CREATIVE NONFICTION
The Babysitter by Andrew Borneman
“My memory serves me far too well.” —George Michael 1979 I’ve heard the story a hundred times. Fourteen phone call attempts before my mother snagged my brother’s first babysitter, Sarah, a quick-witted high school sophomore. She showed up from…
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Four Words Whispered on a Smoky Field by Baņuta Rubess
BAŅUTA RUBESS pioneered feminist theatre and contemporary opera to national renown in Canada and Latvia. She has lived in four countries and writes in two languages. She has written plays, libretti, radio drama, television biopics, stories, and…
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On Possessing a Body by Lotte Mitchell Reford
Content Warning—disordered eating I At night, I find myself lying in bed near bursting with memory, as if something gone could still rip through me and flower. And yes I let myself get hungrier. It feels impossible to…
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What I Do and Don’t Remember from the Days and Nights of Endlessly Smoking Crack and Shooting Heroin by Christian Bodney
It’s all a blur. It can be separated into two five-year periods: using alone and using with Haley. Haley had piercings everywhere: the bridge of her nose, her septum, her nipples, her belly button. She had stretched lobes—one had…
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Where Am I From? by Amber Wong
“I can only answer the question ‘What am I to do?’ if I can answer the prior question ‘Of what story or stories do I find myself a part?’” —Alasdair MacIntyre No one would talk. It was as…
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All the Pretty Little Lies by Amy V. Borg
Content Warning—suicidal ideation The story I tell goes something like this: Did you know I once helped a boy escape from a mental hospital? When I tell it that way, people start imagining things: guns blazing, alarms blaring,…
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Tatuajes by Rubén Degollado
Indiana, in our cold one-car garage, motes of dust falling sideways, the sunlight diffused by the snow covering the ground outside, and we watched Apá working the punching bag, his untaped fists flashing with each swing. Behind my brother…
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My Anesthesiologist by Cynthia Adam Prochaska
Content Warning—miscarriage I see my anesthesiologist at the movies and it surprises me in the way that seeing someone outside the setting you know them does. There is a prick of recognition and then my mind scrambles to…
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We Had Something Beautiful by Kathryn Silver-Hajo
We were agents of change. We wrote about how hugging, laughter, and kissing can lengthen your life. Warned that toxins in commercial cosmetics seep surreptitiously through nails and pores. We advocated ditching pesticides and gardening with beneficial nematodes instead.…
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(up to now separately) by KC Trommer
“Maintenance is a drag; it takes all the fucking time.” —Mierle Laderman Ukeles, MANIFESTO! MAINTENANCE ART 1969! Proposal for an Exhibition, “CARE” (1969) MONDAY socks and shoes socks and shoes socks and shoes Taking all the fucking time,…
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