Saving Della
Amidst the sonic commotion that accompanies the beginning of any new period, the high pitch of a whistle summoned the kids' attention. Gathering 'round, they all sat in a circle in the middle of the gymnasium floor to hear the rules of the game they'd be playing. Standing tall in the middle of the circle, the teacher explained the rules loudly.
The Rules
Two teams: The Pinnies and the No-Pinnies. Straws would be drawn to determine who ended up on each. The No-Pinnies' goal is to capture. The Pinnies' goal is to evade. A Pinnie is successfully captured upon being tagged by a No-Pinnie. Subsequently, any captured Pinnie must proceed directly to the nearest of four possible jails, located in each of the four corners of the gymnasium.
Drawing attention to the assortment of foam blocks scattered about the gym, he explained that they were for exclusive use by No-Pinnies in whatever capacity they found fit. Furthermore, it was clarified that any contact whatsoever between a foam block and a Pinnie, be it intentional or incidental, also constituted being tagged and, as such, rendered that Pinnie captured. He closed by saying that the game would conclude upon the successful internment of each and every Pinnie inside the four collective jails.
With that, he opened the equipment closet and pulled out a box of colored mesh and a large bunch of straws bound by a rubber band.
A short time later, straws drawn and mesh donned, another hit from the whistle around the pinnie-less teacher's neck beckoned his allies for an impromptu No-Pinnie huddle.
The Girl
Despite his own luck during the straw-drawing phase, one boy took note of an unfortunate pull by a girl in class named Magdalena. Everyone called her Della. He liked Della because she was always nice to him.
One time, a deep-voiced eighth grader accidentally knocked over a drink onto the lunch table during an animated retelling of a skateboard trick. With everyone's attention fixed on the booming orator, nobody noticed the puddle soaking the boy’s turkey sandwich. But Della noticed, and then gave him the other half of her sandwich, and even though it was ham instead, he was still happy.
So on this day, Della’s pinnie made him sad: a stroke of bad luck, and suddenly she was being chased by a frustrated middle-aged athlete with a posse of minions. The game certainly wasn’t fair; every kid in class knew that (even before it had started). The best anyone could do was just hope to end up on the fortunate side of the straws.
But because Della wore mesh now, the boy made sure to pay especially close attention to whatever strategy the clump of No-Pinnies gathered in the corner of the gym would ultimately deploy.
The Tactics
With his gang of No-Pinnies clustered around him, the teacher took a knee to divulge the details of the undiscussed and unelected master plan he’d already decided upon. As their de facto General, he explained that the best way to capture Pinnies was to split the No-Pinnies into multiple sub-groups for the purpose of leveraging No-Pinnie strength against Pinnie weakness across multiple fronts.
For starters, he’d send the fastest and most agile No-Pinnies on a straightforward chase, ordering the assemblage of sprinters to target the heaviest Pinnies since they’d likely also be the slowest. He pointed out the importance of targeting heavy boy Pinnies specifically, warning that while they would be slow, their weight would also make them the strongest of all the opposing Pinnies. In order to neutralize this, those Pinnies would be sought out early and intentionally. This No-Pinnie unit was dubbed the Dogfighters.
Then, he’d arm the biggest and strongest No-Pinnies with the foam blocks to be used as ammunition in a type of through-the-air onslaught, commanding the cohort to aim primarily for girl Pinnies and smaller boy Pinnies, assuming they’d be the enemy faction least capable of reliably dodging any fast-incoming fire. This No-Pinnie unit was dubbed the Firing Squad.
Lastly, he instructed those still without established roles in the blitzkrieg-style offensive (a pack of mostly girl No-Pinnies) to band together and use any un-thrown foam blocks to build walls in front of each of the gym’s four jails. This way, captured Pinnies would be unable to escape and rejoin the ruckus alongside their allies. He called this No-Pinnie unit the Homemakers.
With a hoot and a holler and plenty of false enthusiasm for the General’s surefire scheme, the boy joined the rest of his fellow No-Pinnies in assuming the starting position: forward-leaning with one hand against the designated gymnasium wall, opposite that against which the Pinnies began.
