Flying Lessons & Other Stories

Content Warning: The source material addresses parental death and depicts alcoholism.

Baptist’s story, narrated in the first-person perspective by the protagonist Isaiah Dunn, contains informal dated entries, making the entire narrative feel like a diary. The first entry is on New Year’s Eve, beginning at the stroke of midnight. Isaiah, a fifth grader, is with his mother and his friend Sneaky, who is sleeping over. Isaiah’s mother rejects the boys’ conventional declaration of “Happy new year,” asserting that the upcoming year will not be a happy one. Isaiah feels weird and notices that his mother is sad, but he opts not to say anything because Sneaky is there.

Mentioning that they should not wake Isaiah’s sister, Charlie, nor should they stay up late, his mother heads to bed. Though she has ripped the labels off the bottles, Isaiah can see that she is drinking alcohol. Soon after she leaves, Isaiah hears her crying and assumes it is because she misses his father, who recently died. Isaiah turns up the TV so Sneaky will not hear.

The next entry is dated January 3rd.