Short Stories ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
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The Inadequacy of Breathing "When we kiss it is hungry and full of want that is silent and insinuated. I want him like oxygen
in a world where it matters."
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"I
glare at Alan Levy over my apple juice, as he leaves the house that morning, taking the left overs from last
night’s dinner. He and I do not share words. We have dignity."
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"A home life chewed
away by insects, tiny things, invisible things, that worm their way through conversation; parasites in a clean white living
room. They grow, they multiply, until they’ve eaten away at everything concrete and there are holes in the matter you
once called the dinner table. "
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"I’m
leaving for Vienna. I’m leaving you for Vienna. You are hearing it for the first time, knowing you should have heard
it all those times, would have heard it--if only you were listening."
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"I
started thinking of him sitting in class the next day, telepathically trying to bring this teacher to his knee's for his
SERIOUS MISJUDGEMENT OF NARCOLEPSY, just staring at him, just staring at him with those flailing possessed arms,
saying things like "WIDE OPEN" and "JESUS."
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The Things I Tell Myself "I’ve become an expert at this. I
have the split tongue of a bomb-squad negotiator, the discretion and lithe of an escape artist, and the distinct inadequacy
of a toddler in college."
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Livian "The police will have to come and take
her away, and they will ask why she’s cold, and how long it been, and he will have to think of answers for these questions.
Why she’s cold. How she got here."
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Scream "You
will close your eyes and pray like a child for nothing, to feel nothing, to know nothing of what you know. You will pray till
you are on your knees, small fists clutching the carpet, and you will wait and you will wait and you will wait until it all
passes and you will know nothing but the guilt of handing off your responsibility to fix this to some unnamed, unknown source."
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