Marcelle Strati left Cairo at 18 years old with nothing, and everything. She arrived in Montreal empty-handed, apart from the hand that held hers; the hand that belonged to Elie, the love of her life. A decade and two beautifully bright boys later, she and...
There is lukewarm coffee on the table. The couch is old and worn. There are imprints where countless people have sat, ghosts of the time before the storm. Back when people had names and faces had features. Rain batters against the windows. It slides down the...
Take the long way home with me, the girl thinks. She is small, slender, a frail-boned thing, with pale freckled skin and hair as dark as ashes. Her eyes are huge and black, large enough to act as mirrors even in foggy light, and rimmed...
Johnny McKinnon was, in many ways, a simple man. He enjoyed large trucks, good beer, and action movies – as long as they weren’t the kind with magic or aliens or other weird shit. He liked hockey games if the teams weren't playing like they...
Let me tell you about Jim Grossman. Now, when I think of Jim Grossman, I can’t help but picture his artificial white teeth. Maureen always said he must paint them with the same stuff they used on their old fence last spring. I tell you...
You sit across from me on the couch, a variety of lamps yellowing the dark room, your fingernails tapping against your knee. The silence is filled with my heartbeat pressing against my neck, my wrists, my fingers. The blood gets caught in my muscles. You...
[audio mp3="https://www.queensquilt.ca/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/Host.mp3"][/audio] The dread comes first. The signs begin later, though still months in advance. You’ve seen it happen before. You know what to expect, what to fear. The way your sister’s body changed and betrayed her. The way your best friend survived, only to wish...
Trigger Warnings: Death, blood, violence, homophobia, self-harm, ableism ________________________________ There is no funeral for the boy who drowned in the lake. He was only sixteen, a year older than me. A life ahead of him, until there wasn’t. Until someone saw him kissing Tommy Gilner from down the...
24th March Dear Charlie, I miss you. I know you’ve been busy, but your last letter was two months ago, and I’m going crazy. I can’t stand being without you. The longer I’m stuck here, the more I want to tear across the page and scrape ink into...
[audio mp3="http://www.queensquilt.ca/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/i-will-raise-my-Babygirl.mp3"][/audio] As a child, I would cling to her arm. Both my hands wound tightly around her muscle; skin that sunk and sagged from gravity fifteen years too early. My dad looks at photos of her from their twenties and tells me, “This is how...