Steve B Howard
Bio
Steve Howard's self-published collection of short stories Satori in the Slip Stream, Something Gaijin This Way Comes, and others were released in 2018. His poetry collection Diet of a Piss Poor Poet was released in 2019.
Stories (119/0)
Satan's Teen Keg Party
There is a lot of standing around and waiting. I and about two dozen other teens are in the middle of an abandoned walnut tree orchard. The flinty Northern California peat dirt kicks up clouds of hazy dust in the rising, late autumn, moonlight. The dark forms of the dead trees contrast eerily with the wild gyrations of the makeshift mosh pit that spins around a large bonfire. Long haired boys and girls in black heavy metal t-shirts, faded 501 Levi’s, and white Reeboks or Nikes dance and shove along to the hyper-fast music that blares out of a huge black boom box.
By Steve B Howard2 years ago in Humans
The Dirt Tribe
This is a culture of dirt, dust, grease, sweat, complicated unforgiving machines, hangovers, and that terrifying cough through clouds of cigarette smoke that may or may not signal lung cancer. And it is tribal and militant. I am not a tribal member, just a sixteen-year-old summer temp as dumb and useless as a boutique of dead spring flowers out here in this world of trenches, pvc pipe, and hydraulic fluid. My father is a member, a sub-chief in fact. He’s one of those elites who knows how to make the backhoes, track hoes, excavators, and bulldozers plow, rip, and maim the raw earth into something organized and useful.
By Steve B Howard2 years ago in Families
I Blame Tom Cruise
I blame my obsession on Tom Cruise. But this isn’t about Thetans, Nicole Kidman, or Oprah’s couch dance. And to be fair, all old Tom did was star in a little film in 1986 called Top Gun. Now, you might thinking that Tom’s role in Top Gun inspired me to attempt a Don Quixote-esque run at becoming a Naval Fighter pilot or a military loving blockhead with Ronald Reagan and nuclear warheads tattooed over his heart, but you’d be wrong. Stallone’s roll as Rambo almost did that. Just kidding.
By Steve B Howard2 years ago in Humans
A Pistol, Shotgun, and Tacos
Gun Number One Two in the morning. Who comes home at two in the morning? Well, me after working an eight-hour janitor job and driving all over Contra Costa county. Our condos where technically a gated community, but the gate was low and bordered a public park on the north end. The freeway sat on the hindquarters to the east, so a tangle of ivy, sparse evergreens, and weeds grew in the back to reduce the noise. This set up created plenty of late-night shadows around the buildings and cars, plenty of hidden entrance and exit points, and just enough middle-class income to entice the thieves.
By Steve B Howard2 years ago in Humans
Dying to Be a Prospect
They called him Bubsy, but his cutesy name didn’t do much to reduce his wild and fearsome reputation. His linebacker like frame juiced to the tits with steroids didn’t fit it either. I only saw him one summer when I worked as a laborer, but the stories about him made their way back to me via a co-worker and many of them were terrifying.
By Steve B Howard2 years ago in Psyche
