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Los Angeles IKEA Existential Meltdown

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Sometimes, you compare your living situation to a prison because it makes you feel better. "At least I have a fridge," you think to yourself.

A Study in Plastics

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She sat Indian style against the strawberry tree. In her hand she held a little mirror and a note that her father left her that morning. What a night, eh? See you in the morning. That’s what it said.

The Cure for Cancer

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Thus, more people can drown// and leave their bones

Pavane

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The shadows hang fast on the downs this day: And I hang like the darkness, over heath and down; Since the air there is clearer than the clouds, men say, And I'm lost in the country, I shall turn to town. If the heather is restless, then the fete is …

Autobiography 22: It’s Not Just the Income

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Unless they leave you comatose,/ it’s the disasters you remember.

A Storm A-Brewin'

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"I'm just saying," the older man continues, "We oughta be ready in case she hits." "We'll be fine," the woman says. "We've weathered every storm that's ever come through here just fine."

In Real Life

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I’m starting to feel more interested in my savings account.

His Name Was Tokarsky, But He Looked Like Bob Dylan

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Tokarsky and I got chased off an El train by a couple of mean-looking black dudes who looked like they were going to crush us. I let go a spritz of tear gas that I had on me in the train and we ran as it came to a stop at the Morris Street stop. They chas

Freakuccino

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The bus was almost empty, just me and an Asian girl who'd cleaned up some since I'd seen her. She was wearing a too-big T-shirt that said Freakuccino and writing in a notebook. If she remembered me she didn't say so I didn't either. Everybody sheds some…

Flowing, Flown

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Flowing, Flown In the field stands a jealous man with fifteen eyes stored inside the cuffs of well-worn khaki pants. His pockets pull with clinking dimes…

Paulie in Albuquerque

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Savvy as a nine-year-old playing poker with high rollers in Las Vegas, that was Paulie. She'd finally thrown Dick Weasel out the night before, but that morning Diana'd shot down their plan of sharing the house in a “man-free”…

Missed connections

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I lost my job but the government found me a new one. Now the government pays me to pretend I’m a travelling businessman. I fly around the country to imaginary meetings. It’s part of a project to make it look like the economy is doing well.

BLT

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I had a sister-in-law who was a licensed nutritionist. Not sure what “licensed” means, but she had some certificate and worked in a hospital. Hospitals! Places not known for their cuisine, much less their nutrition. —So, what do you…

Hal and Estelle

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They had both discovered, though, that when people stared at them now, away from the carnival, it was very different. There, they were supposed to be odd, it was what people expected. Here, they were supposed to fit in.

Ghost Story

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They come to wipe themselves from my memory, but that, of course, is impossible. In this place, we are bound together, the long line of men who have killed me, and I.

Allergic Reaction

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On his way to his first fishing expedition in the Bay Area, the man remembered the rustle and shimmer of the willows by the muddied Jemez River in New Mexico, cold beer, the clean camaraderie of childhood friends. He walked along a path choked with greenery to the San Pablo…

Pancakes

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I’d look for a fork and quickly stab a piece of it and bite into it, feeling good about the finality of things.

Dipshits.

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[WARNING: THIS FILM CONTAINS PROLONGED SEX SCENES OF AN EXTREMELY EXPLICIT NATURE AND SCENES OF GRAPHIC VIOLENCE, WHICH SOME VIEWERS MAY FIND SHOCKING AND DISTURBING.]

Gun Play

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The guy – it’s Billy Krazik - turns and aims at Jamie Stockwell, sitting there calmly as if he’s in the play or something and he takes two to the head.

Video from Cairo

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The view from the tenth floor of Ramses Hilton hotel was depressing. A restless crowd undulated between the wrecks of tanks and armored cars. JOURNALIST: Hey! I’m dying here, and you admire the views?

Ambassador of Nowhere

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Before you tripped on the third rail, you were like any other: coat a shard of midnight-blue, eyes filled with gratitude but for nothing. You were a lost coyote on a snowy hill. With sad magnificence you wandered, terrorizing passengers who secretly wished to pat your…

The Catch

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His granddaughter, Ivy, sat on his knee looking at an old photo album she found under the couch during one of her afternoon explorations. She made him wipe off the dust and cobwebs before he took her through all the pictures, per normal protocol. The albu

Goody Two-Shoes

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She locked herself in the bathroom on our wedding night. That was my first clue that I had made a mistake.

At the Jr. Algonquin Roundtable

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“He didn’t finish ‘The Witchcraft of Salem Village,’” Scooter says, tattling on his little brother. I’m projecting him to be a first-round draft pick by the National Security Agency in about ten years.

The Nude Pianist: A Novel: Chapter 48

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If you shoot at them now, it'll be attempted murder or, worse, premeditated murder.

Kaddish

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Summer nights or frozen winter, the crackles of his black.

Five Million Yen: Chapter 15

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There was a motley assortment of customers in the restaurant. Mostly casually dressed young men and women who looked like freelancers of some persuasion.

rewind...

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here’s the deal… sorrow follows tears… pain later for the happiness now… is the joy something we only borrow…?

If Hell...

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the sour waft of a secret

Flesh

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Here’s to flesh: