Fiction

  My great-grandfather’s grandfather bought the island and built the house. Before that, the island was nobody’s. There was evidence of Indians, great piles of clamshells near the southern tip, but by then the Wabanaki had fled to Canada to … Read More

  Once upon a time, you and I climbed out the front window of the second story where I lived and onto the roof of the porch. We blinked and sniffed the air. Even in the city, we could smell … Read More

  There is a photograph of our father in an olive drab T-shirt and jungle fatigues, his still-plentiful hair clipped close to his head. He’s crouched on a bald knob of rock, the shade of loblolly pines darkening one side … Read More

  JP is dreaming and Carlos is in the dream. They’re back in the desert, walking toward a road. In the last two weeks, three Humvees have been blown up on the road. It is night and the stars seem … Read More

  Three snowy egrets. The birds floated through the viewfinder. Stillness. I turned north, drove hard a thousand miles back to where I’d lived my entire life at the bottom of a bag—a cul de sac cut right out of … Read More

  Two points: my math teacher Mr. Umbec died two years ago. I gave his dog a home. I’m not sure of Quad’s age or whether I should think of him as a used dog. Second-hand dog sounds better. And … Read More

  When he arrives, she is waiting with her hands painted for another man. He sits at the far end of the sofa, the middle cushion a buffer. But she scoots over, lifting her hands up to show him the … Read More

  I’d been leaving my bicycle in the living room since Pam left. Just in case she ever drops back in. There’s a nice tire tread worn into the carpet. You can feel it with your toes if you walk … Read More

  Matthew High. We knew it would be him. Even before Hannah turned him over, we just knew it. It was Annie who saw him from the road. “Look,” she said, and when she pointed at the dark shape out … Read More

  Kay leaned on the front porch railing on the north side of her grandparents’ house, flicking peeling paint to the driveway below. The afternoon wind had gone elsewhere, and strawberry and blueberry sherbet tinted the Western sky. A block … Read More

Jerusalem For Asher, a time of confusion, a time of desire. One month, and he had yet to kiss Galina, yet to hold her hand. Their most intimate moments were when he watched her dance The Mediterranean Wiggle, The Snake … Read More

This was the year Martin Weiss walked a thousand miles. He’d aimed himself up the West Coast and walked from San Diego to the north end of Puget Sound. Now, sitting on a mesh chaise longue next to an inground … Read More