I was born at the age of 42. Some of you might regard that as a handicap, but at the time I assumed everyone was born fully grown in a corporate test kitchen. In fact, I still think of it as an advantage; like being born with a silver spoon in my hand.

I don't have time

—You know, Angelique, said Elaine Aster, dabbing her lips with a napkin, I’ve opened a new gallery in Paris.

“I'm in love,” Satan said to me cheerily. I could tell he was in a good mood. He was whistling as he came up my sidewalk. There was a spring in his step. He carried his mail tucked under his arm.“I'm in love,” he said …

He checks the bedrooms first, then the hallway, followed by the living room and the bathrooms. When he can't find you he takes to calling out, daddy, I'm sure the neighbors hear.

It takes almost an hour before I drift to sleep on the bus. When I wake up in Crescent City, I’m surprised. Maybe I was going somewhere else in my sleep. Walking out of the station, it feels like a strange place. Somewhere I’ve never been before. The

He knows why I’m here, so he stalls, talking about the coffee, about how it’s a new dark blend from a little shop in The Village, about how he loves the flavor, so rich, but just because a coffee is dark doesn’t mean it’s stronger, that, in fact, it’s the

Stanley had a crush on Sarah. They were in Ms. Goldman's freshman chemistry class together fifth period. That day they were working on homework at Sarah's house while her parents were gone. Stanley was in heaven.“Break time!” Sarah woke Stanley from daydreaming,…

Here the three o'clock sun is an old patched up fellow, with a stained yellow beard, walking in a small crispy rain of brown leaves, looking at something that requires a bit of squinting no one else can see, on the far side of the softening…

We named her Big Cat—I don’t know why. Maybe because she was already grown when we got her, unlike the kittens we’d seen in the pet store window that Dad wouldn’t let us have.

And it's a tough thing to become a father, a contradiction; guiding a child to avoid the things that you know about so well.

"It was here where he’d first seen the girl—Nan. Slender, with brown hair, pale skin, sitting on a bench, and reading from a pile of papers on her lap."

As I gripped the wheel and stared at the expanse above my head, my compass spun wildly. Something wasn't quite right

Atlanta, 1990The night we almost died,crushed at a one-hit wonder concert,comes back to mewhen the club announces it's closing.An ancient excelsior millturned industrial dance hall,I spent three years mapping every dark corner, finding secret places for sex and…

Why, these were the young hands that I kissed only last night.