Fiction | April 23, 2019
Gateway to the Arctic
Jedediah Cannon
I signed up for this surgery, believe it or not, just nine days after Susie and I returned to Santa Fe from Mike’s trial. Mike, our oldest. Michael Jr. Twelve days after the jury, majority Inupiat, delivered its verdict. Five weeks ago. “All right,” Dr. Dejean said, “so we’re where we knew we’d be.” He swiveled on his stool. Hefted a life-size model of the male urinary tract from his desk. “Straightforward, as I told you last time. Little discomfort afterward, beyond a catheter for a week.” With space-age instruments, Dr. Dejean would slice in through my bladder, hollow out my prostate, and suture me up, sex drive intact, for all it was worth anymore.
If you are a student, faculty member, or staff member at an institution whose library subscribes to Project Muse, you can read this piece and the full archives of the Missouri Review for free. Check this list to see if your library is a Project Muse subscriber.
Want to read more?
Subscribe TodaySEE THE ISSUE
SUGGESTED CONTENT
Fiction
Sep 28 2020
Wait for Me
Every day, I stepped off the school bus on Flat Run Road, and every day, on the other side of the fence, Judy Puckett sat astride a four-wheeler, gunning the… read more
Fiction
Sep 28 2020
Triumph
It was harder than she expected. Some of the patients at the women’s clinic refused to give Intisar their full medical history, as though it were gossip she might turn… read more
Fiction
Sep 28 2020
On the Western Bride
I’d been pinheading on a fishing boat called the Western Bride—scrubbing and prepping so I could fish for free—and that winter I’d made deckhand. This was when I was living… read more