A young boy's frank essay on moral principles is erroneously published in the local paper, and the resulting fallout is mayhem for both the boy's family and the paper's editors.

An American veteran who watched his friend drown in a field of excrement in Vietnam drives in circles around the lake in his hometown ruminating on how he might have saved his friend, won a Silver Star for valor, and made his father proud.

In the far future, a woman is selected to undergo a Great Becoming. As she is forced to choose what she will become, she realizes that someone people do not have to choose at all.

As a young gay Pakistani man goes through the interview process to become an Air Force officer, he reflects on how he got there and why he might want to be chosen after all. A crush on a fellow interviewee both complicates things and makes them simpler, in turns.

When a group of boys graduate from Henry Hudson High School in the Bronx in 1944, the ceremony remains largely the same as any other year, despite the country being in the middle of World War II.

In a futuristic world where hardly a trace of natural life exists untouched by human interference, a Citizen makes an unprecedented choice that brings a slew of notoriety and ethical questions.