What Kind of Paradise

by Janelle Brown

But gosh, it’s not like you can smile away pain.” When I looked at her with unease, she laughed. “Oh, don’t worry. I’ve got opioids for that.

Memory is a fickle beast. So often we choose what we want to remember; but sometimes memories choose us. The memories we most want to forget are the ones that fold themselves into our subconscious, waiting until we least expect them to rise up and pinch us tight in their talons.

the use of a seventeen-year-old girl as a honeypot decoy?

I nodded soberly, wondering what a pimp was. It wasn’t acne-related, presumably.