“The In-Between” and The Art of The Quiet Story

Micro Review of:
“The In-Between”
By Katie Lynn Johnston
Bodega Magazine, Issue 136
May 2024

I’ve been told I sometimes fall into the trap of writing a story about nothing—not the Seinfeld kind, but the kind of story where a protagonist reflects on their life, interacts lightly with the world, and then comes to an epiphany with mostly just the provocation of one memory crashing against another. Perhaps a better name than this would be the Quiet Story. Either way, I find it tempting to write these: not only do I better relate to more introverted, solitary protagonists, but I like to write of someone’s whole world, how they came to be, how they see themself. I can lose the drama by being with the person.

Katie Lynn Johnston’s flash fiction piece, “The In-Between,” is a stellar example of the Quiet Story. In it, a man and a woman are waiting for a train; the funeral of the woman’s mother is in the near future; she insists that the man doesn’t try to comfort her, and he complies. When the train comes and she’s confronted with having to make another step towards the funeral, she cries and, as she seeks comfort in him, suggests they get a cab instead.

Quiet, right?

But there’s more to it, particularly regarding the man, who is the story’s narrator, and his interiority. As he fumbles to support the woman, he tries to sort his own feelings towards death and mourning and how he would’ve liked to be supported at earlier instances of loss in his life. What “The In-Between” does so well, then, is that it fluidly creates a seamless line between past, present, and future. The Quiet Story, in focusing less on the present moment and more on the broader scope of a character’s life, allows language to carry more weight, too, as it does in “The In-Between,” with its vivid, impactful prose.

“The In-Between” additionally offers some insightful reflections on how grief draws people together. As someone who’s been working on a novel centered around grief, I’ve found that it’s easy to lose the characters in their sorrow. “The In-Between” certainly highlights this, but it ends on a note that reminds me there’s a flip side to grief as well. When the woman hugs the man and suggests they get the cab, he notes:

“[A]s she wiped the tears from her eyes… he still felt her shoulder as it trembled under his hand and knew that he would never again feel as alive as he did then.”

The man’s grief is not like the woman’s—it’s her mother who died, but nevertheless, he makes clear in his reflection that connection following loss can be what binds people together more deeply than little else can. To be reminded of the importance of allowing oneself to feel to the fullest extent—it’s a heartening thought on which to end an already thoughtful piece.

Benjamin Selesnick is a psychotherapist in New Jersey. His writing has appeared or is forthcoming in Barely South Review, Lunch Ticket, Santa Fe Writers Project Quarterly, The Tel Aviv Review of Books, and other publications. He holds an MFA in fiction from Rutgers University-Newark, and he writes book reviews for The Jewish Book Council and Cleaver Magazine.

Katie Lynn Johnston or Kae, as they prefer to be called, is a queer, nonbinary, and autistic writer. They hold a BA in Creative Writing from Columbia College Chicago and are an MFA candidate at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. They have been an editor for the Columbia Poetry Review, Mulberry Literary, and a production editor for Hair Trigger Magazine. Their work has appeared in Bodega Magazine, Oyster River Pages, and Lavender Review, among others.