The Hunt
Roles assigned and goals aligned, alas, a third and final screech from the whistle marked the official start of the hunt.
As instructed, the Dogfighters almost immediately scored a sizable number of sizable captures. Upon being tagged, the captured Pinnies took their place inside the jail nearest to them at the moment of capture. However, given how early in the hunt these captures were made, the planned retaining walls had not yet been constructed by the Homemakers. Therefore, with relative ease, nearly every Pinnie captured during this stage all but sauntered out of their respective jails while nobody was looking. That said, most of them would go on to be captured again and again as the hunt carried on. And each successive time, escape became more and more difficult as construction on the foam walls progressed.
Unused blocks were quickly seized, aimed, and thrown with notable velocity by the Firing Squad at the most vulnerable Pinnies. The pace at which Pinnies were captured by the airborne attack proved slower than the rate at which the chase unit procured captures. Many of the shots fired were successful. Many were not. However, any unsuccessful shots taken by the Firing Squad simply resulted in blocks being relocated from one side of the gymnasium to the other, at which point they were retrieved by a Homemaker and utilized in the fortification of the nearest wall.
As the hunt carried on, a natural cycle began to appear across the events playing out on the battlefield.
First, an ample wave of Pinnies would be captured by the Dogfighters. Then, a smattering of the remaining Pinnies would be tagged out by shots from the Firing Squad. Finally, after being captured and jailed, a throng of brave Pinnies would shrewdly break free by synchronizing their attempted escapes such that they’d all try to flee at the same time, overwhelming the opposing forces and creating confusion and disarray amongst their captors. Inevitably, a large number of these Pinnies would fail in their escape, either by making contact with the wall on their way out, being tagged by a vigilant Dogfighter, or falling victim to a sharp shot by an out-of-sight Firing Squad goon. However, with each successive attempt, a select few of the slipperiest and most elusive Pinnies would inevitably escape with success and prolong the hunt.
In enough time, progress on the walls blocking captured Pinnies from escape proved respectable and effective. For this reason, with each new cycle, a growing concentration of captured Pinnies would remain in captivity while a growing concentration of their attempted escapes proved wholly unsuccessful. In short, as the battle persisted, fewer and fewer Pinnies were able to stay free.
However, despite the natural tides seeming to be rigged in favor of the No-Pinnies, an unexpected (but consistent) pattern emerged.
Strangely, there came cycles in which Pinnies would regain strength in numbers, albeit marginal, thanks to a series of careless errors and/or silly blunders by No-Pinnies. In at least one instance, a boy No-Pinnie from the Firing Squad missed a shot at a passing Pinnie so badly that he knocked over the nearly-finished, nearly-perfect retaining wall in front of one of the jails (and freed nearly every Pinnie in that jail). As cycles repeated, such mistakes came in waves.
The net effect of such recurrences was a kind of sustained equilibrium in which Pinnies would be captured, Pinnies would escape, Pinnies would be recaptured, No-Pinnies would inexplicably commit tactical missteps, Pinnies would re-escape, and the whole process would start again.
From the throes of the battlefield, the General grew increasingly irate at the confusing failures of his units. As he watched, it occurred to him that the rebellion of Pinnies in this particular third period was the only group to date that’d managed to overcome his many-times proven tactics. Nonetheless, he recognized that this particular game appeared destined to end in a stalemate; the first time he'd ever seen a single game survive the duration of an entire period. And Della stayed free.
Index 0
He stood in front of the window looking down at his phone while he waited for the microwave to beep. He started clicking from link to link, reading news and watching videos.
He found himself on a Wikipedia page listing tragic train crashes. As he browsed, he noticed one crash on the list with his small home state’s abbreviation next to it.
He read that the crash in his home state took place in his hometown. One article said it happened at a rail crossing that intersects with the street that he lived on.
He looked up and out the window, and noticed that from where he stood he could see an intersection with a traffic light and a train crossing gate. He realized he was looking at the site of the crash and spontaneously learning about it in the same moment, as though it were a bubble, springing from a pot of boiling water, wanting to be thought about.
