“What are you so afraid of? Why are you so worked up? There’s nothing to be worried about.”
Category: Issue VII (2022)
The Mind of Shattered Glass
I sit and stare at the shards of broken glass scattered across the black, carpeted floor. I cannot move. I can only sit. And stare. And wait.
Lulu Dalzell’s Four-Part Guide to Love
When I was a kid, I loved hearts. I loved my friends. I loved my family. I loved my dog and my house and reading.
Pietà
She took me to the side into the closet bursting with chiffon, cotton, and crepe. I didn’t know her well, but she seemed to know me; to have observed me closely.
The End of Genre Writing: Crime and Literary Fiction as a Sole Entity
The notion that literary fiction is paradoxical to genre fiction is subjective. Genre fiction involves a writing style targeted to a specific audience focused on plot devices, and literary fiction concerns itself with style and characters over plot; their differences are not enough to disregard the possibility of genre-literary fiction.
One Day I Won’t Be Afraid to Call You
2007. St. Joseph Elementary School is a small building with quaint classrooms, strict Catholic teachers, and a single silver swing set that serves as the height of recess excitement in spring.
Home is Where Kaiser is
Homeroom always started with prayer, and my teacher, Mrs. Stein, always asked the class if there was someone or something we wanted to devote some extra thought and prayer to. I never said anything.
When We Are Older
“I’ll tell you when you’re eighteen,” she sniffled, as she tucked a strand of hair behind my ear. My mother was sitting on the ledge by the window, roughly brushing tears from her cheeks
Fill Me Up
Dry heaving,
Desperate to prove
There’s something more within me.
A Self-Portrait in Three Parts
We arrived in Pennsylvania in the summer. Perhaps that was why I was not yet wary and vigilant as I should have been, as I told myself I would be. The slow and idyllic heat reminded me of the best parts of Georgia, before the air turned febrile and violent with the agitation of summer storms.