Pegasus 2021 by BergenPR

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pegasus 2021

BERGEN COUNTY HIGH SCHOOL WRITING CONTEST SPONSORED BY THE ENGLISH DEPARTMENT

PREFACE

his edition of Pegasus, the 45th, is dedicated to the students of Bergen County, who, through the pandemic year 2020–2021, kept the enterprise of literature alive, strove to achieve excellence, and left an indelible impression of America during an extraordinary time. It is said that only death and taxes are inevitable. To that short list can now be added the last sixteen months, for it is certain that, when historians chronicle the start of the third decade in the twenty-first century, they will always mention the coronavirus and the impact lockdowns, “social distancing,” mandated mask-wearing, and school closure have had on us, especially on young people passing through their formative years.

It is difficult in “normal” times for students to master traditional literary genres; it is heroic for them to attempt mastery in existentially trying times. Deprived of face-to-face contact with real teachers and peers, confined to their homes, and forced to spend hours “zooming” into a merely virtual facsimile of a classroom, they had to summon hope and determination that, somehow, their written words would find an audience and that their efforts would be rewarded. The ancient question of whether literature has real value and, if so, what kind, has been raised anew. As I have suggested before in these pages, Classical philosophy supplied a long-running and still valid answer. Horace [Quintus Horatius Flaccus, 65 B.C.—8 B.C.], in his Ars Poetica [ca. 19 B.C.], argued that great poetry and drama provide dulce et utile. That is, they provide “sweetness” [aesthetic pleasure or delight] and “utility” [useful or advantageous learning]. On this premise rests the traditional Western claim that authors ought to be among the most revered members of society because their work enhances culture and educates an informed citizenry, thereby raising the quality of civic life. In the mid-nineteenth century, the English poet Matthew Arnold added a third value. In Culture and Anarchy [1869], he argues that poetry, by which he means all forms of imaginative literature, fosters the “expansion of our humanity.” It broadens our sympathy with others, regardless of the historical, geographical, linguistic, tribal, and cultural differences that tend to divide us and make us parochial in our affections. Perhaps the value claimed for poetry-writing that most applies to our recent locked-down experience is best expressed by the greatest of Victorian poets, Alfred, Lord Tennyson. In In Memoriam [1850], he movingly describes the grief he suffered on the inexplicable death of his closest friend, Arthur Henry Hallam, at the end of 22. Tennyson states what writers have always known but seldom admitted: the exercise of conforming one’s deepest feelings to a metrical pattern and rhyme scheme can provide a kind of auto-therapy that relieves suicidal despair. He pulls through crippling emotions because, as a poet, he is obliged to discipline his self-expression. It is not mere expression but expression shaped into art. The instinct for order and beauty thereby gains the upper hand and overcomes helplessness, ultimately facilitating healing and hope. Given the academic year that has just ended, it is not surprising that there is relatively little levity in the selections presented here. Absurdity, bitterness, disillusionment, regret, frustration, and anomie predominate. The scholarly essayists (Xie, Shende, Johnson, and King), all of whom focus closely on iconic texts and read with great discernment, reflect least the oddity of the times. The short story writers (Zachko, Adams, Abdelhack, and Panayos) incorporate elements of Gothic horror, science fiction, “magic realism,” and retrospection in their fiction. Unsurprisingly, the genre that most reflects the contemporary scene is the personal essay (Hau, Na, and Park). The baleful effects of working from home, spending the better part of the day in the virtual reality supplied by a computer, loss of motivation, obsession with such commonplaces of life as night-lights, and growing uncertainty about online relationships are graphically described in these essays. One of the winning dramatists (Polevoy) in this year’s Pegasus portrays how social media can distort and then replace human

communication, sometimes with comic results. The other playwright (Shi) depicts the ironic meanings of the vintage torch song “After You’ve Gone,” as she changes the contexts in the lives of a family over a period of eight years. Our poets deal with such themes as the collapse of the mythopoeia that has sustained earlier generations of young people (Shende); outrage at having to spend one’s days preparing and courteously serving revolting fast-food (Margolis); comparing the author’s (Dail’s) slightly scarred upper-middle class hand with her grandfather’s heroically disfigured hands; and, finally (Park), the slow rejuvenation that succeeds the withered coldness of winter. Pegasus and the Bergen County High School Writing Contest would not be possible without the moral and financial support of Vice-President Brock Fisher. We are indebted to Anne Marie Roscello, Larry Hlavenka, Tom DePrenda, and, especially, Cristina Grisales, who labored to good effect on the lay-out and illustration of the magazine. We acknowledge with heartfelt thanks our readers—Jim Bumgardner, Leigh Jonaitis, and Mary Crosby. Most of all, we thank the Bergen County high school teachers of English and creative writing, who, in a most difficult year, tended the flame of literature and kept it shining brightly.

Dr. Geoffrey Johnston Sadock Professor Peter A. Helff Co-Directors, Bergen County High School Writing Contest

BERGEN COUNTY HIGH SCHOOL WRITING CONTEST

FINALISTS SCHOLARLY ESSAY 1st Prize Yilin Xie

Bergen County Academies

"The Reflection of Agency in Oedipus the King"

2nd Prize Tanisha Shende

Bergen County Academies

"Disability in The Metamorphosis"

3rd Prize Steven Johnson

Northern Highlands Regional High School

Critique of "'I am myself indifferent honest': Hamlet as Ophelia's Seducer"

Honorable Mention Thomas King

Bergen County Academies

Miscommunication and Social Intrigue in The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks

PERSONAL ESSAY 1st Prize Halle Hau

Tenafly High School

"no motivation"

2nd Prize Stacey Na

Bergen County Academies

"Night 'Lights"

3rd Prize Dodie Park

Bergen County Academies

"principles of uncertainty"

POETRY 1st Prize Tanisha Shende

Bergen County Academies

"we continue to be engulfed by every thing that remains unknowable"

2nd Prize Jarrett Margolis

Tenafly High School

"Eat More Chikin?"

3rd Prize Isabella Dail

Academy of the Holy Angels

"hands"

Honorable Mention Dodie Park

Bergen County Academies

"Bird Song"

BERGEN COUNTY HIGH SCHOOL WRITING CONTEST

FINALISTS SHORT STORY 1st Prize Zoe Zachko

Tenafly High School

"Morning Commute"

2nd Prize Sylvie Adams

Bergen County Academies

"Mokita"

3rd Prize Micole Abdelhack

Tenafly High School

"Alice"

Honorable Mention Matthew Panayos

Bergen County Academies

"The Faceless Monster of Hickory Hills"

DRAMA 1st Prize Isabel Shi

Bergen County Academies

February 29th

2nd Prize Lindsey Polevoy

Bergen County Academies

A Zoom Story

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Poetry we continue to be engulfed by everything that remains unknowable......................................... Tanisha Shende, Bergen County Academies

Scholary Essay The Reflection of Agency in Oedipus the King......... Yilin Xie, Bergen County Academies

Disability in The Metamorphosis................................ Tanisha Shende, Bergen County Academies

Eat More Chikin? ...................................................... Jarrett Margolis, Tenafly High School

Critique of "'I am myself indifferent honest': Hamlet as Ophelia's Seducer"................................... Steven Johnson, Northern Highlands Regional High School

hands........................................................................... Isabella Dail, Academy of the Holy Angels

Miscommunication and Social Intrigue in The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks .................... Thomas King, Bergen County Academies

Bird Song .................................................................... Dodie Park, Bergen County Academies

16 18

Short Story Morning Commute .................................................... Zoe Zachko, Tenafly High School

Mokita ........................................................................ Sylvie Adams, Bergen County Academies

Alice............................................................................. Micole Abdelhack, Tenafly High School

Personal Essay no motivation ............................................................ Halle Hau, Tenafly High School Night 'Lights Stacey Na, Bergen County Academies

30 33

principles of uncertainty .......................................... Dodie Park, Bergen County Academies

The Faceless Monster of Hickory Hills .................. Matthew Panayos, Bergen County Academies Drama February 29th ............................................................ Isabel Shi, Bergen County Academies

40 55

A Zoom Story............................................................. Lindsey Polevoy, Bergen County Academies

THE REFLECTION OF AGENCY IN SOPHOCLES’ OEDIPUS THE KING Yilin Xie

Bergen County Academies

Scholarly Essay

abandoned; for Kronos, his wife and son would not have conspired against him had he not swallowed his children. Whether a king or a god, neither overcomes their prophecy. The story of Arachne also shares similarities with the story of Oedipus in the protagonist’s hamartia. For Arachne, her hubris and pride lead her to compete with the goddess Athena, and she is transformed into a spider as her punishment (“Arachne”). Similarly, Oedipus’ hubris makes him confident that he can find the murderer of Laius, which ultimately causes his downfall as the murderer is himself. Importantly, both characters are rightfully proud: Arachne is an expert weaver, even more skilful than Athena, while Oedipus defeats the Sphinx and is an intelligent, respected king. Nevertheless, regardless of their capabilities, both are still punished for daring to defy the gods, suggesting that their punishments are not for their ego, but for the act of challenging higher powers. In all three stories—of a god, of a king, and of a weaving maiden—there is a force higher than the characters that cannot be overcome, and defiance of that force causes the characters’ doom; these stories warn that one must submit to higher forces, whether of the gods or the uncontrollable element beyond even the gods. As the observers who have no power over the events in the play, the chorus’s continuous references to higher, stronger powers further demonstrate the values of hierarchy and submission. From the very beginning, the chorus is described as “Huddling at my altar, / praying before me” by Oedipus, who, by contrast, proactively volunteers to resolve the plague (Sophocles 2-3). Likewise, in the first choral ode, the chorus prays to various deities to bring down “that god of death that all gods hate!”, again asking for salvation instead of contributing to solving the issue (244). The chorus is looking for someone above them to save them, and they do not demonstrate an awareness of their own potential to save their city. Even when it comes to praising Oedipus’ powers, the chorus concludes that he is victorious in defeating the Sphinx because “A god was with [him]” instead of attributing his success to his intelligence, which reflects that they believe power lies in a higher being—they believe in their king, but they have even more faith in their gods (48). Similarly, in the third choral ode, the chorus speculates Oedipus’ parentage as of some god, revealing their habitual logic that powers come from divine sources and not selfmade, earthly ones (224). Moreover, the chorus’s lack of

Ancient Greek mythology has no shortage of cautionary tales. From Arachne, a brilliant weaver whose hubris gives her the audacity to challenge the goddess Athena, to Kronos, the King of the Titans, who attempts to escape his foretold fate to be overthrown by his sons, the tales make clear that there are punishments for those who dare to forget their place, establishing the ideas of total determinism and complete submission (“Arachne”; “KRONOS”). However, Sophocles’ play, Oedipus the King, while maintaining these themes, uniquely includes elements of self-reliance. Through deviations from the morals of other mythological stories, Sophocles’ Oedipus the King demonstrates the transformation in the value of agency in ancient Athens that parallelled the success of Athenian democracy. The story of Oedipus has existed long before the Sophoclean play, and it teaches similar lessons to other Greek mythological stories. For example, like Laius who abandons his child for a prophecy that his child will one day kill him, Kronos devours his children because of a prophecy that they will overthrow him (“KRONOS”). In both stories, not only do the fathers’ cruel acts with the intention of preventing the realization of the prophecies fail, but they also indirectly cause the prophecies to come true: for Laius, Oedipus would not have unknowingly committed patricide had he not been

power is by choice: in the second choral ode, the chorus exclaims “Destiny guide me always” and swears to the gods that “Never again will I go reverent to Delphi, /...unless these prophecies all come true” (954,985-989). Instead of wishing for a world where their actions matter, they wish for the fulfilment of a predetermined future; they want divine guidance instead of the possibility to determine their own paths. The chorus’s self-ascribed helplessness leads to their actual helplessness, which reinforces the idea that people have no say in their destinies and should instead follow the lead of the more powerful. By contrast, ancient Athens is known not for strict hierarchies and dictatorships, but the opposite: democracy. In Athens, during Sophocles’ time, though suffrage was not universal, the intended audience of the play—the common citizens—was the voting population (Blackwell, “Athenian Democracy”). In the play, the portrayal of the counterpart to the Greek audience—the chorus—as powerless except in their prayers for the guidance of the more powerful implies the choicelessness and reliance on higher powers of the Athenians, which is counterintuitive for a celebrated play of a city where the citizens directly decided the future of the state. Furthermore, Athens’s democratic institution was successful during Sophocles’ lifetime, when Athens defeated the Persians and established itself as a major power (Blackwell, “The Development of Athenian Democracy”). Therefore, it seems strange that the play bears values contradictory to those of the time during which it was produced. However, according to Aristotle, the story of Oedipus, like that of Arachne and of Kronos, is rooted in an age before reason when people looked to super-human sources as the movers of events, with neither the need to comprehend nor to rationalize them (Agard 119). In other words, the bones of the plot reflect not the values of Sophocles’ time, but those of an earlier era. Although the plot follows older ideas, Sophocles’ 5th century BCE retelling of the tale is representative of his contemporary Athenian ideals. According to Aristotle’s Theory of Tragedy, a good tragedy must have “unity of action,” where each event logically leads to the next and nothing is left to Chance—the universe must be deterministic (“Outline of Aristotle's Theory of Tragedy” 2). According to Aristotle, the protagonist must deserve his fate, so, as the quintessential tragedy, Oedipus the King must have Oedipus as the initiator of his downfall for him to bear the responsibility while maintaining the unity of action (“Outline of Aristotle's

Theory of Tragedy” 1). Therefore, within the universe in which his fate is mapped, Oedipus must still have enough agency to be responsible for his fall. He does: he calls down a curse upon the murderer—“let that man drag out / his life in agony, step by painful step”—which is exactly his future (Sophocles 282-283). More directly, he blinds himself with Jocasta’s brooches, and, when the chorus once more asks, with an assumption that the extraordinary act is caused by the divine, “What superhuman power drove you on?”, he replies, “Apollo...ordained my agonies...But the hand that struck my eyes was mine, / mine alone—no one else—I did it all myself!” (1466-1470). In choosing his pain, Oedipus claims his agency. However, this crucial moment in Sophocles’ play is absent from an earlier version of the story by Homer, in which Oedipus continues to rule as the king of Thebes instead (Wilson). The lack of punishment for Oedipus demonstrates that, in the older version, Oedipus is not responsible enough to warrant a life of pain, whereas the Sophoclean play’s focus on Oedipus’ search cements his role in his downfall and justifies his suffering. In other words, despite the prophecy and the uncontrollable element, the blame is placed on Oedipus’ hamartia of hubris and ignorance because the focus of the play is not on the inevitable murder of Laius and incest with Jocasta, but on what is in human control. This drastic deviation from the earlier version shows a focus on the man, and the emphasis on Oedipus’ free will mirrors the same Athenian value that birthed democracy: to hold the rein of one’s destiny. Oedipus the King reflects changes in the values of Athenian society through adherences to and divergences from earlier mythological stories. While the fundamental plot and the portrayal of the chorus echo tales from the past, warning listeners of the dangers of defiance of what is incomprehensibly powerful, Sophocles’ choice to focus on the discovery of the truth and give Oedipus enough agency not only to deserve but to choose his pain align with the democratic values that blossomed during Sophocles’ time. Sophocles’ Athenian society is presented through the lens of his writing, and his plays, in turn, affected the audience, forming a link of influence between literature and society. Although the playwright and the original audience are long gone, the play grants us a glimpse of their immortal minds.

Works Cited Agard, Walter R. “Fate and Freedom in Greek Tragedy.”

Wilson, Christopher. “Oedipus: The message in the myth.” OpenLearn, 30 August 2019, https://www.open.edu/openlearn/history-the-arts/history/classical-studies/oedipus-the-message-the-myth. Accessed 28 October 2020.

The Classical Journal, vol. 29, no. 2, 1933, pp. 117-126. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/3290417. Accessed 25 October 2020. “Arachne.” Greek Mythology, 27 October 2020, https://www.greekmythology.com/Myths/Mortals/Arachne/ arachne.html#:~:text=Arachne%20in%20Greek%20myt hology%20was,was%20particularly%20skilled%20at%2 0weaving. Accessed 28 October 2020. Blackwell, Christopher W. “The Development of Athenian Democracy,” in Adriaan Lanni, ed., “Athenian Law in its Democratic Context” (Center for Hellenic Studies Online Discussion Series). Republished in C.W. Blackwell, ed., Dēmos: Classical Athenian Democracy (A. Mahoney and R. Scaife, edd., The Stoa: a consortium for electronic publication in the humanities [www.stoa.org]) edition of January 24, 2003. Blackwell, Christopher W. “Athenian Democracy: a brief overview,” in Adriaan Lanni, ed., “Athenian Law in its Democratic Context” (Center for Hellenic Studies On-line Discussion Series). Republished in C.W. Blackwell, ed., Dēmos: Classical Athenian Democracy (A. Mahoney and R. Scaife, edd., The Stoa: a consortium for electronic publication in the humanities [www.stoa.org]) edition of February 28, 2003. “CRONUS - KRÓNOS - ΚΡΟΝΟΣ.” HellenicGods.org, https://www.hellenicgods.org/kronos–kronos. Accessed 29 October 2020. Outline of Aristotle's Theory of Tragedy in the POETICS. The Internet Classics Archive. MIT. 2009.Web. http://classics.mit.edu/index.html Sophocles. “Oedipus the King.” The Three Theban Plays, translated by Robert Fagles, The Penguin Group, 1984, pp. 155-251.

