John McManus - Born on a Train - 13 Stories

But Jearold had eyes, and Isaac liked them; they looked like his own. They could do more things. He’d teach his eyes to do what Jearold’s did. It was important to be tough. He wondered what a BB felt like. He’d ask his father to shoot him with the BB gun so he could know. He’d ask if he could call his father Dad instead of Jearold. It sounded strange to say Jearold if Dad was who he really was, and Isaac pinched himself as hard as he could pinch. BB’s couldn’t hurt worse than that. He knew some boys at school he’d like to shoot, and now he had a dog at home too. It was alive. It had eyes. It was a seeing-eye dog. He didn’t hate dogs anymore, he decided. From now on, dogs would be his favorite thing. He would follow his new guardian through dark fields hunting groundhogs late at night, and they’d lie awake together and look at each other, and he wouldn’t be scared to fall asleep, because he’d know who led him blindly through his nightmares.

I am grateful to the Fellowship of Southern Writers, the Mrs. Giles Whiting Foundation, Hollins University, Madison Smartt Bell, the James A. Michener Center for Writers, and to Jane Gelfman, my agent. I consider myself uncommonly lucky to have Josh Kendall as an editor. In revising these stories I have also benefited from the wisdom of Pinckney Benedict, Kate Preusser, Jenny Noller, Cheri Johnson, Nathan Hilkert, and J. T. Hill. Thank you, all.