Six days after getting married, a man discovers that his wife has stolen money from their family and friends, leading him to reflect on many other strange behaviors of hers. He ultimately decides that he will stay and spend his life taking the blame for her and smoothing over her mistakes.

In a poignant reflection on the legacies of the past, a man finally hears from his grandmother the full account of his great-grandfather’s death at the hands of a close friend.

In an unlikely encounter, a homeless teenage boy recounts harsh events of his life to a writer. He nonchalantly tells of an employer whose assignments caused him to have permanent physical and mental damage.

A writer struggles to craft a story and begins to lose his own sanity when an idea finally comes to him.

A son tells a series of stories, most of them about his father and stepfather. As the son describes a robbery that took place at his house in high school and his experiences with his father, a former Jehovah's Witness and current alcoholic, he begins to recall details from his childhood.

On a road trip from Ann Arbor to Buffalo, a young man stops in Cleveland and meets a whole host of characters who, like the pseudonyms they've chosen, aren't quite what they seem.

A dying man claims he has been falsely accused of stealing. After the man dies, everybody believes the man's statement, until two men discover that the man isn't as honest as he seems, and they must decide whether to reveal the truth.

A middle-aged New York editor becomes entranced by a young female writer whose work he rejects. As they meet more and more frequently for coffee, the editor endlessly analyzes whether or not the young woman shares his interest in becoming more than friends.

A writer and his student are implicated in a rumor.

A chance encounter with an old ex-girlfriend causes a man to remember his past relationship with her and with his cousin, who immigrated from Korea to America to live with his family as a small child. Though she died in a motorcycle accident years ago, when his ex-girlfriend asks how she's doing he lies, creating the life she never had in his imagination.