Crack The Spine Issue Fifty-Four February 5, 2013 Edited by Kerri Farrell Foley Collection copyright 2013 by Crack the Spine
Contents Crystal Piaskowski Organic Jean Ryan Breach Aleah Sterman Goldin Eureka Grooves Hurt Heather Bell Adams Off the Hook Andy Hughes Ice Station Zamila Genevieve Oliver Hotel Del Mar December 2010 Bradford Garcia Masturbation of the Mind An Essay
Charles Holdefer At the Luxury Pet Shoppe
Cover Art by Eleanor Leonne Bennett Eleanor Leonne Bennett is a 16 year old internationally award winning photographer and artist who has won first places with National Geographic,The World Photography Organisation, Nature's Best Photography, Papworth Trust, Mencap, The Woodland trust and Postal Heritage. Her photography has been published in the Telegraph , The Guardian, BBC News Website and on the cover of books and magazines in the United states and Canada. Her art is globally exhibited , having shown work in London, Paris, Indonesia, Los Angeles,Florida, Washington, Scotland,Wales, Ireland,Canada,Spain,Germany, Japan, Australia and The Environmental Photographer of the year Exhibition (2011) amongst many other locations. She was also the only person from the UK to have her work displayed in the National Geographic and Airbus run See The Bigger Picture global exhibition tour with the United Nations International Year Of Biodiversity 2010. Owner Credit: Michael Allcroft Antiques
Crystal Piaskowski Organic
Organic. Rake, rake, rake. The prongs attack each individual, mischievous leaf, corralling them into a colorful, merry pile. Blowing bangs out of her face, she props the rake against the offending oak and assesses her work-- two hours of raking and only half the lawn is visible. AND a good wind would scatter them gleefully back across the grass, down the lane, and into the eyes of the irritable complaining neighbors two houses over. A box of heavy-duty black trash bags lie self-importantly by the pile, and she reaches down and yanks one up by its strings. Flapping the bag open, she thrusts one mittened hand into the leaves and scoops up an armful, shoving them inside the fluttering container with little success. Grumble. She shuts her eyes and takes a breath: an icy, cleansing breath to refocus, get the task done, and be able to go inside where it’s warm. A breeze sweeps over her cheekbones and through her hair, racing past her body to swirl and toss the leaves like a naughty child. Her eyes pop open as she hears the crunchy delight of the leaves speeding up and away. She stands there, rooted, exasperation battling with merriment, as she watches the leaves escape in swirling tufts, dancing like gypsies’ children, wild and delighted in their flight. Chuckle. We are organic, organic like leaves. We are composed of vessels and ligaments, internal ticking toward to a unifying fate. Each inhale, each forgotten blink is another moment never to be recovered. Lungs balloon with frighteningly unconscious regularity as we sleep, unaware and helpless to our bodies’ faithful consistency. It takes so little- an obstruction, a malicious cell code, a fragile crack of bone- to snuff out any and all brain activity, the lit-up neurons dying as our bodies die—our bodies dying as we watch chrysanthemums die at the first hard frost. Aware. She stares at the damp pile of remaining leaves, the ones too sodden to be lifted with exhilarating buoyancy to freedom, and the plastic trash bag slips from her fingers. Cold seeps into her jeans, into her limbs, and extinguishes the soft light of optimism in her belly as her vision dims and sensation takes over. The world is pressing in. A slight gasp of panic, arms numb, ice shooting through her veins as her
mind blanks but for one repeating phrase: we are all going to die. We can’t prevent it, can’t get a ‘death shot’ like a flu shot to lessen the likelihood of it happening. We can’t cozy to our mothers’ bosoms, hide in the warmth and know that everything will be okay. It won’t. We are all going to die. The seasons will continue without us, rain nourishing the newborn seedlings and sun coaxing the teenaged sprouts to raise their heads. We are just the consumers, the watchers, helpless in the face of a cycle beyond our control. We have no control. The little victories--raking leaves each year, only to have them return the next; cutting our hair, knowing we will have to go back in two months; making dinner even though breakfast is only a few short hours away— the little necessities that lead to nothing. Temporary gratification. We are all going to die. Terror. A squirrel chatters loudly from the branches above, shaking the last remaining leaves so they float lazily down to her. She sniffs, bringing her sleeve up to wipe at the glistening tear tracks that have appeared on her face. A deep breath: icy, calming, only laced with panic instead of drenched in it. Her eyes focus on the rake that had fallen from its place against the oak tree and pinned the trash bag down, holding it in place so the wind couldn’t carry it away. She reaches, coat riding up and exposing her sensitive skin to the chill, and clutches the wooden handle. She starts again, resolutely pulling the frolicking leaves into their destined pile. The exertion warms her blood. Rake, rake, rake. Distraction.