The ROSES Card
This story begins on a Wednesday with the return of a woman to Rochester from a business trip in Tampa.
Following her return, she notices her daily movements intersecting with those of the same plain-looking man with medium-length brown hair for eleven consecutive days: every single day, once per day, her life crosses paths with his by way of a seemingly coincidental encounter.
On the first day, she sees him at a gas station. She stops to get gasoline on the way to her office in the morning and notices the brown-haired man for the first time. He’s filling up on the other side of the same pump she’s using. Despite his unremarkable appearance, she notices him thanks to the red shoes he wears, which catch her attention. She stops at the same station many mornings but has never seen him before, there or anywhere else.
On the second day, she sees him at a bagel shop. Roughly once per week she buys a bagel for lunch from the same small store located in a strip plaza exactly one-quarter mile away from her office. While there, she notices him for the second time, standing in the queue for the register as she passes by it on her way out the door and back to her car. Despite how often she patronizes the establishment, she’s never seen him there before either.
On the third day, she sees him in traffic. She’s waiting to turn left through a busy intersection at a blinking yellow arrow. Naturally, as she waits for a break in the stream of the oncoming lane, several cars come to a stop behind her as they wait to turn as well. When the opportunity finally arrives, she turns through the intersection swiftly but notices him driving the car two vehicles behind hers in the line that follows. She can see his face and brown hair in her mirrors and knows with certainty that it’s the same man. Miles down the road, she realizes that he’s not behind her anymore though she’s unsure of when or where he turned off.
Inconsequential but consistent run-ins like these continue for eight more days.
In enough time, the events no longer feel coincidental. Even so, she doesn’t know what to make of them. Is it possible that he's following her? If so, then why? Is he dangerous? Should she be afraid? Despite the strangeness of their repeated comings-together, neither of them ever acknowledges the other. They never speak, or even make eye contact. But she notices his presence each time he's near. She wonders if he notices when she's near too.
. . .
On the twelfth day, she buys another bagel. However, instead of driving back to her office and eating it at her desk like she usually does, she decides to drive to a small park that’s nearby. She goes there for lunch sometimes when the weather’s nice. The park she chooses has a pond with a walking path to it from the parking lot. She follows the path to an empty bench in front of the water and sits down to eat. For almost thirty minutes, she enjoys it. She likes the privacy and the quiet. It feels good to see the sun and the grass and to be comfortable. During those minutes, it’s altogether peaceful. But at what seems like a pinnacle, she hears footsteps walking along the stone path which brought her to the bench where she sits.
Looking up, she sees Red Shoes advancing towards her along the path. He moves normally, approaching at a comfortable pace. He appears relaxed as he grows nearer. Reaching the bench, he sits down next to her. His demeanor radiates a solace which casts a sort of calming effect over her. After several moments of silence, he finally acknowledges her, speaking for the first time across all their convergences. Looking towards her at last, he confirms that he has in fact been following her for many days and even concedes that he's suspected for nearly a week that his cover is blown.
He reveals that he’s a private investigator working for the Monroe County District Attorney's office. He explains that the D.A.'s office has hired him to follow a specific (unnamed) individual of interest whom it’s actively building a criminal case against.
He further reveals that during the course of his tailing the Individual, he's grown concerned at the frequency with which the Individual is placing himself in unnatural proximity to her. Because of this, he’s come to believe with high conviction that the Individual is following her. In light of this conclusion and in the interest of her safety, he’s made the executive decision to formally abandon whatever’s left of his cover, intercept her movements, and officially inform her of the situation and its details.
As he speaks, he discreetly slides what looks like a business card towards her across the space between them on the bench. She picks it up and examines it. It’s proportional to a standard business card but scaled down and feels more akin to a credit card with respect to weight. It’s cut from a thick cover stock which is off-white in color. On one side of the card, a street address is written in all black lowercase letters. She notices that the whole address is printed on just one line, not split across multiple lines the way one would see on the front of an envelope. On the other side of the card, only one word is printed. In all black capital letters it reads: ROSES.
