Postcard Stories

Kenyon Review

Apologies for the absence. I’ve spent the past few days revising a short story I’ve written for the Kenyon Review Short Fiction Contest. Hope to be back  with new postcard stories in the next few days!

If you’re interested in the contest there are still a few more days to enter. Find info here.

- David

Columbus, Ohio

Upon moving to Columbus, and starting at the university, Leah experienced that strange phenomenon of relocation, in which the new people she was meeting closely resembled those she’d previously known in her old life, in her old town.

 Leah was bright and self-conscious, and noticed it right away. It was déjà vu, a ghost note, an inexplicable feeling – but it was there.

Perhaps, she thought, in her anxiety of moving, she was clutching on to what was safe, what was known? Was this a common feeling? She didn’t know. She wished there was someone she felt comfortable discussing it with. She was too afraid of what others would think, how others would react. She worried a lot, Leah did.

But it was there, this phenomenon, in the general impressions, and the physical traits. The feeling a person gave off.

Like the familiarity in the limp first hand-shakes, the first shared words. The bubbly greeting of a bony girl, with pink acne across her back, along the lines of her tank-top. The brooding eyes of a boy across the room of a party. The way another pronounced the word hegemony like it were a cartoon cricket. The flaxen haired field-hockey player, jiggling her calves under her desk. The stocky boy who continued to wear his khaki shorts well into the colder months of Fall. The posture of the curly haired boy in Intro to Philosophy, erect but calm; a fencer’s.

She’d all known them before. Everyone reminded her of someone else, someone from home.

Leah imagined she wasn’t the only one, though she wasn’t entirely sure. Once during a party, she overheard someone talking about a similar feeling they’d had since leaving for school. She fantasized about lining everyone from her dormitory against a wall, and confronting them about their true identities. Had they absorbed the personalities and the traits of her friend’s back home? Was it supernatural? Was it a conspiracy? What was going on? More than anything though, she wanted to feel a part of something shared. She wanted to know that she wasn’t alone.

“Why am I feeling this way?” she wondered aloud, in her dorm room one night, while her roommate was out.

Leah ground her pencil between her teeth. She removed her glasses. She pinched the arch of her nose. She was perplexed, this night, wrought tight with nervous energy. She paced across the Ikea rug covering her floor. She cursed.

“But people aren’t the same everywhere?” she said, at one point.

Further into the semester, everything would shift. The new people she’d met weren’t so similar to those in her past after all – it was the old people who were now reflective of the new. Most of all, she would begin to get distracted, and begin to forget.

And that winter, while cross-legged on her bed, Leah experienced the irrevocable sadness of paling memory – leaning over a book, her chin propped up by her small palms, as the delighted murmur of students drifted up along the side of the building, like ivy, dissipating into the light-less cool of her dorm room.

Postcard: Found at Antiques of Old Wilmington in Wilmington, North Carolina in January 2012.

Amherst, Ohio

I am the family dog. My name is Checkers. I sit in the back of the vehicle and put my head out the window when we drive. I like putting my head out the window because of the smells and the way the wind makes my ears flap. We were in a city that humans call Chicago. It was weird. They have trains that fly through the air and a big metal blob in a park that people like to stand under because it makes them look funny. I don’t get humans. It was supposed to be windy in this Chicago place and I stuck my head out the window when we got there but it was more or less the same as driving anywhere. The family is on what is called a road trip. But I am on a different road trip.

My humans sit up front and call each other words like Gerald and Loretta to tell themselves apart. They raise their voices a lot when they are around each other too long and sometimes they go awhile without saying anything. Gerald works at a place he calls Roaster’s which makes hot liquid that people drink in the morning to give them energy. He raises his voice at home because he wants to leave the job because their old leader died and they have a new leader and Gerald doesn’t approve of him. Gerald wants to be their leader but knows he never will. And I don’t know what Loretta does for work but she is home a lot of the time which is fun because I get a lot of attention.

In the vehicle they would rather be quiet and twist a knob and let loose a bunch of organized sounds in the vehicle. The sounds come from their ruler. The male human they call their King. He lives in a far off place and makes people raise their voices at one another on account of him waggling his hips like he has a tail. This is what humans call politics. I don’t get humans but they sure have been good to me. Which is why I feel bad. I have to leave my humans. I am on a different road trip, remember? I am waiting for a gray sign along the road that says Amherst. That is where she will be.

