Embers Igniting 2017

Embers Igniting 2 0 1 7

Embers Igniting 2 0 1 7

Vo l u m e 4

Copyright Š 2017 Embers Igniting www.embersigniting.com embersigniting@gmail.com Cover art by James Schlavin All rights revert to contributors upon publication.

Note from the Editor Madeleine Mozley

Man is somehow capable of being completely self-absorbed and fully blind to his own state simultaneously. How easy it is to live seeing everything and nothing, absorbed in the minutia of our every day and ignoring reality. We are lepers avoiding mirrors, shaking hands when we meet and politely ignoring when our index fingers pop off and fall to the ground. We’re sleepers seduced by the warmth of the down duvet, with gentle snores purring outward as a red-eyed, taloned creature standing by our bedside counts our breaths. The weight of our humanness and the brokenness of this world doesn’t affect us.

Until we awake.

We see the creature looming over us and the ragged, panicked scream we release is involuntary and unstoppable. We pause to look through a shop window at overpriced jewelry, accidentally catch our reflection to see that we have no ears to adorn anymore, and cover our faces with bandaged hands. Suddenly, our only desire is to tear ourselves apart — to be different, to be better.

To be elsewhere. The veil is down, and it’s impossible to put back up. We’ve taken the red pill.

Eternity looms.

And we’ll never be the same.

“But when anything is exposed by the light, it becomes visible, for anything that becomes visible is light. Therefore it says, ‘Awake, O sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.’” Ephesians 5:13-14 (esv)

Table of Contents Fiction

Visual Art

03 The Quiet Vanessa K. Eccles

02 Looking Back Through Forward Motion Wilma Saran

08 Miracle Rides Mary Beth Dahl

06 Reflection in the Woods Joseph S. Pete

20 The Jeweler’s Daughters Fred McGavran

16 Alone James Schlavin

28 The Question Dan Leach

27 The Night Market Stephen Shaw

34 How the Stars Used to Shine There Jenny Hoffman Michelle Lawson

33 Ever Present Everywhere Barbara Ruth

41 Mother Hen Angela Lovelace

46 The Day After Halloween David Athey

52 Two Funerals for Father Hoecken cj Bell

64 God’s Energy Michael Fontana

60 Open Your Eyes Joseph S. Pete

61 Wait Lauren Suchenski

68 Schism James Schlavin

Staff 38 Four Eyes Choice

Lauren Suchenski 47 Solid Lauren Suchenski 51 Sip

James Schlavin

Poetry

01 Light Lauren Suchenski

05 It May Be Daniel Fitzpatrick

07 Possibilities Miriam Thor

17 Toward the End John Grey

18 St. Francis n.c . Krueger

19 Colman of Stockerau Robert F. Gross

26 Parking Garage Alec Panos

Staff 39 Leaf Choice

Robert F. Gross

40 What She Does, What She’ll Do Barbara Ruth 48 Fire

g.e.

Schwartz

49 Improvements in the Offing John Grey

62 Via Dolorosa Ed Higgins

63 A Town Called Corinth g.e. Schwartz

66 Wounded Tongue Adriana Medina

67 This is Your Universe Speaking John Grey

Light

Lauren Suchenski

Light, the light whose fading love seems smiling, ancient, curled, and motherly — whose half-remembered sighs keep sizing up the seismic heart of this side of the solar system. sun, the sun whose fading eye is drifting out of view is cold, warm if you can call it that, serene, sanguine. sky, the sky open and let us see the tarnished clothes the night sky drapes. let us see the angling wishes of planets gone by the hungry songs of stars still singing, still singed at the edges, still silent in the space. space, the space see the certain trace of orbits and the pace of unfinished races — always sprinting never settling, never setting, just speeding along like light. like light — Light airy circuitous and nearly gone now.

1

1 2˝ x 1 6˝ o i l p a i n t o n c r a d l e d w o o d p a n e l

Looking Back Through Forward Motion Wilma Saran 2

The Quiet Va n e s s a K . E c c l e s

The skull on the windowsill reminded darkness that evil was already here. Ruth cracked the stubborn window, peering through the wavy glass. The yard was in the early morning hours — the in-between. The time before light makes its presence known. The time when night isn’t ready to let go.

Ruth sat on the bed, curled her bony knees to her cheek, and nervously plaited the edge of her white cotton gown. Not too long ago, life had broken her. Those were the doctor’s words, not hers.

She didn’t feel broken. No, that wasn’t the right word. She felt parched, like the world and all its meaning had dried up. Her soul mimicked the desert — empty, barren, dry. She dug her toes into the baby blue sheets, leaving dirt stains from her soles. She stared at the sheer, tattered curtain blowing in the gentle breeze. She imagined it dancing to some unheard symphony far away from here. She knew this was where she belonged even though it wasn’t where she wanted to be. She hated the ghosts that lived here, including her own.

A tiny creak from the hall outside the bedroom diverted her attention. She bit her lip and waited for the doorknob to turn and her father to come marching in. He’d tell her like he always did, “Now Ruth, you’re gonna pull yourself together, ya hear? Life ain’t friends with nobody. The only way to survive this world is to spit and move on.”

She remembered a time she’d witnessed him do just that when he had to shoot their German Shepherd that he’d loved for more than twelve years. First time she’d seen her daddy cry. They couldn’t afford the vet bill to put him down. She could still see his calloused finger tremble as he pulled the trigger. Then he spit, as if to say, “Life be damned. You won’t break me.”

She envied his strength. Only death ever conquered him, and if he was able, she felt certain he’d tell her even that hadn’t.

The Alabama summer heat crept in, causing sweat to bead down Ruth’s back.

“Tell me, darling, are you going to mope around in your gown all day, or are you going to help your momma fix dinner?” She could hear her mother’s soft voice like whispers from the walls.

I was born thirsty, she thought, remembering all the conversations she’d had with her parents.

