An Interview with Metaphorosis Magazine
Hello, dear readers!
I’m pleased to announce that my short story, “Dry Season", has been accepted for publication in Metaphorosis Magazine and will be available in December 2021.
While you wait, I thought I’d share a quick interview I did with their editor, where I had the opportunity to talk about my prodigious love of gardening (which comes second only to my love of writing, though I’ll ask you to avoid sharing that with my family).
Read my interview here, then enjoy this quick preview of “Dry Season.”
The Ozarks haven’t seen rain in nearly five years. All the well to do folks from Springfield to Fayetteville moved away after the first year. Now, the tourists are gone, and the lake’s dried up to nothing more than a craterous puddle. In the town of Sunrise Beach, Missouri, the children ride sleds down the parched shore. They dig in the sand for bones and beer tabs and lost jewelry. But the members of the Sunrise Beach City Council are concerned. They’re desperate.
It’s June. Before the dry season, the town would’ve been packed to the gills with drunk tourists. They’d spill onto the streets from every restaurant and dive bar and pool hall, reeking of beer and Banana Boat tanning oil. But, this year, there are no tourists. The remaining three city councilors are sitting in a corner booth at Redhead’s Pizzeria, a half-eaten cheese pizza growing cold in the middle of the table. Besides a woman—not a redhead, but a brunette—standing behind the cash register, the restaurant is empty.
“What if it never rains again?” Myrna Fairway asks. Myrna owns Gator’s Waterfront Grill. Her last customer was a young man passing through on his way to Denver, and he didn’t even order anything, just asked to use her bathroom.
“It has to rain sometime,” Lou Conaway says. He’s 83, and he’s spent his whole life in Sunrise Beach. To Lou, the last five years are nothing, a pothole on an otherwise smooth road.
“Well, when is sometime, Lou?” asks Mayor Cobb. “The town is dying. Hell, we don’t even have a beach anymore! We have to do something now.” Cobb works in the post office. His annual mayoral salary is $1, but there's something about that title—mayor. Soon, he fears, he’ll be mayor of nothing.
“What’re we supposed to do?” Lou asks. “This is the weather we’re talking about.”
“You know very well what we’re supposed to do,” Myrna says quietly.
Lou curses.
“She’s right,” Mayor Cobb says. “We have to make an offering.”
“Dry Season” will be available in Metaphorosis Magazine in December 2021. While you wait, check out some of their other amazing stories here.
