Works / Short Stories
Standing Deadwood
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A former roofer turned tire shop employee grapples with the devastating wreckage of his life as his wife Gwen succumbs to a severe, mind-altering addiction. With their young daughter sent away to live with his sister to escape the madness, the narrator cycles through bleak workdays and violent nights spent dragging his wife out of dilapidated trailers. Searching for a tangible outlet for his profound helplessness and simmering rage, he becomes dangerously fixated on a nuisance raccoon that continually defiles his property. As he routinely numbs his escalating pain with beer, his struggle to survive the ghosts of his shattered family ultimately culminates in a misdirected yearning to hurl his hatchet at the dark, chaotic world closing in around him.