Take Me To The River
by P. A. Moed

In self-defense, she had tried to suppress thoughts of her mother, but they kept bubbling up to the surface like oil. Guilt, sorrow, and regret -- she struggled with them all.
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Affectionate Brute
by Shipra Sharma

Sushma didn't answer but dreamily looked at the stars that seemed perennially stitched to the web of the sky. She believed stars would soothe her skin with their cold stare as years would start to wither it with their history.
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Editor's Choice:
The Best Of Moondance Fiction, 2000 - 2005

Tanuki
by Jan Hodges

The Buddhist nun had lived on Black Bamboo Mountain for over twenty years. She shaved her head after leaving a marriage she could only describe as tasteless. The priest who ordained her thought it might be convenient to have a live-in disciple for various chores and delights, but Koen had other aspirations.
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Fourteen Days In November
by Beate Sigriddaughter

The fantasies expand. With a small fatherless daughter I might finally become the rebel and the outcast I was always meant to be. Scorned, celebrated, feared. Subject to all the attitudes they have toward someone they don't know what to do with.
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A Love Letter To The Ocean
by Deidre Woollard

The whole rest of the day, Beth felt an inexplicable happiness despite the fact that she usually hated driving the bus on rainy days. But wet seats and slick roads and grumpy passengers shaking their umbrellas out in doorway couldn't faze her today. She had been acknowledged.
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The Husband's Name
by Syed Rafay Ahmed

His face has the quality of a blurred photograph, yet she remembers his rough hands. His rough, calloused hands on her soft body. She shudders.
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The Scarf
by Zdravka Evtimova

Her home, that volcano of squabbles, swamp of eternal penury and central heating radiators that were cold like sepulchers made her accept Emil each Thursday at 6 PM, waiting for him at the front door, a smile of rubber on her face.
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