There’s a trend here. She says 5, I say 6:30; she asks where I am, I say, “coming;” she stares at her watch, I arrive frenzied. I voiced my excuse for that part...
Past the point of no return something always goes terribly wrong—an exploding oxygen tank, an errant asteroid, sabotage by the Iago-like stowaway—and the spacec...
You got a fast car. I remember the day you came home with it, the way you sat at the kitchen counter and spun the keys around your index finger by the metal rin...
It’s a weird feeling being dead.
When the lightning hit, physically my body went down, but a part of me went up. I begin to float, like a balloon filled with...
We'll remember the small moments that seemed not to matter at the time. We'll remember the dust motes caught in after school sunbeams, cigarette smell...
New Year’s Eve. Wife Betty and I consume crisp champagne, year before us nascent and shapely. It’s the year of taming bills and wounding student loans. The year...
When Candice died, her garden struggled on until the frost came. After that, it didn't return. Candice’s basement tenants were kind to us, their new, reluctant ...
Scotty gives me the book on our fourth date. He's written a note on the back cover, mentioning my writing and how this novel about the end of a relationship, wr...
When your new boyfriend says he’s The Joker and you’re Harley Quinn, this means there are rules you are expected to follow. A uniform is required. That means, a...
The worst thing about the world ending is that I can’t move that car off the front lawn. Bloody thing has been parked there for months. It must have been left b...
I would stop at gas stations along the way to buy postcards to mail back east to my friends. My first year away I was basically broke, getting by on 32 hours a ...
Days before the product launch, a rich, ego-driven technocrat is kidnapped, tortured, then killed by a cabal of rivals and international government forces. His ...
Free Speech Rally
I attended a Free Speech Rally today. The first speaker was meant to be good, although I couldn’t hear anything he was saying. There were a...
1.
My friend Andrew is a successful accountant. And a good person. In the sixth grade, he failed reading class. He received a form his parents were supposed to...
On the bright November day I gave away my dog, I watered every plant in the house. Even the artificial ones. The pots overflowed, leaving puddles where none had...
she woke up selfishly. as if cloistered by a hardened bowl, her mind thrashed, its soft edges driving into knots of yellowed ceramic. each hit a knot unto itsel...
The Santiago kid committed suicide that morning. Two men had to carry Santiago’s mother out to a car. Maria said when people got that sad their legs stopped wor...
I drop F bombs on the campaign trail when points don’t come through. Fucking deplore economic inequality in Dubuque, fucking deplore right-wing fundamentalism. ...
Come with me, he said. “Where do you want me to go?” I asked him. Everywhere, he said. “Everywhere?” I asked. Yes everywhere, stop repeating me, he said. “Oh ok...
With my round, smooth-bottomed hull, my wide-ribbed belly, I was made for love. We take turns, you and I, filling and being filled. You open a jar, lift a lid, ...
Ted Bundy would have loved Flat Stanley’s mom
her long straight dark hair parted in the middle. She would have been Midwestern helpful if he needed her to ca...
I had a best friend. Her name was Hannah.
Hannah and I met on the playground at the River City Public park. As the years went on, I got to know the quirks and ...
Back when there were people around, I would blow my moped through town, then ride on and dart between bales of alfalfa. Neighbors called me the crazy crazy daug...
Alcohol: It triggers my anxiety. I drink sencha. BYOB.
Apps: What I have is what I use. Notifications are off. I like to be present in the moment.
Bag...
Finding Freedom through Faith
After the assault, he started reading Bible verses. He tried to find answers within that would resolve the sickness of his mind. ...