Basic and broken. Oren leaned forward against the cold wood railing and looked out at the hills andfields, bleak on bleak. The land, his parents’ land, was a home for wayward winds, and it was all emptycavity, no heart. Wide space going on forever, with anemic trees twisting over blanched tufts of deadgrass. Carissa’s funeral […]
The air in the room was heavy and damp. It had the distinct smell that older housestended to have, something stale and soured by too many years. Early-modernist paintingsdecorated the walls, each depicting a few somber people sitting around a dining table. Thepeople in the paintings appeared stoic, despite having gluttonous amounts of foodsurrounding them. […]
Andrew explains that in the early evening, he walked through a damp forest and discovered acollapsed tent. He explains that it hadn’t been a home for many weeks—at least not many days.Or so it appeared on that blustery afternoon, as photos blew among last fall’s leaves. Now, the photos sit on his mantle, guarded by […]
My uncle was always going to die in an unusual way, and he was always going to dieyoung. I suppose that might come across as cold to say, but it’s the truth. From the moment hewas born three weeks early, faintly blue and impossibly small, my grandparents knew hewouldn’t ever be ordinary. My mother, who […]
The wind catches the tails of her pink scarf and puffs them out translucent and weightlessaround her head, and she looks like a dragonfly floating over the asphalt edges of an overfishedpond. She’s standing below the rainbow rampart and the flapping flags marking the roof of ourgrocery store. Her name is Ashley, and it breaks […]
Most came to the circus for the spectacle of the clowns and the lions, for the cotton candy and the souvenirs. They filed into the big tent where they crammed together and stared down into the ring. Let them have it. The lights were always too bright for me and the smell of the sugared […]
“Whatever. I’m going upstate to meet with Turner. I might also pick up a dog.” With that, Harold Lattimer placed his hands on the counter, stood up, and walked out of the kitchen. Gwyn heard the jangle of his keys in the foyer and the click of the apartment door followed by the metallic clang […]
Leonard sat at the counter of the diner nursing his coffee and applying for jobs on his laptop. Hewas sixty-two years old, recently laid off, wondering if he’d ever work again and how he’dmanage when his 401(k) ran out. An octopus climbed up on the stool beside him, suckers popping on the vinyl. Half itsarms […]
She wanted the world. She wished for the first crisp bite of every red apple. She sought to paint a satisfying stroke across each of our white walls before leaving the room. My Celeste, full of light, sat and thought and was filled with want. That year I selected a gift she would treasure. I […]
One Friday in July I knocked off work early because I was seeing someone later in the West Village. As a census taker in Harlem, I knew where to buy the best bean pie, ginger beer, smothered chicken, pork ribs, and what have you. I also knew all the sidewalk vendors. That Friday, I was […]
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