Getting the Lead Out
The story was dangerous ground, I knew that instantly, and the little voice daring me to tell it a certain way should have stopped me before I started. C’mon,…
Disappearances
Nearing the end of my father’s sabbatical year in Florence, my mother convinced him to rent a house in the mountains. She slipped the Holiday Homes brochure on top…
The Lesser Light of Dying Stars
It is believed that Mr. Leon Levitt of Peridot, Arizona, began to emit sometime around his forty-third birthday—“emit” being the retroactive clinical term ascribed by those of the science…
Mr. Forble
The trees seemed to hunch closer as darkness fell. Something—a mouse, or maybe a squirrel—emitted a high-pitched shriek, and Marta startled. An owl, she thought. The notion of…
Objects Do Not Fall
I. In his entire life, Brother Giorgio has never once thought about rocks falling from the sky. In fact, no one in Milan knows that a stone, like…
Double-Yolked
The emergency evacuation alert is followed by a serene twenty seconds in which I decide to remove the eggs from their ice bath. It’s the simplest action available…
Bubble Time
Today his world was not serene, because just before lunch, Menser lost his cuff key. A pleasing day would be O’Brien working on Max with enough Bubble time to…
The Blue Bull of Bayou Bonne Chance
Maidencane isn’t half as elegant as it sounds. Not even close. When I came across the plant’s name in a copy of Gulf Coast Flora I had checked out…