle for everyone, but at this juncture of my life, it was the best move for me. I mean, I’m twenty-two, soon to be twenty-three, so I can’t be living with my parents anymore. With one kid in preschool and…
Robert Scotellaro: “A Sky Full of Crickets,” flash fiction triptych for Bad Survivalist

Hatching They are strapped in their upside-down car for hours before the firemen, slicing through metal, free them. The deer comes out of nowhere and when Clyde swerves the car flips. The airbags release, with a moments harsh embrace, then deflate. When Arleen says: “Fuck!” in a tone familiar to him he is finally able to…
“Electrolysis,” a Bad Survivalist Short Short by Roger D’Agostin

The follicles didn’t know why they were slathered in foam, but 17 said, “Don’t complain, this is the longest we’ve been.” Follicle 1 goose bumped, then quickly regained her composure. “Let’s not discuss the past.” The others knew that Follicle 1, being the first, had suffered the most. Plucks. Wax. Bleaching. But this foam, it felt good. Still, Follicle 1 hoped…
Bad Survivalist: Three Little Things by Leigh Chadwick

Skinny Kids Skinny kids touching light with their tongues pressed against the sun. Skinny kids with half their teeth gone. Skinny kids with an assembly line of ribs and souls and hearts and sometimes lungs, and mostly always earlobes. Skinny kids watching a dodo run a lemming off a cliff. Skinny kids with half their…
“Dyin’ Lion”: A Bad Survivalist Work Fiction by Jonathan Bluebird Montgomery

I know everyone thinks I’m just a cabdriver, but I also work at the zoo. They pay me to take care of the lion, a 550 lb predator-cat from sub-Saharan Africa trapped inside an artificial habitat. The lion is magnificent and a success of evolution. It is a beautiful, golden killing machine, and when his…
MM/DD/2020: Three Residuals from RESIDUE

*Ed.’s Note: click images to view larger sizes. These pieces are from the book Residue (forthcoming 05/01/2021), a text/image collaboration of dream-inspired fictions by DD that were prompted by Rorschach-like prints by MM (collectively known as MM/DD/2020), both subconsciously rendered in response to the anxiety-ridden events of 2020. More information about the project can be…
“Criminal”: A Bad Survivalist Short Story by Meg Tuite

My mouth belonged to me. “Your head is flat as a tape worm.” We waited in line to get measured. Anything over six inches was condemned as perverse and a student was sent home. These girls lived for high hair. She said, “Fuck your mother.” “My mother’s dead.” She gestured the sign of the cross…
“while we wait for a vaccine,” a Bad Survivalist poem by Michele Popadich

i flock to the lawless. bleachmy hair purple & lob uneven bangs.finally, a stranger to wave to in the foggy medicinecabinet. the sink sprouts split ends & i ask a boyup. pinky my finger into his elasticband. he replaces the cat that has been tuckedbetween my legs for seven months. i write storiesthat mean nothing…