Subject to Change: An Anthology of Iowa High School Writing

an anthology of iowa high school writers

subject to change created by university of iowa publishing students

An Anthology of Iowa High School Writing Edited by University of Iowa Publishing Students

This publication was made possible with support from the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at the University of Iowa, the Department of English, and the Nonfiction Writing Program.

We would also like to thank the many high school English and writing teachers around Iowa, their students for sharing their work with us, and you for reading.

Contents Forward Introduction

6 8

I. JAMAIS VU - Reencountering the Familiar Exhale by Tacy Andrews Lovely Little State by Allison Weiler

12 14 16

A Persistent Past Ghost in an Empty House by Taylor VanDusen The Glory in Destruction by Josie Hall

22 24 25

Adolescence Sky’s Story by Van Iang The Game of Life by Sydney Benscoter Memories by Litzy Aguilar-Duran

28 30 38 40

Reaction Sinful Adoration by Laisha Medina Mirror by Tacy Andrews We Should Go Back to the Good Old Days by Jaideep Thiruthani

41 43 46 48

Entrapment Escaping Sleep Paralysis by Vanessa Vargas Aquifer by Matilda Hogan

51 54 56

To Fight or to Flee A Choice by Sydney Benscoter Animal by Sheridyn Bailey

58 60 63

A Struggle for Victory The Ending Sucks by Natasha Nicholson What Depression Feels Like by Eleanor Lopez

65 67 72

Love Paper Hearts by Candy Thammavongsa

78 80

Peace & Moonlight by Tori Aragon I Want To Die, But... by Alex Hand

82 83

Reminisce A Walk Through a Cornfield by Melana Blomme A Light That Doesn’t Hurt by Nicholas Cordes

85 87 90

II. Transmutation The Witch's Bird by Jordan Collingwood Twisted Trees by Josie Hall

108 111 125

Fragility Life in a Flash by Abby Koeneke Innocence by Elle Polman

126 128 131

Rising Gusts How we Have Fallen by Courtney Rhinehardt Halfway Home by Kyrah Sissel

133 135 147

Funnel High The Terrifying Feat of Meeting an Idol by Emma Conley Family by Kyrah Sissel

150 153 163

The Eye of the Storm Coffee Bliss by Autumn Stanley Beyond by Naylea Verdinez

165 167 170

Braving the Storm Silence Worth Speaking by Emma Conley I Am More by Elle Polman

171 173 174

Entrapment Angels in the Underground by Jordan Collingwood Masquerade by Nadia Schafbuch

176 178 180

Emergence End is Nigh by Emma Conley The Island by Tyson Robinson

182 184 185

About the Authors About the Editors

189 196

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Foreword Students in their second semester of the University of Iowa’s publishing track were faced with a daunting task: envision, design, and execute a complete anthology of high school writing from six Iowa high schools in a few months -- not to mention in the middle of an unprecedented global pandemic.

This book represents not only the work of a range of incredible high school writers, but the combined efforts of over forty undergraduate students, who narrowed down a large and impressive submission pool to a handful of exceptional pieces, held lively debates on aesthetics, and ultimately produced this truly beautiful anthology.

It has been our privilege as instructors to watch this talented group of young writers and editors come together to create such a fierce, compelling, and creative anthology. Our students decided to forego traditional genre conventions and distinctions, assembling each section around a series of thoughtful themes that celebrate the immense range of high school talent: work that includes lyric poetry, nail-biting personal essays, gothic dread, uncanny fairy tales, letters to

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past selves, Iowa-specific satire, and more. The undergraduates in our two sections are responsible for the curation, design, and promotion of this book; its existence, particularly during a difficult global moment of struggle, is testament to their tenacity, passion, and belief in the work itself. Subject to Change, like the context it is born out of, is a collaborative feat, alive with vulnerability, strength, and urgent voices.

We are incredibly proud. —Julia Conrad and Bryn Lovitt, Course Instructors

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Introduction Dear Reader, This collection of works began in individual classrooms.

The pieces themselves were collected from classrooms across Iowa and catalogued in a small room on the second floor of the English-Philosophy Building at the University of Iowa.

As the semester continued, this project grew to include multiple states across the country as we were all sent home to deal with the ongoing effects of COVID-19. Our processes have changed and uncertainty has set in.

As we’re writing this from Marion, Iowa, and Batavia, Illinois, we are set to hit the peak number of cases this very week. Instead of living on campus with thousands of other young adults, walking around Iowa City, and keeping to our planned lives, we get in a car once a week for an outing. We are luckily safe, trapped between the walls of our homes. Our “normal” is gone, and is replaced by something completely different; these daily adaptations are significant.

The authors represented in this anthology spoke to

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change: change of scenery, change of pace, change of mindset, and the inability to change. Without their knowledge or control, the world decided to change around them, too. Subject to Change has become a formative piece for us; working on innovative high school writing calls us back to optimistic memories of sitting in their seats just a few short years ago.

Every adult has gone through their formative years as a teenager; however, this specific batch of young adults are going through the most significant evolution in routine, expectation, and normalcy in years. Their thoughts and feelings are raw and dauntless—making them imperative for the future of Iowa literature.

The individual work that has gone into this collection is personal for every editor on our staff. We hope this anthology entertains every reader’s sense of adolescence and calls back memories of the changes they underwent in their teenage years.

Enjoy, —Sylvia Clubb and Lauren Whitney, Managing Editors

Part 1

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JAMAIS VU Reencountering the Familiar Human beings ground themselves in the familiar. We operate off of repetitive cycles: day and night, work and sleep, inhale and exhale. We take comfort in the simple things. The same old reliable mundane. Amid life’s many distractions and fast-paced changes, simplicity is a relief. But sometimes, the cycle glitches to a standstill. Our lungs fail to take in air.

Fail to breathe it out. As we struggle to take control of our own bodies, the world stretches out in a vast sweep of sky and earth before us. For all its familiar uniformity, even the most peaceful surroundings can feel like prisons. Where can we hide?

Tacy Andrews’ poem, “Exhale,” travels on an intense journey. When our bodies cannot serve us even in the most fundamental ways — like breathing — who are we to blame?

Andrews creates emphasis in captivating rhythms, much like the rise and fall of breath itself. The constant echo of “Inhale/ Exhale” throughout the piece challenges the comfort we take in repetition by overwhelming the reader with one demand that looks simple before feeling daunting. Do they even

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remember how to breathe? “Maybe,” says the speaker, shaking our faith.

“Lovely Little State” by Allison Weiler is an unnervingly powerful piece of fiction. Native Iowans may have learned to take comfort in endless cornfields and winding country roads, but the narrator of this story can’t help but feel trapped by the state’s openness. Unlike Andrews who uses repetition to frustrate the audience, Weiler uses it to terrify us, twisting the happy promises written across Midwestern billboards into unsettling threats. The corn “might rasp your name.” The sun will make your skin like “the bloodied hide of a slaughtered farm animal.” With surreal narration and eerie imagery, Weiler transforms the comfortable invariability of this lovely little state into something deeply unfamiliar, intent on hunting us down.

These pieces are gripping, beautiful, and uncomfortable.

Two vastly different explorations of what it looks like for us to become prisoners of the most familiar and predictable spaces and places. While one narrator longs for liberation through a sense of order, the other is desperate to escape it.

Yet, both stories challenge our trust in the mundane experiences of living. That it should be easy. This should make sense.

But — it doesn’t.

—Zoë Tobin and Abby Davis

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Exhale Tacy Andrews Inhale.

Exhale.

No need to get worked up.

Inhale.

Exhale.

Lungs – Not responsible.

Exhale.

Inhale.

No. Wait.

Wrong way.

Maybe.

Spit it out and soak it back up again.

Repudiate and replicate.

Scream and silence.

Everything and nothing.

SUBJECT TO CHANGE: AN ANTHOLOGY

Inhale.

Please inhale.

I need air.

Inhale.

Exhale.

Please exhale.

I cannot keep all this inside.

Exhale.

Inhale.

Exhale.

Relax.

Blame not the respiratory system for such suffocation.

That, Darling, The world’s shoulders Are to carry.

Inhale.

Exhale.

No punishment is due.

Yet.

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Lovely Little State Allison Weiler Come to Iowa! You’ll love it! The state universities are some of the best in the country! There are so many opportunities! And we have some of the nicest people around! It’s really such a nice little state. It’s a wonderful place to settle down!

A billboard flashes across my peripheral vision as I cross the border into the Hawkeye State. The pockmarked country road adds its miles. The road curves and crosses but it doesn’t duck or climb. It’s flat. I can see miles and miles in any direction. I know Iowa is a farming state, but this is ridiculous.

Fields of corn stretch across the horizon. It’s nice enough, even if a bit monotonous.

Iowa has some of the most fertile soil in the world! We usually produce the most corn of all the states! Wanna hear a joke about corn? You can’t say anything around it, because the fields have ears!

They also have mouths. Mouths that twist and rustle together in the dead of night. They might rasp your name.

Don’t listen.

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My tiring feet crunch against gravel. The cushioning soles of my running shoes protect my feet from the uneven roads that are so abundant around here. I stop, huffing and holding my sides. The tall stalks surround me. There’s not another soul for miles. It’s just me. Me…and the corn.

I stretch my calves, raise my arms, and look up to the sky.

The now corn-gold and traffic-cone orange sky. It’s getting late. I should be getting home soon. I take out my earbuds in case a car comes up behind me. The only sound I hear is the swaying and scratching of corn leaves.

That over there is the old Jenkins’ house. Poor folks, their youngest son drowned in the creek behind their house, you know.

They couldn’t take the pain, they had to move. Never sold the house, just up and left. So sad.

He’s still there. If you see him, he’ll wave. You can wave back, but never get near him.

I continue my run, speeding my gait as the sun sinks lower and lower toward the horizon. I don’t want to be alone out here in the dark. My breath comes in short bursts as I near the main road. A looming object approaches me from the side of the road. A disarming snap of glass underneath my feet catches me off guard as I pass it. Glass from where the windows used to be. The fields have started to reclaim the old farmhouse. I don’t see anyone in there. I don’t even look. There’s

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no one in there.

You wanna invest in a good air conditioner. That ,or make sure the one you’ve got is hardy. Summers can get pretty hot around here.

The sun will smile cruelly as it scorches your skin from May to September. Spring, summer, fall, it will target you.

It wants to make your skin deepen until it is as raw and red as the bloodied hide of a slaughtered farm animal.

I’m home. My apartment is ungodly hot. The heat is suffocating. My eyes focus and unfocus with sweat. My new neighbors told me to hold off on using my air conditioner until absolutely necessary. It is necessary now. The vents breathe out lukewarm air. I sigh and open a window.

It’s so calming at night when you can hear the cicadas in the trees. Sometimes you’ll even see a coyote or a deer. They like the nighttime, you know.

You think those screams are coyotes? Or do you just hope they are?

The sounds of the night invade my closet of a bedroom.

Usually, the subtle scraping of cicadas calms me. It does not tonight. Tonight I think I hear something besides the cicadas.

Tonight the cicadas cannot mask the unmistakable yowl of coyotes in the distance. I distract myself with the thought of another run tomorrow, maybe a more suburban run.

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We do have a lot of farmland, but it’s also a nice place to live even if you don’t farm!

The cities are flat. There is nowhere to hide. As it is in the smallest towns, the biggest cities know you as well. If you think that’s bad, never venture into the suburbs. Every house looks the same. Every house is the same. Every street is the same. The labyrinth of middle-class houses will trap you.

Oh, God. My tortured lungs pull the super-heated air into my body. The mid-day heat is making this run a living Hell.

The sun smiles cruelly as it sears your skin.

My playlist employs a song that screams and howls at me.

The noise unsettles me; it’s vaguely familiar. Suddenly I realize what it sounds like: coyotes.

You hope those are coyotes.

Disgusted, I rip the chords full of music out of my ears.

Panting, bent over, I see something in the corner of my eye.

Someone is growing corn in their yard. Couldn’t they get enough out in the fields? I eye the house. There’s a large window in the front, almost obscured by the corn. There’s someone in there…I think. A small moon peers at me from behind the barely-there curtain. I think I see a small hand wave at me.

I wave back.

You can wave back, but never get near him.

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The corn here is too dry. The negligent grower did not water it enough. The leaves rustle together, the sound scrating my ears. They say something. It scares me.

The corn might rasp your name. Don’t listen.

I continue my run, listless earbud cords dangling, whacking my thigh as my legs pump. Rounding a corner, I feel like ending this run early.

Wait. How do I get back to the main road again? I stop.

All of these houses look similar. Every house looks the same.

I turn another corner. Again, the same houses. Another house with corn in its yard. Or wait, is that the same house? Every house is the same. Was that house yellow? I can’t remember.

For some reason, this terrifies me. I backtrack and re-run my route. Different house. No, wait. This house is blue. Wasn’t that other house blue? Yellow. Blue? No. What? Every house is the same. My heart quickens. I decide to run straight until I hit the main road. Why is there no one else around?

I continue straight for as long as I can. Every street is the same. I stop again. The sun is relentless. The sun smiles cruelly as it sears your skin. It seems to be getting stronger.

It targets you. My heart beats out of my chest. My breath comes in short bursts. This is not good. The labyrinth of middle-class houses will trap you. I can feel the cool fingers of panic reach for my brain. I start up again in an effort to

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delay it.

My limbs grow tired and as heavy as lead pipes. My heart beats too fast. My breath comes too fast. Before me, the neighborhood ends and leads to another gravel road. There is no shade from the Devil’s Iowa sun. Blackness crowds my vision. The last thing I see is a billboard sticking up from the cornfields like a hand reaching toward God. Iowa: such a lovely little state, you’ll never want to leave!

Iowa: such a lovely little state. You’ll never leave.

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A Persistent Past Memories stay with us throughout our lives. In times of tribulations, memories aid in keeping us whole. Without the past to comfort us, we are left to wallow in solitude. Our memories hold us together with twine and glue, patching up the holes of one’s regrets. Whether or not these thoughts bring warmth to our present, they are persistent in their desire to be felt, seen, and heard. Taylor VanDusen’s “Ghost in an Empty House” and Josie Hall’s “The Glory in Destruction” reflect these lasting echoes of romantic love, loss, and vulnerability. In both pieces, the authors illustrate how our pasts can foster future feelings of exposure. The works highlight the private sphere of emotions that sit with one’s nostalgia and loneliness. Each piece yearns for romantic love, separated by both land and the realm of the living. The magnetic pull of our desires is an experience every reader can resonate with as we all grow our futures from the foundations of our past.

The “Ghost in an Empty House” excerpt endeavors to explore the intricacies of lost love and how the memories cling on long after. The piece is personal and raw; a slice into

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the writer’s psyche as they reminisce on the sweet and tender aspects of a lost relationship. The author battles with past emotions that crawl into their present regret, creating art that brings light to imposing feelings.

“The Glory in Destruction” takes readers into the mind of soldier Edward Raleigh in the wake of victory at the Battle of Trafalgar, a prominent naval battle in history. This letter, written to his love, Elizabeth, expresses the complicated emotions of war. Love, loss, and regret are warring with each other and signaling to the reader that these emotions persist long after the moment they occur. "The Ghost in an Empty House" excerpt gives readers important context that demonstrates the loss and horror soldiers experienced during this battle.

—Emily Engwall, Emma Scintu, and Rebekah Hallman

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Ghost in an Empty House Taylor VanDusen I still remember the feeling of your lips on mine. How could we forget about everything we had? I remember the way your hand fit into mine perfectly. The way that you kissed my lips as if you never would be able to do it again. I remember the feeling of my soft skin under your torn and calloused hands. You were always so scared to touch me because I was “fragile.”

I can still feel you thinking about me.

You are the only thing that is in my head. You’re the shadow that is following me around wherever I go, even into the sunlight.

I can feel you searching for something more in my head, but all you can find are the bookshelves filled with the stories of you and I. Always there but never seen.

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The Glory in Destruction Josie Hall “In one of the most decisive naval battles in history, a British fleet under Admiral Lord Nelson defeat[ed] [the] combined French and Spanish fleet at the Battle of Trafalgar. In five hours of fighting, the British devastated the enemy fleet, destroying 19 enemy ships. No British ships were lost, but 1,500 British seamen were killed or wounded in the heavy fighting. [As the battle raged on] a French sniper shot Nelson in the shoulder and chest.

The admiral was taken below and died 30 minutes before the end of the battle. Nelson’s last words, after being informed that victory was imminent, were “Now I am satisfied. Thank God I have done my duty…” (History.com).

Dear Elizabeth, We did it. We have won the battle that will keep the motherland out of French hands, though I cannot say that this knowledge brings me any joy. The battle was hot and bloody, but the ship prevailed in the face of such a historic

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fight. The combined might of the French and Spanish fleet hammered against our barricade for what seemed like an eternity, but what damage was dealt unto us was returned sevenfold. That is not to say we did not suffer many losses of our own. Amidst the pounding of the cannons and the screams of dying men, one could hear the wailing of close friends lamenting the loss of their comrades and the shrieked commands of our captain.

Little did I know when boasting of the glory found in battle how the aftermath would shape my outlook on life.

Though I sail on one of His Majesty’s finest ships, HMS Temeraire, I cannot help but see her as a tool of destruction now.

As a 98-gun second-rate ship in the line of battle, we were one of the first ships to be thrown into the thick of the fighting.

Our guns barked out fire and smoke as we plowed through the enemy barricade. Officers and men alike shed their blood onto the deck and fed their bodies into the churning waters of the Atlantic. As we fought and died for Mother England, the smaller schooners in our fleet fed on the severed limbs of our countrymen, and while they wept for our pain, the bloodlust in them rose until they swarmed about the enemy, bringing ruin with them. And still the water fed on the blood of French, Spanish, and English alike until the waves frothed red and the sky was painted with rust.

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Yet the battle went. With the hands of dead men twisted around our boots and the scorch of overheated cannons singeing our faces, we fought on. Through blood, sweat, and tears we fought on. Over the cries of our enemy and countrymen alike we fought on. Over the crackling of burning ships and the acrid tang of burning gunpowder, we fought on. Even when Lord Nelson, the greatest of us all, fell to enemy fire, we fought on.

And once again I say to you, Elizabeth, we won. But should men celebrate their triumph when so many lay dead on the ocean floor? Should we raise a glass to the glory of destruction and the mindlessness of chaos? I do not know. As I sit here listening to the waves that carried so many lost souls to their watery end, I cannot help but gaze across the bay at the stretch of pale sand that borders the Spanish coast; where even now boys and men of all ages scavenge through the wreckage that was once a grand armada. As I sit and pen this letter to you, I cannot help but revel in the feeling of being alive.

With hopes of seeing you soon, Leftenant Edward Raleigh

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Adolescence Adolescence. Just the word alone sparks vivid memories, doesn’t it? How we perceive the world as children guides our understandings of adulthood. In this section, Van Iang’s autobiography, “Sky’s Story,” Sydney Benscoter’s poem, “The Game of Life,” and Litzy Aguilar-Duran’s poem, “Memories,” reflect on the idea of adolescence and the pivotal transformation from childlike innocence to grownup maturity.

“Sky’s Story” by Van Iang details the life of a young girl immigrating to the United States from Malaysia. Traveling across borders and settling into Iowa, Sky repeatedly finds herself alone in a school full of strangers who don’t look like her. In this particular excerpt, Iang details adolescent growth with colorful and humorous snapshots of her experience feeling different in a brand new country. Through introspective diction and a youthful voice, Iang paints Sky’s uniqueness.

