Posts

At 4:48 on Monday, March 12, Theodosia touched the stove for the fifteenth time. Fifteenth time in Carly's tenure. How many times before that she couldn't guess. Hundreds . Or maybe the previous custodians were paragons whose attention never strayed even for a millisecond and who expertly dove in to intercept any wayward small hands.

Materials You will need: A standard 52-card playing card deck. Two jokers, separated. Fishing tackle, assorted. Don’t worry too much about the contents, just make sure you have a nice box. It’s mostly for show, anyway. One net, any size. Ten days’ rations. If you’re feeling particularly careful, fifteen. A boat. It belongs to your… Continue reading A Rényú-Hunter’s Guide to Playing Go Fish by Adeline Wong

On the day Dad is diagnosed with terminal cancer, Ana arrives home from the hospital, does the dishes from the dinner—cluttered from the previous three days—puts some food out for Tufinho, sags back on the couch to spend half an hour crying, then finally opens the faucet in the sink, swirling her finger on the rising water.

The railcar rumbled as it descended into the sewer levels of the fortress city, Aguiyi. The cramped railcar smelled strongly of bleach and grease. Hazard and Safety Commission workers filled the available seats, bodies pressed shoulder to shoulder, with even more of them in faded green coveralls standing in the aisle, hands clutched around a steel beam on the railcar’s ceiling. A dingy speaker somewhere in the car broadcast the mayor’s morning address. Elections were coming up, and many of the cleaners in the car were in heated political debate.

“Careful, mortal.” The voice was disembodied, high and sweet as a nightingale’s call, commandingly stern as a priest’s sermon. “You dare step into the abode of a van-yakshini?”

I drifted over the top of Diver’s Cliff in my spacesuit and considered going for a swim. That’s what we called giving up on Sapphire Alpha: going for a swim.

They said afterward that the first fishermen who’d gone down to the beach that morning had found her, but when the people from the village hurried to see what the tide had carried in, no one claimed to be the person who’d discovered her. It was as if the woman’s gigantic body had been there for days already, and the population of Punta de Piedra had only just realized she was there.

It was just past midnight, and the only life present in the sorcerer’s sanctum was the cat who called it home. The real master of the domain, one might believe.

Before you open your eyes, you know you're not home. The weighted blanket gave it away, wrapped around your body like a tortilla, turning you into a breakfast fucking burrito on that cold, cold early morning. The weather — that was the next sign. You know, it's never really cold in Bahia, so where the hell are you now, shivering, curled up like a kitten on the hardest mattress you ever laid on (so different from the one in your bedroom)? If you pretend you're still unconscious, maybe you'll convince your brain you are just dreaming, and it'll take you back to the place where you belong.