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

The Red Phone

The red telephone hung on the wall and rarely rang. Only three people had the number: One never called, one was dying, and the last was my Aunt Sandra. When it rang that August morning, I stood and watched it. Ring. Ring. “Pick it up, Mommy,” my daughter said. Ring. I knew who was calling, what she was going to say. Perhaps if I did not pick up, it would not have happened. If Sandra could not reach me, the news would not be true. Ring. I reached for the receiver. One sentence told me all I needed to know.

Sara Staggs lives in Portland, Oregon. Her work has appeared in Change Seven Magazine, Tiny Seed Journal, and In Parentheses. Find Sara on Twitter @SaraStaggs.

Out in the Wild

Powder Room