DISABILITY IN T HE METAMORPHOSIS Tanisha Shende

Bergen County Academies

Better to understand disability as well as the social norms and conditions that define particular attributes as impairments and proceed to challenge the disabled, critical disability theory is applied to literature. Doing so reveals how society treats such individuals and how the perception of disability changes over time. The disabled identity can be found throughout literature, even in characters that aren’t outwardly identified as disabled, which can provide nuance and subtlety to the study. One such example is Gregor Samsa in Franz Kafka’s The Metamorphosis. From his physical and mental changes to the treatment he receives from hisfamily, Gregor’s predicament serves as a literary parallel for disability. In The Metamorphosis, Kafka illustrates the experience of disabled people in modern society through the internal and external conflicts of his central characters. One of these is the external conflict between Gregor and society. By extension, Kafka examines the designations every member of society falls into and how one will be treated if one does not conform to those standards. After his transformation, Gregor cannot speak, he cannot move without pain, and his outward appearance as a “monstrous vermin” terrifies others (Kafka 7). As soon as Gregor makes contact with the outside world, he is met with revulsion and antagonism, seeing his father threatening him, his mother fearing him, and “the head clerk, standing closest to the door, pressing his hand against his open mouth and backing away slowly” (Kafka 16). To the people outside of Gregor’s world, he is inhuman, and the change is so disorienting that they fear him. This reaction is caused by societal standards that define the boundary of what is human and what is not in order to create a sense of identity. There is what is accepted in society, the Subject, that which is tolerated in society, the Object, and that which is expelled from society, the Abject. “What strikes [Gregor’s] other able-bodied observers is the gross ugliness of his transformation. His appearance, which is a vivid reminder of his otherness, becomes the core of his new identity” (Ghosh 2). Society cannot stand to look at Gregor because he violates the social parameters of personhood and serves as a reminder of the instability and flexibility of bodies and mental states. Thus, Kafka reveals society’s expectation to look and behave a certain way by displaying an antagonistic reaction when a person behaves outside of the norm.

Scholarly Essay

Just as Gregor’s rejection by society was an indication of the expectant relationship between an individual and the rest of society, his rejection by his family addresses another defined component of personhood: the ability to produce capital. Before his transformation, Gregor had “begun to work with consuming energy and was promoted, almost overnight, from a minor clerk to a traveling salesman with much greater potential to earn money” (Kafka 26). By working to pay off his father’s debts and maintaining his family’s good quality of life, Gregor establishes himself as a prized breadwinner and a valuable contributor to society. Notably, Gregor would produce enough “cash that he could then lay on the table before the astonished and delighted family” (Kafka 26). His family is specifically delighted by the money, showing they care more about Gregor’s ability to produce income than his work ethic or personality. Therefore, when he transforms into an insect and must now rely on his family to provide for him, Gregor has taken away their effortless life and spurred their animosity since he can no longer support them. Instead of caring for him in return for his care, the family resents his change, and both his physical appearance and newfound dependency transform him into an abject creature to his family. Over time, this resentment grows until even his sister Grete, who seems to be the only one who still cares for him, will not come inside his room if

she can see him and changes his food from “milk, which had otherwise been his favorite drink” to “old, half-rotten vegetables, bones covered with congealed white sauce from the supper the night before, some raisins and almonds” (Kafka 21-23). This ill treatment of Gregor by his family serves as a commentary on how a person is defined by what he or she can provide society and how individuals who cannot contribute meaningfully to society are looked down upon. In reality, these kinds of treatment are almost unavoidable and often expected, but there is another conflict to be addressed. Through the characterization of Gregor as he deals with his new body, Kafka confronts the mental toll of disability and the resulting social consequences. When Gregor first transforms, he is surprised to have “transformed in his bed into a monstrous vermin,” but his energy soon goes into pondering his family and his job (Kafka 7). Notably, regardless of his change, he doesn't find himself nauseating. Given the opportunity, Gregor may even not be able to adapt to his new body but also to learn how to enjoy it and maneuver about the house. Given enough time and support, Gregor likely could have adjusted to his change and reintegrated with society, but this fantasy is shattered when the outside world reacts to him, and his new body now becomes a problem. It is only when he perceives their reaction that Gregor finds himself disgusting. Regarding the production of income, Gregor, who once took great pride in his role as the breadwinner, is now distressed when he can no longer provide for his family. He fears that he is causing his family financial ruin, despite their ability to support themselves by working, renting out rooms in their apartment, and living off saved money. His worries make him throw “himself into the cool leather sofa nearby, [feeling] so flushed with shame and guilt” (Kafka 27). The self-loathing and shame destroy Gregor’s humanity and mind until he sees himself as a waste and a burden and is compelled to starve himself to death to alleviate his family’s stress. Gregor’s family perceives him as different from what is considered normal, inciting the internalization of role expectancy. In this case, Gregor’s traits characterize him as a manifestation of the damage caused by isolation and ostracization on the basis of alienness. In The Metamorphosis, Gregor the human was acceptable for what he could produce and for how he fit into the social

boundaries of society, but once Gregor finds himself outside of these boundaries, his family isolates and ignores him, leading to his self-destruction. Gregor is still fully conscious and mentally human at the beginning of the story. It is only after he is treated exclusively as an insect and as a tragedy and accepts all of this that he loses the last vestiges of his personhood. Could he have continued to live if he was allowed the privilege of being seen as humans despite his superficial appearance and utility to capital? Should he have been treated with respect despite his permanent disfigurement and inability to work? The answer is yes. But rarely are the real people who undergo such a debilitating change, the human beings who are locked away and starved and dehumanized by the family and society who are supposed to care for them, shown such decency. Works Cited Ghosh, Uttara. “The Metamorphosis: Through the Looking Glass of a Disabled.” The Criterion, An International Journal in English, vol. 4, no. IV, Aug. 2013, pp. 1–6. Kafka, F., Pelzer, K., & Pelzer, J. (2017). The Metamorphosis. In The Metamorphosis and Other Stories (pp. 5-52). New York: Barnes & Noble

CRITIQUE OF ‘“I AM MYSELF INDIFFERENT HONEST”: HAMLET AS OPHELIA’S SEDUCER” Steven Johnson

Northern Highlands Regional High School

In his article ‘“I am myself indifferent honest”: Hamlet as Ophelia’s Seducer,” David Buck Beliles argues that Hamlet seduced Ophelia. In order to prove his thesis, he examines Hamlet and Ophelia’s relationship throughout Hamlet chronologically and analyzes their characters and personalities, ultimately synthesizing his claims to suggest that Hamlet seduced Ophelia. While Beliles’s argument has some merit, he weakens his argument by relying on assumptions and circular logic, contradicting himself, failing to refute or acknowledge other interpretations, providing insufficient explanation or evidence, and taking focus away from his thesis, all of which ultimately leave the reader unconvinced of his argument. Beliles does not thoroughly support his claim that Hamlet’s inability to “carve for himself ” (I,iii,23) and his higher status suggest “the possibility” that Hamlet is a sexual adventurer who uses his princely status to seduce women (78). To describe and contextualize Hamlet and Ophelia’s relationship, Beliles begins with Act I, scene iii, in which Laertes and Polonius forbid Ophelia from seeing Hamlet.

Scholarly Essay

Since both Laertes and Polonius recognize Hamlet’s inability to select his own wife, Beliles asserts the fact’s significance and claims that it signifies that Hamlet is promiscuous. Unfortunately, Beliles leaves this claim mostly unsubstantiated and does not explain the connection between Hamlet’s inability to choose his own wife and his reputation as a seducer, so this claim does not function as convincing evidence of his thesis. Furthermore, Beliles fails to acknowledge and refute other interpretations of Act I, scene iii. Laertes concedes that even though Hamlet cannot choose his own wife, he may love Ophelia (I, iii, 15-24). Hamlet’s potential love for Ophelia, therefore, may have led him to engage in a romantic relationship with her regardless of his ability to marry her, as opposed to the purely sexual one that Beliles argues. Beliles’s claim is not necessarily wrong, but he does leave it open to rebuttal by failing to explain his claim fully and acknowledge other valid interpretations of this scene. In addition to lacking sufficient explanation, Beliles contradicts himself in his analysis of Polonius’s conversation

with Ophelia in Act I, scene iii. Polonius tells Ophelia that she has behaved like a “green girl” and should know better than to trust Hamlet (I, iii, 110-112). Beliles argues that this merely notes that there have been “previous tests” upon Ophelia’s chastity, but it does not suggest that Ophelia is the opposite of the “picture of virtue” (78). While Polonius may have legitimate fears about Hamlet wooing naive Ophelia, Beliles’s assertion of Ophelia’s virtue suggests otherwise, contradicting his thesis that Hamlet seduced Ophelia. Ophelia, in Polonius’s eyes, may have had tests upon her chastity, but this does not conclusively prove Beliles’s claim that Hamlet seduced her; it merely suggests a correlation that Beliles does not support with solid evidence. Moreover, Beliles’s claim that Ophelia is, indeed, virtuous seems to contradict his thesis that Hamlet seduced her. Beliles also acknowledges the unreliability of Act I, scene iii, for interpreting Hamlet and Ophelia’s relationship, as the audience hears about their relationship indirectly. In the introduction to his article, Beliles explains the “dangers” in interpreting something presented to the audience indirectly (77), but he still relies on that evidence he has told the reader not to trust, using the scene to support his argument. Beliles also credits Act I, scene iii, with setting up Hamlet and Ophelia’s relationship at the beginning of the play (78); however, Laertes and Polonius present Hamlet and Ophelia’s relationship indirectly, and Beliles has warned his audience against trusting this presentation. The reader, now skeptical of this evidence, should be less willing to agree with Beliles’s conclusion. Because of this warning, Beliles has invalidated his own interpretations. Neither is Beliles’s analysis of Polonius’s interpretations of Hamlet’s vows to Ophelia completely justified. Beliles argues that the “almost” in Hamlet giving Ophelia “almost all the holy vows in heaven” (I, iii, 123) echoes “Hamlet the quibbler” and indicates that Hamlet is a seducer, but one with a bit of honor, as he woos Ophelia but is careful not to promise marriage (78). Beliles, however, does not explain how Hamlet is a quibbler, which weakens his analysis of the word “almost.” Better to support his claim, Beliles could have drawn the readers’ attention to Hamlet’s perfectionism in his revenge, as he takes meticulous steps to prove Claudius’s guilt and to ensure that Claudius would go to Hell by not killing him while he prays. Beliles also could have cited examples evident throughout the

play of Hamlet’s precise word choice, his careful wordplay in scenes where he feigns madness, such as when he discusses the location of Polonius’s body with Rosencrantz and Claudius in Act IV, scenes ii and iii. Beliles is correct in his description of Hamlet as a quibbler, as Hamlet does pay attention to trivial details. By leaving this claim unsupported, though, Beliles diminishes his analysis of the word “almost,” as he does not show the reader the Hamlet who would carefully avoid promising all of the holy vows in heaven. Beliles relies on the assumption that his reader knows and agrees with this description of Hamlet, but this is not satisfactory to prove his point. Beliles fails to acknowledge other possible interpretations of Polonius’s conversation with Ophelia in Act I, scene iii. Beliles points to Polonius’s suggestion that a young man like Hamlet is more interested in sex than romance (78). When watching or reading this scene, the audience must remember that Polonius is protecting his daughter and her chastity from a man he does not trust. Polonius may have presented a distorted view of Hamlet in an attempt to convince her to stay away from him; after all, Polonius similarly claims his own son is interested in sex and not romance (II, i, 29-69), so this represents his general, paternal opinion about young men. As a result, it is possible that Hamlet is truly interested in Ophelia romantically, which would negate Beliles’s interpretation of Hamlet as Ophelia’s seducer. Beliles persuasively argues that Rosencrantz and Guildenstern’s laughter in response to Hamlet’s statement that “man delights not me” (II, ii, 322-324)—the laughter that prompted Hamlet to explain his seriousness by adding “no, nor woman neither” (II, ii, 323)—suggests that Hamlet is a “notorious womanizer” (79). Contrary to Beliles’s previous arguments, this one is a justified interpretation that indicates that Hamlet has a history of being a seducer, and, combined with Beliles’s other description of Hamlet and Ophelia’s relationship, this functions as effective proof of his thesis. The laughter of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, both of whom are childhood friends of Hamlet and thus know him well, at Hamlet’s comment shows that the Hamlet they know is not delighted by men, but women certainly delight him. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern's implications of Hamlet and Ophelia’s sexual tendencies might support Beliles’s thesis that Hamlet seduced her; however, this moment alone is not enough to

completely prove his thesis. While Beliles’s interpretations of Hamlet in Act II, scene ii, accurately demonstrate the possibility of Hamlet having seduced or intending to seduce Ophelia, he further weakens his own argument by contradicting himself. Beliles claims that Hamlet’s comment that Polonius not let Ophelia walk “i’ the sun” and his warning to Polonius to “look to ’t” (II, ii, 201-203) indicate Hamlet’s willingness to “take advantage of Ophelia’s affection” (79). As Beliles correctly explains, this is a reference to Hamlet himself and his relationship with Ophelia, as shown by the comment from Act I, scene ii, that he was “too much in the sun” himself (I,ii,69). Hamlet warns Polonius that he is a threat to Ophelia’s chastity, which supports Beliles’s thesis that Hamlet is Ophelia’s seducer. Countering his own argument, Beliles claims that in Act II, scene ii, “we are almost certain” that Hamlet is pretending to be mad (79). This claim is accurate—Hamlet asserts his madness by calling Polonius a fishmonger (II,ii,190)—but Beliles does not include this explanation. Instead, he relies on the assumption that his reader either knows that Hamlet is doing so in the scene in question or that the reader will automatically agree with him. Additionally, if Hamlet were acting mad, then it is unclear whether his warning to Polonius should be taken seriously. If the audience is meant to dismiss Hamlet’s behavior in this scene, Beliles’s claim about this scene would be invalidated. Hamlet may be attempting to mock and confuse Polonius again, as he had just done a few lines earlier by calling him a fishmonger (II,ii,190). Beliles establishes that Hamlet pretends to be mad in this scene, so Hamlet’s warning to Polonius may not have any substance behind it at all. This would effectively invalidate this line of argument. The danger from these warnings, according to Beliles, supports Laertes and Polonius’s warnings to Ophelia in Act I, scene iii: Because he cannot marry her, Hamlet merely wants to seduce Ophelia. Although he uses their warnings to support his thesis, Beliles diminishes his claim further by attacking the credibility of Laertes and Polonius. Beliles says that while neither of them is “a good judge of character” and that, throughout the play, Polonius’s advice “ranges from questionable to laughable,” both of them grasp the “practical fact” that Ophelia is not of Hamlet’s estate and can not marry him (79). By criticizing

the ethos of Laertes and Polonius, Beliles suggests that his audience should not trust their views, which weakens his claim about Ophelia’s inability to marry Hamlet. In addition to discrediting Polonius and Laertes’ view of Ophelia marrying Hamlet, Beliles discredits what Gertrude says at Ophelia’s funeral, that she hoped that Hamlet would have married Ophelia (V, i, 255) without explanation. Although she is of lower status than Hamlet, Ophelia has Gertrude’s posthumous approval, and her father is the chief counselor to the King, which suggests a union between Hamlet and Ophelia seems feasible. Beliles further alleges that any child of Hamlet and Ophelia “is bound to be a bastard” (79), based on his claim that Ophelia is already pregnant. This, however, assumes that Beliles’s thesis is true and that Hamlet and Ophelia have already engaged in sex, which he has not proven. Beliles reinforces his argument of Hamlet as Ophelia’s seducer by explaining that Hamlet’s behavior with Ophelia is clearly not part of courtship, so he is not a prince seeking a wife but one seeking a private seduction (79-80). Yet Beliles does not acknowledge that Hamlet sent love letters to Ophelia (II, ii, 117-132), which are part of courtship and provide evidence of a romantic relationship. While his analysis does support the possibility that Hamlet could have seduced Ophelia, Beliles is still unsuccessful in achieving his goal of proving that Hamlet is Ophelia’s seducer, and his failure to mention Hamlet’s love letters to Ophelia detracts from his argument. Beliles makes the assumption that his own thesis is true once more while analyzing Hamlet and Ophelia’s interaction in Act III, scene i. Beliles claims that Hamlet acknowledges his guilt and the sins he has committed when he says to Ophelia, “Nymph, in thy orisons / Be all my sins remembered” (III, i, 97-98). Beliles asserts that the sin Hamlet has committed is seducing Ophelia, which has created the guilt he expresses towards her, but this interpretation of Hamlet’s guilt only works if it is true that Hamlet has indeed seduced Ophelia, a point Beliles has not yet proven. Nor does he show that, upon seeing Ophelia enter reading her prayer book (III, i, 49-52), Hamlet's statement constitutes anything beyond a polite greeting. By relying on the assumption that his thesis is true, Beliles invalidates his argument. In his examination of Ophelia and Hamlet’s conversation in Act III, scene i, Beliles explicitly tells the reader he will assume that his thesis is

true in order to “reconstruct the scene” (81) to fit his argument. The interpretations that follow this announcement to the reader still do not prove his thesis because of Beliles’s admitted employment of circular logic, accepting his own thesis to be true to prove the truth of his thesis. Consequently, his arguments are ineffectual. Even with this rhetorical trick, Beliles’s discussion of this scene does not prove his thesis. Beliles returns to the discussion of Hamlet acknowledging his sinfulness and claims that it contradicts his self-identifying as “indifferent honest” (III, i, 132). Again, Beliles assumes that Hamlet feels guilty about his sin of seducing Ophelia; however, Beliles has conveniently overlooked the sins that Hamlet confesses to in the same speech. While Beliles believes that Hamlet is guilty of seducing Ophelia, Hamlet explicitly admits to being “very proud, revengeful, ambitious,” among other sins (III, i, 135). Although Hamlet leaves his sinfulness open-ended, he does not mention nor even imply seduction, making it unreasonable to accept him as “indifferent honest” when it comes to sex. Beliles interprets Hamlet’s question of “What should such fellows as I do” (III, i, 138) as Hamlet’s awareness that he has wronged Ophelia (82), but he does not prove that Hamlet has done so by seducing her. The reader can simply accept Hamlet’s explanation that he fooled Ophelia into love or his admission of other sins instead of Beliles’s assumption that Hamlet seduced Ophelia. Beliles’s discussion of this scene and his arguments rely on Hamlet’s guilt; however, Beliles still attributes this guilt solely to Hamlet seducing Ophelia. In a similar use of circular logic, Beliles claims that, when Hamlet discovers that Polonius is listening to his and Ophelia’s conversation, he no longer feels guilty and proclaims that women absolve themselves of “sexual desire and activity by claiming they are deceived by men” (83). This is Hamlet’s way of shifting the blame onto Ophelia for having desire. Hamlet does, in fact, condemn female sexuality, but, coupled with his supposed sexual indifference, Hamlet could be criticizing Ophelia for being fooled into his false love, not for allowing herself to be seduced by him. Beliles shows how this scene could be interpreted if his thesis were true; although his interpretations seem somewhat reasonable, the reader must not fall into the trap of accepting this circular logic as legitimate proof of Beliles’s claim. Beliles’s interpretations of Ophelia’s mad song in Act