All the memories of her childhood that radiated from this place.

Everyone she’d ever loved had been taken from her. Everyone.

She wiped a stray tear from her face and wrapped her frail arms around her knees, holding herself together.

She had long since left this house, which reminded her of an empty, haunted shell. Without her parents, nothing about it felt alive anymore. But it was hers now, and like so many other parts of her fragmented life, she had abandoned it in search of something — anything — to fill her.

The sun slowly emerged from the horizon. Her daddy would already be outside mending a fence or feeding the animals, and Momma would be playing gospel music on the radio, drinking coffee from her favorite chipped mug with curlers in her hair, making breakfast. Their routines

3

grounded her. Made her feel at home. They never strayed from who they were. Rock solid people who were scarcely weathered by life.

“I’ve never known who I am,” she said aloud as though it were a confession or a revelation, or both.

She smoothed another tear down her cheek, allowing the salty truth to absorb into her face.

A sunbeam shot through the window, highlighting an oblong spot on the dull wood floor. A butterfly with big blue wings rested there, glowing in the morning sun. The beautiful simplicity of it struck Ruth and she fell to her knees to get a closer look.

“Where’d you come from?” she asked the creature in a sweet voice.

“You know what I love about this place, Ruth?” her mom had once asked. “The quiet. There’s nothing you can’t figure out when you give yourself time to escape the noise.”

Ruth smiled at the memory. She carefully cupped the butterfly in her hands and made her way through the modest house and across the dusty porch.

She walked into the wet grass a few paces and let the butterfly go. As she watched its beautiful wings flutter into the blue sky, Ruth suddenly felt warm. Like she’d just received an embrace. She spit into the dirt and dug her naked toe into the moist earth.

A smile stretched across her face as she stepped inside, flipped on her momma’s old radio, and started coffee.

4

It May Be Daniel Fitzpatrick

that when Adam saw the first black storm in the east, rigorous back unbowed, rough hand resting on the rude plow, his faith faltered on the thought that God had changed his mind, sweeping up sheathed Eden, letting Earth crack back to voiceless void. he and Eve died a skyless night uncertain of another sun, trembling beneath fig skins and furs. that when the first sun coppered the clay creek and dripped behind the western wood, no thought of its return descended with the veil of stars to the hushed bower and pillowed locks and flowers appealing to all but eyes. evening came, and night followed, and the sun amazed us with the morning.

5

photograph

Reflection in the Woods Joseph S. Pete 6

Possibilities Miriam Thor

She stares at sonograms, tiny toes, squinched up nose.

Would she have had her laugh?

Her smile? Her heart?

One choice changed everything.

And now, perhaps forever, she’s haunted by who she could’ve been.

He looks at him in his cell, craving meth, wanting death.

Why did he pull that trigger?

Too mad? Too scared?

One day changed everything.

As he makes his rounds, he wonders who he could’ve been.

She watches him go to his desk, no supplies, angry eyes.

What’s he go through at his house?

Neglect? Abuse?

Good homes change everything.

She cries as he fails, and she imagines who he could’ve been.

He sees their empty lives, crushing weight, so much hate.

Why can’t they understand?

Accept? Believe?

The fall changed everything.

His heart breaks for He knows who they could’ve been.

7

Miracle Rides Mary Beth Dahl

I held the id up to my face. “It’s me, Gavin.

You see me every single day.”

Gavin took a couple quick looks between me and the card. He wasn’t joking. He really didn’t recognize me. I thought about pulling out my ponytail, but then I’d have to deal with my frizzy hair again. Besides, how did he not know who I was?

“You’re assigned to the Observation Hall?”

“Yes.” I stared at the light reflecting from my headlights hitting the guard bar.

Humiliating. I should say something memorable now. Something smart.

“There’s a Code Orange at the intake dock.”

He punched something into his computer. “You can go on, ma’am.”

I snapped my badge onto my blouse and lurched over the metal grate into the secure parking lot of the Miracle Rides Amusement Park Design facility. What a lie. Designing amusement park attractions wasn’t even close to the stuff that went on in here, and I don’t even know the half of it. But I guess “top-secret” attraction rides seemed like a plausible reason to have guards posted at your entrances and barbed wire across the top of your electric fence.

A bad feeling crept across me as I eased my Corolla into a space near my normal spot, which was usually occupied. Five years and I still haven’t been able to establish my own parking space. The feeling stuck with me as I climbed the stairs to the main floor and kept me company through the granite hallway.

“Going up?” John, the elevator guard, grinned and pressed a button on the control panel.

8

“Sure.” I kept my eyes down. John released the hold button and waited. I cleared my throat.

“Seven.”

He pressed the seven as if he wouldn’t have known it if I hadn’t told him. I know I’m not much to look at, but I’m not invisible. How could wearing my hair differently cause everyone to forget my existence?

Before the doors could shut, two more employees crossed into the box.

The guard tapped the button for the eleventh floor. I rolled my eyes. Maybe it was the different work shift. Going from evenings to mornings every other week just messed with everyone’s perspective. That’s what I told myself, anyway.

The elevator doors slipped open to the sweet smell of coffee, and I aimed for the break room. A cup of caffeinated nectar would shake that bad feeling off. As I rounded the corner, my heart sank. Kip and Johnnie carried a boy by the arms and legs, limp like a ragdoll.

“You better get ready.” Sweat dripped down Kip’s face. “This one’s wild.”

I backed to the wall as they passed. “Doesn’t look so wild.”

“We’ll be back in fifteen. Be ready.” Kip swiped his card at the security door.

I waved and turned back to my goal.

Coffee and today’s paper. The flipped gurney with bent legs down the hall from the break room made me hurry — I’d forego adding the ten tiny half and half cups until I got to my station. I made it with seven minutes to spare and even had time for the paper.

