The Devil’s laugh was the screech of wind. Ignacio Carillo heard Him as he dug the grave that would hold the body of his beloved wife.

‘Your hands are very clean’ she said to the furniture salesman. His name was Morrison. "After Jim" Morrison Pentworthy. His father specialized in Doors.

…

But the best thing about Rebekah was the way she floated always beneath the scent of woodburn and dusty Middle America,

The redwood trees were taller than dreams

The debits and credits of life have been recalculated. You are not due tax; you are owed a trapeze. It turns out you have a natural gift for hanging upside down, knees to the clouds.

Rowan’s arm burned and throbbed like the center of a neutron star as it went critical for minutes turned inside-out like hours. Standing in a wall, then huddled underneath the couch, she danced around the rim of consciousness, ripping at the seams of her

Last night, in a tavern called Wits End, we dropped quarters into a console, sized and shaped like an old TV.

I looked around the room at the shit, the dog bed, the dish. Lights burst behind my eyes, knees weak. “Fuck…” I bent over and puked.

Fingers fan like birds’ wings cradling the volume, head hanging low and lips moving silently...

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.

One of the pieces, I noticed, had the real shape of a miniature chicken, its mohawk, pin legs, and small definition of wing. “Look at that,” I said to my friend. And just then, the wing twitched.

Fumes of sugar rose to Kofi's brain - intense, foreign, disquieting. At every turn of the handle, Kofi wouldn´t know which flavour would suddenly prevail, whether he would like it, or how long it would last …

Pow! I shoot him through his jelly donut.

My T-shirt read BOO HOO.