He explains that the address on the card is that of an active (but undisclosed) safe house in Rochester: an unassuming yellow, two-story, single-family home with white shutters and a red mailbox. He claims that his agency has labeled her an at-risk person in the wake of his most recent briefing concerning the Individual.
He tells her that if she goes to the location on the card and gives the card to the man that answers the door, she will be offered entry into an unnamed, government-funded program which exists to protect the whereabouts and well-being of at-risk persons like herself. He explains that the man at the safe house is his associate, a Documents Specialist whose role is to usher new members into the program. He tells her that if she chooses to accept the program’s protections, the Specialist will provide her with the necessary paperwork to prove her membership in the program and confirm her assumed identity.
He adds that while his and his associate's agency has determined that her circumstances more than qualify her for admission into the program, ultimately, entry is entirely voluntary and thus the decision is hers alone to make.
This story ends with the woman, unsure of Red Shoes' motives, looking down at the ROSES card in her hands as she ponders what to do next.
Relax
My sense is that they're wrong when they say it feels like a weight lifts off you. That's something I hear people say when they talk about what it feels like to relax.
But anytime I feel the anxieties that I carry with me release their grip and stop vacuuming me from the inside in order to reduce drag from the world as it passes by the cabin of my life, I start to re-inflate. And as I do, the contact I make with reality becomes greater. And as I make it, I just feel life becoming heavier. So in my actual experience, it's the exact opposite of a weight lifting off me. Perhaps it simply comes down to a choice between whichever feels less bad: anxiety or reality.
But honestly, who knows? I don't. That might be the one thing I actually do know. I only have my senses. Maybe my sense and theirs are both wrong with respect to this entire topic. In fact, I have an even greater sense that both of our senses being wrong is the least wrong sense I can have. And behind that I have another creeping sense that it's probably that way for every topic.
Saboteurs
Two men encounter danger while on the run from the law. One of them is gravely injured and loses consciousness. Believing his partner to be dead, the other carries on, unaware that his comrade's faint is due simply to pain and not any fatal affliction.
Left behind, the injured man slowly recovers, the growth in his appetite for revenge quickly outpacing the rate at which his strength returns. Nevertheless, it does, and eventually he carried on as well.
. . .
The two continue to flee separately. Both men struggle on their journeys, experiencing numerous close calls along the way and nearly fumbling their precious (albeit borrowed) freedom on many occasions. They remain at large, but often at great risk and frequently owing the success of their continued elusions to little more than luck.
. . .
Before long, their paths inevitably cross again. The abandoner is shocked to see the apparent ghost of his once fellow fugitive in the flesh—the sudden realization that he'd deserted him at a moment most dire immediately summoning enormous guilt. The recovered man, disregarding their complicated bygones, suggests that the two reunite their efforts, arguing that they each stand the greatest chance of buying the most possible time by re-joining forces. So, they proceed together; their shared slate evidently wiped clean by the depths of their independent desperations.
. . .
Eventually, the two encounter authorities. When they do, the recovered man intentionally foils their escape so as to ensure his accomplice's capture—retribution for the past betrayal. In turn, the abandoner is apprehended. The recovered man slips away undetected and does so in perpetuity, collecting crimes as he continues—committing another with each new back he stabs for the purpose of prolonging his own liberty.
. . .
In enough time, there are no men left unlike the recovered man: defined by spiteful agendas and permanent distrust. But their selected-for kind thrives, carrying on as heads-down practitioners of data-driven decision-making in the best interest of the company.
Poker Player’s Dilemma
I suspect that one of the worst things that can happen to a poker player is to experience success early. Because more often than not, it means they're getting lucky. But a young player won’t know the difference between doing it right and doing it wrong if they’re busy winning.
And if a player is a certain type of person (the outcome-oriented kind), it can be especially dangerous. Because when the luck runs out and the winning stops, they'll keep doing the same thing. And instead of changing, they'll just start complaining about how it's not working anymore.
And after that, they still won't change. They'll just keep losing, claiming that whatever the problem is, it isn't their fault. Eventually, they'll even reach a point where, instead of changing, they'll start recalling and reciting past instances of victory. And in enough time, they'll increase the frequency with which they do that: recalling and reciting, more and more and more. And as they do, they'll matter less and less and less. Because nobody cares about losers. Least of all the ones who can’t own it.
