When the world can’t sleep
Mar 11, 2025

Agatha lay on her left side, then on her back then on her left side again, then on her back and then over to her right side, no rest. Her mind whirreled. The radio called it the second World War.…

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No one sleeps in this room
Mar 11, 2025

The day after my mother’s funeral Daddy quietly moved himself out of the Master bedroom and into the guestroom. He never slept in that Master bed they’d shared for 65 years again. Right after Daddy’s move across the hall he…

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Breathless
Mar 11, 2025

One of my students, a ten year old with identified emotional problems, decided he really wanted to challenge me to a holding your breath contest. He didn’t have a lot of same-age friends and I thought he just wanted to…

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When the world cannot sleep
Mar 11, 2025

She dreams. She can't remember all the small stories behind her eyes, who can? But the last dream felt awake, like her real life. A white room, she thinks, yes, that's where I was. Maybe a doctor's office, a clinic.…

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Fan’s Inner Monologue, Part 1 of 2 (for Ch 7)
Mar 11, 2025

That American, she's so ignorant. A granddaughter of the KMT. But maybe I can convince her, and then what? Vivian told me to be nice; it's to get Yi Ting's on stage. But so what? Our trauma isn't for parading…

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Fan’s Inner Monologue, Part 2 of 2 (for Ch 7)
Mar 11, 2025

Finally, Fan asks her what are you looking for? This is the question I’d been waiting to ask. Maybe I'd been waiting for her to ask me. To be honest, I’ve just been trying to figure out who is in…

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Mar 11, 2025

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Kevin #10
Mar 11, 2025

Today was a mom day. On alternating weeks, he stayed with his mom or his dad and this was a mom week. His mom lived with her boyfriend two towns farther away from school than his dad's house. He kept…

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almost famous
Mar 10, 2025

Agatha knew Andres was a man who adhered to a schedule, but she didn't know how scheduled until their marriage began. She was the cook of the house, yet Andres insisted on arranging all of their cupboards plate by plate…

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It was the answer to everything
Mar 10, 2025

When I first began teaching High School English to officially labeled “low literacy” students I wasn’t sure how to approach them. Not because of the obvious gaps in our age, gender, race, religion, family situation, economic class, religion or politics…

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Jess Storm #1
Mar 10, 2025

(Note: I'm using this morning writing to work on a novel in progress. We're fairly far in with this character, an environmental activist.) I’d laid it all out on the bed after I got back from dropping Ivy off at…

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Earlier Days
Mar 10, 2025

"This boy," Don thought to himself as Kevin disappeared into his phone. "Seems to be waiting for life to happen." Though Kevin has grown up primarily in west county, the muffled beats of aggressive, inner-city rap music pulsed from his…

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