Fiction

I glanced at your screen, the warm bright center of possibility, and plucked the third idea from the top. A digital detox.

When we speak, the light pours from our mouths and blinds us.

At first, I didn’t know how to tell him about the tests. After knocking back half a glass, I thought: this was no time to be polite.

I was all marked up in his fingerprints, the berry hues blooming against the summer bronze of my skin. My lips had been painted with the same care and attention.

You’re okay, the plant told her, its voice comforting as a warm bath. Its gray-green flesh glowed in the light of her room. You’re safe here.

But no matter how fast the speedometer said he was going, he knew: nothing was faster than sins coming back for revenge.

We’d decided to try out Calf, the restaurant where the only thing on the menu was calf. Each set of diners was assigned their own room, called a “pen.” When we got there, the host walked us to our pen and latched the door.

With each atrocity Shoshi was forced to watch, she retreated into herself, creating bigger and stronger dolls to shield her, only her outermost layer visible to her tormentors.