Fiction

The Sinner

After two years in Europe, fighting in the war, Frederick returned to the family farm outside of Ipswich. It was June of 1945. People commented on how much he’d changed. His eyes, which had once been full of feeling, were now entirely empty of emotion. Looking into them was like staring at a desert or…

Occupational Hazard

On a Friday, during his inspection of the sludge containment tank at the East Winder Municipal Wastewater Treatment Plant, Calvin’s foot slipped off the catwalk—it was raining, the metal was wet—and his left work boot and left leg became submerged up to the knee in treated sewage. “Whoops,” said the plant manager beside him. The…

The Half-Wall

On a glorious, gilded Levantine morning, the day after the one-year anniversary of her husband’s death, we heard the flapping of Auntie Lulu’s strapless sandals climbing up the two flights of stairs to our landing. Glee and smile wrinkles overwhelmed my mother’s face. She looked invigorated, as if she’d been dunked in an Italian fountain…

Banner Creek Summit

It was Whitney Putnam’s first time inside the Boise Airport. He stood in the baggage claim watching two suitcases and a car seat rotate on the carousel. The plane arriving from Denver landed twenty minutes ago, and the passengers have come and gone already. He searched the faces of women descending the escalator at the…

Post Production

Albert Arno, the film director, dropped dead at his home in the middle of a sentence. It was early evening and his wife, Lynne, was lifting a dish of potato gratin out of the oven. Albert came out of the downstairs shower room, one striped towel wrapped round his waist, rubbing his neck with another:…

Natural Wonder

Once, when she’d been walking in her neighborhood, a car had stopped for directions to Alsop, the psychiatric hospital perched above the Blackstone River. How to get there was complicated, the man already so lost in the tangle of leafy streets that Tess hadn’t been sure where to start. Begin at the beginning, wasn’t that…

The Monster in the Mountain

By midnight, Josif had downed five shots of whiskey, flirted with three girls the wrong side of half his age, and sprawled into a table, clattering aside glasses and bottles. It was my fault. I’d brought him. He was a contract worker from Croatia, and, despite monthly sojourns in the States, he had no friends….