IV, scene v, do effectively support his thesis that Hamlet seduced Ophelia; however, Beliles could have utilized more evidence to prove his claim. Beliles argues that her songs reveal that she has been seduced and is a sexual being. Ophelia’s lyric about a man taking a woman’s virginity and then abandoning her (IV, v, 55-60) reflects her own situation: “seduced and then abandoned” by Hamlet (83). Because Ophelia is grieving Hamlet’s departure for England—as well as her father’s death—it is logical to believe that Ophelia is referring to her relationship with Hamlet. Although his claim that Ophelia’s mad songs suggest she was seduced and abandoned by Hamlet support his thesis, Beliles could have further strengthened his argument by citing more evidence from Ophelia’s song that shows she was actually talking about Hamlet. Though her song can be partly attributed to grief over her father as she sings about a man being “dead and gone” (IV, v, 35), Ophelia does reference her “true love” (IV, v, 28) and being taken advantage of by “young men” (IV, v, 65-66), which could be a direct allusion to Hamlet’s actions claiming that she should not have believed his pledges of love (III, i, 125129). Beliles also argues that Ophelia highlights her own sexuality in her songs (83) as she declares that “bonny sweet Robin is all [her] joy” (IV, v, 210). Her joy in “Robin,” which, according to Beliles, is an Elizabethan slang term for penis, shows how she “celebrates her sexuality” (83) and suggests that she is unchaste. While this could be an effective argument toward proving his thesis, he never demonstrates that it is Hamlet who seduced Ophelia. Beliles’s analysis of Ophelia’s flowers may be his strongest argument in support of his thesis that she has been seduced by Hamlet. Beliles asserts that Ophelia’s handing out of flowers has meaning beyond the symbolism of the flowers and their recipients; Ophelia is deflowering herself with flowers that an Elizabethan audience would recognize as abortifacients, suggesting that she has not only lost her virginity, but she may be pregnant, as well (84). Considering that Ophelia has just sung a song about a young man taking advantage of her and seducing her, this interpretation of the “deflowering” effectively supports Beliles’s thesis. Furthermore, Beliles explains that the flowers’ abortive uses would be widely known among Hamlet’s original audience, citing the popular 1597 book The Herbal or General History of Plants by John Gerard (84). Beliles’s claims show that Ophelia believes that she is

pregnant and, based on her song about him, has been seduced by Hamlet. Although Beliles makes a persuasive claim about Hamlet’s reaction to Ophelia’s death, his argument ultimately is irrelevant to his thesis. Beliles argues that Hamlet’s reaction to Ophelia’s death proves that he did not love her—Hamlet is angry because Laertes expresses a greater amount of sorrow that Hamlet believes he should feel but does not (85). Whether Hamlet loves Ophelia or not does not, however, have any bearing on whether he seduced her or not. During his discussion of Act I, scene iii, Beliles explains that we can not judge whether Hamlet loves Ophelia at that point, and “in a way it’s not important” (80). This holds true for the rest of his argument, as Hamlet could have loved Ophelia or not and still have seduced her either way. As a result, Beliles wastes time showing that Hamlet did not love Ophelia, because it does not matter; neither option would be adequate evidence of his thesis. In his analysis of Act II, scene i, when Ophelia recounts the story of Hamlet coming to her closet with his clothes in disarray, Beliles claims that Hamlet’s feigned madness in the scene intends to convince someone of his madness, so that word of his madness will eventually reach Claudius, and to make rejected love the understood reason for his madness (86-87). Beliles uses this to support the suggestion that Hamlet would know that he can deceive Ophelia with his fake madness since he has deceived her before by seducing her without intending to marry her (87). This is insufficient evidence; both Laertes and Polonius understand Ophelia’s naivety enough to warn her against Hamlet’s approaches, so Beliles can not say that Hamlet understands her naivety merely by having already seduced her without intending to marry her. In his article, Beliles seems to analyze every instance of Hamlet and Ophelia’s relationship throughout the play; however, he does not comment on their interaction in Act III scene ii, thus weakening his argument with his incomplete evidence. He fails to cite Hamlet’s crude jokes about lying in Ophelia’s lap and his three joking references to her genitalia (III, ii, 119-128). Beliles should have shown his audience this image of Hamlet making crude sexual jokes to Ophelia because this would have supported Beliles’s depiction of Hamlet as Ophelia’s seducer. Beliles completely undermines his argument in his conclusion. Throughout the rest of his article, Beliles argues that

Hamlet seduced Ophelia, but he takes a much more passive stance on their relationship in the conclusion. While he should be using his conclusion to drive his point home, Beliles instead insists that he does not mean to portray Hamlet as “a swaggering Don Juan,” but merely that a “coherent understanding” of Hamlet and Ophelia’s relationship emerges if “we consider that possibility that he has seduced her” (87). Beliles’s description of Hamlet here does not match the earlier suggestions that Hamlet is a promiscuous seducer, and Beliles’s assertions in this paragraph lessen the impact of his argument on his audience. Reflected in the ambivalence he shows towards his argument in the conclusion, Beliles overall does not convincingly prove that Hamlet is Ophelia’s seducer. In his article, Beliles often assumes his thesis is true when trying to prove it. He also wastes time making claims that are irrelevant to his argument, such as when he argues that Hamlet does not love Ophelia. He previously states that whether or not Hamlet loves Ophelia is unimportant (80), thus blurring the focus of his argument. Furthermore, Beliles contradicts himself multiple times and frequently does not adequately support his claims. Finally, he does not attempt to acknowledge and refute other interpretations of the scenes he analyzes, allowing for his claims to be rebutted. While some of his arguments are logical and persuasive, Beliles undermines his claims far too much to ignore. By the conclusion of Beliles’s article, the reader has little choice but to disagree with Beliles and admit that Hamlet is “indifferent honest.”

Works Cited Shakespeare, William. The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark. Simon & Schuster, 1992. Beliles, David Buck. “‘I Am Myself Indifferent Honest’: Hamlet as Ophelia's Seducer.” Hamlet Studies, vol. 21, 1999, pp. 77–88..

MISCOMMUNICATION AND SOCIETAL INTRIGUE IN THE IMMORTAL LIFE OF HENRIETTA LACKS Thomas King

Bergen County Academies

Rebecca Skloot’s creative nonfiction work The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks is an ominous reminder of how proper communication between patients and healthcare providers has proven to be inconsistent at best in modern history. In the book, Skloot investigates the life and legacy of Henrietta Lacks, a black woman who died of cervical cancer in 1952. Cancer cells were harvested without her permission and continued to multiply after they were separated from her body. Unbeknownst to her family, an entire industry was created out of growing and selling her cells to researchers. Miscommunication is a recurring motif in the book with members of the medical community failing to provide full explanations of patient circumstances–sometimes with nefarious intentions and sometimes with benevolent intentions. However, sometimes doctors simply fail to understand the minimal extent of the Lacks’ education: a byproduct of their social circumstances and a huge contributor to the events in the Lacks’ story. Skloot suggests that this education gap is part of a larger issue deserving the attention of the general public. Skloot indicates that even before Henrietta Lacks died, there was a precedent of deliberate miscommunication between medical providers and black test subjects in American history. The book cites the Tuskegee Syphilis Study as an example of medical researchers specifically deceiving their test subjects to encourage participation in the study. The Tuskegee Syphilis Study was an experiment by the US Public Health Service which examined the effect of Syphilis on black men. The subjects were not informed of their ailments nor were they informed of treatment options after a cure was discovered (Skloot 40). The researchers intentionally did not communicate the full extent of the study to ensure the subjects would remain in the program. Skloot, therefore, explores a nefarious flavor of miscommunication between the medical community and black research subjects which took place years before Henrietta Lacks develops cervical cancer. Skloot’s establishment of the precedent of intentional miscommunication helps to explain why Henrietta was hesitant to see the doctor at Johns Hopkins and suggests a more systemic flaw in the medical system. However, later in the book, Skloot explores instances of miscommunication between medical researchers and the Lacks family which are less intentional. A prime example of an unintentional failure of medical professionals to

Scholarly Essay

communicate with their test subjects comes in the form of Dr. McKusick and Dr. Hsu. Looking to identify HeLa cell contamination amongst other cell cultures, geneticist Dr. McKusick instructs PhD research fellow Dr. Hsu to collect blood from Henrietta Lacks’ descendants (Skloot 132). Dr. Hsu calls Henrietta’s husband–Day–asking for his permission to draw blood from his children to learn about the HeLa genotype. However, Day misunderstands the purpose of drawing blood–instead assuming it is a test for his children’s susceptibility for cancer. Meanwhile, Hsu incorrectly gathers that the Lackses are completely aware of their mother’s “contribution” to cell biology and understand why Hsu is taking blood. Day completely misinterprets Hsu’s intentions despite giving consent for the study. Skloot attributes this miscommunication to Day’s lack of education as well as Day and Hsu’s respectively unfamiliar accents (Skloot 132). Even though Hsu tries her best to explain the situation, she completely overestimates Day’s knowledge of cellular biology and the ubiquity of HeLa cells in research (Skloot 132-133). Unlike Southam or the Tuskegee researchers, Dr. Hsub does not believe she is violating her subjects. She is simply doing her job as a researcher with no ill intentions for the family. Later in the chronology, Henrietta’s daughter Deborah has an appointment with Dr. McKusick to give blood when she asks him about her mother’s cancer and the role of HeLa cells in medical research. Eager to help her understand the situation, McKusick gives her a medical genetics textbook which is far beyond her level of biological understanding (Skloot 136). Again, McKusick has the intention of helping Deborah, but nonetheless completely fails to communicate the details of her mother’s cells and their role in the scientific community. Skloot demonstrates that these researchers both fail to communicate with their research subjects not through ill intent, but through their inability to understand the perspective of their subjects. However, she also makes clear that these instances of miscommunication are in large part due to the lack of education in the Lacks family. David Lacks left school after fourth grade, and Henrietta Lacks left after sixth (Skloot 18). Deborah was able to finish high school, but when she tried taking community college courses as an adult, it was revealed that her high school curriculum was insufficient for college (Skloot 219). Skloot attributes the lack of education in the Lacks family to external circumstances

which expand far beyond the scope of just Henrietta’s family. Henrietta and David were forced to quit school to help their agrarian family make a living (Skloot 18). The Lackses are extremely poor, and the distinction between the social status of the black Lackses and their white counterparts is stark. Skloot states: On one side of the two-lane road from downtown, there were vast, well-manicured rolling hills, acres and acres of wide-open property with horses, a small pond, a well-kept house set back from the road, a minivan, and a white picket fence. Directly across the street stood a small one-room shack about seven feet wide and twelve feet long; it was made of unpainted wood, with large gaps between the wallboards where vines and weeds grew… Slave-era cabins sat next to cinder-block homes and trailers, some with satellite dishes and porch swings, others rusted and half buried. (Skloot 61) Skloot spends several paragraphs describing the literal have and have-nots of the two neighborhoods–not just Henrietta’s immediate family, and the use of the adjective “slave-era” to describe the Lacks’ homes is certainly intentional - alluding to the initial cause of this disparity (61). This part of the book is perhaps where Skloot maximizes the benefits of writing in the genre of creative nonfiction: she explains the story of Henrietta Lacks but also allows herself the creative freedom to explore relevant but ostensibly distant social concerns in her story. She also uses more subjective but nonetheless powerful language to support the notion that the Lacks’ social circumstances also impacted their relationship with medical treatment. Johns Hopkins was the only hospital near the Lackses which treated black patients, and it was over 20 miles away (Skloot 15). Most black patients, including Henrietta, visited the hospital only as a “last resort” (Skloot 16). Skloot further explains that this poverty was part of the reason black patients were recruited for dangerous studies: many were “desperate” for resources like food stamps or transportation to their employment (40). Skloot tries to convey that the circumstances of Henrietta’s death and her family’s long-term struggles are not unique to the her immediate family. She makes a point of describing the entire neighborhood of the Lacks town - not just Henrietta’s childhood home. She also purposely mentions that Henrietta’s apprehension to see a doctor was common amongst black Americans–not just a personal apprehension. Skloot may be pointing to a larger

societal issue in the book, indicating that the circumstances which led to her cancer treatment, the cells being used without her permission, and her family’s turbulent relationship with medical professionals are not unique to Henrietta Lacks’ family. This is not implausible considering that Skloot does talk at length in the afterword about other groups of patients from around the world of which their organs were used for medical research nonconsensually–drawing attention to a larger, systemic issue that needs to be addressed. Skloot also states, “The History of Henrietta Lacks and the Hela cells raises important issues regarding science, ethics, race, and class; I’ve done my best to present them clearly within the narrative of the Lacks story…” (xiv) - implying that she is aware that her book calls attention to broader societal issues. Skloot is calling attention to the gap of social, especially educational opportunities, between balck and white Americans in the local Baltimore area where Henrietta Lacks raised her family and in the rural Virginia town where she grew up. As Skloot confirms, opportunity gaps in these places still persist, and if the Lackses had been given more educational opportunities and more accessible healthcare, the story of Henrietta Lacks and her family would have been far different. The Lacks’ social circumstances are a core element of the story of HeLa. The miscommunication that resulted from their being denied of educational opportunities created a large gap in the story of Henrietta Lacks for decades until The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks was published. The book ends with a sense of cautious optimism for the family: the afterword states that a scholarly fund was created to help the next generation of the family gain financ i a l stability with the help of the book’s publisher. But the problems inherent to some of the health care and educational systems discussed in the book still persist in the United States, and Skloot makes no attempt to hide that fact. Works Cited Skloot, Rebecca. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. Broadway Books, 2017.

NO MOTIVATION Halle Hau

Tenafly High School

BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP… The sound of an emergency alarm blares throughout my room, a sound that would cause most people to start up in panic. But I have grown numb to the alarm’s urgent cries, and I simply shut my eyes tighter, trying to ignore my imminent doom. The alarm screeches on, forming an endless pulse that repeats over and over again, each sound bringing me one blare closer to restarting the infinite cycle of what has become my life. Then, just as the clock strikes 8:05, I yank myself from my bed and make the treacherous three-step commute to my desk, shut off my phone alarm, and frantically search for the link for my first period class, hoping that my sleep-fogged brain manages to select the correct one. There I sit staring at my computer screen, struggling to focus on my teacher’s words with the wonders of YouTube and Instagram available at my fingertips. Between periods, I immediately rush out of my room to pet my dog or just peer outside the window, but remain ever aware of the four-minute passing time quickly trickling away. I endure this pitiful process over and over again until it is finally 1:04, and I slam my laptop shut. Freedom at last... but not for long. Sure, I might eat lunch, walk my dog, or play the piano, but all these things are simply part of the cycle. In the end I’ll always have to return. There’s no escaping its grasp. Wake up. Work. Sleep. Repeat. How did my life come to this? When school had first shut down last March, I was elated. No more having to wake up early and spend seven hours a day at school, only then to be burdened with hours of homework and studying. That year, I had been struggling with the increased workload, constantly shoving facts about the French Revolution or Shakespearean plays into my brain that would be spewed out the second after they were used. I found myself constantly on the verge of tears as I crumbled under the pressure of pop in-class essays, group math assignments, and imminent history exams. As each day passed by, I began to ponder the meaning of my efforts. What was the point of working so hard, if I gained so little joy or failed to learn anything from it? My life was looped in an endless cycle, like a vortex spinning out of control, trapping me in its inescapable pull. The first few weeks working from home felt like paradise. With the shorter days and lack of conventional in-class exams, I was at last free from the stress and pain that had hindered my happiness for so long. I had more freedom to

Personal Essay

do as I pleased, with more time to spend with my family and take up new hobbies. But I soon realized something. While basking in the glory of my new stress-free life, I neglected to notice that my motivation was slipping through my fingers. On top of that, instead of the mere two-week grace period I expected to have, the entire world had transformed before my eyes, leaving barren streets and closed doors in the shops of the once bustling town. A sheet of gray seemed to shade my view, leaving me face-toface with an uncertain future, each day at home blurring into one, with no visible escape. Soon, I found school to be just as jarring as before. What was the point of paying attention if no one would notice whether or not I was? Why should I study if I could use my notes on all my exams? What was the use in waking up early if my “classroom” was in the same room as my bed? Why did I still have to learn as before, with the world I’d known before permanently faded from view, living in fear of this unknown virus that could strike those I loved and many others around the world? As each day passed, my desire to put effort into my work crumbled to dust, leaving me questioning my purpose. In destroying the version of school that had previously consumed my entire life, another one simply emerged, the cycle again prospering through it all. Now here I am in my junior year, still attending school from home, with a more conventional school schedule and workload, yet I have even less motivation to work hard in school. I constantly procrastinate on my work, always rushing to finish assignments at the last minute. Even on days with less homework, I still struggle to complete it on time. No matter how hard I try to finish earlier, I always find myself aimlessly browsing the internet or lying around doing nothing, wallowing in the pile of work that is sitting before me, as my brain has learned only to equate schoolwork with productivity, refusing to let me enjoy myself until it’s done. For each minute I stray from my work, more and more guilt begins to squirm in my gut and fill my conscience. You could be doing so much right now. Why are you wasting so much time? No breaks until the work is done. But is it ever done? What is life without work? Even on the weekends or holiday breaks, I feel restless, as if I am obligated to do something “productive” with myself. I can never take my mind off the imminent return of school, when I will be thrown back into the cage

I wish I could say I have learned to overcome my struggles. Unfortunately, I have still not found the distinction between working hard and overworking myself. I am barely managing to finish this essay on time. But through this all, I am somehow still standing. I somehow manage to complete my work, despite my timing being rather questionable. I somehow am still able to find little specks of joy in each day I endure. And just that alone gives me hope. Hope that we can one day escape this cycle, and be more open to allowing people to enjoy their lives, instead of forcing everyone into a repetitive, jarring lifestyle. May we all strive for joy, not just mere productivity? May we all stop punishing ourselves for failing to conform once in a while? Or is this cycle neverending, keeping our society afloat but destroying those who inhabit it?

of my responsibilities. So here I am, trapped in a neverending battle between constantly needing to work, as I have been conditioned to my whole life, and my crippling lack of motivation actually to get anything done. Why does our society always call for perfection, when reaching such an ideal is impossible? Why can’t we simply neglect our work once in a while, take the 0 on an assignment every so often? We should be able to skip school to frolic in the great outdoors. Sleep in for as long as we want. Read books. Watch TV shows. Make art. Help others. Take time to learn more about ourselves and those we love. Experience all this joy without the looming expectations of society, work, or school weighing down on us, free from detrimental repercussions. Just for one day, I wish I could live this freely, without an ounce of guilt for experiencing joy I am worthy of having. Even in times of solace, I always fear the passage of time getting the better of me, forcing me to return to my life of constant work, that I don’t stop to actually enjoy the moments I get.