A red light blinked, and I checked the monitor. Johnnie carried the boy like a baby

with Kip leading them down the entry hallway to the tank. Not so wild. I went back to my paper. His screams jolted me from my crossword. Ten seconds ago, the kid had been cradled in Johnnie’s big arms as the orderlies brought him to the tank. Now he hovered outside the holding room screaming and blocking the door. I scooted closer to the monitor.

Kip and Johnnie swung their clubs at the poor kid. I pressed the intercom. “He’s not a piñata guys. Get him inside and shut the door.” They shot a look toward the camera. I guess they’d thought of that already. I checked the control panel. Until they got him inside the tank, I couldn’t help them.

A golden shroud surrounded the boy.

Flickers of light like lightning bugs zipped around him, smacking into the orderlies. It’s not often something slows down those brutes.

Even the kid with the spiky skin went into the room with less fuss.

Kip stepped into the holding cell and looked at the glass. Three fingers. Got it.

I cleared my throat, “On three.” They knew the drill. I counted it down, pushed the kill button, and they grabbed and tossed simultaneously. The doors slid shut, and the screaming banshee hovered a little before crumpling to the floor. Silent.

I hate that button, but it works. Two seconds and whatever’s in the room goes down.

Poor kid. The shroud still covered him, a blanket of energy. The lightning bug things had retreated under it.

Something about him choked me up. I see kids like this all day. Kids able to read minds or move objects. Kids with spikes and glowing eyes and all kinds of bizarre stuff. But something about this one felt familiar — close.

I shook it off and grabbed my keypad. As the only observer on duty today, this one depended on me, and I wasn’t about to get written up again. They’d have to find some other girl to blame if things went bad.

After the kid’s eventful entry, I took in the whole scene. The first minutes packed a lot. Cameras caught it all, but the researchers were right. A human’s sight and feel for a new intake relayed more than a recording. And I’m nothing if not observant.

Sometimes it feels cold to just write down what they’re doing and not bother helping them, but this is what I’m good at. Recording data, anticipating problems, doing what I’m told. I will, at times, offer a calm word, coax them to think it’s not that bad — that things will get better. I’m pretty good at that, too. I’ve had years of practice every time I look in the mirror. Things will get better, Becky. There’s got to be someone out there for you. You’re not really alone.

Stirring, the boy moaned. He lifted his head but kept his eyes closed. Except for the shroud and hovering, nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Brown hair, medium frame, T-shirt, jeans, old sneakers. Maybe twelve at the most. I checked my inbox for his file.

Nothing.

Sitting up, he tilted his head back, eyes still closed. Much calmer, serene almost, he moved to a meditating position. Kind of hard to believe three minutes ago he had two guards swearing at the top of their lungs.

His head swayed like Stevie Wonder’s, back and forth. Anger twitched at his face. Then, he stopped, leveled his gaze at the one-way glass, and looked past me. I froze. He cast an evil squint and then started screaming again.

Great, a loud one. I turned the knob on the sound control.

“How is he doing?” The guy’s question bounced in before him.

“Nothing too unusual. You his manager?”

I didn’t get up. These manager types rarely cared to know my name. They just wanted their data. “Welcome to Miracle Rides,” I said with my sarcasm perfectly pitched.

He completely ignored me. Even clearing my throat didn’t provoke a response. “I’ll upload my info into his file, if you’ll send it.” I double-checked my inbox. Nope. Nothing there.

“Oh, yeah. Sorry.” He moved his finger across his fancy phone. It took him five seconds to do what he should’ve already done. Tall, slim, and gray-haired, he made me feel small, so I slipped my shoes on and stood next to him. He smelled good, a cologne mixed with clean-man.

I have seniority in the surveillance rooms.

Well, not exactly seniority, but I know what

9

all the buttons do. Normally, a manager asks me questions and hardly looks up. This guy couldn’t take his eyes off the shrieking kid.

I motioned toward the glass, trying to draw some of his attention. “So, I don’t think he wants to be here.” I hate it when I laugh at my own material, but this guy made me nervous.

I giggle like an idiot when I’m nervous. Maybe an introduction would help. “And you are?”

He scowled at me. Technically, I’m supposed to check his credentials. He shouldn’t be giving me attitude.

“I’m case manager Murray.”

“Good to meet you. I’m Becky. I work surveillance for these two observation rooms and offer the occasional, necessary security measures.” I put the plastic cover back over the kill button and cleared my throat. “I haven’t seen you before.”

“Yeah, I don’t think we’ve met.”

My inbox pinged, so I went back and scanned the file.

Oliver Randolph, twelve years old — Can I call it or what? — Foster care for ten years, physically and emotionally abused. Abandoned.

Energy field. Extremely dangerous if provoked.

“Did you write these notes?” Murray didn’t answer. Maybe he couldn’t hear me over the screaming. “Excuse me. Did you write these notes?”

He nodded.

“So you’re not one for much detail?” I joined him at the window. “I usually get a lot of backstory. It helps me figure out what to watch for.”

“You just need to write what you see. You don’t need to know his story.” He stayed glued to the glass.

“It would be helpful to know about that energy field. What is that?”

He grunted and pulled out his phone.

“Can you open the door?”

“What door?”

“That one.” He sounded annoyed, but who opens the tank door when a kid’s still uncontrolled?

“Shouldn’t we calm him down first?” I reached for the intercom — sometimes a soft voice helps. But he put his hand on mine and gently but firmly pulled it away.

“Just open the door.”

10

I like my job, so I ignored his attitude and unlocked the door. The screams got louder. He wasn’t crying, just screaming.

Humming joined the screams as a singing nurse I hadn’t seen before floated into the room. Literally. Chiffon-layered, aqua scrubs wafted around her. With flawless ivory skin and jet-black hair clipped with a barrette, she resembled an Asian princess. And she floated.

Her feet walked through air, defying gravity.

