Spare Parts

Fall was always his favorite season. The brisk air and the way the colorful leaves were crisp beneath his steps seemed somehow magical to him and every year he wanted it to last forever. That fall, things were going to change for him. He was prepared for whatever that brought to his life, even if it meant that he wouldn’t be able to turn back to how he had lived until now. But that was okay, he thought, change meant exactly that - you couldn’t just remain the same. It had been a journey, for sure. For over a year and half it had been a journey of discovery. His mother and father, Cindy and Brian Sinclair, had given their blessings to him. So with the strength of their faith and good wishes, Mike Sinclair had set out to find his birth parents. At first, Mike thought that even the idea of him searching for the people who gave him up would kill his parents. They certainly didn’t deserve that. All his 21 years, they had stood by him, raised him as their own, loved...

“I can’t really tell you what it was about Heather Laurie and Janine Vega that I loved the most. We were all different, yet alike in so many ways. The three of us were inseparable soon after we met in junior high. When we went on to high school, even some of the teachers at Martin Van Buren referred to us as the Three Amigas. Well, that was a long time ago. Either way, they were my best friends. Yet, we let an asinine thing - one stupid man actually - ruin it all. “It’s been two full years already. It’s been two years of no emails, no phone calls and no text messages or get-togethers. Heather and Josh got hitched in a little ceremony near his parents’ house in Far Rockaway in late 2006. Then they bought a house and moved upstate. I only know this from hearsay, not like I was invited to the nuptials or anything. Janine was so distraught over Heather’s betrayal that right after graduation, she left her apartment in Jackson Heights and moved to Florida, where her parents had moved a few...

It's all simple, really. I wake each day and stretch the old muscles and shake out of the slumber from the night before and make my way to the kitchen for a bit of water. It's pretty smart to start the day off with a nice drink of water. Gets all the kinks out and sets you up for the day ahead. I burp and remember last night's dinner with a satisfied grin. I sniff around the kitchen for any possible droppings from dinner, but I come up empty. There is such a thing as too clean!! I walk back to my place and look down. My bed's a bit worse for wear, but it's dented in all the right places and I get a good night's sleep out of it. It should probably be replaced, all mattresses should when you're getting up there in years, or when your back's starting to give you trouble. My back is fine and I am still trying to ignore the age thing. Hey, we all do that! Plus, I look damn good for my age, and no I won’t tell you what it is! Now all I've go...

Behind the apartment building, where Abigail Winthrop-Beck has lived all her life, there is a small dark cobblestone alleyway. When she was a young girl, she would watch some teenagers necking under the cover of darkness and it would make her toes and tummy tingle uncomfortably. The building has a rusted staircase in back, leading up to the 4th floor. That's where the landlord has an office. Abigail lives on the 5th floor now, though she raised her family on the 3rd. From her kitchen window, where she sits for hours each day, she can look down and see the lives of the people in her neighborhood unfolding. In the 40 years she has lived here, Abigail has seen so many people come and go. She has seen changes in the neighborhood. She has seen marriages end and lives begin anew. She has seen heartache and happiness. She has gained and lost so much. She has seen weddings, births and baptisms, lots of baptisms. Most of the folks in Abigail's neighborhood are Catholic. She is...