45 pages 1 hour read

Morgan Talty

Night of the Living Rez

Fiction | Short Story Collection | Adult | Published in 2022

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“Food for the Common Cold”Chapter Summaries & Analyses

“Food for the Common Cold” Summary

Five years after the events of “In a Jar,” David watches his mother and Frick fighting over a headstone that David’s mother wants to keep and Frick wants to destroy. The fight results in Frick leaving and his mother having an emotional breakdown. David’s grandmother visits and comments on a strange smell in the house. Through the conversation that the grandmother then has with David’s mother, David learns that Frick wants to have a child with his mother, but his mother is unable to conceive. David calls his father to ask why his mother can’t have children, but his mother ends the phone call before David can get a satisfactory answer.

A few days later, David wakes to find that his mother has gone missing. David heads to the mechanic’s garage where Frick works, and together the two of them set out to find his mother. They find her at Frick’s cabin in the forest, where his mother has discovered Polaroids of a young girl. When she confronts Frick about these, Frick grabs her by the wrist, pushing David aside when he tries to intervene.

After David returns home with his mother, she confronts Frick. He reveals that the girl in the photos is Corinne, his dead daughter.