A boy fakes sick to get out of school. Then he fakes fainting in the driveway on the way back from getting the mail. And a cop comes by all what’s this kid doing sprawled out on the ground. Also, there’s a leopard on the loose.

(from The New Yorker, Nov. 10, 2008)

With the leopard out there, the woods seem famous now.

I’ve been walking around with this one in my backpack, wondering when I would get to it. I savor Wells Tower stories, didn’t want to rush it, or waste it on the wrong mood, or when I’d have to rush. “Leopard” is an cool story, one that really captures a certain post-kid/pre-non-kid plateau. The kid spreading out the mail and laying down in the driveway was just so perfect. This story, one might say, ends before it should. Eh. It ends when it ends. Loved it.
Read it here.