Ding-Dong! Ugh, I think to myself while walking, head cocked, to the front door. I lean back for one last glimpse of the television before reaching forward and turning the knob. “Trick or treat,” the children holler before the door… Continue Reading
“And here’s the cosy breakfast room,” says the realtor. She makes an expansive sweep with her arm. The fraudulent smile on her face doesn’t falter — even when the back of her hand smacks into the wall of the cramped… Continue Reading
Grampa Don hated houseflies. To hear him talk you’d think there weren’t no flies in Chicago, but we visited once and there were flies a’plenty, I assure you. But when Grampa stayed with us he was forever complaining about flies… Continue Reading
There is an energy in the room, I’m sure, but I can barely notice it over my own anxiety. I share the space with around twenty others, but I know they can’t compare to my devotion and appreciation of his… Continue Reading
“The only information I can give you about the episode,” said the rep, “is that its title is ‘My Dirty Little Secret’.” Helen stood paralyzed in her kitchen as the phone call’s initial excitement swerved into a loop de loop… Continue Reading
I let the children play with the lions because I decided that it was part of their education to examine life from another planet. This was after I ordered a box of domestic cats but many of my students, the… Continue Reading
Paris is a city of many things — lights, sounds, whispers… and cats. Cats haunt modern Paris like fur-clad ghosts — whiskered faces through window panes, gray mousers plying their trade in alleyways, rooftop cats and cats who sleep and… Continue Reading
Three young men were sitting a few seats away from me at the counter, sun-browned and neatly scrubbed in civvies. Newly assigned at the Coast Guard station out on the point. They weren’t difficult to spot. I could pick up… Continue Reading
Lunchtime sucked when your best friend was at home sick. Sure, I could hang out with those I labeled ‘school friends,’ but then I’d be the kid who didn’t quite fit in with the rest of the group. As a… Continue Reading
She’s just a touch tinier than the rest of the cheerleaders, so Viv is the one who gets thrown into the air. She likes feeling like she’s flying. She feels special up there. Maybe even magical. When she goes upwards,… Continue Reading