Author
Alex Sobel
Slight Courage
I slip back to my ten-year-old self, the hospital. A shallow inquiry to Mom, as if to say something palpable, to be retained: Why do you have to leave me? Why now? Her lips move, a gentle separation, but hold a wordless tenure. I slip forward to my own child, no longer a child…
Remainder
She pays, gladly. Of course. It was his money, anyway. Using it to see him again seems right, something wiped clean, fractions evened out, remainders made whole. How far back? She wants to go back more, as far as possible. Maybe before he was sick, even. But two years is the…
The Whole Of Me
***********Editor's Note: Triggering (themes of abuse)************ Mark is dead for three months when he starts contacting me. The texts come when I'm in the middle of something, half asleep, driving, a meeting at work. I feel the vibration in my pocket, know it's him. The texts…
The First Drowning
"Do the drownings get better?" I ask Amber. She weaves her fingers together, shakes her head down toward her hands. "It fades a little, you know? Becomes routine, just another part of everything." At sixteen, I'm old to be having my first drowning. I've been sheltered so far by…
That Boy in the Picture
"We talked about you in class today grandpa," I said. The colored parts of his eyes widened like a submerged marble surfacing in a cup of milk. Interested, maybe annoyed. "We got to the chapter in our history book about the Great Wizard War." I didn't mention that his name only…
Play Pretend
"Hands up or I'll vaporize all of you," Dan says. He doesn't intend to, but years of pretend play with his friends takes over and he puts up his right hand in a fake gun shape, thumb pointed upward, one finger out, the five remaining fingers curled into his palms. "Can you try…