1911 3 2
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The Bird King suffers from phantom head syndrome. Ever since his decapitation by a critic, he has felt pain where his head used to be. Sometimes it wakes him in the night. It's so excruciating, he fumbles for a saw. But alas! there's nothing to chop off.He's seen every…
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191184
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“I don’t know what’s going on there,” Hank, who hated his name and wanted a more Biblical name because those names (Jeremiah! Matthew! David!)—although common—sound ominous, said as he pointed up to the top of the apartment building that housed the whores
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191100
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Where was it? Tino wondered, craning his neck, plastic bag in hand. He would have sworn there was a Barnes & Noble along this stretch. Had it closed since his mother had last been in the hospital two years ago?
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19112112
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The decision is made. I am going to a Zumba class. What better way to achieve behavior modification than to leave my TV and fuzzy bear slippers behind for some hot Latin aerobics in a strip-mall? I try to pull my hair into a ponytail that will make the two inches of…
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191151
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The waitress says,
“That’s a memory,”
as the smoke dances around her head.
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19111710
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Even if your heart is as large as a small car, your tongue as heavy as two grown men—even then—you will have to carry it with you wherever you go.
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191120
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“We’re prisoners,” Sean reminded the guard. “Prisoners of your military.”
“You have never been treated as such.” Captain Hughes looked around the bar. “This festival is a celebration of you, of all of you. We pride ourselves on ou
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191165
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Someday, the Grim Reaper, wrapped in hooded cowl, the thorny stem of a red rose clenched between his teeth, will climb up the garden trellis to my bedroom window
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1911117
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Kramer wraps himself around Kramer’s legs, from behind, then lifts him and tips him up and over and down, per their rehearsed routine.
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1911114
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Upon learning the fetus has fingernails, Missy texts her boyfriend: It has nails! He won’t reply because he’s just left for war, but she does it just the same.
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191044
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191084
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At first we envied Tom and Betty’s dancing. Friday nights at The Big Club, Saturdays at Mickey’s, and none of us can remember a time we saw them in the arms of another partner.
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191010
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Yellow tape marks a walkway that was previously unknown. Caution, caution. Lounge turned waiting room for a ballroom turned infirmary. An entrance, an exit, caution, caution. The line is of amusement park ride length. But no roller coaster at the end, only an antidote…
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19101614
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The woman carried a wooden log which was her husband into the house.
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191021
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It felt like he'd just taken his marriage out into the woods, forced it to its knees, and put a bullet through its head. Or they had, together.
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1910115
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After court, the three of us skipped third period, walked down to the river and huddled under the 6th Street Bridge.
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19091713
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No fear of that, / he assured her,
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1909129
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in which creative destruction holds the heads of entire populations beneath the surface of the water in bathtubs until the bubbles stop
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19092414
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Our lives depend on/
engineers
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190943
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…Professor Wumbat begins.
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190920
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What the heck to believe in??
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190910
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The schedule fell smoothly into place: After Imogene went home at the end of the day, Calvin locked the office door, then he and Rosalie marched into the examination room and she flossed him.
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190851
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It was the shock of black hair twisted into a long thick braid that got our attention and made us want to find meaning here. Albert thought he recognized the hair in the grave.
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1908117
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I walk back home, alone and without the bus fare. Distancing myself from the shadows that float interminably against the drowsy sun. Where frightened boys often roam, going in circles against the long lines of epitaphs and gravestones. Puzzling…
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190810
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Almost on cue, Xavier emerges and is in the vendor’s face. “X,” as he is known around here, is indoctrinating the obvious newbie on the merits of showing up earlier and the logistics of placeholders and markers.
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1908104
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They live a simple life..two solitudes by lamplight.
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190821
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He had expected more -- at least his grandfather's classic Packard touring car.
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190864
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Where truth is revealed
To all, transparency
In policy, including
The REAL reasons
We are at war.
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19081817
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Soon, she will turn to liquid
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190741
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She comes in with her white bag with its floral patterns scattered, almost accidentally, all around it
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