Sebastian Malloy – Page 7

My Next Door Neighbor is a Vampire

“My next door neighbor is vampire,” Rivi tells me. “Keeps late hours?” I ask. “No,” Rivi says. “She’s an actual vampire.” We are sitting on the front porch of the house Rivi shares with Boone and Tina. The sun is out today for what feels like the first time in...

Zombie Chickens and Poultrygeists

Rivi and I are sitting on the porch at Boone and Tina’s new house, where they have given Rivi a temporary (or permanent, because who can really say) room in which to live. I have been over helping them to unpack, which has mainly consisted of carrying boxes up a...

Timothy Hutton Popsicles

What’s the temperature, Kenneth? Rivi texts me. 12 degrees right now, I text back. With a wind chill of -11. Her typing indicator winks an ellipses at me for what feels like thirty seconds, then pauses, then goes again for another thirty. Finally, her message pops up on the screen: Fuck....

Perpetual Drama Machine

“The power’s out,” Rivi says, on the other end of the phone line. “My madness is beginning to set in.” “Your madness set in years ago,” I say. “That ship has sailed, hit an iceberg, sunk, and was swallowed by a sea monster way before today.” “Don’t make fun of...

Panic Buying

My phone buzzes with a call while Hunter and I are in Grossett’s General Store, grabbing cheese sticks and pizza slices. I pull it out of my pocket and see that it’s Tina, in another time zone from us, three hours behind. “Hey,” I say, answering the call. “How’s tricks...

Curated From the Dusty Archives

Twenty Year Storm

The rain is pouring outside, Biblical and a little unsettling. It pounds against the window of Viola’s attic, and the window rattles in its frame against the wind that whips down from the atmospheric river currently pummeling the west coast. “Well,” Viola says. “Guess we aren’t going out on the...

Ghost From the Archives

Headphone Girl

“I’m setting fire to my Twitter,” Viola says. “It’s too much of a fucking mess. That whole place is imploding so hard that it’s going to suck into itself and black hole the entire thing into another dimension.” We are sitting on the roof of her house, just outside her...

Ghost From the Archives

A Dead Man’s Gum

“So,” Viola says. “You know those carnival rides with the swings? The ones that spin and spin and raise up, and you’re going forty miles an hour in a stomach-churning circle that’s supposed to be fun, but really just make you want to vomit on everyone that’s standing down on...

Ghost From the Archives

The Immediate Past

At the Edge of the Continent

“I should take a trip,” Hannah is saying. “Someplace far away. Darjeeling, maybe. Someplace where the air is spicy.” We are walking outside the zoo, and the air is not spicy here. It smells of eucalyptus and salt air. “I want to be in one of those hotels that you see in the movies,” she continues. “Old wood on the walls and a balcony overlooking a marketplace.” “How about Fresno?” I ask. “Fresno is exotic.” “Fresno is an armpit,” she says. “Don’t be a putz.” She has work this morning, and so we are here walking in the dawn, the…

The Blood and the Smoke

“There’s a ghost living in my apartment,” Rivi says. “I woke up last night and she was in bed with me.” We are having lunch in Chinatown, dumplings and roasted duck. Tina was supposed to join us, but she texted us to say she was on a mission and wouldn’t make it. She didn’t say what her mission was. “She was curled up like a dog on my feet,” Rivi continues. “She had smoke where her eyes were supposed to be.” “You were having a dream,” I say. I pick up a dumpling with my chopsticks and take a bite…

The Middlemost Exception

“In is the way out,” Middlemost says again. A subtle current of air drifts through the shed, and motes of dust spin through the beam of sunlight coming through the window. I can detect the faint scent of the sea, although we are miles from the shore. “You have questions,” he says. “Now is the time to ask them.” “Who are you? Why am I here?” He opens his arms and gives a slight bow. “I am Mr. Middlemost, as I have said, and you are here simply because you must be.” “I don’t know what that means.” “You had…

Fist-Fighting Shatner on the Acropolis

Rivi and I are walking along Stow Lake in Golden Gate Park. As we go, she is counting the number of turtle heads she has seen breaking the surface of the water. “Three,” she says. “We should take a paddleboat,” I say. “Haven’t done that in a long time.” “Nah. I’m not feeling the call of the waves today.” “There aren’t any waves. There are never any waves. It’s Stow Lake.” “Let’s go to the de Young. That’s always nice.” She points at the water. “Four.” We have been in the park for a few hours today, having walked a…

Barstow

Tina sits on the floor of her bedroom, her back against the mattress, the grey parachute hanging above her head. I can see the outlines in the silk of the pieces of plaster that have collected there since the last time she emptied it. I don’t know how there can be any of her ceiling left above her by this point. “I found a ladybug in here yesterday,” she says. “I have no idea where she came from. I thought it was too cold for them to live in December.” She touches her lower lip, which I know is her…

The Way Out is In

The taste is like cobwebs on my tongue, and it starts the moment I cross the threshold and enter the shed. The light is dim, the window small and coated in a layer of dust and grime, and it becomes more dark when I let go of the door and it closes gently shut behind me. A quiet but insistent sound hovers at the edge of my hearing, like the hum of a distant waterfall. The key in my hand is no longer hot to the touch. I put it in my pocket and turn in a slow circle, looking…

Springtime Honey

Hannah and I don’t go skiing, because going skiing was never the point. Instead, we are at her house in Daly City, in her bedroom. We are laying in her bed, but it’s friendly, and not a romantic thing. There is a cemetery across the street from her house. I can see it through the window. I try not to read anything into it, but of course it’s hard not to right now. Hannah has not told me what it is she is having tests for, what disease is gnawing at the edges of her body, and I haven’t asked…

Cheese In a Can

Tina and Rivi are sprawled across my sofa, one at either end, feet tangled together in the middle. Tina has an old Polaroid, some beat up old thing she rescued from a Goodwill, and where she has managed to find film packs for it, I have no idea. Rivi has the cat—Jessie—on her chest, and the purrs are louder than would seem likely from such a small animal. “The thing about being depressed,” Rivi is saying, “is to just stay in bed until you get over it. It’s absolutely socially acceptable to eat cheese in a can and not bathe…