Greenpoint
by Edward Mullany

A guy whose front teeth were missing stopped me and my girlfriend on the sidewalk, near the steps that go down into the subway.  “I lost my sweater,” he said.  “Can I have yours?”  “I’m not wearing a sweater,” I said.  “Come on, let’s go,” said my girlfriend to me.  But I was angry with my girlfriend, because we’d been arguing.  She’d been staying at my place, but now was returning to hers.  “You go,” I said.  “You want to go anyway.  I was only walking you here in the hope that I could talk you into staying.  But obviously that’s not going to happen.  Here, take your pillow.”  I handed her the pillow, and without a word she snatched it from me and disappeared down the steps into the station.  The guy whose teeth were missing looked at me and smiled and started laughing.  “You’re like me,” he said.  “You’re going to turn out just like me.”

Edward Mullany lives in New York. His book of poems, If I Falter at the Gallows, is forthcoming from Publishing Genius. He is an editor at matchbook.

Artwork by Margarita Korol.