NIGHT “LIGHTS” Stacey Na

Bergen County Academies

Personal Essay

proven by the extension cord plugged in and capable of providing energy for a standing lamp, desktop lamp, heater, while simultaneously charging a laptop and a phone. And the light bulbs themselves, at the time of initial use, were relatively new. Thus, there was no real reason as to why the light produced by these night lights were constantly dim. It was infuriating. These antique night lights serve no real purpose and, in all honesty, fail to do what an ideal night-light is designed to do. And so, with this sad excuse of a night light plugged into an outlet in my room, my five-year-old self was incapable of taking on whatever the darkness had in store for my imagination and me. Now these dim lights, as provided by these Christmas light knockoffs, are the very definition of hypocrisy. Any night light makes the undying promise to a child to provide the comfort of their presence in the darkest of times. Dim night-lights do not have the power to ward off the cyan monster with purple spots and six countable pointy teeth and bushy eyebrows waiting in the dark to

In some drawer of some storage area in some forgotten corner of my house are the five or six two-faced night lights of my childhood nightmares. A few of these night lights are antique, and as I like to refer to them, “poor Christmas light dupes”: the bulbs of these night lights mirror the intensity and shape of a traditional christmas light. When, as a five-year-old, I’d eagerly plug these sad night lights into an outlet, they projected the most inhospitable yellow. My face scrunched up in disgust and my smile lines became both frown lines and forehead wrinkles. The light from these light bulbs was the color of rotting teeth,1 or maybe decaying wood. The switch to turn on this particular type of night light produces a singular, ominous click. Moving this switch from on to off, or off to on, requires a strange amount of force. Some of these vertical black or brown on and off switches are chipped from heavy wear.2 Besides being terribly ugly and emitting a crummy shade of yellow light, these night-lights are also inexplicably dim. Adequate power was supplied through the outlet, as

feed on two year olds.3 Dim night-lights do not provide those suffering from nyctophobia the comfort of a source of light in the bleakness of the night. Dim night-lights are just simply not bright enough to provide the user with an adequate degree of comfort, as should any good nightlight. And through a practical lens, dim night lights are incapable of assisting someone who does not have very good night time vision in going to the bathroom, nor someone wanting a cup of water, in the middle of the night. These dim night-lights comprise a fraction of the night-lights that were plugged in my bedroom wall. Cinderella's castle4 projected four colors (pink, blue, green, and yellow), each approximately twenty or so seconds in length before switching off to the next color. The color of these lights was closer to neon than to pastel, and thus produced an annoyingly bright echo on my plain, innocent wall. Bright night-lights are arguably more counterintuitive than dim night-lights. If the night-light provides light in all corners of your room, why not just turn on a lamp on your nightstand? Why go the extra mile to turn on the night-light, likely farther away from you than you are from the nightstand, when you can just reach over to the night stand and sleep with the lamp on? Why don’t you just turn on all the lights and just not sleep? Yes, brighter night-lights are of potential assistance in an individual’s midnight conquest to obtain a glass of water from the kitchen likely on the opposite side of the house in the night, but, in truth, this individual would not even be asleep in the first place because of the jarring intensity of this night light. The absolute worst night-lights are the special type of night-lights that provide just enough light to cast evil shadows. These sadistic night lights and their side-kicks (power outlets near furniture) wreak havoc on someone’s meant-to-be-restful night, brewing up a perfect storm of one part uncertainty and one part unknown. The bulbs of these night-lights of perfect intensity radiate light in a perfect fraction of the room, unlike the lamps that bring light to the entirety of the room. These lamps barely cast shadows, as they bring light to the entire room and there is not much stark contrast between light and dark. On the contrary, the light bulbs of ideal intensity cast definitive shadows; the mercilessly perfect contrast between light and

dark is apparent in a dark room with just the right amount of localized light and darkness as opposed to a completely lit room or a completely dark room. Shadows are at most mischievous. A swivel chair may have a shadow of the enormous monster, or of an ominous figure. These night lights give rise to theshadows of anyone’s worst fear: the unknown. A closet door may appear as a person in the middle of the night. And so, you awake entirely from your slumber and reach for the lamp on your nightstand in one frantic motion, possibly knocking over a bottle of unassuming moisturizer. As the room is lit up by this lamp, you may look in the direction of the “person,” and conclude that this “person” was a closet door. Whether a night-light works to be of physical or mental assistance is completely up to you, as the intensity of a night light is a matter of personal preference. How I see it, the cons of night lights outweigh the pros, and by a landslide. Night-lights are the same kind of “useless” as pet rocks5 and diet water, but also, in retrospect, the same breed of “useless” as plastic water bottles and polystyrene foam takeout containers (not questioned before use and are, when in use, counterintuitive). Night-lights are the same kind of “useless” as audience-less TVs, or fans left on in a hot, person-less room; they remain on when no one is really conscious of them. 1

of every child’s dental nightmares.

One deviation from these antique christmas bulb shaped night lights had a plain white body and a blue guard with elementary cutouts of stars. These cutouts were so poorly designed, the sharp corners of the stars transferred blunt on the walls. These so-called corners of these so-called stars merged to form The Blob. 3

Sulley from Monsters Inc.

Closer (in description) to that of the castle in original 1950’s Cinderella than of the castle in DisneyWorld.

Homage to Patrick Star’s pet rock in an episode of SpongeBob SquarePants, “The Great Snail Race.”

PRINCIPLES OF UNCERTAINTY Dodie Park

Bergen County Academies

Personal Essay

doesn’t stop you, because you are a veteran. All you need to do is swipe right or left. Drop them when they don’t “match your vibe.”

Lonely People say to you “You are not alone” as if you needed the reassurance of presence, and you have a lot of friends. And you do, by their definition. You realize your thousand follower count on Instagram and 414,147 Snapchat score doesn’t mean anything until you get a pencil and paper to write down the names of those who would really understand you. Not everyone you have a streak with on Snapchat will even show up to your funeral. That’s just the ugly truth. And quite frankly, you just have a lot of more-than-acquaintances. I’m not saying these relationships are bad in any way. You still learn from them and acknowledge how they are human too. These relationships are superficial, but it’s easier that way because you don’t want them to know the icky details of your private life. Living in your own shell as your own person requires a good amount of resilience in dealing with the random pangs of loneliness, but the feeling of freedom is liberating. You constantly feel the need to meet new people to forget the pain of loneliness. And by new people, I mean a variety of people, good and bad. But that

Repeat Once you get drunk on the feeling of the firsts of every friendship, it becomes an addiction. Every new friendship hones your next act, a synthesis of curiosity in their curated museum of relatable LOL moments and superficial sob stories. Your backstory is basically a quilt mended with snippets of conversions you pieced together from your memory. Some are funnier than the memes that made you laugh at 3 a.m., some make conversation like breathing, and there is rarely a person that can pull you out of your hermit crab shell. But it’s strange; no matter how great you think they are, you’re always back to day 0. At first, it was a crushing realization that whatever adrenaline rush you felt completely evaporated from a chatroom that now says “Read 10/6/18.”

noting his quirks, his crooked humor, and the uncanny resemblances in the crevices of your personality. Every moment makes the sand in the hourglass flow continuously. You develop a curiosity for hope which is now tangible in a place where space and time exists. That’s when you realize. Will we still be friends after two months?

At this point, you’ve been in enough friendships to notice a pattern. It won’t last after two months. Maybe, it’s a natural ebb and flow. Some days they come to you, some days you’re the one searching to meet someone. But it becomes tiring, and you become numb to the point you feel like a hotline call center. You reach a breaking point when at a sleepover, you have an out-of-body experience where you become the birthday candles. Seeing yourself melting onto that peacock blue fondant is enough for you to silently break down. Numb You still get the surge of notifications, but now they annoy you. Those notifications sound like wake up alarms, making you turn on “Do Not Disturb” 24/7. How ironic. That something as simple as your phone lighting up your bedroom had excited you. You finally settle into a solitary life. Wake-up, study, like some posts, snap, shower, and repeat. It isn’t exciting, but it’s enough. You still meet new people. The constant “what are you doing” texts you always wanted are now unwanted. You don’t even want to start replying to texts that will stretch into a morning of sleepdeprivation. They are the exact opposite of perfect. You hate how her voice is so high, something about her mannerisms feels off and her values are subpar. You pull the go-to text “I’m busy on Saturday,” and you are, but you’re just trying to avoid feeling anything by experiencing emotional work by yourself. Uploading pictures for the random DMs of compliments, commenting on your friend’s post to hype her flopping visuals. It’s not new. Remember? You’re a veteran and it’s comforting to know you’re not phased by the ups and downs of a friendship anymore. Hope Then you meet him. After the first moments of neglect and ignorance, you stumble upon a sudden convergence of reality and imagination. Have you ever felt this before? What’s even more confusing is that you are starving, sleep deprived, and you corroded the idea of faith into apathy and doubt. None of that matters anymore. As you listen to his story and watch his passions about quantum physics unfold at 3 a.m., you feel something igniting in you so deep that it can’t be described. It’s like the warmth of a fireplace in the middle of a snowstorm. You continue

WE CONTINUE TO BE ENGULFED BY EVERYTHING THAT REMAINS UNKNOWABLE Tanisha Shende

Bergen County Academies

how do we survive this winter? the gods huddle around this small, diminishing star. how do we survive this tombstone of cold? remember when we went to cyprus to get away from all of this? all the blue jay warmth, all that magnificent trembling? i spoke to you in only truths, that evening, and you have never been one for fear, so we dive into the water, headfirst. under here, our veins go sluggish, ichor meeting staccato in a soprano murmur. we are all divinity, personified in fluttering eyelashes and drifting snow. tell me the story of the first sunrise, you hum around the chipped mug cradled between your palms like a dying star. you are talking about that first morning of grace and pale ichor where the sky became a lit candle; the mountains and the forests rose up out of the mist, crying, remember the reverence of our ancestors, as if the bottled breath of gods had shattered on the granite tiles and spilled marigolds and sugar over the canyons between them. the one where the rest of us promise each other a new beginning, and the eons spent in a blanket of night fade away into stardust. the world was so wide, and you, my darling, grappled at the edges like they would turn to cigarette smoke in front of our eyes. that was the night i told you that i was going to leave, remember? not to get away, but to see what comes after— is it anything as peaceful as this? if it is, i promise I’ll come back for you.

Poetry

EAT MORE CHIKIN? Jarrett Margolis

Tenafly High School

I punch the clock at 4 A.M., long before the rooster’s ode to sunrise The smell of chicken shit and bleach permeates my clothes; sears my eyes The more I kill, the more He makes, so I consign the birds to their fate I stun and stick and slit and slaughter and see them exsanguinate I'm an avian assassin, hardly a need for a trial A slaughterhouse Anubis without the dog or the Nile So, in memory of all the cocks and hens that I’ve had to slay, “I hope you enjoy your Chick-Fil-A”

As captain and oarsman of all eighteen wheels My frozen hard-ship hauling chicken-tender meals Jackknifes, fumes, and fog; all things to avoid I suffer from fatigue, isolation, and a large hemorrhoid Like my cutlet cargo, this truck will truncate my lifespan I’ll usher us both across the river, I'm the Kentucky Fried Ferryman As I pass each mile marker on this desolate high-way “I hope you enjoy your Chick-Fil-A”

“How may I help you?” I say with a smile, as I stare down the lunchtime stampede Chicken and fries are the tools of my trade, my job is simply to feed Harsh words come from customers and my boss Which compete with the stench of peanut oil and zesty buffalo sauce As you insist on more napkins and extra dip I consider your paltry poultry tip “We accept cash, credit, or debit. How would you like to pay?” “I hope you enjoy your Chick-Fil-A”

Poetry

HANDS Isabella Dail

Academy of the Holy Angels

Poetry

i smear Vaseline over the little scar on my right hand an unholy blemish, a rippled patch of scales against the lavender lacquer of my manicured nails. my grandfather’s hands were deformed. callouses and cracks wreathed his fingers as he plucked juice-encrusted mangos from drooping branches. his hands clenched uselessly as he watched his relatives starve, and swung by his sides as he walked across india to find work. The border police beat his hands over & over until they looked like melting candlewax. labor smeared the crevices of his skin with the inkiness of coal. the little scar on my soft & squishy skin is the fractured piece of a past i don’t remember. i could sprinkle mango juice along its lines to preserve the hardships of my ancestors in the amber of my culture. instead i yank down my shirt sleeve & pray that no one notices the foreign mark on my body.

BIRD SONG Dodie Park

Bergen County Academies

straighten your fingers like the rays of the sun stretch across the field enough to let the light trickle onto your palms crack your joints counting to ten

leave the parka covered in winter behind dipped in the scent of bitter in your mornings and filled you up fifty percent

feel the warmth and let it cup your ears that was muffled to hear the empty in your body mouth that was bottled up with tongues of letters yet to be sent nose that smelled the frozen tears in January eyes that was blinded by the shadows

hear the awakening of the warbler calling for you taste the mangos and kiwis by the pine wood bench smell the hyacinths and wisterias in the slow walks covered in spring see the joy in the breeze drying up the teardrops embedded in your moleskine

you are renewed but not new peeling off the seal of the journal bought in two thousand and eighteen you drink the same sun poured into the cup of sixteen years with a different tea bag of new petals

place the worn welcome mat in front of your home waiting for yourself to come back for you to melt hundred percent

Poetry

MORNING COMMUTE Zoe Zachko,

Tenafly High School

It's morning. You wake up to the sound of your alarm, a sound reminiscent of high school fire alarms, war movies, and ambulances. It's, without a doubt, the sound you hate most. But you've tried other sounds, other alarms, and they just don't work. You get up (albeit two snooze buttons and a solid twenty minutes later), brush your teeth, comb your hair, maybe even put in a little gel. Anything to distract your coworkers from your eye bags the size of suitcases and your empty, dead-tired gaze. It's Monday, the week has just started, and God do you hate work. It's pitch-black out as you shuffle your way to the bus stop. Once again, the point of Daylight Savings is pondered by you and the lack of a decent pair of gloves is cursed by you. Winter mornings are hard, but your boss makes sure that the mornings you miss the 9 A.M. briefs are the hardest. So you push on. At the bus stop are the usual crew–people you've seen the faces of for the past ten years without fail–but you've yet to find the desire to learn their names. Blonde with the Red Wool Coat got divorced last month, and the settlement money must've been good, because she's been wearing a different outfit every day for the past week. Bald and Tall–at least six feet but you've yet to ask for his exact height–has a son who used to come with him to work all the time. Cute kid with rosy cheeks, very un-cute fiery temper tantrums. A tall teenager with the same rosy cheeks stands next to him. Huh. Time flies fast. The bus pulls into the stop, nearly taking out Short Brunette who always stands at the curb and holds her thumb out even though the bus river has yet to miss this stop and the ten other habitual riders who have waited here for the last ten years. And still after these ten years, Short Brunette always manages to look more shocked and more frightened as the large, swaying toaster on wheels almost careens right into her. Some things never change. You get on the bus and walk down the narrow aisle, purposefully not looking down, lest you see something that makes you want to push aside the line of passengers behind you–already grumbling about your average walking pace–and unload your meager breakfast onto the curb.

Short Story

You find a seat (at least two rows behind the middle seat; anything before that is where the smelly, elderly, or tourists sit) and you gracefully dive into it as the bus driver swerves back into the road and takes off at the speed of light, only to slam to a halt at the stoplight fifty meters away. You're lucky today; the seat next to you is empty, and it stays that way for the next few stops. The bus goes from small suburban town number one to small suburban town number two, three, and four. Speeding to screeching. More people come onto the bus, all wearing the same business casual uniform. Mostly blacks, grays, respectable muted blues and maroons. You see Blond with the Red Wool Coat sitting in the handicap seat. She stands out like a sweet potato fry in a basket of regular potato fries. Unexpected, but not unwelcome. You see a pair of tourists get onto the bus and sit in the very first row. Those are the true infiltrators; they are the cauliflower bites that have supplanted your side of mac and cheese due to the blunder of an overworked waitress. Eureka! The bus has pulled out of the residential area and onto the freeway and the seat next to you is still empty. Monday blessings are few and far between, so this one you savor like a glass of red wine you paid twenty dollars for at a restaurant even though you know you could've bought the whole bottle for fifteen at the store. You pull your laptop out of your bag to get a headstart on work for the day. But really, you're scrolling through Facebook to see if any of your past classmates are doing anything worth being jealous over. You notice a slew of emails from work that have been streaming in since 7:15. It's your Corporate V.P. George accidentally sending out his kids' soccer practice schedule to the wrong email list. Again. You hear a groan, high and whiny, accompanied by a loud whoosh of air and anunpleasant squelching sound. Is that you? No, it's the bus that has just blown a tire and pulled up alongside the road. A long line of business-casual uniformed prisoners shuffle out of the vehicle, most are grumbling, a few are groaning, some are too tired to care. You are of the latter. Short Brunette is on the verge of tears, probably worried about being late to her early morning meeting. You should probably be worried too. But standing there on the side of the freeway, your hands cold, seeing cars go by, lined up

alongside the bourgeoisie of the corporate workplace, you feel nothing. You see a crushed up water bottle fly out of the window of a silver Prius. You see a Tesla that's white, shiny, and toy-like make a (probably) heavily calculated movement to ever so slightly change the trajectory of the car as to narrowly avoid hitting the piece of litter that would leave a speck of unwanted germs on the tire. The water bottle remains in the middle of the road, strangely picturesque. Smooth, lightly-tinted blue, reflecting a rainbow of colors along the backdrop of the black asphalt. Unknown, unnoticed, but sure to be trampled and swept aside in the sea of gasoline-fueled predators. Crumpled beyond recognition. Not thinking, not feeling, you walk to pick up that water bottle. From behind, you hear the grumbling, the groaning, the silence from those too tired to care, and the tears of a Short Brunette that may or may not be meant for you. You reach down to pick up the useless, crumpled, dejected water bottle when you hear a honk that's loud, ferocious, and desperate. Is that you? No, it's a black Jeep, going ninety-five in a sixty, coming straight at you. This driver is not the bus driver who can slam to halt in 5 meters or the Tesla that does a million calculations a second to precisely swerve out of the way. This is a normal human being on their way to work, a breakfast sandwich in hand, ketchup on their lips, and fear in their eyes. But you are too tired to care. So you are pushed down. It is said that right before you die, a life review flashes before your eyes. That is, the entirety of your life history is relieved in the seven minutes of brain activity after your spine has snapped and the connection between mind and body is severed. You are a spectator of the movie of your life. If it was a real movie, critics would've hated it and it would've tanked in the box office. Second week of third grade. It was show-and-tell day, and you brought in a picture book full of your favorite paintings. It was full of blues, reds, yellows, and greens. Your friends brought in footballs and T-shirts signed by NBA stars. You told your teacher you forgot to bring it in, but you were going to bring in a baseball signed by the Roger Clemens. It was a family heirloom. Whose picture book is this? Not yours, you had said. Maybe it's Cindy Miller's?

