Ian M. Anderson

"David, I see you have your belt on." Mrs. Carver Chestnut lived next door to David, and many evenings they sat together under his walnut trees. The branches of the walnuts shaded his yard to the south, and when the day wore down, his dining room windows testified to their golden leaves. "Yes, Ma'am, I do have my belt on," David said. He ran his fingers over his new prized possession. "Thank you for it." "Well, David, Mr. Chestnut thought you'd like it." "How did he know?" David's brows furrowed in genuine inquisitiveness. "The other day, you know what he said to me? He said, 'David has all sorts of tools and things. I bet I know what he needs.' That's all I got out of him." She laughed and bit into a gingersnap. "I brought this plate of cookies over, David, and you haven't touched one of 'em." "Oh," he said, and took one. "That's right. He d...

Three people, one night, a long morning. January 13 & 14, 20--. One of our subjects is 18 months old, dressed in little more than a diaper. Another tries to pray himself to sleep but fails. The third drifts -- like the snow that began to fall around 10:00 the night of the 13th. 9:48pm, 13 January The child heard the popping duct, and she waddled to the nearest register. Her hand touched the warm air. "Hot," she whispered around the opposite middle and index finger. She squatted down to look into the vent cover, but the heat brought water to her eyes and took her breath for a moment. She would have moved away if her feet and legs, which were both uncovered, had wanted to; she put her toes where the metal had warmed and smiled. "Hot," she said. Then she cried for a minute because her stomach rolled and squirmed, there, while the warm air pushed strands of her hair straight back, but it wasn't long enough for tears to come because of it, and her knees rema...

On the northernmost edge of the south side stood a Pelican Burger -- "Proudly serving the city's biggest burger since 1978" -- and its sign loomed over 56th street so that the head of a massive pelican cast a deep shadow, westward during early morning hours, then to the east as the day waned. The bird's plastic head could be seen as far away as 52nd, and the running joke of those who lived nearby was if you saw the feathered head even that far off, you were caught -- or just as well you were -- by the large beak of the pelican: your next meal awaited you, no matter the hour. Dr. Mary Glen-Shaw's mind clenched like a fist as she stood under the creaking Pelican Burger sign. From where she stood she could hear the commotion of customers inside, and she saw her son, Matthew, standing along the wall. The muscles in her neck tightened; she gritted her teeth. Deep in the recesses of her thoughts she remembered telling him he could be anything he wanted to be. This co...