Two Jethros
A Visitor voices concern over the safety of his Host's new neighborhood after the Host moves into an apartment building in the city's North End. To quell the Visitor's worry and demonstrate the low propensity for crime amongst the area's residents, the Host leaves his own wristwatch on the building's stoop. Confident that it'll still be there when they return in the morning, the Host ushers the Visitor back inside and the two carry on with the events of their evening.
. . .
Later that night, the watch is stolen by a passerby. Nobody sees. The Thief promptly pawns the timepiece at a 24-hour shop for a quick sum of cash which he uses that night to purchase high-quality narcotics from an acquaintance who manufactures the goods locally. Given the wholesale nature of the transaction, the Manufacturer sells him a large quantity of product at a rate well below its market value.
With the goods in hand, the Thief travels south to a wealthy suburb located slightly beyond the city limits. Contrary to appearances, the affluent community is home to a populace of heavy users with an insatiable appetite for North End product.
Once there, he reaches out to a longtime neighborhood contact: a regional distributor with a standing offer to buy out any available North End supply. Leveraging the Distributor's urgency to restock, the Thief sells him the goods at a radically elevated price point.
Having fetched sufficiently more than the original value of the stolen capital, the Thief returns to the North End and retrieves the watch from pawn, paying back both the cost of the initial loan in full and any applied interest. Pocketing the remaining margin as profit, he returns the item to its rightful place on the stoop from which it was taken.
. . .
Emerging the next morning, the Host and the Visitor step outside to find the watch undisturbed. Reiterating to the Visitor how safe the area is, the Host dons the accessory and the two depart for another day's happenings.
The friends diverge for good that afternoon, and following a text message to the Thief, the Visitor collects his share of the previous night's profits that evening.
Misery, Learned
When I was a kid, I believed that happiness could be bought, the logic being that any time I felt unhappy, I could simply buy whatever thing whose absence was making me feel that way.
New shoes.
Video games.
CDs.
And so on.
Like many, my definition of happiness was anchored to the ownership of things. And like many, it seemed simple to me: those with the most had the most. And those who had the most were the happiest.
I even remember being challenged: "What if you fall in love with someone who doesn't love you? You can't buy them." I thought, "Of course you can. Just buy everything that makes them happy and they'll love you for it."
But soon after that, I fell for a girl in class who couldn't buy any of the things I wanted. And even if she could have, I wanted nothing anyway; only her.
Alongside my attraction to her came the realization that my abrupt unhappiness had nothing to do with any lack of things owned. Lo and behold, it was more complicated than that. And as such, so was I.
And so was attraction.
And love.
And probably other things too.
Maybe even everything.
And with that wisdom came the thought that if I felt the way that I did so suddenly, then she may already feel some kind of way too. And if she did, then no matter how much I might ever be able to buy her, the possibility would always remain that it may never be enough—a lesson which introduced me to a brand of unhappiness out of which I can never buy myself, and which goes by the name, Misery.
Camping Family
Leaving their Massachusetts home behind, a man and his family set out for upstate New York in a recreational vehicle he'd rented for the summer. His wife rode alongside him at the front, reading the map and telling him when and where to turn. Their two children, a young girl and her even-younger brother, entertained themselves in the back.
Arriving at their destination, a secluded plot on the banks of a northeastern lake, they unloaded the vehicle and began constructing a proper campsite. After pitching a small tent for the children and a larger one next to it for themselves, the man and his wife unpacked chairs, food, lanterns, and other items before starting a fire upon which to cook. Sitting comfortably around its flames, they all unwound from the hours of travel to the hums of a portable radio.
Sometime later, with hot dogs digesting, the man snuffed out the fire for fear of wandering embers in the night. Retiring to their respective tents, the camping family officially turned in. Echoes of the unrestricted wilderness lulled their tired minds to darkness.
. . .
Waking the next morning, the man emerged from his tent, started a new day's fire, and began cooking breakfast. A while after, the sizzling sounds and savory scents of frying bacon woke his wife and daughter. Emerging from their neighboring tents, they joined him outside and spoke of plans for the day while preparing to eat.
