“I’ve always seen airports as a window into other worlds, other lives, other stories,” writes Chuck Tingle in our latest round of the Napkin Project.
Much like airports, fiction is a window into “other worlds, other lives, other stories.” Perhaps that’s why, when we asked five extraordinary writers to participate in this summer’s round of the Napkin Project, we had travel on the brain. We gave them a simple prompt: “Write a story about a summer vacation.” And boy, did they take us somewhere.
In one story with a metafictional twist, a traveler receives an apology from the stranger sitting next to him at the airport bar, who’s nicked his copy of Esquire from the future. Speaking of strangers, travel is the perfect opportunity to be one (or observe one), according to our writers—these napkin stories feature memorable encounters with strangers everywhere, from the beach to the airport bathroom. Elsewhere in this collection, our writers consider the travel experiences that change us, from decades of friend trips to an affair between drifters in a Texas motel.
Maybe you’re reading this from your own summer vacation, clutching a mai tai with your toes in the sand. Or maybe you’re stuck at home and hoping for a story to take you someplace, anyplace different. Whatever the case may be, let these stories transport you. And if you need to bug out on your family vacation to write down your own story at the local watering hole, we won’t judge. —Adrienne Westenfeld, books and fiction editor
