by Kirsty Logan

Renfield lives down a narrow alley above the bar where he works. The bar is called Stereo. Renfield has a theory that every city in the world has a bar called Stereo. He doesn’t travel much, but he has Googled it. Montreal, Alicante, Frankfurt, and Saint-Petersburg all have bars called Stereo. Renfield still eats bugs.

On his morning off, Renfield walks through Glasgow. He orders fish and chips with a mug of sugary tea. He picks at the food, moving it around so it looks like he has eaten some. He suspects that hunters are watching and the appearance of normality means survival. He goes to Argos and flips through the catalogue. He browses the classics section in Waterstones. He watches the pigeons fight over shreds of battered sausage and the tourists photographing them. His destination is the Necropolis, but it is important for this to seem accidental because of the hunters. Renfield knows that the dead must have their hearts burned. He is not sure whether this counts as a crime. He knows that hearts sing through the flames.

In the bar, Renfield is a fixed point. The customers in the bar swarm and buzz, but Renfield keeps his place behind the counter. He pulls pints quickly and cleanly. After closing, Renfield locks the bar and climbs the stairs to his flat. It has three rooms including the bathroom. This is where he eats the birds. His kitchen window is small but has no blinds, and his neighbours can see in. The bathroom window is dimpled glass and shows only blurs of dark and light. He is no longer sure whether the birds are helping his life force to grow. He thought they might heal his broken neck, but their small bones catching in his throat just made it feel worse. To hide his neck Renfield wears high-collared shirts and sometimes even a neck brace. He says this is because he fell off his motorcycle. None of Renfield’s customers or fellow bartenders can imagine Renfield on a motorcycle. He does not look like he could be trusted with an object traveling at 100mph.

(more…)

by Randall Munroe

___________________________________________________________

more at http://xkcd.com/

by Edan Lepucki

When I was young I lived next door to a horse. The man who owned the animal came every day to ride and feed him, and to clean out his stall at the edge of the property. My mother said the horse had been living there forever, long before there were laws to forbid that kind of thing, back when vacant plots of land could go undeveloped for years. I knew from school that the horse had once been a colt, uneasy on his legs, and before that, in his mother’s belly, folded up like a somersault. Like people, horses were mammals. The horse next door wasn’t human, but he had big, sad eyes like one.

Rachel and I had an argument and I took a bath. I shaved my legs and left the little black hairs to pepper the tub. The argument had been about the lock on the front door; she was upset because I’d forgotten, again, to deadbolt it before coming to bed. “We’re two women living alone,” she said. “This is the big city.” She threw up her hands in that way she does when she’s mad, like she’s an actress onstage, playing angry. “Who knows what could happen?”

Like most of our fights, it was silly. Later on, after we’d made up, Rachel played me some opera and told me she just wanted us to be safe, and happy. I said I’d work on it.

(more…)

by Randall Munroe

___________________________________________________________

more at http://xkcd.com/

by David Thorne

———-

From: Shannon Walkley
Date: Monday 21 June 2010 9.15am
To: David Thorne
Subject: Poster

Hi
I opened the screen door yesterday and my cat got out and has been missing since then so I was wondering if you are not to busy you could make a poster for me. It has to be A4 and I will photocopy it and put it around my suburb this afternoon.

This is the only photo of her I have she answers to the name Missy and is black and white and about 8 months old. missing on Harper street and my phone number.
Thanks Shan.

———-

From: David Thorne
Date: Monday 21 June 2010 9.26am
To: Shannon Walkley
Subject: Re: Poster

Dear Shannon,
That is shocking news. Luckily I was sitting down when I read your email and not half way up a ladder or tree. How are you holding up? I am surprised you managed to attend work at all what with thinking about Missy out there cold, frightened and alone… possibly lying on the side of the road, her back legs squashed by a vehicle, calling out “Shannon, where are you?”Although I have two clients expecting completed work this afternoon, I will, of course, drop everything and do whatever it takes to facilitate the speedy return of Missy.
Regards, David.

———-

From: Shannon Walkley
Date: Monday 21 June 2010 9.37am
To: David Thorne
Subject: Re: Re: Poster

yeah ok thanks. I know you dont like cats but I am really worried about mine. I have to leave at 1pm today.

