In this story by Adolfo Bioy Casares, childhood sweethearts grow up believing their “souls are united”. From the man’s perspective: Life was a pleasant habit which led us to look upon our eventual marriage as something natural and certain. He takes the relationship for granted, doesn’t express his love, and she marries someone else. Shattered, he accepts a two-year scholarship to study abroad. On his return, she visits his apartment and falls into his arms. When he goes looking for her the next day, a friend has shocking news. Themes include childhood love, complacency, jealousy, loss, memory, the supernatural. More…
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Pumpkin Seed and the Snake
This Hmong folktale is full of broken promises. Three times a widow breaks a promise that whoever removes a large rock from her field can marry one of her daughters. Each time the rock is returned. She finally relents and agrees that the mystery helper (a huge, shape-shifting snake), can marry her daughter “Pumpkin Seed”. Later, over three nights, she breaks a promise to Pumpkin Seed that she will kill the snake while it is sleeping. Forced to accompany the snake to its home, Pumpkin Seed proves just as untrustworthy as her mother before unexpectedly living “Happily Ever After”. More…
The Lighthouse
In this story by H. E. Bates a man recovering from a troubled marriage begins a passionate affair with a lonely woman working at a beach-side café. The climax is his sense of confusion, anger, and betrayal when, having lied and told her he is single, he learns she is also married. Her husband works away from home and returns on weekends. For her, the relationship with the man appears primarily sexual. She presses him to remain her mid-week lover, and he could well be too weak-willed to refuse. Themes include isolation, loneliness, insecurity, sexuality, deception, jealousy. More…
The Near Departed
In this story by Richard Matheson, a man hides a sinister secret as he visits a mortician to arrange an elaborate funeral for his wife. He emphasises that cost is unimportant. “There’ll be many people,” he says. “Everybody loved her. She’s so beautiful. So young. She has to have the very best.” The mortician reassures him that he will be more than satisfied and, after completing the necessary paperwork, says his people will collect the body within the hour. As they part, the mortician asks the man a question which he pretends not to hear. Themes include marriage, death, dissimulation. More…
The Living
In this story by Mary Lavin, a boy challenges a younger friend to visit a wake to “know” a corpse for the first time The dead man, who had been intellectually challenged since birth, had never had contact with children. The boys agree when his mother invites them to pray over the body, but flee when she asks them to stroke it. The encounter with death not only brings the younger boy closer to his parents but also highlights the grim significance of his family’s nightly prayer. Themes include bravado, death, family, the precious and capricious nature of life. More…