Kevin P. Keating: Fiction, Essays & Commentary

From the May 28th edition of Bandit Fiction: An hour before dawn, when he finally returned to the house, Mother had a large leather-bound book under one arm and a swollen left eye from a strong right hook, a fat lip and a chipped front tooth, a pair of bloody crosses slashed into his tattooed forearms, and a nasty bruise on the back of his neck that bore the hallmarks of busted bar stools and smashed tabletops. The children, watching from the front window for the first buzzards of the season, could hear Mother panting like a beaten dog from a block away. He lowered his broad shoulders against an icy gale and bellowed for more whiskey, more beer. On unsteady legs, he struggled through knee-deep snowdrifts left by last night’s late winter storm. Under a cold, blue beam cast by the full moon, Mother staggered up the porch steps and, with a triumphant smile, kicked open the door. READ THE ENTIRE STORY

  From the Spring 2021 edition of The Cafe Irreal: She came again last night, the old woman, to pick apples from our tree.  Through my den window, I saw a familiar figure in a crocheted shawl shambling across the backyard. Unable to concentrate on the botany book my wife had been urging me to read, I opened the sliding glass door and stepped outside into the crisp autumn air. From the shadows I watched her pluck a cluster of small, red apples from the lowest bough and hold them close to her cloudy blue eyes. After a careful inspection, she discarded any misshapen, wormy apples and then with surprising agility filled the brown paper bag at her feet. She's been coming here for weeks even before the apples were ripe, but I've never felt compelled to shake my wife awake and ask her to witness the peculiar scene. These days my wife, because of her snoring and weird, nocturnal outbursts, sleeps in the guest bedroom. READ THE STORY HERE

From the Summer 2020 edition of  Potato Soup: Samantha Serpentini is an insufferable little warthog. Associate editor of the school’s monthly newsletter, vice president of the Youth Leadership Council, quintessential overachiever, class snitch, she sits, arms crossed, high in the bleachers and slowly shakes her head so everyone knows just how displeased she is to be here. From beneath the bangs of her severe black bob, she glares at her teachers and in her most truculent voice tells them that the phony jousts at Camelot’s Court are “a sickening display of savagery.” Her carefully articulated outrage surprises no one. Fond of using modish words, Samantha seems to believe existence itself is a kind of affront to moral decency.  READ THE STORY HERE

From the Fall/Winter 2020 edition of The Maryland Literary Review: On any other summer day, someone would have spotted Anson flailing in the heavy surf, a conscientious mother lathering sunscreen on her toddler under one of the pastel umbrellas that dotted the beach, a divorced dad helping the daughter he hasn’t seen in two weeks build an elaborate sandcastle near the water’s edge, weekend boaters sunbathing aboard their pricey pontoons and bowriders, but on that unusually cool August morning, as a light fog rolled in off the lake, the beach was completely deserted. In the bay, anchored near the breakwall, a lone cabin cruiser named the  Lady Cordelia  bobbed up and down in the heaving white waves. Atop the grassy hill overlooking the lake, Sister Agnes picked plastic bottles from a garbage can inside the picnic pavilion and whispered prophecies about the creature rumored to lurk along the steep shale cliffs. On the fishing pier, two middle-aged men passed a brown paper bag ba...

From the Spring 2021 edition of The White Wall Review: Professor Jeffrey Deepmere stands alone under the great sandstone arch at the entrance to the riverfront memorial park. He reaches for the crumpled pack of cigarettes in the pocket of his pilled wool overcoat and strikes a match. It’s a shameful habit from his experimental phase with Quinn, but the occasional nicotine rush puts him in a creative state of mind and fills him with a sense of euphoria. Unfortunately, after taking a few desperate puffs, he traces with one trembling finger the familiar names engraved on the arch for all time. It has become a ritual for him, and he begins to suspect that he may require a stronger type of medicine. As a self-respecting Humanist, he rejects the grossly superstitious beliefs of the well-meaning locals, but now, above the swiftly flowing current, he perceives the low moans of the restless spirits rumored to haunt the river’s muddy embankment.  READ THE STORY HERE

  From the March/April 2020 edition of Better Than Starbucks: At twilight they make their way to the edge of a deep forest of Douglas fir and mighty hemlock. In single file they trot along a high limestone ridge overlooking an eight-lane interstate highway. One by one they weave their way down an icy switchback and then, to the blare of horns and screeching tires, dart across a steady stream of oncoming traffic. Somehow all six of them survive the perilous crossing. Near an underpass strewn with smashed bottles and crumpled cans, they quickly assess the terrain before moving on. For the next mile there are hills and trees, but soon the land becomes flat and barren as a windswept prairie. There are no sturdy oaks and hickories to shield them from the drifting snow, no rock ledges and caves where they might take shelter for an hour or two from the brutal winter gusts blasting across the great lake to the north. Here there are only roads and more roads. READ THE STORY HERE 

From the Spring 2021 edition of The Mark Literary Review: The music festival happened to coincide with Earth Day, and all over campus, taped to every lamp post and pinned to every bulletin board, there were propagandistic displays of pantheism— anthropomorphic planets spouting somber platitudes (“We were born to save the world, not spoil it”), mischievous woodland elves tiptoeing through lush gardens, whimsical pixies with pink flower petals swirling around their dainty ankles, alluring fertility goddesses draped in billowing lace robes of blue and green, their fingers fondling black irises and priapic mushrooms. Irritated by all of this trendy idolatry, Taylor averted her eyes and spent her evenings in pious prayer. She believed the season had a much more profound and sacred meaning. But now, as she traveled south to the river, she began to wonder if nature did indeed possess some subtle power to confound and deliberately mislead a person of faith. READ THE STORY HERE

From the Spring 2021 edition of The Cabinet of Heed: It took them three days by car before they reached the desert. Towards nightfall, in a dusty town in the high Utah plateau, they passed the Wishing Well, a store that, according to the weather-beaten sign, specialized in used and rare books. Tabby asked if they could stop, and Scott, against his better judgment, said yes. During their journey, she’d gone through three coloring books. He tried his best to ignore the strange modifications she’d made to each drawing. Sometimes, though, she tore a page from the book, thrust it in his face, and insist he praise her for her creativity. READ THE STORY HERE

From the 2021 edition of  Dissections: The Journal of Contemporary Horror: Ever since my divorce last summer, I’ve been renting this two-bedroom apartment in a converted warehouse not far from the lake. The building is more than a century old, a relic from the sweatshop days of the early twentieth century when children as young as eight and nine were sent at dawn by their half-starving parents to work twelve-hour shifts at the looms and presses. In my dreams I see them sometimes, the shades of those miserable little boys and girls, their faces sparkling with graphite dust, their tiny fingers working the spindles of those unforgiving high-speed machines. I have an 18-year old daughter who lives with her father. Had she been around in the days before the enactment of child labor laws, she would have been a professional saboteur. Within an hour of entering the building, she would have made sure every lever and gear had malfunctioned. What’s more, an entire army of cigar-chomping overs...