Fiction

The langur, her fur so soft and glowing it seemed to cast a halo around her, extended one arm toward a cluster of sal leaves, just within her reach.

Life by candlelight is fun at first, in a homesteading sort of way, but then suddenly there’s no way to charge your vape. And the candlewax. My god. Living in the dark was no permanent solution.

An uprooted stalk dangled from one hand, pink and fleshy, slender as a neck. A thrill bloomed in Hannah’s chest. Rhubarb, she thought, and she became excited in spite of herself, in spite of knowing better (because of it?), that they should never rip plants from the garden.

My girls were my greatest joy—sometimes I wondered how I could be the love I felt, looking at them—but the kind of happiness they gave me wasn’t the long-walks, ruminative kind. It was a slowly accreting thing, terror threaded through every layer.

I spend lots of time watching you float from squid tank to squid tank, writing down—in a cute little notebook—your observations concerning the glow in each bobtail squid’s specialized light organs.

Ma recognized the feral look in the reptiles’ eyes, the desperation in their throat flares—hunting for a mate. At least Fred had left the girlfriends behind and there was nowhere on this lake to find another.

Connell appeared in the bathroom doorway, his pale, skinny chest bare, picking his nose. Below his neck, a crescent like a reddish, smiling moon. Connell wasn’t old enough for the mark to embarrass him. Jasper wouldn’t tell him, not now. Today, Jasper was in charge. And they couldn’t stay home with no mother. Her absence was in every room.

Despite being in a small boat, there’s a surprising amount of physical action—shifting, standing, hunkering. And fluids, always important—minnow water, fish slime, even blood. Ellis chuckles. Gus will probably just want to know what handsome devil will play his part.