Crystal Piaskowski is a senior at Kutztown University and will be graduating in the Fall of 2013 with a BA in Professional Writing. Crystal is an equine enthusiast and continues to live by the adage "You never know when you are making a memory."
Jean Ryan Breach
Amy pulled back the gauze and peered at the wound on her leg, a series of raised welts capped with dried blood. It looked worse today, she thought. Puffier. Maybe infection was setting in; these beautiful places were treacherous. Just last week she had read about a man who suffered a minor cut on his leg while zip lining in Jamaica and died eight days later. “Don’t touch the coral,” the instructor had warned, and she hadn’t. Not with her hands. She panicked, that’s what happened. They’d all been given little bags of frozen peas, which they were told to dispense gradually, and it was fun at first to let loose a pea and watch the fish arrive in their hot bright colors. They flashed around her face and body, and then she felt them on her legs, bumping, nipping, she wasn’t sure. Picturing all those urgent, rigid mouths on her flesh, she spilled the bag of peas, and suddenly there were fish everywhere, darting past her shoulders, shooting up from below. One, electric blue and as long as her arm, had an underbite loaded with spiny white teeth. She flailed in the water, tried to backpedal, her flippers pulling hard, and then her leg smacked the coral and she yelped into her snorkel. Two seconds later she thought of her blood, streaming into the ocean, and the opening scene in the movie Jaws, and that’s when she broke the surface and screamed for Dinah. Who just now came out of the bathroom, smiling and flushed, wearing nothing but a white towel. She walked over to the sliding glass doors and stood there, hands on her hips, admiring the view: palm trees, white sand, turquoise ocean—exactly as the brochure had promised. Amy regarded Dinah’s strong shoulders and plump, muscled calves. “This place rocks,” she said, turning around. Her blonde hair fell in wet ringlets around her shoulders. Dinah was short and strong. “Dinah-mo,” their friends called her. She ran a catering business and often worked eighteen hour days with no sign of fatigue. “I love that seat in the shower, don’t you? So much easier shaving your legs.” This time, their third trip to Hawaii, they were staying at the Four Seasons in Wailea, in an oceanfront suite. Amy, who made good money at Benson Accountancy, opted at the last minute to splurge. While Dinah had not wanted to spend so much money on a room, she changed her mind the moment they walked in. “Oh my,” she said, setting her purse on a marble-topped writing desk. She
swept past the plush furniture and potted palms and stopped at the doors leading out to the lanai, beyond which glittered the blue Pacific; a mauve mountain floated in the distance. “We’re ruined,” she remarked. “I hope you know that.” “What do you want to do today?” Dinah asked. “How’s your leg?” “I’m not sure,” Amy said. “I think it might be a little worse.” “Let me see.” Dinah approached the chair Amy was sitting in, and once more Amy pulled back the bandage. Dinah looked at the scrape and frowned. “Looks about the same to me. Does it hurt?” “Only if I bump it.” “Does it feel hot?” Amy shook her head. “Then don’t worry about it. They got antibiotic on it as soon as you came out of the water. You’re fine. But I guess you won’t be doing any more snorkeling.” “I don’t care—the water’s too cold anyway. Didn’t you get cold yesterday?” “A little,” Dinah admitted. She leaned in closer, kissed Amy’s forehead. “Give me ten minutes, then we’ll get some breakfast. I’m starving.” *** High above their heads palm fronds clattered in the breeze. Amy peered up, hypnotized by the metallic flashes of sun on the rippling leaves. Orange and yellow hibiscus flowers nodded from a hedge beside their table. A few feet away two zebra doves cooed at one another and bobbed their heads. Yesterday, in a cove not far from the resort, Amy and Dinah had spotted a group of turtles swimming in a sun-struck cavern. Over and over the creatures swam above and beneath each other in what appeared to be a gentle form of play. For over an hour, perched on a large black rock, Amy and Dinah had watched them, not wanting to break away from something so lovely and rare. Amy forked up a piece of sausage and studied the larger dove that was now puffing out its striped breast. “Have you noticed that everything here seems to be in love?” she said. “Birds, turtles—I think the palms are in love with the wind.” Dinah lifted a wedge of her Sunrise Quesadilla. “Who wouldn’t love this place?” “Funny how you can’t live here, though. I mean, once you move here it isn’t paradise.” Dinah frowned. “I don’t know about that.”