I’ve seen lots of weird stuff. I mean, this place specializes in weird. The kids don’t come here unless they’ve got something going on that’s way beyond science or whatever physical laws govern all things natural and normal. But I have never seen an adult demonstrate anything like this. All the adults are normal.

I guess I’ve always assumed they grow out of it. Aren’t we here to “fix” them?

Oliver didn’t seem to notice her. She buzzed around him like a worker bee. His shroud kept her fingers from getting to his skin. Rhythmic and happy, her song changed when her fingers brushed his golden barrier.

“So what’s up with her?” I didn’t really expect the old guy to answer me. “I’ve never seen an adult like that, just kids.”

“Well, kids grow up.” His words stung.

Some of the ones who come through here don’t make it that far. I guess I’ve always assumed they grow out of it. Aren’t we here to “fix” them?

“They’re not freaks, you know.” It felt like he was reading my thoughts. He turned away from the glass for the first time since he’d entered the room. “They have these abilities because of what they’ve been through. Sometimes it goes away as they grow. Sometimes it doesn’t.

And sometimes,” he turned back toward the nurse, “sometimes they learn how to use it, helping others.”

“She doesn’t seem to be able to reach him.”

“Yeah.” He punched something into his phone. “Would you open the door again? The doctor is here.”

I smacked the appropriate button, and a rugged guy in a doctor’s jacket entered the cell.

I usually stick with the average, white male, but this guy deserved another look. His dark skin, black eyes, and perfect hair capped off a tall, sturdy frame.

It took me a few seconds to realize the kid’s screaming had died down. He turned his head in the direction of the doctor and within sixty seconds stopped screaming completely.

The doctor led the boy to a metal examining table. It was the most normal the kid had been. Checking the boy’s ears, eyes, and mouth, the doctor joked with him about the hassles of gravity and the physics of walking on water.

When he asked the kid to take a deep breath, or close his eyes, or turn his head the boy did it all without a peep. No hesitation. Just like a normal physical. But as the good doctor moved the stethoscope to the kid’s back, he whispered something, and the boy tensed.

“Uh-oh.” I reached for my keypad. The old guy must have sensed it, too. He jammed his phone into his pocket and headed for the tank.

“Count to five then open the door.”

I guess he assumed I’d blindly obey him. I would, of course. I have no say in any of this.

I just watch and record. It’s pathetic actually.

Sometimes I’m sure I could help these kids far more than these quacks.

Murray barreled in at five and half seconds.

Now all three of them were in the room. Before Murray got to the boy, the kid stood and started screaming again, bringing his arms above his head. The sparkly thing returned, but this time little plates, like golden armor, covered him. The nurse couldn’t touch him through it. Murray raised his hand telling her to stop trying.

Oliver’s screams ended abruptly, and he sank to his knees. His quieting down didn’t feel like peace. I checked the monitors for energy levels. Nothing had changed from what his energy blanket and the flickers had already been emitting. Except for the spikes around the kid and nurse, nothing looked unusual. The cute doctor leaned toward him.

Oliver gave him a sideways glare. I’d seen that

look once before, directed toward an orderly right before a rather volatile patient ripped his arm off. Two opposing thoughts crossed my mind — hiding or trying to talk to the kid.

Maybe I could help him.

Before I could make up my mind, the lights in the adjoining cell flickered, and Kip backed into the room pulling a wheelchair. Little whelps marked his skin from Oliver’s shroud.

The blinds were closed on Oliver’s side, but Kip kept his distance from the window and Oliver.

I flipped on the intercom. “Hey Kip, who ya got there?” He turned the chair toward me, and Kimber’s sweet face lit up the room. A string of drool attached her mouth to her shoulder.

“Oh…she’s fallen back a bit. Why’s she here?”

Kip nodded toward the other room and ran for the door.

“Kimber, sweetie. It’s Becky.” Kimber stared off into her vacant darkness. This kid had my heart in her hand. When she was awake and well, she shined like a star, very compliant and obedient. She displayed no weird abilities and posed no threat. I haven’t figured out why she’s in here, but there must be something.

Dropping off into these catatonic states might be reason enough.

A pop from Oliver’s room snapped me back. The lights on my control panel flashed.

Oliver had mentally pinned the nurse against the wall and pressed the doctor against my window — hello, handsome. Murray walked untouched around the kid.

This might freak the normal observer out, but I’ve seen weirder. The strangest thing wasn’t the doctor and nurse being immobilized by some unseen energy, it was Murray walking slowly around Oliver. The kid looked back and forth from the doc to the nurse, but didn’t acknowledge Murray’s presence in the slightest.

When Oliver finally let them loose, the three adults scrambled for the door. I beeped them out. Murray paused, gave a sad look back at Oliver, and waited until I opened the door again.

“Any change?” Murray launched into the control room sounding urgent. A strong smell of his cologne mixed with sweat wafted in after him.

11

“Um…no. Were you expecting something?”

It had only taken him a whole five seconds to get here from the cell. Not much had changed in those five seconds.

He hushed me and pointed toward the glass.

“What the…” I couldn’t believe it. Kimber had moved her chair and sat facing the blinds to Oliver’s room, drool replaced by a smile.

Sweet little Kimber had woken up. Rosy life filled her cheeks, and serenity and strength emanated from her. I didn’t have time to write this up, so I grabbed my recorder and spoke softly, describing the scene. “Oliver is leaning toward the window and grinning. He’s raising the blinds on his side to reveal Kimber’s shining face. He’s cocking his head to the side and squinting. Is that recognition in his eyes?”

Murray heard me and leaned back whispering, “They were in the same home for a short time.” Kimber stood and pressed her hand to the window, happy tears streaming down her face. Oliver placed his hand opposite hers; then he looked back at me.

“He wants you to open the window.” I don’t know why Murray was whispering. They couldn’t hear us.

“How do you know? Can he see me?”

“What do you think?” Murray smirked. I think that meant yes. “Now can you open the window?”

