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Daily Archives: April 23, 2015

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“The Front Seat”

My school bus was Lord of the Flies on wheels, and I was Piggy. Nighttime tears shed the residue of that day’s humiliations. My parents’ variegated forms of “Children are cruel” landed as corroboration rather than sympathy. Their concern quickly sewed into ennui hemmed with

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“First Confession”

“You are at the age of reason,” Sister said, “ready to understand the mystery of transubstantiation.”  She cued them with her ruler. “Tran-sub-stan-ti-a-tion,” the children repeated. Angie spoke it softly, enjoying the roominess of the word, its multiple, mysterious syllables that would teach her how

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“Then, Finally, After”

The goal, someone told me, is to make each day different than the one before. So I heeded the advice and added to my routine that summer half a joint every morning and about a hundred butterscotch candies. For maybe seven months my teeth stung

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“First Draft”

To whom it may concern: I write to recommend Mr. Anthony Mills, an enterprising young man who served our company last summer as an intern in the Accounting Department. As the vice president in charge of said department, I supervised Mr. Mills in his duties

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“Magic Kingdoms”

Ponca wasn’t saved. The thought sat like a weight on my chest. Grandma didn’t attend church either, but Mom insisted her mother believed; Ponca, my grandpa, was another story. He was a wayward soul – someone we prayed for earnestly as if faith was something

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“An Orange Glow”

There was a house at the bottom of a hill by the shore. It was coated in a clotted-cream-colored siding perpetually speckled with dirt. A sturdy oak sat in the back yard, centered between the off-white vinyl fence and a deck only big enough to