August 21st was the exact day I realized I was in an alternate universe. Not an exaggerated alternate universe, but a subtle and unnerving one. The most terrifying alternate universes will look like your world, but they will feel off, and you’ll never be able …
The morning before Father’s Day, my brother and I rode our bicycles to McCann’s Gift Shop. The store carried a brass shaving kit with our old man’s initials embossed on the mahogany case. We went fifty-fifty on the gift and engraving — an idea endorsed by …
How am I supposed to chart you a map or paint you a picture in words of something that I can’t get a clear sight of even while looking at it? Even though I live here and have lived here most of my life, even …
I am sitting at the table in a cheap hotel off Conz Street. There is football on the TV, but I do not know who’s playing. I have taken all the money out of our bank account and talked my way into a hotel …
Stubb is behind the wheel talking about martial arts. Between swigs from a bottle of Beefeater gin he tells me about Grandmaster Itosu. Hokkaido, like 200 years ago: Little Itosu’s father, Mr. Itosu, a low-level politician of noble descent and feeble constitution, disgraces himself in …
