"Up the Creek" by Howard Pearre

 – We had lost our paddles.

We had no idea about the force of the river’s current.

Howard Pearre’s fiction and memoir stories have appeared in Personal Story Publishing Project anthologies, Flying South, GreenPrints, and the Dead Mule School of Southern Literature. His short story “September, 1957” received an honorable mention at the 2020 International Human Rights Arts Festival. He also writes articles promoting voting for the Winston-Salem Chronicle and is a board member of Winston-Salem Writers. He retired after a career as a counselor and manager with NC Vocational Rehabilitation and the US Department of Veterans Affairs.