Her childhood wasn’t entirely about innocence, and includes shades of hardship: growing, failing, and having to change even when you don’t necessarily want to.

In “The Game of Life,” poet Sydney Benscoter compares adolescence to a game. She explores the direct connection

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between the pivotal decisions in a teenager’s life, like trying to make the best moves in order to “win.” Her introspective voice strikes a balance between the nostalgia of board games and a foreboding darkness. That sometimes, no matter how much goes into a decision, a person can still lose the game.

Whereas childhood is fun, the gravity of adulthood can be terrifying if one doesn’t play their cards right.

“Memories” by Litzy Aguilar-Duran represents adolescence with its theme memories. Reflecting on one’s adolescence will bring memories, both good and bad, and this poem beautifully draws up these moments of the past. Letting go of your memories and your adolescence is hard and something that one may never want to do. Still, it’s essential to let go in order to grow up and embrace the future.

All three of these pieces detail the fraught transformation from childhood to adulthood. From the picturesque, youthful kid to the confident young adult learning to find their place in the world. Maturity is messy, confusing, wonderful, transformative, and terrifying all at once.

—Jenny Eikre and Madison Coleman

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Sky’s Story Van Iang There once was a little girl, born of an Asian country, who wanted to become a writer when she grew up. Back in her homeland, everything was dirt-poor and even the little kids went around working to help support their families.

Her country was in a civil war and everyone worked hard for the bare minimums; everyone went home after a long day of work, tired and starving. This little girl, whose name was Sky, was content, despite the hardships. As the youngest child, she had nothing to worry about and no work to think about, unlike her hard-working older sister. Everything she wanted was granted to her—if it was possible.

Sky’s family moved from the small village to a larger city in Malaysia. How surprised she was to see the cars and planes go about, buildings not made of straw and sticks, and such fine clothing worn on a regular basis. How surprising was the concept of school not miles away, and the ability to see more than one restaurant. To see people having fun instead of working every day, it was all so very new to Sky. Sky had

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a new sister. She was no longer the youngest, but now the middle child. Although Malaysia had its opportunities, it was also not the best. The land was still not very advanced, to say the least, and it wasn’t a place Sky’s father wanted his children to grow up in. Then, Sky’s father heard of a land of opportunities. A land of freedom.

Years later, Sky’s family migrated to the United States. To cross all of Asia and the Pacific Ocean, her family of five went on a plane and had worked extra hard to afford the tickets.

Well, “extra hard” was an understatement; her father had worked day and night, barely ate, barely slept, and worked long hours only to be paid barely above the already bad paycheck. Sky and her big sister began to help him by picking up littered bottles and cans off the streets. They would resell them to a place that needed trash but were never paid more than a dollar per bag. Their mother worked at a restaurant for as long as possible, even when she was many months pregnant. But it was worth it. How big the airport was, how amazing it was to fly, how wonderous were the lands below the plane! It was all so scary, yet amazing to Sky. After a brief stay in a hotel—the concept was still wrapping itself around little Sky’s mind—the family of five flew to Houston, Texas. The cycle repeated itself. Cars, trucks, apartments, big open areas, and more. Apartments they would

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stay at. Open skies that seemed to stretch on for eternity. Big, beautiful cities with many people. Loud. New. Terrifying.

It was all exciting to little Sky, although she was afraid of the white-colored people around her, not knowing why they weren’t brown like her (and got a thorough explanation by her parents).

Iowa was a lot smaller than Michigan and Texas, where the apartments were loud and bustling with noise, either from the people inside or the cars outside. Iowa was a quiet town with separated houses that seemed like no one was living in them. It was all so quiet. Eerie. Surreal. The contrast of big, bold, loud Michigan to small, quiet, and ghost-like Iowa was huge. There were no cars that zoomed by every waking day, no parties at night in the distance with booming music. It seemed as if Iowa’s specialty was corn and silence.

The school was a lot smaller than her old one, less diverse.

Sky was terrified of the new school and a new life. She found solace in her cousins, whom she never knew existed but was deeply grateful for. (Years later, Sky’s whole world was flipped when she was told her “cousins” weren’t really her cousins).

Fourth grade started and Sky found it difficult to make new friends. It was universal that friends and packs were formed in preschool through first grade. How could she have just intruded and made new friends? Sky didn’t know these

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people and struggled to make friends.

Less confident, Sky’s English stumbled when she spoke.

Yet she was still academically great, although she had her rivals. Sky thought she was still academically great, although she had her rivals. Sky thought she would be an outcast until she made a friend who liked everything she liked and got along with so easily. They became attached at the hip. Then she realized her teacher wasn’t so bad, and the admiration grew until that teacher became her favorite.

Sky was settling into Iowa. Her only friend introduced her to more friends, and they made their own little group. Sky didn’t know the people outside her little bubble, but she was alright with that. Her interest in books and bugs made others move away and her desperation to please others made them uneasy. But she didn’t mind since she still had her best friend.

Then that friend moved away and Sky was devastated. Her little group began to crumble as more people moved away.

She was alone.

However, this time, Sky decided to talk more and be friends with others. So, she did just that and became somewhat friends with everyone else. Because they were not as close as her old group, Sky wished she had a best friend back but stayed content with the others for now.

Fifth grade came and Sky had new, former-high-school

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teachers. She immediately loved everyone except the math teacher. In science class, she met her new best friend. A project they were partnered together had revealed their love of drawing. That one friend, lovingly nicknamed Zot, became dear to Sky’s heart.

She decided to become a vegetarian, too. It was not because of the poor animals in slaughterhouses. It wasn’t because she cared about the environment. It also was not because she wanted to watch her weight. It was because she hated the “Asians eat cats/dogs!” jokes thrown around by her classmates, so she thought that perhaps they’d stop teasing her if she stopped eating meat. It didn’t work, but she continued on with the lifestyle until the eighth grade. It wasn’t a good choice for her either—Sky basically starved herself until she realized she wouldn’t do well in sports if she continued. It took her nearly five years to realize that. Sixth grade came and the transition from elementary to middle school scared Sky. She was even sadder when she realized she won’t be in the same school with her little sister, the one born in Malaysia.

Middle school wasn’t as hard as she thought, and her academic excellence soared. She took accelerated classes and online AP classes. Her worst grade was a B (in Art, of all classes!). There, Sky found her passions and interests: band, choir, art, English, and science (and specifically astronomy). Cross

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country introduced her to her new love of running, which prompted her to join track and field and become even more acquainted with others. She also met aerospace engineering and fell in love with it. She knew her parents were okay with her author/writing career choice, but she also knew they wanted more of her. They wanted her to be a doctor or an engineer. So, Sky changed her future completely and decided to pursue aerospace engineering. Specifically, astronautical aerospace engineering. How could she not? Space was cool.

Her relationship with other people grew and she now had a reputation. Perhaps it was her caring nature that made her so weak; either her emotional personality or how she closed herself off. But once spoken to, she was unstoppable. She was known as the nice, quiet, and stereotypically smart Asian. But she didn’t mind and continued to thrive.

Seventh and eighth grade went by with a breeze. Her cross country team was like a second family. Cross country had become her life, and she honestly wouldn’t change it for the world.

Sky’s family gained another little sister. Still no boys. But Sky couldn’t be happier. Her life felt complete. It felt good.

Sure, there were the occasional things to stress about. Like tests, PE, new sports, the opinions of others, et cetera. But in the end, Sky was still happy and (most important) stress-free.

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Sky, then, transitioned into her first year of high school.

She thought high school would be hard and challenging, but it was about the sameas middle school. She went through the first half of school with straight A’s to brag about, friends she cared so much about, and sports that she passionately talked about. She joined more clubs, including cheerleading, speech, and drama. She continued to do cross country and track, too.

Sky soon found herself crushing on a boy, whom we will call Jar because it’s related to his name but also funny. She hadn’t realized it yet, but her best friend Zot also had a crush on Jar. Go figure. It was like some cliché movie, except it wasn’t. It was real life. Anyway, Sky seemed to be the braver of the two and advanced toward Jar. Even though she (lovingly) insulted Jar and hit him sometimes, the two built up chemistry and began to date. Aww, how romantic…or something.

For a short while, the two dated and things went…rather fast, to say the least. Even though Sky had saved her first kiss for marriage, Jar took it already. He was fast and inexperienced with love, so he caused her to also stumble along. Even though they tried to solve everything together, Jar confessed that he had never loved Sky. The two broke up. Their whole relationship lasted barely four months.

Yeah…that didn’t work out for long.

It was alright, because Sky had the perfect coping mechanism: just ignore her ex until she forgave him (hint: it took

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her a week or two…or three…okay, it took her like a month).

Whatever, Sky had other things to worry about. Like…like homecoming!

Homecoming was something Sky had never been interested in before. Until she experienced it for herself and found herself enjoying it immensely. Sky had gone with another boy, Handout. They were joined by Ethanol and her older sister, Star. By this point, it’s obvious this story renamed everyone Sky had ever met with funny synonyms or nicknames used in real life. There was no actual person named Handout nor Ethanol. Or maybe there was. But not in this story. Anyway…

The group went to eat at a restaurant (it was spent awkwardly eating and conversations dying every time they’re brought up), then ended up in Handout’s house playing UNO and trying to watch movies. By the time the dance started, Sky and Star were cross-stitching with Handout’s mother while the boys were playing video games upstairs.

They were thirty minutes late, but it was okay because homecoming had barely begun anyway due to people not coming.

Sky danced a lot, sang a lot, and smiled a lot that day. It was also that day that she developed a crush on Handout after a slow dance to Ed Sheeran’s “Perfect”. Of course. No, this still wasn’t a movie, it was still real life. Sped-up real life, but real life nonetheless.

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The Game of Life Sydney Benscoter

Is this really Earth I stand?

A living, breathing soul?

Am I spinning round and round By science I’m told?

What’s this feeling that I have, This sinking, pitch-black hole, That festers deep inside me, Looking into your eyes, The foggy glaze that covers them, My nightmares every night?

Your hands are cold and mine are warm, But how can this be right?

I live, I breathe, the Earth, it spins, Yet this feeling stays the same.

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The board is gone, I float alone, Where do my pieces lay?

Where are the rules, The rights and wrongs, The hints along the way?

What step to take, Which move to make, The walls are closing in.

To draw or pass, To bluff or chance, Reset and re-begin.We thought we had three lives, Safe behind usernames, But looking at your milky eyes, I don’t know who to blame.

A finish line that’s nowhere near, A world engulfed by flame, Perhaps I ought to join you now, And end this silly game.

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Memories Litzy Aguilar-Duran

Everyone has a favorite memory A bad memory, and a good memory.

Memories that you’ll either forget about or cherish. Or reminisce about them when you’re sad or happy.

Ready or not, you’ll forget about them because In the end some things are meant to be forgotten, Even if you aren’t ready to let go.

Every memory that is forgotten can return but won’t be clear.

Soon enough, when those memories do return, You won’t be ready to let go of them.

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Reaction It takes a skilled writer to draw the reader in. Whether it be prose, poetry, or even something more experimental, getting a reaction from the reader takes wit, craft and an immense amount of imagery, and the three pieces in this section do just that. The visceral reaction that these pieces create when reading them is sure to keep you on the edge of your seat.

Laisha Medina’s “Sinful Adoration” is a poem that utilizes the point-of-view of artist Frida Kahlo, an artist whose life was marked by pain and suffering due to physical limitations.

These experiences are made physical here, each stanza contributing to the confinement and restraint of a body in pain. But underneath that stifling comes the speaker’s itch to overcome.

“Mirror” by Tacy Andrews takes the theme of moving past an obstacle even further, via literal and figurative reflection.

Andrews’ poem will surprise you in the way it reinvents a fairytale trope. Sharp and vulnerable, the speaker here demands we see the dangers of becoming too self-critical. With a haunting repetition and the expert dialogue between, An-

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drews’ work is an experimental siren song to one’s self.

Lastly, Jaideep Thiruthani’s “We Should Go Back to the Good Old Days” is a hilarious piece of satire that Thiruthani, through quick-witted lines and harkenings to the “good old” caveman era, really gets the point across. This essay is a triumph of smart humor that demands we confront the uselessness of looking back. He is at once conflicted and aware, and the result is stirring. Each of these pieces work expertly to grip the reader with a sense of what’s at stake. They are inventive, startling, visceral, and even laugh-out-loud hilarious.

—Georgia Sampson, Nicole Klostermann, and Mia Ugalde

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Sinful Adoration Laisha Medina Unable to escape this endless wound All hope is trapped in a metal cage With nowhere to go Yet the only thing stopping all the chaos Still offering a wave of rage A single memory of that day Which would change all I knew All those gone could never say How that impact became grief No longer affected yet not forgotten Everything left broken by this painful sorrow Never thought a crash could change my perspective A new horizon I’m forced to see Still this laceration could never faze me

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Its burning qualities I’m used to A bitter pain brushes my skin As a loss of recuperation Hurt’s bits still try to pierce me within Just to be hit with disappointment As my reaction will never be more than a subtle flinch For I’ve lived with worse Betrayal and emptiness are just other appointments I’m booked in for Secured to a bed is now a comfort zone An escape to the love I lost That unfateful day Diego now calls for my repair Causing me an awful sting Knowing the birds of happiness will no longer sing This desert land within me has stopped being my enemy I find beauty all around even when it’s bitter

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The crushing sound of broken bones Relieve me knowing I’m happier all alone Functional and lost a stranger to all that’s known

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Mirror Tacy Andrews “Mirror mirror on the wall, Who’s the fairest of them all?”

Roles off my tongue like a narrative I am far too familiar with The syllables send a pulse through my body I cannot relieve myself from this burden: Cherishing my perception of this response above all reason “With that face?

Anyone But you, Disgrace.”

Darts back to me My pupils widen My heart descends My breath sharpens “Nothing different From any other day”

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I hear my echoing voice say My body is somehow not ready to hear this familiar phrase My body cannot bare that nothing has changed My body yearns to ask again Maybe if I phrase the question a different way The response won’t take my breath away But no change in language will make this truth easier to tolerate Because I decide what is recited back to Me “A mirror is just A mirror” I declare to myself To Myself In one last desperate plea to neglect this feeling

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We Should Go Back to the Good Old Days Jaideep Thiruthani Some people say that they were born in the wrong decade. Others say that they were born in the wrong century, even the wrong millennium; however, I say that I was born in the wrong era. I want to go back to the good old days of the Paleolithic era, or what’s more commonly known as the caveman era. The caveman era was obviously the best time to be alive because only the strong survive. I mean, who needs modern conveniences like toilet paper, easily available food, transportation, shelter, or the comforting thought that you would most likely not die from a vicious animal attack?

One thing we certainly don’t need is medicine. Instead of going to a hospital to be treated for something like a broken bone, in the good old days, we just would beat the injured individual to death with a rock. We should do that, too. It’s far more efficient, and we would waste fewer resources than if we treated an individual with modern medicine; rather, we would gain resources, as we can use the corpse of the recently

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bludgeoned individual as a food source. This is only one example of why the Paleolithic era was the best time to be alive.

As of now, we are about as efficient as a Volkswagen.

Another example of modern deficiency is the use of language. Back in the day, Paleolithic people would probably grunt and scream to convey meaning. I mean, who needs language when we can merely grunt and point? This is just another example of the superiority and efficiency of the people in the caveman days. In the words of Kevin Malone, “Why waste time say lot word when few word do trick?” Language is highly overrated, as it is only for the weak and those about to die from a rock. If a person uses complex language, then Yabba Dabba Doo not leave them alive.

A third reason that the Paleolithic era is superior to the present is our poor resource management. We are so careless with our resources that we waste a good chunk of them. After all, who doesn’t want a world where if the women of the tribe did not pick enough berries, then the entire tribe would starve to death? This world is better than the modern world, so we should go back to the good old days. I’m not projecting, nor am I tired of this world being terrible. I simply want a world where people can live their best life hunting mammoths, and I can have a good time committing cannibalism (I can’t wait to eat delicious, tasty people).

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On a more serious note, I know that I sound like the guy who wrote Industrial Society and its Future. We as humans live in the best objective time to be alive. While we are at the cusp of Armageddon now, we had to accomplish much to get to this state. If we were to live in a primitive state, we would all collectively suffer. Our lives would be short and brutal. If anyone says that they would like to live in a different time, they do not know what they are saying. People are blinded by nostalgia and they only see the good things instead of taking in the whole picture, which is much more complicated in history. If we were to go back, we would not have the technology that our lives are so dependent on, like the internet, laptop computers, or cell phones. We wouldn’t have modern medicine, the ability to live long lives, or the assurance that we will not be mauled to death by wild animals (unless you live in Australia). Most of all, we wouldn’t have the shared anxiety of our world ending at any moment, leading to good post-apocalyptic media. Truly, there is no time like the present.

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Entrapment Entrapment is a state of being that exists in both the physical and emotional realms. It can be a restriction on the body or a pressing on the psyche. Within this section, two student pieces, “Escaping Sleep Paralysis” by Vanessa Vargas and “Aquifer” by Matilda Hogan, reflect on the feeling of entrapment. By embodying the reader within the experiences of claustrophobia, loss of control, and, ultimately, freedom, these two authors invite us to explore the horror of the loss of agency and what these experiences mean to us as people with a need for control. Both using the second-person, there is an inescapable immediacy to these pieces that forces the reader into the uncomfortable. It is through this discomfort that the theme of entrapment emerges. As readers, we are invested in this feeling and internally mirror the fight of these narrators in their search for release.

“Escaping Sleep Paralysis” by Vanessa Vargas is a creative nonfiction piece that explores the narrator’s experience with sleep paralysis, the phenomenon of being awake but unable to move. Vargas experiments with point-of-view, writing this

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experience from a less immediate perspective, in a slightly detached second-person instead of the traditional first-person. This brings the reader and Vargas onto an even playing field, so that we navigate this unfamiliar landscape together.

The reader encounters the mysterious and menacing shadow man in tandem with Vargas. When the mother walks in, the reader feels the desperation and horror of having their voice rendered useless. “You need to get out of this nightmare,” the piece tells us, and we believe it wholeheartedly.

“Aquifer” by Matilda Hogan is a poem that follows a speaker slowly being crushed by rocks in a cramped cave.

While in the beginning the pebbles feel small and tolerable, soon they pile and the speaker—who, again, brings the reader closer with second-person—is unable to move. The imagery is both lovely, lingering within nature, and visceral, causing our teeth to ache in phantom pain. There is a comfort given to the familiar feeling of entrapment. The rocks and excess dustbecome a new skin, the status-quo in which the speaker is content. “Aquifer” gets its name from the underground permeable rock layer that transports water. Even though the speaker is trapped as the weight piles, it is the water that washes the skin’s layer of dust that scares the speaker.

While both of these pieces are concerned with entrapment, they both come to the conclusion of freedom. They do

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not end on hopelessness. In “Escaping Sleep Paralysis,” Vargas gains movement again and reality settles. In “Aquifer,” Hogan has the speaker washed by the moving water, craving it and the newness it brings. Starting in a place of suffocation allows for these ending moments of liberation to feel like an accomplishment, a triumph, an escape.

