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Abstract
This thesis is comprised of four short stories. “Stones” and “Muscadine Wine” reimagine North Carolina folktales which (like most folklore) engage with our baser bodily fears; these retellings aim to centralize the female sexualities which are framed as abhorrent by the original tellings. “Next to Godliness” and “Inheritance” are contemporary realist stories that explore the collision between social movements and individual lives; they consider the complex shapes that tolerance and intolerance take within private spheres—the home, the family, and even the self. I hope that each story asks, in its own way, whether that which alienates us can also be what allows us to approach a shared humanity. Are shame and taboo inextricable, or might they be untethered somehow? What worlds might open up in queer lives if they were?