Articles

I. She awoke with a jolt, reaching for the red journal her therapist had encouraged her to keep. As she opened it, she reached for a pen, filling in the date and the context. The column of entries was growing longer every day—or, more specifically, each night at erratic hours. October 15, 2:14 a.m.—Same dream as last night. I can’t remember all the details, but it’s the same chair, same outcome. Very real. More so each time. It’s been coming […] Read More

Detective Llewellyn Fox first saw Amira by chance, when he went to Coven with Tim Small to check out Jimi Pugh, a dealer Tim had been watching. Tim thought something was going down that night, but Jimi spotted them and hid out in the men’s room, where they followed to pin him against the wall and frisk him intimately. “Dude’s clean,” said Tim. Jimi said, “What the hell, man, I just wanted to take a piss.” There was a little […] Read More

Any hopes I’d had of a peaceful morning of work that day evaporated the instant I opened my email and saw the single word in the subject line. Ireland.           My heart raced. Was this the moment I’d dreaded for so long—the unmasking of the truth? The beginning of the end of the journey I’d begun so long ago? I calmed down after a moment, scrolling through the body of the message. The writer was a student reporter for The […] Read More

It was late afternoon and Photine Antos Young thought it was time to call her dog back from his romp in the wet field, when she spotted the shape walking along the abandoned railroad tracks, about a hundred yards way.  She stood still, watched intently, not moving.  Her dog Tucker was bounding to the left, which was good, because that meant her dog couldn’t be seen by the figure, stumbling and moving along off there to the right. A man, […] Read More

Dessie came in first from recess and woke up Ms. Clemson, and she smiled and got her eyelids half-open and asked where they were at in social studies. He told her Indian removal, and she slurred through the lesson. “What can anyone tell me about the war with the Indians?” she asked the class. “Andrew Jackson fought the Seminoles in Florida. He was president later on,” Dessie said. “Perfect, Desmond. Yes, Andrew was a president of this United States…” He […] Read More

Frank’s least favorite part, by far, of buying a home. This strange, pervasive social contract insisting the space in his house would be used the same way as in the neighbor’s house, and the house next to that. On and On. If he let himself think about it long enough, he got depressed. He also hated the words “open concept”. Maybe that was his least favorite part. But these things didn’t bug his wife. Not one bit. Behind him, through […] Read More

Just as Jessica dropped off her last drunk of the evening, silently cursing the college debt and lack of full-time work with Channel Five that forced her to drive for Uber, her phone rang. She didn’t recognize the caller ID, but as a reporter she’d been taught to answer anyway, lest she miss a good lead. The caller didn’t bother with pleasantries. “You don’t know me, but I saw you on television last Sunday, the report you did about that […] Read More

Crimson.  That’s the color I think of when I remember that night.  It’s what I see every night when I close my eyes.  It’s not just the color of it either.  It’s also the cold, harsh sound of the word, with the hard “C” followed by the “r” that rolls off it as if to pry open the rest of the word.  I can mostly think of bad things that start with that letter combination – crime, cruel, crude  – […] Read More

Mary told me about the doll on Tuesday. I told her she was nuts. We had met for one of our lunch outs after she stuffed her six year old daughter into a leotard to learn jetes and I needed to get away from the office before I told my current client that adding ten more floors to their office building would not compensate for their lack of social success. “I’m not kidding,” she told me. “You didn’t sound as […] Read More

He sat on the park bench covered in dirt and ash. A light, late spring rain shower began to streak the dirt on his arms.  People stared at him as they hurriedly walked past. His body ached and his throat was raw. He was on the east side now, close to the 4, 5, and 6 trains.  The subway entrance was just a few blocks away. He could make it there and then get a train uptown to the Bronx. […] Read More