Hindsight Can Be a Rather Smart Old Bitch
She has the considerable advantage of knowing how everything turned out, then sits there wondering how anyone could have been so spectacularly careless. I look back at the young woman I once was and sometimes wonder what the hell she…
Keep readingThe Wrong Crowd
“If it weren’t for these fucking shoes…” Mila thought. It was midafternoon. Julia had gone out, and Mila could not wait to slip out of the house to visit the kids from la quinta. She ran out as fast as…
Keep readingThree Bic Pens
It was a school day. There was barely any cash, so most days I either had to walk or sneak through the back door of a bus. We had been staying at Dora’s house, well into the better part of…
Keep readingIris and Tobias
The question was whether she’d be amenable to adopting a cat and, frankly, I had expected her to agree the minute I asked. “I am not opposed to it, just that it might be soon…how ’bout in the spring?” Not…
Keep readingThe Scooter Had It In for Me
Aunt Vicky came to pick me up on weekends, often bringing clothes she’d made for me herself. I lived for Saturday mornings because it meant I got to go home to my grandmother, even if only for one night. One…
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Just Like Him
(A Twig) The bus was nearly full. Yellow light made the whole inside feel cheap, like a waiting room nobody wanted to be in. She got the window seat. I sat next to her, feet not quite touching the floor,…
Keep readingThe Stairs to Grandma
I’d take a colectivo from across the school, the one going downtown. I might hang around a little with a couple of friends, but never for long. The colectivo, a car that picked up as many as five passengers and…
Keep readingMercedes
“Well, I don’t know about that, but I can’t take sides, so let’s just leave it like that. God bless you for your help…” Mila had recently written Mercedes a letter which included a brief mention of how abusive Apophis…
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Almost Funny
I never once saw him angry. Not really angry. Not the way Julia got angry. Her insults came easily, sometimes within earshot of the children, sometimes loud enough for the neighbors, and maybe even for innocent passersby who had only…
Keep readingThe Roses Under the Bridge
They met when Julia was almost eighteen and Fernando was nearly thirty: handsome, articulate, unemployed, and overdependent on his mother. His last name still carried a small degree of influence. Before the family moved to the capital, they had enjoyed…
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