When Amy begins to flay herself during office hours, you aren’t quite sure what to do. You hate office hours. You used to enjoy them, actually, back before the flayings started. Sure, it’s hard sharin...

Club Statement: Adelaide United Responds to Social Media Claims.

It’s taken me a while to digest how my time at Adelaide United ended, but I think the fans deserve honesty. Leaving the club had nothing to do with football. Decisions were made by people in power that blocked my opportunities, not because of my talent, but because of who I choose to love. Under the new management, it became clear that I wasn’t allowed on the pitch because of politics. It’s hard to swallow when I realised my own club was homophobic. I was angry because people thought I was sidelined based on injuries, when in reality, it was internal homophobia that kept me on the bench. I stayed professional, kept my head down, and worked hard every day which I’m proud of. Yet no matter how much I produced or improved, my contributions were continuously ignored. It brought a lot of negativity and affected my wellbeing as a professional footballer. This was exactly the fear I had about coming out, seeing prejudice affect my career in modern day. For the first time, I actually questioned if I should have kept my sexuality a secret. This brought up fears I had about coming out publicly, that being myself would affect my career. I felt incredibly isolated and wondered if I’d made the mistake of sharing my story. I felt things going backwards, not just on the pitch, but in the one place I thought was a safe space and after seeing a group chat of teammates mocking a picture of me and my partner only added to this heartache.This fresh start in the UK has helped me breathe again and I hope I can fall back in love with the sport that means everything to me. Despite the way it ended behind the scenes, I refuse to let it ruin my connection to this city. Adelaide is where I found my wings. To the fans and supporters: thank you for your passion and backing. You deserve honesty and success. You were incredible to play in front of. Thank you. ❤️

Because her sudden pregnancy doomed her---as she saw it---to diapers and daycares she couldn’t afford and the same drab job she already disliked, Abby asked for Marcia’s advice. At thirty months, Marc...

Clarkesworld Science Fiction and Fantasy Magazine and Podcast.

Woodpecker, Warbler, Mussel, Thrush by Ruth Joffre     Yesterday, I was a bird. A slender-billed curlew, to be exact. My girlfriend helped me ID the bird. Took photographs of my decurved bill, the fla...

Clarkesworld Science Fiction and Fantasy Magazine and Podcast.

Honey, the spirits are here with us tonight and they are deeply disappointed. [audience laughter] Momma, do you not own a mirror? Did you think you looked cute when you walked out of your house tonigh...

“…but what is it like, having a war criminal as your past life?” Sadie Salazar, Licensed Life Speaker, should have been professionally above the prurient interest lighting her hazel eyes, and much too...

Krungthep means “The City of Gods.” A much more charming name than the bawdy Bangkok that foreigners joke about. But to Somsak, it is the city of ghosts. He drives his taxi slowly along through the gl...

The day I found seaweed on my sister’s shoes was the beginning of the end, for me as well as her. I grabbed her by the shoulders as she tried to scoot past me into the house. “Audrey…

In Salemo, virtually the entire populace is kept in drudgery and toil. There are no public parks, nor libraries, nor song, nor wine, nor holidays. People slave away in seventy-two -hour workweeks, sus...

We lost so many souls today. Reports stream in across five continents; icons bloom on the map like blood spatters. Broken filters, zero latency, bandwidth that somehow blew through the roof when no on...

Clarkesworld Science Fiction and Fantasy Magazine and Podcast.

The grow pods clung to a red, humped ridge about a twenty-minute hike west from the habitats. Inside one of their plastic domes, a farmer named Oliver Judd nestled potato starts in the ground with nim...