In 1 day we publish Colin Winnette’s Fondly, two novellas. As the cover exposes the innards of a thing, so will we, each day revealing another illustration from the book by artist Scott Teplin alongside excerpts from the novellas In One Story, The Two Sisters and Gainesville.
Jiminy’s foster father had a heart attack. They visited him in the hospital and Jiminy pocketed some of his heart medication. He took it with a beer. He took great notes. Aced another test. He took the heart medication with a glass of absinthe.
“It’s real,” Sam swore. “It’s imported.”
They both took the heart medication. They got drunk on absinthe, forewent the ritual and drank it straight from the bottle.
Jiminy kissed Sam and Sam kissed him back for a second. Then he stopped.
Jiminy took more of the heart medication and Sam drank more of the absinthe.
Sam copied Jiminy’s answers on an English test and they both aced the test together.
They graduated from high school and went to a number of parties afterward. They were both drunk and driving from one end of town to the other. They filled the car with girls Sam was interested in. Jiminy was rude to all of them. He started crying halfway through the night and locked himself in the bathroom at one of the parties. He took all of the oxycodone he had and passed out. He woke up in the emergency room, passed out again. He woke up strapped to a bed. He passed out again.
He was in a facility. He’d tried to kill himself. He hadn’t actually, but that’s what they told him.
–from Gainesville