—Franny Marzuki and Lauren Whitney

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Escaping Sleep Paralysis Vanessa Vargas You slowly begin to wake when you realize only your brain is awake. Your eyes are still closed, you can’t open them; in fact, you can’t move anything at all. You panic. You try to scream, but your breath is gone. You feel pressure on your chest as if someone or something is pressing you down, sometimes loud whispers take over your ears and can’t think.

Maybe your brain lets your eyes open, but only to be face-toface with a shadow man. He is a tall black figure with a top hat menacingly standing in the corner. If he’s not in the corner, that means he’s on you, pushing down like a cinder block suffocating you.

As you are focusing on the shadow man, your mom walks in. The shadow man vanishes, but you still can’t move. You attempt to call out to her but your mouth won’t move. Mom, help! I can’t move and I’m scared. She picks up dirty clothes from the floor. I don’t get it; she’s right in front of me! Why

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can’t she hear me? She hears your muffles and notices you’re awake, saying, “Okay, okay, I’m leaving now,” leaving you in a panic, stuck alone in the dark.

You need to get out of this nightmare. You try to drag yourself back. The shadow man isn’t real, the whispers are just your imagination. Focus on your breathing: in through the nose and out through the mouth. Once you are calm, you can try to take back control of your body. You could try moving one digit at a time, but instead, you use all of your strength to jerk your body all at once like Frankenstein’s monster. You finally shake out of it only to be faced with reality, where there is no shadow man and the whispers are gone.

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Aquifer Matilda Hogan A pebble appears, then another and another, cramping the dark cave. You look up towards the heavens as more drop down, at first slightly poking at your skin, then falling harder and harder, covering you with more chunks of rock of various sizes.

Then the rock changes, grinding into a fine dust, shrouding you like flour whisked at too high a speed.

Your open mouth tastes the earthen flavors, grains comforting your gums and promoting a film of dirt on your teeth.

Your eyes dry, but it doesn’t matter that you can’t see with them anymore.

You are content under your pile of rocks, mouth agape when the water comes.

At first it disrupts your quiet slumber,

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making you fearful of what life is like without the dust that comforted you so, but then as you are washed, you crave it.

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To Fight or To Flee Fight-or-flight is a deeply ingrained psychological reaction that occurs in response to a perceived danger. This sense of danger could take the form of a harmful event, an attack, or any threat to one’s survival. Within this theme, “A Choice”

by Sydney Benscoter and “Animal” by Sheridyn Bailey are two poems that contemplate one’s response to fight or to flee when forced to decide if survival is worth the pain that life brings along with it. These two fantastic poems explore what it means to be an individual outside of a relationship, as well as the accompanying pain and difficulty of knowing that ultimately, we’re on our own in this world. So what are you going to do about it? Fight, or flee?

“A Choice” is a prose poem that delves into the speaker’s consciousness as they traverse across a natural and dream-like landscape to recall the freedom and euphoria of being lured into the woods. The speaker has to consider the worthiness of adventure over their safety. Artfully done, Benscoter’s lyrical take on classical mythology draws in readers with its beauty nonetheless. “Animal” sees the speaker realize that they are

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being left behind. With striking nature imagery and acknowledgment of humankind’s more animalistic tendencies, we witness a transformation. By becoming an “animal,” she transcends into the hunter rather than the hunted.

To fight or to flee, these pieces encompass drastically different responses to the threat of survival. While both poems consider the intrinsic danger of losing one’s self in a relationship, they weave beautiful and imagistic tales along the way, leading you, reader, to consider what you may do were you to find yourself with such a choice.

—Amelia Juhl and Lauren Achenbaugh

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A Choice Sydney Benscoter The soft blades of grass turn sharp as I stumble forward, tiny cuts on my feet barely register. There is nothing to run to, but stopping was never an option. I gasp for breath, its peaceful chill like nectar, a mockery to the beating of my soul, begging to be free. There is earth, and there is air, and there is me. There was me.

Who am I? I run until I see her. I crave her smile, her laughter, the pure joy alight in her eyes—and there is hunger. It opens within me, a deep gorge with no bottom. She dances through the trees, gliding and weaving between the branches. My heart aches for such freedom. I run to her, joining the dance.

Why was I scared?

The forest watches, jealous of our beauty that lifts the weight of the world. I follow her light as she melts into the trees, and we fall through time, her laugh as my compass. We break through the branches, and there is silence. I search for her eyes, still high with euphoria. The field is empty, save for

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the water.

Where is she?

The water is a terrible wonder, and as I fall to my knees, crawling toward the glistening blue, I already know what I will see. I hug the edge and let my nails sink into the mud as I pull myself to the water’s face. Her eyes watch me from the surface, a distorted mirror of my own. Her smile no longer a comfort, but a sad reminder of why I’m here. I reach out to wipe her tears, stopping as she mimics my actions.

Do I want to know?

She is truth. She is beauty and joy and delicious thoughts that call to my hunger, yet it falters. She is a bargain, for beauty is pain and joy is sin, her thoughts are candied poison. She is peak and pit, pleasure and pain—she makes me feel again.

She is me, and I am afraid.

I step back towards the forest as I hear a comforting voice, promising a home that is not mine. He is ignorance. Numb and desolate, a different type of bliss. He offers safety and direction, a predetermined path. It is lonely, but there is no pain. They cannot hurt what they do not know.

He is a lie, and I love him.

I turn my back on them both and let the wind carry me to the stars. The hunger rests as I fade away, dormant once again.

Her eyes close, and she awaits my return. His voice softens,

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the white noise of life drowning him out. He melts back into the dark, ready to pounce. They are a choice that looms in the distance, but for now, there is time. Time to forget until another day.

When will it be too late?

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Animal

Sheridyn Bailey The day you called me an animal, Was the day I figured it out.

It really is about our survival, And you were just a drought.

I searched for water in your eyes, When you hung me out to dry, So imagine my surprise, When I realized I was left to die.

So the frost was left to mend my bones, And the fire to thaw my heart, Alone down there the human died, The hunger tearing me apart.

Maybe it was the animal in me, The urge to eat for winter, That finally made you turn and flee,

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When we know that I’m the natural sprinter.

No, I get it.

I guess now you’re my prey.

Because if I’m an animal, Pain is just the human way.

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A Struggle For Victory What makes a monster? Are they born, or made? Is there any way to tell, and does it even matter in the end?

“The Ending Sucks” by Natasha Nicholson subtly grapples with these questions in a subversive fiction piece about a man trapped in a gladiatorial fight with a hideous monster.

Through their combative dialogue, the unnamed man realizes that this monster is a victim of kidnapping and other circumstances. The plucky young man and the rather rancid monster team up to escape in an unexpected classic struggle of good versus evil. Or so you’d think. Nicholson forces readers to grapple with the root of this old trope. Should the man have killed the monster after all? Was the monster ever a victim?

Why did they have fabulous adventures together before the monster betrayed the man?

“What Depression Feels Like” by Eleanor Lopez is a creative non-fiction piece about the hurdles and hardships of fighting depression. Lopez takes us on an exhausting walk through daily life, giving us insight to the constant pressures

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of a largely misunderstood kind of illness. Lopez shows the reader the small crevasses of depression that are easily overlooked through such detailed imagery that makes the mundane haunting. But the glimmer of hope throughout the piece is a silver lining that we as readers can cling to with the protagonist, making us feel close to her and slightly less alone.

Nicholson’s “The Ending Sucks” reminds us that not all stories end happily or neatly. That sometimes endings can feel predisposed. But by placing these pieces into conversation with each other, “What Depression Feels Like” suggests that maybe hope can surface when you’d least expect it to. That maybe, the monsters don’t always win.

—Erica Crawford and Julia Comer

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The Ending Sucks Natasha Nicholson The only thing standing in his way now was a monster unlike any he had encountered before. He bowed his head ready for the fight to end. He waited for the final blow from the monster who had beaten him. The sweat dripped down his dark-colored leather armor, his breathing threatening to not steady. His arms burned with stings like a thousand scorpions, his chest battered and bruised from the blows he received previously. He dared not look at the monster that stood before him. His thoughts flashed like lightning, his vision steadily growing blurry. With his legs too wobbly and too weak to stand, they fell out from under him and rendered him in a kneeling position of defeat.

The room was lined with torches and the voices of the men who had tried to beat the monster that he now stood before. He kneeled helpless, his sword cracking from the strength of the beast’s blows. He looked upon it, taking in every feature, with his mind racing at the possibility of defeating this god-like monster. The room he gazed upon was

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made of stone specially cut for the monster. The torches lined crookedly as if hurried to be placed. The ceiling of the same cut stone never to break, the floor the same. If the man didn’t know where he was, he’d be lost trying to find the door, the only indicator being the seeming pile of torches.

The monster stood close to the back of the room waiting for the man to make his move. The monster was tall, with a vicious-looking face that could scar anyone for life with one foolish look. Its fur the color of sand, its head with the look of an ox and the build of an enraged bulldog-pitbull mix. It’s almost rotten yellow fang-like teeth bared in an irate manner at the man who stood before it. Seemingly pounds of saliva dripped down to the floor building a pool of the foul material. The monster’s smell was by far the worst part, every move the monster made, every time the monster dared to bare its teeth a monsoon of dead human flesh seemed to pool in the air around it.

The man looked up, his rigidly cut copper hair drifting to the side slowly, his slightly tanned complexion the only indicator of his travels. His light, vivid blue eyes stared darkly at the hay below the monster as if in a trance. His 5’4” frame threatened to be crushed by the monster’s comparison and his whole body heaved as if he had just run a marathon. His mind, lost in the thought of losing the battle, jumped when

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the monster--towering over him with its 7’8” height-- spoke in a deep gruff voice.

“How dare you kneel with your head bowed before me.”

The copper-haired man stayed silent, as if contemplating.

“Do you know how cowardly that makes you look, you seem weak and easy to beat,” the monster continued. “Do you know how many men I’ve fought? None of them seem as cowardly as you.”

The man slowly stood up, his legs threatening to give out.

“Now you stand,” the monster laughed a deep bellow, “but your head still stays tilted down; have you no confidence? You’re weak, like the rest of them.”

This time the man answered, his slightly deep voice rugged as he caught his breath. “But all men before me died, what makes you think I’ll be the same?”

The monster stood in shock that somebody had talked back to it for the first time. The copper-haired man glared daggers at the monster who called him cowardly. The monster felt a slight feeling of intimidation from his opponent, the first time he had ever felt scared.

The monster took a step back under the piercing gaze of its copper-haired opponent.

“Intimidated?” the man asked venomously.

The monster dared not say anything before it was inter-

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rupted again by the copper-haired man. “There’s no way you can intimidate me anymore.” The man paused before speaking with utter and complete confidence, “Sometimes you have to play the fool to fool a fool.”

The monster burst with laughter that shook the whole room, “You think you can defeat me?! There’s no way. I’m invincible, unable to be beaten down to the ground like dirt like you.”

“How would you know? I haven’t died yet,” the copper-haired man retorted.

The monster was taken aback by the man’s sudden outburst. A shocked look sailed over the monster’s dimly-lit grim facial features.

“How dare you talk to me like that, you imbecile! You remind me of someone whom I hate!”

“And who might that be?”

“Someone like you,” the monster snarled.

“Tell me, and maybe I might take it easy on you and kill you quickly.” The copper-haired man raises his sword toward the monster.

“Fine.” The monster glared at the copper-haired male before continuing, “I’ve been kidnapped.”

This time it was the copper-haired man’s turn to be taken aback. “You have a captor?” The monster realized what it said

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and another grim look spread across its face.

The copper-haired man interjected before the monster could speak. “Did he do this to you?”

The monster hung his head in a defeated position, “Yes” it said, hate clearly present. “Why?” the copper-haired man asked, clearly curious and a bit saddened.

The copper-haired man’s face fell as he was the one to hang his head this time. Quietly the copper-haired man spoke. “I’m not like your captor, the stories I’ve heard have given you the reputation of a monster, now I see it’s all been conditioned.”

The monster’s anger faded.

“I’ll cut you a deal, I’ll help you out if you help me out.

Then we’ll get rid of your captor.”

The monster only nods in reply.

In the end, both got out alive and had fabulous adventures. Until, that is, the monster ate the copper-haired man, whose name was never revealed.

THE END

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What Depression Feels Like Eleanor Lopez There is a box. I don’t know how, but I am inside the box.

The box sits in the very middle of Times Square, as people in business suits and coats are bustling in the streets surrounding it.

The box is clear glass, perfectly sized so that I can only stand and reach my arms out side to side and touch the walls enclosing me.

I pound on the side, but it doesn’t budge. I yell out, but nobody on the street looks up at me. Not a single person even notices me, standing still, while the world rushes on without me. I throw all my weight against the glass but it doesn’t crack. I could scream, and yell, and cry, and bang, day after day, but not one person would never break the glass and let me out. Eventually, I will only suffocate in my isolation, alone in a clear box that nobody seems to be able to see me through.

I sit at a gray lunch table, the ones with eight seats circled around the outside. My friends sit in the spaces surrounding me, talking and laughing. They laugh like they have no care in

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the world and speak about their days as a child would speak of their favorite game. I just sit there. I don’t talk or laugh like they do. I simply sit and watch it all happen. Now they are discussing the English assignment we were assigned last period and their ideas for topics to write about, but I‘m not interested. I am, but at the same time, it’s a lot of effort. I don’t want to talk about the English homework, or how my brother made me late to school, or how long it took me to fall asleep last night. I don’t want to talk about anything. Or move. Or think. Or exist, really.

Sometimes I just lay on the floor. Who lays on the floor?

Normal people lay in beds or on couches, but nobody lays on the floor. Nobody except me. I surround myself with lights, little rainbow stars on a string of Christmas lights that somebody bought on sale in the Target clearance section. They should have been hung up on the ceiling, but I never got around to that. I see a sock next to me on my carpet that desperately needs washing. I guess I never got around to doing laundry either. I just lay there and stare at the ceiling, watch the fan go around, and around, and around, and around, and around... it will only stop when I turn it off, but I don’t. I just don’t. I don’t anything. I don’t think, I don’t move, I don’t even fix my hair when it falls into my face. My eyes start to well up with tears, seemingly for no reason. Why am I crying?

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What do I have to be sad about? I don’t feel anything at all.

I want to feel, though. At school, my friend tells a story and everyone else is laughing with tears in their eyes. Everyone else cracks up, but the story evokes no response in me at all, even though I want it to. I want to laugh like they do, smile like they do, but I can’t. I don’t feel anything but never-ending, colorless, empty fuzz. I am black and white, and they have color. I want to go home, so I can stop pretending, so I can take off the mask of happiness that I plaster on every morning. Nothing is real. Not even me.

Nobody knows who I really am. Nobody knows that there are demons inside my head, an infestation of darkness that infects my spirit. And they can’t. I can never let them find out. If they did, they would see me for what I really am: a worthless pile of dust, slowly blowing away in the wind of life. “Are you feeling sick?” No, I’m feeling great. I just want to sleep for the rest of my life. “Do you want to go out tonight with us?” No, I think I’ll just stay home, I have a lot to do later. I just want to be alone. “You used to like running.” I guess I just fell out of it. I hate everything I used to do for fun. “Are you all right?” Yeah, I’m ok. I’m not ok.

My alarm goes off, a blaring sound of sirens that jolts me from peaceful sleep into the cold reality that is being awake.

I smack my phone to snooze again, the horrible noise stops,

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and I can hear my family getting ready for the day in the kitchen. I squeeze my eyes shut as darkness floods over me again. I pull the blankets tighter around me. I don’t want to swing my feet to the floor, stand up, and get out of bed. I have no desire to brush my teeth or my hair. I really don’t want to put on clean clothes and new socks or tie my shoes. Come to think of it, I didn’t want to do any of that stuff yesterday or the day before that either. I don’t even know if I can. “Get up and face the day,” my dad might say, “We’ve got people to see, places to be, and things to do.” Yeah, but I don’t feel like doing any of it, and I probably won’t feel like getting up in five minutes, or five days, or even five weeks either. Maybe I won’t do it at all.

Eventually, I muster up the strength to drag myself out of bed and out the door, but the rest of my day will go no better. I am almost late to my first period because I sat in my car staring into space for too long. My hair is a mess because I couldn’t find it in me to straighten it before I came to school.

I only put on makeup because the demons inside me tell me that I’m ugly and worthless every single day. My homework isn’t done because I couldn’t make myself get up and do it last night. I wander through the halls between classes like a clueless child in a grocery store. Voices in my head tell me I’m despicable, that I will never amount to anything, and that I

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might as well just give up now. I want to go home.

I go home. I still want to go home. But I am home. This place is horrible, everything is horrible. I lie down on my bed, but the sheets turn to sand, the pillow transforms to rock, and my blanket smells terrible. I look around my room as the paint peels from the walls, the lilac purple of my dresser drawers fades to gray, and the lights blur through my tears. It’s ugly, just like me. The music in my headphones sounds like nails on a chalkboard. The crackers I was eating taste like sawdust.

Horrible. It all is.

I’ve been stranded in the ocean. My only hope is to swim to shore, to make it to land. I have been treading water for what feels like hours. Who knows how long I’ve been out here? I feel myself getting very tired, the movements of my arms and legs growing slower and slower, the water around me getting viscous.

I’m not sure how much longer I can tread for. I try to conserve my energy, keep myself afloat, just keep my head above the water, and pray that someone will come rescue me. The sky grows dark overhead. I am so tired. I watch as boats cross the horizon in the distance. Nobody comes to help me--they don’t even know I need help. Desperately, I pull at the surface of the water, reach for the sky, thrashing about and sinking rapidly. My head slips under the cool, dingy water. I am drowning, but I have no hope or energy left to fight it. Someone, please, help me. My body sub-

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merges deeper and deeper, engulfed in blackness and desolation.

Suddenly, an arm. Air fills my lungs.

The demons will always be inside me. Some things, like antidepressants or therapy appointments, can only help so much. Every three months I will go to the doctor for a med check. Every three months the nurse will swipe her white plastic ID card in a little black device and a depression screening will pop up on the computer screen. Every three months I will answer the same exact questions that have the same exact answers, and every three months I will get the same result. I will never be freed. Demons of depression will always live on inside me, and I can only hope to endure. I can only hope to keep treading.

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Love Love. We’ve all been inundated with ideas and ideals about love, and sometimes it can feel as if we’ve run out of ways to talk about it. Luckily for us, three authors have taken on the challenge of writing “love.” It’s clear the old tropes may have missed something, and that something here feels fresh, electric, and inspiring.

Writer Candy Thammavongsa’s poem “Paper Hearts” delves into feelings of mutual vulnerability. Using the conceit of paper hearts, Thammavongsa pleads for someone to hold hers with only tender hands. The metaphors repurpose fear and fragility into a window of cautious appreciation from a speaker who wears her heart on her sleeve. This is a poem where just by applying too much pressure or experiencing the drop of a tear, love leaves everlasting marks on us.

Poet Victoria Aragon examines what it means to love a moment in her poem “Peace.” In six carefully crafted lines, Aragon sets up an atmospheric realization. With soft rain lulling us to sleep, she gifts us with simple pleasure: “like a dove in the spring/i am at peace.” To feel love for a moment,

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“Peace” explores that fleetingness were it as fresh and soft as drumming rain. In a second poem, Aragon’s “Moonlight” highlights the vulnerability of telling someone you love them.