Second semester of freshman year. You had wanted to take that honors painting class. You had sat down with your guidance counselor to talk about courses. Math class, science class (Maybe two?), social studies, English–for your elective, maybe try computer science? Colleges love that. Painting? But you've already done your art requirement. You backed out and chose economics. It was the worst class you took in high school and every day you looked at the paintings hung in the hallways, imagining what you could have put up there. College graduation. A painfully cheerful ceremony, full of parents (father and mother: father now dead, mother retired in Florida) and friends. You had a job already lined up, at an almost-decent company starting at an almostdecent salary. Business wasn't really your passion but you hadn't held a paintbrush in years. You wore square glasses, had a degree in management, and a suit. Your parents were proud; your soul was subdued, and you stepped into that office with the perpetually broken air conditioner and squeaky chairs, never to be seen again. Today. 6:30 in the morning, an alarm clock that sounded like an ambulance speeding along the parkway after an accident on I-95. You woke up from your life as an artist and into your nightmare as an office worker with a nine-to-five and an exacting boss. You got on your bus–same one every day for ten years–and headed to the gray office with the gray chairs and the gray desks and the gray people. Except the bus never got there. And you were dead tired.

MOKITA Sylvie Adams

Bergen County Academies

It’s an apartment of oddly cut corners and figurines silenced to knick-knacks. Bodies walking through the landscape of collectibles and objects left-behind hear the faint whisper of dust. In the midst of spoken words and ones only whispered, a mother and daughter sit in a breakfast nook in companionable quiet. Mia, the daughter, reads a book about Papua New Guinea. Raina, the mother, reads the paper from two days ago. A heat has settled in, sticky and quiet (much like the small family it clings to now). A dribble of sweat emerges from the groin of Mia’s index and middle fingers. It slides slowly down her carefully painted bubble gum nails, leaving a mild sheen on the skin it touches. It slightly dampens the pages Mia thumbs through as she tries to find the chapter she left off on. Raina stares blearily and unfocused at a story about a local soccer team, breaths slowly becoming light snores as she nods off. Mia snorts happily when she takes note of her mother’s tipped back head and slumped figure. She good-naturedly files away the unfortunate tenor of Raina’s snores, triumphant that while she had not inherited her mother’s ever cool and crisp skin, she had managed to skirt the rather inelegant habit. Mia returns to her reading, laughter echoing quietly in her bones. The light continues to wane as night attempts to sweep away day. Mia will soon begin dinner, a chore that she enjoys executing for her mother, who otherwise has nothing done for her. Yet… she finds herself far from the tasks of her evening as she comes across a word–a word she swears she has heard before. It reminds her of dancing, of two partners in competition even as they wrap their limbs around the other and step in beat to the music. An unbidden memory of a third figure sitting in the nook sails through her mind, bringing tears to her eyes as she recalls that there was once another person reading next to her. She can see it–mother, father, and daughter enjoying each other in the coming twilight. When Mia was still too small to read herself, her father would hoist her onto his lap and tell her stories about the world. He loved learning languages and often told Mia and her mother that had he gone to college, he would have been an excellent academic. Yet, grimy with dirt and liquified rust, he would always tell the other members of the nook that the wonders of the world did not compare to them. Raina would smile and kiss his dirty cheek.

Short Story

Mia would ask for another story. He knew many of them, having read his whole life about lands he never expected to walk upon. Mia rises from her seat, young bones creaking like the improperly placed floorboards of her apartment. She sets about preparing dinner, concocting a mess of spices and vegetables. The recipe comes unprompted. It's from a distant memory, a nearly forgotten cooking lesson given under a shroud of colorful curtains and the songs of muted cardinals. Mia faintly recalls that morning now, happy to see her parents dancing around her. She tries to remember the lines of her father’s face, her imagination failing to render a completely familiar image. He appears stilted and awkward like an unfinished sculpture. Mia swallows the memory. The rush of paper into the mailbox brings Mia running to the door. She picks apart the bundle of letters to find a single shining correspondence from the state university. It is the only packet in the bunch–thick and colorful. She recalls the fortune in receiving a packet, probably full of freshmen orientation information and congratulations. She sets it carefully on the counter, resolving to celebrate after dinner is finished. A lovely smell fills the space, sprinkling flavor onto the air as an invisible hand taps Raina on the shoulder and awakens her senses. The beautiful woman, aged but shining, awakens to the lovely image of her daughter in their kitchen. She watches her Mia carefully oil the vegetables and delicately distribute red pepper flakes. Mia smiles at her mother sweetly. Raina, spotting the mail on the counter, goes to rifle through it. She finds bills and more bills and then a letter from her brother. And then something else. She lifts up the packet, examining a vaguely familiar photo of a university mascot. Raina quietly glares at it and sets the mail down. Her daughter watches from the corner of her eyes, examining the quickened breaths that rapidly work to expand Raina’s delicate neck. Mia disappointedly looks away as her mother sits down, once again in the nook, without a word. Mia distributes plates and utensils and then initial helpings for both of them. Her mother munches quietly. She rises from the table after finishing, thanks her daughter for a lovely meal, and goes to her room. Mia hears the quiet crunch of sheets and quilts as her mother cocoons herself. She stops eating, uncomfortable with the famil-

iarity of the situation, of nights spent listening out for movement from her mother’s room. She sighs and finally goes to open the packet, feeling slightly empty as she reads the smiling letters of her acceptance. She sets down the papers and stares down the hallway only to be met with the cold solidity of her mother’s door. Her eyes drift to something else–to the poster that hangs behind her mother’s normally open door. It dangles limply, appearing to continue to cling to the wall only by the mercy of a single piece of tape. A ADISE That’s what it says–this strange composite of greying palm trees and smiling faces. The laminated eyes stare down at Mia until she escapes to her bedroom, shutting the door quietly so as not to disturb the cartoon tourists. She sees her father hanging it up. He had smiled at his daughter. Paradise–you see? He gestures to the print, still unfamiliar to Mia’s young eyes.One day I’ll go there. Mia falls asleep in her jeans, listening to the gentle lilt of her father’s voice. He reads Kilivila to her, a language from Papua New Guinea. He chants and her mind fills with his world of artifacts and history. He tells her a word. He hands her the word and whispers so quietly what it means, it slides from her. She reaches, reaches, reaches for the sounds just out of touch, and finally grabs ahold. Mia is yanked into consciousness. She lies a moment in her plastic framed bed, contemplating the stars on her ceiling. They glow in the dark–but the grey morning light drowns them. She thinks her father painted them. He used a picture and planned them out in pencil before begin-

ning, telling Mia that he would teach her each constellation in her sky. She goes to the kitchen and quietly makes a cup of Earl Grey, drinking it thoughtfully in the nook. Raina joins her soon, very suddenly springing conversation on to her: “Chicken!” She cries. And then she rolls off the rest of her grocery list. And then she talks of errands and work and school and friends and family and anything but the packet that still sits between them. Mia thinks of the night before and of a night that came years before that one. She remembers that for a year her mother was sick, that the light in their strange apartment turned grey. She remembers the stark absence of her father’s voice. But she heard his voice last night, telling her a word that she had forgotten. It dances across her eyes, filling her even as she feels her mother’s heart breaking, unfolding with every hysterical word. Raina stops her speech, realizing the emptiness of her words. She falls into herself and becomes silent. She looks at the apartment, imagining that Mia’s presence will soon be vacatedfrom it. She returns to her tea and paper, now three days old, and lets it leave her mind. It becomes a dance between them, one of awkward glances and unsaid words. They circle each other slowly, daring the other to speak of what must not be acknowledged. Mia goes closer to the edge, almost thinking to mention it… but not quite. She cannot bear to make her mother sad, to be another person that departs so suddenly from her life. Mia pictures her mother reading her old paper at the kitchen alone, going to work only to come

home to an empty place. Mokita. The word falls into her lap unbidden, said in the sweet vibration of her father’s voice, a sound she feared forgotten. It was at the door that he first gave her the word, a single suitcase under his strong arm, the same one that lifted her onto his lap. Are you going to come back? He had hesitated before answering. There are things we need not talk about, Mia. Then he told her about Papua New Guinea and Mia listened weakly, for the first time disgusted by his knowledge. He said to her mokita, and like that the truth needn't be uttered. It was an untranslatable word, a favorite of his. It had sprung from one of the pamphlets that cluttered Mia’s life. She had asked her father what it meant, observing the way his heart took flight when he told her about a place that wasn’t home. Mia saw it–a weakness perverting the sanctity of their apartment. She said nothing. It’s something that we both know but… quietly agree not to discuss. Mia thinks about this word now, as she tries to find the words to acknowledge her approaching departure (even months away as it is). She thinks about her mother–who took to the sheets and waited–refusing to say goodbye to her husband. Mokita. It fills Mia and bashes her heart as she tries to make sense of herself. Traitor is among the words that come to mind. She talks to her mother about the weather, hearing her voice become her father’s, charming and empty. Eventually the conversation turns to silence and tears weakly spring to Mia’s eyes. Must an ending bring such sorrow? Have the embraces they’ve shared, the love given freely, been muted to this terrible moment? Mia feels unfamiliarity seep between them. It’s hot and putrid as it climbs down their throats. A sensation emerges; it begs for relief as two hearts begin to tighten. Mother and daughter slowly journey back to their paper and book. They avert their eyes and settle for an uncomfortable silence. The pair remain there for the day, in that nook which once shook with laughter. Now it crumbles, shrinking as a kind of estrangement sets in. A lie barely props it up. It supports the cracked beam above, preventing the ceiling from entirely collapsing. Mother and daughter, at its mercy, feel uncertain It’s an apartment of oddly cut corners and figurines silenced to knick-knacks. It has gathered the two of them together in an embrace, bringing comfort and nurturing them when so much was lost. In it a family finds once again that love is not enough to sustain them, that while

Raina has become closed to adventure, Mia only now stretches her legs to run to an awaiting world. In it there is a word that sits between them, so soft and musical that one can barely hear it. The whisper of it travels through the hallways as another voice once did, catching on broken heartstrings and hidden family pictures. It goes slowly past stacks of old books, ones set aside to the farthest corners of the attic, gazing mockingly upon the remnants of a person that once mattered so much. The word moves and surrounds the family of two, preserving and wrecking their peace all at once. The mother and daughter withdraw from one another, the unsaid caving in between them until they feel completely alone. Mokita.

ALICE Micole Abdelhak

Tenafly High School

Short Story

to me. My mind has taken me back to the day I reached for my diploma. My hand was steady and I was sure of myself. I had received a top education for which I had worked incredibly hard, graduating with honors, and had a job offer from a prestigious law firm all lined up. Although I had sacrificed many social nights and at points my own mental and physical health for this very moment, all I could feel was excitement and pride. Everything was finally falling into place. I stepped off the dais knowing my life would finally begin, that my work had finally paid off. All those late nights I had spent studying were worth it. My fear, dread, and doubt left me as if the weight of the world had been lifted off my shoulders. I awoke on Monday morning, dressed in my freshly dry-cleaned suit, and walked the ten blocks to my new office. The early autumn sun gleamed on my face and a brisk breeze blew my hair off my shoulders. I arrived at nine sharp and took the elevator up to the eleventh floor. “Good morning, Alyssa!” A woman approached with her purple stilettos rhythmically tapping on the linoleum floor. Her tight-fitted, fuchsia suit was a perfect match to her violet, wiry glasses that hung down her nose. Her face, hidden behind a plastered-on smile, with ten layers of foundation, in no way matched her flawless exterior. Although her bun was so tightly pulled to the back of her head, it was unable to stretch out her deep wrinkles, which were quite apparent. She showed off two wide sets of pearly white teeth as she smiled; however, the top half of her face didn’t match the bottom. Her eyelids sagged, causing an overall tired appearance. “Welcome aboard. There's coffee in the break room. Help yourself. You break for lunch at one thirty.” She briskly walked back to her office, her shoes making the same ker-tap sound as she went. I didn’t have time to tell her that my name, in fact, was Alice. I turned back to my cubicle. The soft, gray walls surrounded me on all sides. I was also given a nameplate, a heap of paperwork, and a bulky white computer. As I unpacked, I questioned why I would need a nameplate. As a first year lawyer, I wouldn’t really be meeting with anyone in my small cubicle. No one would be there to see it. I turned the object towards me. Alyssa Fisher looked back at me. And so the days went on. I never did inquire about getting a new nameplate. I was new and didn’t want to

Dear Vanessa, It is with grave earnestness and consternation that I find myself writing this letter. Your mother informs me of your current state. I too remember when I was just out of law school, still eager for what was to come. I am in no way trying to discourage you, for that is not my purpose in this letter. Instead I find it my responsibility to warn you, for if only I had someone to warn me…. You know that your mother is someone who has always been near and dear to my heart, and I wish all the best for you as well. I have many regrets in my life and I fear that this will become a projection of them onto you, which is in no way what I desire. But I see much of myself in you–the same hope, the same ambition, the same determination that caused me to make one of the biggest and most regrettable decisions of my life. Perhaps as you read this letter you will find that my past in no way resembles your present and, if that is the case, then please disregard my apprehension. But, as I said, when your mother requested me to give you advice about this profession and informed me of your own second guessing, I knew that if I didn’t inform you of my truth, I would always feel a pang of guilt. With my prior briefing over, I will start at the beginning, from the point in my life where you find yourself now. As I write this now, with a shaky hand, a vivid outpouring of memories and emotions comes flooding back

bother. I took the same mindset with most other aspects of my work. I came in at nine. I clocked in. I went to my cubicle. I did paperwork. I broke for lunch at one thirty. I did more paperwork. I drank coffee. I clocked out at five. I walked home. On Friday I got paid. As the days went on, I felt a sort of discontentment grow. The days all felt the same. I often heard my coworkers chatter amongst themselves. I usually didn’t participate. I didn’t work this hard and get this far to make new office friends, I reminded myself. “Friday again.” “Yes, how about that. Any plans?” “Mondays, am I right?” “Did you catch the game?” “Where's that intern? I need another coffee.” “Shoot, I forgot to clock in.” The gray walls of my cubicle engulfed me. Every day they came in closer and closer. “Welcome aboard, Olivia.” “Um, actually it’s Anna.” Ker-tap. Ker-tap. Ker-tap. It was all the same. My mother invited me over for dinner. I clocked out at five as usual and stopped by the employee bathroom on my floor. I turned the faucet and heard the pipes groan, loudly, begging to be freed from their labor. I knew this sink was faulty but I used it anyway. I let my hands rest under the warm water for a moment. I grabbed a brown paper towel from the dispenser. The leftover water from my hands softened it enough so that it conformed into a wrinkled shape around my hands. I met my eyes in the mirror. Were they always this way? The brightest of blues had always shone through my eyes, my best feature, according to my mother. Perhaps it was the lighting, but now, to me, they were grey. More grey than my cubicle walls if it were possible. My suit was a pale brown. Wrinkled around my body as if it too was slathered with water and plastered on. I smoothed my skirt and tossed the soggy paper into the trash. “And how are you, Alice?” my mother asked. My family had crowded around the table devouring every last drop of my mother’s savory food. How am I? “Well.” “Enjoying your first year as a lawyer, aren’t you?” my

brother said as he shoved food down his throat. Mike, a doctor, had been married for seven years. He extended his arm out to his wife and made a beckoning motion with his hand. She passed him another soda. Their three children were fighting in the next room. They made no move to stop them. “Work’s all right, but I don't know if it’s meant for me. I was thinking about going back to school. Maybe I would be interested in art. I saw an advertisement for....” I felt my mother’s eyes glare up at me. I swallowed. I didn’t lift my head to meet her gaze. “Alice, you have sacrificed a lot, the family has sacrificed a lot for you to be where you are now. Do you think I had the opportunity to do what you're doing? A college education. Seven years of school.” Suddenly my brother became aware of the brawl in the living room. “Kids!” he said, rising from his seat and yanking his napkin off his neck as I nodded my head. I woke up. I went into work at nine. I clocked in. I went to my cubicle. I did paperwork. I broke for lunch at one thirty. I did more paperwork. I drank coffee. I clocked out at five. I walked home. That Friday I got paid. The next Friday, I got paid. I progressed in the field. Within four years, I got my own office with grey walls, a less bulky white computer, and a new nameplate–Alice Fisher. That’s me. This is me. As you know, Vanessa, I was a successful lawyer. For forty years I clocked in and I clocked out. I got married. I had children. I clocked in. I clocked out. For forty years I was grateful for the roof over my family's head and the food on my children’s plates. As your mother has informed me, you are having doubts, second thoughts. Normal, she says. She wants me to be a source of encouragement, a source of advice. While your mother might tell you of your eagerness, inform you of your privilege–for which she is not wrong, it was much harder to be a professional woman when we were young–my own advice is that if it is true that you are unhappy now, don’t simply push through. There will not be an end to your discontent if you are not enjoying life now. Explore your passions. Do not let one unfulfilling year turn into forty. With my love and best of luck, Alice

THE FACELESS MONSTER OF HICKORY HILLS Matthew Panayos

Bergen County Academies

The soil wasn’t soft. It was as if the rock protruding from the ground nearby was part of a much larger unseen rock, a rock that was mostly buried underneath a shallow layer of dirt. All this rock had to experience the world was a small portion exposed to the air. It could feel a few drops of rain, a gust of wind here and there, and even an animal from time to time, but the thick canopy ensured it could never feel direct sunlight, so it sat in darkness, incapable of escaping its tie to the ever-present ground. Rine was uncomfortable on the unseen rock, lying in a ball so close to the truth. He knew he should get up and run for the people, his only hope of survival, but he didn’t. Something he could almost feel, something he had never understood before, kept him pinned to the ground. He knew his suit should be ripped, and his hair should be a matted mess, and yet, minus the dirt from the forest floor and the blood, his suit was in-tact, and his hair was neat. Rine waited for silence that he knew would never come. He hoped to sleep, to forget his mistakes, but the sound, like a dog whistle in his head, kept him awake and thinking. Rine thought of his failure-ridden past and his grim future, but he did not think of the present. He could not think of the present without making his headache worse, without knowing that his life was over; everything he had worked so hard to build lay on a floor far too different from the one he lay on now.

