A New Kind of Literary Pulse

It began at a sports bar, the kind of place the realtor would call "happy-go-lucky." In other words, if your barstool wasn't sticky, assume it had just been swabbed clean by CSI. There was graffiti on ... [+]

I remember when my world divided into male and female, when the girls screamed "Shaun has cooties!" across the playground and flushed with what I thought was anger. I remember being in a closet with ... [+]

First thing every day, I count out the same colorful cocktail of medications into Mother's four containers: morning, midday, evening meal and nighttime. Two pink pills shortly after waking up, and ... [+]

The first time it really hits me, I'm staring at the peeling paint on the doorknob.I long ago memorized the feeling of coming home – the click of my key in the door, the scent of Mom's stir fry on ... [+]

Mr. MacInnes had decided it was time to talk to Brian about his appearance. He didn't want to, lord knows he wasn't a stickler for such things, but lately it had all gotten a bit out of hand. It ... [+]

While pulling lobster pots from the bay, Finn chanced upon the mermaid. His mind was on Jenny, dark with worry, when the mermaid appeared alongside his boat. An old friend once told him of a legend ... [+]

1. Octopuses have nine brains. Me? I wouldn't want so many organs with which to overthink and fly into hysterics. You always ran from those—took the car and left me alone for hours, sometimes days ... [+]

We pull off at the side of the highway in Somewhere, Maine looking to sing to the snails. There's a deep shoulder of gravel here, so we assume it to be a parking lot. The sky and the water and the ... [+]

In college, I went on a date with the son of my mother's coworker. I couldn't remember if his name was Jason or Justin, so I spent the entire night maneuvering my way out of saying his name. He was ... [+]

On our last day at the beach the sun came out, and the fog, which for that whole week had draped the shore in a veil of cotton, burned away: we discovered there was an ocean here, after all. It wasn't ... [+]

Zebra, Mule, and I stood abreast, as always, and studied the newcomer. Sea Horse reared up from his pale green tentacle of a tail. His upper half resembled the cavalry horses behind us, complete with ... [+]

The meep of the alarm dragged me from the warmth of my quilt cocoon and smack into Monday morning. I had to bat at it four times before it finally stopped and I found my glasses. 6:00 A.M. and still ... [+]

When did my heart harden? How did empathy slip away? Dr. Lindelson pondered these questions in the spacious office where she had practiced psychotherapy for forty years, since she completed he ... [+]

Of the over 5,000 numbers in the English language, it is the number 14 alone that has come to hold a special place in my heart. I'm not a superstitious woman, or a woman at all for that matter. I am ... [+]

"Yeah," Darius said into the phone as Jessica, the receptionist, made no attempt to disguise her eavesdropping. "I just finished the work-trade shift and will take a class with Hannah. After, I'll ... [+]

We are simple people. For us, fulfillment comes from hammering a piece of iron into a useful shape; from plowing the black soil for the new crop; from kneading the dough for the bread we all need. My ... [+]

It had been nearly fourteen years, but there you were on my morning commute. On your way to work like nothing had happened. Both of us on our ways to work as if nothing had happened. You looked good ... [+]

Our new house really felt like a home, with cockroaches and two pit bulls and a palm tree and a chain-link fence. On that first day, I heated up a can of kidney beans for breakfast and ate it sitting ... [+]