A teenage girl holding a baby opened the splintered door and nodded. I followed her upstairs where her man was on the couch watching TV. “What,” he said, not looking. “I’d like to buy an ounce,” I stammered. “Where you… Continue Reading
Jenny had swallowed time and space. A lot of it. And now she was feeling…what? Bloated? Yes. Reflux? Maybe. Heartburn? Definitely. “Have some time. Have some space.” Mark, her boss, had instructed on that initial dreadful day—without her husband, with… Continue Reading
I pick up a pink, glittery, ceramic bowl, and am reminded of my ex-boyfriend’s hatred of all things sparkling and feminine. If we were still together, purchasing this bowl would have been an act of rebellion. I assumed I would… Continue Reading
The audience applauded wildly, and “Tosca” swooped low in her final curtsy. Down came the curtain. Still channeling Puccini’s ecstatic paean to art, Rayna’s round, shining face beamed at the other singers as everyone hustled to their designated dressing rooms.… Continue Reading
The heater blasted out its eighty-degree setting and I was still shivering. A record cold they say, but in Chicago, it was hard to believe that a day in history could be colder than today. Everything thermal from my socks… Continue Reading
Our Volvo SUV awaits as we butter toast, shuffle plates of eggs. I hurriedly book a massage, text my oldest daughter’s violin tutor right before the shoot begins. What the photographer sees: an impeccably dressed Japanese woman surrounded by three… Continue Reading
AYE MIO AMICO, who could say a train is not the most beautiful class of vehicle? She come this one from the mountains, where still some snow shows on her roof. Step up with me on the bell and compare… Continue Reading
My date is burly and gruff, a lumberjack squeezed into a French blue polo and wing-tips. He fumbles through the menu with giant hands. A white scar cuts from his left nostril down to his upper lip. He notices me… Continue Reading
There were scales in the bathroom. Shell looked to the two blue towels already hanging with their limb-shaped patches of damp. Her dad and stepmother had had their showers already, and Shell felt two speeds in her heart. They had… Continue Reading
Her father, gulping his whisky, insisted the three puppies remain outside because “there is nothing cute about stepping in shit.” No one in the neighborhood saw the mother of the tiny dogs and most presumed she was dead. Some saw… Continue Reading