The Vision

From Jonathan Lethem’s classic collection, Men and Cartoons, a haunting, playful story about dress-up, superheroes, Mafia, love and treachery. “I first met the kid known as the Vision at second base, during a kickball game in the P.S. 29 gymnasium,” the narrator, Joel, explains. Decades later the Vision returns to his old Brooklyn neighborhood, no longer a young boy who dresses up in superhero costumes but a confident adult. But at a party with several mysterious visitors the Vision reveals some secrets still lingering, as the partygoers turn from party games to the uneasy weight of truth. This is an exemplary story from a modern master—poignant, witty, and entirely original. An eBook short.