The West | JOYLAND

Prune Yourself, Girlfriend!™

Liz Breazeale -

The Garden arrived on a heatsick summer evening, Mom charging to intercept the mailman at the edge of our scraggled, sun-brittled lawn. She was...

Sanctuary

J. Vera Lee -

Years after our divorce, my dreams, during an on and off again tryst with a man named Otto, feature X: both of us cleaning...

There Are No Hills On the Cape

Duncan Birmingham -

Lilly dipped a rice cracker into the specialty market hummus her mother had laid out on the kitchen island and wondered how much her...

2007

Eddy Boudel Tan -

It started with a tragic old shirt. We’d spent the afternoon unearthing boxes from the depths of our closets, and now once-forgotten artifacts were...

Reunion

Mimi Wong -

In spite of the early morning heat, the taxi driver insisted on keeping the AC turned off. My feet, puffy and pink after the...

Spontaneous and Appealing

Chloë Boxer -

In the long shadow of a bad breakup with my dad, I was trying to become a more appealing and spontaneous person. It was...

Everything We Do Brings Us Closer to the Truth

A.G.S. Gordon -

“I see your daughter around glittering things.” That prediction, suggestive of prizes and the trappings of the good life, was hand-written on a sheet of...

Imperial Valley

Krista Diamond -

Lauren At a gas station in Twentynine Palms, I bought two silk scarves. “Tie it over your head,” I said, studying Nadine’s reflection in the rearview...

Other Voices, Other Blues

David Exumé -

The car rides to swim class were the quietest parts of summer. Aside from the small talk Josephine threw out from the backseat of...

The Lightning Jar

Emily Woodworth -

It starts with spirits. Strong spirits. Many years ago, we captured lightning in a jar and relabeled it homemade sauce. And from this jar...