Catherine Lacey’s Biography of X is one of the best books I’ve read in recent years, and her weird, dreamlike, off-kilter prose is cranked up to 11 in this short story. I’ve read it three times; each time another section stands out to me.

 The curtains caught fire and he sat there staring at me as the flames grew overhead, staring at me like a perfect picture of apathy, motionless as the flames ascended his pant leg. This was not how I thought that Tuesday was going to turn out.