Wow are we far behind--we will be catching up on the mini-interviews and the stories behind the Dzanc Short Story Collections and have another guest post or two before June 1. We will also be looking at a future story collection story by story as well.
No pictures to go with this post for National Short Story Month because "First Responder" is the first story in the manuscript Cheer Pack, which is not signed by any publisher as of yet. The manuscript has been written and put together by Colin Fleming. Once somebody snaps this up, it will become Colin's fifth full short story collection (three have currently been published and another is coming later this year). So far all but the title story have been snapped up by literary journals (most having found their way to publication already, at least one still on the way) and by journals that should impress--Harper's, VQR, and more. As I go through these stories, I'll note where you can track them down while you wait for the collection to come down the pike.
"First Responder" is a great opener. It involves a boy and an older boy (the first boy's brother) and takes place in Boston on Marathon Monday (which sadly took me reading it twice before I realized where the story might go). The boys are out on a mission, one the boy is both proud and afraid to be on. He's just about always happy when the older boy allows him in on his doings. The mission is to gather the foot of a mallard in order for the older boy to gain access to a gang of older, tougher boys.
The first place they're going to look is behind the Museum of Fine Arts, which led to maybe my favorite moment or thought in this story--the boy thinking of his love for visiting the MFA with his parents when he would:
...pretend he was a curator giving tours, not saying the words aloud as he rehearsed them in his head, thinking he had a particular skill for describing the battle scenes.
The side of fear defeated the pride in the boy and the older boy forced him to head home. He doesn't though. He heads in the direction of Copley Square instead where the idea that it's Marathon Monday comes up again (yes, this is when it hit me) and how they'd enjoyed that day in the past with his father. It doesn't take long before
He heard two explosions, close together, like cannons, or maybe really old-fashioned guns, and looked around for the Foxborough Minutemen, who fired their rifles when the Patriots scored a touchdown at home games.
The story is fabulous in how we see this event many of us believe we're familiar with through the eyes of a young boy and Fleming never misses a step throughout. Seeing others helping the wounded the boy picks something up from the ground and carries it with him through the rest of the story, leading to a strong ending.
There are little touches through this story that I simply love:
"But he patted the breast pocket of his flannel shirt and felt his standard packet of sour-cream-and-onion potato chips there, so he had provisions for an extended journey."
"No one stopped him as he walked along, threading his way through an ever-thickening crowd, with everyone looking everywhere save towards the ground, which he was quite low to."
"He was surprised by how different real blood looked than TV blood."
And they continue throughout. This story was originally published in Virginia Quarterly Review Fall 2013.
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