The first thing you need to do when you meet a man is take away his name. Without a name, he only exists in your story. It started with Clammy Hands, in his late twenties, too eager to talk to your not quite legal (but almost) neckline as you shelved books at the...
Issue Twenty
Garage Sale at the Singhs’
The inventory: Twelve packets of Silken Touch wet wipes. Ordered online for the Goa trip and delivered within twelve hours by a delivery boy who thoughtfully placed a call over intercom before ringing the doorbell of the Singh residence, then handed the parcel to Mrs...
On Buying Playboy with Queer Men in the Bush Era
The year is 2004. We have invaded Iraq on a lie. Over 4,000 American troops will be sent to die in the desert. 9/11 is still fresh; the nation remains flush with its victimhood. I am a senior in college. I am rife with undiagnosed mental illness. I long for security,...
Mean World
I recognize the sequence, it’s from a show I used to watch in the middle of the night until I’d watched every episode at least three times. The animated gif soundlessly depicts a mostly toothless man, mouth wide open, crying like the dickens. The look in his eyes says...
The Reborn
I bleed a heart-shaped stain on my mattress then sell it for $100 on Wichita, Get It Cheap. The woman texts me, Is it heavy? I won’t lie to her, I say it is, and that she’ll need a rope.I stay inside as the woman and her daughter stomp up the front steps and bicker...
Your Husband Wants to be a Cardboard Cutout at the Last Blockbuster on Earth
Just think, he says, me, a part of history. And you do. You think about your husband as an inanimate man. You wonder if that’s how he feels about you, about your marriage. If this dream—that’s what you choose to call it—was inspired by something left unfulfilled by...
When The World Moves On
There’s this song by The Cranberries called Linger. It’s a relic from the 90’s, a familiar tune that I never offered a second glance until recently. Someone uploaded a video on Youtube playing that song but as if you were listening to it from another...
Booming Economy
The first sloth appeared on Clarissa’s desk, right next to her keyboard. The statue’s dark brown eyes stared, its painted mouth smiled wide, and its three toes curled around a tiny sign that read “Follow your dreams!” “What the fuck,” she said. She picked it up with...
The Fall of Toby and Lady
Before the neighbors leashed and fixed their dogs, they roamed freely through our fields, and Toby, my dog, courted Lady, the Airedale next door, who had nappy hair and bivits dangling from her shaggy ass, and who was anything but. Goats climbed on tractors and ate my...
Celestial
You played quietly, as instructed. Hunkered in the gap between your bed and the wall with a ballpoint pen swiped from the telephone table in the hallway. Tiny particles of chalky white paint clogged the tip, but you continued, undeterred. Bubble hair for Mum,...