My humans spend most of their time in a house in a place called Shaker Heights but I think about this other place Amherst every day. I came from this place. It was two human years ago which is twenty-one in dog years. I know this because I am a dog. Have I mentioned that already? Gerald and Loretta took me home with them from here but they forgot my sister in a big dark gray house with tall grass in the yard and light gray covers over the windows. I love these humans but they are idiots because they forgot my sister so now I have to go get her in this place called –

“BARK BARK BARK!” I yelled. I see the sign! I see the sign! Amherst! Amherst! Amherst! It was right there! We just went by it!

Loretta said something in human words and put her hand on my nose. Humans think this calms us but it doesn’t do anything. I shook it off and barked more and more. Gerald pulled the vehicle to the side of the road and we all got out. Loretta had my leash but I ran into the woods. I heard them raise their voices and chase me but I was too fast.

I followed a path in the woods. The smells were amazing. Things I hadn’t smelled since I was probably three in dog years. What humans identify by the word “puppy.” I am strong and a young dog and I could run all day.

I got lost in the woods and was thirsty and found a creek and drank. I was mad. I barked a lot and dug my paws in the mud. This wasn’t the Amherst that I remembered. Where was my sister? Where was the dark gray house?

I ran along the creek for a while and finally saw a road. There were speeding vehicles and I knew better than to run in front of them. A vehicle pulled over to the side of the road. It wasn’t my humans. It was a different Gerald and Loretta. They put me in the back of their truck and sped along the road. I couldn’t put my head out the window here because I was already out the window. This was like getting two dog treats instead of one. My ears and mouth were flapping and I barked to thank the new Gerald and Loretta. They went past another sign that said Amherst and stopped at a light. I don’t understand how they know which light is which. They all look the same. I have trouble telling colors apart.  But I jumped out the back into the grass.

I ran. I saw the town. I remembered this place. I ran along vehicles front to back on the side of the road. People raised their voices as they saw me run but I ran faster than all of them. I am a young dog remember? Remember how I can run fast? One man held a piece of plastic against his head which is how humans talk from far away distances.

I saw another one of me and went up to it and sniffed it. It was smaller and had weird human fabrics tied in its hair. I barked for directions and it barked back. The dark gray house with the light gray window covers was near this place.

Then the man with the plastic against his head pointed at me and another man with a big net and a black hat ran toward me. I know from human cartoons that these are evil men and I ran into an alleyway and hid behind a big metal trashcan. The man in the black hat followed me into the alley and I tried to run away but I was trapped. I showed him my teeth which makes humans scared and he whistled and waved at me. Then I ran and tried to get through his legs but he put the net over me and made stupid human sounds. I barked a hundred times and he did nothing. I hate that humans can’t understand me.

In his vehicle there was a window and I looked out and saw the house! It was exactly how I remembered. It was dark gray with light gray covers over the windows and the grass was tall. My sister was in that house. I needed to get to her.

But then I was put in a cage with a bunch of other dogs. Maybe twenty. They all looked scared and all the dogs were afraid to bark. None of them knew my sister. The evil man with the black hat sat in a chair and read the word-paper. The kind that appears magically on human doorsteps in the morning. I could see the door to outside and I hated this cage and I needed to get out. The evil man put his word-paper down and went outside. I saw that the latch was loose on the cage. I put my paw on it but couldn’t get it. I barked at a bigger dog and showed him what was going on. The bigger dog put his teeth on the lock and then the cage door swung open and we were free! We all ran down the hallway and the door to outside swung open and knocked the evil man down onto the ground. He raised his voice and we scattered out into the field behind the dog cage place and we were all barking and happy and safe for now.

I ran until my paws hurt and saw it again. It looked darker than I remembered and the grass was shorter. I heard a bark and saw her in the yard. I ran up to her and barked and she barked and we shared a lick which is like what humans do when they spend a lot of time together. She was surprised and together we ran through the grass around the house. We were happy. And then I saw Gerald and Loretta pull up in their vehicle and they came up to us and I barked and I think they understood because they went into the house and whatever they said was good because my sister and I were both in the car on the way back to Pennsylvania with our heads stuck out the windows smelling the smells and letting our ears flap.

Postcard: Found at JUNK in Brooklyn, NY in May 2010.