To Brown Duck, Potters’ Mill Pond, Brynby Green, Lincolnshire LN12 0BX by Philippa Bowe and Karen Walker
Dear Duck, here there are only gulls for company, some are large and quite pretty but they’re all strangers. Please reply. How are you?
Esme learns her lesson by Cole Beauchamp and Sumitra Singam
A finger on the lips, a rubbing of the brow, a curling of the lip even at the threshold. This is the snip-snip rhythm Esme finds at Nana’s now that Grampa is gone.
Lucy Goes to the Museum of American Nuptials by Kate Faigen and Kyle Weik
In the Engagement Room, Lucy holds up her ring finger to a display of diamonds. Something inside her sparkles. She fantasizes about a gold band sliding past her bare knuckle: slowly, quickly. Lucy blushes hard, then shuffles after a group into the First Dance Studio.
IVF by Ela Brave and Iván Brave
“This is your sperm cell,” the nurse practitioner says. He draws an oval with a squiggly line on the white crunchy paper of the medical exam table. Meanwhile I’m annoyed and feeling like a dumb lab rat.
Courtesy by Kim Magowan and Michelle Ross
At the checkout line, I wave ahead a woman who clutches nothing but a bottle of shampoo. She doesn’t say thank you, but she does smile gratefully, so I’m not too bothered by the omission. But then she and the elderly cashier get to chatting. About courtesy, of all things.