by Michael C. Roberts Mr. Benson looked at me down the dinner table with a face, not like I had ever gotten before. I knew the look was different. It was not a look adults give to kids. Not a corrective look like from my third-grade teacher, peering over her glasses, when I talked without raising my hand; not bemused censuring from my father when I farted in church causing my older brother to snicker; not proud like my mother when I recited memorized poetry; not the tearfully sad look when …
by Natalie Mead The tent is gray and orange—gray like the color of my face after a long bout of vomiting, or of my favorite wire-free bra after years of abuse and few washes. The orange is the sturdy International Orange of the Golden Gate Bridge. This is the same orange my friend Vivian wants to paint her house. The light coming through my living room window makes the gray tent fabric glow yellow, like the rotten-banana bruises in the crooks of my elbows. My husband Cory set up the …
by Lewis Scott The Drive There I rolled the windows down and drove toward the trailhead. The breeze carried in the sounds of birds, leaves, and distant traffic. Each familiar sight, sound, and smell filled me with bittersweet nostalgia as I embarked on this journey. 4,400 Steps The first 4,400 steps were the hardest. Each step was a battle against myself, a conscious decision I had to make over and over again. As the sun rose higher, the heat intensified. With every step, the …
by Sam Moe (Content warnings: Mentions of blood, sexual violence, emotional abuse, mentions of food/disordered eating) TemperatureA small burning fire at the center of your core. Nights spent sobbing in the walk-in freezers. Chilly wine-key, blue frost growing on boxes of wine glasses. Beer stashed behind buckets of sauce. Sticky blue tape, peeling from heat. Burns on the backs of your hands. The man who requested you sauté his clam chowder until its temperature peeled the flesh off the …
by Dana Stamps II “When I say I want to photograph someone, what it really means is that I’d like to know them.” —Anne Leibovitz Objects, subjects, the brazen anonymous porn star, whose audacious nudity is not faked. I wonder what brought her to pagination, and no clutter of tattoos, no butt inked—classy, probably the poor kind—and I wonder how she is coping with her life after the shoot, …
On the first Sunday of October in 1988, Mr. and Mrs. Suzuki drove my suitcases to the next homestay family, the Yashiros; I followed behind on my 50cc Honda Tact. Mr. Yashiro— a busier carpenter than Mr. Suzuki, judging by his absence— had built a home for his family with amenities like climate control in every room. In the front hall bathroom, he had also installed a washlet: an evolved toilet that directed a jet of cleansing water in the direction of my butt at the tap of a remote control. The …