The new issue of Shenandoah, which includes my story “The Fossil Record,” has just gone live.
The working title for “The Fossil Record” was “The Nanny’s Tale,” and I guess that just about covers it:
The Davenport’s beautiful house is filled with beautiful art. Art Molly loves to look on. So for a while, the stage before this stage, she supposes, she tried to convince herself that was reason enough to stay with the job, reason enough to be happy — the slant of light on the gleaming wooden floors and the quiet, and the milky bubble at the corner of Odette’s mouth whenever she falls asleep clutching a bottle. Which she is not supposed to do, or Molly to allow, because it’ll be bad for the teeth Odette doesn’t actually have yet. The fact is that there are bold still-lifes hung everywhere, even the kitchen, oil paint on canvas, such an orgy of art that Molly can hardly comprehend it. She begins to run a sponge over the marble countertop. How much longer can she rationalize what she’s doing? She needs to go back to school, so she can get her education certificate, so she can teach art to preschoolers, at least until the next downturn, when such positions will once again be cut.
Katherine L. Hester 