Stories

Waiting for Baby

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I got pregnant in October two months after a miscarriage. I didn’t feel happy at first. Gun shy, my father would have said, but he died, of lymphoma, just before…

Frenchie Says

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Frenchie says I look best in the khaki pants because they hide the heft of my ass. I keep asking him what he means, thinking he’s insulting me. It sounds…

Lethe, California

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The Pacific. Rob and I have driven all the way from Oklahoma pretty much nonstop to reach this place, driven almost on a dare. And now, without even changing out…

Perfect White Ash

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Our table radiates slate blue in the back of this too-dark bar and restaurant. My drink is phosphorescent green, tastes fruity, and has gone straight to my head. My wife…

The Rung

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I used to go to the Hurst Hill Social Club when I was painting houses with Cal Reynolds. He’s been dead for a few years now, yellow jaundice. Cal loved…

A Friend Like Carl

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Doctor Wilhem was making his rounds when (this is how the story starts but I got the idea—appropriated the idea, sue me—from my friend Carl’s sister’s psychotic episode so, for…

Dying in the Cuts

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Maggie cuts. By the number of slashes, hash marks, crisscrosses, and scars, she’s practiced in hieroglyphs, a Rosetta Stone to translate her ancient agony into a modern-day understanding. One pill,…

Eye of the Storm

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Valentino doesn’t have anything on him; he’s insurgent, a lover, and an ex-concert pianist with a handicap. Yes, I despise him, despise the way he could persuade me into his…