This is The Writer's Voice, new fiction from The New Yorker.

I'm Deborah Treesman, fiction editor at The New Yorker.

On this episode of The Writer's Voice, we'll hear Adam Levin read his story, a lot of things have happened,

from the December 27th, 2021 issue of the magazine.

Levin is the author of the Story Collection Hot Pink and two novels, The Instructions and Bubblegum,

which was published last year.

Now here's Adam Levin.

A lot of things have happened, plunger.

As Sarah bunched up her night shirt, she clocked at a disturbance, some movement or sound, scraping, paddling, exhalations.

It happened so fast she said she couldn't be sure, but her rat in the toilet submerged to the neck,

was definitely trying to scale the bowl.

And the next thing she knew, she was standing in the bathtub, hollering for Darren.

Next thing Darren knew, he was brandishing a plunger and yelling at the rat,

hoping to scare it back down the toilet, then nudging it toward the outlet with the plunger,

then driving it below the surface with the plunger.

But soon he was afraid he was making a mistake.

Were the rat to escape the toilet through the outlet, it could drown along the path to freedom,

clogged the line expensively, and so he changed course.

He angled the plunger to block the outlet, while pinning the rat till the haunch that protruded from under the plunger cup no longer thrashed.

By then he was traumatized, he said, don't laugh, or well go ahead and laugh he said, but he was beside himself,

or wasn't himself, could hardly in any case recognize himself.

He was angry at the rat for having made him a killer, and he did something senseless, he did something ugly.

...