Jeremy Stevens

“The Monsters We Become” by Jeremy Stevens

Submitted to Contest #259

This amazing story of heartbreaking genius contains profanity. Desire is our new administrative assistant. She pronounces her name De-zur-ay. While contemporary names have run amok with the apostrophe, I do think one belongs at the end of her name. I don’t tell her this, though. Since moving to the South, I’ve evolved in my open condemnation of idiocy and the human condition. My face says it all. And, my tone, over-emphasizing the third syllable. “Good morning, De-zur-AY.” She thinks I am flirting with her, but really, I am not, and I won’t ...

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“I Just Met a Girl Named Maria” by Jeremy Stevens

Those of us at Canisius College who are residents, who dorm or live near campus, know well enough who are the commuters, especially on a winter’s day when we take the tunnels and endure classes in our jammies. The girl who sits in front of me in Willa Cather is a commuter. She always looks so showered and weather wise. This morning she still had flakes dusting her North Face parka and she smelled like cold. My sweatshirt was inside-out and I smelled like last night.I know her name is Maria, that she went to St. Francis High School, and that ...

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“Dachau for Queers” by Jeremy Stevens

Submitted to Contest #255

This story, including the derogatory title, is based on true events. ****There are James and Mary, all cuddly by his locker, she looking up to him, dotingly subservient. They are everything you would expect in the male/female archetype: he, tri-sport athlete —football, wrestling, track— and lettering in all three; studious; congenial; probably helps his old man till the land. Ruggedly handsome, chiseled features. Strong hands. Mary is, of course, a cheerleader. Her posture is ballet perfect. She is secretary for student government and has bi...

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“Boys During Wartime” by Jeremy Stevens

Submitted to Contest #253

Possible triggers: gore; ethnic slursIn the area behind Tristan’s house and the condemned apartment building separating Ashland Avenue from Elmwood there lies our stone yard, a discarded appliance and home furnishings cemetery decorating the rubble and detritus of some contractor’s ignorant distraction from detail, and it is here that we —me, Tristan McCabe, Rob Pollock, and Sean Barone, colloquially known as those damn kids— escort Aaron Barone, Sean’s six-year-old younger brother, to his initiation into, until we happen upon a better ...

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“The Compromise” by Jeremy Stevens

Submitted to Contest #252

He called on me in class today. “Audrey, have you a verse to contribute?” he asked. He does this, calls on students whose hands aren’t raised, his (admittedly effective) way of keeping us tame. He calls it “voluntolding.” There’d been a lull, a long, uncomfortable pause after he nominated Lance to contribute a verse: Lance, the one who sits in the corner closest to the back door, the one who gets picked up by the Boys’ and Girls’ Club bus. The one whose refrigerator displays the school lunch menu with a smiley-face magnet; the one whose grea...

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“The First Deadly Sin” by Jeremy Stevens

Submitted to Contest #249

This is it: either I get this job, or we move. Jonathan Carson had graduated in June with a Master’s in School Administration from the (very esteemed) University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He had a thick portfolio with laminated pages containing his “artifacts” of achievement (edu-speak for evidence) during his year-long internship, replete with personal initiatives (including the inaugural community parking lot sale where he generated $750 in revenue), transportation issues (including his suggestion, that found fruition, in an alter...

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“Persuasion” by Jeremy Stevens

Submitted to Contest #248

This is a sensationalized story based, quite tragically, on a funny/not funny true occurrence.****“Running out to buy juice.”“You just bought juice yesterday. Try again.”“What can I say? The boys like-a the juice, eh?” Silence; yet another Saturday Night Live reference —and a pretty good mimic at that— wasted on the ignorant. The kitchen sink’s faucet disguises the glug! as I pour out the remaining juice. “Think I’ll get some more Eggos while I’m at it.”“There are three boxes in the freezer, cupcake. Maybe say you’re getting something we nee...

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“I'm With the Banned” by Jeremy Stevens

Submitted to Contest #247

This story contains leftist political hot-buttons. Do not proceed if you are easily offended.“Do you promise you won’t leave me?”“Baby, how many times I gotta say it?”“More times than you have.”“I promise. I’m not going to leave you.”“It’s just…everyone I’ve ever loved has left.”“I am not everyone.”“And if we do this…”“Ssshhh…you talk too much.”“Just, go slow, ‘kay?”“You got nothing to fear.”-----“And you met him, where?”“At the dugout…”“I mean, where, the first time?”“Online.”“Where online?”“CuddlesClub. He said he was fifteen though…”“And ...

