I am dancing in circles because I just wrote the last chapter of my novel! I will use an overabundance of exclamation marks in an effort to express my excitement. Hurrah! It is 59,526 words, thirty-one chapters or 331 pages long depending on how you want to count it. I know have much proof-reading ahead of me, but I feel so invigorated to have gotten the whole story down on paper. Hurrah! I say again, Hurrah!

If you want to the rest of this short story, post a comment below or email me.

Trip, Trap, Tripping
by Mary Robinette Kowal
The heat rose off the sidewalks and crept down the walls; it wound through the apartment building and clung with sticky fingers to Clef Trollinger’s skin. He grimaced as he tried to tighten a pipe on his sink.
Through the pipe, he could hear a constant syncopated rhythm, the same rat-ta-tat-tat repeated with slight variations. Occasionally it would pause long enough for him to think it was over and then the tapping began again. He crawled out from under the sink and turned the tap on, letting the water flow down the drain. No leak. Satisfied, he turned it off and poked his head into the front room. The tapping was louder there.
He glared at the ceiling. He had moved in a week ago, and the freakin’ idiots upstairs kept pounding on the floor. Enough was enough.