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Redline Deadline

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I ran for the car, heart pounding in my chest, feverish. I jerked the door open and dropped into the seat of the Audi S5. The ignition fired and the car purred to life. I dropped it into gear and hit the gas, tires spinning, gravel spraying. The treads caught on the hot …

When I Was Young In the Suburbs

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When I was young in the suburbs, there was an empty lot across from our house. Bulldozers cleared the trees, shredded the bushes, and piled mounds of dirt three times as tall as I. But they never built a house.The dirt mounds, chain-link fences, and neon signs were…

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I must apologize for only having words to bring todaywith me. They seem so little to give and not much tooffer you. All their silly little hats seem to have been around with us now for quite some time. Others before me have certainly worn them farbetter…

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...to know they are not alone

Dear Plant Life Magazine

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I have enclosed a newspaper clipping so you can see I’m telling the truth. I’m in the picture on the far right, standing near a maple tree with my mouth wide open in a scream. On the far left is a rearing horse with one of the local farm kids on it,

Why We Were Arrested

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We have a responsibility,” she says, “to enrich our local business community while delivering quality products to customers.” She had brought over some application forms for the Better Business Bureau, and we sit at the big table and fill them out, marki

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And by God he made it to heaven! St. Peter waved him on in...

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I am far from home, wherever that is.

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. . . my mind stops idling, kicks back into gear . . .

Tumultuous Cracker

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The whole scene smells like paranoia.

Beneficial

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Had I said something before, she might could have saved a little face by telling me to go to hell before we tumbled into the covers. All right. Again, I was no gentleman. Send me to hell. Whatever. I lay there on my back, my arm around her, and listened t

Yellow Dining Room (from The New Yorker)

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...you should pick a VERY OLD millionaire. Very old, and NOT VERY WELL...

We the Wild Men

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There's a whole pack of us, men minted from hot brass and thumbtacks. Too tough for sensibility's sake.

Stinger: a Novel

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Lipstick on the bolt, she told herself, if it's no good in the slot anymore.

Summer Party Advice, From Father to Son

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“Madras shorts with those candy-ass Brooks Brothers shirts? If you wear stripes with plaids, you’ll look like a TV test pattern.”

Puppet X, 3

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I look good Together Got these penny wings I could actually fly with It all becomes so clear Sound goes down Sanity returns in an instant The night is bigger... I’d rather stay near the ground I’m not a practicing angel

Strawberry Swirl

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Keisha selected a strawberry swirl cupcake from the waiter's tray, so pretty, from the hottest, coolest, newest patisserie. Moist strawberrylishious cake, swirly pink frosting, sprinkles. Keisha was one lucky lady, scoring a bizdev gig at recession-proof…

Puppet ABC - 2

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I clearly see the squirrels of negativity all around me, ladies & gentlemen. I sensed they were there filling in the blank spaces as I read down the page, prior to arriving at the meaning of everything.

A Serial Killer’s First Day in Medical School

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To rival the professor in his knowledge of various body parts is impossible ...

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Who has the child’s foreskin The mohel has removed? Who took the bleeding piece of flesh His human nature proved?

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My friend once told me about this island of trash in the Pacific. He said that if you threw a piece of trash in any body of water it would find its way there somehow.

Ah Ha

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He started to shudder and stutter as he got closer to it. Time went at a different rate. The gravitational field was getting stronger. His resolve to enter the point of Nothing grew stronger.

Coming Through the Rye

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As I stood in my mother’s closet with my niece Chloe, and read the letter aloud, I was shocked to discover I had shared with my mother details about my love life.

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Right away, like toadstools, there were crackpot theories. The first: that kids out on the lake dock, against fire department warnings...

Chicagoo (from Swink literary journal)

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When Kim handed me some of her husband’s condoms—“Here, use these”—out of one of their bedroom dresser drawers, could she sense the astonishment I was trying my best not to show?

Good Belongs to You

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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,…

Mama's Boys

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A pale face was illuminated by the street light. A voice rasped, “Charlie?” “Do I know you?” “It's Bill.” The side of his little brother's thin face

It's All in the Interpretation

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a random sticker that says, Repent Sinner, and a club lineup snaking around the corner and sirens and that urine smell at alley's mouth

Eloise

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Even at five years old, I could tell that Eloise was haunted by ghosts that shook her core, leaving her dangling and seeking stability in slowly repeating her compulsive routines.