Short Story

shaky voice. When he turned to look at Rine, Felm’s face was wet, and his eyes were red like he had been peppersprayed. Rine had always thought of Felm as strong; he didn’t think even something as bad as pepper-spray couldget a reaction out of him, let alone knock him down. “Who pepper-sprayed you?” Rine asked as Felm pulled himself onto the stump. “No one,” Felm said as he wiped his face dry on his shirt. Rine didn’t understand why Felm would so clearly lie to him, but he didn’t particularly care to find out. “You got my pops?” Rine inquired. Felm acted weird. It was as if his body and face weighed significantly more than they had before, and yet he didn’t look any fatter. “Yeah, whatever. Here,” Felm responded as he pulled a single popsicle from his American-flag printed lunch box. “On second thought, take both today, I’m not hungry.” Even his voice sounds duller today, Rine thought. “Where are the other three?” “What are you talking about?” Felm asked as his face appeared to scrunch up. “Well, you didn’t give me any last week, so now you got to repay me.” Felm didn’t respond; he just stared at Rine with an odd look on his face. His eyebrows had slanted inward, and his mouth curled down. Why did people always make faces when Rine opened his mouth? He thought Felm was different. He thought Felm would never make faces at him. After a moment, Felm stood up and walked loudly away. Rine opened a popsicle and began licking its mostly melted remains while trying to understand why Felm was acting so weird. Maybe Felm didn’t see any benefit in talking to him any more. Rine never really knew why Felm had kept giving him popsicles in the first place. Rine never gave anything back. Why should he?

20 years ago Felm finally came back after being out of school for a week, something about his parents and a car crash. Rine thought that, after being out for so long, Felm might have to repeat fifth grade. Would they still eat lunch together if Felm was held back? And more importantly, would Felm still give Rine his extra popsicle at lunch? For now, Rine put these questions away in the back of his mind. He was really good at that. Rine figured he should go claim the five popsicles Felm owed him from the days he had been absent, so he went to their normal lunch spot in the woods. Well, Rine didn’t think it exactly fit the definition of “woods.” It was more of a patch of trees surrounded by open fields, but they called it “the woods” anyway. Rine strolled up to the pair of stumps seemingly made for them and found Felm next to his stump instead of on top of it. “Hey, Felm, what’re you doing on the floor?” “Nothing,” his friend responded in an unreasonably

6:00 AM Rine snapped awake as his eyes darted around the room taking in the unfamiliar surroundings; his headache surged, and his brain slowly started to catch up with his eyes. He saw himself in a picture frame on the wall, and his headache subsided. Rine had lived here for almost a year now, and every morning, he went through the same process: wake up lost, headache, recognize his room. He had moved to Hickory Hills with his family because he thought it would give the children an opportunity to grow up in a better neighborhood; after all, he had designed

most of it himself. It was organized into nice neat blocks with traffic directed through the center of the town, so the streets outside houses wouldn’t be too busy. Each house was outfitted with state-of-the-art sound-proofing, so sleeping during the intended expansion projects wouldn’t be a problem if his company could ever manage to purchase that nature reserve down the street. After exactly a minute of staying in bed toachieve full consciousness, Rine slowly escaped the grip of his blanket, careful not to wake his wife. Maria got quite annoyed if she was woken up even a minute too early which was what originally motivated him to include the soundproofing. Rine grabbed his socks and suit from the closet and headed towards the bathroom. As he did every day, he donned his formal attire after glancing at the calendar. Monday, May 10th, 1965. He never understood why people thought having a calendar in the bathroom was weird; it seemed like the perfect place for it. The bathroom was the first place he went in the morning and the last place he went before bed. Rine grabbed his toothbrush from the cup next to the sink and his toothpaste from the cabinet behind the mirror. He squeezed out what he considered the perfect amount of toothpaste and began to brush. Using his watch on the counter as a timer, he brushed his teeth for exactly two minutes. After returning his teethcleansing supplies to their proper locations, Rine looked at himself in the mirror and scooped some water from the tap to wet his hair. Rine took the comb from the countertop, and he ran the comb back through his hair twice and then, to the side once. Satisfied with his appearance, he placed his watch on his wrist and fastened the buckle. Rine opened the bathroom door and stepped into the hallway on his way to the kitchen. Rine’s routine was always exactly the same; he had perfected it years ago. Deviation would only bring unpredictability, so as much as he could, Rine repeated the same actions each morning. Next on his schedule was breakfast. Rine opened the refrigerator and gathered two pre-peeled hard-boiled eggs from where a pile of ten sat in a box on the third shelf. He shut the refrigerator and filled a glass with water from the kitchen sink. Without sitting down, Rine popped an egg into his mouth and began chewing. The taste wasn’t anything spectacular, but Rine never minded. He ate eggs because they were concentrated nutrient pouches designed by mother nature herself and

hard-boiled seemed the most convenient way to eat them. Rine washed the remaining egg particles down his throat with water. He only ever drank water. Every other beverage struck him as too full of unnatural chemicals or too sugary to possibly promote an extended lifespan. Rine inserted the second egg into his mouth. Maria emerged from the hallway appearing to have just gotten out of bed. She walked over to the counter, started the coffee maker, and sat down at the kitchen table to wait. After washing down the second egg, Rine grabbed his briefcase from his study down the hall and returned to the kitchen. Preparing to leave, Rine made his way over to the front door off in a short hall to the side of the kitchen and started to pull on his shoes. “Rine, you should really say goodbye to the kids before you go,” called Maria from the kitchen table, interrupting Rine from tying his shoe. “You know I don’t have time for that,” called Rine back. “They’re not even awake yet.” “Maybe you should make some time for it. They would really benefit from seeing their father each morning.” Rine began thinking of a response that would get him out the door the quickest, but he knew Maria was generally right with this type of thing. It had never occurred to him that something as simple as saying goodbye could improve the children’s development. “All right, I’ll make time for it but not today. It’s already too late.” “Fine. I’m going to wake the kids up for school,” she said followed by the sound of a chair sliding on the floor. “Have a nice day at work.” While Rine tied his other shoe, he considered the possibility that he had made yet another irreversible mistake. Gabe would probably be fine anyway. He was strong and smart for his five short years alive, but Zara was the opposite. She always seemed too weak and developmentally behind even considering she was only three. Rine didn’t have a favorite; he couldn’t have a favorite, but Gabe was fundamentally the better child. Rine knew he wasn’t the best parent and thought it right that the children had Maria to make sure they don’t get messed up like him. Why did she even like him? Rine stood up, twisted the doorknob, and finally exited his house. Rine glanced at his watch: 6:21 A.M. He was one minute late.

15 years ago Rine hadn’t specifically wanted to court Maria, but everyone else pushed him into it. All the kids in his grade knew Maria liked Rine, and, since Maria was universally adored, it only made sense for all their peers to urge Rine to make a move. Rine thought you needed to love someone before you went out with them, and Rine didn’t think he loved anyone. In the end, that didn’t even matter; Rine’s classmates had essentially asked Maria out for him. Rine went along with it at first only because he thought he could learn some valuable information about relationships.

“This is not good,” Rine said to himself. They were running from something. The people, his neighbors, kept glancing back with expressions that could only mean one thing: Fear. Then he saw it. A naked man, wait no, a woman. What was that thing? It didn’t have any hair. The thing seemed to be chasing his neighbors. Rine squinted his eyes and felt his head pound as he realized it had no face. The creature had the appearance of a person who had put on a tight costume made of skin covering his or her entire body. Rine’s head screamed as another realization hit him. A whole town wouldn’t run from a single monster. They had the numerical advantage. Rine watched as thirty or so more faceless monsters ran down the street after the mob of people. Chaos seemed to engulf his perfect little town in a matter of seconds. This was not part of his routine. How could he have planned for this? How could he have predicted this? The leading faceless caught up to the group of people at the back of the mob and attacked. It didn’t seem it was trying to kill, but when it touched someone, Rine saw a part of its flesh split off and grow to cover the person whohad been touched. The new faceless just stood there, but the other one kept chasing people in the group, attempting to get close enough to touch them. A man in the group shot it with his pistol, and the monster fell giving everyone else enough time to start running again. The skin of the felled monster grew slack and split open as it fell. The being inside the skin was not recognizable as a human any longer. The new faceless stopped standing still. It launched into a run much faster than the person it had absorbed. It chased after the humans as well. It caught up and spread to a woman running away with a man by her side brandishing a large steak knife. The man immediately stabbed the pursuer in the stomach with his knife and it slunk to the ground, no longer a threat. Rine watched the man turn to his now faceless companion and stab it in a glowing spot on its chest. Rine knew the monster would fall and reveal a mangled pile of meat within, so rather than watching it happen again, he turned back to his door and swung it open. He strolled inside, quickly shut the door behind him, and threw its deadbolt. “Maria!” Rine called as he briskly walked through the kitchen and into his children’s room across the hall from

“Why don’t you ever smile?” Maria asked as they walked through a nearby park on their fifth date. “I don’t know,” Rine responded. “Well, what makes you happy?” Rine hesitated. No one had ever taken enough notice of his actions to ask these questions, not even himself. “I don’t know,” Rine answered after a short pause. “I don’t know if anything does.” “Not even your birthday or Christmas? What about warm socks on a cold night? Or Summer?” “Headaches, all of them.” “Gee. How do you even live?” “I don’t know.” “That was rhetorical, Rine. You didn’t need to answer.” “Oh.” They walked in silence for a time down the winding path between a thousand trees. It was mid-afternoon, but the trees’ shade devoured the harshest rays of August sun. Rine glanced up towards Maria at his side and smiled. “You smiled!” Maria declared, returning his smile. “It’s your fault,” said Rine. Maria hugged him, and Rine knew instantly he had made a mistake. Maria would never let him go now. Maybe if he could keep pretending to be normal everything would be all right. 6:21 AM Rine looked up from his watch and immediately got a headache. People were running down the center of the street. Rine would have known if this was some sort of planned event, so he knew for certain something was wrong. As he looked closer, he noticed the people seemed to be running too fast, and their faces were contorted.

the bathroom. He was too late. If he had one more minute he could have saved them. He was sure of it. The window facing the street was broken, and he caught the blur of a faceless jumping back out to join the horde of faceless rampaging down the street. It hadn’t seen him. Maria, Gabe, and even little Zara, recognizable only by their heights, stood still in the center of the room completely covered in skin. They all had an odd circular lump about the size of a fist over where their hearts should be. The lumps glowed red as if they contained a small fire. Rine had no time to ponder the meaning of this; he had mere seconds before they came after his body. He ran to the kitchen and opened the cabinet under the sink. His head was pounding harder than it ever had. Rine grabbed the axe that hid there among the cleaning chemicals. As he stepped back into the room, Rine thought he could almost feel the soft beige carpet through his shoes. He knew his heart should be beating fast, but Rine was perfectly calm. In a hasty, yet purely logical decision, Rine cut down the faceless monsters that had once been his family. He thought his own head might explode right there, and he would die, falling to the welcoming floor next to the corpses of his family on the blood-stained carpet. The floor seemed to call to him. It wanted him to lie down and give up, to let what might come come. At least if he gave up now, his resting place would be warm and comfortable. He could stay here forever just curled up on the floor embracing the consequences of what he had done. Rine leapt out the back door and ran.

able and even sometimes when she shouldn’t have been able. She was a great mother, and an even better person.” With this last sentence, Rine’s unblinking eyes finally welled up with tears, and Rine blinked hard so they would run down his face. Making a show of trying to contain his tears, Rine paused, and after a moment, he quickly left the podium, fleeing past the solemn audience. Rine navigated to a private room for Rina’s closest family members, a room solely for Rine. His escape plan had worked, but he had forgotten one thing. Maria followed Rine into the private room and shut the door behind them. “Are you all right?” Maria asked, hoping to console Rine. Rine had already wiped away the tears and restored his expression to its normal stoic state, “I’m fine. Just have a headache.” Maria’s somber expression was replaced with one of confusion, “Were you,” her face shifted expressions once more, “faking?” “Maybe.” “How could you do that?” Maria said, clearly getting angry. “How could I not? It’s what’s expected of me. To be distraught I mean.” “And you don’t feel distraught?” “No.” “But she was your mother.” “And now she is dead.” “You’re callous, Rine,” Maria disappointedly noted as she walked out of the room. “You have no idea, darling,” Rine whispered without a hint of emotion. 6:25 AM A high-pitched whistle slowly overtook the pain of Rine’s headache. He paused his run to look around for the source of the noise, so he could quiet it. In a vain attempt to block it out, Rine held his hands to his ears, dropping the axe from his bloody hands. Covering his ears only made

10 years ago Rine wasn’t good at dealing with death, not because he couldn’t bear it but because he could bear it too well, so he improvised. A feeble looking podium stood near one of the pale walls facing towards the center of the warmly lit room. It made sense to him that he had a headache at this moment. Showtime, Rine thought as he strolled over behind the podium and took in a breath ready to speak. “We are gathered here today,” started Rine, “to mourn the loss of Rina Brumal, my mother.” Rine forced himself not to blink as he twisted his face into an expression he knew would convey sadness. He intentionally made his voice quiver as he spoke, “My mother was an incredible person. She always helped when she was

the whistle louder. Rine picked the axe back up and started running again. Something in his head urged him to run to the nature reserve. Of course, the trees will provide cover, Rine thought. He couldn’t hide here in the abandoned yards of his neighborhood, he needed to get to the trees. Rine’s heart beat fast now, but not out of fear. It beat fast to accommodate his active body’s need for oxygen. In a continual loop, his blood hurtled through his veins, a luxury lost to the dead. Rine could barely think over the sounds playing in his head, and yet he still managed to form a plan. He would run to the forested portion of the reserve. There he would search for others and make sure they were of no danger to him. Then, he would approach and help them all survive these monsters. The minutes he spent running felt like days and seconds. The pain of his mind made every second a year of torture, and yet it also impaired his ability to comprehend the passing of time, so it happened in the blink of an eye. Forcing thoughts into the cramped remains of his sanity, Rine spotted a group of people near the edge of the forest. He silently rushed in and found a rock just large enough to hide behind. Peering over the top of the rock, Rine found that the people were occupied with a trio of faceless. He watched as one of their number, a large red-headed man wielding a fire poker, was touched by one of the monsters. Rine now recognized this man as his neighbor three doors up the street. A shot rang out as the faceless who had transformed the man fell. Another faceless was struck to the ground with a shovel. The final faceless jumped inhumanly far towards an unarmed young woman standing close to where the new faceless stood unmoving. She swiftly scooped up the fire poker from where it had dropped out of the man’s hand and held it up towards the arcing faceless. It landed on the poker going motionless. The young woman, whom Rine recognized now as his neighbor’s daughter, pulled the poker free from the faceless. Rine watched as she did something peculiar. Rather than kill the new faceless, who was no doubt about to attack, she used the poker to stab it lightly in the chest. Rine realized only now that the faceless bore the same red glowing lump over its heart that his family had exhibited. She popped the lump, and the faceless’ skin grew limp and fell off, revealing the man completely unharmed underneath. The last thing Rine saw before he turned away was the father embracing his daughter.

6:33 AM Rine was uncomfortable on the unseen rock, lying in a ball so close to the truth. He knew he should get up and run for the people, his only hope of survival, but he didn’t. Something he could almost feel, something he had never understood before, kept him pinned to the ground. He knew his suit should be ripped, and his hair should be a matted mess, and yet, minus the dirt from the forest floor and the blood, his suit was in-tact, and his hair was neat. Rine waited for silence that he knew would never come. He hoped to sleep, to forget his mistakes, but the sound, like a dog whistle in his head, kept him awake and thinking. Rine thought of his failure-ridden past and his grim future, but he did not think of the present. He could not think of the present without making his headache worse, without knowing that his life was over; everything he had worked so hard to build lay on a floor far too different from the one he lay on now. The whistle screamed, and his head pounded as if he had trapped a feral bear inside his brain, and it was clawing against his skull, trying to escape. What had he done to deserve this damaged mind? He knew there was no answer, that he was born with it for no reason beyond the unchangeable fact that his parents’ DNA blended in such a way to give life to a defective human. His attempt to answer such an irrational question was ludicrous, especially in a time like this, but he wondered anyway. Perhaps an illogical thought now and then is exactly what he needed to shine light on the inherent absurdities of reality. The world he lived in did not conform to his understanding of it, and with the weight of this truth piled atop his mistakes, Rine finally broke. He clamped his eyes shut in a futile attempt to replace the world with the image he had in his head. He plastered a smile on his face resulting in a twisted concoction of several expressions as a single tear rolled down his cheek and into the dirt.

FEBRUARY 29TH Isabel Shi

Bergen County Academies

Drama

Characters: ATHENA MOORES: Female. Age: starts 24, ends 68. DAVID MOORES: Male. Age: starts 27, ends 71. MARION MOORES: Female. Age: starts 30, ends 38. Song: “After You’ve Gone” - released in 1918. Composed by Turner Layton with lyrics by Henry Creamer. Notes: Apartment setting is various and arbitrary, with few furniture pieces scattered around the stage but always in the same place through the years. There is a door to the apartment on the side of the stage. Airport setting is minimal and bare. The instrumental of “After You’ve Gone” will play during blackouts/scene changes. All characters must visually/physically change to signify aging as the years pass. SCENE ONE: Flashback, 36 years ago. DAVID is on one side of the stage, playing music from a record player. ATHENA enters from the other side. Rose petals litter the ground in a path leading to DAVID. YOUNG ATHENA Hi.

YOUNG DAVID Hi. Y. ATHENA (surprised) What is this? Y. DAVID A serenade. Y. ATHENA Oh? Y. DAVID (places the needle on the record player. After You’ve Gone instrumental music starts playing. He sings.) Now won't you listen, honey, while I say, How could you tell me that you're goin' away? Don't say that we must part, Don't break your baby's heart. You know I've loved you for these many years Love you night and day, Oh, honey baby, can't you see my tears? Listen while I say. (pulling out a rose and meeting her in the middle of the stage.) (playfully) Happy One year anniversary. Y. ATHENA (frowns facctiously) We’ve been married for four years. Y. DAVID Well, this is our first REAL anniversary so it’s extra special. February 29th. Y. ATHENA February 29th. Tell me again why we picked that day to get married? (DAVID laughs. ATHENA takes the rose. They kiss.) Y. DAVID I love you. Y. ATHENA Is this your way of making up for the fact that you haven’t been home to celebrate our anniversary for the past three years?

