Spring 2024 - Recrudescence

Itxaro Borda

Chapter 1 Rain-soaked streets. One of the town’s lost souls flew past like a leaf in the wind.1 In the old Opel with Haugesund plates sat the Red Handler, private detective. He took a gulp from a flask etched with the words, To my dear husband.2 He envisioned his ex-wife for a brief second, before the liquor flushed the painful memory down the sewers of oblivion.3 He turned on his car stereo. From the speakers flowed the tones of Glenn Gould’s recording of the Goldberg Variations.4 The later recording, the one from the 80s. The Red Handler closed his eyes as the eminent piano tones played with his ears.

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