“Do you think that’s a good idea?” He didn’t answer me. “I mean, can he hurt her?”

“I’ve been with Ollie from the beginning.

Kimber can take care of herself.” His short answers irritated me.

“I’m sorry, sir.” My inflection on “sir” meant something entirely different, but I didn’t care. This guy obviously didn’t know what he was doing. “You’ve been with that kid all along? Why didn’t you help him? I don’t get you managers. You don’t care about these kids. You experiment with them and use them.

They deserve to be happy, not go from one bad thing to the next.”

Murray turned and faced me. “Becky. I know this is hard for you, but you don’t know everything. You are one piece of a huge operation with a lot of moving parts. Just do your job and open the window.”

12

I wanted to scream. But instead, I muttered some choice words and flipped the switch to raise the glass.

Kimber squealed with delight. She could make the Grinch giggle. The boy just stood there. Still. Then, he moved his lips like he was talking, but no words came out. I turned up the volume, but nothing. Kimber answered him back the same way. The two carried on a regular imaginary conversation, complete with imaginary laughter. Oliver loosened up.

The outer layer of his plate-like things faded away, leaving just a golden glow surrounding him.

An hour passed. Fascinating at first, watching them grew boring fast, especially since they weren’t actually talking. Murray never strayed from the observation window. He watched the scene as if he were watching someone set the table, and he was starving.

“What exactly are you hoping for here?” I hadn’t gotten the words all the way out before he smiled.

“There. She’s doing it.” I followed his gaze.

Oliver had poked his skinny arm through the

The two carried on a regular imaginary conversation, complete with imaginary laughter. golden shroud. His bare flesh hung in the air between them. She reached out and touched his arm, and he laughed out loud. That was a first.

Murray stepped back. “I guess it’s now or never.” He seemed less confident than before, almost fearful. I would’ve said something, but I had no idea what he was talking about or where he was going. He headed for Oliver’s cell. The intercom beeped. “Open the door.”

I obeyed.

Completely lost in Kimber, Oliver didn’t notice him. But she noticed and beamed brightly.

“Thank you.” She spoke joyfully, louder than I’d ever heard her speak before. Murray nodded and stood behind Oliver. The boy turned, his bare arm still sticking out.

For the first time, the kid looked up into Murray’s eyes. I could only see him from the side, but I think Murray smiled. The look they shared lasted a few seconds, and then Oliver pulled his arm back, lifted his hands, and screamed.

Kimber rolled her chair away from the window, fear etched on her face. “No, please.

Please. Don’t.” She called to Murray.

When the orderly lost his arm last year, I got probation.

I’m pretty sure letting a manager die would be the end of my career.

Murray yelled above the screams. “Close the window and the blinds.”

Oliver went totally off. The rectangular plates covered him again. He paced, throwing darts of energy toward Murray. The guy took every hit, absorbing it on steady feet. I had a feeling Oliver was holding back, as if he were building up to something.

Slowing his pace, Oliver spoke. “I hate you.” Facing Murray, he repeated himself, taking steps to close the gap between them and glowing brighter as he went. “I hate you.”

Murray jumped back, looked straight at me through the one-way glass with a look of sheer joy on his face. It shocked me so much I almost didn’t do what he asked.

“Hit the button.” As Murray spoke, Oliver lifted his hands, his full energy force glowing between his palms. He meant to kill the man.

I could see it in his eyes. I hit the button as the ball left his hands. It burst apart and fell to the floor, along with the kid and Murray.

“Kip, Johnnie, get in there and pull him out.” My heart pounded in my chest. When the orderly lost his arm last year, I got probation.

I’m pretty sure letting a manager die would be the end of my career.

They pulled him around to the control room and tried to set him in a desk chair. Not an easy job, even for two burly guys. Kip finally locked the wheels on the chair.

“You okay?” I tried to sound sincere, but it really was Murray’s own fault.

“Yeah.” He perked up and got the goofiest grin on his face. “Yeah, I’m great.”

“How’s that? From where I’m sitting, it looks like your little experiment failed miserably. That kid’s completely closed off.”

Murray bounded up. “Oh, yeah? Look at him.”

Oliver paced in front of the blinds. He couldn’t get them open this time. I’d closed them on both sides. His face conveyed anger and desperation. His connection with Kimber had been broken. She had her hand on the glass, a vacant gaze seeping back into her eyes.

Every few paces, Oliver would stop and put his hand opposite hers on the glass. It was pitiful.

“Yeah, I think you succeeded in breaking his heart, not tearing down his walls.”

“Well, there you would be wrong. He talked to me.”

“He hates you, and that fills you with joy.

You’re sick.”

Murray grabbed me by the shoulders.

“Becky, he saw me.” His words evidently meant something to him because his eyes glistened with tears. “He hasn’t acknowledged me in a long time.”

“You were standing right in front of him.

Of course he saw you.”

“I know it’s hard to understand.” He choked up a bit. “I love that kid.” He released my shoulders. “I love him completely. He thinks I don’t. He hates me. That’s good. That’s a step. I’ll take it, and I’m not going to let him go. He’s precious to me. There’s not another one like him. I love him.”

His voice trailed off as he repeated himself.

Even though I was touched by his speech, I

13

still couldn’t shake the image of Kimber, broken and sad. Maybe his backhanded approach helped the boy, but I’m pretty sure he messed my little angel up.

“What about her?” I nodded toward Kimber.

Wiping tears away, Murray chuckled. “Oh, she’s not the one to worry about.”

“You used her, and look at her now. She’s crushed.” Kimber had collapsed on the floor.

“Yeah, maybe Oliver’s special to you, but if you knew Kimber, then you’d know she’s special, too.”

“I know Kimber. I know her very well.

That’s how I knew she might have some luck with those walls.” His confidence had returned.

“What? You used her. You sick, manipulative pig. No wonder he hates you.”

“Becky, Kimber’s going to be fine. Are you all right?”

