midnight & indigo Issue 7: celebrating black women writers
Edited by Ianna A. Small

midnight & indigo is a literary journal dedicated to short fiction and narrative essays by Black women writers.

Featuring 8 new short stories by emerging and established Black women storytellers, our seventh issue introduces characters discovering self and defining relationships, negotiating with the past, and celebrating the things no one else understands. Contributors include: Herina Ayot, angelia carey, Abigail Jordon, Quintessa Knight, Valerie Morales, Chinwe I. Ndubuka, Hannah Onoguwe, and Ifediba Zube.

“Life in Pixels” by Chinwe I. Ndubuka is the story of a couple’s balancing act between the marriage they present to the world and the marriage they live after suffering a miscarriage. The truth is harder to hide when a wedding requires them to travel from the United States to Nigeria for an extended visit with relatives.

“The Lucky Ones” by Herina Ayot was inspired by the 1958 stabbing of MLK.

In “Laundering” by Abigail Jordon, Wesley works in her father’s laundromat as punishment for a scheme that takes place before the story’s opening. On a dreary night, a problem from the past walks back into her life.

What if the people who are supposed to care for you can’t see you? Your therapist thinks you only know how to be angry. Your doctor thinks you’re crazy. Your significant other thinks you’re not so significant. “tongue: tied and twisted” by angelia carey explores a key question: is there anything you can do?

“A Woman’s Place” by Ifediba Zube explores the impact of gender roles in a contemporary African home.

In “The Roots That Held Us” by Quintessa Knight, Evie returns home for her family reunion for the first time since her brother’s death and finds that everything is not as she left it.

Outwardly Sarauniya has nothing to complain about, in “Life is Like A Weave” by Hannah Onoguwe. She has her own business and lives a life of apparent leisure. Underneath it all is a desire to be accepted, as she struggles to catch a younger man’s eye and tries to fit into her daughter’s life.

In “The Secret” by Valerie Morales, Lucy Alain Carruth does the unthinkable. She pays for a white soldier to be buried in the local Black cemetery. No one can ever find out, especially her three brothers.