By use of the natural world, Aragon’s wonderfully sparse poem leaves all of its ambiguity to emotional uncertainty.

Alex Hand’s “I Want to Die, But” addresses the myriad types of love that keep us alive. Whether that be the love between friends, cousins, or pets and owners, Hand tackles the difficult task of discusses the responsibilities of being loved back. Love is explored in this poem as a series of people and promises. With the final line, Hand poignantly states: “I’ve found things to live for.”

With these four poems, our authors face head-on what it feels like to love and be loved. After all, love is a power for which most of us do not understand and perhaps that is why it’s incessantly explored through the metaphors, questions, and statements of these young authors.

—Lily Friedman, Faith Ellington, and Hannah Kinson

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Paper Hearts Candy Thammavongsa All that I ask is that you hold my heart with such gentle hands.

For my heart is made out of paper.

I only ask that you hold my heart close and dear to your heart.

In which I hold your heart close and dear to my heart with gentle hands.

For your heart is made out of paper too.

I am scared if I apply too much pressure, it will crumple up.

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I am scared if I cry it will stain, the paper.

I am scared if I allow a strong wind to pass, it will glide you out of my hold.

For we are only two paper hearts that are in fear of hurting one another.

For we are only two paper hearts that are learning to love.

For we are both fragile.

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Peace & Moonlight Tori Aragon Peace the soft drumming of the rain clears my thoughts while the gentle whispers of the wind rock me to sleep like a dove in the spring i am at peace

Moonlight star gazing after midnight with your hand on my thigh and the moon in the sky providing a dim light and setting the mood right to tell you that i love you

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I Want to Die, But Alex Hand I want to die, but...

I want to see what the world has in store for me.

I want to see what my cousins grow up to be.

I want to see my cousins’ families.

I want to see my friends be successful.

I want to see my friends’ families.

I need to be there for my grandparents.

I need to be there for my parents.

I need to be a good role model for my cousins.

I want to graduate.

I want to go to college.

I want a degree.

I want to get a good job.

I want to get married.

I want to have a child.

I want more than one child.

I will be their role model.

I want to help others.

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I want to have my own house.

I want to be a pet owner.

I want to not have to put up a front.

I want to die, but…

I’ve found things to live for.

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Reminisce A story doesn’t have to be “nonfiction” in order to feel or be real. “A Light That Doesn’t Hurt” by Nicholas Cordes may be a work of fiction, but the characters are without a doubt real as the cornstalks of a cornfield. Margaret’s memories evoke a tangible quality that feels as though her life was truly lived. Melana Blomme’s “A Walk Through the Cornfield” and Cordes’ “A Light That Doesn’t Hurt” each demonstrate the importance of experience and phenomenon.

Melana Blomme’s “A Walk Through the Cornfield” takes the reader from the page to the field. In a landscape commonly regulated to the background, she breaks it down for us, piece by gorgeously detailed piece. Blomme’s writing will sidle up to you, take you by the hand, and give you the sense that the author is deeply familiar with the scene they’re painting for you. For those familiar with the distinct experience of simply existing in the middle of a row of corn, these words will transport you back. And for the uninitiated, we hope you come away from this piece with the urge to find the nearest cornfield and take a walk through it, just as we did. The

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phenomenon of familiarity is not lost on this writer and is instead artfully observed.

“A Light That Doesn’t Hurt” by Nicholas Cordes is an exploration of grief. Readers get the story of Margaret as she returns home from a doctor’s appointment, having received news that she may not live for much longer. The story flows beautifully in and out of her present life as she reminisces over her past life with her family who have all long since left her. The story works with her memories to create a narrative that opens up not only a vulnerability in Margaret, but also in readers as they stick close to her throughout.

Those who have never set foot in a cornfield know nothing of the spider webs “spanning the gap between stalks,” or the “aroma of freshly overturned soil.” People who have never known loss or sorrow cannot fathom the emotions that come from reliving fond memories with passed loved ones. These stories, with their captivating imagery and articulation of empathy, offer these experiences that others may lack. Given that shared experiences can act as a universal language, “A Walk Through the Cornfield” and “A Light That Doesn’t Hurt” establish a bond of communication between writer and reader, transcending any differences that may exist between them.

—Caroline Meek, Haley McCormack, and Rocco Romano

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A Walk Through the Cornfield Melana Blomme

A staple of Midwestern culture is driving past seemingly infinite cornfields but walking through one is an entirely different experience. The world seems to shrink to the row you are standing in as the corn waves high over your head. A cornfield, despite what the movies say, is unlike anything you could ever experience.

Bright, green leaves with sharp, crisp, yellowed edges catch your arms and face as you walk between rows. Dust billows in clouds as you disturb the leaves. Salt explodes in your mouth as you taste your sweat. A spider crawls across the leaf to its home spanning the gap between stalks. Spiderwebs tickle your arms and stick to your clothing. A breeze whistles through the leaves, shaking the plants and cooling the air.

Tassels that look like stars snag your hair. Golden pollen is deposited on every surface, making your skin crawl. Although they leave no mark, their rough stems constantly scratch your

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face as you wander among the crops. Bees sing their buzzing songs as they bop amongst stalks and tassels, delivering pollen. A slightly sweet taste fills your mouth as a gust of wind disturbs the settled pollen and dust. Your nose tickles as you inhale particles from the air. Birds flock overhead, babbling and tweeting as they begin preparations for their journey south. They gather on stalks, powerlines and the packed dirt all around you.

The ground, slightly cracked in the dry conditions, is littered with debris from previous years’ harvest. The dirt is hard to the touch but gives under your feet when stepped upon.

The aroma of freshly overturned soil fills the air as you break the surface. Weeds - dandelions and buttonweed- persistently grow in every available space. Corn roots break to the surface, showing themselves to the world. Crickets scuttle about and scream their thoughts. A frog croaks as it passes by in its search for a puddle. The grit in your mouth is the result of dust clouds from your own feet. Layers of dirt and grime coat everything. Your clothes, your skin, your shoes.

Drying and yellowing at the bottom, stalks reach into the sky. The dark green gives way to the golden yellow of harvest.

The sturdy stalks become slightly brittle in the warm afternoon sun. Ears of corn, one or two per plant, shoot off from the main stalk. The ears have also begun their march towards

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harvest. The papery husks crackle and tear as you brush by, yet they keep their firm hold on the ears. Broken kernels coat the tips of the husks in a sugary stickiness. Silks, as soft as the name suggests, break out of the top of the husks. Once a bright white, the silks have also begun to dry, their color changing to dull tan. Soon, the plants will be ready for harvest.

During the harvest season, the dried plants will be picked, shucked, and stored to be sold. More crops will grow in the field next year. The cycle of growth and harvest continues as farmers labor on in their cornfields, one of the most unique landscapes in the Midwest.

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A Light That Doesn’t Hurt Nicholas Cordes The walk from her car to the door was long and daunting.

Margaret leaned against her old Cadillac as she gazed up the concrete sidewalk. The sun was setting slowly, and the inside of her home was dark; she had forgotten to turn on the lights.

Finally building up the courage to move, Margaret leaned heavily on her cane as she took her first hesitant steps.

There’s not much we can do.

There’s not much we can do.

There’s not much we can do.

Her doctor’s words echoed in her mind as her feet shuffled along. The cane creaked as Margaret stooped lower over it. She had left the house early in the afternoon, her joints already aching. Now, though, the pain was nearly unbearable.

Every step brought her more and more pain, and by the time she reached her door, she had both hands on her old, wooden cane. It took all of her will to brave the few seconds to pull

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the key from her pocket and jam it into the keyhole. She leaned against the door for a moment, though she feared that the pressure might snap the key. Finally, she twisted it sharply and heard the rewarding click the door offered.

Pushing through it, Margaret stepped into the entryway.

Orange light from the disappearing sun slipped past her, illuminating the living room just beyond the rug she stood on.

Margaret’s shadow was long and inky; whatever it touched was momentarily stained the darkest of grays. She padded further into her home, prying one shoe off with her foot, then the other, before turning back to push the door shut. She sighed with relief and exhaustion, the hardest part of her day finally over. With little trepidation, she turned back around.

Margaret gave her glasses a soft push so that they slid up her nose. Her eyes adjusted to the semi-darkness while she groped a nearby wall for the light switch. Finding it, she flicked the tiny lever, and a yellow cascade emanated from the ancient bulb in the ceiling. She bathed in it for a moment, the artificial light much easier to endure than the harsh, uncontrollable luminescence of the sun.

Margaret’s cane stamped down on the wood floor with a crack as she hobbled through her house. Her feet hardly left the floor when she moved. Rather, they shuffled along, the slippery oak aiding her in gliding across the surface. Marga-

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ret came to a rest in the threshold that separated the living room from the kitchen. She pushed on until she came to the sink, her weathered hands falling to rest on the tiled countertop. She peered through a window before her, the backyard stretching to the white fence.

Little Jacob was playing a game with Amber and Robert, the latter two helping him jump over the rope that they had tied between trees. Frank raked in the corner, and there was Margaret. She was kneeling over the flowerbed that Frank had just raked clean. Amber, their oldest, came running over. She was asking for a snack, her feet filthy with dirt and grass. Margaret called Frank over, and he turned the hose on to rinse her feet off. Next, Jacob and Robert were at their mother’s side, their emerald eyes beaming at her knowingly.

Can we have a snack too, Mommy?

She could never say no. She walked with the boys into the house, Amber and Frank already inside. They made their way into the kitchen, and there was Frank again. He was cradling Jacob in his arms, the baby merely days old. Margaret, her hair longer, brighter, came stumbling into the room, Robert glued to her side. Amber was hobbling after them, her arms draped with towels. Washing Jacob had become some sort of family project.

Frank was running the water, making sure that it was

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warm, but not hot. Robert was squeezing a surplus of baby shampoo into the sink, and one of Amber’s towels had ended up in the water. Frank was looking at them sternly, but his expression softened when Margaret took Jacob from him, her face red from giggling.

Margaret looked down at the now-empty sink. The edges were brown from years of dirty water occupying its space. It occurred to her that she should call Amber and Robert to tell them. They knew she hadn’t been doing well, but they didn’t know that mere days, perhaps even hours were all that she had left. For whatever reason, though, Margaret did not move for the phone. Instead, she locked her hand around her cane in an iron grip once more, and she journeyed from the kitchen back into the living room.

Frank was sitting in his recliner, the only person allowed to. The gray monster was hideous. It had been appealing once, but not after they had bought it. When they were first married, money was tight. In need of furniture, they picked the thing up from the side of a street on the other side of the city.

By then, it was covered in brown, questionable stains, but it was their first real piece of furniture.

“And you couldn’t get a better deal at the dollar store!”

Frank always liked to add whenever he told the story.

The chair had remained vacant for nine years. Not even

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Robert or Amber sat in it when they visited for holidays.

Margaret had simply refrained from touching it for fear of catching a disease, but Frank was insistent that his chair wasn’t that dirty. Although, some days Margaret passed it and swore that it smelled like him.

She stumbled by the coffee table, but Margaret quickly regained herself. Reaching the stairs, she climbed the treacherous obstacle leisurely. She and the stairs were old acquaintances, something between friends and enemies. She simply had to remember her place, and the steep steps remember theirs. Margaret hadn’t fallen yet, much to her satisfaction.

At the top, she slipped past the bathroom and shuffled into Robert’s bedroom.

The walls still smelled of fresh paint, the dark green color only days old. Robert, however, had already returned his posters and photographs to their homes above his bed and desk.

Books, drawings, and a mixture of dirty and clean laundry decorated the floor. He slumped onto his bed, an overturned math textbook teetering precariously on the edge. He claimed that he just wanted to be alone, but the depressing voices of Simon and Garfunkel that echoed through the room begged to differ. Before long, though, Robert was on his stomach, armed with a pencil.

His hand ripped across the blank sheet of notebook paper

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with a sort of joy that Margaret never saw anywhere else.

When he was with his friends, or even Frank, his personality never bled as easily, as fluidly, as it did when he was drawing.

She peered over his shoulder, and there it was: Jacob’s face, sketched gorgeously in the shadowy graphite of Robert’s pencils.

Margaret was smiling down at her son and his picture, a comforting image that he always scurried to create as a source of relief. The boys were so close, much closer than Robert was with his father. In fact, he rolled onto his side and hollered for Jacob to come see. The little boy, only three, was there in a flash. He was lying at Robert’s side, his face alight with wonder as he marveled at what his older brother had drawn.

Jacob was often a centerpiece in Robert’s art, although he was different in every piece. Often, Margaret would gaze down at a sketch and see Jacob playing with a ball, or perhaps he might be jumping rope. Once, Robert had even sketched an adult Jacob, a picture that the little boy loved so much that he insisted it be hung on his bedroom wall.

Margaret was leaning ever closer, trying to get a better view, when the picture changed. Robert’s hand was moving much more slowly, and the music was gone. There wasn’t even a dull, quiet beat emerging from the record player. Margaret straightened, and she turned around the room. The walls were

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bare, and the floor was even filthier. Everything seemed... gray.

She looked back, and Robert was still lying there, drawing.

She glanced at the picture, and there was Jacob again. Her youngest son was not happy in the picture. He wore a solemn expression, his eyes piercing right through the paper and into her mind. Trembling, Margaret turned and stumbled from the room.

Her cane clattered to the floor, and Margaret slumped against the wall. She brought a wrinkled hand to her mouth and fought to swallow air. Each shuddering breath, in and out, in and out, felt icy. She leaned there, her eyes closed, for a while. Margaret waited until she could breathe calmly, and her hands had warmed as best they could. With a great lack of enthusiasm, Margaret managed to kneel just enough to grasp the handle on her cane. Pressing it into the floor and heaving herself up again, she turned and continued to trudge down the hall. Her fingers trailed just behind her, their tips softly caressing the weathered wallpaper.

Turning into Amber’s room, Margaret nearly tripped over the pink, hideous rug that still covered the chunk of the floor where Frank had spilled brown paint just before Amber’s sixth birthday. She regained her footing and stepped further into the room until she was at the foot of her daughter’s bed.

Sitting, finally, Margaret let her cane fall to rest beside her.

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Wringing her hands, she carried her gaze through the room.

With each of Amber’s old possessions that her eyes found, from a green, plastic lamp, to the ancient collection of Boxcar Children novels shoved to the back of her shelf, Margaret was letting a daze settle over her.

She had first met Frank at seventeen, only a few years after she was finished with the children’s novels and the vibrantly colored furniture. Looking back to the door, she watched herself step into the bedroom. She was much younger, perhaps having just turned sixteen. No, this wasn’t her.

She had forgotten how much Frank thought Amber looked like her. Her daughter’s inky hair was twisted and wrapped into some sort of style on her head that Margaret had never found appealing, Amber’s choice in fashion being the only thing that really set their appearances apart. She slipped a handful of bracelets off her wrist and tossed them onto a wooden chair that wore several pieces from various outfits. There were even three pairs of shoes at the feet of the chair, although Margaret doubted that she was dressing the seat for the next school dance.

Amber was pacing back and forth across the room, biting her nails. The smallest of smiles tickled her mouth, and thin tendrils of hair coasted down to rest by her cheeks, which were blushing profusely. Margaret found herself smiling, and

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she opened her mouth to say something, but Amber no longer looked happy.

She had changed clothes into something far less exciting: a gray shirt and ill-fitting jeans. Clearly, she had not been concerned with her looks when she had dressed that morning. In fact, the tears that streamed from her eyes suggested that her thoughts had shifted. She made no move to wipe them away.

Suddenly, Amber halted, and she dashed to the closet beside her bed. She tore the door open and began to yank various items out. Shoes and shirts flew, boxes, both empty and full, following them. Finally, she found whatever it was that she so desperately needed.

Margaret stretched to look beyond her daughter. Below, Amber was flipping through a juvenile-looking scrapbook.

Margaret felt a twinge of familiarity at the sight of it. The book might have been something from when Amber was little. She had always been collecting photos and pasting them to pages, although Margaret had never been allowed to see them. Nobody had, but for the very first time, she was seeing what Amber had assembled.

In the book, between glitter and stickers and captions, Jacob was bursting with glee on every page. His smile couldn’t be escaped in the black and white photos. His third birthday party, his first Halloween, even a picture at a gas station,

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could be found inside Amber’s secret scrapbook. At the back of the book, on the very last page, Jacob’s smile was just as loud, contradicting the way his clothes hung loosely around his thin body.

It was all Margaret could handle. She rose again and nearly ran from the room, the fastest she had moved in months.

She ignored every creak, every aching joint, every scream from her bones as she fumbled from Amber’s room into the hallway. This time, she didn’t stop to catch her breath. Margaret ambled down a little further until she was standing in her bedroom.

She and Frank were asleep in the bed, and a storm ravaged the world outside. Lightning seemed to crack the sky open, and a sharp scream rang through the house. Jacob came rushing past Margaret, Amber close behind him. Even Robert was dashing in, and there they all were, hiding beneath the covers.

Frank was cuddling Jacob to try and calm him, and Amber clung to a younger Margaret. Robert tried to keep a calm demeanor, but even he let out a brief yelp when another strike of lightning boomed ominously.

Margaret vividly remembered their fear that night, the way that they shook until she had sung them all, even Frank, to sleep. In the morning, they had jostled her awake to come gawk at the fallen branches in the yard with them. Frank had

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spent the day collecting branches and twigs, and Jacob had gone splashing in the puddles on the sidewalk. Amber had helped her with dinner; it had been an enormous meal that day, and Robert drew in his notebooks in the living room.

Smiling, Margaret softly pulled the door shut behind herself as she made her way to the end of the hall. She faced the right side, the entry to Jacob’s room before her. She released a shuddering breath before forcing herself to enter. The room, decorated for a little boy fittingly, seemed to welcome her.

Margaret felt a warm wave rush to meet her, almost like Jacob was waiting there, his arms stretched wide for a hug. She could feel a quiet trickle of tears slipping from her eyes, but she didn’t swipe them away.

Across the room, Margaret sat by herself in a wooden rocking chair. She was leaning forward, and her shoulders furiously shook. Again, her hair, black as the night, was long, but it was tangled and knotted like it had never met a brush.

Margaret recognized the moment immediately.

Jacob had been gone for just over a week. The funeral had been two days prior, all the visits and apologetic phone calls had faded, leaving behind a silence that nothing, not even Margaret’s terrifying sobs, could fill. Those days had been the hardest, she remembered. An exchange of words in the house was rare. Robert was rarely home, and Amber would not leave

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her room. Even Frank had made himself scarce. Margaret had far too much free time then, often finding herself right back in the chair, crying until her eyes hurt.

Enough, she thought. Margaret exited the room, closing the door behind her. She could hear the tiny sobs that fought to fill the empty air, but she pushed away the sound. Instead, she focused on her cane, its frequent creaks filling her mind.

She padded to the top of the stairs where she paused. For a moment, she debated whether it would be worth it to venture back down for supper. She put a hand against the wall, her thoughts swirling with too many emotions and memories.

She pressed more weight onto the cane.

Margaret couldn’t resist the urge to gasp when she saw Jacob at the base of the stairs. It wasn’t Jacob as he had been in Robert’s drawings, in Amber’s photos, or even in her own memories. No, it was as if Jacob was really standing there.

“Jacob,” Margaret breathed. She didn’t notice the tears that showered her cheeks. The little boy smiled up at her and gestured for her to come to him. Nodding, she released the cane and moved eagerly, perhaps too eagerly, down the stairs. She reached out with both hands and pressed them flat against the walls to balance herself.

