by Kim Brown Seely
A Girls’ Trip to Italy
Men have their golf weekends, their guided fly-fishing, and that ultimate male-bonding ritual, the heli-ski week, which costs practically as much as a child’s education. But when it comes time for women to get away, we often sabotage ourselves with convenient excuses. As a [...]
by Elizabeth Creely
A hiking trip turns disastrous for two sisters in California’s Desolation Wilderness.
Last July I went to Desolation Wilderness with my sister Emily to celebrate her fortieth birthday. I woke up at 5 a.m., kissed my husband goodbye, and walked to the nearest BART station with my backpack strapped to me. [...]
by Shauna Sweeney
It takes fifteen minutes to confirm I’m being followed. At first I had my doubts, kept second-, triple-, quadruple-guessing. I thought fear was playing tricks on me, making monsters out of shadows. But we’ve turned too many corners, switched onto too many new streets for coincidence. The car hasn’t left my taxi’s bumper [...]
by Johanna Gohmann
One cozy night at home, while enjoying a pizza dinner, I flipped on the television just in time to see a close-up shot of a woman’s labia being “trimmed” by a surgeon.
“Look!” I shrieked at my fiancé, involuntarily crossing my legs. “How can they show that on regular TV?!”
David glanced up from his [...]
by Brege Shinn
I awake naked. I’m on my bed but there are no sheets. The pillow case is gone. I scramble to my backpack for something to wear, but there’s not a stitch of clothing to be found. Confused, I look in my travel-mate’s pack, but she too has no clothes.
Damn it, I gave all [...]
by Pearl Chen
“Do you speak English?” the blonde woman asked casually as she plopped right down next to me on a block of concrete outside the bubbly Water Cube on Beijing’s Olympic Green. For such a sprawling, futuristic, Disneyland-esque plaza, it wasn’t exactly overflowing with places to sit, and we were both relieved to take [...]
by Rick Steigelman
At the risk of sounding like a scamp of a child, ungrateful towards the one whose generosity has provided him his first glimpse of London, England, part of my plan going into the trip was to ditch Mom as often as was possible and for periods of time as long as I could [...]
by Kevin Kaiser
Scarlet and I are making out in a bathroom stall in the men’s restroom of a Hollywood eighteen-and-up club. Her fist twists the cityscape image on my red Dismemberment Plan t-shirt, pulls my body close, as I grip the flesh of her hips exposed between the too-small black shirt, the tight black pants. [...]
by Diane LeBow
“That’s the Hindu Kush Mountains, the killer of Hindus.” An Afghan man sitting next to me on the Ariana Afghan Airlines flight from Dubai to Kabul leaned over and explained. Outside the window, the flat desert lands of Iran and southern Afghanistan suddenly gave way to barren blue and gray ridgebacks, like waves [...]
By Erin Byrne
Imagine being placed at the top of the main staircase inside the most visited museum in the world. Daylight streams from above, bathing the arched walls in golden light, illuminating and exposing you. You’re there for thousands to see, but have neither head nor arms.
Winged Victory stands boldly atop the sweeping Daru staircase [...]
