She tried to explain it once, but then she started crying and I couldn’t take it cos it reminded me of how much she cried after dad left so I told her to please stop crying cos then I’ll start crying too and that I totally got it even though I didn’t get it and then she stopped crying and I never asked her about it again.… Continue Reading
My father would laugh and say it’s not the Depression anymore and FDR’s not President. He would say we’ve got that idiot in the White House and he’s got us in a war we shouldn’t be in. He would say but I don’t believe in the war and you don’t either, and she would press her lips together just like when he asked if my mother didn’t want him to give her grocery money.… Continue Reading
First time they try sex on the deck. He leans to kiss her, she doesn’t want to be kissed. First time he can’t climax; she bangs her shin climbing out of the zero-gravity chair.… Continue Reading
Santa Claus always gets the credit for delivering Christmas gifts, but it was tired, overworked bastards like me making sure everything got there on time, 13-speed, 500-horsepower white Freightliner pulling a dry van, and rather than shouting ho-ho-ho and whipping reins, we were throwing gears and blowing our horns at assholes in beemers cutting us off at every exit.… Continue Reading
When you cleared away everything else, there they were. Countless promises. They piled up. A bulk of them we upheld, some we renegotiated, and more than a few we looked the other way when they weren’t kept.… Continue Reading
I stroke the port wine stain on his temple. I remember the day our parents brought him bundled home during a historic cold snap. He was shriveled and small like the sundried tomatoes Mom snuck into all our food. I promised to look after him.… Continue Reading
On the ledge, the short man looked down. He felt the lonely tent behind him. In front of him, there was the storm, moving black and slow.… Continue Reading
When King Karson groggily awoke, he found his wrists and ankles tied to a chair, bound with strong, soft, golden rope. He was naked, and in an unfamiliar room, with an unfamiliar woman standing before him.… Continue Reading
Below him, the sea churned, spitting white foam. He saw jellyfish floating in groups, stark against the white. Purple, clear, and blue. The purple ones looked the most poisonous. He imagined they had the power of a box jellyfish which kills its victim in minutes.… Continue Reading
We’ve all chuckled at the theatrics of the stiff-legged subhumans in a zombie film. Brian was fried in a way that no Hollywood pathos I know of has successfully evoked.… Continue Reading