I noticed the light would often be on in 1-D's sunroom, but the blinds stayed shut. One time, while I was sitting out on the patio reading, I caught 1-D's patio door open ever so slightly, and a hand (which I correctly guessed to be a woman's) stuck out as if to check the temperature. When I turned to look over, the hand retreated, and the door slammed fast but gently enough to keep the blinds motionless.  

The street was vaguely lit; some stores had signs that blinked, and the neon lights flooded the street. Small rainbows glistened over the water drains, slick and black. The meows of an orange calico cat flooded our ears and then its tail rubbed up against John’s pants.

It’s almost three in the morning, and my mother’s half asleep. I understand when she declines. My irritation over identifying the song or chiptune or whatever it is–she’s humoring this with a thinly veiled sense of worry.  

I still have my phone. During the last few weeks, I don’t think they gave me my phone in some of the hospitals–it’s hard to remember. The seizures started four or five nights ago.  

“Honey, we can talk about this later,” Ken says in a stagey voice now, tilting his head toward Sandra, who’s reappeared with the young couple, the three of them staring. 

 “I want to talk about it now, honey,” Mary says. “You think I don’t know where you go on your so-called bowling nights?” 

At night, we lie in bed and tell stories about the people we’ve met at the Marx, the things we’ve heard and seen, and we try to scare each other for fun. We talk about The Shining, which we saw just before we moved here, when a babysitter wanted to see it so bad she took us to a matinee and made us swear not to tell our mother.

It’s not much but redemption begins in the smallest acts. A tiny step towards the light is a supersonic flight from the blood-red darkness of his past. As Michael hammers another plank of wood to the window that opens up to the veranda, Harrison sits next to him and passes him nails. 

I tilt my head back too and see a white cloud enveloping our room. With it came a cold, like we were standing in our freezer, and one by one little snowflakes fell around us. My dollhouse, already destroyed by the thunderstorm he created before, started to be covered in white. It looked like Christmastime and I imagined my dolls inside, running over to look outside at the snow.  

The man grazed the pocket of his leather jacket, revealing the edge of what I knew to be a gun. The only other time I’d ever seen one had been in the cupholder of my friend Jack’s Chevy Impala. It was the first time that I glimpsed the graveness of his addiction.  

The very first wish I ever granted for someone was my mother’s. My mother’s only wish in the entire world was to become a planet. One that could not sustain life or anything or anyone. She wanted nothing more than to become a planet that had nothing on it and spun out forever into cold, dark space.  

People talk about how badly “Washington’s NFL Team” is doing and your husband uses the words “unwatchable.”

The long-hair grey with jaundiced eyes and matching teeth closes in on me. I think it’s in poor health. Old-timers always say, ‘It is a good idea to maintain a stare. They’ll chicken out.’ It’s a bad idea to have one in your face, too.

I remember from my old days. I am better now. There are two kinds of people who hike Runyon Canyon. Those who hike Runyon Canyon and those who are hoping to find a private enclave in the woods to score or shoot up or meet a stranger. There was also once a severed head found not too far from where I am right this moment. So to murder could be added to that list. Although I am not sure the murder occurred exactly here.

“Thanks, hon,” Ruth said. She retrieved two dollars from the register and stuck it in the long pocket at the base of her apron. “Sweet girl,” Ruth said to one of the men at the counter, leaning over in his direction. The man adjusted his ballcap with his thumb and forefinger and resumed the tale he’d been telling when Isabel had interrupted to order.

So I have come here to ask you a question, one to decide your fate. Back there, and Rosario pointed behind him again, they want to toss you in jail. And if I’m honest, Ivanchenko, if you disappoint me, I will let them. I don’t have a problem with letting the dogs eat you from the guts on out if that’s what it means. You defaced my brother’s life, you know?

The jogger, an ultra-fit man in his fifties, dressed expensively in body-tight black Spandex and color-shock pink-and-yellow Nikes, swept down North Lombard, keeping to its straight center line as if his life depended on it. Eyes trained forward, he no more saw the couple and their dog, the woman picking up her paper or the waiting schoolkids, than they saw him, not really, not until he dropped.

My mother’s voice calls out just as I take a seat on the edge of the bed. I’m lightheaded as my breasts surge with milk, suddenly soaking my sweatshirt. I hear the car door slam. Before she steps into the RV, I grab a blanket from behind me and toss it to the floor, covering as much of the blood as I can.

“My God,” she says, staring at the stained sheets, at the bloody paw prints that stop at her feet.

I ventured out of my cabin to find the captain. I needed to know who else was on the ship. When I opened my cabin door I froze in the frame. The hallway was consumed by darkness. The electrical problems must extend to the whole floor rather than just my cabin. I grabbed the half-used candlestick from my desk and stepped into the hall.

There was a knock at the door. Owen already knew it would be those two fresh-faced missionaries out to convert Amelia. She was too tender-hearted to tell them no, so they kept trying. If they could offer some tangible proof of God, maybe a free month’s rent or an occasional Sunday off, she could be more easily convinced.

I move out onto the field and take in what should be fresh air. It’s as putrid out here as it was inside. I see them in each end zone. Big ones. Roaches the size of Smartcars. Their rust-colored shells sheath them in a thicker skin than I’m used to seeing. Have they come this far this fast?

Well, says Rob, I guess so, like he’s reluctant but they’ve convinced him. He starts typing. Okay. The Adventures of Sophia and Thomas. His voice does not betray his guilt at being a manipulative dick. Forgetting them all that time. Using them now. But they are his characters, right?