Knockemstiff

by Donald Ray Pollock

“You gotta quit readin’ them books,” Clarence warned Duane one morning at the kitchen table. He looked like hell, anyone could tell he’d had another fucked-up dream. “Start watchin’ more TV,” he advised.

Then, without waiting for a reply, she turned and trudged back to the shiny counter, her white waitress pants saggy in the ass and stained with coffee spots and doughnut grease. If I were a man running for office, she was just the kind of person I might appeal to.