Issue 13 Fiction | The Common

Dancing in 4/4 Time

April 30, 2017 Fiction, Issue 13, Issue 13 Fiction

Among the snowy houses, a small woman in a white wool coat shoveled a path from the street to her front door. Meanwhile snow was falling, gathering slowly on the path being cleared, and on the small woman shoveling.

Each of the woman’s movements was like the second half of an echo: It seemed as if her gestures weren’t occurring now, but had been initiated some time ago. Faint, also fated. She emptied half a shovelful of snow onto a large bank, and then gathered more snow in her shovel.

Fallow

April 21, 2017 Fiction, Issue 13, Issue 13 Fiction

By LAURA WINTHER GALAVIZ

We were unemployed and without a place to go, but we got up in the morning and pressed things under the iron anyhow. Our parents turned us out of their houses, telling us to Go get some fresh air!, then locked the doors they refused to give us keys to. We piled up in the streets like garbage, a dozen of us on every block, sitting open-legged on the curb in department-store suits. There was me, Mike, Paul, and all the rest of the guys we’d grown up with. We were a decade and a half past high school graduation, loaded down and barely breathing under stubble and spare tires and thick letters from Sallie Mae, but there we all were, out at the bus stop again.

Firsthand Account

April 20, 2017 Fiction, Issue 13, Issue 13 Fiction

By BRUNA DANTAS LOBATO

The plan was to take the bus to my father’s farm, to see him in person for a change. My mother said, Your father is too busy for you, and you don’t know his wife. But I went anyway. I wanted to be able to say that my father was unavailable, firsthand account.

I packed only one large duffel bag, and my mother drove me to the bus station. She told me, Call me if you need anything. I said I’d call her every day.

I didn’t mind the nine-hour ride.

The Eunuch, The Colombian, & The King

April 20, 2017 Fiction, Issue 13, Issue 13 Fiction, Issues

By MENACHEM KAISER

The Eunuch

In the courtyard were more of these men and women who—how should I describe them?—who still were. They didn’t do anything except exist. They sat, alone or in silent clusters. None would say yes to an interview. I circled the courtyard, asking. Most did not even say no.

Guy Gever Stands in a Field

April 20, 2017 Fiction, Issue 13, Issue 13 Fiction, Issues

By: BETHANY BALL
From What to Do About the Solomons?

Now it is just a question of what to do with Guy Gever. For extra money he works in the evenings to frighten the birds that eat the crops in the fields around the kibbutz. At night, he hunts the porcupines, the dorban, and sometimes the tiny kipod, the hedgehogs, with his brothers. But now people think he has gone mad.

Living in the Past

April 14, 2017 Fiction, Issue 13, Issue 13 Fiction, Translation

From The Baghdad Eucharist

By SINAN ANTOON

Translated by MAIA TABET

“You’re just living in the past, Uncle!” Maha burst out as she ran from the living room after our argument. Luay, her husband, was upset and he called out after her, his face flushed.

“Hey, Maha, where are you going? Come back! Maha!” But she was already hurtling up the stairs that led to the second floor. He looked downcast as he apologized.

“Forgive her, Uncle. You know how much she loves and respects you.” In a voice speckled with shame, he added, “She’s a nervous wreck and can’t help herself.”