ONLINE BONUS: A Quarter of a Life

We leave the bar a little before midnight. The laughter of the drunken crowds outside muffles the car horns and screeching tires

Witness

Our family moved to West Philadelphia in the 1960s after my father left the Army. Maybe because it was such a gorgeous

City Rain

Philadelphia becomes a movie set when it rains. Neon slices through water droplets that crash against the dark street, tiny prisms spinning

A Non-Fairy Tale

My daughter fell under the spell of fairy tales early on when, as a toddler, she watched Lady and the Tramp for

McPherson Square

A tiny girl cupped her eyes against a tree and yelled numbers as fast as she could remember them. “Fifteen… sixteen… seventeen…”

Look Away

While talking to the colonel about how to administratively process Nicole’s death, I volunteered to walk through the house where she was

Seaming

My mother holds me down, her hands locked around my wrists as I am screaming, writhing in pain. It is midnight, or

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