Not far from Edgcumbe Road, where pines offer their shade and scent, I meet a craggy snowbank that a homeowner failed to shovel early, when it was soft and new.
Mom and I trudge up the hill through the warm Kansas rain, lugging my possessions up two flights into my college suite. Dad sits in our van with the Colorado plates, eerily silent after a lifetime of telling me I’d be the one to make it to college.
I was alone, always alone now, and when the doorbell rang I went to answer it. I’d been expecting him but only found the emptiness of the dark night outside.
Shoes go in an evidence baggie, bright red suede shrouded in plastic.
“I sold another book.” Mom had persuaded another person to buy my novel.
She became distracted and let go of the carriage. It quickly rolled toward the water. Someone screamed in horror.
In the morning on my birthday, my mother texted “Happy Birthday.” Texting instead of calling … strange.
Like every sedan back then, the Fleet had a closed-in trunk. We decided to put it to good use.
I put my eye close to the glass half-filled with strawberry jam and pale orange cordial. Below the surface a handful of insects slumber eternal, imitating their ancient brethren encased in amber.
A chunky black snake with bright yellow splotches slithered through the grass towards me. Before the damn thing could slide up my leg, I ordered myself to run.
Climbing trees, skinning knees, falling off bikes, go-carting down hills, building things, breaking things, getting lost in the woods, and floating down rapids—everything was fair game until that time my brother and I tried a physics experiment.
I wanted forever. You thought you wanted forever.
I drive the coast road through my childhood and teenage years. When I reach the spot where I’m the one who makes the decisions, I pull over for a moment.
As a goof on a sweltering day in August ’73, my cousin Aldo tried to fry an egg on his brother Rocco’s beloved ’66 Mustang GT. It wasn’t hot enough; uncooked egg oozed over the Mustang’s candy-apple-red lacquer.
Mugs slide around cabinets with the ship’s roll, yaw, pitch.
“Lie down,” she said. “And look up.” I felt tufts of grass lumpy under my back. Above was an expanse of deep blue-black and pinpricks of light.
"Hurry up in the shower!" I yell, as my son's bathing quickly drains all the hot water from the tank. This was never a problem in the school years, when there was a natural order to things and school started early in the morning.
In front of the candy display stood a man in a rumpled suit, balding and paunchy, abjectly staring, unable to decide. Suddenly, the man became life’s absurdity writ small …
I'm giving this girl a ride back to college and on the New Jersey Turnpike she says, "Try? THC laced with acid." In my crowd, the studiers, we just smoke grass. Here is my chance to be cool.
My interviewer has just emailed me that his wi-fi is terrible, and that our video call will now be a simple, old-fashioned phone call. So there’s no one to see that I’ve put on pants—