Sweet Talk
Stephanie Vaughn
Language: English
Pages: 208
ISBN: 1590515161
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
Stephanie Vaughn is a writer’s writer, one whose debut collection of stories, Sweet Talk, was published more than two decades ago to critical acclaim. Readers have come to these stories over the years through word of mouth, posting glowing reviews to their Goodreads pages and on their blogs—unanimously agreeing that this collection is a modern classic that deserves to be in print. Crafted in graceful, honest prose, Vaughn’s stories go straight to the heart of how people live, grow and survive.
fanned out in ribs of orange and purple silk. I was afraid to look back. I was afraid that if I turned to see him, Sam might recede forever into the damp gray of the western sky. I slowed down in case I had gone too fast and he wanted to catch up. I concentrated on the water and listened to the still, heavy air. By the time I reached the three-quarters mark, I realized that I was probably running alone. I hadn’t wanted to lose him. I wondered whether he had waited by the van or was already
planet. We were still going places. We were leading off the transmission from earth in front of sports and weather, the late-night talk shows, and old movies. We were going to be up there with everybody who had ever been on TV. Truman and Eisenhower, JFK and LBJ. You name it. Pete Rose and Gloria Steinem. We were moving fast, already on our way to the moon. Pretty soon we’d be passing through the orbit of Mars, then Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto. We’d be going to Andromeda and who
and she presses me for advice. “Do you like harvest yellow or that green color?” “I don’t know.” I am impatient with her, anxious to deal with the crisis at hand. She pretends that this is like any other summer, that once, a year ago, she was sick and gaunt but now she is well again. It is early July and the serious heat is here, moist and languid, settling upon the town like sleep. In the evenings we drive into the cooler countryside in search of air-conditioned rural restaurants. My mother
insane.” The river fascinated me. I often stood between the yellow curtains of my bedroom and looked down upon it and thought about how deep and swift it was, how black under the glittering surface. The newspaper carried stories about people who jumped over the Falls, fourteen miles upriver from our house. I thought of their bodies pushed along the soft silt of the bottom, tumbling silently, huddled in upon themselves like fetuses—jilted brides, unemployed factory workers, old people who did not
and my mother was trying to pull it away with both of hers. He jerked his arm back and forth, so that she was drawn into a little dance, back and forth across the linoleum in front of him. “The Lord knows the way of righteousness,” said my grandmother. “Please,” said my mother. “Please, please.” “And the way of the ungodly shall perish,” said my grandmother. “Whose house is this?” said my father. His voice exploded. He snapped his arm back, trying to take the bottle from my mother in one