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would contact them too. They would recount the inci- dent of the child and the gun—everyone in the build- ing knew—and how nobody liked him, how strange and unfriendly he was. Lock him up they might say. They might even chant it.
He heard distant sirens outside again, in a steady slow drone. Were they real? Perhaps they’d remain with him always, nagging at him, reminding him. It became night and Seymour was alone, in his apart- ment waiting for whatever was going to happen next, amid his bare, yellow walls and the body of the dead bug from this morning decomposing in his trash. The
TV remained on and the program switched from the news to a comedy show to a drama to the news again and then to a sequence of late-night talk shows. But the content wasn’t important. It was just good to have someone talking in the background, grounding him. Some company. Some comforting words.
Stutch received her MFA in Fiction from the University of Southern Maine’s Stonecoast MFA program. Her stories have appeared in Typehouse Literary Magazine and Five on the Fifth. She is currently employed as an attorney and lives in Scarborough, Maine, with her husband, son, one cat and one dog.
All That Heaven Allows
acrylic on canvas 18'' x 18''
By Andra Samelson
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