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Jackie Thomas-Kennedy, a finalist in Narrative’s 2025 Winter Story Contest, is the author of the debut novel The Other Wife (Riverhead, 2025). She holds an MFA in fiction writing from Columbia University School of the Arts and was a Wallace Stegner Fellow at Stanford University. She lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.

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Baptism

An iStory

by Jackie Thomas-Kennedy
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I asked how long the immersion would last, though I’d seen it dozens of times.

“No more than three seconds,” my father said. “You’ll be fine.”

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  • After the story tenaciously gripped my breath, the end slowly released...
  • Intriguing. I am left wondering if he literally held her...

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