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

Rules

It’s eight in the morning. It feels so odd being the only passenger in the car. The silence is so loud that it hurts. I get off the train onto an empty platform. I’m still wearing my face mask; rules are rules. From my neck hangs the card that allows me to be outside in this ghost city. I do as I was told. I feel like the only survivor. Traffic, people, all are conspicuous by their absence. Out of sheer habit, I stop walking at the red light although there are no cars to be seen. Rules are rules.

Miguel Angel Calvo worked for an insurance company for nearly three decades. He is a retiree who dedicates part of his time to enjoy this hobby.

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