She praised his book and he embraced her from gratitude rather than lust, but she didn't let go. Neither did he. She kissed his cheek, his earlobe. For months they'd run their fingers around the hem of their affection without once acknowledging the fabric. The circumference of the world tightened to what their arms encompassed. She sat on the desk, between the columns of read and unread manuscript, and pulled him toward her by his index fingers.
Anthony MarraInvader and invaded held on to their fistfuls of earth, but in the end, the earth outlived the hands that held it.
Anthony MarraYou are a coward,' she said, and with that one word wrote a denunciation, a biography, and a prophecy.
Anthony MarraHer father was the face of her morning and night, he was everything, so saturating Havaa’s world that she could no more describe him than she could the air.
Anthony MarraSometimes it bursts from your imagination fully formed, sometimes you absorb from nonfiction, sometimes you're able to imprint your own autobiographical experiences on a world you never yourself were a part of. A decent number of the one-liners in the title story originally came up in conversations with my girlfriend or my neighbor.
Anthony Marra