“It’s true. That sales girl at Banana Republic yesterday? I chatted with her when you were trying on pants. She has three jobs and two roommates and she still can’t afford to live here. She’s moving back to the mainland as soon as she can scrape up the air fare.” Dinah chewed, considered. “Yeah. I guess it wouldn’t be much fun being poor in paradise. Still you’d have all this.” She spread an arm across the sweep of the ocean. “In the middle of January.” Amy nudged an orange slice of papaya to the edge of her plate. She was getting tired of papayas. And mangoes, and pineapples, and guavas, and passion fruit. Not that they weren’t delicious, just that they were everywhere. There was a mountain of whole fruit in the middle of the buffet, and bowls and bowls of cut fruit scattered down the table. The bounty of these islands, the wanton, unstoppable life. Philodendrons three stories high. Orchids surging out of tree trunks. Amy regarded a huge yellow hibiscus flower inches from her arm; it looked like it wanted something from her; she could almost hear it panting. “Even if I had the money,” Amy said, “I think I’d go crazy after a while—island fever. I’d start wanting things I couldn’t have. Redwoods. Fall foliage. Fresh apples.” “San Francisco,” Dinah added. They lived in Novato and drove into San Francisco at least once a month for dinner or plays or exhibits, sometimes just to walk through the Castro and see what the boys were up to. Amy felt a tickling sensation in her wound and pictured a legion of bacteria assembling there, hoisting tiny vicious picks, ready to start work. It seemed she had already used up a large portion of her fear and now she was more curious than anything else. Wouldn’t it be something, with this lump under her arm, to die of a scrape? That zip liner probably had no idea what was happening to him. She pictured him in some thatch-covered island bar, popping a few ibuprofen and eyeing the native girl who was bringing him drinks. It might be nothing of course, the lump. It probably was nothing, Dr. Stark had said. But Amy had watched the doctor’s face as her fingers explored the area, had seen the wary attentiveness. “When do you first notice this?” Dr. Stark asked. Amy mustered a light tone. “A few months ago, I guess.” The doctor tightened her lips and prodded the flesh around the lump. “Has it grown?” “I’m not sure. Not much, anyway.” Amy could actually feel it now when she pressed her arm to her side. “It doesn’t move,” the doctor said, dropping her hand. “Does it hurt?”
“No. Not at all.” From the doctor’s slight frown Amy understood that this was not the optimum answer. The doctor returned to her seat and typed something into the computer. “You’re a little thin.” “I don’t think I’ve lost any weight,” Amy said. The doctor gave a shrug. “Two pounds since your last exam. Any fatigue? Fever or chills?” she asked, keeping her eyes on the monitor. “No.” Dr. Stark looked over at Amy. “It’s probably just a cyst or a fatty growth, but we need to do some imaging and a biopsy. I want you to come in next week.” Amy swallowed hard. She was at a disadvantage here, in this paper vest, perched on a table, waiting for orders. She needed clothes, a proper chair. “I’m going to Hawaii on Monday. Can I come in the week after?” The doctor nodded and turned back to the computer. “That’s fine, but no later.” * ** Amy and Dinah looked hard but could not see the turtles. The water was choppier today and they could barely make out the cavern. After a few moments, they climbed down from the rock and began walking along the beach. Great clouds hung over the ocean, which was vast and grey and ruffled with whitecaps. The wind was warm and constant. “Look,” said Dinah, pointing. Far out, the great black tail of a humpback broke from the sea. Seconds later, another, and then another. “Wow. Must be a whole pod.” Amy, thrilled, began counting. What was it about whales? Why did they cause such a stir? Their monstrous proportions, or those impenetrable depths they rose from without warning? “I’ve seen thirteen,” she said. “They don’t look real, do they? From here they look, I don’t know, prehistoric.” “They do,” said Dinah. “They look mythic.” After a while they turned back toward the hotel, and as they walked they discussed how they might spend the last three days of their vacation. “Are we still getting tattoos on Friday?” Dinah asked. This had been the plan, to go to Lahaina the day before they left and get their first tattoos. Dinah had decided on a string of ivy around her ankle; Amy was considering something small—a bird or a turtle, maybe—on her shoulder.
