A Black teenage boy in Illinois becomes obsessed with the idea of owning a gun–until he realizes that with the gun comes a level of adult responsibility he isn’t ready to assume.

After watching a cattle drive on the Great Plains, a cow tells her young a grim tale of the cattle who get sent to factories to be slaughtered and the one cow who escaped.

A woman is fascinated by her neighbor's strange evening ritual of slamming a metal saber into her balcony wall.

After his newspaper route, a young paperboy enters a Southern café, only to be roped into a philosophical conversation surrounding love by an old man.

The most famous man in the world decides to escape from the constant attention and pressure of his daily life.

A soldier stationed in Tunisia during World War II reflects on how his perception of death has changed while he buries two of his fellow soldiers.

An encounter with a grieving ex-soldier forces a Women's Army Corps member to realize the army may have robbed her of her ability to see death as anything but a necessary sacrifice.

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.

A father tells a story about his deceased wife and the wild traditions they used to have involving alcohol as well as the disapproval his mother-in-law had about their relationship.

A young boy wades down a creek killing water moccasins, despite his mother telling him not to since another boy in town was recently bitten by one. On his way home, an encounter with the snakes gains the attention of the adults nearby but leaves the boy confused.