Y. DAVID (smiles) What are you talking about? It’s our one year. Y. ATHENA (laughs) I love you. (Blackout.) SCENE TWO: Flashback, 4 years ago, 32 years after SCENE ONE. At home, DAVID and ATHENA are older. DAVID just got off the phone. ATHENA You’re leaving? DAVID The investment guys said some pretty attractive business opportunities have opened up in Hong Kong. They think it would be best if I could head over there and check it out. ATHENA So how long are you going? DAVID Um, I don’t– I’m not sure but it won’t be long. I promise. Maybe just a couple months? ATHENA Well, when are you leaving? DAVID (hurriedly) I’m not sure. I have to buy a plane ticket, but the sooner the better. The investors said that this is a really huge deal. ATHENA But what about Marion? She leaving for college– DAVID I don’t know, honey. I’m just gonna have to talk to her. She’ll understand. ATHENA David, do you think we should talk about this? Together? With her? DAVID I said I’ll talk to her. I will. But this is something that I need to jump on right now. ATHENA Don’t you think I should have some say in this decision? I’m your wife. DAVID (sigh) I know, honey. But― ATHENA You know what? Go. It’s fine. It’s a good business deal and you’ve been waiting for something like this. This is good. DAVID Athena―

ATHENA No, really. I think you should go. You should go. (DAVID tries to read ATHENA’s mood but can’t quite.) DAVID (trying to be gentle) Athena. It’s gonna be okay, all right? I know I was gone a while last time I went on business. (teasing) But this time, I’ll tell those investment guys, if they can’t get me on a plane back home in less than six months, I’ll jump in the ocean and swim back to you myself. ATHENA (giving in) You better. (DAVID’s phone rings. He looks at it and back at her apologetically and goes off stage to answer it.) (ATHENA sighs and sits down on the couch silently but holding her head like she has an intense and painful headache.) (Blackout.) SCENE THREE: Present time, at home. Four years later. ATHENA is on the couch. MARION is cleaning but hears the phone ring. She goes to answer it. MARION (on the phone) Hello?...Hi...I’m good. How are you? Oh that’s good. (pause) Wait, really...oh my God, okay...yeah. I will, yeah, see you soon. Send me your flight info. Mom’s great, yeah. I’ll see you soon, okay? Okay, bye. ATHENA Who was that, Marion? MARION It was Dad. He says he’s coming home on February 29th. We have to pick him up at the airport. ATHENA Really? Your father’s home? (muttering to herself) He’s finally home. He’s finally coming home. I can’t believe it, he finally gets to come home. (to MARION) February 29th, you said? MARION Yeah. (pause) Wait isn’t that the day of your anniversary? ATHENA Yes, it is. MARION Aw, that’s sweet, you guys can celebrate together again.

ATHENA Yes, yes. What was I doing? Oh, never mind, I have to get the house ready for when David comes home. MARION (checking cell phone) Oh Mom, I have to head back. Peter and I are going out to dinner tonight. ATHENA Go ahead dear. I’ll see you tomorrow. MARION See you, Mom. (almost out the door) Remember to take your meds! ATHENA (mildly irritated) Oh, I will, I will. (MARION exits.) (ATHENA takes the pill container and takes out 2 pills. Swallows them unwillingly. Picks up a picture of DAVID next to her on the table.) You’re coming home. Pick up David on February 29th.(internalizing it) Pick up David on February 29th... pick him up February 29th… (Blackout.)

SCENE FOUR: At the airport. It’s February 29th. MARION and ATHENA on one side of the stage, surrounded by a few other people also waiting. On the other side, people are walking out the wings with luggage, etc. Those people walk out and see their friends/family, go to them and leave the stage. DAVID walks out slightly and spots MARION and ATHENA. MARION Do you see him? ATHENA No, not yet. (looking around as people begin to clear. DAVID appears and he stops on the other side of the stage when he sees the two women. Other people around

him keep moving forward, and eventually exit the stage. DAVID and MARION see each other, but ATHENA still seems to be searching. DAVID sees his wife and walks towards her slowly. He stops in front of her.) (searching, looking past DAVID) Where is he? Marion, do you see him? (Blackout.) SCENE FIVE: Same time. An intense conversation between MARION and DAVID in the house setting. ATHENA is asleep in her bedroom (offstage). DAVID How could you keep this a secret from me? MARION It wasn’t exactly an ideal situation for me either. Why are you blaming me? You’re the one who’s been gone for four years. DAVID Maybe if you’d told me about your mother’s condition, I would’ve come back sooner! MARION Maybe. DAVID What did you say? MARION Maybe you would have come home sooner. Maybe. Is that all my mom’s worth to you? Maybe? DAVID What are you talking about? MARION Is that all we’re worth to you? Maybe you would have come home. The same way you “may be able to come to my college graduation” or “may be able to come home for my wedding.” But you didn’t. DAVID I couldn’t leave my work, you know that Marion’, we’ve talked about this. Why have I been gone for so long? Because I wanted to? No, of course not. I did it for this family. I’ve been busting my ass every day for the past four years to get this business off the ground! Why? Just so I can support you and your mother! MARION Next time you want to support your family, why don’t you actually be there for them? Be with them. God knows why you thought the best thing to do for your family was to leave them for four years, while your only child’s off to college, leaving my mom all alone!

(Pause.) Maybe I didn’t tell you about Mom because knowing that you knew about her Alzheimer’s and still didn’t come home, would’ve hurt more than Mom having the disease itself. (Beat.) DAVID I would’ve come home. I’m sorry, Marion. (Beat.) MARION Why’d you come home? DAVID What? MARION Why did you come home? DAVID It was time to come home. MARION It was time to come home a long time ago. Why did you come back now? (Silence.) Your business is going down, isn’t it? DAVID No, no. The business is not going down; we're still running. We just need more investments. MARION So you’re back because you need more money. DAVID I’m back because I wanted to come back. MARION Your company’s out of money and you have to fork over thousands of dollars to keep it running because now that you’ve been over there for four years, you’re ready to go back for another four years because you know what to expect now, right? Because the business has a real chance now, right? (Silence.) DAVID Marion… MARION She’s getting worse. DAVID What did the doctors say? MARION It’s progressed to the point where there’s not much they can do. They said there can be moments where she may become lucid, but it’s not likely.

DAVID She can’t get better? (MARION shakes her head. A long silence.) Then what do we do? MARION They said the only thing we can do is to not aggravate her. Don't force yourself on her, try to go along with it. She doesn't know who you are right now and she still won't, no matter hard we push her to. DAVID No. MARION No? DAVID No, she has to remember. MARION Did you hear what I said？All you can do right is support her, and be there for her. DAVID (quietly) She has to remember me. We have to try. (Blackout.)

SCENE SIX: Back at the same airport setting, this time another four years later. Visible changes to all 3 characters signify their aging. ATHENA has insisted on going back to the airport to pick up DAVID, who she believes hasn’t returned yet. DAVID and MARION make another attempt to help her remember him. ATHENA Do you see him sweetie? MARION Uh, yeah, there he is! (pointing directly at DAVID, who’s walking towards them out of the wave of actual passengers. It’s clear that they’re trying to get ATHENA to understand that

he is her husband.) Look he’s right there! DAVID Athena! I’ve missed you, my love. (goes in to kiss her but she moves away). ATHENA (completely stiff, rattled and shaken up) You are not my husband, you are not David. DAVID (desperate) Yes, I am. Yes I am, Athena. Look at me. ATHENA No you are not. My husband is still away. He’s coming home today. February 29th.... DAVID Athena, please, look at me. ATHENA (panicked and nervous) I don’t know you. I don’t know you! You are not my husband. Marion, let’s leave. DAVID Athena, it’s me! Athena! Please! (ATHENA drags MARION away and DAVID wavers or a moment before exiting off the other side of the stage.) (Blackout.) SCENE SEVEN: Same time, just a few weeks later. They are at home, sitting on the couch. ATHENA Mr. Moores, how long have you lived in the complex? I feel like I’ve never seen you in the neighborhood before. DAVID Please, call me David. I’ve, um, actually lived here for a while. Just as long as you, actually. I’ve seen you around before. ATHENA Oh dear. Really? I was sure you were new here. My apologies. DAVID Oh, that’s all right. So how long have you lived here? ATHENA For quite a while. I’ve been here since my little girl was born, all the way up till now. She’s graduating from high school. DAVID (confused) Your daughter? ATHENA Mhmm, she’s 18 this year. She just got into college and she’s so excited. They really do grow up fast don’t they. Do you

have any children? DAVID Um, yes I do, actually. I also have a daughter. She’s 26, she’s in grad school. She’s married. ATHENA Oh, I see. That’s wonderful. (Beat.) DAVID Where is your husband? ATHENA He’s off on business in Hong Kong. He has this big impressive tech company that he’s trying to launch. It’s great, I’m very happy for him but I miss him so much. We never spent much time together ‘cause he was always at work and I was taking care of Marion. I think he’s coming home soon though. February 29th, he said. It’s already passed this year, hasn’t it? DAVID I’m afraid so, yes. ATHENA Hm. (ATHENA suddenly zones out. She’s in her own world. She gets up and leaves the room with DAVID still sitting on the couch. DAVID there for a moment, then gets up and exits through the apartment door.) (Blackout.) SCENE EIGHT: Same time, just a few days after. A phone call between DAVID and ATHENA. Lights up on DAVID, who was just seen exiting through the door, now standing in front of it, facing it, from the outside. ATHENA is in the apartment, offstage. DAVID picks up his cellphone and calls the phone in the apartment. It rings. ATHENA comes out from offstage to pick up the phone. ATHENA Oh, hello, my love! DAVID Hi, dear.

ATHENA Why didn't you come home? I went to the airport to pick you up but you weren't there. Didn't you say February 29th? DAVID I did yes...but, um, some things came up and I had to stay a little longer. ATHENA Oh, you always have some kind of excuse not to come home. DAVID (almost as though speaking in regards to everything that’s happened) I’m sorry. ATHENA Oh it’s all right. Just come home soon. Are you still coming home on a February 29th? DAVID Um, I...uh...(Seeing that he has no other option) Yes. I’ll be home on February 29th. ATHENA Good. I miss you. DAVID (overwhelmed with emotion) I miss you too. (Tries to pull himself back together as he’s standing right outside the door and is afraid ATHENA will hear him.) How’s Marion? ATHENA She’s doing well. She misses you too. DAVID Tell her I miss her so much. ATHENA David, are you all right? Is something wrong? DAVID No, everything’s fine. I’m okay. ATHENA You don’t call that much anymore. DAVID I know, I’m sorry. Things have been busy over here and, for some reason, it’s really hard to make international calls from Hong Kong. I’ll try to call more though. ATHENA Oh, that’s okay. Just make sure you’re taking care of yourself. Try not to pull so many all-nighters and don’t sleep with the AC on, you’ll get sick.

(DAVID is completely heartbroken by this point, sobbing. He can barely get his words out.) You’ve been eating well over there? DAVID (manages to choke out) Yeah. (Pause.) How are you? ATHENA (rambling) I’m good. I made a new friend today. He also lives in the apartment complex... (Blackout.) SCENE NINE: At home, same time. DAVID and MARION are there discussing ATHENA’s future treatment plan. DAVID What are the options? MARION The doctor said that at this point in time, there is still not much more they can offer than palliative care. DAVID What does that mean? MARION They’re suggesting... that we may need to start looking into assisted living facilities if taking care of her is no longer an option. They gave me some recommendations of places other patients have― DAVID Assisted living? They want me to put her in a nursing home?! YOU THINK I CAN’T TAKE OF HER MYSELF? YOU THINK THAT I AM INCAPABLE TO CARING FOR MY WIFE? MARION (not frightened, defensive) Dad, stop! I don’t think anything! This is what the doctor told me! Calm down. We have to think about this. DAVID I THOUGHT ABOUT IT. I AM NOT SENDING YOUR MOTHER TO ASSISTED LIVING. I LIVE WITH HER. MARION Dad, I know― DAVID No, you don’t know. I haven’t been with you and your mother for years. I did this. I have never been there to take care of her. I spent the past four years in a different country, trying to get a stupid business off the ground, when your mother...(breaks down). And I wasn’t even there. I will not send her to a nursing home! I refuse to not be there! I

REFUSE NOT TO BE THERE FOR HER. (Beat.) I was so selfish. I wanted her to remember me. I caused her so much pain. I promised I would protect her and provide for her and make her happy. I PROMISED I’D BE HOME IN SIX MONTHS. I PROMISED THAT I’D BE HOME ON FEBRUARY 29TH. (crying) She’s never gonna know who I am. Or that I came home. To her, I’m just gonna keep breaking those promises for the rest of her life. I’M NEVER GONNA BE THERE FOR HER. MARION (crying) SHE DOESN’T KNOW WHO I AM EITHER. Barely. She thinks I’m in high school. I know you want to take care of her yourself, I do too, but what if we can’t any more? (Beat.) Peter and I, we’re talking about starting a family. We wanna have kids. But I don’t think I can do that unless… DAVID I know, honey. You have the right to go live your own life. But she is my family and she’s also yours. MARION SHE DOESN’T EVEN REMEMBER WHO YOU ARE! (Beat.) What happens when we’re at work? Or I’m at my apartment with Peter or I’m at school and I can’t get to her soon enough? You don’t live with her, you live near her. Sometimes she doesn’t even let you in the house. DAVID I quit my job. At the company. I resigned three weeks ago. I never leave the apartment complex, I’m always there. Marion, I know I have never been here for you. I know I have constantly been letting you down. But now I’m here and I’m not going anywhere. So please, just let me do this. (Blackout.) SCENE TEN: We are back at the initial setting, where the first serenade scene took place. This is another four years later, ATHENA is in a wheel chair and David is an old man. After You’ve Gone instrumental music continues playing until we see lights up on DAVID and his record player. The vocals pick up where he left off in scene one. The transition between where the background music cuts off and where DAVID starts playing and singing should match up and be continuous. ATHENA is rolled in on her wheelchair by MARION. DAVID (singing) Now won't you listen, honey, while I say, How could you tell me that you're goin' away?

Don't say that we must part, Don't break your baby's heart. You know I've loved you for these many years Love you night and day, Oh honey baby, can't you see my tears? Listen while I say. (He meets ATHENA at the middle of the stage) Happy Anniversary, Athena. ATHENA (genuinely confused) What is this? DAVID (reminiscent) A serenade. ATHENA Oh. How did you know it was my anniversary, Mr. Moores? DAVID (slightly disappointed at “Mr. Moores,” but he expected it.) Oh, a little someone (indicating MARION) told me your anniversary is on February 29th and I thought it was so... special because mine is also on February 29th, so I thought I would celebrate it with you. ATHENA Oh, that’s very sweet of you. Your anniversary is on February 29th too? What a coincidence, it’s a rather unusual date to get married on. DAVID (Laughing along) Yes, it is. ATHENA Oh, the song you sang! That was so lovely. It sounds so familiar. My husband used to love to sing for me. (spacing out) He’s been gone for so long. I miss him. DAVID (Handing her the flower) Athena, why don’t you take this rose. ATHENA (Still in her own world) But he’s coming back today! Yes, I almost forgot! He’s coming home today. I have to go pick him up. (Sees DAVID’s flower and snaps back to reality) I must go and pick up my husband. He’s coming back today, and I must go to the airport to find him. MARION (trying to calm her down) I’ll take you. ATHENA (frightened panic) No, no! You can’t! You have to study for finals; your math finals are tomorrow. You can’t take me.

MARION Mom, please― ATHENA (Mumbling to herself ) How am I gonna go pick up David? He’ll be there any minute. I need someone to take me there― DAVID I’ll take you. (ATHENA looks up at him) (Blackout.) SCENE ELEVEN: It’s the airport setting except the perspective has flipped so that DAVID and ATHENA start upstage and make their way downstage, searching the exiting passengers. The only people left on stage are DAVID and ATHENA. The scene is almost as though it’s in slow motion. The stage is dimly lit, with a spot light following DAVID pushing ATHENA in her wheelchair. The song instrumental is still playing as DAVID and ATHENA make their way to the front of the stage. Once they get there, the instrumental cuts out and DAVID starts singing acapella while ATHENA is still desperately searching for her husband in front of him. She does not hear him singing, she is in her own world. DAVID (singing) After you've gone and left me cryin' After you've gone there's no denyin' You'll feel blue, you'll feel sad You'll miss the dearest pal you've ever had? There'll come a time, now don't forget it There'll come a time when you'll regret it Oh, babe, think think what are you doing You know my love for you will drive me to ruin After you've gone, after you've gone away. (Blackout. End of Play.)