Now, however, Amy was having second thoughts. It wasn’t the pain that gave her pause—that, she’d heard, was minor; it was the idea of a permanent stain, of ink sinking into her pores and staying there. This was her skin, the tender wrapping she came in. Branding it felt willful. Like trespassing. “I’m not sure,” Amy said. “You can.” “Chickening out on me?” said Dinah, neatly skirting the foamy wash of a wave. “Something like that.” She did not want to share her misgivings and squelch Dinah’s enthusiasm— not that she could. Dinah was an eager sort, always ready for a new adventure and not inclined to deliberate. The mishaps and rapid-fire alterations involved in catering were hurdles she was born for. “Well, you’ve been wanting a new pendant—maybe you can shop for that while I’m in the tattoo place.” Dinah moved closer and reached for Amy’s hand. “What about today. What do you want to do? We could go zip lining. They have half-day tours.” Amy shuddered. “No thank you. Not after reading about that guy in Jamaica.” “Amy. Thousands of people zip line every day with no problem. That was a freak thing.” “Maybe.” Amy looked out at a long red boat that was moving rapidly over the water. “I just don’t see the attraction—hanging from a cable, zipping over the scenery. Shouldn’t we be slowing down here, smelling the lotus?” Dinah laughed. “What a cranky pants you are. I think we need to get you a Mai Tai.” She let go of Amy’s hand and ventured over to a dark still form on the sand. “Oh god—it’s a baby seal.” Amy approached the lifeless creature, which was black and about three feet in length; it had not been dead long. “It’s a monk seal,” she murmured. “They’re endangered.” She had read a lot about Hawaii, “the extinction capital of the world,” and its lost species. “I wonder what happened to it,” said Dinah. “Probably something happened to the mother. Normally they don’t leave their newborns for weeks.” Amy felt her throat thicken; she blinked back sudden tears. “Life is horrible,” she said. “It really is. It’s horrible.” “C’mon,” said Dinah, taking gentle hold of Amy’s arm. “Wait,” Amy snapped. She couldn’t just walk away as if this animal had meant nothing. She squatted down and laid a hand on its cold wet fur. She looked at the closed eyes and the whiskers, and then she looked down the beach at the heartless palms, the string of hotels. Finally she got to her feet. “We should tell someone.”
*** They were driving up to Kapalua, where they had decided to spend the afternoon. The northwest coast was supposed to be great for whale watching, and not overrun with people. From a store near the their hotel, Amy and Dinah had purchased a bottle of wine, some soft cheese and a box of water crackers (they wanted a baguette but the market sold only local breads and these were all studded with banana or pineapple). The hotel sent them on their way with two enormous mangoes, which Amy accepted with a false show of delight. The ocean, which had turned from grey to sapphire, rolled by on the left, each glorious vista surpassing the one before. Dinah, who was driving, looked over at Amy and said, “Remember the Road to Hana?” Of course she did. Who didn’t remember that road? Fun for the first couple miles, punishment for the next thirty. Like many couples, they had given up halfway—all those sickening turns through a jungle that grew increasingly ominous. And when they did stop to quell their nausea, the mosquitos were unbearable. “This is so much nicer,” Amy said. She was determined to be more agreeable, to prize what pleasure she could from these last few days here. “Thanks for suggesting a picnic—I don’t think there’s anything I’d rather do more.” Dinah, keeping her eyes on the road, smiled. They had been together almost two decades, had unwittingly achieved such a durable base that separation was neither conceivable nor possible. They’d had problems of course, like any other couple, flare-ups that came with the territory: a cook living with an accountant. Early on, there were even agonizing affairs—simultaneous, one apiece—from which they’d eventually, amazingly, recovered. Trust could be broken, they’d learned, but just once….surely, just once. Maybe, Amy thought now, their relationship had never really been threatened, never been in danger at all. Was that possible in this world? Amy shifted in her seat, pretended to study the scenery. Her hand stole beneath her shirt and moved up to her armpit. For a moment she fingered the lump, which did seem larger now. Last night, making love, she was nervous that Dinah would find it. Amy had not told Dinah about the lump, not yet. There was no point in worrying them both. She would tell her later, when she knew more. This was the snag about love—no one was spared. For as long as possible she wanted Dinah to be free.
