“Can I?” Lily asked. I gave her a nod. She tore at the package with greedy fingers. As the paper fell away to reveal yet another self-help volume, Lily cocked her head in a gesture of confusion and curiosity. Following her gaze to the lipstick-red

I passed Buster Keaton on the way to work this morning. He was standing, hands in pockets, at the corner of Riverview and Keil. It was the young Buster, handsome and still strong enough to pin down the scars that marked his childhood. This was the Buster

The Count was used to boredom but he had reached the point where he was even bored with boredom.

"I called him a fucking loser and left."

Teddy laughs like a machine gun. People back away when they hear him. Every time I see him at work, I try to make his skinny body rattle. I would never back away.

We walk in silence. We water our plants. We don’t eat as well as we should. We try to love. We try to forget.

Traveling with a live chicken on a city bus is an experience I hope never to repeat.

I can never tell if he’s drunk or using some sort of substance or if perhaps his brain just doesn’t fire at the pace that we have come to accept as normal.

The French 751 1/2 ounces of cognac1 ounce of lemon juice1 teaspoon of sugar6 ounces of champagne For the rest of that night, everything Mickey looked at appeared to have a halo of music, something nearly visible that he could almost …

You don't make money worrying about other people's feelings. I learned that from my father at an early age. He managed rental properties, which I, his daughter, now own. He wanted a son, so I became one.

Smoke is pouring outta my ears! (And outta my mouth and nostrils, but that's normal.) The Fast-o-matic Supermart has changed their coupons. Now you can't swap them for plastic surgery. So all those tubes of New Orleans-style Cottil-i-Lard dog sausage…

My name is Wanda McClure and I lived in the foothills of Eastern Kentucky. A small town miles off the interchange, and mostly in the middle of nowhere. I lived in a trailer. I was 52 years old.

They cut the tall specious tree storms snapped the night in two or three. At times they pause most piously to count each ring of truth, drive nails into the stiff cathartic spine, divine if this unseasoned cigar topiary agrees with its own everlasting te

Sylvia Plath killed herself while her children slept upstairs, breakfast ready at their doors. Anne Sexton wanted to do it, but Sylvia got there first, making Anne just a little less remarkable, although she tried often enough, her death like a song put on repeat. …

I sighed and looked deep into his eyes. “There is nothing more powerful than denial.”