Brian Kenneth Swain

“What is it?” Adam said. “What do you mean ‘What is it?’ What’s it look like?” Eve replied. “I don’t mean the tree. I know what a tree looks like. What is it you want?” “What I want is for you to explain to me,” Eve replied, “why all this awesome fruit should be off limits.” “Why? How about because God Almighty, the creator of heaven and earth, said so.” “For heaven’s sake, Adam,” she said. “Are you sure God didn’t make me from a piece of your brain instead of your rib? It’s just a tree.” “Excuse me,” Adam said. “This is not just a tree. This is THE tree. Knowledge … good and evil … ring any bells?” “And your point is?” “My point is that when the creator of the universe … ...

The corpuscles … that rise from the Minerals, entering the rod, determine it to bow down, in order to render it parallel to the vertical lines which the effluvia describe in their rise. William Pryce Mineralogia Cornubiensis, 1778 “Fred Johansson, what in the hell are you up to this time?” The voice was distant, but I recognized without hesitation the mostly jovial but always slightly cynical tone of my neighbor from two farms over, Rogers Manning. He was easy to spot as he made his way across the field, being of far-greater-than-average girth and being, as well, clad in a nearly glowing red shirt. The combination of these attributes created the appearance, if one squinted, of a large crimson beach ball rolling toward me ...

#237 sat at the cafeteria table across from #414. By an odd coincidence, they had ordered identical sandwiches—Virginia ham with Havarti cheese, lettuce, tomato, and Dijon mustard. 237’s sandwich lay untouched on his tray, while 414 worked at his with vigor. A small bit of lettuce clung to left side of 414’s lower lip. 237 could see it clearly but said nothing. It was the peak of the lunch hour, yet the cafeteria, which had a capacity of hundreds, was surprisingly empty. Aside from 237 and 414, there were perhaps two dozen other diners scattered throughout the room. It was nearing the end of the quarter and the pressure to make quotas was immense. People were skipping lunch these days, working at their desks, drumming up leads. ...

I inherited the restaurant from my father and, like him, I expect that someday I will die with a paper hat on my head and a spatula in my hand. He was Big Al, I am Albert Junior, and the shop is Albert’s World Hamburger Emporium. Lofty-sounding? Absolutely. Over the top for what is, in truth, a pretty ordinary burger and fries stand? Perhaps. But we are well known around the area, and the only decent hamburger place for five blocks in all directions that isn’t a national chain. Our section of town is what my realtor friends refer to as being in transition, which is a salesman’s way of saying that a great deal of money would need to be invested in order for it to be elevated to a position of mediocrity. I have worked at the restaurant ...

Ketchum, Idaho–Ernest Hemingway was found dead of a shotgun wound in the head at his home here today. His wife, Mary, said that he had killed himself accidentally while cleaning the weapon. Mr. Hemingway, whose writings won him a Nobel Prize and a Pulitzer Prize, would have been 62 years old July 21. Frank Hewitt, the Blaine County Sheriff, said after a preliminary investigation that the death “looks like an accident.” He said, “There is no evidence of foul play.” The body of the bearded, barrel-chested writer, clad in a robe and pajamas, was found by his wife in the foyer of their modern concrete house. A double-barreled, 12-gauge shotgun lay beside him with one chamber discharged. New York Times, July 3, ...

April 19, 1955 OBITUARY Dr. Albert Einstein Dies in Sleep at 76; World Mourns Loss of Great Scientist By THE NEW YORK TIMES Albert Einstein was born at Ulm, Wuerttemberg, Germany, on March 14, 1879. His boyhood was spent in Munich, where his father, who owned electro-technical works, had settled. The family migrated to Italy in 1894, and Albert was sent to a cantonal school at Aarau in Switzerland. He attended lectures while supporting himself by teaching mathematics and physics at the Polytechnic School at Zurich until 1900. Finally, after a year as tutor at Schaffthausen, he was appointed examiner of patents at the Patent Office at Bern where, having become a Swiss citizen, he remained until ...

I’m no horror writer, but I’ve lingered over their work enough to know that they deal primarily in the fear trade. I begin my story with this observation only because, in like vein, I have carried with me these many years, in the farthest recesses of my mind, a story that, if not generally horrific, at least qualifies as the most fearful period of my long and humble existence. Truth be told, it’s not so much a story as a series of recollections that begin with an article I came across in the local paper a few months after I moved into that second-floor apartment out on Mill Street. The article described an event that took place at the local paper mill, an ancient small-town icon, now long closed but in whose employ I served ...

I don’t recall ever being so afraid at any time in my life, and I hope to god I never am again.Still, stuck as I am now in this wheelchair, which they tell me I will almost certainly never get out of, it seems highly unlikely I could ever again manage to get myself into the sort of pickle that put me here in the first place. Which may turn out to be a mixed blessing, because having been like this for just a few weeks, it occurs to me that in a year or two I may so dread the rest of my life that I will sincerely wish for the ability to end it. Or maybe not—who’s to say? There’s plenty of folks who do this their whole lives and don’t seem any the worse for it, issues of mobility notwithstanding. Just not sure if I’m made of ...

“So what’s the big meeting all about?” Peter asked. The two men stood in the office’s small third-floor kitchenette, Gabe at the counter, pouring the last half-cup of decaf from a badly-stained pot into an only slightly less stained mug, its “Earth 2.0” logo emblazoned in navy blue on the side. He set the empty carafe back on the heater with a hiss, and reached up to one of the overhead cupboards, searching for sugar packets. He found, instead, nothing but an empty bowl where the packets should have been. Fuming, he poured the half-filled cup into the sink. “Who in the hell can drink this stuff without sugar?” he said, annoyed. “We made dozens of countries down on earth that can grow sugar, but can we get one goddam…one ...

“I shouldn’t have thought you’d be all that keen to visit a place like this, Buster, I mean what with your lofty new status and all. That was quite a piece on the news the other night.” Alvin Cressey stood adjacent the passenger door of his Mercury Marquis, right hand resting on the upper window frame, waiting patiently as Buster Cranston slowly, methodically thrust his legs to the ground and lifted his ancient frame from the seat and into a more or less vertical position. The Marquis, a nondescript burgundy 2004 model four-door, was Cressey’s “everyday” car, the one he used when meeting or chauffeuring members of his congregation who were less than comfortable with the notion of a Protestant minister owning any of the ...