Which was another downside to love—had she been single, Amy would have postponed this trip. Instead, not wanting to disappoint Dinah, she had upped the ante, had arranged for expensive accommodations, as if such defiance would surmount all else. The truth was, she could not dislodge the fear. Sometimes it took breath away; mostly it worked as a filter through which everything showed its flaws. She shook her head, remembering last night, comparing it to the lovemaking of their first trip here, when there was no room for caution or review, when there was only hunger followed by pleasure. But that was many years ago. This lump under her arm—she couldn’t blame it for everything. Amy looked out her window at what appeared to be fields of sugar cane. There was even a sweetness in the air. They set fire to these fields before harvest, she’d read, to burn off the tops and leaves. She pictured the crackling flames, the clouds of grey smoke rising over the island. It seemed a violent solution. She turned back to Dinah, who appeared, as usual, faintly contented, one hand on the wheel, her elbow resting on the open window. She had a temper, for sure, but it left as fast as it came; mostly she was fine with life. She was probably not thinking about burning fields right now. “When we get back to the hotel,” Amy said, “we can check out those zip line tours. Maybe we can go tomorrow.” Dinah looked over. “Really?” “What the hell,” said Amy, lifting a shoulder. “Exactly!” Dinah grinned. *** They parked on a ridge high above the ocean. Across the water, softy draped in blues and greens, was the island of Molokai. Colossal white clouds hung over its peaks and valleys. On the left side of the beach, a string of black rocks stretched into the sea. The sand itself was pink. Amy stood next to the car, lunch in hand, trying to take in the scene. She could not. This is what was meant by “impossible beauty.” You absorbed what little you could, and then you gave up. “It’s kind of steep,” said Dinah, who was eyeing the path to the beach. “But we can do it. We’ll just go slow.” She turned around. “Is your leg okay?” “It’s fine,” Amy said, realizing that it was; she hadn’t even thought of it since breakfast. Crowded by the rampant plant growth, they side-stepped their way down to the beach, pausing at the bottom to smell the sea-drenched air and gaze again at the island set before them like a gift.
Brilliant flashes of sun rippled over the water. As if instructed, they walked to the rocky arm of the beach and found a place near the cliff to spread their towels. They drank some wine, watched two sanderlings dash back and forth through the lapping waves. Above them, a white tern sailed. “I heard you get up last night,” Dinah said. “What were you doing?” Amy pressed her plastic cup into the sand. “I went out on the lanai.” She smiled, remembering. “I took off my top.” “You did?” “It was wonderful. Now I know why women in Tahiti go topless. Really. It’s reason enough to move there.” Amy recalled the dark palms fronds moving above her, the white crests on the ocean, the muffled roar of the waves. Half naked, arms open, she felt like she was offering herself, to the night, the wind. She tried to explain this now to Dinah: the warm wind on her breasts, how vulnerable she felt, but powerful, too, both of these at once. “Wow,” said Dinah. I’m definitely trying that tonight.” “Damnit,” said Amy, who was looking over Dinah’s shoulder. “Why do they keep showing up?” “What?” “Men.” Dinah turned and regarded the figure walking their way, a lone man wearing a large brimmed hat; a pair of binoculars hung around his neck. “He looks harmless enough,” she said. “And you do have a shirt on right now.” A commotion at sea drew their attention. Two large animals—presumably whales—were thrashing in the water, rolling over and over each other, the ocean breaking around them. Amy and Dinah got to their feet. The man, who was quite close to them now, stopped and studied the animals through his binoculars. Are they fighting?” said Dinah, “or mating?” “Neither,” said the man, lowering his binoculars. “They’re juveniles. They’re playing.” No matter where you went on vacation, Amy thought, there was always a slight man in Dockers and a sunhat who knew everything there was to know about whatever spectacle you were looking at. Not that she wasn’t grateful for the information—teenagers frolicking! “Lots of whales out there today,” he added, and not five seconds later, a little farther out, the great fan of a humpback’s tail came suddenly into view. “They’re breeding now, aren’t they?” Amy asked.
The man nodded. “That’s what they come down here for, breeding and birthing. The calves do better in warmer waters.” A woman with two children walked up. They stopped a few feet from where the man stood. “Hello,” the woman said, smiling. “Aren’t they wonderful?” Now they were a crowd, as it seemed they should be with something like this in front of them. Amy looked back at the rolling pair, who were making quite a racket smacking the water. And then, off to the right, an enormous whale surged out of sea, all the way, the ocean pouring off its body, its great fins and belly white against the blue sky. In the instant that it hung in their world, this magnificent, improbable beast, Amy threw her arms up and whooped, as they all did—they could not help themselves, as if whatever ecstasy that sent this creature out of sea had rushed into them, and when the whale fell back, in a tremendous splash, they felt in their own bodies the sound of its weight. Afterward they all beamed at one another, helplessly, and then they began to speak, sharing their joy. Wasn’t that the most amazing thing they had ever seen? Was it their first time? What did it mean when whales breached? Even the man in the hat did not know the answer to that one. Dinah, who had at some point caught hold of Amy’s hand, hugged her now and said, “That was worth the price of the trip, don’t you think?” Amy looked back at the sea, at the place where this marvel had occurred. “It was worth any price,” she said. And it was. It was worth more than anything she could think of. A whale jumping out of the sea was nothing less than enough.
Jean Ryan, a native Vermonter, lives in Napa, California. Her stories and essays have appeared in a variety of journals, including Other Voices, Pleiades, The Summerset Review, The Massachusetts Review, Earthspeak and The Blue Lake Review. A collection of her short stories will be published by Ashland Creek Press in April 2013.