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“Just When You Think You Know Her” by Jeremy Stevens

Submitted to Contest #241

I was always the first to bed. I would ask if she’d like to join, but she’d always have late night things to take care of, things she couldn’t get done during her busy day. Tabitha had a tough job, and I often commended her on how well she was able to balance work and home. I knew she loved me. It was our mutual respect for each other’s space that had kept us so close, for so many years.Or, so I thought.We met at the fundraiser. She was part of the production, and I was, well, a benefactor. Don’t get me wrong here: it wasn’t a black-tie affa...

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“Where the Answer Blows” by Jeremy Stevens

Submitted to Contest #240

I’m not talking ‘bout moving in, and I don’t want to change your life, but there’s a warm wind blowing the stars around, and I’d really love to see you tonight.All the feels, that song gives me. I switch off the transistor —yes, I said transistor, all I can afford— and, having mopped the floors, I step out for a cigarette. There is indeed a warm wind, just as the song said, a warm spring wind that disseminates the potpourri of evening rain and mown grass and Bradford pear; perhaps it is blowing the stars around, I do not know, for I am surro...

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“The Road Well Traveled” by Jeremy Stevens

Submitted to Contest #239

OneAll you feel is heat. Unrelenting scorch. Around you there is buzzing, perhaps cicadas, but all you see is dust. Dust and stone; not cicadas. You want to look up, but you cannot. You fear the condemnation, the shame, the scowls of disapproval, and you have no strength to look up, anyhow, for heavy is the head.Conviviality and camaraderie to deception and manipulation to incarceration and institution to vilified recluse. Heavy is the head that bears despair.And all our yesterdays have lighted fools the way to dusty death.A quadruped, you c...

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“My Dearest Partner in Greatness” by Jeremy Stevens

Submitted to Contest #237

Walking up her steps after work; her front door is open, and the screen door allows for the cross breeze through the high-ceilinged living room where she works from home. The slough of my shoes on her WELCOME! mat announce my arrival; she jumps up excitedly, as though her “working” from home in the living-room lounge chair were just a pretense. (For I know she has an upstairs office, though I hadn’t been upstairs yet.) She practically skips across the floor to greet me, a prance, wearing a smile that says you are the reason for this beautifu...

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“A Rose by Any Other Name” by Jeremy Stevens

Submitted to Contest #234

My world was shattered, I was torn apart/Like someone took a knife and drove it deep in my heart.“The eighties put out some great music, but this is not that.”“You’re kidding, right?”“No, not at all.” The evening has worn on me; my patience is done. I snap off the radio. “I think we should just play a game.”“Do-you-want-to-play-a-game?” Her voice is computerized. “Okay, name that movie.”Sigh. “War Games. How about—“Ding ding ding. Winner winner chicken dinner. I had such a crush on Matthew Broderick. Who was the girl?”Don’t answer. It’ll jus...

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“My New Pair of Glasses” by Jeremy Stevens

Submitted to Contest #233

Disclaimer: According to the 11th Tradition, "[Alcoholics Anonymous'] public relations policy is based on attraction rather than promotion." As discussed in this story, AA is for narrative purposes only. This story contains pertinent profanity. *** December 31 I am about to do something incredibly stupid. I am about to quit cold turkey. This is incredibly stupid because I have been drunk for over a year, and I have been a drunk since I started high school, and everyone knows the dangers of quitting without detox for the chronically imp...

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“The Viper” by Jeremy Stevens

Submitted to Contest #231

It was finally here, the day they’d all been waiting for: our eighth grade end-of-year field trip.  The sun was shining and the birds were singing, and the school bus was agog with excited chatter.  They were so excited.  I tried to be. I was dimly eager about our trip to Darien Lakes amusement park, simply because I’d never been to one, an amusement park, that is, but I was more focused on the water slides and bouncy houses and the ferris wheel, and the ring tosses and balloon popping ---I could win Sharon an enormous Panda...

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