Novel Songs

Touch by Courtney Maum on Novel Songs

The possibility that he really did harbor some attraction to her couldn't pierce her core. It wasn't in the realm of things that were feasible these days. Bombings, bankruptcy, coastal flooding, all of these things, yes, but that he could feel some tenderness for this broken person, no.

The almost biological certainty that the more often you checked your cell phone, the more likely you were to find that one wondrous message or notification that would improve your entire life.

Alice and I were the same size. We displaced the same amount of air. But when we embraced she became elusive and darting, like a remora fish. When I held her I imagined that I could crane my neck and kiss the small of her back, or reach around to clasp my own shoulders in my hands.

At the restaurant, the sound system was playing Dinah Washington singing “For All We Know.” The walls, like love, were trompe-l’oeil—walls painted like viewful windows, though only a fool wouldn’t know that they were walls. The menu, like love, was full of delicate, gruesome things—cheeks, tongues, thymus glands. The candle, like love, flickered, reflected in the brass tops of the sugar bowl and the salt and pepper shakers.

She was a curious woman, whose dresses always looked as if they had been designed in a rage and put on in a tempest.

Find It or Fling It: The Girl on the Train

These things sneak up on him for no reason, these flashes of irrational happiness. It’s probably a vitamin deficiency.

The terminal seems busy for a weekday. A crowd mills around the conveyor belt: a sunburned family in flip-flops; several imparient men in suits; two baby-faced soldiers in desert camouflage; a woman shouting Spanish into a cell phone. Where, Dolly wonders, is everyone going? Years ago people stayed put: you found a job and kept it, bought a house and kept it. There were meals to cook and children to raise, and in this way, years passed. Those who did otherwise-the unsavory characters, the criminals and misfits-were easy to spot, back when men got regular haircuts and shaved daily. Now they seem to be everywhere.