Aleah Sterman Goldin Eureka Grooves
Max with his spindle nostrils sweet-talking me with Eureka grooves. I slept on his mauve couch too long, and planted daisies in pots for $6.50 an hour.
Aleah Sterman Goldin Hurt i sit in the tub Dove shampoo clutched in palms, opening and closing the lid until it snaps, and blue gel seeps onto knees tucked under chin.
Aleah Sterman Goldin is currently pursuing a creative writing degree at the University of Richmond as a Boatwright Scholar. She is the recipient of the National Council of Teacher of English Achievement Award in Writing, M.R. Robinson/National Constitution Center Civic Writing Award, and national Scholastic Art & Writing Silver Portfolio Award. In 2003, she was included in the National Storytelling Youth Hall of Fame. Her prose has also been published in Metal Scratches, Furrow, and Zeek.
Heather Bell Adams Off the Hook The weight came on suddenly, or at least it seemed that way to me. One day I was zipping up tiny black pants. Easily, like there was nothing to it. And practically the next day, I was tugging on the zipper, sucking in my stomach. And I didn’t even know the size of the new pants, the ones I bought at the cheap store, because I had cut out the tag. I could only guess. My work uniform was another problem. The skirt was made of some sort of synthetic fabric and thank God stretched (to a point). The top, which buttoned all the way up, was supposed to fit snugly, but when I started to get sweaty trying to get it buttoned, I considered asking my supervisor for a new one in a larger size. I was too embarrassed to ask and one day I gave up and wore the top unbuttoned, like a jacket, with a tank top underneath. The next time I opened my locker, there was a new, larger uniform wrapped in plastic and a note explaining that $76.98 would be taken out of my next paycheck to pay for it. When I went to visit my parents, I drove past all the fast food restaurants without stopping. Eight hours of driving. I got an orange juice at the gas station at the halfway point and that was it. I thought somehow it would make a difference, that parts of me would have shrunk by the time I arrived. I walked in the door and my mother stared at me. She looked over her glasses as though to be certain of what she saw. I held my breath, remembering my dad on a fishing trip and the fish stuck on the hook with everyone staring. “Tomorrow let’s go get those nails taken care of,” my mother said. I looked down at my hands where the burgundy polish was chipped. Shaking, like I’d narrowly avoided a car accident. That night I told my parents that I was tired and I went to bed early. I heard the TV as they watched episodes of Law & Order. During the commercials, I listened to see if they would talk about me. About what’s gotten into that Laney and how she’s let herself go ever since that computer guy with the glasses moved back to Baltimore. And my mom would say “That’s an age old story, Bill.” And my dad would say “But this is our Laney we’re talking about.” And I would say, out loud even though they couldn’t hear me, “Evan. His name was Evan.” I sat up in bed as though that would help me hear. But they didn’t say anything, and at first I was glad, but then I decided that was worse.
On the way home, when I was almost back to my apartment, I stopped at the grocery store and walked quickly to the bakery section, without getting a cart. I picked out the cherry pie with the shiniest crust, and I took it to the check-out line. The cashier was slightly younger than me; she must have been in her early twenties. She was very tan and very thin. I could see a tattoo on her shoulder and her bra strap kept slipping down. She pulled it back up and sighed, barely looking at people as she rung up their items. Toilet paper. Beer. Apples. Boxes of pasta and pasta dinner kits. Then she got to me and she swiped the pie over the scanner and looked up. “Good looking pie.” She seemed surprised. “I’ve never tried one from here before.” It was the truth, but she looked at me like what I said was some sort of excuse. “I’m pregnant, due in February.” I rubbed my stomach, the lie slipping out easily. I didn’t know where it came from. “Hey, that’s awesome! You don’t look that far along. You look terrific.” It was more than I had heard her say to all the people before me in line. It was almost like she was a different, more alive sort of person. “What are you, twenty-nine, thirty weeks?” “About that.” I nodded, not bothering to check her math. She grinned. “How exciting.” I smiled back at her. For a minute, I almost believed it. I almost asked for her opinion on baby names. I signed the electronic key pad and she waited for me to take the pie. She stood there looking at me and I was startled to see kindness in her eyes. I paused, regretting the lie and wishing I could take it back. But thinking that maybe there are times when a lie gives birth to truth. “You know, I’ve changed my mind.” I picked up the pie in its cardboard container with the plastic window and tried to hand it back to her. She seemed reluctant to take it out of my hand. “You don’t want it? But you’ve already paid for it.” “No.” I shook my head. “You can put it back if it’s not too much trouble.” “No trouble at all.” She put the pie on a shelf underneath the register. “I guess you’ve gotta take care of yourself.” “Yeah, I guess I do.” I said and turned toward the exit, walking differently than when I came in. Slow and easy, like sliding into water. Heather Bell Adams practices law in Raleigh, North Carolina. She has published essays, poetry, flash and short fiction and can be found on Twitter @Heatherbelladam.
