Nourish the Beast
by Steve Tesich

Baba Goya is a loudmouth mother who goes through husbands and orphans like the Turkish coffee she makes in a dirty old soup pan.

In Queens, she presides over a household comprised of a childish orphan who happens to be a cop, an elderly gentleman who explodes every time somebody calls him “Grandpa,” a dying husband, and an errant daughter who cries all night.

The husband, Baba’s fifth, is already submitting an ad for her sixth.

The cop catches a Japanese man stealing cameras and chains him to a radiator, the daughter guiltily confesses she voted for Nixon and runs off, and the husband, who may not die after all, insists they must wait out Watergate for a Democratic president.