“Evening in Nod,” by Dave Lucas, appeared in the Winter 2018 issue of MQR.
His day’s work done and his third beer drained, Cain finally feels like himself. Buzzed in the static of late August, when his friends go back to school. He always misses them more than he can say. He does not say much. Soon they will be old and he will need to wander on, labor, earn by the sweat of his brow. For now they have set up the empties on the railroad trestle and are knocking them off with rocks one by one. Cain can throw better than any of them, but he lets his friends win. He loves them. He cannot believe how the summer has flown. He has never loved anyone so much.
Image: Grosz, George. “Cain and Abel.” 1938. Mixed media. Private owner.