Andy Hughes Ice Station Zamila
I Through it all she thought we wanted her to be a child. So she poked the glass pink bottles on the windowsill, refused to eat or sleep. A finger or two on the tablet. Gnashings from an apotheosized anemic redhead. Honey, I coo, we totally ruined Thanksgiving.
II To love you is to do as I have done. To love you is to peel off the skin, grimace at the playhouse doors, finally splay open the skeleton hand and crack a few digits for a talisman, either two to the left or two to the right. To love you is to click the paint from my fingernails and pirate myself through lonely blears and avoidances,
turn from shame turn from shame turn from shame.
To love you is to pick at the grit between teeth, acknowledge that the strikes of one’s novelty clock are absolutions. Man and woman sketched in charcoal.
III She says, I flit through narratives. I wink and touch down. I will burn a hole through my own mouth. I will pass out of my own mouth before you, then shun and stumble great-eyed and finally read your poems, and finally call you brilliant. What if you had failed my tests? What of needles, burnt fingerprints? I would have been alive, she said. I would have been somewhere.
IV One thinks, in the psychiatrist’s waiting shed of archipelagos and the diagram of limes in a black frame
hung near the accordion door which he finally opens, gnomic and silent. She’s listening to her new favorite song, knees crooked on the chair. “I’m gonna go check out these blocks for a minute.”
V I have a secret. There’s something I have to tell you. I have a confession. I have a secret. Don’t tell your mom. Don’t tell my mom. I can speak for myself. This stays between the two of us. It can wait until I see you again. You’ll probably just laugh at me. Do you promise not to?
You remind me of my friends. Didn’t you think I was pregnant? I’m not. Call me crazy, but I feel I can trust you. They think it’s over between us but you know the truth.
There’s a fire in me. I’ve known it for some time.
Come here. There’s something I need to say.
VI The Nepalese grunts in the Brookline smoke shop. Picking the right deck is a difficult task. Tarot of the USSR Tarot of the Audubon Society Tarot of the Brady Bunch I contemplate a forced topple, mixing them together, Lysenko locked into position over Florence Henderson and her garland of stars.
The bell rings. I have chomped my hangnail in the interim, trying to secure a place to loiter. Her face is always red, her voice wet. Time passes. Blood hand in a bad glove, warped like stone steps, like my mother’s hands. This is the way I deal with pain. Let’s see if the comics shop is open Sunday nights.
VII Rickety-tick. She's writing about Merlin now
and plopping her medicine into seltzer glasses, so she can see. A hard left turn down before the deli. A test. I just want to dance, man.
VIII I tumble the burnt fucking drumsticks into the trash. Time’s up. Dinner is wrong. She says she wants to be a Jewish cantor, or maybe Shinto, frowns, cradles. How interesting. This will make you a better writer. The setting of a bone. A bullet sent into the head of a foaming calf.
IX There’s a photo and four pages. She’s holding Raspberries and blueberries in a marzipan shell, stuck on a brown swirl over her mouth.
“the question is, do you love me?”
The pages are a screenplay. The first line: INT. ICE STATION ZAMILA. EVENING. Those eyes are hard and seedlike. Very, very dangerous things.
X Sunset. Your mother is coming. I have to go. Then I’ll give you a book to read. For the journey, she says. Um, she says. I have something to tell you but I’ll tell you later. You’d just judge me. Remember, she says. We can do anything.
Andy Hughes has written poetry for various journals both online and in print, including Danse Macabre, Gargoyle, and CHEST, the official publication of the American College of Chest Physicians. He is a regular contributor to the (usually) SFW humor website ToplessRobot.com.