Having been sent to wake her brother, the girl ducked back into the smaller tent but didn't see him inside. Their mess of blankets, pillows, and sleeping bags had become strewn about during the night. She pressed down on the pile in search of his buried body but felt nothing. Scattering them further to no avail, she left the tent and strolled the short distance to the R.V. at the edge of the site. But her search of its interior revealed no evidence of him being there either.
Alerting her parents, they instructed her to sit quietly at the food-filled table and told her not to move a muscle. Unsure of how literally the order was meant to be followed, she refrained from beginning to eat.
Initiating their own search, the man explored areas of thick grass and brush close by while his wife walked down the narrow, dirt access road by which they'd arrived. Both of them shouted the boy's name as they did. At one point, the man strayed as far away as a nearby stream, hoping the curious youngster had wandered there in the early-morning hours in search of the source of its burbling sounds. But he found nothing. The woman continued down the road for some time, hoping to encounter a patrolling park ranger or friendly angler who might help her look. But she saw nobody. Eventually, they both returned to the camp.
Upon returning, their rule-breaking daughter approached them, grabbed their hands, and led them around the back of the tent in which she and her brother had slept. Facing its backside, she pointed down at a large flap-like hole in its surface, near the ground. Squatting down to inspect it further, the man immediately demanded that his wife and daughter board the R.V. Upon realizing that the hole had been cut—not ripped—he knew it was time to contact authorities.
. . .
Having sped into the nearest village, the R.V. rushed to its small police station. The panic-soaked air about the vehicle's three occupants was immediately clear to the officer with whom they spoke. The unsuspecting junior officer was quick to call in additional personnel. However, despite the situation's palpable urgency, law enforcement remained calm and responded to the family's concerns with composure. When faced with criticism in the years that followed, officers attributed the relaxed nature of their collective reaction to the Academy's training.
After alerting additional stations in the immediate area to the report of a missing child, the village's station (along with several others) dispatched a flurry of officers to the campsite to search for the boy, reaching it via a crude map drawn by the couple while they and their daughter were instructed to remain in the custody of those unsent. What's more, each of the three was brought into a separate room in the building for questioning, the nature and intensity of the inquiries with which they were confronted varying depending on the officer administering them. Hours later, with those dispatched having returned, the consensus throughout the department became that one of two possibilities was true: either the child wandered off during a window of insufficient supervision, or the boy's father was somehow responsible for his unknown whereabouts.
When asked to explain this conclusion in the time since that day, many officers cite the man's muted demeanor during questioning as revealing some manner of culpability by him, often using the phrase "cold and unresponsive" to describe it. Those dispatched to the campsite and who weren't present during his questioning simply alluded to the absence of any evidence of suspicious third-party activity as convincing them of his responsibility in some capacity.
Still, in the days after the boy's vanishing, law enforcement continued to examine the campsite and surrounding areas for clues, expanding its search efforts in both manpower and geographic scope. It took nearly two weeks of continuous round-the-clock combing of the vast wooded and mountainous landscapes before anyone involved felt comfortable admitting that they were running out of places to look. It took only days after that for investigative efforts to begin dissolving. Before long, they'd grown completely stagnant given the lack of any actionable information.
. . .
Even until his own death, the boy's father never wavered in asserting that his near-catatonic affect in the period after his son's disappearance, that which officers interpreted as being probative of his involvement, was merely the product of shock and disbelief at the reality of the unimaginable situation. For the rest of his life, however, there persisted an insurmountable guilt inside him upon admitting, though only to himself, that he'd always held an affection for his daughter that he never felt as strongly for his son.
His daughter lived the rest of her life largely unaffected. While the logic of the incident sat intact in her memory, it did so void of any debilitating emotional component. She understood the course of events and never struggled to appreciate the reality that she'd never see her brother again. But the gravity of any danger she herself may have been in that night eventually became overshadowed by more traditionally formative life events which occurred in the years after, and which came to define her youth with greater profundity.
