“Shower caddy and soap—” “Check.” “Desk light, pillowcases, notebooks—” “Got it.” “Socks, glasses case, portable radio, my quote mugs—” “All present.” “Okay…” Harper Little released a flap on the last cardboard box and watched it settle into place. Looking up, she grinned at her mother. “What?” Vivian Little rolled a felt-tip pen between her thumb […]
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Your mother is not always the person who brought you into this world. Maybe she adopted you a few years in, or maybe she married your father after you were born. A mother is not defined as who gave birth to you but rather who has nurtured you like a parent should since the moment she […]
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“Excuse me, but can I take a picture with you?” All three of us spun around. My family and I were roaming the streets of Italy when a podgy, quinquagenarian tourist decked in a straw hat with a DSLR slung across his neck posed this query. “Sorry, who?” my dad probed. The man’s friends laughed […]
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The day my mother first fell asleep, it began to rain. It lashed heavily against the French windows, the mulberry trees in the yard almost screaming with terror as the wind whipped them ungracefully around and the old swing and dead flowers fell under the weight of water. As she sunk, languid and tired, into […]
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I spent my weekends in Brooklyn with Dad, where he had an apartment near a Hasidic neighborhood. It was a couple of blocks away from a stretch of benched sidewalks where men would gather in their black garbs and tall hats, long beards prickling down as far as their length would allow. It was nice […]
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It was raining the first time I left my body. Mom left the house to be one with the storm. Her shirt was still stained with hot tea when she left, and the floor behind me was still covered in broken glass pieces. Mom had been far away from here again, yelling about Missed Opportunities […]
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The skirt sways just below my knees. It is old and ragged and carries a scent that reminds me of father — safe and familiar. The suitcase swings just by my calves. It is brand new and shiny and smells of the shop from which we stole it. The hand that my mother clasps slips […]
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don’t tell your mother about the painting you have of a gun in the back of your room. don’t tell her about the time you put into it about how you made sure every edge was exact and every curve linear. don’t make her watch you attach shells to its edges so it looks a […]
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I pace the aging dock, its wood groaning in the shallow water. My summer- browned legs quiver at the thought of walking the plank. I cannot see the joy in swimming in this, where beneath the surface dart tiny fish, slimy reeds that will seize my ankles and toes. I can see, though, how her […]
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