Member-only story
Another Chicago Magazine publishes an excerpt from “As Far as You Can Go Before You Have to Come Back.”
Onions in the Tea Garden
It seems unwieldy to post the 4,000-word short story here on Substack. Here’s the link, which I will also post at the end of the bit, here. I’m hoping you’ll be into the story by then!
It was super hard not drinking on the plane, Bangkok to Tokyo. Probably because I left my cigarettes in the boarding area in Bangkok. As soon as lightly-accented English announced that the in-flight beverage service was ending, I couldn’t stop myself, I chowed down on the peanuts I’d managed to avoid throughout the flight.
Narita Airport — an orderly haze of white tile. I passed through Japanese Immigration and Customs — Mother Mary, was that beer in a vending machine? Swiftly, I looked to buy some Camels. Six dollars. I settled for a random brand, about three bucks, and found a pay phone. I dialed Cho at the department store. A moment later, she was in my ear with, “Hey, girl! Boy, I’d love to — but I’m going into a budget meeting. Write this down.”
Cho interrupted herself with a cough, and then fired off the instructions to get me to a train station in Tokyo, “Oo-way-no. West Gate, two hours. Ask for the nishi guchi. Write it down.”