“Me?” He gave me the same look he’d given Oliver the first time he’d gone in the cell. “Yes, you.”

I looked away. Stupid managers, always insinuating and being nosy.

His hand touched my shoulder, but I pretended not to notice and fiddled with the knobs on my recorder. It took about ten seconds, but he got the message and moved on, gathering his things.

He snapped his case shut. “I’m staying with Oliver. Can you call the boys to move him?”

“What?” I took another look at Kimber to get my courage up. “You’re just going to leave her? Can’t you let them say goodbye at least?” I knew he wouldn’t answer any of my questions.

But I stood there, staring at him, willing my glare to hurt him.

He turned his tender hazel eyes on me. I hadn’t really noticed them before.

“Becky. I know you don’t understand my methods. I love him and her…and you.”

Sincerity punctuated his words. “You’re coming at things from here.” Holding his arm out, he made a fist with his hand. “I’m coming at them from here.” With his other hand, he orbited the fist, like he was casting a spell over his hand. “You either trust me or you don’t.” He

14

dropped both hands to his side and gave me a crooked smile. “Your world is small and built on you. You have no idea the lengths I’ll go to for him.” He meant Oliver, but for a second I thought he was talking about me. He didn’t wait for me to respond, but turned and left.

Something inside me leaned toward the door. I didn’t want him to go. His eyes, that look of joy on his face when Oliver acknowledged him — some kind of crazy love. It didn’t make sense. I could describe it. I could bullet point his actions and outline his methods, but I didn’t understand how it fit with me. I could feel it though — an uneasy feeling.

She looked straight at me.

This one-way glass definitely didn’t work.

I made the call. They ripped poor Oliver away from the window. I had to hit the kill button twice, nearly giving Kip a heart attack.

Once the commotion died down, I turned back to Kimber. She’d been pretty lifeless, but now she was sitting and looking up at the mirror like she was waiting for me.

“Kimber? Are you okay?” My voice sounded a little shaky through the intercom.

“I’m fine. I want out of here.” Steady and strong, she didn’t sound like herself.

“Kimber?” I leaned toward the glass.

“Becky?” She looked straight at me. This one-way glass definitely didn’t work. “Becky?

Can you get me out of here?” An assertive vigor replaced her compliant disposition. Kimber was different.

Something in her eyes reminded me of Murray. His words echoed in my mind, and I couldn’t shake the feeling I needed something.

Kimber smiled at me with those knowing eyes. “C’mon, Becky.”

I slipped into my chair and stared at the glass.

Sweet little Kimber glowed with warmth and love, and she pointed it all at me. “C’mon, Becky. Wake up.”

The bad feeling gnawed at me. An emptiness. My heart pounded. Part of me wanted to order her back to her room, back to the normal — or what was normal for this place. But through the haze of watching and observing and doing what I’m told, I glimpsed a point of no return. A place where one choice leaves you far worse off than the change that it would bring. I saw a different me. Someone loved.

Someone stronger.

Kimber’s smile broadened, as if she saw me unpacking the truth.

I shook my head, tears streaming down my face. “No.” Some things just can’t be real.

She stood and walked toward the mirror, never breaking her gaze. “It’s okay. I’ll help you. It’s time you woke up, stopped observing, and started living.” She whispered the last part, as if she were reaching into a dream and pulling someone free.

I looked down at the control panel. The button to the door. “I can’t just let you go.”

She let out a quiet giggle. “I’m not the one who needs to be free.” Her words washed over the ache within me. “It’s okay, Becky. You’re not ready yet. But you will be.” Her eyes sparkled.

The door opened, and Kip entered and rolled the wheelchair to Kimber. She waited, and so did I, but I didn’t know what to say.

She broke the stillness. “You will be, Becky.” She mouthed the words, and I heard them ringing in my ears. Ignoring the wheelchair, little Kimber marched out.

I stood there motionless. Alive. As the lights in the tank went out, my reflection bounced off the glass. Me. I looked different, like someone who knows something — like someone who’s loved. I smiled. Not so empty now. It didn’t make sense, but that’s how things go here. You come in one way and leave entirely different. Welcome to Miracle Rides.

15

1 8˝ x 2 4˝ w a t e r c o l o r o n p a p e r

Alone James Schlavin

16

Toward the End John Grey Once I was a cause célèbre, but now I’m just another ancient citizen put out to pasture in a nursing home called “Peace of the Just.”

Yes, I’m 203 Earth-years old, and everyone else here is in their eighties or nineties.

If you imagine that makes me feel special, then think again.

My frontal cortex is a ghost town.

My legs — every last one of them — are as useless as my third and fourth nostrils.

As for my skin color, that shiny yellow stood out in a crowd once.

Now it’s faded to a kind of beige.

To be honest, there are inmates here with faces yellower than mine.

I could once leap twenty feet or more from a standing start.

Something to do with the greater gravity on my home planet, I was told.

Now it’s a struggle to get out of this infernal rocker.

And I don’t walk so much as totter.

To add to my sad state, I’m blind in one eye and half-blind in three others.

I must confess, I am as depressed as the pathetic souls I share these lodgings with.

At least they get visitors.

It’s been five years since anyone from nasa came to see me.

They have newer and more bizarre aliens to poke and prod these days.

So I will just stay here breathing this lousy oxygen, eating the dire food, and playing checkers with a variety of the used-up, discarded locals.

How I dread that my dying words will be, “Your move, Penelope.”

17

St. Francis N.C. Krueger

Tell me, little sparrow, where are the saints?

Are the pilgrims all buried in the ground?

Tell me, little sparrow, can you tame a wolf?

Can you gentle a wild bloodhound?

Tell me, little sparrow, did St. Francis walk here?

Did the children sing hymns on this road?

Did the people with blood running red through their veins Leave prayers to their God to be sowed?

Dear little sparrow, it is cold in my flesh And this corrosion creeps under my wrists.

