" CONTENTS Before Paphos
Alone in the House
o Art Gallery by Loretta Casteen
of Mims
o Articles 8 January 2007
By Barth Anderson
o Columns It starts again. The baby
begins to cough and
26 April 2004
o Fiction
choke.
o Poetry s students poured into the first two rows for
A
Locked Doors
class, California maneuvered into Wyhoff's line
o Reviews
of sight, folding his long body into a seat near theby Stephanie Burgis
stage.
o Archives
1 January 2007
"Oat toast," said one student.
" ABOUT US
You can never let
anyone suspect, his
"Oat toast," said another.
o Staff
mother told him. That
A new girl laughed and tried again. "Oat toast."
was the first rule she
o Guidelines
taught him, and the last,
It was a game that Wyhoff played with students
o Contact
before she left him here
and members of this acting troupe, both of
alone with It.
whom took classes from the director known
o Awards
only as "the Big Core." Wyhoff and the troupe's
Heroic Measures
o Banners
newer students were imitating upstate New
by Matthew Johnson
York tonight. Wyhoff claimed you could tell
" SUPPORT US
where anyone in America or Canada was from
18 December 2006
by the way they said oat toast.
o Donate
Pale as he was, it was
"Oat. Toast," said Wyhoff, flattening the O in a
o Bookstore
hard to believe he would
perfect Rochester. He looked like hard cold
never rise from this bed.
cash in his black silk SNL! tour jacket. "C'mon,
o Merchandise
Even in the darkest
Cali. Before the Big Core starts class. Say it."
times, she had never
" COMMUNITY
really feared for him; he
California was turned around in his seat,
o Forum
had always been strong,
watching the game. He said the phrase, not
so strong.
imitating any particular accent.
o Readers'
Choice
Love Among the Talus
"Hmm. Sacramento? Chico State?" said
Wyhoff, impersonating California. "Dewd, c'n
by Elizabeth Bear
yew score some owt towst?"
11 December 2006
Everyone laughed -- it was dead on --
and California's hands got hot as he realized that
Nilufer raised her eyes to
Wyhoff had been paying such close attention to
his. It was not what
him.
women did to men, but
she was a princess, and
The house lights went down, then came up
he was only a bandit. "I
again, sapping the laughter and chatter from the
want to be a Witch," she
Edmund Fitzgerald's little theater. The Big
said. "A Witch and not a
Core was starting his class.
Queen. I wish to be not
loved, but wise. Tell your
Wyhoff walked by to take a seat near T.Z.,
bandit lord, if he can give
whispering to California, "Don't let the bastard
me that, I might accept
get you down."
his gift."
"Spot, Nakamura!" The Big Core's voice came
Archived Fiction Dating
from shadowy seats in the risers behind them.