fwriction

The new winter issue of jmww is overflowing with good writing. However, for this reader, Julie Innis’s “Blubber Boy” is the tops. fwriction readers should be familiar with Innis’s work, which is some of the strongest to walk these literary halls, and I know we’ll be reading her stories for many years to come.

It’s rainy today in New York City, so grab a cup of coffee, stay dry, and read something worthwhile.

We didn’t start out calling him Blubber Boy, but once Brian suggested it, I was no longer able to imagine his name could be anything else. Blubber Boy is probably only nine or ten, but looks forty-five with his practical buzz cut that does nothing to disguise his fat square head. He looks like a football coach who’s spent too much time on the sidelines. When he leans over the bridge railing, his arms pillow out from his t-shirt sleeves and his chest falls into two perfect breasts. “You guys look stupid down there,” he says.