New fiction from NER 39.2

 

Ihad no choice, Jane liked to tell her friends. Nobody else would come. Why not?

Deer season, said Jane.

Deer season. Of course.

Nobody would come. Nobody could. Nobody was around, I was told. 

Who told you? 

The deputy. Deputy . . . Deputy . . . What’s his name, again?

♦

Treat. It was Deputy Treat who set Jane straight. She had walked into the kitchen with her shopping, found the small round hole in the middle of one of the glass panes in the window over the sink. She called the sheriff’s number. They said somebody would be along. Jane waited in the front room. She wouldn’t wait in the kitchen. The hole in the glass was level with her eyes as she stood at the window. She showed it to the deputy. She knew what it was. [Read more]

Castle Freeman Jr. is a longtime contributor of short fiction to NER, most recently with “Enough of Billy” (NER 38.2, 2017). He lives in southeastern Vermont.

from NER 39.2
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