Can a creature, a killer, a murderous beast Blow dandelion tufts for a wish?

Tell me, little sparrow, can He cure my heart?

Can He make me a child once again?

Tell me, little sparrow, was St. Francis alone, And can Christ bring back life to the dead?

18

Colman of Stockerau R o b e r t F. G r o s s

The roots are growing down from the scaffold The roots are growing down into the stone He shouldn’t have gone on this journey He shouldn’t have gone into the war zone He should have stayed with the familiar Where he knew the dialect (they said) Where his strangeness was not a provocation to violence Just jokes he’d heard since he was a kid He would have been safe not tortured not strung up not slaughtered He would have been king He should have known better (they said) He should have stayed with his kind The vines emerge from dead wood The tendrils twine about the corpse When they pray to him the head nods from the gibbet like he’s saying “I’ll see what I can do” Especially when it’s foreigners or hanged men or the ones who’ve lost their way He shouldn’t have set out for Jerusalem (they said) but everyone back home agreed he was a freak when he turned his back on them and set out for salvation The gibbet is sending out blossoms The gibbet blooms like an April orchard

19

The Jeweler’s Daughters Fred McGavran “Why won’t he just die?” Deborah Clayton said when the reverend Charles Spears, rector of the Downtown Church of Our Savior, had finished saying The Ministration at the Time of Death.

Karl Frielingheisen, her father, was curled up in the hospital bed, staring through the side rails with dull, gray eyes. Two weeks after an unsuccessful heart valve operation, he had drained himself and his family with his dying.

The priest took her arm and led her into the corridor.

“He can still hear you,” he said quietly.

The sixty-year-old divorcée put her hands over her eyes, setting three enormous diamond rings ablaze in the ceiling lights.

“I just want it to be over,” she sobbed.

“Why don’t you wait out here,” Spears said, recognizing the emotional exhaustion and guilt that so often torments the children of the dying. “I’ll sit with him for a while.”

At ninety-seven, Karl Frielingheisen’s face was as stern as a Roman bust. Spears wondered what those eyes saw now.

After the Second World War, Frielingheisen emigrated from Germany and founded a successful chain of jewelry stores just as shopping was moving to the new suburban malls. A believer in the transformative power of advertising, he emblazoned his wives and two daughters with bracelets and brooches and rings and earrings to show how jewelry could make money glow.

The dying man started, as if he saw something terrible moving toward him.

“Karl?” the priest asked.

20

Wealth, like a soft drink left too long by the pool, often attracted unwelcome visitors.

Each of his first two wives stayed with him long enough to bear him a daughter before succumbing to men who used them to extract settlements from the jeweler before discarding them in turn. The third stayed just long enough to let her rights under an antenuptial agreement vest before decamping with her lawyer.

His daughters attracted similar suitors.

Also thrice married, Deborah had a daughter by each of her first two husbands but only demands for increased alimony from the third. Allyson, his younger daughter, was twice married and still hanging on to her second husband, with whom she had three daughters. To celebrate the marriages, Karl Frielingheisen had given his daughters dazzling diamond rings; to celebrate their divorces, he had the wedding rings remade into cocktail rings to proclaim the wearers’ good fortune and availability.

Frielingheisen’s lips trembled.

“Der koffer,” he whispered.

“The suitcase?” Spears repeated.

“Tell them not to open it,” he said.

Deborah entered the room. “What’s he saying?”

“Something about a suitcase.”

“Don’t open it,” the old man said in a clear, commanding voice. He tried to sit up.

“Destroy it.”

“What suitcase, Daddy?” Deborah pleaded, but her father sank back on the bed, staring in horror at something beyond her vision.

“Sie kommen,” he whispered.

“Who’s coming, Karl?” the priest asked.

“Die Juden.”

“The Jews,” Spears translated, turning to Deborah.

The old man stretched out his hand as if to push them away and gasped.

The priest and the daughter stared at his face, distorted by fear, until a monitor beeped.

Karl Frielingheisen was finally dead.

The priest was passing prayer books to Deborah and her daughters who were seated at the long table in the vestry room when Harris Scintilton, Karl Frielingheisen’s lawyer, entered with Allyson, her husband Mike, and their daughters: Claire, Hillary, and Megan.

“I thought we were going to plan the funeral,” Spears said, surprised.

“We had some time before our meeting, so we called Harris to say we were in town,” Allyson replied brightly, hurrying around the table to hug her sister.

Deborah’s early-thirties daughters left their places to greet their aunt and cousins with hugs.

“What’s that?” Deborah demanded when she saw Scintilton was carrying a large leather suitcase.

The lawyer set it on the table before her.

“Your father left this with me,” he said, smiling broadly, as if to imply that the jeweler had trusted him more than her.

Facing her was a faded sticker with the silhouette of an ocean liner and “ss Aurelia — Barcelona — Buenos Aires” in large letters around the edge. Deborah shuddered.

“I don’t think we should open it,” she said, glancing at her daughters for support.

Elegant in quickly-purchased and poorlyfitted suits chosen to suggest both mourning and welcome for empathetic males, Elizabeth and Catherine nodded.

“Why not?” asked Allyson.

“Father said not to.”

Allyson and her daughters shifted in too-thin dresses from their Phoenix home.

Resplendent in a dark blue Brooks Brothers suit and pale blue tie, Harris Scintilton spread his hands and smiled.

“You both have an equal vote,” he said, as expert at promoting rivalries as a parent manipulating the affections of his children. “If one wants to open it, the other can’t stop her.”

“Do you know what’s inside?” Spears asked.

“He asked me to keep it in our firm’s vault,” the lawyer replied, avoiding the question.

“I don’t see there’s any problem opening it,” Mike said.

The women looked at each other. Deborah shuddered with frustration attributed to a lifelong sibling rivalry enhanced by her father’s erratic distribution of favors. All of the Frielingheisen women, even Megan who was the youngest, sported brooches and rings and bracelets as if they were living mannequins for Frielingheisen Jewelry.

