A Canadian Literary Journal
Agnes and True: a Canadian online literary journal dedicated to providing a place for the work of Canadian writers, both established and emerging.
A Canadian Literary Journal
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The Order of Things
by Lauren Stein
It’s time for the third glass of wine, and Bubbie is asleep.
At the kids’ table, my youngest cousin swings her party shoes into my overlong legs, and I don’t say anything. She shovels tiny bites of spongy matzah ball into her mouth, distracted by the older kids and their tablets.
Last year, I was pissed about being relegated to the kids’ table. I was twenty-one. I could drink all the glasses of wine. I could even buy them across the border. This year, my place card finally migrated to sit with the grown-ups. But without Uncle Meyer, it feels wrong. Like I just got it because a spot opened up. So I’ve placed myself back with the kids instead.
I watch my other uncles—once a triumphant trio, now a depressing duo—and the rest of my family go through the motions of the […]
Women of Windsor
by Preston Lang
The book was called Men of Moncton. Rita grabbed it on the way out of Owen’s apartment to have something to read on the train. She’d thought it was fiction, but it was a collection of short biographies—each profiling another illustrious son of New Brunswick’s most essential city.
The woman sitting next to her, glanced at the cover. “Are you from Moncton?”
“No, I’m from Windsor,” Rita said before realizing that she should’ve lied. But quickly […]
Donor Fatigue
“Just the blood today, ma’am?”
Marybeth blinked, still distracted by how she’d hung up on her daughter to make this appointment in time. “No, I’ve signed up for the whole regimen, as usual,” she said. “Compassion, patience, tolerance—the works.”
“Oh,” said the nurse—Prashant, according to his nametag—confusion fluttering across his face. “I wasn’t given the extended forms. Wait here, please . . .” He stepped out, leaving Marybeth in the consulting room. She fanned herself with an aftercare brochure […]
The Universal Treat
by Jenny Vester
Even before they chain up that dog in their spectacularly untended back yard, you despise the couple next door. You refer to them as Bitch and Asshole, same as they call each other, and give them the surname Knob so you can lump them together—as in, The Knobs have really done it this time.
The dog arrives on a Friday night while you’re at work. You drive home from another shift of mixing drinks and pouring […]
Bad Luck and Big Ants
In the darkness, Ella swats the side of her head before lifting it from the pillow. “Fucking ants,” she says and fumbles for the switch. Bedside lamplight blinds her, but soon she can see that the dog on the floor beside her is awake—alert and ready to do whatever is needed. Maybe that’s where the ant landed.
His back to her, her husband mutters, “Wha…”
There’s the ant. On the duvet pulled up over her husband’s […]
Intentions
by Beth Goobie
Riley locked her bike to a NO PARKING sign and surveyed the storefront forty feet in from the sidewalk, behind a small parking lot. Four months ago, she had started volunteering at The Good Intentions Emporium, a local thrift store, in the hopes of earning a job reference. At twenty-seven, she was The Emporium’s youngest volunteer, and she had quickly learned that her good intentions were not to manifest in helpful suggestions, no matter how […]
That Woman I Know
by Imola Zsitva
I saw her every morning at eight fifteen on the corner of Avenue de L’Épée and Fairmount. First to emerge from the electric car were the black, high-heeled boots and blue skinny jeans, followed by the green wool coat. It didn’t look warm, but it wrapped around her figure in sheer elegance. Like a movie star who always looks immaculate, even when she pops out for groceries. Her hair was blonde (as you would expect) […]
Bed Blocker
The words fly down the hospital corridor like precision missiles homing in on Maggie, their fleeing target, piercing her on impact.
“Keep her away. She’s abusing me!”
Maggie presses palms against ears as she escapes her accuser, the screeching woman in the corner room.
Indifference is everywhere—in lab coats, with stethoscopes, or arms laden with flowers, moving with unflinching eyes, looking ahead or downcast, but never back in the direction of the desperate cries—the wails just white noise […]
The Broken Village
“It’s your fan belt,” the mechanic says. He has dirty hands and clean hair, a lopsided smile and good teeth. He charmed the older sister, Odelia, when he leaned over the engine and raised his pale green eyes. Young and cute—so cute he doesn’t have to be tall or rich. Odelia squeezed among the tools and grime, clearing a place for her pleated skirt. Now she sits on the counter swinging her feet, watching his […]
The Radical
Looking at my sister’s Instagram makes me feel hollow inside, but I can never stop returning to it—the same way I ran my tongue over the spot from a missing tooth as a kid. I tell myself I should cut back, but it’s a harmless vice, no worse than my occasional late-night drink.
Esther worships Audre Lorde, provides commentary on Beyoncé that verges on the Talmudic. These “yas queen” posts are interspersed with self-portraits of joyful […]
Antler Handle Magnifying Glass Late 1800’s, Good Condition
by Emily Hunt
My memory has changed everything about you. It thinks you’re perfect. I buckle under the druggy weight of the lie, sometimes. Press awkwardly against the ground, happy and stupid beneath it. It thinks that when you first walked into my shop—collapsing your umbrella between us in slow revelation, careful amongst the worthless antiques—it was love at first sight and not, in fact, aversion. My memory forgets that. Forgets that I tried to resist, first. So […]
Nonna’s Mandolin
Cyril hands me a plastic package bound with duct tape. It’s heavier than I expect. This feels like a clandestine drug deal might. My giggle is stopped short by Cyril’s quizzical look.
“Sorry,” I say. “This is a first for me.”
“Me too.” He clears his throat. “I’m pretty sure it’s flour. With maybe some gravel and a few chunks of chicken bone for good measure. In the urn, I mean.”
I nod. Nonna would have made it […]
Any Time After Now
When Anna was a teenager, she would look at her mother and cringe. To Anna, her mother was ancient. She had wrinkles beginning to bloom in the corners of her eyes; her hair was permanently dyed a chestnut brown to hide the grey strands that had started to sprout at her temples; her breasts drooped a little lower each year, and her waist thickened. Anna vowed that she would rather be dead than be like […]
Unmasked
There were no vacant benches in the park, so I leaned against a tree. I watched the masked parents riding herd on their unmasked little bandits—no way were those kids safe-distancing on the playground equipment. I was glad Bridget hadn’t suggested a coffee shop where I’d have to take off my mask between sips of coffee. Bridget was not in my bubble.
Never in the past twenty years, had I expected this rendezvous would happen. […]
The Ideal Swing
I’ve always wanted a porch swing. The kind that you would sink deep into, and your feet wouldn’t reach the ground. They would dangle. You’d twirl your ankle, clap your flip flop to your foot, and critique the pedicure you got last Wednesday from Perfect Nails downtown. The swing would be white and hang from chains that rattled when you got off and rattled again when you sat down—this time with a cappuccino in hand. […]
Let’s Say I’m a Tree
by Angie Ellis
And here I sit on a chilly, pine needle morning—the trees cut black against the watery
tangerine sky. Poetic .
I’m mentally going over my speech. No, my proposal. A statement of deeply felt resolution.
“Don’t be mad, but . . . listen. How are you feeling about this?” (Gesture between us.) “Remember when we fought about which seedy bread to buy for sandwiches in Tofino? What a stupid life, right?” (I’ll laugh here because it’s stupid in […]
