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

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

On this episode of The Writer's Voice, we'll hear Nathan Blum read his story Outcomes from the November 3rd, 2025 issue of the magazine.

Blum received his MFA from Vanderbilt University, where he taught creative writing.

He's currently working on a collection of stories and a novel.

Now here's Nathan Blum.

Outcomes.

On his first day back at Winslow College's climbing wall after the long winter break,

Nolan checks the Belay sign-up sheet and sees that someone named Heidi Lane

has written her name in the seven o'clock slot every

weeknight for the entire month of January.

Sure enough, at seven exactly, a short, narrow-nosed girl with a shiny brown bob hustles

in through the gym's double doors.

She's wearing blue jeans and duck boots and fuzzy white earmuffs around her neck

like headphones. I made a New Year's resolution, she says. This is going to be my new thing.

Some people find it hard to climb in jeans, Nolan says. I do everything in jeans. What else do you do?

Like besides school, nothing.

That's why I made this resolution.

In the gear room there's a harness and a pair of climbing shoes meant for older children.

They fit Heidi perfectly.

While he tightens her waist strap, she lifts her elbows and stares right at him, unlike

most new climbers, who tend to look up or off to the side.

...