We didn’t care, really, about the traveling euthanasia veterinarian’s failed marriage. We didn’t care about why this woman showed up nine hours later than she said she’d arrive. I don’t know all of this for certain. I’ll admit that I’m making some suppositions. I’d like to say that I could call Miranda and fact-check the …
from a novel-in-progress Something had gone wrong. Gracie had arrived just when she said she would, on the final ferry of the day, the winter light dimming over the course of the two-hour journey east, and she unable to enjoy the drama of the ocean, the air too bitterly cold for standing on deck, the …
The first woman Mom brought home was a server from Thai Fantastic.That night, the curtained strip-mall restaurant was cleared out, andwe had our pick of the seven Formica tables. We’d arrived long pasta normal dinner hour, but it didn’t matter when Mom got hungry.Our happiness in those days was hitched to her eating, and cravingstypically …
The dog seller hawks mangy curs across from me at the flea market. Misty brings me a cherry slushie like she’s a woman who takes care of her man. Don’t think I don’t notice she makes a big show of it for mister dog seller. The son of a bitch wears clean overalls. He’s bigger …
There was no reason to see Terra shirtless so many times and at such length, but she insisted on taking off her bra—even when it wasn’t necessary, even when it inconvenienced the doctor—and so we sat, every two weeks, staring at her chapped nipples. “They’re supposed to look like this,” Terra assured us, though she …
The thing about guilt: it’s so unattractive and I’m so good at it. And I’m thinking: How can I read the poems without buying the book online because the book’s being sold by a third party and my old boyfriend will address the envelope to me, no doubt, because he’s the third party. I also …
Tonight we the living gather to meditate on death—while eating hamburger sliders, in fact, and pumpernickel crackers spread with pâté, plus celery and carrots and various berries and wine that comes in a box but is not that tacky college kind. The spread is part of the funeral home’s Life Well Lived package, which also …
Eudora loved her life. She had been sober three years and nicotine-free for two and a half. She had not quit her necessary day job. She had not stayed involved with an abusive boyfriend. She had made love to a man who became her best friend and never again her lover. Her weight was right, …
The Canadian comes to us with blue-black eyes and a forehead like the cliffs of Santorini. We think that he is Greek, but the Canadian is quick to correct us. He is Jewish, and he is standing in my doorway, and he wants to know the way to Giorgos’s taverna. Yianni looks the Canadian up …
My husband wanted to go to a minor-league hockey game. You mean, before you die? I asked. No, he said, tonight, there’s a game tonight, I want to go to a minor- league hockey game tonight. It seemed a dumb thing to want to do. But in our marriage vows we had sworn that we …