When he leaned in, as if confiding a great secret to a greater friend, I swear I saw the piece of green caught between his two front teeth twitch, as if it didn't want to be on his face any more than I did.

“What they don’t know,” he was saying, “is the fabric of our universe is suffering, see? No animal or man gets outta here without scars, you know? But plenty of things never get a lick of pleasure. Babies stop screaming because they get tired or get fed or whatever, not because life gets easier, right?” The whole time he spoke, the lettuce fragment waved to me from its tooth perch, as if vying for my full attention.

“So what do you think we should do?” I asked.

“Shatter every mirror in the world,” he said. “Easiest way to reduce a damned population.”

a spider laughs away 
seven years of bad luck 

Bio: Jared Frank