“Jacob,” she repeated. His smile grew.

When her foot first reached the floor, she thought that

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years must have passed. Not even the trip from her car to the house had felt as long as the walk down the stairs. She knelt in front of Jacob and reached out, pulling him into a hug that they both recognized, even decades later. A sob escaped from her lips, and she breathed in her son. “Let’s go, Mommy,� Jacob finally whispered to her.

Standing, Margaret took his hand, and they began to make their way to the front door. She paused for a moment, and Jacob looked up at her with a puzzled expression. She looked over her shoulder at the staircase, her gaze briefly meeting herself on the steps. A broken cane lay beside her, and one of her arms was twisted sharply to the side. She did not move, filling Margaret with a relief like no other.

She looked back to the door, and she and Jacob took the last steps to it. Letting him pull it open, they walked outside together barefoot. Although the sun had finished setting moments ago, it was breaking over the horizon as they made their way to the grassy yard that stretched to the street, Jacob only a few steps ahead. Bathing in the sunshine that no longer hurt, Margaret followed her son.

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Introduction Dear Reader, There is nothing permanent in a stormcloud.

Heavy rain can beat its way through shingles, and heavy snow can seal away the world, but the torrent itself can never last.

Storms end; snow melts; water sinks into the ground, and all that remains are rubble, memories, and petrichor.

Yet, despite their relative impermanence, storms make themselves remembered. A tree that loses a branch to the wind will never quite be the same, and a child will never forget the thrill of their first blizzard. Countless stories throw characters into storms for a thrilling climax, a moment of catharsis, because authors know that nothing and nobody comes out of a downpour in the same state they went in. The rain may save a farmer’s crops; the wind may destroy a family’s home. For better or worse, the air after a storm is different, and difference creates an opportunity to grow, to change, to move forward.

In this anthology, Iowa’s finest young writers have captured the feeling of every part of a storm. They live and create in a state that is more than familiar with the wild side of weather, and their collected writing presents the ups and downs, darkness and relief that weather conjures with a raw, firsthand point of view. Section Two is arranged to follow the path of the storm, through the wild confusion of the first cloudburst, the shuddering relief of the eye at the center, and the lung-twisting thrill of the return. The weather is presented as it comes, reminding readers that one must know the worst

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of the storm to see the purity of a clear sky. It is up to the reader to find their way out of the dark.

There is a unique and powerful emotion to be found in each piece of writing presented here—something that connects, if not to the physical storm itself, to the thrill of a storm’s emotion or the inescapable change it inflicts. The plotlines are peaceful and chaotic, simple and eventful, lines taking shape like lightning to strike down anything in their path with threatening cliffhangers, shocking stand-stills, and jaw-dropping endings.

Don’t forget your umbrella.

—Stella Tarlin & Lizzy Rioux, Managing Editors

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Part 2

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Transmutation A half-giant uses an umbrella to light a fire in the hearth.

A girl finds the wintry forest that lies at the back of a wardrobe. A hobbit is entrusted with a powerful ring. Iconic moments of fantasy tales we grew up with and look back on as defining moments of a genre. But what makes them so memorable? In short, the answer is change; everything changes forever for the main character, but what is possible in the world has also changed. Things are warped, different; the reader journeys along with the main character, just as in awe as they are as more and more of the strange and wonderful world is revealed. But the strength of fantasy isn’t only in the world, but in what it can reveal about its characters.

Fantasy is a word we all know, but few stories capture the essence of the word. It is a combination of wistfulness, a want to be there, and a specific mood of wonder and desire, all bundled up into one genre, one descriptor. Both of the stories ahead of this introduction do their part to capture fantasy and bring the reader along on an adventure that will change their mood to that one of wistful desire.

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In “The Witch’s Bird” by Jordan Collingwood, witches live in the depths of the city, a fearsome queen rules over them all, and Lux is honor-bound to serve her, though he has secrets of his own. The weight of the world is evident in the tense emotions of each scene, and it feels lived in, from the street under the bridge named Deadmouth to the Croakies, slang for whistleblowers that report to the Queen. No character is purely good or evil, and Lux’s inclination to serve the Queen despite her apparent authoritarianism, as well as his relationships with his mother, the Witch, and his younger brother paint a picture of an inexperienced yet determined protagonist.

“Twisted Trees” by Josie Hall is a short poem that reads like a lullaby and is reminiscent of the fairy tales told to children. The poem doesn’t stay too long on any imagery, but ghosts through them like the unnamed speaker rushes forward, creating movement through the piece. The enjambment is artfully done, maintaining a consistent tempo, and the poem ends without a period, as though the speaker has run out of breath, or perhaps something has happened. The “terrible twisted trees” add a sense of malice and danger to the whimsical poem.

Though connected by their fantastical nature, the poem and story both end on extremely different notes. The Witch’s

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Bird ends on a grounding note, on family and healing and the desire to see a loved one restored to health. “Twisted Trees” is simple but catching, capturing the essence of mystery and the protagonist’s journey, ending as quickly as it begins.

-Caylin Spillman and Cay Warner

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The Witch’s Bird Jordan Collingwood Every sound Lux made was too loud.

He splashed his face with cold water before he left the bathroom, turning the knob slowly so it didn’t creak. He walked past the room where his mother stood, edging along the wall to miss the floorboard he knew would groan under the weight of a feather. He knew this house so well, born in it nearly two decades ago. As he was sliding on his dark coat, his mother stalked into the room with her hands on her hips and her forehead wet with sweat.

“Luxling, where do you think you’re going?” She whispered, tossing a rag into the sink.

“I can’t be here right now, Ma. I’ll be back later. I’ll grab some food from the market while I’m out,” he answered, not looking her in the eyes as he reached for the doorknob to leave.

Her pale forearm flung out to stop him, and her small hand wrapped around his. He could feel all the callouses

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hidden on her palm, reminders of all the work she’d done for them. For him. All by herself.

“What if… what if it happens while you’re gone?”

Lux paused. He looked at her hand, grasped tightly around his, then up to her eyes, tears welling up in them. She was so scared.

He took her hands in his. “It won’t.”

Lux didn’t know exactly what he was looking for, but he knew what he had been ordered to do. He knew that Witches were said to have pale skin, fingernails like knives, and the eyes of a demon, but he also knew they were good at hiding, or at least the one the Queen was looking for was.

She had sent out guard after guard to ransack the city for this one, saying she knew the Witch was out there and that if she wasn’t captured someone would pay for it. She would hold an execution—of someone, anyone really—if she couldn’t find the Witch.

She’d say they failed as subjects, that some of the local folk weren’t helping to look for her because they wanted bloodshed, that there were “subjects” conspiring against her, and those were just the ones who knew they were in the Queen’s

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good graces. Hell on Earth for those who weren’t.

He weaved his way through the crowded street, waving off vendors stuffing their product in everyone’s faces. He tried to look in every shadow, down every alleyway he passed. Nothing.

Then he remembered: Deadmouth. The street below the old cobblestone bridge.

It was less of a street and more like the slums of the city where the people not spoken of spent their time. People just didn’t want to admit it was anything more than a single street, tarnishing the city name. Rumors were always swirling from the lips of the faeries in the high court about the poor and the filthy Witch apologists who dwelt in that small, neglected area. These denizens certainly were not in the Queen’s good graces, and The Court certainly didn’t want to acknowledge that they existed at all, save to blame most if not all of the kingdom’s troubles upon them.

The main street itself stretched so far into the darkness that only heaven knew what slinked down it, and even as he braced for “anything”, when he saw her, she was very much a surprise. Stories of covens among the cities of the kingdom were plentiful, but no one ever seemed to actually see a mem-

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ber of one, much less out in the open street like this, looking so… fitting. The stories made them sound like you could see them from miles away, but there she stood, right in the middle of one of the well-lit areas just beside a ramshackle pharmacy. He watched as a skinny man walked towards the pharmacy, clutching his stomach, his tongue lolling from his mouth, drool rolling down his chin as a groan escaped his lips. The Witch (she had to be) hobbled a few steps closer to the man before he made it to the door and touched his shoulder with the tips of her fingers, her other hand raising to her lips in a quieting gesture.

“They don’t sell what you need in there, my sweet,” she whispered.

Lux watched as she slipped a small vial into the man’s shirt pocket, patting it lightly. The man looked at her, gratitude in his eyes as he nodded, then stumbled back into the street.

“You are The Queen’s Man, you are The Queen’s Man,” he told himself as he approached the old woman, who seemed to melt back into the street’s shadows. He reached her just as she began eating a piece of bread from her satchel and, faking an air of authority, grabbed for the pouch from which she had produced the vial.

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She seemed completely unphased, even amused, as she snatched it from his grasp and said through a mouth full of bread, “Is there something I can assist you with, boy?”

He took a step back, sucking in a breath, trying to regain his authoritative posture. “I thought Witches didn’t need to eat.”

Her hazel eyes shone as if in a midday sun. The wrinkles around her eyes grew deeper as she looked at him, measuring, and took another bite of the bread.

“Is that really what you want from me? You came all the way over here to ask an old woman about that, eh? Anyways, I ain’t no Witch. 'M jus' old.” She continued to chew and turned from him, walking towards the east.

This wasn’t going the way it needed to go. He didn’t have time for games. “Stop!” he said, striding after her.

She turned and sneered at him, “I’m guessing what you want to know is if the tales are true. If there really is an old bat with The Shining Eyes skulking through the streets of your precious city, and right under the Queen’s pretty nose.”

The woman smiled, spitting at the cobblestone ground in front of him.

Lux stopped, eyeing the woman carefully. Indeed, her eyes

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blinked from left to right, a small strike of black in each stared back at him.

He gulped. “I suppose that’s right.”

Her eyes wrinkled with suspicion, as if she knew what he wanted but was waiting for him to ask the right questions to get it. She swung around again, making her way towards the south market.

As Lux stood looking after her, the woman yelled, still looking forward, “You gonna prod me some more, boy? Not in the middle of the market you ain’t. Y’ever heard of the Croakies? They’ll take any ol’ jabber they hear straight to the Queen. Follow me if ya want answers, don’t jus’ stand there lookin’ dumb.”

The old woman hobbled towards the alley, her walking stick clicking on the stones. He hesitated. Was she even a Witch?

He started to follow her between an old tavern and a brothel that stood with hardly a space between them. He watched her make her way through the stacks of boxes and trash that had been thrown out the windows of the two establishments, tiptoeing through as if she had every piece of rubble memorized.

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She stopped half-way through, reaching farther in her satchel than he thought was possible, and pulled out a dirty napkin that she cradled in her palm. She snapped her odd eyes towards Lux, squinting to see him in the darkness—or squinting at him as a warning; he wasn’t sure, but it made his insides roll.

Her nimble hands and sharp nails slowly, carefully, unwrapped the napkin to reveal a lump of feathers. Slowly, the feathers shook, the small pile quaking in her hands, and Lux stared so hard in the darkness that his vision started to blur.

Emerging from the pile of feathers was a very small hummingbird, morphing, from a minuscule piece of veiny flesh with tiny limbs, to a plump sea-green bird. It ruffled its new feathers.

The old Witch grunted in satisfaction, a small snarl like smile on her thin colorless lips.

“Good little bird,” she whispered, her bony finger raising up to caress the bird’s head. Her fingernails were shorn down to the cuticle. Lux stared in amazement. He’d seen plenty of magic, but this… rebirth… was unfamiliar.

“Close your mouth, boy. The taste of the moldy air isn’t a forgiving one.”

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Lux snapped his lips closed, swallowing the lump in his throat. He watched as she lifted her arms higher in the air to the top of a door he hadn’t noticed before. A bird’s nest lay atop the termite-ridden wood, leaning against the brick wall of the alleyway. She nudged the bird towards the nest, and it settled there like a missing puzzle piece. The bird, who had just finished cuddling itself into the dead grass of its bed, looked up to the sky in one sudden, jerky movement.

A garbled noise came from deep in its throat, and it coughed like a sick child; the noise so familiar to Lux it made him flinch.

Its mouth flew open as it wheezed some more, struggling against something coming up its small trachea. For a moment, he was back in that room, the smell of sickness as heavy as a wool blanket hanging in the air, and his hands began to shake.

Then the bird’s diminutive body started convulsing, pulling him back to the moment, as it pushed with all its strength to remove whatever lay inside it. He shoved his hands in his pockets.

Something long and shiny began to emerge from the bird’s throat with each heave, lengthening with each wave that passed through its body. There was a final shudder, and a

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long key was birthed from the hummingbird. Its beak opened so wide it split in two, and without the grace that it had in its arrival, the bird burst. The key clattered to the trash filled ground with a clash that reverberated through the quiet alleyway, the feathers of the bird slowly raining down with it.

The Witch leaned over and calmly picked up the key from the street, then began gathering up the feathers.

After the horrifying sight of where the old Witch hid her key, she invited him into her home, but before she opened the door, she made sure Lux knew she had known about the dagger that was sheathed at his back and promptly made him leave it tucked under the nearest trash heap.

Her home reeked of rotten apples and mothballs, but he didn’t mention it. She shuffled around a bit before looking over her shoulder at him, telling him to sit down.

He spent the night asking her every question he could think of, and she told him everything. How she—decades and decades after the last Witch was thought to be killed— was alive and breathing. How she had escaped the Queen, about her journey and her power and her love for the children in the city: the ones with broken wings and the orphans starv-

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ing alone on the streets, their parents working in the palace day and night. Only when his eyes started to droop and his head became heavy did he think to ask the most important question since their meeting.

“Why are you telling me all this? Why do you trust me with this type of information?”

The old woman hesitated, then smiled at him, one that looked almost kind, and said, “Because I know you work for the Queen.”

Lux stopped breathing.

He was fully awake now, her words snapping him out of his drowsiness.

“How…? Then why—” “Because I can see it in your eyes. Tonight, you are only dressed like you work for the Queen. Tonight, you work for someone else, and you won’t tell her anything.”

She lifted her what must now be lukewarm tea to her brittle lips, satisfied with her answer. Lux was not.

“Why wouldn’t I?” He got up from his place on her sunken couch and stepped backwards towards the door. He reached for his dagger, forgetting that he agreed to leave it outside.

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“You didn’t ask those questions for her. They were your questions. Would they be beneficial to her? Oh yes, tonight you don’t care about her, but someone much more immediate.”

Lux stood up straighter, remembering she was probably only a fairytale, and if indeed truly a Witch, she had no potion to work on him at the moment. He towered over her.

“How dare you say I don’t care about my Queen. She would cut out your tongue for such disrespect.” He lifted his chin, looking down on her.

“She would cut out my tongue for many things, boy,” the Witch countered with a chuckle, standing up while still clutching her tea, “Which is exactly why you won’t tell her anything. I know why you have come.”

A shiver traveled up Lux’s spine.

She was wearing his coat now. A shawl over her hair and colored glasses that covered her eyes. They were walking through the city now, but only down the alleyways and backstreets, and he knew exactly where they were headed. He had to get himself together and get control of this.

“How far away are we? These shoes weren’t made for long

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walks,” the Witch grumbled.

“We’re almost there,” he said, trying to sound as if he was the reason they had decided to make this trip. In just a few turns, they were back to his house. She shuffled up his wooden stairs and he opened the door, entering the kitchen first.

He looked around for his mother but didn’t see her. He ushered the Witch in, closing the door behind him. He brought her into the sitting room, where he saw his mother on her knees. Praying.

She looked up when they walked in, and her eyes widened when she saw the old woman with the Shining Eyes take off her glasses. She gasped, backed away, and reached for her holy book.

“Lux, what have you—” “It’s okay Ma, she’s here to help.”

Was she?

“She’s one of, of, of, THEM!” the last word a shriek of anger and fear. “You’ve brought one of them here, you, a good Man of the Queen! Do you know what these people are?”

The old woman said nothing, merely standing as the object of the mother’s fear and dread.

“Mother, please, just listen. . . .”

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His mother protested, sobbed, and objected. She appealed to Lux’s reason, his faith, and his standing as a Man of the Queen. She produced all forms of vile slurs used to characterize Witches which stunned Lux to hear, and all the while the old woman stood and said nothing, eyes sparkling in the dusky light.

At last his mother relented, and they made their way to the room off of the kitchen. Tommy lay on his twin bed in the corner of the room. He looked as tiny and as fragile as the Witch’s doomed bird. His olive skin was turning blue, and his eyes gray. The air felt suffocating. He was tossing and turning, the sickness roiling through his mind, and his arms hung at his sides as he looked at where Lux stood by his side. Tommy moved his lips to say something, but nothing but breath came out. Lux kneeled next to his eight-year-old brother lying on the same blue comforter he always had. He put his hand to Tommy’s clammy face.

“It’s okay now, Tom. Help has come.”

Lux kissed his forehead gently and stepped away from him, placing an arm around his silently praying mother.

The Witch stepped up to the small boy in pajamas and put her hands on his head. “This will hurt a small bit, child, but

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you’re going to be just fine.”

She reached into her pouch and produced a small pile of feathers.

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Twisted Trees Josie Hall Out the door and Through the garden Flying through dandelion seeds Around the fountain and Under the bridge, Water splashing at my knees.

Up the hill and Into the woods To see the terrible twisted trees

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Fragility Fragility is both a source of fear and an expression of strength. We constantly look with uncertainty to what the future will throw at us; we can only hope that we’ve done enough to meet the coming challenges with grace. Especially as young people, the future seems to present endless possibilities, even while we fear losing what we have now. In this section, we bring you an essay and a poem, “Life in a Flash”

by Abby Koeneke and “Innocence” by Elle Polman. Each of these pieces concern the fragility and precariousness that define our lives. They make the claim that what is most important to us—love, beauty, connection—is no more essential than it is volatile.

In her essay “Life in a Flash,” Koeneke gives us a narrative of an unexpected disaster that nearly rips away everything familiar to her. She meditates on life’s unforeseeability and the swiftness with which mere accident can become tragedy. Ultimately, her reminder to the reader is to treat each moment with care because it is impossible to know what will happen in the next. Polman writes in “Innocence” of the depression

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that comes after misfortune steals away innocence. Youth blooms at the beginning of her poem before it is stripped away by the end, reminding us all of the desolation of first recognizing misery in the world.

Youth’s fragility and self-doubt runs throughout each of the three pieces in this section. Koeneke and Polman each illuminate an aspect of the universal fear held in the hearts of young people encountering the world—how will I stand up to what’s coming, when I cannot know what it will be? Like a summer thunderstorm, abrupt and savage, the trials and tribulations we all encounter pursue us without warning. These pieces are a testament to the youthful and human concern with our own delicate state and the caprice of chance.

-Kaylin Butterfield and Danica Merrill

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Life in a Flash Abby Koeneke Being out of control sent me into a panic. No matter which way I turned the wheel, I couldn’t correct the slide.

The ice under the tires was unforgiving as I smashed into the side of the semi-trailer and rolled my car twice into the ditch.

The airbags deployed and the windows were shattered as they came into contact with the ground and the glass slashed into the back of my head. The operator of the trailer pulled over, along with nine other cars to see if I was okay.