———- (more…)

by Jason Conde

I already had a blender that worked just fine, but I bought a new one anyways. I couldn’t help it. I was only supposed to buy a new set of cutlery as an early birthday present to myself when I saw the blender glowing under soft, recessed lighting. At home, my wife asked, “Another blender?”

“It’s also a combination food processor,” I said. “It’s multi-functional.”

“What about the old blender?”

“We’ll sell it,” I said. “Or give it to a friend.”

“And the old processor?”

“We can give that away too.”

But we didn‘t. The old blender I placed on top of the refrigerator, alongside old jars that once held pasta sauce and jelly preserves, and the old processor I put under the sink with the half-empty bottles of disinfectant. They collected dust and grime and even little feces pellets from the brown mouse my wife named Diphthong.

The new blender sat on the counter where the old one once did, and in the old processor’s spot was my new teak block of kitchen knives. I made pesto the one time I used the new blender and let its glass jar sit dirty in the sink for a week. When I finally got to washing it, I found little pieces of Diphthong’s presence, hardened bits of brown like ants at a picnic.

I once set traps for Diphthong, but he was too smart for that. I’d find the bait gone but no body, just feces. There was once half a foot left in a trap. Seeing the curled, clawed toes, my wife decided Diphthong had suffered enough. I left the traps where they were and got rid of the foot. I told my wife I threw it in the outside trash bin but really I chopped it up in the garbage disposal.

One morning, I saw Diphthong in the kitchen, hobbling around the doorway from behind a stack of newspapers. It was his right front foot that was gone.

(more…)

by Randall Munroe

more at http://xkcd.com/

by N.A. Jong

I was surprised that, from far away at least, the moose reminded me of a horse, which reminded me of being rich. I had thought of them as being gawky things with overly large snouts and big, bulky bodies that balanced precariously on spindly legs. The moose was maybe a hundred yards away. My father had woken me at three in the morning. We’d spotted the moose the week before and had tracked it for three days. It was the first day of the season.

The moose didn’t seem to know we were there. My father and I were huddled in the willows up on the hill. We began to make our way down the valley wall, disturbing as little of the vegetation as possible. The reindeer moss crackled beneath our feet. The broken parts clung to my sneakers like tiny white antlers.

The moose was a young bull, my father said, and showed me how to read the rack: the points on the main palms reached gracefully to the sky and out to the sides of the animal’s massive head; there were two brow palms, too, which pointed down and curved inwards toward the sloped face. If a hunter couldn’t get close enough to see how big the rack was, he said, he would have to count the brow tines. At least three on each side made it a legal kill. Through the binoculars I could see that our moose had seven clearly defined tines, three on one side and four on the other. (more…)

by James Donovan

This was New York.

A woman. At the bar. Managing a glass of Cabernet.

My pickup line somehow involved the moose head on the wall. She laughed some. Her chest was flat and she looked older than me. To me, she was the city. I assumed she was off limits.

A man next to her said, “So I said to him, ‘nice doggy,’ while my partner went in search of the company machine gun.”

I didn’t stand a chance.

But she took my number. She called. She wanted to do things. She wanted to walk slowly down the street and make comments. Coffee, sake. A blowjob in the afternoon.

She was in the beauty business and she had a man’s name: Charley. Her job was Closet Aesthetician. She knew a lot. She told me little. I didn’t ask.

I’d just landed a job running food at a vegetarian restaurant on the Upper East Side. The manager was a large Asian man named Danny. He was a superstar at managing restaurants.

I sat down with five aspiring actors as Danny walked us through the code of conduct. Four hours of information. I forgot it all except for one thing: Keep your fingernails neat and trimmed. (more…)

by Clarissa Romano

Read Part I

“It’s simple,” Molly said to him when he got her on the phone. “Wyatt and I live here now. You live here. Why shouldn’t you two have a relationship?”

“Hey, I’m not dense, all right?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“I’m catching up on a few years of being in the dark, if you’ll forgive me.”

“I understand.”

“So I have a few questions.”

“I’m not after your money, if that’s what you want to know.”

“Why not? I mean, I’m sorry, but I have a few questions—”

“What if we all have dinner Saturday night? Jim wants to meet you. We can put it all on the table.”

“I’m not sure,” Nicholas admitted.

“We’ll pick you up. Wyatt wants to see where you live, anyway.”

“He said that?”

“How’s two o’clock?”

(more…)