Rumpus fiction Archives - Page 2 of 3 - The Rumpus

Rumpus Original Fiction: To Go

Love can feel muddled, vast, diffuse; so little to do with the singular volatility of a firework. I hunger for that kind of crystalline precision, though. That clarity. To scream myself across the sky just once—consuming everything in my wake—and then vanish from view.

Rumpus Original Fiction: Only Humans

Hearing old people’s memories is like watching a once-in-three-generations downpour. In the past, they lived in abundance and air conditioning. So many details go over Salwa’s head. She doesn’t know how to transcribe all the words.

Rumpus Original Fiction: Mycomorphosis

“Everything looks good,” the neurologist said. The hairs on his head, she couldn’t help noticing, resembled plump white beansprouts—they stood from his scalp as if fat with water. His fingers too. “The only thing is that you have extra fungus in your head.”

Rumpus Original Fiction: Breaking Through

I read somewhere that sounds don’t stop, they keep going all the way into deep space, reflecting off whatever might be in the way and speeding infinitely on. My head feels like deep space, and those voices haven’t even begun to wind down in there.

You Don’t See the Whole Young Man until the Very End: An Interview with Douglas Stuart

The amount of pressure on young men still to get on with it and to bottle it up and to be strong and be certain is overwhelming. And it shows in the UK. The suicide rates for men are so high. It’s a mental health issue. We don’t allow men to express themselves or talk about their vulnerability, and we blame them for a lot; we get to that phrase “toxic masculinity” really quickly. I don’t believe masculinity is always toxic, I just think sometimes it’s very unhealthy and we need to examine it and open it up.

Feeling Comfortable Enough to Be Funny Is What Makes Me Want to Write Fiction: A Conversation with Megan Giddings

There was a long stretch where I tried actively not to make things I wrote funny because of a disastrous undergrad fiction workshop where I spent thirty minutes just listening to people complain that a story had jokes. And wouldn’t it have been so much better if the author had let us pay attention to the emotions? Lol.

Rumpus Original Fiction: Genesis

The speed boat moves fast and Genesis notices Kayla’s hair keeps getting into her eyes. She laughs, as do all the others, who bounce up and down and let out…

Rumpus Original Fiction: Bridle

But I am, I wanted to say. I am willing.

Rumpus Original Fiction: The Things for Which We Have Prayed

In the nursing home, his few lucid days are passed recounting the things he had prayed for as a child. The zookeepers, he cackles. I prayed for the zookeepers.

Rumpus Original Fiction: A Girl Lost at Sea

Sometimes, she thinks her parents can mute the world.

Rumpus Original Fiction: Feast

I’m the only deaf person at the party, again.

Rumpus Original Fiction: A Hundred Orbits

Anoushka reaches for my dresser, too close to the Prednisone prescription. If she accidentally flips it over, I’ll have to tell the truth. She picks up two matching earrings: long ones with black jewels that could be grapes on a branch.

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