1696 7 1
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My mother was Irish as Paddy's pig. So all her family. Lovely people they were. Also, seldom seen among the Folk; stone cold sober. My father's family; Bavarian German. Bavaria's the wrong side of the German tracks. Frankfort people laugh at Bavarians as people in…
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140930
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The last time my old lady threw me out, I decided to go and stay with my brother. I thought, "That's the last place I'll be welcome," and I knew that was true. The drive was calming, which was good, because Steven wouldn't have even let me in if I…
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145230
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After our first kiss,
a team of scientists
scrubbed away the cancer
of your lipstick.
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168961
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I was quite alone in this small room with the tarp and the dying fire.
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199501
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Lydia slid into the pool and rubbed lotion on the exposed areas of skin. She lathered her flipper arms. She lathered her sun-worn face. And she lathered her chest, rubbing some between her chubby breasts.
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1912188
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Overnight, I felt drunk, as if headed for hangover, but I hadn't drunk enough to cause it. What caused it? Superstitions dialed in sleep.
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25822310
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'Hey, are you supposed to be from a cartoon or something?' said the Grim Reaper. I had to take a big drink before I could reply. I didn't know what to say, so I said 'Could I see your watch, please?' He looked down my dress while he thought about it.
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154643
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"You're no good at sex, no good at drugs and, god knows, no good at rock and roll."
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27382312
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Down cellar, my father showed me where he kept his beer stash. It was in a cubbyhole under the bulkhead, where Mom never thought to look.
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182121
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The car has been parked there for slightly more than a day now, and nothing has occurred—there’s nothing “unusual,” nothing “amiss.” Except that it’s there, still, as he follows his boys to school.
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34284327
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Walking to work, Lawrence Settler was struck by a bus as he crossed a one-way street.
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174510
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Shh!
What?
The downstairs neighbors. They’re at it again.
What?
It’s the weekend? They’re both home?
Oh.
Remember?
I think so. Sort of.
Shh!
What’s that grunting?
He must be doing the heavy lifting.
Sounds like he’s hurt
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241500
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Her body shivered from the liquid and she felt loose. Her mind relaxed and a veil of pink mist covered her body.
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126410
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I found Mathew face down, cold and ridged like a plastic doll. I had overslept because he never cried—never told me he was hungry. Rodney had to peel my arms from around my son so the paramedics could take him in a blaze of flashing red and white lights.…
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221621
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The tapping of hard soles moves slowly but forcefully away from the front door and toward the kitchen. Johnny looks at his dinosaur as if its spiked tail and plates of armor will protect him. Clip clop. Clip clop. The footsteps circle the kitchen. The bac
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142600
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He bounds like a lunar explorer into the Edinburgh Castle, the goofy porcelain busts glaring at him with contempt.
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153821
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I hope you enjoyed the celebration last night. Good things always come to you. I thought your family would never go home. I didn't get to sleep this morning until 2:59, although I had set my alarm to 6:10. I didn't want you to miss your plane. At daybreak,…
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2804143
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You should really see my father's bunions. They are as obnoxious as fuchsia bowling bowls.
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180300
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"I think you're a great candidate for a sentinel node biopsy," said Dr. Kartes.
They sat in the small, dark office. On the sofa, not touching. She still wouldn't take his hand.
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25552711
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As soon as she left, I sat down at the computer. Booted up. Read my e-mail, then looked at pictures of bare-naked ladies.
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513500
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Bess spent the summer that year at a lakeside court in Lake Elsinore. They told her she only had to spend three months there, before she was allowed to have a spot of her own at the nudist camp. Just three months. But Lake Elsinore seemed like something
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208551
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Class (appears in my book Breaking it Down; no journal publication) When your neighbor James Frehley cusses you out for hanging a block and tackle from the silver maple in your front lawn, begin to pull the engine from your Galaxie anyway, smile and nod…
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335500
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More and more, incoherent masses of letters scroll through my mind. Ideas struggle to form. Flashes of images flit rapidly in front of my mind’s eye. There are fish, mountains, presents, forests, mirrors - a menagerie of meaningless symbols march pas
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2550124
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It's a lie, it doesnt mean anything this, only that my lips are ripe and soft.
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146461
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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.
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208820
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The phone rang. Pete wiped his heavy eyes and squinted so he could see. He looked at the clock. It was five o’clock in the morning. He rolled over and tucked his head under his pillow. The phone rang again. He ignored it. It rang again. He picked up.
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27986524
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The second thing Annie Riser did after receiving her diagnosis was to find a realtor in the Yellow Pages and put her house up for sale.
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183410
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They're bound to wonder what sort of offspring we'll hatch. We've done the tests, we are cross-fertile.
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2569113
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Marcel Proust ran about the grounds chasing an itinerant tennis ball and kissing the guests, his huge testicles sweeping the lawn.
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39273915
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"It's what being out of work does to you, " she said, with that innocent sense of the everyday tragic, that kind murmur.
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