Sebastian Malloy – Ad Victoriam!

Every Cat’s Got a Bit of an Asshole in Him

Election Night, Anxiety Night

Every Cat’s Got a Bit of an Asshole in Him

Popeye as a Role Model

What’s In Your Head

A Postcard to Rivi

Things From the Archive

Funereal Hillbillies

We are in the California Central Valley, about a half an hour north of Sacramento, and we are tired of driving. It’s farmland here mostly, trees and low plants that I can’t identify without vegetables or fruit growing on them, and fenced off grazing land with cattle wandering about. It’s...

Ghost From the Archives

Salt Lake Matador

My phone buzzes in my pocket. I pull it out and see that it’s a FaceTime call coming through: Rivi. I swipe to accept it. “Rivi,” I say. “Sebastian.” The image is dark except for a sliver of blue, enough to dimly illuminate the right side of Rivi’s face, and...

Ghost From the Archives

Crime Scenes of Christmas Future

Rivi insists on helping me to unpack, although I try telling her that it isn’t necessary. “Shut up,” she says cheerfully, and starts taking my books from the banker boxes in the living room. “Go do something in the kitchen,” she says. “Make yourself useful.” It’s a change,...

Ghost From the Archives

The Recent Past

Election Night, Anxiety Night

Dear Rivi: And here we are again, teetering on the edge, like we did in 2020, and in 2016, and I’ll tell you something: I am over all of this bullshit. How dare Americans be so shitty. So racist. So fascist. It’s both sickening and disheartening, while at the same time being this really pointed reminder that people have to fight for progress every goddamn time, or risk sliding back into the dark ages. And yes, I know that it’s not all Americans who are shitty, but it’s honestly far too many of them that are, and it turns my…

Every Cat’s Got a Bit of an Asshole in Him

A large orange cat sitting in the open window of a house

The library in Winchester is open four days a week, and today is one of those days. We have come to escape the heat, and because we haven’t had the chance to visit the library yet, which is a crime in a civilized world. The building is small, no larger really than a fast food restaurant along the highway, but it’s got a charm that is unmistakable. It’s brick, for one thing, which makes it stand out in a town of mostly wooden buildings, and there’s an old cannon out front, pointed at the weed shop across the street (there…

Popeye as a Role Model

Interior of a general store, with wooden shelves full of candy on one side of the image, and wooden floors and walls for the building

We are out of butter and short on cream, so Hunter and I decide that a trip to the general store in town is in order. It’s too far to walk, but a half hour drive isn’t too bad, and there is still enough of the city people in us that we like to get out and about a little now and again, although I feel that’s a trait that is slowly dying out in us. The pollen is thick in the air here today, and we almost have to scrape it off the windshield of the car before we…

What’s In Your Head

In the mailbox this morning, we find an envelope addressed to us from our realtor, the one who had helped us to get this house in the woods in which we now live. Inside this envelope is a second, smaller envelope, like one that would come with a bouquet of flowers, and a folded sheet of paper. Hunter hands the second envelope to me while she reads the letter. “Claire says there’s a key in there,” she says. “Sure is,” I say, having unsealed the smaller envelope and tilted the key out into my palm. It’s an antique-looking thing, all…

A Postcard to Rivi

Paranormal Tinglies

The clock on my phone reads 1:40am, and I finally give up on trying to sleep and crawl out of bed. I slip into the walk-in closet and get dressed by the glow from my phone before heading downstairs for coffee and breakfast. My mood can not in the slightest bit be categorized as pleasant. While I wait for the coffee to brew, I notice that I’ve gotten a message from Rivi waiting on my phone, only five minutes old. Why are you awake at this hour? I text her. My phone immediately vibrates in my hand: Rivi is calling.…

No Take Backs

Rivi is crumpling junk mail newspaper fliers into balls and packing them around the drinking glasses in the box on the counter. “I still find it impossible to believe you guys are moving,” she says. “We’ve been talking about it for years,” I tell her. “You should have been listening, obviously.” “I find it more impossible to believe that you aren’t asking me to come with you.” “The only reason I’m not asking is because I know you’re going to come along anyway.” “Obviously,” she says. “It would be rude of me not to.” I am working on my own…

So Irritating

We are hiding in the blanket fort that Rivi has built in her living room, a semi-permanent and elaborate construction, stretching from chair to chair and bookshelf to bookshelf, nestled in the corner near the door to her bedroom. Christmas lights dangle from binder clips at the top of the fort, and a small Bluetooth speaker rests on the top of a tiny table at the back of the area, softly playing a shuffled playlist of Rivi’s favorite songs. The winter chill is thick in the air, and we are bundled in a collection of Rivi’s blankets, staying warm as…