You must pay the rent. But you can’t pay the rent. But you must pay the rent. So you find a side hustle. You cook and clean for the rich; you care for their elderly parents. You sell dead people’s sex toys and vintage clothes, your time, your blood, your prosthetics, your heritage. You deliver smoothies, drugs, curses. You hunt pythons, cryptids, demons. You become a guinea pig. You install another app. But you still can’t pay the rent. These nineteen horrific tales of capitalism run amok (same as it ever was) ask: what would you do to survive?
Table of Contents:
Lauren Bolger – Fish Fry Shouldn’t Look Like That
Cardigan Broadmoor – OutSourcing
Sasha Brown – The Harpies of Central Park Tower
Poppy Z. Brite – Violet
Laura DeHaan – No One Wants to Work These Days
Felix I.D. Dimaro – Absorb ME
Yasmeen Fahmy – Four Hands Full, Three Eyes Open
Jennifer Lesh Fleck – The Musgrave Articles
Nick Hertzberg – Chew You Up and Spit You Out
Akis Linardos – Unfortunately, This Finger
Casey Masterson – Bon Appétit
Mae Murray – Ghosts of Jackson County
Jorja Osha – The Black House
A.J. Sharpe – Pre-Order Now
Michelle Sturges-Brown – TOM
Emily Y. Teng – The Cutting Heft of Its Teeth
Kristina Warlen – The Guide Job
Andrew Whalen – The Long Duck
K.A. Wiggins – Swallow Down the Notes