1423 13 9
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We mourn/
in perpetuity and are inured
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142254
|
It turns out I know a thing or two about momentum. I know, I know. Like the crescendo of your bicycle wheels. Like the force the florist put on the stems the day Linda died. The way my fingers spin between planetary mass. This is how I know I’m not real
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142232
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I have committed to nothing. Therefore I have committed to something. The first sentence is now moot, and this story will eat itself.
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142200
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That was really the problem with leaving. She had to leave everything, could take none of the perfection with her. Anything she took would’ve been too little, or too much, once removed. Once not in his house, not in his vision or touch, the magic would
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142200
|
She says he is not a real person. He says he doesn't understand. And that she should be with the dudes who want to be her boyfriend.
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142200
|
Boy meets girl. Girl meets boy. It was an unexpected meeting, but one that was sure to bring a lot of change for both. They met at a work event. Some friends wanted to put together a company and they had both been invited to be part of the project. Boy smiled. Girl remained…
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1422107
|
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142244
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I arrived Sunday evening to a darkened house. Everything unplugged. Even the fuses from the breaker. Meticulous, this undoing. Silence has a sound. Cold has a voice, a pearly cigarette whisper. It says, “Metaphor?”
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142210
|
She was now sitting in her bathtub. The warmth of the water made her pale, rich vanilla skin flushed with the fullness of circulation as her pores continued to allow the passage of her toxins from her system.
|
142221
|
We received the news unexpectedly. The suspicion was true. The nausea and fatigue were caused by the honor of your presence in our lives. We had waited for you for years. We had prayed endlessly for the universe to bless us with your gift; with you as our gift. And…
|
142255
|
I got an email notification that your relationship status had changed to Single...
|
14221210
|
I avoid weddings like the plague.
|
1422119
|
|
142233
|
A small bar of glycerin soap floated in the sink full of bloody water . . .
|
142220
|
She suggested just moving in together. A lot less constrained by convention she, on occasion, did not wear a bra.
|
142221
|
How could you run from me now?
The loneliest child in the house
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142198
|
When the sun was above the treeline, and the hunter returned to the cabin, they were ready for him.
|
142130
|
You wake up. Slowly but surely. Okay, you're in the bookshop. Yes, apparently this is where you slept, on the floor, with absolutely no sense of irony, in the romantic fiction section...
|
142133
|
Ten am, and the piledriver behind Rhys's eyes shows no sign of mercy. Beyond the safety glass, caverns of empty air tumble down and out to where the edge of the city is lost in the murk. The figures on the screen pulse and phase with the hideous internal rhythm of his…
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142164
|
Luke was in the gutter, his face in stagnant water littered with cigarette butts, condom wrappers, and green shards of glass from broken beer bottles. A man was kicking him in the face with a boot the size of a U-boat, over and over and over again. Blood
|
142153
|
For reasons he couldn't fathom, his motorcycle only moved in reverse. He engaged the engine and lurched backward hard. He called a friend, a gear-head with perpetually dirty nails, asked him to look it over.
|
14211310
|
the ugliness will not be denied
|
142152
|
You stand in the mirror. You see yourself. You stand sideways; your profile is always your best. You tuck in your stomach, you stick out your ass but it's the same. You stand face front. You shiver. The mirror adds weight to your already sagging breasts, the wrinkles…
|
142131
|
|
142198
|
Bert also said that somebody else at the meeting was complaining about his high blood pressure, and Bert repeated what Hank had said, that he was glad to have any blood pressure at all.
|
142133
|
I remember mad strong words out of a teenager, fresh from the shower without a blouse: First! He will be my age, period! He will be the first to walk me to my room as my fear crashes to earth, final, considered.
And I will be the first to milk the w
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142152
|
Now they are sleeping in a poppy field, sun-drenched warm afternoon girls lying on their stomachs and sides, faces in flowers, and flowers blowing, blowing. If this afternoon were every afternoon, the world would be cured.
|
142157
|
My grandmother didn't like fireworks much. She said they reminded her of the raids during the war, when everybody stayed in the tube tunnels at night, going in buckets and curling up on the tracks.
|
142141
|
Once, during an argument, she had said, It’s like there’s another woman, except she doesn’t exist. Which sometimes it really did feel like, a betrayal, being thrown over for someone else. The muse.
She could have shot the muse.
|
142187
|
He died in the ditch he dug.
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