Otium

Piotr's Novel ($ One Million)

by Jonathan Ullyot
31 January 2007

I am talking fast over all of this because this is the sad part and I am not sad or deported now, and I don’t like this part at all. I wanted to cut my poor Russian throat with razor. But these razors are too small in America, and pushed 3 and 4 in the plastic cases so you just snap them on the stick. And they are also very expensive. So I thought it would be easy to jump off roof. But it is hard to get up there and it was second choice, so I wanted to wait for Sunji to come back first to see if she could help me.

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Excerpt from Conception

by Kalisha Buckhanon
31 January 2007

“Whatever you want. I got money. I mean, this ain’t all I do. I do more than drive a cab. I got a house. I got money. I could take you out, anytime, wherever you want to go…I got money.”

“Well give it to me.” I shut my eyes tight, and the rising vomit sunk down once more. I opened my eyes long enough to see his hips jerked forward as he lifted himself off the seat to reach into his left pants pocket. I had been right—a slick black pistol slid out right along with countless bills. He bent down to collect them before I could ask, and when I opened my eyes again his hands were outstretched and in them he held a pile of cash which looked like a fat, giant spider in the moonlight.

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The Gift

by Lila Shapiro
31 January 2007

When I was twelve, my grandmother started talking about death. She brought death up like this: we were driving in her car, swerving back and fourth across four lanes of a South Florida highway, when she turned towards me and shouted (she was hard of hearing), “Lucy! Promise me this—when I go, you be the first to get to the jewels.”

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Excerpts from “Untitled Phil”

by Jenna Telesca
31 January 2007

This time of year belonged to the watermen. Men that drove boats that were reliable and made for efficiency. Men who painted their boats grey and had only a tiny alcove for protection from the water spray. These men were starting a long day of crabbing, fixing broken crab traps and hosing down their boats.

Phil Larken was not among these men.

Phil Larken was lying in his bed, fast asleep, dreaming. In his dream, Phil was squinting against the sun as he pulled the pots hand over hand into the boat. He was surveying the trap. Eight medium size crabs and two softshells. The crabs climbed over the cage and the chicken remnants, raging against the capture. Deceit! Deceit! They screamed to him.

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In Order to Remove the Boot

by Megan Stielstra
13 January 2006

By the time she’d finished all the letters, the bottle was gone, too, and Penny cried twenty-six proof for all the things he was supposed to have said but hadn’t. I love you and I need you and sweetheart and darling, and before she knew it she was ripping the letters into little pieces, slowly at first, with deliberate, even tears—riiiip—I think of you often?—riiip—Fortunate to have met?—riiiiip—You’ve been considering? But as she threw the little confetti scraps into the air she knew that he was the closest she’d ever get to love—and the ripping got fast and angry and destructive, papers flying around the bedroom, origami birds crunched underfoot, deep gutsy sobs pulling from her middle ‘till she finally collapsed in a lump and balled into the carpeting, that sniveling pathetic sort of crying, the soundtrack to desperate acts.

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Love, Mum

by Miklós Vámos
13 January 2006

Mum,

They’ve taken Grandma off in an ambulance. And Grandpa has smashed the water jug and he drank two bottles of wine and he’s raving drunk. Take this parcel in to Granny. It’s got a nightgown, slippers, and soap in it. She’s at St. Roch’s. I’m off to drawing class.

Mari

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This Babalu Goes Out To You…

by Hugo Perez
14 October 2005

I am the son of Ricky Ricardo… I see that you do not believe me, that you are skeptical. The look on your faces seems to ask why the son of the great Rumbero is working in a small lounge off Calle Ocho in Miami instead of performing on his own TV show on Telemundo, or perhaps on Sabado Gigante as a special guest of that great host and humanitarian Don Francisco. Before I continue with my next song, I will explain.

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Mourning

by Joe Hanson
27 May 2005

Before Gabe was buried, Sidney thoughtfully placed a handwritten poem into the breast pocket of his suit. Three days later, she decided she wanted it back. She had tried to rewrite it, but just couldn’t match the original. She even tried staring at a picture of Gabe and imagining his corpse, but still, the words would not come. This left no other choice but to dig up his grave and take the poem back—she just dreaded seeing it again. The words might be faded or smudged, leaving blanks that could never, ever be filled.

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Angela on the Road

by Jamie O'Hara Laurens
27 May 2005

In the shadow of a tree, I hold still. I quiet my breath. I don’t want to listen but I can’t just ask him to tell me what happened. He tells her the man was old, at least in his seventies. He was waiting for the bus with about four other people at a stop on the road curving away from the university. The other people at the bus stop said he got fed up, and though he was groggy, he was absolutely determined to cross the street. They said they tried to stop him.

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Excerpts from Free Burning

by Bayo Ojikutu
11 April 2005

“Ten years you known me.” I only recognize that I’m yelling watching Ta’s face cringe at every third syllable. “Shoulda come to figure I ain’t the type to be about no half-ass bullshit. I look like a blue collar factory nigga? Ain’t bout to be one to pay your rent.”

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Excerpts from Pierce

by William Veeder
9 March 2005

Father’s fistic maxim was: First punch of the first round, daughter, nail him right between the eyes; establish who owns the ring; set the ref. to counting. The ring in question proved to be Mr. Bowles’s crammed pantry of an office on the second floor of the Republican building in Springfield.

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Vagina Dentata

by E. S. Carroll
9 March 2005

Its teeth were deceptively feathery looking, but brittle to the touch. He pushed his finger into their center, carefully, and the teeth, not sharp at all, seemed to caress it, sucking it further and deeper inside him before, with an unexpected bite, they severed his finger tip, ingesting it while blood poured across his belly…

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Finding That Special Someone, and Why It Might Be a Bit Naïve to Presume He or She Exists

by Kyle Beachy
9 March 2005

He cuts the engine and says, “Great day for a game.”

The irony being: the game will be played inside the domed stadium. The Girlfriend laughs delicately out of habit and sympathy, unable anymore to distinguish her own imitation laughter from real thing. In the backseat, the Other girlfriend smiles because she genuinely finds the Boyfriend’s sense of humor charming. The Other boyfriend stares at the back of the headrest to make sure he doesn’t roll his eyes.

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Six Views of Jerusalem

by Spencer Dew
9 March 2005

Navigation is possible by franchise restaurant alone. At the sidewalk bar known for selling pork, the table of Americans orders three club sandwiches, two of ham and cheese, feeds bills into the internet jukebox, dated dance numbers.

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Pop!

by Lee Wang
9 March 2005

“I'm about to load the bomb, Robot.”

“Get Ur Freak On,” Popbot replied.

(Why does he always have to say that? she thought to herself. That song was seriously overplayed. She’d have to upload a new song onto him, which, she realized, actually would be another way of sticking it to the proverbial Man.)

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SOS

by Tiffany Funk
9 March 2005

I’m rambling again and need to breathe and let my hand rest. I can’t write too quickly or I’ll break the lead of the pencil, and it will take too long to sharpen it on the claw end of the hammer. I can’t waste this time or this energy. I need for you to get this message and understand.

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So Much

by Merrie Greenfield
9 March 2005

She actually become this sort of inside joke around the magazine. This person who produced SOOOO MUCH CRAP. Reams of it. It was obvious after reading five pieces that it was all trash. It was sad how much manpower must have gone into just writing it all down. It contained no evidence of editing. (Oh GOD, hopefully this wasn't a piece she'd re-read and improved upon, was it?)

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