Austin Ross

Daddy’s monster is back. That slightly musky scent of sawgrass wafts in across the Everglades as he slides a single bullet into the revolver. This is what I remember, all these years later. This incident with the revolver is familiar to me, a nightly ritual to cap off our evenings of foil-wrapped TV dinners and, for him, nearly a third of a bottle of whiskey. I have learned by now to keep silent during the ritual. As he examines the revolver in his hands, polishes the silver of the barrel with his sleeve, I think: he isn’t such a bad…