Read the winning piece of our 2025 Nonfiction Contest “Through the Mirror” by Jessie Cato selected by Lucy Ives.

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Autumn 1962 • Vol. XXIV No. 4 • Fiction |

He and the Cat

Take it to a lawyer. That’s what my friend told me to do. Now, I had never had occasion to have anything to do with lawyers. Mention of lawyers always brought to my mind pictures of courts, arrests, police: terrifying pictures. Although I was in trouble, I wondered why it should be a lawyer who would help me. However, my friend gave me the address.

And from that moment my problem loomed larger. It turned in my mind. On the night before my visit to the solicitor, my heart was full of feelings of hurt. My soul fed on fire and scalding water. I’d tell the lawyer; I’d tell him everything that had gnawed inside me for several days.

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