REVEALING EVERYTHING was published in Connotation Press.

On their last night in Tokyo, Dominic went out to a bar to get wasted while his mother packed. He sat alone at the counter, with his head down, praying to avoid young girls and old vets or anyone from the yazuki. The nihonshu burned a hot trail down his throat, dragging with it his feelings of being inconsequential and unwanted and transforming them into dull, deep longings in his belly. As he stumbled back to the subway, two girls from a nearby love hotel walked silently alongside him, snaking their sinuous arms through his. What the fuck, Dominic thought, and let them steer him around, leading him back to their room. They giggled like his students with one another on the street and in the lobby, making fun of his teeth. They called him Uncle Rabbit as they unbuttoned his clothes and pushed him down on the bed, clamoring on top of him like sticks from a collapsing lean to. Dominic squeezed his eyes shut tight the whole time, tearing himself open again and again on their sharp limbs.

Author’s Note: Years before I wrote Revealing Everything, I came up with the first line: “Dominic Manzini had buckteeth and a penchant for cunnilingus.” What felt like it would be a story of crass humor eventually became something deep and poignant. I love it when the process of writing surprises me in that way and I was so delighted that editor Jonathan Cardew, whose work I have admired for a long time, accepted it for publication.