A man found me first. He addressed me by asking if I was okay, but in a concussed state, I had no idea what had just happened. Earlier that morning I had dropped off my younger brother’s sneakers that he left in my car. When I was addressed by multiple witnesses, I mixed up the events of taking my brother’s shoes to him with him being in my car. I kept telling everyone that my brother was in the car with me and that I couldn’t find him leading to everyone looking for my eight-year-old brother in the ditch among all the debris from the crash.

I called my mother before anyone else. She told me I

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wasn’t making any sense. A few seconds later the first person on scene took my phone and told my mom what had happened. He dialed 911 on my phone afterwards, and I heard him explain that there was blood covering my face and I looked like I wasn’t in very good condition. There was an ambulance within minutes, and I was rushed to Blank Children’s Hospital in Des Moines. My parents met me there in a separate car.

The first thing I remember from the whole incident was being in the hospital and my boyfriend and his dad walking through the door. I repeated questions such as: What happened? How long have I been here? Where is Dad? Turns out he had been there the whole time, but I kept forgetting. The doctor came in and asked me what day, year, and month it was. He asked my name, how old I was, and more questions that I can no longer recall. Once I was able to actually keep a conversation going without forgetting what I was talking about halfway through, I visited with my family, and asked a few more times what had happened. My boyfriend arrived at 1pm, having left school early, and stayed until around 8pm.

He sat on my hospital bed with me while we played Call of Duty on our phones together, and our walk to the vending machines was the best part of my hospital visit.

I spent the night in the hospital. I can’t remember if either

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of my parents or my grandma stayed, but I remember the staff of the hospital waking me up constantly throughout the night to check my vitals and ask me the same questions as before to make sure I was healing okay. I left with a concussion and a non-threatening small cut on the back of my head which caused the amount of blood on my face at the scene of the accident. The next day around 3pm, I grabbed all of my bloodstained coat and other things that were left in my totaled car.

As my dad was driving me home, I realized no matter how much I believed that tragedies such as car accidents would never happen to me, it did. I believed disasters and misfortunes like these only happened to other people, but before I knew it, my life could have ended. That morning was as regular as any other morning, and I never expected I’d be in the hospital that day. I learned to appreciate my loved ones more than I ever had and to never take time with them for granted.

I began to make sure I always said, “I love you,” at the end of calls, and to never leave home angry at my family—because I never knew when the last time I’d see them would be.

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Innocence Elle Polman Sunlight caresses the outer petals of a rose vibrant and fair The warm breeze sways it back and forth as it begins to bloom So beautifully bright and full of life Healthy and happy and free as can be Violent weather comes leaving the rose impaired Now damaged and frail and purposeless The bright rose

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no longer full of life No longer caressed and no longer safe nor beautiful Left without liveliness to embrace Left to have the petals fall to understanding To have the innocence of beauty be stripped and used

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Rising Gusts “How We Have Fallen” by Courtney Rhinehardt and “Halfway Home” by Maddie Alke both use masterful command of language to explore the themes of hidden feelings and the emotional struggle of concealing feelings.

They ask us to step away from the storm and instead focus on how our experiences have affected us.

“How We Have Fallen” launches readers into the world of Quinn and Isaac, two childhood friends torn apart and thrown back together again. Isaac becomes a storm chaser as he confronts Quinn, and Quinn, still ravaging the world, shows Isaac the destructive force he really is by leaving behind scenes of an almost mindless slaughter. Quinn and Isaac dance around each other, both boys wanting to say more, do more, but unable to find footing as the world continues while they seem stuck in place.

“Halfway Home” is a poem that examines the slow build up of love as the narrator slowly learns to let others in and embrace the support and trust this new person is

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willing to give. There is a recognition that love takes time, and homes need foundation- whether a birdhouse or a real home. The storm within the narrator gradually lessens as the poem continues and the narrator’s feelings are reciprocated.

Both story and poem challenges readers to be honest and reconsider their outlook on life. Our authors delve into their narrator’s psyche and explore how they ended up in the situation the readers find them in, and leaves readers wondering about their own lives, friends, and loves.

—Jessica Bilak and Brittany Kelly

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How We Have Fallen Courtney Rhinehardt The odious darkness consumed the remaining light from the cold, stone walls. Shadows hung lazily in the corners, seeming to expand with each passing second. They clung to the narrow corridor with an almost pious determination. It was almost impossible to see very far with the normal, human eye, but it never bothered Quinn. He had honed those skills after years of living on the streets.

Quinn strolled down the corridor, bolstering his black messenger bag higher on his shoulder, ignoring how his bones ached with the motion. He ignored the bruises blossoming on his skin from the fight he had escaped from just hours ago. He ignored the blatant, cruel words that reverberated through his pounding skull with each resounding step he took. Quinn had a goal that he would see through with a stubborn fidelity.

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The corridor abruptly opened up into a lackluster, square room that was various shades of the same stonegray. A balcony ran around the entire space above his head, nearly hidden within the shadows. The only source of light was emitted from a filthy glass dome about fifty feet up from where Quinn stood on the ground level.

Evening sunlight trickled in from between the dirt and shattered glass, but even it wasn’t enough to properly illuminate the dilapidated room.

Quinn slowed to a stop when he reached the center, allowing the bag to slip onto the dusty concrete floor. He had been well aware of the brusque footsteps that had been chasing after him since he entered the desolate warehouse only a handful of minutes prior. He never confronted them. Instead, he preferred to goad the unfortunate soul into following him so they’d have a chance to speak alone, without tedious interruptions.

It was only when those familiar footsteps ceased that Quinn turned around to face the one who had been stalking him.

Another boy around Quinn’s age, with a precocious

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glimmer in his copper-colored eyes and spiky blond hair stood, huffing, only a few meters away. Quinn could tell he was a few inches taller even though the boy was bent over his knees, slightly bulkier, and more comfortable in his skin than Quinn would ever be. The boy’s jaw was sharp with a darkening bruise blooming across his tanned skin. It was the only thing to destroy his perfect, picturesque figure. The bruise plus the fiery anger boiling in those metallic eyes that burned into Quinn’s.

Quinn tempered the panic rising into his throat, blanketing it with indifference and a sickening sweetness that rotted his teeth.

“Isaac!” he mused, throwing his arms out in a wide gesture as if to hug the boy in front of him. The falsified zeal in his voice seemed to deter Isaac from coming any closer, but it did nothing to quell the rage permeating from his childhood friend. “It’s been awhile! How have you been?”

Isaac growled, standing up straighter as his breath returned to him.

“Cut the act already,” he spat, his harsh voice dripping venom. Even from where he stood, Quinn heard Issac’s

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knuckles crack as he curled them into tight fists. “I’m not an idiot, you psycho.”

Quinn’s smile faltered, cracks appearing on the surface to reveal the emotions beneath. There was rage, but it was nothing like Isaac’s. Isaac wore his like one would wear clothes, naturally, like it was a normal occurrence that hid no ulterior motives. Yet, his rage was boiling, a fiery ball of vicious flames that decimated everything in its path without mercy or question. It poured from the boy with an almost-palpable inferno quality that discouraged anyone from getting too close in fear of being burned.

Though they had grown up together, Quinn was nothing like Isaac when it came to his anger. Where Isaac was infamous for his blazing heat, Quinn was cold, bitter.

Ice coated his invulnerable heart like armor, turning his emerald green eyes frostbitten. His fury was quiet, simmering, but above all else, patient. It waited for the perfect moment to strike, and when it did, it went for the throat.

Some of that silent, icy wrath was seeping from the cracks in his friendly facade.

“That was disappointingly prosaic,” Quinn lament-

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ed dramatically, his bottom lip trembling in a pout that might have been believable had Isaac not known the truth. The cracks were softly mending, but it was too late.

Once it had been released it was extremely irritating and difficult to pull it all back in. “That line was so ordinary, so cliche! Calling me a ‘psycho’? Seriously? Where’s your sense of imagination? Did I hit your head so hard you lost it?” He paused for a moment as though to allow the other boy to answer, but quickly filled the empty air with more pointless words. “Aw, I’m sorry, Zac, but at least you still have your looks; it’s really the only thing going for you.

Though with that bruise, you may not even have that. . . oops.”

Isaac hissed in response, taking a threatening step forward. Quinn’s presumptuous behavior was finally striking a nerve. A sort of twisted, hedonistic grin split across Quinn’s bloodied face, seeing his friend squirm beneath his gaze. He distantly recalled the times when these situations were reversed, when Quinn was the one flinching at every sideways glare offered by his childhood friend. Now that everything was backwards, Quinn couldn’t help but

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feel overjoyed.

The thought of tormenting someone who once tormented you was the secret, guilty dream that everyone had at one point in their lives. Quinn just never thought that he’d get the chance to act upon it. It regaled him to no end.

“Why did you do it?” Isaac wondered aloud, more to himself than to Quinn, as if the answer was lying in front of his very eyes, but he was unable to decipher it. The rage still existed on his face, in his voice, but had quelled to a more socially acceptable level.

Quinn cocked his head like a confused puppy. “Why, what?” he drawled, his words slow and enunciated. “Why did I fight with you? Why did I betray your precious trust? Why did I beat those guys half to death? Why, what, Isaac?”

The boy in question stomped up to Quinn, grabbing fistfuls of his ripped, blood-stained shirt.

“I don’t care about your little outbursts,” Isaac snarled, sounding more animalistic than human. “I don’t care if you’ve become a lying scumbag. I don’t care if you sent

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four of our classmates to the hospital. I don’t even care that one of them is paralyzed from the waist down. I want to know why. Why are you vilifying yourself ? What do you hope to achieve?”

For a moment, there was only silence. A cold, deafening silence slithered down Isaac’s spine like a dozen, grating claws of the monsters that he had so desperately believed vanished. The monsters that whispered in the back of his mind seemed to take an incarnate form before him, choking away any more harsh words that he wanted to spit from his toxic lips.

“So cruel, Isaac,” Quinn hummed, his green eyes seeming to glow with an incorrigible desire to rip the world around him apart, piece by crumbling piece. “I knew you were loud and obnoxious, but I never would have expected you to be so completely heartless as well. Didn’t your mother ever teach you that you should care about your friends while you still have them?”

Isaac violently tugged Quinn forward until he could clearly see the traces of dried blood around his nostrils from a fight he knew Quinn could never win without a

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sacrifice. Yet, somehow, despite all odds stacked against him, Quinn still managed to beat four people without so much as a stick to defend himself.

“Shut up and answer my question before I knock your stupid teeth in.”

Quinn bared his pearly whites in a sickening grin as if to tempt Isaac into doing something that neither of them would ever regret, or perhaps he just wanted Isaac to sink down to his lonely level so he might finally have some company in the darkness where he resided. One could never tell when it came to Quinn.

Isaac didn’t know why he was suddenly reminded of the old days when he saw that horrifying expression on Quinn’s face. When they were younger, Quinn’s smile had been so obnoxiously bright and genuine that Isaac was tempted to punch the boy in the face to see if it still had the same effect while bloodied. Back then, Quinn smiled simply because he was wrapped in a joy and warmth that, somehow, only he could possess. Isaac had always wondered how his childhood friend could be so happy, despite all the terrible things that life threw his way. How could

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one look like that when they had lost everything?

Distantly, Isaac wondered when those times had become the ‘old days’.

“I embroiled myself into quite a troubling little argument,” he stated, after a moment of hesitation.

The falsified brightness faded from his expression like water slipping through the cracks between one’s fingers.

For the first time since Isaac had met the boy, years ago when they were still too young to comprehend cruelty and unfairness that enveloped the world like a thick, suffocating blanket, he saw the cold consume Quinn’s comforting, familiar facade. Even if it was all an act, even if it was all a lie, the fact that it had dissipated as though it was no longer worth keeping around tore something in Isaac’s chest.

Isaac shook his head, clenching his jaw. “What happened?”

Quinn blinked slowly, as if processing the words that Isaac barely managed to eject from his tightening throat.

“Someone once tried to convince me that this world’s posterity deserved to be salvaged,” Quinn murmured, a particular tiredness that did not come from just a few days

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of sleeplessness weighed heavily on his thin, bruised shoulders. Shadows draped across his pale face like curtains, concealing whatever was left within his weary, hopeless mind. It had been haunting him for longer than he would ever care to admit, but Quinn had always been annoyingly determined and stubborn. “They tried to convince me that the future would be a brighter, happier place where monsters didn’t exist and darkness didn’t lurk behind every smile. I tried my best to believe them. I really did.

However, I know optimistic lies when I see them; people have been spouting them at me since my parents were killed. I knew they were wrong. So, I took it upon myself to convince them that their vision was nothing more than an idiotic dream of an hopeful child.”

Isaac froze, his feet rooted to the floor. There was something in his childhood friend’s voice, something that didn’t belong to a seventeen-year-old boy with an entire life ahead of him. It was an eerie calmness that seemed to devour the life from his poor, tainted soul.

How could he not have seen it? Isaac knew that things had been distant between them for the past few months,

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but it wasn’t like they had entirely cut contact. They still talked; they still laughed together and hung out during the weekends when neither of them were too busy. How could Isaac possibly miss the way his friend was falling, slipping beneath the bitter waves that crashed around him? How did he miss the demons looming over his friend?

“You nearly killed four people, paralyzed one of them,” Isaac whispered, his hands sliding from Quinn’s shirt to rest on his shoulders, “just to prove a point?”

“No,” Quinn sighed, his eyelids fluttering, “I nearly killed four people because I was bored, and they were frustratingly stupid. I crushed a guy’s skull against a brick wall to prove a point. Though it’s not like he’s around to see what that ‘point’ is anymore. He didn’t last long enough to see much of my side of the argument.”

Isaac stumbled away from him, his coppery eyes as wide as dinner plates.

“You . . . you killed . . . ” His voice trailed off, unable to continue with the thought. It was impossible. Quinn was many things: manipulative, calculative, intelligent beyond

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compare, and an excellent liar, but he was no killer. Yes, he had been hurt before, hurt in ways that would shatter the average soul, but he had always managed to push through it all with a smile. Isaac knew that smile was fake for a very long time, but he never liked to acknowledge that little fact.

Quinn could never murder someone, even at his lowest point. Yet, Isaac knew that he probably never had the misfortune of witnessing his friend’s ‘lowest point’, whether that be because Quinn had yet to reach that far or because Isaac was hopelessly blind, he didn’t know..

Quinn saw the turmoil whirling behind Isaac’s eyes, and for the smallest moment, he wanted nothing more than to fade away like the shadows that haunted him in the sunlight.

“Do you think that I deserve to be saved now, Isaac?

Quinn had a goal that he wanted to see through to the very end, wherever the end may lead him. He knew he wouldn’t fail. He wouldn’t fail because in the most important ways, he had already succeeded.

The horror in Isaac’s eyes was all the proof he needed.

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Halfway Home Kyrah Sissel Me as a bird sits alone in my Dark and empty birdhouse, Waiting patiently for someone to bring Warmth and comfort To my halfway home.

Years pass and some birds visit my home, But they never stay for long.

I soon lose hope of ever really Being home.

I start to think all birds are the same, And my door slowly closes, So no one may enter. Now I am all alone, And my heart is cold In my halfway home.

One day I am living my normal routine When I hear a slight knocking at my door.

I am hesitant to let this stranger in,

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How do I know for sure?

Despite all my worries, I take the risk to find a real home.

You fly through my open door and start to look around.

You're awed by my outside trinkets But shiver when you look further.

You haven’t flown away and the more you stay, The more beautiful your feathers seem.

Time passes and you still haven’t flown north.

My birdhouse starts to lighten up, And the fireplace is roaring.

With this sight and your warm embrace, My heart starts to pound.

Against my chest, my tiny heart is screaming, Begging to be let out.

My brain denies the heart’s right To speak.

Both my mind and my heart are fighting, But for two different things.

One howls, “Say it!”

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The other screams, “Don’t risk it!”

They’re about to make the decision for me.

I can hear the deafening sound Of my heart weeping.

But between the heart’s gasps I hear Myself Starting to release the words.

I can’t resist your glowing smile.

“I love you,” I finally hear the words, But they didn’t come from me, for once.

There it is, it’s there at last, The beautiful, overwhelming, and lamenting sight, Of my real home, sweet home.

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Funnel High Enter into a wave of anxiety—emotions are running high, fear and excitement crashing against one another until your fingertips are shaking with overwrought feelings. Fingers are interlaced, gripping hard and twisting in an effort to stay grounded, to put a lid on those emotions. Only now, sweatslicked palms make the tight finger grip slip and the speaker is left in the eye of the storm, stuck.

Nonfiction Writer Emma Conley submitted a story that brought us back to our high school days—you know the ones. The days where you stayed up until 2 a.m. for the release of your favorite artist’s album and listened to it three times through before going to bed at 5 a.m., only to wake up at 6 for school. The days where you straight binge-watched an entire season of your favorite show before tweeting out your review, freaking out over plot twists on your fan account.

Conley takes the reader on a journey back to high school where the only thing that got you through the seven hours of English, trigonometry, biology, P.E., and electives you didn’t even really like was your idol and the art they made. What’s

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special about Conley’s piece, though, is that she takes you through the narrative of meeting an idol, forcing the reader to dive headfirst into the emotional current of the piece and the experience itself. Her use of imagery and introspection throughout the text allows the reader a window inside the experience of meeting an idol. It’s an intensely intimate thing to share: an episode so special that it will bring you back to your fangirl days where you read fanfiction and ran tumblr blogs.

Poet Kyrah Sissel is both in the storm and watching it from the outside. In her poem, “Family,” the reader watches the upending of a world: tree branches ripped “limb from limb,” vacant streets threatened by the sweeping in of rain, buildings and houses, gone. We watch a world in flux, like a teeter totter nearly “thrown off balance,” and we wonder if the speaker stands in the same place as us, or if we are watching a storm they’re caught entirely inside of.

Like any storm, the poem follows a familiar trajectory: things will get worse before they get better. Sissel, instead of shying away from this familiar path, leans into it wholeheartedly. The result is twofold, the inner-workings of the poem opposite and yet parallel. Sissel doesn’t give us the image of flooded streets without, first, the “vacant streets.” She doesn’t give us the sky without simultaneously giving us “the Underworld.” There is a world inside of “Family,” carefully balanced,

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and it’s unsurprising, given the meticulous construction of destruction right up next to calm. This isn’t simply a meditation on equilibrium, though. Sissel upends any chance of it halfway through: yes, whatever it is that may “teeter back and forth” may also be “thrown off balance/… may cause deadly wars,” but the speaker quickly revises: “it will never break.” In the end, we aren’t given trees reconstructed, or streets swept clean of water and debris–but we still imagine a world mended. Sissel makes sure we don’t forget: “And that is enough.”

Flip the page and be swept into the emotional currents that are Emma Conley’s “The Terrifying Feat of Meeting an Idol” and Kyrah Sissel’s “Family.” These writers will take you on a wild ride into the funnel of a storm—one that’s anxious, brewing with fear and excitement, the strong bond of family—before leaving you in the eye of it.

—Nichole Shaw and Ellie Zupancic

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The Terrifying Feat of Meeting an Idol Emma Conley “Hello! My name is Emma and I love Supernatural.”

That is how my friends would describe the way I meet new people. I am not ashamed to admit, it is pretty accurate. Most people who know me know that I seriously, seriously, adore the CW show, Supernatural, and idolize one of the main actors, Jared Padalecki, who plays Sam Winchester. What most do not know, however, is the 'why' behind my adoration of this far from ordinary show.