The boy's mother struggled mightily, however. Composed largely of bouts of mania and rootless sobs, the subsequent tear-filled years of hysterics at the thought of her son eventually silenced any mention of him. And while the items of his which she kept (the pill-surfaced ThunderCats pajamas which she continued to wash, the Lite-Brite on which he'd spelled out his name and whose batteries she continued to replace) remained forever haunting, nothing jolted her core as violently as the sound of the ringing telephone, immovably perched upon the family's kitchen wall as its spiraled taupe cord hung low. Its note became an illusory sound which, to her, seemed to twist eternally upward with a brand of hope that proved impossible to suppress: a foolish hope that an investigator may be on the other end, calling to share a breakthrough in her son's case; a desperate hope that whoever was responsible for whatever befell him may simply be calling to tell it to her; a delusional hope that the voice on the other end might be that of her son himself, calling to tell her that he still loved her. But the other end never brought any of those things.
Yet the note rang out still, rising, but never dying. Continuing up and up and up, to nothing. No resolution. No catharsis. And each time, there came another climbing behind it. And then another after that.
The Catch
A boy, his sister, and their dad arrive at a shore to fish. The man opens a cooler and grabs a beer from the new six-pack inside. The boy eyes the cans from a distance, hoping to steal one. He asks his sister to toss him a lure from the tackle box at her feet, next to the cooler. She does. The three of them fish.
. . .
A short time later, none of them has caught any. Frustrated, the man decides they'll move to a new spot. Fumbling her words, the girl asks to stay, believing she's on the verge of a catch. Impatient, he insists they relocate. They do. Resettled, he opens the cooler and grabs one of the four cans inside. They keep fishing.
Honest Tom Ln.
A man and a woman enter a ballroom arm-in-arm. Their guests all stand and clap while an orchestra plays. The couple walks to a table at the front of the room. She sits at it, but he remains standing. The orchestra fades and the clapping ceases as he picks up a glass from the table, raising it to toast his and her fifty years together. Afterwards, their guests clap once more and resume chatter as the orchestra launches into another number.
. . .
Later, the couple dances slowly in the middle of the marble floor, amid the crowd. With her head and arms, clad in white evening gloves, resting upon his tuxedoed shoulders, neither of them speaks. They merely sway, spinning slowly; their movements never rushed nor out of sync.
. . .
Two wrecked cars rest peacefully in the center of a residential intersection on a brightly lit summer's afternoon. An injured teenage girl sits curbside as an officer restrains her while medical personnel tend to the injuries of the teenage boy in the driver's seat. She looks towards the vehicles as she sobs.
A Tale of True Crime in the South
In 1971, a man entered a small bank in a small North Carolina town and demanded all the money in the safe.
The police arrived at the scene within minutes but mistook another man in the building for the robber. Despite his cries of innocence, the suspect was arrested while the true thief escaped undetected.
When the man was presented to the public as the alleged perpetrator, the media noted that the case against him was thin and suggested that the incident might be one of mistaken identity. Captivated by the theory, the public grew to believe the accused to be a victim of unjust persecution by the judicial system—showering him with support and adoration. Subsequently, after appearing in court and having the charges against him dismissed due to a lack of evidence, the accidental martyr was set free.
. . .
In the years that followed, the once-admiring public lost interest: first in the man's story, and eventually in the man. Riddled with cold, sleepless nights spent longing for the warmth of the fame and celebrity that the events of years prior had brought, the man entered a bank in the neighboring county one afternoon and demanded all the money in the safe.
Coincidentally, in that bank, on that day, and at that moment... the never previously apprehended thief responsible for the years-old crime was depositing a paycheck to the teller inside.
When the speedy police arrived this time, they mistook the depositor for the robber committing the theft in progress while his once inadvertent patsy fled unnoticed. But after the now-innocent patron was arrested and presented to the courts as the contemporary culprit—while his prior offense remained undiscovered—he too was released thanks to the case against him having been built upon insufficient evidence.
. . .
Neither man ever contacted the other—nor any authorities—regarding his respective role in the crime which he committed, but for which the other was arrested.
Neither man was ever brought to justice.