"Mix Tape: Vol. 1," by B. J. Hollars

Sixteen and in love. Cars and music and time alone, and time wending your way through adults, parents, siblings. Experiencing life with someone who you believe understands your intense feelings and your blooming logic. But then there is the mystery too of how to deal with absence and routines, and the changes that intervene, the inevitability of a breakup. The great short story, “Pet Milk” by Stuart Dybek comes to mind. Hollars’ use of music fragments from a tape mix convincingly links with the emotions of the point of view character. Perhaps this reminds me of the way Dybek offers visual imagery to reflect the young man’s emotion in his story. For beautiful, poetic melancholy read Hollars’s story here in Night Train.