The flasks and beakers looked boring now, even though they had fixed most of mankind’s problems. The glassware and cheap centrifuges looked as unremarkable as they did on the day they arrived by mail. Spencer paced in vague celebration among… Continue Reading
“So… is it true what they say about redheads?” I noticed him when he first walked into the bar. I don’t mean that in a “he walked through the door and my heart skipped a beat” kind of way. He… Continue Reading
Per tradition and necessity, I am untouched by man. “Aurora?” Sofia asks. “What’s a virgin?” I close my eyes. My head aches. It’s the chlorine. The full moon is the only illumination in the shadowed natatorium. The sacred flame of… Continue Reading
“If you can guess what I have in my pocket, you can have it.” I looked into the faded, cornflower blue eyes of my grandfather, as he sat across the table from me. Today they seemed remarkably clear as if… Continue Reading
We are told: these are not children. So we treat them accordingly. We don’t wave to them, or smile or ask them to join in with our games. Of course they don’t ask us to join in with their games… Continue Reading
The characters in my first novel refuse to be written; they think only of themselves, never of me. They keep their distance, and their own counsel. I think it’s unbecoming, really, in fictional characters, to be so standoffish — unless… Continue Reading
Yuly and I trekked down to El Malecon to find Don Manuel. The old man spent his days riding his antique three-wheel bicycle up and down the sidewalk adjacent to Havana’s seawall to hawk the used goods his daughter —… Continue Reading
“Grandmother?” Rossa reached for the weathered door. There was no answer from within, but Grandmother was old. She was often sleeping when Rossa brought her supplies. The rough wood slab swung inward at her touch, and she frowned. Grandmother lived… Continue Reading
A nurse unplugs me from something. Aggie bites her lower lip. Our son and daughter and their spouses look ready to cry. Even my oh-so-world-weary teenaged grandson swallows hard. If I could, I’d whisper, “Rosebud.” Anything to lighten things up.… Continue Reading
In a box of mixed up secondhand books, something needs to stand out. This one did. Its title, How to Disappear; Vanishment Made Easy, caught my eye at once, mixed in with cheap novels from the Fifties and various “How… Continue Reading