Wrigley McCormick

by Andrew B. Hurvitz

In a tense time of academic purges and social media bullying, a newly fired, nearly retired professor from Northwestern University is befriended and taken in by a wealthy young benefactor hungry for a father figure and style muse.

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Note: This story contains a racial term which is considering insulting but is necessary in the telling of this fictional tale. There are also documented historical events which may be painful for some readers.

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Sunday, weekend of Labor Day, Professor Steven Goodman walked at dawn down the driveway alongside his small ranch house in West Evanston, IL. He pushed a metal clothes rack, hung with garments, and a “$10” sign, taped on end.

It was the third day of his four-day estate sale.

Items included a cherry wood glass cabinet and six dining room chairs arranged around a Queen Anne table covered in stacked piles of…