I just started talking to myself. I’m not sure it’s a good thing.… Continue Reading
I’ve been known to feign language or hearing issues, run to the bathroom, anything to avoid this question. Sometimes, I say things like, “I write stories about nature,” which makes me feel like I have betrayed myself because that is not entirely true. The worst is when I try to be honest, and halfway through I realize I sound off.… Continue Reading
When her grandfather died April told June that she hated being his granddaughter but it was what she had always been and June said, you will always be rich and I will always be poor and April said, yes, funny isn’t it to think we used to think we could change all that.… Continue Reading
I made a rule in the old apartment not to answer the phone during exercise time, but this was a new house, my house. I make a new rule, pull the phone out.… Continue Reading
Ralphie is a good dog. We say “Good boy!” and “Good doggie!” because Ralphie can wait patiently for his turn to eat. Ma says, “Patience is a virtue.” So when Ralphie waits patiently by the table for us to be done, Ma lets him clean up the scraps. Ralphie is a Golden Lab. He is… Continue Reading
The door to my office burst open and in walked a blonde. A blonde to make a bishop kick a hole in a stained-glass window. Let me say for the record that the bishop in question, well, he/she/they needs/need to get a grip on him/herself/themselves, maybe get some counselling. I have a number he/she/they can… Continue Reading
At first, Jessica thinks it’s the darkness that her body needs to escape. Their tent’s air pocket of darkness. The forests’ surrounding miles of darkness. She is scrambling away from the darkness. Not the explosions opening wounds into that darkness.… Continue Reading
When they were dating, Tomáš chatted endlessly about all the Americans and Brits and Aussies he had befriended online over the family computer in his adolescence. He talked about how many of them disappeared completely, leaving behind only the legacy of their grammars and vocabularies; the composite parts he fashioned into fluency. Tomáš was an amalgamation of all things. And she forgave his forgetfulness because his memory worked like his control of Czech, English, Russian, so languid and free, until it would suddenly freeze, where a clever synthesis perched on the tip of his tongue. In these moments there was an intellectual bent to his stoppage, watching his brain scour the vast traffic of networks for one more piece of something to share with her. And when he found it, it came out as a hiccup-sized yawp.… Continue Reading
I think of that line Carrie Fisher says in When Harry Met Sally, when her character (Marie) is trying to persuade her boyfriend to get rid of his wagon wheel coffee table: “Everyone thinks they have good taste and a sense of humor. But not everyone can possibly have good taste and a sense of humor.”… Continue Reading
I have a ritual before I get my haircut. I take off my nail polish. Earrings have to come off, too. The rainbow lanyard that hangs from my pocket must stay inside my car. Most importantly, my voice must get deeper. Queer folks aren’t as welcome in these parts. Only the manly men. Only the straight men.… Continue Reading