A ZOOM STORY Lindsey Polevoy

Bergen County Academies

Drama

CHARACTERS MAISY, senior in high school. SHARON, Maisy’s hippie mom. GRANDMA GLADYS, Maisy’s spunky 80-year-old maternal grandmother.UNCLE NORMAN, Maisy’s tired maternal uncle. AMANDA, Maisy’s party girl cousin. TIME December 2020. The COVID-19 pandemic. PLACE The screen of Maisy’s laptop. (A MacBook computer desktop screen. The mouse clicks on the Zoom application and clicks the‘New Meeting’ button. MAISY’s face appears, framed in a small grey box at the top of her desktop. The mouse turns off the video and opens iMessage. To a group chat titled ‘Family,’ shesends the Zoom link and texts ‘Started the meeting! Cw to see you all!’ Then, MAISY opens hergmail. She clicks on the (already opened) email titled ‘Re: Test Retake’ from ‘Katherine Anthony’. It reads ‘Sorry Maisy, retakes are just not my policy. If you get a C, you get a C. But you could say I’m feeling nice today. Do one nice deed for your family and document it. Ifyou impress me, maybe I’ll give you extra points.’ MAISY’s mouse lingers for a moment. Suddenly, SHARON’s face pops on the Zoom screen. She sits in a cavernous room filled withcandles and patterned scarves.) SHARON Hi, sunflower! I’ve just finished my meditation session... Are you on here? I can’t see your face. (MAISY quickly archives the email and opens her video on Zoom.) MAISY Sorry— hi, my video was off. SHARON Maisy! What did I say about saying ‘sorry’?! MAISY I don’t know… That it’s not good for my mantra? SHARON No, honey, that it’s not good for the id. Heed my warning: if you don’t stop suppressing your primitive

desires, you’re going to end up sad and depressed. (There is a loud crash.) SHARON (cont.) The Tibetan healing bowl! (SHARON’s video turns off. MAISY opens the iMessage application. We see that the contact ‘Grandma’ has texted “What is a Cw?” MAISY then clicks on the contact ‘Allison’. She texts ‘Hey how did you end up doing on the math test?’ Allison answers ‘92! Thank God I thought Idid terrible.’ After a moment, Allison adds ‘What about you?’ SHARON’s face reappears.) SHARON (cont.) I’m back. (UNCLE NORMAN’s face appears on the Zoom call. He sits at a kitchen table.) UNCLE NORMAN Hi, guys. SHARON Norm! Goodness! You look like you got hit by a train. Not a train. UNCLE NORMAN (smooths his hair)

(AMANDA’s face appears on the screen. She is lying on a couch and holding a phone up to her face on ‘FaceTime.’) AMANDA No, Zachary! I told you already, I can’t come to your multi-million dollar beach house this weekend. My stupid father is making me stay home. UNCLE NORMAN Like I said. Not a train. (As AMANDA talks, we see MAISY type ‘How to be nice to my family’ into Google. She quickly deletes it and types ‘Nice ways to surprise family.’)

AMANDA All he says these days is ‘No, Amanda, you can’t go clubbing,’ ‘you’re not allowed to go on thatjet ski trip,’ ‘I don’t want you going to that party at the Hype House.’ I’m starting to wonder if this COVID thing is even real or just a plot to keep him company. SHARON Amanda, sunshine, we can all hear you love. AMANDA Oh, I know. Say Hi to Zachary everyone! (No one responds.) AMANDA (cont.) (to her phone) Anyway, got to go. My cousin called a family zoom. MAISY Where’s Grandma? We downloaded Zoom to her iPad, right? UNCLE NORMAN Think of it like this, Maisy: there’s a lot of stuff old people and toddlers have in common. (MAISY opens her instagram profile. She scrolls through the feed, lingering on congratulatorycollege acceptance posts.) UNCLE NORMAN (cont.) They have half a mouth of teeth, sometimes you feel like they have no clue what you’re saying, and they love to clap along to those hoppy little circus jigs from the 1920s. But, if there’s one thing that separates an 80-year-old from a two-year-old; it’s that the two-year-old loves a good iPad. SHARON I don’t blame Mom, Norman. The internet isn’t natural. If my patients didn’t insist we continued our aura sessions, I would’ve rather just not Zoomed at all during this pandemic. (MAISY closes her instagram tab.) MAISY Okay, well, can someone please get Grandma? I need her on this call.

SHARON What’s got you so vexed, my little wood nymph? MAISY I have a surprise for you all. UNCLE NORMAN A surprise! AMANDA Ooh! Gimme gimme gimme! MAISY Yeah, I think it’s going to be good. I think it’s going to be something really nice. AMANDA Like a David Yurman ring? I’ve been dying for a David Yurman ring! MAISY Uh… nope. AMANDA How about my dignity? MAISY Um… not that either. (beat) UNCLE NORMAN So, Maisy, you are applying to college, aren’t you? MAISY Mhm. UNCLE NORMAN How’s that going? MAISY Y’know…

UNCLE NORMAN Oh, yes, I can remember the process with Amanda quite clearly. SHARON Maisy is doing great. Her essays are amazing. Her grades are also pretty good. That mid-year report is about to come out. UNCLE NORMAN Those senior year grades are important. A lot of people slack off at the beginning of the year,forgetting that those grades get sent. MAISY Yeah, I guess they’re looking all right— (A new box joins the screen. Unlike the others it’s glitchy and slow. GRANDMA GLADYS has arrived.) GRANDMA GLADYS (in slow motion) H—i—i—i—i—i—. Ca—a—a—n—n. Y—ou—ou-ou. He—e—e—a—r—r—r— AMANDA Grandma, you’re breaking up! SHARON We can’t hear you, Mom! GRANDMA GLADYS M—e—e—e—e—e? UNCLE NORMAN Mom, leave the Zoom and rejoin! GRANDMA GLADYS W—h—a—a—a—t—s—s—s-s, g—o—o—i—n—g— o—o—o—o—o—o—o-n—n—n—n—n—ah— (Suddenly, GRANDMA GLADYS disappears.) MAISY Where’d she go?

SHARON Oh, no, I could just sense that this would happen. The vibes. Wait here. (SHARON leaves the screen.) MAISY Mom? (AMANDA’s phone buzzes.) AMANDA (putting on her jacket) Yeah, that’s my cue. MAISY Your what? UNCLE NORMAN Yeah, your what? AMANDA (putting on her jacket) Don’t forget to send me that surprise! Byeeeeee! MAISY No, wait! (AMANDA logs off. UNCLE NORMAN jumps out of his seat.) UNCLE NORMAN Wait a minute, young lady— If you think you’re going to that whorehouse in Malibu, that’s going to be a big no! (Just as UNCLE NORMAN jumps out of his seat, he gets hit with a giant stuffed animal.) UNCLE NORMAN (cont.) Oh, two can play at that game! (UNCLE NORMAN shuts his computer, leaving the Zoom. MAISY opens her iMessage and sends three or four exasperated messages to ‘Mom’ asking her to return. SHARON pops up back on the Zoom, only this time she’s walking around the house.)

MAISY Mom, what’re you doing? (SHARON puts her phone down on a table and lights incense.) SHARON Cleansing the room sweetie. MAISY Why? (SHARON begins to chant.) SHARON Smoke of air and fire and earth cleanse and bless this home and hearth. Drive away all harm and fear; only good may enter here. (SHARON’s walks offscreen, still chanting.) MAISY Mom, can you come back please, I only need a minute! I— what are you— (UNCLE NORMAN and AMANDA simultaneously rejoin the Zoom. UNCLE NORMAN sits at the kitchen table with a smug smile. AMANDA glares in her spot, holding a sign that says ‘UNGRATEFUL.’) UNCLE NORMAN Hold up the sign higher, honey. AMANDA This is cruel and unusual punishment. UNCLE NORMAN (mocking)This is cruel and unusual punishment. (UNCLE NORMAN holds up a phone with AMANDA’s recognizable sparkly case.) UNCLE NORMAN (cont.) Maybe you’ll think twice next time you set down your most prized possession to retrieve a tube of lipgloss.

(AMANDA holds the sign up higher. GRANDMA GLADYS appears on the Zoom just as we hear SHARON’s voice coming from MAISY’s screen.) SHARON O.C. (cont.) Mark Zuckerberg— Be gone! Elon Musk— Be gone! Tim Cook— Be gone! Oh spirits, fearful spirits of the Tech world, leave us be at last! (MAISY’s room grows smoggy and she tries to fan away the smoke.) GRANDMA GLADYS (to someone at her side) This must be the wrong website, I haven’t seen stuff like this since Woodstock.

MAISY No, Grandma— this is the right room! I’m here! Right here! GRANDMA GLADYS Oh, hello, Maisy! UNCLE NORMAN Mom, who were you talking to? GRANDMA GLADYS Ruth and Edna, dear, they’re here for tea. UNCLE NORMAN Mom, why are they there— they shouldn’t be there! GRANDMA GLADYS Oh, it’s okay. I see them every day. UNCLE NORMAN We’re in a pandemic! AMANDA See dad! Even Grandma’s seeing people and she’s like, almost 90! MAISY Okay, everyone, can I just have your attention for a second—

(SHARON reappears on her Zoom screen.) SHARON Oh, Mom, is that you? Did my ritual work? GRANDMA GLADYS Who’s that? SHARON It’s Sharon, Mom. GRANDMA GLADYS Oh, Sharon, how sweet— MAISY AHEM! (silence) MAISY (cont.) Great introductions everyone. But can you please please just give me your attention?(No one responds.) MAISY (cont.)Kay, great. I’m going to send you the surprise now. AMANDA Finally, it’s been what, an hour? (Everyone laughs.) MAISY Just— quiet! I’m just going to film your reactions. Give me a second— (MAISY click on an open Amazon tab — the Amazon gift card page. She picks up her phone to film.) MAISY (cont.) I hope you all enjoy this nice deed. (MAISY clicks the send button on the Amazon page. We hear simultaneous dings across the Zoom screens. There is silence.)

MAISY (cont.) So? What do you think? You like it? AMANDA What— a five dollar Amazon gift card? MAISY Yeah, it’s good, right?! You can use it to buy whatever you want! Very versatile!

AMANDA You must be kidding. SHARON Honey, you know how I feel about Jeff Bezos and his evil billion-dollar corporation. AMANDA This is so lame. GRANDMA GLADYS What’s going on? What is everybody looking at? (MAISY stops recording and puts down her phone.) MAISY Why aren’t any of you happy?! I’m doing something nice for you all! AMANDA I mean, five dollars? Is that the best surprise you can do? UNCLE NORMAN I’m sorry Maisy, but this was a complete utter waste of my time. MAISY Are you kidding me? I mean— How are you all so unappreciative? SHARON Maisy! MAISY I spent this whole time trying to corral you, give you a nice surprise, get your happy smiling, loving reactions

on camera— and still, this is what you give me! I just needed this one thing! Onething! UNCLE NORMAN Maisy, it’s just a gift card. Why do you care so much— MAISY I have a C in my math class!

GRANDMA GLADYS What? AMANDA You have a C in math class, so you gave us Amazon gift cards? SHARON Sweetheart, that’s okay, a C is okay! MAISY No, it’s not! It’s not. I never get Cs. I’ve never gotten a C. SHARON You’re not gonna be perfect every time, honey. Cut yourself some slack. MAISY I can’t! I’m not that kind of person! I’m not that girl that fails her math class and goes to a stateschool and ends up living at home, I’m not— AMANDA Like me? MAISY Amanda, no, I— I didn’t mean it like that. AMANDA I might not be the perfect student or person, but I’m happy, Maisy. Is all that stress and pressure really worth it? (long pause) SHARON What happened? You usually do so well in school.

MAISY I don’t know how to explain it— It’s all been a lot this year, you know? My schoolwork, and applications, and being virtual. Before I knew it, everything just started to pile up… I mean, I studied for hours. Hours. But I was so tired, and I barely understand the material to begin with— UNCLE NORMAN Did you talk to your teacher? MAISY Yeah. She has a no retake policy. AMANDA Seriously? MAISY It’s not that bad. She let me do extra credit. SHARON Like a worksheet? MAISY No. I had to do one nice deed for my family. (AMANDA starts to laugh. Before we know it, UNCLE NORMAN, SHARON, and GRANDMAGLADYS join in) MAISY What! Why are you all laughing? AMANDA So that’s what this whole Zoom thing is about? Some stupid teacher’s extra credit assignment? MAISY It’s not that stupid. UNCLE NORMAN It’s pretty stupid. SHARON Very stupid.

AMANDA Trust me, I failed many math tests in my day and most of my teachers let me retake them. And ifthey didn’t, they for sure didn’t make me do something nice for my family. I mean, she doesn’t even know us! UNCLE NORMAN Yeah, and how belittling! She must really think she’s something, that teacher, giving you her pity! She is a little conceited. MAISY (smiles slightly)

SHARON Oh, my goodness, honey! Trust me! Don’t be upset about this stupid grade; it has nothing to do with you at all. UNCLE NORMAN Yeah, we all know your intellect. If you fail, it’s not because you did something wrong. MAISY Thanks, Uncle Norman. GRANDMA GLADYS Do you want me to come down there and talk to her for you? I can give a real good slap! SHARON That won’t be necessary, Mom. I have a better idea… (The screen fades to black. Then, an iMovie video slowly appears with the text ‘Maisy’s Nice Deeds.’ Next, we see a bunch of clips (with a clear F.U. vibe) spliced together over the song ‘Gonna Make You Sweat (Everybody Dance Now’ by C & C Music Factory. First, we see a short sequence of MAISY’s head, poorly photoshopped over the bodies of famous Humanitarians.There’s MAISY-Gandhi, MAISY-JFK giving a speech, MAISY-Mother Teresa. Then, the montagecuts to AMANDA, who sits in a bikini and lavishly lounges by a pool.) AMANDA Wow, Maisy got me this cool, really expensive new 14 carat diamond ring! That’s so nice!Thanks, Maisy! (UNCLE NORMAN appears, sitting on a yoga mat and meditating.)

UNCLE NORMAN Maisy’s so awesome. She cured my stress and anxiety by shape shifting my daughter into a catand teaching me Confucian thought. Thanks Maisy! (A cat walks up next to UNCLE NORMAN and meows. UNCLE NORMAN gives a big thumbs up.Next, we see GRANDMA GLADYS. Her video is glitchy and her face is too close to the camera.) GRANDMA GLADYS M—ai—ai—ai—s—s—y—y—y— i—i—i—s—s—s—s— s—s—o—o—o—o— (Suddenly, GRANDMA GLADYS’ audio turns quiet and we hear an AI voice speak over her.) AI GRANDMA GLADYS Maisy is getting me a new iPad. Thanks, Maisy. (Finally, we see Sharon.) SHARON Maisy already did the nicest deed for me by being the most sweet, intelligent, and caring daughter. She doesn’t need to live by a 40-something teacher’s definition of success anyway. Because, trust me, she’s going places. And I love her no matter what. Failed test or not. (The screen fades.) THE END.

JUDGES BIOS

shows, and improvisational shows in various theaters and venues throughout New Jersey and New York, including the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre and The Second City. He appeared as Dogberry in the 2019 Bergenstages Production of Much Ado About Nothing, and has been lending his voice to dozens of Radio Theatre shows for Bergenstages. Peter is also a co-advisor for BCC’s Theatre Club.

James “Jim” Bumgardner (Professor/Producer) earned an MFA in directing from Sarah Lawrence College in Bronxville, NY and a BA in Theatre and Romance Languages from St. Andrews University in Laurinburg, NC. He is a professor of theatre arts and is the producer for Bergenstages, the theatre arts program at Bergen. Jim has previously taught at Seton Hall University, St. Thomas Aquinas College, and Hofstra University. He has worked as an actor in New York City at the Lamb’s Theatre, Soho Playhouse, Ubu Rep., Judith Anderson Theatre, Playwright’s Horizons, Actor’s Advent and the Actor’s Playhouse. Regionally, he has worked all along the East Coast, as far south as Boca Raton, FL and as far north as Whitefield, NH. He is a member of A.E.A, and SAG/Aftra. Some of his directing credits include Into the Woods, Guys and Dolls, Oh, Coward!, South Pacific, Company, The Threepenny Opera, Making God Laugh, The 1940’s Radio Hour, The Heiress, The Hollow, A Murder Is Announced, Cabaret, Brigadoon, Kiss Me, Kate, South Pacific, Damn, Yankees!, Godspell, and Kindertransport. Jim is also the co-advisor for Bergen PRIDE, the LGBTQ+ Alliance of BCC – bergen.edu/student-life/ virtual-lgbtq-center/

Dr. Leigh Jonaitis is a Professor of English and Theatre at Bergen Community College. She holds bachelor’s degrees in English (BA) and Musical Theatre (BFA) from the University of Michigan and an MA and EdD from Columbia University - Teachers College. She has published articles in the Journal of Basic Writing, Research and Teaching in Developmental Education, and Teaching English in the Two-Year College. She served as co-chair of the Council on Basic Writing (CBW), and was recently elected Secretary of the Two-Year College English Association (TYCA) of the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE). Dr. Geoffrey Johnston Sadock has served as director, or co-director, of the Bergen Writing Contest and as editor of Pegasus since 1976 – 45 years. He holds a baccalaureate degree, with Honors in English, from Brooklyn College (CUNY) a master’s degree from Tufts University and a doctorate from Brown University. His areas of special interest are Victorian prose and poetry, aesthetics, Literary Critical Theory, the Celtic Revival, American Literature, and modern military history. He teaches a variety of literary electives, composition, and Introduction to Religion at Bergen. He has published on Tennyson, Dickens, Trollope, Walter Pater, and the wines of the German-speaking regions. Recently, he has written and lectured on the Irish Potato Famine of 1845-1852 and the Irish diaspora. Starting in 1975, he has served on three occasions as director, or co-director of the Honors Program, now the Judith K. Winn School of Honors. He has received awards or grants from the Princeton Mid-career Fellowship Program, the Mellon Foundation, Bergen Community College Student Government, and the Center for Peace, Justice and Reconciliation. In 2015, the Carnegie Foundation and CASE named Dr. Sadock Professor of the Year for the State of New Jersey. He is a Fourth Degree Knight of Columbus and serves as Lecturer of St. John’s Council #1345.

Mary Crosby is an Assistant Professor of English at Bergen Community College. She teaches Creative Writing, American Literature and Composition at the Lyndhurst campus. She is Advisor to Bards & Scribes, BCC’s Creative Writing Club and The Labyrinth, BCC’s literary journal. She has poetry published in Calyx, Dos Passos Review, Blueline and Earth’s Daughters, and two chapbooks: Alluvium Stream (2012) and Cannon Mine (2019) published by Finishing Line Press. Her poem “Augury” won second prize in the 2020 Allen Ginsberg Poetry Awards. Peter Helff is an Associate Professor at Bergen Community College and this is his fourteenth year as a judge and presenter for the Bergen County High School Writing Contest, and ninth year serving as co-director. He is a proud alumnus of Bergen Community College, having graduated with Honors. He completed his undergraduate and graduate studies in English at William Paterson University (both with Honors), and returned to BCC teach in 2006. He currently teaches various levels of English Basic Skills, English Composition, and Theatre, and has also taught Creative Writing and various literature courses during his tenure. Peter has presented scholarly work at national conferences, and his creative resume includes several published short stories, as well as multiple plays, sketch

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Pegasus 2021

Articles inside

The Faceless Monster of Hickory Hills

Alice

Short Story Morning Commute

Mokita

Bird Song

hands

we continue to be engulfed by everything that remains unknowable

principles of uncertainty

Miscommunication and Social Intrigue in The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks

Night 'Lights

Critique of "'I am myself indifferent honest': Hamlet as Ophelia's Seducer"

Disability in The Metamorphosis

Personal Essay no motivation

Eat More Chikin?