The woman just turned up at the house one morning. That was not unusual in itself. People turn up at other people’s houses without invitation or warning. All the time. It is even more usual in Dhulivadzimu, being so close to the border post. It was little wonder that the VhaVenda gods and ancestral spirits had chosen this dusty, barren gorge as their dwelling place. It is as if they had known that this is where all their benevolence and guidance would be most needed. Always.
‘It’s been many a year since we had a day like today! It was a lovely wedding. You looked beautiful. It was an absolute pleasure dancing with you.
All day long is about Roxxi’s wants and needs. Mrs. Lombard watches the sun stream through translucent curtains in her kitchen, feels a pliable breeze. She reflects the day: Roxxi believes there’s a syringe lodged in her cervix. Mrs. Lombard and all the staff had laughed. It’s crazy Roxxi’d say such a thing. But here, comforted by early evening light enveloping her home, while Roxxi shoots heroin “made from tar and apple cider vinegar” (Roxxi reports) into her fifty-something veins, Mrs. Lombard’s thoughts on her reflective pedestal stream in like the light traveling through the kitchen: Well Roxxi is a product of the system. Yes she is an intravenous drug user. But she is a product of The System that got her addicted in the first place.
For the first time a daughter had broken the absolutely perfect line of seven generations of newborn Brindamour boys.
Really great to see one of Leila’s stories having a second outing. Thanks so much for this Dave Henson. This is what he said:
Continue reading “Literally Reruns – Learning to Fall by Leila Allison”
And following on from Week 241, here we are at Week 242.
That number is a palindrome.
That’s not very interesting but it makes you wonder why palindrome is spelt that way.
The handsome interviewer smoothed his shiny red tie. “Says you’ve worked at the docks for practically your whole life,” he said, scanning Gwen’s resume on the other side of the desk. “That your crew unloads—whoa—a hundred ships a day? Is that true?”
Continue reading “The Womb is a Careless Weaver by Mark Benedict”
She preps students for SATs, tells them that for some extra cash she can get them into the college of their choice.
In Laajpur, a notorious town on the outskirts of Delhi, strange things were happening. The events had baffled everyone. Initially, some had dismissed it as sheer foolhardiness and some as an act of sorcery. But now people were beginning to panic.
Continue reading “The Girl with the Sealed Vagina by Vartika Sharma Lekhak”
In the quiet darkness, well past midnight, where we had been drinking for about three hours with modulated care (if you can believe it) beside someone’s massive pool in the Poconos, the narrow beam cast by a flashlight came with an alarming start down the barrel of a sawed-off rifle bound to spread pain, sac pain, heart pain, knee cap pain. The rifle and the projected flash were steady, likely in the hands of a confident man beyond rifle-range tough, the heavy voice not asking but demanding an answer: “Who the hell are you guys? Speak up quickly, one of you, before this popper gets away from me. I’m not the best shot in the world.” The qualification he added in a mimicking tone said it better than any hard-line threat: ” but I don’t have to be.”
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