Fiction

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….

The smell of scattered mothballs as the cottage doors rattled open year after faithful year. There was the sweet rot of paperbacks stretching their spines. Here, men and boys didn’t wear socks with their trousers, and the women talked in whispers scrutinizing newcomers over gin and tonics, straightening their stiff cotton skirts with a propriety…

At first, it is a tiny flap of skin no bigger than a fingernail, like a mole or a birthmark but with more substance. I find it when I’m in the bath, the water cooling around me and my father’s razor floating across the surface, reminding me of his presence below the window in the…

Cootie Munster’s sister is scared of spiders, Jack says, and then Charlie says we should put some down her pants.“We could get those big ones,” he says, “like that came out of the jungle in the movie yesterday.” Kansas City is hot in July and we are sitting in our clubhouse—The Roscoe Turner Flying Corps—which…

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania is the softest state in the Union. Early in its history, when it was still a colony, Pennsylvania passed an ordinance outlawing sharp corners for the good of the citizenry. As a result, the artisans of Pennsylvania pioneered a style of furniture making that came to be known as Rustic Curvature for its…

           for Richard Bausch   There was some sort of commotion at the end of the checkout line. Words had been exchanged, and now two men, one tall and wide-shouldered, the other squat and beefy, were squaring off against each other and raising their voices. Their shoes squeaked on the linoleum. The short one, who…

1. There was an old man in Germany who thought he was a Nazi. He turned himself in to a small court in a town near Nuremburg, and said, “Restart the trials, I should be punished for what I have done.” He was the right age, and his name was a fairly common German name—…

Looking Sometimes we still see it. Even now. Nights like this, sprawled on the deck of the mothership—stars rioting overhead, waves spanking the hull below—we close our eyes and there it looms, our Infinity, floating serenely across the insides of our lids like some pale winged creature borne of desire, luck, and dreams. Also a…

The notification came on a weekend, and Jake’s, in Iceland, had gotten through first. Sarah was in a desert, her cell phone wasn’t working well, and she had to go back to the base to find out what was wrong. She calls him from the landline, and he tells her as much as he knows….