HOBART #9: games available for preorder now!
			A Little Bit Orphaned J.M. Patrick
			You, Too A. Papatya Bucak
			The Hook Brian Foley
			Colossal Crimson Crop Gabe Durham
			Cathy Day Bryan Furuness
			Brian Foley is the author of chapbook The Tornado is not a Surrealist (Greying Ghost Press). His work is forthcoming in LIT, Caketrain, Nano Fiction and Wandering Army. He can be found at www.eunuchsblues.blogspot.com .

Photo by Ryan Molloy

A man had many things hanging off of his body. There were two arms, two legs, a hose. Mostly though there were a number of barbed hooks, which hung from chains stemming from his torso. They picked up anything they felt like, the man having little say in the matter. Plants, cars, organic foods, etc. The hooks seemed especially keen to feral children, the man often spending long hours at a time in his den releasing the wiggling worms with a pair of pliers. It was a daily struggle to tow it all. It was in this way the man developed incredible upper body strength. Though his toned warrior physique did little to improve his self-image that slowly deteriorated with each new bloody lip.

One day the hooks picked up a woman. Unfortunately the man found her unappealing as she was bleeding heavily from her face and chest where the hooks had gotten to her. Still, he tried to keep his manners, looking her in the eye instead of her wounds and holding her hand while waiting for the ambulance. He appreciated the hooks' intentions, but ever since Melissa had shook loose his love, he was lost in the aftermath of the one who got away…