Category: Urban Fiction

6s in Queens

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By Joseph Morales

It is 2:15 PM on Saturday, August 8th in Forest Hills, Queens. 30-year-old sneakerhead Liam Anderson just woke up from what was a long night’s sleep at his apartment on Austin St and Ascan Avenue. In addition to being a sneaker fanatic, Liam is also a recreation specialist at the Al Oerter Recreation Center in Flushing and an aspiring fashion designer. The job entails developing and implementing programs in order to provide people with fun and enriching activities. He loved his job since it allowed him to help the community and develop new fashion design programs at the center. The programs would help people build skills that could be used to make clothing, such as sewing and tie-dying.

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Wonder in New Dorp

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By Joseph Morales

It is around 6PM on Friday, July 24th, 2026 at the field on Cedar Grove Avenue a few blocks from Cedar Grove Beach on Staten Island. 12-year old Justin Russo and his brother James are walking back home after Justin finished playing soccer with their friends. The two had spent most of the day at Cedar Grove Beach with the clique before going to the field. While it was a fun day overall, James was bummed that his parents wanted him to stay at the field to watch Justin play soccer. They told him that it was because they wanted James to expose himself to some sports so that he can ultimately choose one to play. Besides wanting him to play something, his parents also wanted him to be more well-rounded and enjoy something other than academics.

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Riding to a Summer Job

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By Joseph Morales

It is an 80-degree summer day in Bayside, Queens, and 16-year old Christina Kramer is waiting for a train at the Bayside LIRR Station. These days were her favorites, warm enough to catch summer vibes but cool enough not to melt away in the Northeast humidity. She really enjoyed taking public transportation since it gave her a chance to explore communities more personally. Specifically, Christina felt like walking and being in a public vehicle allowed her to see and hear more than she could in the metal box of a vehicle. She absolutely adored the freedom transit gave her when she lived in Downtown Brooklyn. There, the number of subway lines available made her feel like she lived in an international airport with flights to different parts of the city instead of different continents. Christina would take countless adventures going practically anywhere. This included the electric zoo of Times Square, the cosmopolitan streets of Jackson Heights and so many other places.

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The Interborough Juror

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By Joseph Morales

*In real life, Marble Hill Playground is owned and operated by the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation.

Carmen Gonzalez is a nurse at the Moses Campus of Montefiore Hospital in the Norwood section of The Bronx. Her husband, Andrew, is a curator at the American Museum of Natural History on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. They have been married for 40 years and share an apartment in the Marble Hill neighborhood, overlooking the northern tip of Manhattan Island. The couple bonded over the ambition they both have in their unique crafts and a desire to do the best they can for the people they serve. For Carmen, that means racing around the hospital floor ensuring that all of her patients are as pain-free as possible. Meanwhile, Andrew’s time was spent doing endless research and making constant phone calls to meticulously gather a set of artifacts for immersive exhibits about the history of the universe.

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Cranberries in Crotona Park

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By Joseph Morales

It is a hot and humid summer day at Crotona Park in The Bronx. The date is Friday, July 3rd 2026, and it is the start of Fourth of July Weekend along with the middle of a historic heat wave. This Friday is only the second time since 2012 that it has hit 100 degrees in New York City. The last time it was this hot, Robinson Cano was the best player on the Yankees and many of the modernist buildings that are visible from the Cross Bronx Expwy didn’t exist yet. Though much has changed, the things that make a summer day in The Bronx special have not. Dozens of people from all age brackets are lined up on Fulton Ave, anxious for some time to cool off in the olympic-sized Crotona Park Pool. The jingle of Mister Softee combined with the roar of the Metro-North Railroad and Cross Bronx Expressway make for a track more distinctive to the West Bronx than any hip hop mix created. Vendors known as piragüeras or piragüeros, pace the sidewalk hoping to sell their homemade piragua, filling the air with an ambrosian smell no other treat can match.

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