This is the writer's voice, new fiction from the New Yorker.

I'm Deborah Treisman, fiction editor at the New Yorker.

On this episode of the writer's voice, we'll hear Treason, fiction editor at the New Yorker.

On this episode of the writer's voice, we'll hear Rebecca Curtis, read her story, Hansa and

Gretel and Peace of Shit, from the November 16th, 2020 issue of the magazine.

Curtis is the author of the Story Collection 20 Grand and Other Tales of Love and Money,

and a winner of the Rona Jaffy Foundation Writers Award for Fiction.

Now here's Rebecca Curtis

Hansa and Gretel and Piece of Shit.

Gretel wakes at 6 a.m. as usual, but her stomach feels crampy.

These are not what her mother calls the normal cramps, which

gnash her abdomen for four days each month. These fissures poke her midsection

with acidic fingers as she dresses.

She hunches while she brushes her teeth,

unloads the dishwasher, and mops the kitchen.

She walks down to the cellar,

carries up stacks of logs,

and feeds the wood stove.

She toast spread but finds she's not hungry,

so puts it in her heavy school bag.

She doesn't ask to stay home.

Her mother's warned her that she knows the girl feign's illness,

...