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, newsletter editor kate meen, and founding reader bobbi lerman, plus our rotating team of guest readers, who you can meet in the latest newsletteR. 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

At First Sight

She runs up the stairs on all fours, the way kids do. She’s one day short of nine years old. Dark blonde hair with pink tips, mismatched socks, and jeans. She sees me and freezes. Our eyes lock. Coincidence, not genetics, that they are the same blue. This kid and I are entirely unknown to each other. And yet, in this moment a bond fuses between us that will outlast my marriage to her mother. Will outlast everything in my life. The longer I know her, the harder I wish to go back in time and meet my daughter sooner.

Jim Latham’s words have appeared in Eunoia Review, Spillwords.com, Microfiction Monday Magazine, and elsewhere. Read more of Jim’s stories on his Substack at www.substack.jimlatham.com, and find him on Twitter @JimLatham15 and Instagram @jim_latham_author.

Rope Climbing

Change Please