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Berchta

November 15, 2013

The little people eat on the couch while Berchta and I eat at the kitchen table, and she relaxes enough to grouse about how no one appreciates the old gods and goddesses anymore. I assume this is a typical complaint among mythical figures.

Solo

November 5, 2013

Your hands swiped gently up at the sky as you named the constellations, each syllable a puff of white smoke into the cold. I could already see the faces our children would have.

Flavor Factory

October 23, 2013
Jason wishes he were in Hawaii, and keeps his surf instructor's business card on his desk. Grace tests chemical samples for purity and remembers how much she hated communist Poland. Bob thinks about all the odors rising from the factory floor, but misses his favorite one.

White Girls

October 15, 2013
I see how we are all the same, that none of us are white women or black men; rather, we’re a series of mouths, and that every mouth needs filling: with something wet or dry, like love, or unfamiliar and savory, like love.

Five Shards

July 15, 2013

A couple years before I was born my mother took my four year-old brother and ran away, home to Massachusetts and her parents, where they holed up like fugitives.

Blak Power

May 15, 2013

They are just everywhere, walking, rushing, running, toyi-toying, fists and machetes and knives and sticks and all sorts of weapons and the flags of the country in the air, Budapest quivering with the sound of their blazing voices: Kill the Boer, the farmer, the khiwa.

Looters

August 1, 2012

They were followed by a group in tropical wear, slipping and sliding, trying to prevent their ill-fitting thong sandals from flying off. A smaller group had chosen winter wear, rolling up the block like juiced up ticks, draped in coats and jackets.

Islands

August 1, 2012

I stare at the ground imagining I am one of the condemned, what it felt like to have my fingernails torn off. I clench my fists tight and brace myself for the pain, wishing I was off this wretched island, wishing I was home.

Stippling

May 31, 2012

Still, I started for the parlor. I’d polished my shoes, put gel in my hair: habits my mother had always wanted me to form and I had always resisted. Walking down the street, I felt conspicuous, as though people were sniggering at my gleaming head and feet.

The Red Tricycle

May 14, 2012

He liked how her odd mouth conjured surprise like a jack in the box. She liked how he used his bathtub as a closet.

Casino

May 1, 2012

People who look on the bright side all the time are hypocrites at least some of the time. To say that shitty things are shitty is to speak honest truth about the world.

Lovers

April 15, 2012

Their bodies converse. They forget that very soon one of them will be burned alive on Place de Grève.

Two Stories

April 15, 2012

And then he would knock on the door and my mother would answer and he would say to her, “This is no ordinary child. She understands.”

Lang’s Dragon

April 1, 2012

Demand for drugs was on the rise, and there was more pussy to be had than ever. Can you blame me for helping to move a little bit of both?

Things (Part Two)

April 1, 2012

Never again will men be treated as things.

Things (Part One)

March 7, 2012

A member of the public complained that the settee was getting overheated. And he was right.

Suddenly, a Knock on the Door

March 1, 2012

“Tell me a story,” the bearded man sitting on my living-room sofa commands. The situation, I must admit, is anything but pleasant.

Devil in the Bottle

February 15, 2012
She tried not to look at the dead body lying only a few steps away in front of the Berkeh and under her breath prayed to the prophet Mohammad that Faraj had nothing to do with it.

All At Sea

February 14, 2012
Entire island nations were not supposed to sink into the water in the space of minutes, no matter how hard the earthquake or immense the flood, but it seemed that this was what her home had done.

The Doctors’ Daughter

February 1, 2012

Guillermo kissed her and she was not afraid of his tongue and his hands on her body, and she wanted to stay with him all night, wanted to lie down on the wet earth, but he turned around and began walking back, pulling her behind him, and soon they were out on the road and the sound of the insects grew distant, and the trees no longer protected them from the stars.

Turnabout

January 15, 2012
"What are years? Just so much backed-up vomit and shit. But look at me digressing. How rude of me. When you want money."

Pairidaeza

November 1, 2011
“It will never stop, and it will always be necessary. What I did to you was necessary, and what you do to me is necessary.”

Bijan

November 1, 2011
The spark of attraction he felt for Farideh could grow into a steady flame, he was sure now.

The Man from the Ad

September 1, 2011

Nelda didn’t know of anyone else turning thirty who’d never kissed a man. Her sister Maria said women who never made out with anyone were prone to a nervous condition in their old age.

Girls on Ice

June 1, 2011

I was in the bathroom stall at the Armenian chicken place in Anaheim when I overheard Sarah say to her even more annoying friend Abeer at the mirror, where they were both putting on gobs of makeup, “I’m just going to kill myself, habibti, if I don’t make the triple axel at the championships next month.”

Girls On Ice

June 1, 2011
I was in the bathroom stall at the Armenian chicken place in Anaheim when I overheard Sarah say to her even more annoying friend Abeer at the mirror, where they were both putting on gobs of makeup, “I’m just going to kill myself, habibti, if I don’t make the triple axel at the championships next month.”

Him, Me, Muhammad Ali

June 1, 2010
He drank bourbon out of an unpacked glass, and talked about a photograph of him, me when I was a baby, and Muhammad Ali. “I have no idea where it is now,” he said.

The 24-Hour Date

July 13, 2008
Acorns began to fall from the sky and slapped him with the ferocity of bullets in a gang shooting. I told him he could boast of hickies on his neck on his second date. I grew suddenly hot and wanted to masturbate in the woods hysterical naked.

Big Truck

December 16, 2006
Once you've been with a guy who has a big truck, there's no going back. It's depressing but true, it's like falling off a cliff. May as well just slit your wrists, dig a hole, and write the obituary.

Thirty-Seventh of Tales of The Nameless

October 27, 2004

We went to a cafe I knew near the bookstore. I tried to please him by saying, they have excellent coffee here.