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Rowboat

November 30, 2019/ Josh Krigman

[fiction]

The way I see it, we’re in a rowboat. I’m facing Sarah, who’s rowing and avoiding my eyes. Behind her, Dad is reading yesterday’s newspaper. He holds the paper in front of his face so all I can see are his knees and his fingers clamped around the pages on either side.

A summer fog has settled on top of Jamaica Pond and we move through it toward the center. The trees are rounded and black and wall us in on every side. In my memory nothing exists except the fog, the trees, the occasional turn of a newspaper page, and the sound of Sarah’s paddles sliding in and out of the water. It’s five in the morning, and I’m eight years old.

“Here’s good,” Dad says from behind the paper, and Sarah stops rowing. The boat drifts for a moment until it’s still. Then Dad folds the paper, steps around Sarah, lifts me up, and drops me in the pond.

After that I see it from above. A girl thrashing in the water like a cat in the bath. Sarah, leaning over the side, looking between me and Dad and waiting for instruction on what to do. No matter what they later tell me, I’ll always imagine Dad returning to his seat at the end of the boat, unfolding the paper, and continuing whatever article he’s interrupted to toss me in.

I never sink. I stay right on the surface, slapping the water, spinning my limbs as fast and as hard as I can. But drowning has nothing to do with depth. You can drown in a bowl of cereal if there’s no one there to help you. I inhale one mouthful after another, slowly sucking up the contents of the pond. Maybe I’m thinking if I drink it all in, there won’t be anything left but dry land to stand on. It’s more likely I’m not thinking anything at all. As my lungs fill, my arms and legs slow. Soon a paddle comes down. I grab for it, slip off, grab again. I finally get my hands around it, and Sarah pulls me in and helps me up over the side of the boat. Dad points toward the shore and Sarah starts rowing.

“Well,” he says, and turns to me for the first time, “it worked for your sister.”

Josh Krigman is a creative writing teacher at Hunter College, where he received his MFA in fiction. His work has appeared in Breadcrumbs Mag and Akashic Books. He is also the co-founder and New York host of Club Motte, an international storytelling night with events in Brooklyn, Oakland, and Berlin.

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Genre Archive

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Friday Lunch Blog

Friday Lunch! A serving of contemporary essays published every Friday.

Today’s course:

Where Are You From?

August 5, 2022/in Blog / Majella Pinto
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The Old Folks’ Home

July 22, 2022/in Blog / Karen Gaul Schulman
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Peace, Love, and a lot of Loud Rock & Roll

June 17, 2022/in A Transfer, Blog / Sunee Lyn Foley
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Midnight Snack

A destination for all your late night obsessions.

Tonight’s bites:

QVC-land

May 6, 2022/in A Transfer, Midnight Snack / D. E. Hardy
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Escape Artists at the End of the World

April 29, 2022/in A Transfer, Midnight Snack / Lisa Levy
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The House in the Middle

April 15, 2022/in A Transfer, Midnight Snack / Megan Vasquez
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More coming soon!

Amuse-Bouche

Little bites every Monday to whet your appetite!

Today’s plate:

Defy Gravity

August 1, 2022/in Amuse-Bouche / Megan Peck
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Little Shrimp

July 25, 2022/in Amuse-Bouche / Karen Poppy
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Litdish: On Writing Form, Style and Moving Through the Moments: 7 Questions for Author Megan Giddings

July 18, 2022/in Amuse-Bouche / Interviewed by Gail Vannelli
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School Lunch

An occasional Wednesday series dishing up today’s best youth writers.

Today’s slice:

I’ve Stayed in the Front Yard

May 12, 2021/in School Lunch, School Lunch 2021 / Brendan Nurczyk
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A Communal Announcement

April 28, 2021/in School Lunch, School Lunch 2021 / Isabella Dail
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Seventeen

April 14, 2021/in School Lunch, School Lunch 2021 / Abigail E. Calimaran
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Word From the Editor

The variety in this issue speaks not only to the eclectic world we inhabit but to the power of the human spirit. We live in an uncertain world. In the U.S., we’re seeing mass shootings daily. Across the world, we’re still very much in a pandemic, some being trapped in their homes for weeks on end, others struggling to stay alive in hospitals. War continues to wage in Ukraine. Iran and North Korea are working diligently to make nuclear weapons. The list goes on. Still, we have artists who are willing and able to be vulnerable with one another, to share stories and art to help us try and make sense of our world.

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