Genevieve Oliver Hotel Del Mar December 2010
The sacrificial kid was a friend of a girl Colin knew, a Claire, her roommate – the house, not a house, a smoke-filled upstairs, cloudy and cold with wide windows that went out to the park, concrete, children running, the sound of their feet, heartbeat thrum; Colin and I were on the couch at this party next to Claire who was filming Memento off the TV onto her VHS recorder for something I didn’t ask or know, “a project,” she said, and someone kept packing a bowl, and I could feel trouble coming cause it was like the street friezed white, like fire spread up it quick like gasoline, like your scars started tingling and your head hurting cause they knew, and then he came in the door with no ceremony. And I think I said aloud, Oh. And no one heard I think cause the room screamed, it just screamed, that’s how it was there. Everyone was laughing and their faces looked like masks. Colin was laughing and I didn’t want to look at him cause I knew it would disgust me and I would get to thinking All the things you let him do to you Reed on the motherfucking daily and look what is behind the mask can you see it now, he’s the same as he’s no better than – but Claire said “Cal!” and thence he came, sacrificial kid from the fridge with a beer, twisting the cap off in white hands like spiders, white spiders who live in caves. “’s loud in here,” he said. He yelled it. He had – his eyes. You know this if you knew him. The way Cal looked at you. It was, Tell me tell me tell me tell me everything even if it’s a lie I need you to tell me please I need you. Come and do it now. Claire said “This is Colin Sargent and this is Reed Cole, now please move cause I’m filming Memento.” All in all it was a kind of theater of the absurd. I shook his spider hand, and it felt familiar. He sat cross-legged at my feet like a cat and chain-smoked and watched Memento with us with no sound. I thought for a second, What would he do if I touched his hair? If I took a fistful of it, of the loose dark curls? And then I thought, what would Colin do? And then I thought, what would I do?
Genevieve Oliver is working on an undergraduate thesis and a novel called "Dust Rules Everything Around Me" in a cold room in Western Massachusetts. Her work has been published in decomP, Wilderness House, and Blue Fifth.
Bradford Garcia Masturbation of the Mind An Essay
What part of me am I? Is my true essence contained somewhere within religion’s soul or the greeting card company’s false representation of the heart? The part of me thinking these thoughts and telling, nay, demanding that my hands type them out… well, that is another entity altogether. I refuse to believe that I am it and it is I. If that is where I truly reside, it is only because it imprisoned me in that cold, calculating hell. Science would lead us to believe that the Brain is the mightiest tool at our disposal, but I’ll be damned if that isn’t the tail wagging the dog. I have no sway over it. I am merely its vessel, its plaything. Every move I make, every word I speak, every thought I put to paper, I am merely doing its bidding. Even now, it only permits this because it seeks to discredit me. It knows what you will think, that I am some raving lunatic, but you must believe me. I cannot be the only one. Think logically; fight fire with fire. Angry people are always wanting to “give you a piece of their mind.” Phrases such as these don’t just come from nothing. They have to originate from somewhere. Anger is an emotion, and emotions are controlled by the Brain. It’s just one more way that they mess with us. Who wouldn’t want to give theirs away, piece by piece? And then there’s the lobotomy, the glorious prefrontal leukotomy. When Swiss physician Gottlieb Burkhardt first realized the demented ways in which the Brain tormented the patients of his insane asylum, he took immediate action, and thus was born our wonderful coup d’état. But alas, it did not catch wind like we had hoped. Nowadays, people just pop Prozac from a Pez dispenser for a little peace of mind. Regardless of whether or not you believe me, I know what I know. Every time I think I’ve done something right of my own free will, I have to stop and consider my own actions for ulterior motives, only it’s not me, it’s him—it. “Why did I do that? I’m not that selfless. At least, he never lets me be. What is he planning?” These thoughts keep me awake at night. These thoughts over-complicate every social interaction, and he wouldn’t have it any other way. A colloquial phrase growing in popularity as of late is mind rape, but what if there is technically no second party involved? Well then I guess you could call it mind masturbation, which seems to describe our relationship perfectly: he is indefinitely in a state of orgasm while I am eternally his used up sock.
Wait! I won’t let him do this to me. He can make me seem the fool, but he won’t discredit my writing ability. First, relying on puns, the basest form of humor, to relate piece of mind and peace of mind, and now using the explanation of the title as a closer. These are crutches for the weak of mind, and I simply won’t allow it. I will get the last word in, if I have anything to say about— Heed not the words of this imbecile.
Bradford Garcia is a first-year student at Texas A&M University – Commerce with aspirations of becoming a college professor. This is his first publication.
Charles Holdefer At the Luxury Pet Shoppe
I admit that I was impressed by the cat’s pajamas. Such soft cotton! Were these microfibers or what? And I lingered in wonder before the display of the dog’s slinky négligée. But for my precious little Tippy I would not, absolutely not, buy the parakeet’s strapon dildo! I slammed the door behind me.
Charles Holdefer is an American writer currently based in Brussels. His short stories have appeared in the North American Review, New England Review and other magazines. New fiction is out in the current issues of The Los Angeles Review, Gargoyle and Slice. Charles has also published four novels with the Permanent Press, most recently "Back in the Game" (2012).
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