New Story: Smoke
“Hey — can I ask you for some advice?” The girl stepped out into the streetlight toward me and took a made-for-TV drag off her cigarette. She’d been nearly camouflaged against the […]
“Hey — can I ask you for some advice?” The girl stepped out into the streetlight toward me and took a made-for-TV drag off her cigarette. She’d been nearly camouflaged against the […]
“Richard Cater was seven years old when he ran as fast as he could down the parched grassy hill on his uncle’s farm, trying to set the record for human […]
“MacDermott?” He flinched. “Brian MacDermott?” He was older, much older than his photo, of course. But those eyes were unmistakable, those brows still furrowed with the piercing gaze that took […]
“I always try to tell Anna that it’s not the cold that gets you — it’s the wind. But, oh what I’d give for a little wind now. Any wind.” –The Long […]
No, it’s not quite time for the story-of-the-month, but I wanted to share a short little modern romance that I jotted up and couldn’t convince McSweeney’s to take. I can’t […]
“I had half a mind to make up some story. Wondered if it might make this easier. For you, for me. But it seems wrong to lie about things like […]
“Its founders had intended to honor Henry Polson. But the courthouse clerk had quarreled with his wife that morning, and his foul mood conspired with the document’s uncertain orthography to […]
“The thing is, I don’t think I would have tried to pick a fight with Viva. Or any of our other Marine Techs, for that matter. It wasn’t that they […]
“Shelly can think of more embarrassing ways to die, and she’s had more than enough time to enumerate them. But none that feel so ironic, nor as damning to her […]
“The thought comes to him seemingly out of nowhere: this is nothing like Fallujah. But the fact that he has even evoked the comparison frightens him. The fog of […]