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Argoyle

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He extended his bent arm to its full length with a crack, straightened his hunched body and tried, and failed, to close his lips over his frightening grimace. Stone lips are not pliable.

Birdhouses

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That year, if you asked Al, was truly the best of times, the worst of times.

Rwanda Suite: Ape Woman

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I should have buried him on the saddleback and kept my mouth shut. I'll murder the bastard who did it.

The Animal Cracker Incident (Part 2)

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“I feel like my bones are melting.” Her arms are wrapped around her body tightly, like she’s trying to hold herself together. She’s shaking; I can hear it with every breath she takes.

Apologia

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A short snippet of text

A note from Liu Xiabo

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I think about the weight of those words—how they are silenced by the weight of stone, by the weight of 11 years in a Jinzhou prison cell,

Rejected York Peppermint Pattie Commercial Blurbs

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When I bite into a York Peppermint Pattie, I get the sensation of being curled in a ball inside a cold, dark cave filled with my darkest, most paralyzing fears.

Adios

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After seventeen years of struggling to wake up early in the morning, I had managed to wake up on my own. Actually, I think it was because I was unable to sleep that I was up so early. I had laid on the bed all night, staring at the dark ceiling, taking in every…

Untitled

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What else, H, is there to say about heartbreak? What else could it be but our hands, cupped as if holding water against our chests, then broken into halves. Or the picture of this one, pretending to load a gun. Or this one, soaked in smoke—asking for

Lint Trick

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Those socks? Nope. I'd look like the joker in the commercial, the creep with the pollen issues and the triangular smile. What a genius. It's the part off-screen I can't forget, the part they left on the editing reel. She's crumbling the crackers into her soup, that dry…

Miracle of Life

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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…

Okatooga Warhammer

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They looked like girl’s jeans. Matt held them against himself in the mirror. Not that girl’s jeans were a mark against them. Usually, girls had better jeans anyway. Matt took two of the biggest pairs out of the big chest in his grandmother’s back closet.

Prurient

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I like him. I really, really like him in a way that I don’t like guys, not anymore, not after all the dirty lies into get in my pants, the dirtier lies to get out of them later, the indignities and the humiliations and the disappointments.

Small Talk

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Her fingers scampered over the table, practicing the deft stitching of the basilar artery.

Who's Chasing You?

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“Who’s chasing you?”. When the answer is ‘no one’, it’s best to drive away, like you would from a forgettable Oregon town or someone who can’t love you more than they hate themselves.

A Case of Mo Yan Blues

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my speech/ in Oslo.

Old or Fat

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Which is worse?

Circumstance

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In a time of drought,/ the sound of rain is sweet/ and joyful music.

A Bitter And Unseasoned Business Attorney Makes His Case That "Crazy Heart" Is The Perfectly Nasty Ending

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In closing, Your Honor:After the interview Bad Blake, a/k/a "Otis" takes "Miss" Jane Craddock back to his hotel, ties her up, and gives her a Cleveland Steamer. For reference, please refer to my Brief, Exhibit A, showing a thespian named Ronald Jeremy…

Feb 8

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Call it a spell or a prayer or a ritual; it worked.

Frances at Virginia Beach

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My husband waits for him to hurt himself. The boy drinks red wine between movements, Staring hypnotically at the back Of a girl’s head.

The Ann chapter

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The way I felt was as though you were, every day, making the conscious and deliberate decision not to be with me, not to share your life with me—and not to share my life, that you were choosing not someone else, but something else.

holding it down

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You lazy fuckwit! You half-assed shithead!

Esther

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the moon is the pupil of the cave’s eye

Big Al Dissects Literary Fiction since No One Else in the Bar could pronounce Aristotle

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“Well” I say. “What do you think about the dilemma of a guy who’s tortured by a history of incest and bondage?” “Depends” Says Al. “On who was cested and who was bonded.

Valentine's Day

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I first met you in a February, but my best early memory is of your deep and sweaty tan. You'd been to Florida, I ran into you in the market, the sight of your tan made me hard for your pale parts. It was summer, you were dressed all in white, I invited you…

Mistaken Identity

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Scott was sure his father was reassured by the sticky stains in his Penthouse; Dad found them when Scott was thirteen. Dad had just one issue of that venerable porno, which Scott defiled with his joy. It was not the Penthouse models…

why are we feeding the lawyer?

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They were press­ing her about the money, it was always about the money.

Please Don't Pass The Salt

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The only silver lining? The man in my life and I are in this together.

Selfish Success

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I wear my gun so it shows, so everyone knows.