Meridian, the literary journal of the University of Virginia, opens a general fiction submission pool for work that resists easy categorization. The editors explicitly call for 'precarious stories, volatile stories, stories zinging with electric energy'—whether absurdist parable or realist tragedy. This is not a call for the merely competent; it is a search for fiction driven by ambitious sentences and an unmistakable style. The journal's historical commitment to emerging and established voices alike makes this an open field for writers who prioritize language as much as narrative. The submission parameters are precise: one unpublished story per submission, with a soft ceiling of 5,000 words. Flash and micro fiction writers may submit up to three pieces under 1,000 words each in a single document. There is no strict word count limit, but the editors note they rarely publish longer works. Work produced using AI is not accepted. Simultaneous submissions are permitted, provided the writer withdraws immediately upon acceptance elsewhere. A reading fee of $3.00 (USD) applies. What distinguishes this opportunity is its curatorial clarity. Meridian does not ask for a theme or a genre; it asks for voltage. The editors are transparent about their aesthetic: they want stories that take risks, that move with urgency, that bear the mark of a singular sensibility. For writers whose work lives in the tension between the absurd and the real, between formal experimentation and emotional precision, this is a natural home.