I deal with some pretty bad anxiety and borderline major depression. I sometimes have an idea of when a little ‘episode’ or wave of anxiety and depression will come, but usually it comes with no forewarning, even when I’m having fun with friends. Supernatural helped me with the pain and loneliness I felt. Imagine how amazing it was when I learned Jared Padalecki himself struggled with both anxiety and depression.

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Well, the fact he had to deal with them was not amazing, but knowing he understood what it was like to deal with them and launching multiple campaigns for mental health awareness helped, to say the least.

For almost two years, I believed I would never be able to meet him in person and tell him what he did for me—someone he never met before. Do not go thinking that stopped me from dreaming. I definitely dreamed, and prayed. One day while searching around the internet, I discovered Creation Entertainment conventions that entirely center around Supernatural . These conventions are a giant part of the fandom. At every convention, they have actors from the show; some go to as many as they can, others, just a few. The ones that do make it are not only the small, minor characters. Jared Padalecki and Jensen Ackles try to make it to every single convention.

In 2018, they had 16 conventions.

My eye was caught on the August 17-19, 2018 convention in Denver, Colorado. I spent hours watching videos, trying to find the best tickets and figuring out how exactly the conventions work. After school every day, I would check to see if the Silver Passes were released for purchase. They were the ones I believed gave you the best for your money while still being

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able to get Jared and Jensen’s autographs, whose were only available for Gold and Silver passes. I knew that the Silver Passes sold out fast, as they were and still are the most popular. As soon as I got the email announcing they were available, I talked to my mom.

If I knew the exact prices for tickets, I would have a better chance of the answer being yes, but it was still a long shot and I did not want to get my hopes too high. A couple weeks passed, and I started to worry that they would sell out. One day at school, I checked the tickets to see how many were left.

Eight. Four pairs of two. When I checked later that day, four were sold. Immediately I texted my mom and dad, sending them the link to purchase the tickets, along with a little plea from me. Okay, it might have been more than a little.

I think they knew how much I wanted this. My mom answered me, saying that if I smiled the whole time during my dance—something I struggled with—that night, she would get two tickets. Trying to calm my breathing, I promised myself I would smile like I have never smiled before.

That smile never once broke on my face. The competition started late, which meant it ended late, in this case after midnight. Everyone was exhausted. When we got in the car,

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I pulled my phone out and checked the tickets—two of the four left were sold, and the last two were on opposite sides of the convention. My heart broke, I would never be able to go by myself. This was supposed to be the perfect timing, but it was too late.

Defeated, I said, “Forget about the tickets, they’re sold out.”

My parents exchanged a look, and I knew something was up.

“Do you want to tell her?” My dad asked my mom with a stupid smile that stretched ear to ear.

Continuously, I kept asking what they were talking about.

Then that glorious moment happened.

“Emma,” my mom said excitedly, “we bought the tickets.”

I thought I would have been more ecstatic as soon as the words hit my ears. Instead, I probably had a dumbfounded look plastered on my face.

Between the two of them, they told me the story. When I had texted them, my dad had called my mom and they debated it. My dad told my mom that he thought I deserved to be able to see them in person. I do not know the exact conversation, but I got the point. Mom had purchased two Silver Pass-

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es, one for me and her for the weekend, and two general day passes for my brother and dad on Sunday. Of course, I had a huge grin on my face and I forgot it was after midnight. All I could think was that I was going to see Jared Padalecki IN person. As any starstruck teen would do, I texted my friends immediately.

Once the excitement died down, my usual worries came running back. Why did I have to ask for tickets? Now I’m actually going to have to follow through. What if I don’t belong or go too far out of my comfort zone? What if I freeze when I see them in person? Oh god, what if I go all physco-fangirl on them?

What if it isn’t everything I’ve imagined? For four months over the summer, I worried and dug myself deeper into a terrible hole.

We had decided to drive to Colorado. Flying would cost too much and driving would give us a chance to stop and have some fun along the way. The Tuesday before the convention, we headed out. I put the printed out tickets in a new, nice, and clean folder and checked them every time we got in and out of the car, scared they would be gone or ripped. I’m glad to say, they were perfectly safe, thanks to my constant checking.

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Thursday night we checked into the hotel. By the time we got there, there was already a long line for pre-registration.

Gold passes had an earlier pre-registration than Silver, but my mom said it did not matter and wanted to get in line anyway.

That worried me. I did not want to get up there only to have them send us to the back. She saw the scared look on my face, and I think it was pretty bad—bad enough that she suggested we go over to the restaurant and have some drinks as we waited.

My mom suggested I try a Virgin Daiquiri, but when we asked, they said they did not offer virgin drinks. So, I ordered a Shirley Temple. I watched the ice move around as I moved my straw around, waiting. Eventually, my dad and brother joined us. When I finished my drink and mom finished hers, we got in line. My hands were shaking from nerves, and I was shifting my body from one foot to the other. This is it.

We were given two lanyards with our seats written on them, M33 and M34. Somehow, and I still do not know how, I had convinced my mom to pay half the price for the photo with Jared Padalecki. I would pay the other. My worry was they had sold out of Jared photo ops. Thankfully, they did not, and I got my ticket, putting it safely in my folder. All I

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could think was how nervous and terrified I was to meet him.

I certainly voiced it enough.

The convention went smoothly, I got up and asked a few questions, even participated in the trivia on stage in front of the whole crowd. That was scary. It came down to me and another girl on stage. We were back-to-back, so we could not see each other’s answers. I ended up messing up and got second.

Then it was show time: my photo with Jared. My dad wanted to go with me, so together, we walked to the photo area and stood in line. The line went past where backstage was, so sometimes you would have to pause before you go into the room the photos were in. We were the first to be stopped and guess who walked by to get to the stage? Jensen Ackles.

I did not realize it was him at first because silly me had been looking at the lady in front of him. I thought she was a fan, and I was there wondering, why was a fan going backstage?

Turns out she worked for Creation Entertainment and was leading Jensen backstage. It was not until the lady in charge of my line said, “good job not freaking out,” did I realize that it was Jensen Ackles who just walked by. Like anyone would, I felt like an idiot.

She told us to head on in, and I asked my dad to set my

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bag on the table they provided. I did not want to lose my spot in line.

“Is this your first time?” the person in front of me asked.

“Uh—yeah,” I said nervously.

“Well, his hugs are pretty amazing.” That is what I had heard and that is exactly what I was planning to ask for.

The closer we got to the front, the more scared I got. My dad, when we were a few people away, had gone to stand on the other side so he could meet me when I was done.

It was my turn. Walking up to this 6’4” giant, I asked him for a hug in my tiny voice, made even more quiet by the music in the room. He bent down and wrapped his arms around me.

In a totally-not-weird way, it was heaven. The photographer had to fix something on his camera, and I got a bit of a longer hug from Jared. Those few extra seconds made me so, to say the least, happy and satisfied. My dad told me I was glowing when I met up with him later and I had no doubt about it. I could feel myself shining.

The rest of the day went as smoothly as the rest of the convention; I saw Jared and Jensen have their panel, lemons were being praised, and the person behind me had bought a poster for $1050 at the auction. That night, we had our com-

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plimentary Jared and Jensen autographs. There was so much I wanted to tell Jared, and I was worried we would not have enough time. That’s when Mom came up with the idea that we should try to be the last people in line.

From previous nights, we knew that the autographs would run into the late night. We waited in our hotel room until around 9:30, then went back downstairs. Instead of going when our row was called, we waited until the last row left, and then we got in line. It kind of worked. We were the second to last person, and I had plenty of time to say what I needed to.

I was freaking out, but at the same time, I was strangely calm. Remember to breathe, Emma. Take a deep breath, and, “Hey, my name is Emma.” Here is where I probably laughed from nerves. “I loved your chapter in Family Don’t End With Blood. The part about writing ‘Always Keep Fighting’ on your arm,” and here is where I pointed to my arm, “really hit me, and I’ve started doing it, and it has really helped.” I was mentioning his story of having a huge panic and depressive attack in Europe. He chose to fly back to the United States instead of ending his life right then and there. On the plane, he grabbed a pen and wrote AKF along his arm to calm his anxiety (You can read his chapter in Family Don’t End With

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Blood: Cast and Fans on How Supernatural Has Changed Lives).

He held his hand out for a high five, thanking me and telling me to always keep fighting. Then I started on the weird thing.

“Also, me and my friend, Ronnie, have a silly tradition of wearing the same supernatural shirt on Tuesdays,” Guess where I pointed; to my shirt, because, of course, I was wearing it. “It has brought us closer as friends.”

That earned me another high five. He said a few things, then told me “Tell Ronnie I’m excited to meet her.” Which, of course, I told her as soon as we left.

Before we left the room, my mom quickly told him that she loved him in Gilmore Girls. Cliff, his bodyguard asked, “You were in Gilmore Girls?” I laughed.

When we got back to our room, I realized that I had no reason to worry. After all, they are just humans like me. The only difference is they are on television. It was an amazing experience I will never forget, nor would I ever want to.

Thinking about the best weekend I had in a long time, I lay on the bed with my photo next to me and watched The Impractical Jokers with my brother.

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Family Kyrah Sissel The wind was ripping the trees limb from limb The sky was as dark as the Underworld The rain poured in and flooded the vacant streets Someone had angered him The waves were crashing harder and harder against these buildings once thought to be unbreakable These buildings, these houses, which meant so much to these people, Were gone Although, no matter the force he brings up from the sea He could never break it It is unbreakable It may teeter back and forth It may be thrown off balance But it will never break It may be fought over It may cause deadly wars

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And it will definitely hurt But it will never break No god or goddess, no princess nor king Will ever break the bond that is family Their houses may be gone They may have nothing left But they will always have each other And that is enough

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The Eye of the Storm The eye of the storm is the calmest place in a tornado or hurricane. As chaos ensues all around, the eye remains still, unbothered by the surrounding destruction and high-speed winds. This section includes “Coffee Bliss” by Autumn Stanley and “Beyond” by Naylea Verdinez which mirror the feeling of being momentarily placed in the eye of a storm. The reader is taken from a land of heightened anxiety, doubt, fear, — all emotions which create chaos in life — to a place where they can simply exist, even if just for a moment. The eye of a storm is not a large place. It is small, concentrated, and allows for a breath or two of air, much like these pieces offer for the reader.

“Coffee Bliss” by Autumn Stanley takes the reader on a journey through a groggy, quaint trip to the coffee shop.

Within its lines, Stanley explores the limits of acknowledging the scene while finding a way to indulge the reader on a personal journey with the narrator. This piece exposes the tranquility of self-indulgence. It allows the reader to let go, to be in this very intimate and private moment, and to flash

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awareness to the chaos swirling around them.

“Beyond” by Naylea Verdinez is a poem that invites the reader into the narrator’s eyes, a key to their soul. Verdinez plays with bodily and natural comparisons throughout the piece, building on the imagery within the lines. The narrator’s eye parallels the eye of the storm, an escape from reality, a break from the negative surrounding confines. Veering from sadness and surrounding turmoil, happy and timeless images of clouds and a night sky appear in this piece as an outlet. The comfort of the unknown provides solace in this piece, much like the eye of the storm offers a moment of relief as well.

Although both of these pieces are centered around an escape from reality, they also remind readers that these quaint moments cannot last forever. In “Coffee Bliss," the narrator acknowledges the return to the world around them at the end. Yet, for just a moment, they remain, hanging onto the last sips of that delicious coffee. In “Beyond," the last few lines remember these beautiful sights when they can no longer see them. These endings serve as a reminder to take simple moments and enjoy all that they have to offer.

-Sheridan Kelly

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Coffee Bliss Autumn Stanley

Coffee beans and computer screens accent the aura of sophistication. The sweet scent of warm, rich indulgence is being served, accompanying the busy side of customer's lives.

The satisfaction of getting something done while being in a cloudy haze of thoughts allows for a moment of peace. Taking time to acknowledge the foggy figures of everyone else’s imagination and determination around me, I find no pressure made by the mind. The pure, calming comfort of coffee bliss hangs by the thread of an imaginative paradise. For some, waking up greeted with exhaustion can take a toll. For others, they can wake up and work out. But I need a little more of a boost.

A car ride away, the sweet sensation of coffee bliss awaits me, embracing my need for caffeine. Pumping lyrics through my mind, feeling the beat flow through my veins as the car spouts the sounds of grace in the form of a glorious melody, my soul is lifted. Twisting and turning, the roads to fulfill-

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ment are filled with people in their own lives and imaginations, leaving me wondering about another’s journey. I walk in the door feeling the breeze as it sweeps me into a seat. The rich, sweet scent of coffee and cream makes me feel chills of ecstasy. Hearing the buzz of everyone’s day-to-day life, I close in on my own daily tasks. I hear the light echoes of steps walking in and out of the building of dreams. In line, I scour the menu board, taking a peek at what sounds delicious. A creamy French vanilla coffee strikes at my taste-buds. A toasty and sugary stream engulfs my throat, giving my stomach a pleasant embrace. I sit, hoping to let the sweetened grasp stay a while longer before the next swallow of pure satisfaction. As I walk around, different scents engulf the air. From cologne to trash, perfume to creamer, my nose guides me on its own adventure. Greetings fill the calm, soothing room as I approach the uniformed missus, pregnant with two. Looking around, I see colors, but didn’t acknowledge the stories behind them.

Blues to yellows, purples to reds, the colors whisk around the room, leaving my mind in a haze. As I satisfy my stomach with the sweet sensation of warm, creamy fluid, the colors of the people become clearer as happiness spreads through my body.

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Finally sitting down and relaxing, I open the screen of infinite wonders. As I type in the code to my life, I begin the assignment and the search for answers, one paragraph after another, until the end is near. Finishing the essay, my mind relieves itself from the stress twisting my brain. My train of thought is enlivened with focus, seeing the world as it is and walking towards the entrance to reality. I take one last sip of coffee before grasping on to my free-roaming imagination, along with another sweet memory of paradise.

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Beyond Naylea Verdinez I won’t tell you that I’m sad It may be the wrong thing to do Instead, I let you stare at my eyes My eyes have witnessed the most beautiful things I can flow into the motion of the clouds There’s not a thing that I wouldn’t be able to explain Pink blossoms through my cheeks I blame the cold breeze of winter I like to glare into the cotton candy sky Always changing colors But it fades away when the moon appears and shines bright in my eyes When I start staring at the moon, I see the things around it I wonder if I can fly up to the moon and start to wonder what can happen to me Who wouldn’t want to?

I play it on repeat Whenever I won’t be able to see it

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Braving the Storm Together these poems show the reader that without taking a risk, or venturing into the storm so to speak, one remains frozen in the illusion of safety. As these poems fall in Part II’s “eye of the storm” section, “Silence Worth Speaking” and “I Am More” make readers feel relatively calm. However, since they are the last poems within the eye, they also display hints of tension and foreshadow that the other half of the dark storm will soon make its appearance. “Silence Worth Speaking” and “I Am More” displays hints of something brewing underneath the surface that signal to readers that the security of this safe haven is fleeting.

Emma Conley’s “Silence Worth Speaking” freezes a single, beautiful moment in time. Conley’s clear and powerful style sweeps the reader into the speaker’s head, creating a scene that feels alive. In only a few lines, this poem expertly captures the vulnerability and intimacy of falling in love. The openness and hope of these characters pulls the reader in and gives us a

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relationship we can’t help but root for. This poem plays with form, turning moments into physical space and further inviting the reader into the scene. “Silence Worth Speaking” embraces vulnerability and shows the reader that without taking a risk, or venturing into the storm so to speak, one remains frozen in the illusion of safety.

Elle Polman’s “I Am More” is a beautiful poem about self-acceptance. In a world obsessed with telling us who to be, how to act, and what to look like, Polman’s poem is a strong rebuke. The speaker’s assertions that “they are more” builds throughout the piece, asking the reader to look beyond the superficial and see the complexities of who they truly are. By pushing back societal beauty standards, the author of this poem creates a tidal wave of change and boldly declares that they won’t let others dictate who they should be.

These poems ground themselves in their self-assurance.

They celebrate the beauty that comes with owning your authenticity. These pieces invite the readers to reflect inward, asking themselves who they are and what makes them more.

—Kelli Spaur & Lily Rosen Marvin

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Silence Worth Speaking Emma Conley Not a word was spoken, but I could feel what she was holding inside.

I could feel it in the way her breath

was slowing down.

I could feel it in the way her eyes kept flickering to my lips, if only for a moment,

before racing back to my eyes.

I could feel it in the way her blue eyes glistened in the moonlit vacant street.

I could feel it in the way she leaned ever so slightly.

I could feel it,

and I said it right back.

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I Am More

Elle Polman

They don’t see the fire in my eyes the vibrance my skin betrays or the naturality my hair embraces.

They see the ethnicity I possess, the pigment I inherited to hold and the perfectly imperfect complexion I bestow to all.

But I am more.

I am more.

They don’t see the obliging offer my hands give, the warmth and comfort my arms share or the gracefulness of my legs.

They see the appearance I reveal, the body I occupy and the style of attire I present.

But I am more.

I am more.

They don’t see the softness of my fingers, the feminine ride of my shoulders or

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the spring in my step.

They see the height I grow to loathe, the size I am to be and the beauty they perceive.

But I am more.

I am more.

They don’t see my sensible mind, the devotion my heart speaks or the liveliness of my soul.

They see the voice I loudly spread, the stride of my walk and the attitude I retain and reflect.

But I am more.

I am more.

They don’t see the eased arch of my brows, the rosy tint of my lips or the irradiance my face conveys.

They see the makeup, the piercings I chose and show and the one tattoo I love.

But I am more.

I am more.

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Entrapment Rainstorm. Snowstorm. Icestorm. Hailstorm. Blizzard.

Lightning storm. Wind storm. Dust storm. Sandstorm.

Hurricanes and tornadoes. With each storm comes its own procedures, its own precautions. To encounter a storm is not the same as becoming trapped in one, and being trapped in a hailstorm vastly differs from being hopelessly lost in the heart of a sandstorm. Often times, there are no right answers to choices that need to be made. Not when every decision relies heavily on each environment, available options and knowledge, and of course, the choice maker themselves.

With every storm comes its own feeling of entrapment.

It can be the terrifying whirlwind of panic to find oneself caught in a thunderstorm on a mountain, hoping that each lightning strike heard is farther, not closer, and that each mud-slick step doesn’t lead to the foot of a cliff. It can be the horrifying silence and loneliness at the end of the blizzard, when the wind dies and the snow settles, and the house door is glued shut by ice and the weight of rib-level dense snow.

Each piece in this section grapples with these questions,

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exploring what it means to be trapped and what it might take for us to be freed. "Masquerade" by Nadia Schafbuch is ruled by chaos. In it, the reader is whipped from one moment to the next, without the time to settle and breathe. In contrast, "Angels in the Underground" by Jordan Collingwood is deathly still. The storm has passed and we are left with the wreckage behind, a mournful chorus of the dead bemoaning their doom.

Both pieces use bold language to paint the bare minimum of detail, leaving the rest to be interpreted by the reader.

What is the story of the dramatic dance of "Masquerade"?

How did love bring low the dead in "Angels in the Underground"? We may never learn the answer, but we are invited to speculate by the richness of the pieces.

