There’s a hum of wasps in the air as we run past the picnic area with its cracking benches and scrappy bark to the outdoor gym. The equipment is glossy and painted in calming colours, silver and grasshopper green. I… Continue Reading
How I long for those smoky-blue mountains of Montana. Born and raised in the west, I have an almost visceral hunger for wide open places and the endless sky. I can think I’ve adjusted to the city, this agglomeration of… Continue Reading
His two front teeth shone silver in the sun. They didn’t blind, reflect, dazzle. Instead, they had a soft glow. I couldn’t pull my eyes from them. His name was Royce. He was sixth grade president, always chosen by the… Continue Reading
I am hungry because Wendy told me I can’t eat before she draws my blood. My waiting room overlooks the blue Pacific. I had asked Wendy several times if I could come to visit her here, but she was evasive… Continue Reading
The AV system is still on, showing a YouTube video of the Vietnam Draft lottery from 1969. Slips of paper pulled from a bowl. A series of unlucky birthdays. You ask the students: do you hear your birthday? “Raise your… Continue Reading
Two summers ago, Mom and I flew to Chicago, where Aunt Cathy had lived for years. Mom’s only sibling was younger, twenty pounds lighter, single, and obsessed with cosplay. Cathy traveled to comic book conventions, Renaissance Faires, and movie premieres.… Continue Reading
Shotgun in hand, I inch toward the contorted deer. Behind me, breath reeking of whiskey, Pa hisses, “It’s suffering, boy. Put it out of its misery.” I rest my cheek against the stock and aim the barrel at the buck,… Continue Reading
Friday night I played another piano bar. If you’d told my younger self that all those years of practice would amount to this… Well, I probably would have been ecstatic, to be perfectly honest. But I was young and dumb… Continue Reading
I sit in front of the blank canvas. There’s only a bright sun in its top right corner. My brush sits full of lemon yellow paint, but a dark tempest dominates my mind. I get gooseflesh as I replay Chuck’s… Continue Reading
On the day my mother died I woke to rain, a rhythmic tick-tick-ticking against the windows, the first real downpour we’d had in months. I roused Oliver, crouching beside his tiny bed and tugging at the blankets, the blunt comma… Continue Reading