Five Minutes explores five minutes of a life in one hundred words. Five minutes is edited by Susanna Baird, with editorial support from managing editor Maria s. picone and founding reader bobbi lerman; May READERS Darcy alsop, PRERNA BAROOAH, AMITA BASU, Sarina Caragan, Antony Püttschneider, and Elisa Rivera; and May Editorial intern sienna lew. Five Minutes was founded in October 2020, with the Salem (Mass)-based writing group Carrot Cake Writers supplying the journal’s first pieces. We’d love to read your five. Submit here

Tracked

That dang pickup is still there, has been since I left work. Lane-changing when I lane-change, that’s how I know he’s tailing me. I’m driving south on the six-lane 405 freeway to San Diego. He can’t just happen to be going there too. I’ve got to ditch him. I spy the sign: The freeway splits a few exits ahead. I slide left one lane, then another. So does he. One more time. The exit is here. Our lanes go left but I go right at the last moment, across three lanes, bumping over the triangular split. Too late for him.

Gay Degani has published a short story collection, Rattle of Want, a chapbook, Pomegranate, and a suspense novel, What Came Before. Find Gay at gaydegani.com, www.facebook.com/gaydegani, and on Twitter @GayDegani.


Avoidance

Look Down