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Extortionist

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They leaned against the hood of his pickup, which sat heavy on its wheels, the back of it filled with the things that he’d held out of the yard sale three days earlier. “When’re you leaving?” she asked. “Early. Get on down the road. Shut ’er down ea

Dead to Rights

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He draped the sheet over her body. Blood spotted the fabric, rose petals on snow.He left the pistol, but pocketed the first edition she'd signed. Part of his fee.In the park, he ditched the glasses, fake mustache, and anorak before making the call.The publisher called an…

Coffee

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He picked up a pack of cigarettes and shook it. He flipped the lid to confirm there were none left.

Snapshot

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Behind them all, in the background, a tray of vodka tonics waits on a glass table, the limes losing color as they drown.

A Natural Consequence of Things

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Belief is a hammer, like saying the mind is a piece of iron.

Then You May Have Complicated Grief...

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......Based on an ad I heard on the radio from Mass. General Hospital in BostonHave you ever experienced death?Have you been in grief,past the cut off periodof six months?Has it affected your life?Has it strained relations with your wife?It is our beliefthat you…

April

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...he thought often of the rollicking waves, of being pulled under, of being weightless and senseless...

Valhalla After Dark

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In traffic I cry bloody murder, but my bloodlust subsides once I'm in Valhalla. Chip Whitehead wants to see me on the 22nd floor before I start my shift. Charlie and the other suits have been looking at me funny since I sent Chip a memo suggesting the recession…

Whither Butter Sculpture?

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Would we have been satisfied with a humble butter sculpture of a cow in 1960? Puh-lease! Would Parisians of the Impressionist era swoon over a big-eyed child picture?

My Way

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We were over Casper, Wyoming, when some terrorists tried to take over the airplane. They had concealed weapons.

An Unheeded Return

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On an over­cast and humid day in August, Jesus—with Dad’s per­mis­sion, of course—decided to make his grand return.

Waiting for Big Bird

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Jonathan jumps up from his seat, knocking over his mug of coffee, when Mona tells him she thinks she is in labor.

Thick as Thieves (my new gang)

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He reached into the bag on the table and pulled out a ten inch record, sleeved in brown paper, with a circle cut out to display the label information. He handled it delicately, like a fresh egg.

86 the Conversation: A Side of Flat Screen TV with Your Burger?

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This couldn’t be a bar; I was with my mother. It took a few seconds for the collision of senses to clear, and I realized the restaurant had not only one, but two flat screen televisions hung in their dining room, and a fake fire blazing in the fireplace.

Meaning of Life # 18

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To hell with the moon!

The Signal

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I take the plastic off of the last videotape and stick it in the VCR. I make sure the channel is on 6. Still a commercial. I get my notebook, turn it to the next page and write today's date on top. I get ready. I don't really like the back and forth banter the other news…

Oliver Pratt

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We lingered there in that room for a few moments, stuck in the awkward goo of rejection and regret. At some point, I’m not sure when, I left, found a bathroom down the hall and washed my ear.

The Cracked Sidewalk of Kentucky

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One summer night, as I walked alone down the cracked sidewalk of Kentucky underneath a canopy of maples where the moonlight fell through branches and lit my path with uneven lines I wondered: where does the residue of lust and desire go when everything you want to…

The Good Farmer

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He leans in close then, close enough that when he speaks, his words tiptoe out and tuck me in.

Amber

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I am the marigold wheel no one can understand, the menace your grandfather warned you about. Yes, yes, that last phrase was overkill...

and I used to sing, too, after sex

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Females exuding from the genitals, giving life meaning, shape, cleanness of line, purity of spirit. They may form man as the honey moans out its salt song, solitary, its epic shout of joy, the sweet science of the human form. Then to give back in re

The Perils of Open Hand

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There are worse things than getting your ass kicked by a 12 year old Puerto Rican kid. This was exactly my thinking as he stood over me, his pre-pubescent screams sounding like a baby Bruce Lee, preparing to finish me off.

Goat

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But we tell them to each other. We feel we are riding on a boat in the well. That is our secret. We aren't. We know we aren't.

"Cary" Me Home

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"Would you mind if she took your empty seat?" The stewardess said. "She has a phobia." "Oh." Archie's dimpled chin fell, then a smile broke above it. "Not at all."

1987, What I wanted

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I wanted to watch, for as long as I could, until my innocence, like balloons, disappeared from view.

Love

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My grandmother is magnificently breasted in her floor-length nightgown.

Three Questions on Distance Running

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Do you see the hot coals of doing? The way time sizzles or wilts…eat those coals.

Paradise Island

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A man comes out of the waves

Give Me Back My Albert Hall

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“Now, “Pour Some Sugar on Me” is a hit of the eighties.”

The Unlucky Thirteen

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They were working on the factory floor when they died, the auspices of mayhem filtering out to a host of ravens gleaning the neighboring fields. Clouds of them fled the scene around the time of the incident turning the day into twilight…