Resurrection Through Fiction

Resurrection Through Fiction

Somewhere in northern Colorado there's a dingy gray duplex sitting on a cul-de-sac near the railroad tracks. Behind it is a dry, yellow field where grasshoppers and mice keep busy.One half of the duplex is occupied by my mother and a version of me at 16 years old. The other half is occupied by another single mother and her 16-year-old son, Shawn.My friend Shawn.We call one another "Neighbor Boy" and "Neighbor Girl."We call the duplex "Our House."There are shenanigans. There's trouble and fun. But life is always fucking with things, flipping them upside down, changing them into something new and almost unrecognizable.People drift apart. They move away, have adventures and things happen to them.By the time we turn 19, Shawn is a quadriplegic due to a car accident and I'm in Florida, acquainting myself with the redneck bar scene.I soon flee back to Colorado, and from time to time, I run into my old friend at a party, a mutual...
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How to Find Closure When Your Bullies are Dead

How to Find Closure When Your Bullies are Dead

I wore the dress because it was Halloween. One day where we can dress up and pretend to be something that we're not. Something we don't get to be every day. Something more wild. Cooler. Louder.My dress had a newspaper print pattern splashed with neon pink and green. My mom wasn't crazy about it, but I loved it. It was cheap, so I was allowed to buy it when we were shopping for new clothes a couple months before. However, she hardly ever let me wear it. It was too "tacky" and too "loud." But then, Halloween approached and I had a last minute idea. I was now 12 years old and adult enough to dress my own self up for Halloween, thank you very much.I put on the dress. I slipped into my neon green jelly shoes. I sprayed red and black and glitter into my hair, which I curled and teased and sprayed and poofed. I did my...
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