Where the Sunflowers Grow
By
Rebecca Anna Coleman

-10-
The First Phone Call Home

I decided not to venture into the “Eden Cafe” from the outside looking in. I could see two dozen white men in greasy overalls gathering around a few broken down tables. No doubt they were holding a fellowship breakfast for the local branch of the Ku Klux Klan. And by no means did I want to be the guest speaker or be invited to semi-weekly cross burning. I'll take my chances somewhere else.

Torn from his own world and stuffed into the body of a villainess, facing the end of a doomed route he himself wrote, "Amelia" must navigate a world she really should know - too bad she was never great at worldbuilding.

Stuck in a world she (maybe) created, Amelia quickly finds that reality has filled in the details she failed to describe. The characters who were so flat when she wrote them now have nuance, and motives. The kingdom she wrote into existence is experiencing internal strife she never even thought about. And let's not even get into the complexities of the magic system, or the demon that forced her into this situation to begin with...

Oh, and then there's the fact that she's about to be arrested and executed... but surely she can come up with a way to write herself out of that, right?

...Right?

NOTE: This story was originally posted in single large chunk. But some readers have indicated that it was hard to navigate, so I've split it into two parts.

Torn from his own world and stuffed into the body of a villainess, facing the end of a doomed route he himself wrote, "Amelia" must navigate a world she really should know - too bad she was never great at worldbuilding.

Stuck in a world she (maybe) created, Amelia quickly finds that reality has filled in the details she failed to describe. The characters who were so flat when she wrote them now have nuance, and motives. The kingdom she wrote into existence is experiencing internal strife she never even thought about. And let's not even get into the complexities of the magic system, or the demon that forced her into this situation to begin with...

Oh, and then there's the fact that she's about to be arrested and executed... but surely she can come up with a way to write herself out of that, right?

...Right?

Wasn’t that what they were calling it these days?

Another Country -16-
by Erin Halfelven

{This is a very short story by my standards}
The art of the window dresser is easy to understand. Their goal is to grab passersby's attention, then entice them to come into the store and, hopefully, persuade them to spend a lot of money. That is the theory… In practice, it only works sometimes.

After a man is stabbed in the back and dies, he wakes up in the Labyrinth with a new body, new power, and another chance.

This story takes place in the same universe as my story Invoker.

Bonnyread Island
A Short Story
2026 Summer Island Getaway Challenge
By Maryanne Peters

Where the Sunflowers Grow
By
Rebecca Anna Coleman

-9-
Eden, Mississippi

In sophomore year there was a new girl in school. There was nothing special about Mary. Well, that was what everyone else but me thought. I always felt she was special. Ok, so she was not beautiful. Cute perhaps in the girl-next-door way. Not one of the popular girls. While smart far from the top ten students in our class. Not an athlete. Actually, she was prone to various illnesses so she didn’t take PE and was she was away from school for a long time in after Christmas. Not a recluse either . Just one of the girls. But for some reason she was the girl of my dreams.

Chapter Sixteen
Mother To The Rescue…Sort Of

“Samantha my dear”, Tichiba sought to soothe Samantha's ruffled feathers. “It’s all a moot point now. Jenna is the last daughter of the Stewart house. The curse ends here.”

“Does it?”. Samantha pulled her daughter toward her. “What about Tabitha? After I’m gone will she get a locket and a curse? Will she be the next example, the next sacrifice for the good of all witches?”