GenPop Magazine is pleased to bring you new fiction by Elena Georgiou, who has been a favorite among the poetry community since the debut of mercy mercy me, and remains so, with her more recent Rhapsody of the Naked Immigrants.

But Georgiou has turned her attention to fiction recently, and we couldn’t be more pleased with this new development–particularly our ability now to debut “Hummus,” from Georgiou’s forthcoming collection of linked stories, The Immigrant’s Refrigerator:

Here’s an excerpt:

In 1972, she went to a new school. This was the time when English 11-year-olds were introduced to Algebra and The Irish Question. In Math there were unknowns that were represented by letters. In Religious Knowledge, there were unknowns represented by God. In Math, there were equations to be solved. In Religious Knowledge there was Jesus and Sinn Fein. In the back of the car, unknowns and equations and questions and struggles for independence all got muddled in her head. When she got home, she tried to solve the piano-practice problem by using equations with knowns and unknowns. In her Math book, she wrote:

If x = piano, a = fingers on keys, b = at home, c = never alone,

and if x + a + b + c = d, then what does d equal?

This bit of the equation was easy:

d = no opportunity to practice.

If d = no opportunity to practice, then what does d – y equal?

She spent the hour between the piano lesson and the black-eyed peas and spinach for dinner trying to calculate the correct answer. The first time, d – y equaled Jesus answering a prayer. The second time, d – y equaled the separation of piano + pianist from family. The third time, d – y equaled government intervention and her being placed in care (which, in effect, was the same as the previous answer). The fourth time, d – y equaled a struggle for independence. The fifth time, d – y equaled being swallowed up by the Loch Ness Monster and living happily inside Nessie’s stomach, like Jonah had done inside the whale. Once inside Nessie’s stomach, she would repeatedly practice the “Sonata Pathétique” until her whole body was filled with music….

Read the rest of Georgiou’s “Hummus,” from The Immigrant’s Refrigerator.