We invite you to dive into these pieces, to experience the havoc of "Masquerade" and the dead’s mourning wails in "Angels in the Underground". For some storms, there is no way to escape; the only way out is to take shelter and pull through. We present to you these tales trapped within their own storms, and hope you will find them just as compelling and memorable as we have. —Jack Donley, Ray Janus, and Sarah Weeks

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Angels in the Underground Jordan Collingwood Love is a pink flame deep beneath the ground every dead thing fossilized in its mouth it burns with so much force it sometimes gets too much each living soul afraid to breathe what they cannot touch But with each inhale the chorus of dead sing “Well if love is what was burning—no wonder the air was thick with fear” They sing it in their shallow graves

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too withered to dig themselves out the angels whisper back from within the pit of fire “Twas the death of you—you filthy rotten things”

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Masquerade Nadia Schafbuch Waking up on hard, marble tiles. Dazed. It’s blurry. Is that music? Colored patterns. Squares, red and white. Slowly sitting up. Head pounding. Where am I? Bodies dancing round and round. Swishing gowns. Clicking boots. Masked faces.

Who are they? Patterned dancing. Rush of wind. Hand takes mine. Spun in unknown arms. Turned ‘round. See shaded eyes behind red feathers. Terrified. Grip tightens. Now dancing in patterns. Never-ending. Fast-paced. Round and round.

Pushing him away. Stumbling over floor. Figure disappears in crowd. Got to get out of here. Dance pattern tightens.

Swirling. Lunging. Swiping. Pushing me back. Scrambling to the center. Can’t find a way out. Try again. Punched. Kicked.

Slapped. Room darkens. Music intensifies. Dancers black and red. Dancing violently. Sneering. Eyes glowing behind masks.

Beautiful. Menacing. Deadly. Masquerade of death. Dark forms rain down. Huddling in fright. Black raven feathers.

Slick leather. Black eyes. Looming over me. Reaching toward

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me. Scrambling away. Hands stepped on. Pain. Blood. Face the foe. Midnight sword poised. Bracing myself. Suddenly falling. Darkness.

Waking up. Soft bed. What a weird dream.

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Emergence “The Island” and “End is Nigh” both capture the idea of Emergence, resurfacing unscathed after a time of emotional turmoil. They leave the reader with a feeling of uncertainty, but also the understanding that there is more to come. These pieces remind us that when the storm settles, we can leave the confusion behind us and carry on.

“The Island” conjures a vivid depiction of one man’s quest for salvation. We understand the man’s struggle solely through the descriptions of his actions, leaving us to fill in the character’s thoughts independently. The piece suggests that struggle feels more worthwhile when you have someone there to support you.

“End is Nigh” captures a dark feeling of hopelessness through the lens of the Black Plague. The piece marches us toward a definite dark ending which reminds the reader that an ending is an opportunity to escape the darkness and move on.

In both pieces, we see an emergence into a new and unknown future, a journey which we felt connected to being in high school. We see emergence as critical to the high school

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experience, a time when some may feel trapped or stagnant, unsure about what the future might bring. High school represents a turning point in students’ lives: a definite ending leading into a new experience.

—Anna Ellis, Joe Marino, and Gabrielle Price

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End is Nigh Emma Conley

Death raps on the window as the clock strikes the witching hour the roads it walks paved with corpses of those with no place to lie curse the heavens but don’t be angry please the halted Cathedral bares down upon us enough Pestilence stains the air as we wait for Death we wait for Death we long for Death to take away our misery unable to run from the night as it swallows us whole blackened fingers, blackened heart one by one, we are taken apart atra mors, atra mors atra mors ashes, ashes, we all fall down

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The Island Tyler Robinson

A blast of frigid, salty air sweeps over the wrecked ship.

Jagged rocks impale the wreck as waves crash upon them. A small gravel shore to the west acts as a trap for what is swept away, including the bodies of the men aboard. An early morning glow leaves a dense fog while a body stirs away from the water. Coughing, he hastily scrambles off the beach to a thicket of pine trees. Nestling into a ramshackle shelter, the soaked clothes absorb the bitter chill of the breeze. Realizing he will freeze, he strips, nestles back and collapses.

Midday now, he is jolted awake. The sun heats where it lands but the trees are still blanketed in the cold morning’s icy grasp. He crawls out, like a bug scuttling in fallen leaves. His clothes are still damp and cold; he hangs them up on a branch to let them dry. He needs to find food and water, stomach growling like a cornered dog, lips dry and cracked, caked with dried blood. He wanders in the small thicket; he dare

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not venture away from the shelter from the wind. About 50 yards from his shelter there is a small waterfall trickling down a rockface; it flows into a shallow, muddy pool at the bottom.

He stands ankle deep in the puddle as the icy water trickles over him, breaking the tight salt crust casing. It’s a brief moment of calm. He gulps the trickling stream and wanders back to his camp. His clothes are as dry as they will be without a fire. He dresses and heads to the small beach.

He looks out to find broken planks and rope scattered along the shore. There are cracked barrels, exposing their contents to the icy depths. Soaked gunpowder, smashed fruit, spoiled meat; he salvages what he can. Bodies of his shipmates are scattered in the debris. He spots an axe buried in one of the deceased. He heaves the axe out of the bloated cadaver, like King Arthur pulling Excalibur from the stone. He bundles his bounty up and heads to his camp. Everything is laid out in the sun to dry. An hour or so passes, he goes back to the beach to find a small dinghy recently washed ashore.

Inspecting leads to the discovery of a flintlock pistol and chest of gems, jewelry, and gold. He looks out over the water to see another ship and another crew meeting the same fate as his

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own. With a grimaced sigh, he turns his body away from the shore.

Back at camp, he looks at all he gathers and sits with everything sprawled out around him. It’s getting dark so he eats some waterlogged fruit and crawls into the nest. He tries to rest, but the land is caught in rain and lightning. Jolted by the sound of thunder, he gathers his belongings and goes to the dinghy, rowing out to find a drift to get him away from this deserted island of death. Waves batter the tiny boat. The storm had come faster than expected. The rough sea is too much, and he is capsized.

Groggy, on a familiar shore, all is the same except that the pistol lays before him. He picks up the pistol, turns it on himself, and pulls the trigger. Click. It is soaked and can’t fire. He throws it into the raging, dark waters. He screams in agony into an abyss of eternal storm.

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About the Authors Litzy Aguilar-Duran has never really had a passion for most types of writing, except for poetry. It just comes naturally to her to write poems. She plans on majoring in Psychology.

Maddie Alke strives to be a musician when she graduates. Her poems bring her one step closer to finding the words that match her music. She is a sophomore in Ms. Jennings' English class at West Liberty High School, and she wants to share her writing with the world.

Tacy Andrews is a junior at HLV Community High School in Victor, Iowa. She loves singing, acting, writing, and playing the piano. She plans to study Secondary English Education in the future.

Tori Aragon is fifteen and Ms. Jennings’ student at West Liberty High School. She enjoys reading and writing, and she hopes to pursue a career in journalism in the future.

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Sheridyn Bailey is in the ninth grade at Van Meter High School.

Sydney Benscoter is a junior at Iowa Valley Community Schools in Marengo, Iowa. She loves to read and write in her free time, as well as wonder why people act the way they do at times.

Melana Blomme is a sophomore at HLV Community High School and her English teacher is Mrs. Jack.

She plays basketball and volleyball. She is also involved in band, jazz band, and choir.

Jordan Collingwood is a junior at Iowa Valley Community Schools. She reads fantasy as well as poetry, and tries to write both when she has time. Her teacher is Mr. Daniel Sovers.

Emma Conley is sixteen and a junior at North Polk High School in Alleman, Iowa. Her teacher is Jessica Trier.

Nicholas Cordes is a senior at AHSTW High School with an ongoing love for reading and writing. He

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reads just about anything and is always trying to broaden the genres he writes in. He has self-published a short story as part of an anthology, and has also self-published his own novella, “The Universe Watched”. He currently works on his writing with Mr. Ross and Mrs. Noethe.

Josie Hall is a student at HLV Community High School. While she enjoys writing about impossible topics, such as the existence of magic in the modern world, she also has an appreciation for books based around historical instances, thus inspiring her to write “The Glory in Destruction”. While the sights described in the letter to Elizabeth are of her own creation, they are based around an actual battle that occurred in 1805 off the coast of Spain.

Alex Hand is a sophomore at Columbus Community High school, and her current English teacher is Mr. Miller.

While her name is Atlie, she goes by Alex since it is easier for people to remember and spell. She started writing in third grade as an escape and as a creative outlet. She never knew how writing would become such an important part of her life, or how others would become interested in the things she writes.

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Matilda Hogan is a senior at Gilbert High School.

Van Iang is a freshman at Columbus Community High School, studying under Steve Riley to be an author‌ or an aerospace engineer.

Abigail Koeneke just completed her AP Writing class last semester at Newton High School, along with a College Prep Composition class. Her teacher's name is Sarah Patterson. This semester she is in a creative writing class. Her essay is about her real-life experience being in a car accident last October.

Eleanor Lopez is a seventeen-year-old student with Mrs. Tensen at Gilbert High School.

Laisha Medina is a fifteen-year-old sophomore at West Liberty High School. She enjoys reading historical memoirs, watching political debates, and keeping up on serial killer shows.

Natasha Nicholson is a junior at West Liberty High School. Last year, she took Creative Writing with Ms. Clark and enjoyed writing short stories and longer fictional work.

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Elle Polman attends West Liberty High School as a junior. She writes because life brings you ups and downs regardless if you wish them to or not and she likes being able to capture the memories. Her writings mostly come from experiences or feelings, but she loves to dabble in creative writing as well.

She is currently enrolled in Creative Writing with Ms. Clark.

Courtney Rhinehart is a sophomore at HLV Community Schools. Mrs. Jack is her English teacher.

Courtney intends on pursuing a career as an author in the future.

Tyson Robertson is seventeen years old and a junior at HLV Community. His teacher is Stacey Jack.

Nadia Schafbuch is a senior at HLV Junior Senior High School. She loves being creative and imaginative with words. In the near future, she plans on being an elementary school teacher as well as an author.

Kyrah Sissel goes to HLV Community School District. The poem she wrote for her English class with Mrs.

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Stacy Jack includes a few references to Greek mythology and Greek morals, while also tying in her beliefs of family.

Autumn Stanley is from HLV Community and her teacher is Stacy Jack. She has wanted to submit one of her pieces for a while and thought this would be her best bet. She is very thankful for the opportunity!

Candy Thammavongsa is a junior at West Liberty High School and is taking Creative Writing II with Ms. Clark. She writes because it allows her to take a break from this world; it is her escape. She likes to write romance and wishes to major or minor in Creative Writing.

Jaideep Thiruthani is a senior at Cedar Falls High School. After being recommended to submit an essay by his English teacher, Heidi Anderson, he wrote his piece on one of his biggest pet peeves and the absurdity of nostalgia for the past.

Taylor VanDusen is a senior at West Liberty High School who enjoys writing poetry about life, love, and heartbreak. Last year, she took Creative Writing with

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Ms. Clark, and she now continues to write poetry on her own because of her passion for this type of expression.

Vaness Vargas is a sophomore at West Liberty High School and was recommended to submit her writing

by Ms. Jennings. She is interested in fashion and would like to become a stylist in the future. She has suffered from sleep paralysis for two years, which was the inspiration for her writing.

Naylea Verdinez is a junior at West Liberty High School. Her Creative Writing teacher is Ms. Clark.

She enjoys writing poetry, and hopes to study to become an English teacher.

Allison Weiler is currently a senior and will graduate this year in 2020. Her plan is to earn her master’s degree in English and become an English professor.

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About the Editors Lauren Achenbaugh is a third-year student at the University of Iowa, majoring in English on the publishing track and minoring in Mass Communications. In her free time, she is either taking a nap with her dog or caring for her many household plants.

Jessica Bilak is a third year English and Creative Writing major. Before this publication, she was a fiction editor for Mirror Magazine.

Kaylin Butterfield is a double major in English and Art while also learning Mandarin. In her free time, she likes to bike, hike, paint, read, and spend time with her friends and family. She is also a plant mom.

Sylvia Clubb is a managing editor and a second-year student at the University of Iowa majoring in English and Journalism and Mass Communications with a certificate in literary publishing. In addition, she works at Quill and Scroll International Honor Society for Journal-

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ism Students and is a Fiction Editor for Earthwords. You can find her editing every piece of writing her friends will let her put her hands on.

Madison Coleman is one of the design editors for Subject to Change. She is a second-year student majoring in English and Creative Writing on the publishing track and minoring in Cinema at the University of Iowa.

When she doesn’t have her nose glued to a good book, Madison enjoys writing her own fantasy short stories and novels, as well as catching up on all things Disney.

Erica Crawford is a junior studying at the University of Iowa to achieve her Bachelor's in English with a certificate on the publishing track. When she is not somewhere reading, you'll find her cuddled up on the couch with her dog and hot coffee in her hands.

Abigail Davis is a senior majoring in English and Creative Writing on the publishing track. When she isn’t working or studying , Abigail can be found napping, reading for fun, or binge-watching Grey’s Anatomy.

Jack Donley is a sophomore student from Kansas

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City, double majoring in Creative Writing and History.

When not reading for a class, he enjoys reading science fiction or fantasy. He’s excited about the anthology and thinks all the contributors are very talented.

Jenny Eikre is a junior at the University of Iowa studying English and creative writing on the publishing track. She loves reading, writing, and listening to any music that comes out of a jukebox. You can catch her drinking tea (always with milk and sugar), writing her novel, or talking about her pet cats, hedgehog, and rat.

Faith Ellington is a senior at the University of Iowa studying English and Creative Writing. You can check out her work in Fools and the Sierra Nevada Review.

She is attending Louisiana State University in the fall to pursue a Ph.D. in English.

Anna Ellis is a sophomore at the University of Iowa studying English and Creative writing and German.

Anna enjoys reading and writing fantasy and was recently published in Spect Magazine.

Emily Engwall is a junior at the University of

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Iowa majoring in English (on the publishing track) and Communication Studies. You can most likely catch her reading or singing wherever she is.

Ray Janus is a junior doing their best to major in English Creative Writing, Spanish, and Russian. In the past, they’ve worked as an editor for Metal Magazine.

They enjoy writing (and hoarding) short stories and poems.

Amelia Juhl is a second-year student at the University of Iowa, majoring in English and Creative Writing on the publishing track with a minor in Spanish. She enjoys spending long days on the water, running, and devouring desserts.

Hannah Kinson is one of the design editors for Subject to Change. She is a junior studying journalism and mass communications with a certificate in writing on the publishing track. She works as a photojournalist at The Daily Iowan and teaches dance classes as a Tap Captain for UI Dance Club. You can usually find her dancing in the fieldhouse or on assignment for the newspaper shooting collegiate sports including basketball, field hockey, and baseball.

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Brittany Kelly is a junior majoring in English and Creative Writing with a minor in film. She has never seen Cool Runnings.

Sheridan Kelly is a junior studying Publishing and Creative Writing at the University of Iowa. She has previously served as the Senior Editor in Communications for the semester-long magazine Mirror Magazine.

Nicole Klostermann is a fourth-year student of English and Creative Writing at the University of Iowa.

Her poetry has appeared in Witness and Fools. She makes a mean lasagna.

Abbey Laird is one of four Design Editors on this anthology. She is a junior double majoring in Creative Writing on the Publishing track and Cinema. She is an aspiring book designer, seasonal poet, and occasional 16 mm filmmaker.

Joe Marino is a sophomore majoring in English and Creative Writing on the Publishing track. He likes high-fiving his brothers and having fun with friends.

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Franny Marzuki is a second-year student at the University of Iowa, majoring in English and Creative Writing on the publishing track and minoring in Latin.

You can most likely find her playing Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild or reading the latest speculative fiction short stories.

Lily Rosen Marvin is a sophomore studying English and Creative Writing on the Publishing Track.

She has previously worked as a Fiction Editor for Mirror Magazine and as a Nonfiction Team Member for The Iowa Review. She looks forward to sharing the wonderful pieces in this anthology.

Haley McCormack is a 4th year at the University of Iowa studying English and Creative Writing on the Publishing track. She will be pursuing a Bachelors in Education post-graduation.

Caroline Meek is a junior studying English & Creative Writing on the publishing track at the University of Iowa, and her work has appeared in Fools, The Passage Between, Wordsmith and more. Look for her in your local coffee shop, wearing flannel and drinking coffee with too

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much sugar—or on Twitter @carolinedmeek.

Danica Merrill is a sophomore studying Creative Writing and Computer Science. She hopes to one day make a living from writing, editing, and publishing books. She is chilly all the time, likes power outages and poetry, and is afraid of deep water.

Gabrielle Price is a sophomore at the University of Iowa studying English and Psychology. She hopes to one day work with children as a counselor or therapist. In her spare time, Gabrielle enjoys reading thrillers or romance novels.

Lizzy Rioux is a junior majoring in English with a minor in Communications. She dedicates her free time to reading, when she can, and watching The Office over and over. She previously worked on and was published in Mirror Magazine.

Rocco Romano is a third-year student double majoring in English and Creative Writing on the publishing track and Ancient Civilizations. He enjoys writing and reading Fantasy and Science-Fiction stories and has a deep

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fascination with languages, mythology, and theology.

Nichole Shaw is a junior studying journalism and English on the publishing track at the University of Iowa. She is also involved in Off-Kilter and Quill and Scroll publications. She dedicates her studies and work to engage in the art of storytelling, ensuring those voices that must be heard, are.

Kelli Spaur is a junior studying English on the publishing track and hopes to one day work in book publishing. When she is not scrolling through Twitter, Kelli enjoys chatting about all the books she wants to read and drinking large quantities of tea.

Caylin Spilman is a junior majoring in English and Creative Writing on the Publishing Track. She loves science fiction and fantasy and enjoys spending times browsing bookshops for old and rare volumes.

Stella Tarlin is a sophomore majoring in English and Creative Writing. She’s a lover of comics, podcasts and music, as well as lit mags. She’s excited to see our anthology come together in print!

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ZoĂŤ Tobin is a second-year English and CreativeWriting major at the University of Iowa, with big dreams of vanishing into the woods alone and being happy.

Mia Ugalde is a third-year student majoring in Social Justice and English and Creative Writing on the publishing track. She is a drama editor for Earthwords.

You can often find her at Prairie Lights, drinking an oat milk chai and writing emo poetry in the Notes app.

Cay Warner is an artist, writer, and designer.

She’s nuts about clarity and concision and enjoys wellthought-out-plots and characterization. She loves lifting weights, listening to pop music, and playing League of Legends.

Sarah Weeks is a graduating senior with a passion for publishing and English. She has appreciated being able to have a glimpse into the mind of up and coming young writers and is so proud of the work put into the anthology.

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Lauren Whitney is a co-managing editor for Subject to Change. She is working towards her Bachelors in English and Creative Writing along with a writing certificate in literary publishing. In addition, she is a resident assistant for the Iowa Writers community and intern for Folio Literary Agency. She loves the occult and anything vintage from the 20th century, whether clothing, music, or novels.

Ellie Zupancic is an editor and poet. She lives in Iowa City where she studies English and philosophy and serves as the Editor-in-Chief of Fools Magazine. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Ghost City Review, A Velvet Giant, Dream Pop Journal, Burning House Press, and Earthwords, among others.

Thank you for reading!

This anthology was designed by Hannah Kinson, Madison Coleman, Abbey Laird, and Cay Warner.