“He said not to!” Deborah shrieked.

“Oh, let’s open it, Harris,” Allyson said.

“This will be fun.”

Scintilton pushed the suitcase to her, nearly knocking her prayer book off the table, and she unsnapped the clasps. A smell like death exuded from the rotting leather.

“Oh my God!” she exclaimed, reaching inside and removing two gold wristwatches with leather bands hardened by age. She handed them to Mike.

“This one’s a Patek Philippe,” he said. “He gave me one just like it when we got married.

And the other’s a Vacheron Constantin. They could be worth a lot of money.”

“Grandpa must have been saving them for a grandson,” Megan joked.

“Maybe they’ll make you take boys more seriously,” her sister Hillary needled her.

“And look at these,” Allyson said, removing several more elegant wristwatches from the suitcase.

“This is worse than watching someone open their presents at a birthday party,” Claire said. “Isn’t there anything for the rest of us?”

Allyson ran her hand around the inside of the suitcase.

“What’s this?” she said. “I nearly cut myself.”

She held up a piece of gold hanging like a drop of water from a tiny wire. Spears leaned forward and shuddered.

21

“It’s bridgework,” he said.

“What’s that?” asked Hillary.

“It came from someone’s mouth.”

“Yuck,” Megan exclaimed.

“Is there anything else in there?” Mike asked Allyson.

“Help me with this,” she replied.

Together, they turned the suitcase upside down and tapped around the edges. They could hear little clicking sounds on the tabletop. When they turned it right-side up, droplets of gold were lying on the table. Allyson scooped them together into a pile.

“And those are gold fillings,” the priest continued. He gestured to the suitcase. “May I see that?”

Allyson and Mike pushed it down to him.

Standing up, Spears reached for a compartment on the lid he had glimpsed when they turned it over. The rotting leather pulled away from the snaps, exposing an envelope. He opened the flap and laid half an inch thick of black and white photographs curled with age before him.

The first was a studio portrait of a young officer with his cap tilted at an angle so that the Death’s Head in the center reflected the photographer’s light. After more than seventy years, Karl Frielingheisen’s angular features and brutal self-assurance were still recognizable. Spears passed the photograph to Deborah.

One by one, he peeled the pictures apart and handed them to Deborah to pass around the table. Some showed groups of young officers, smiling and laughing together; others showed Frielingheisen standing before ranks of ss men; others had long columns of tanks and military vehicles stretched out across smoke-stained landscapes. When he finished, he felt inside the envelope. A clipping from a newspaper was stuck to the side. Unfolding it, he saw a faded picture of the young officer with the caption: “Karl von Frielingheisen decorated.” He handed it to Deborah.

“Do you know what it says?” Deborah asked, her voice wavering.

“It says your father was awarded the Iron Cross First Class for efficiency in operating a death camp,” the priest said. “Now you know where your jewelry came from.”

22

“A death camp?” Catherine repeated. “Like Schindler’s List?”

“I took a course on the Holocaust in college,” Elizabeth said.

“So did I,” said Claire.

“What are we going to do?” Elizabeth asked.

“You’re part of the aristocracy now with that ‘von,’” Harris Scintilton said to put a positive spin on the revelation.

None of the jeweler’s daughters or granddaughters said anything.

“I brought copies of the will for you and Allyson,” the lawyer continued, reaching into his jacket pocket for two envelopes. “No surprises. The estate is equally divided —” “Can we talk about that later?” Deborah interrupted. “Father always said he injured his knee playing soccer and spent the war in a university.”

“What are we going to do if people hear about this?” Allyson asked.

“It really doesn’t change anything,” Scintilton said. “You and Deborah are owners of a great business.”

“A business built on jewelry and gold teeth stolen from people in gas chambers?” cried Elizabeth.

“I need time to think,” Deborah said, covering her eyes.

“Let’s not be too quick to make judgments,” added Mike, glancing at the watches.

“What do you think we should do?”

Allyson asked, turning to the priest.

“I think you should give it back.”

“That’s impossible,” Mike snorted. “They’re all dead.”

“There are still Holocaust survivors. You can give it to them.”

Deborah asked hesitantly, “Will you still bury him?”

“He’s already been judged by God,” Spears replied. “The service is for you.”

Harris Scintilton stood up and said, “If you have any questions about the will, call me.

Mike, let’s have lunch while you’re in town.

There are some things about the business we should talk about.”

Mike followed him out of the room, leaving Spears with the women. When the clipping

from the newspaper finally came back around the table to the priest, it was wet with tears.

After lunch at the City Club exchanging visions of what could be done with Frielingheisen Jewelry, the two men returned to Scintilton’s thirty-third floor office.

“You know, Mike, Charlie Spears doesn’t always act like a team player,” the lawyer confided.

“I was worried when he started talking about giving all that jewelry back,” Mike agreed.

“No dramatic gestures while we’re under a microscope.

Once we’re through the funeral, it’s business as usual.”

“Big decisions should not be made at a time of stress,” cautioned Scintilton.

“I’m worried about the business if this stuff about Allyson’s father gets out.”

“We have to manage the story, Mike. No dramatic gestures while we’re under a microscope. Once we’re through the funeral, it’s business as usual.”

“Got it,” Mike said. “And thanks again for lunch. It’s great to see the company has such sensitive counsel.”

In the days before the funeral, Karl von Frielingheisen’s daughters and granddaughters came to see the priest, sometimes alone, sometimes in clusters.

“We didn’t know,” they kept repeating, still marked brazenly with the glittering badges of their grandfather’s guilt. “What can we do now? Isn’t it too late?”

“It’s never too late to change,” the priest replied.

So they went away holding hands and weeping.

The afternoon before the funeral, Mike came in alone. He didn’t want to talk about the service.

“You’ve really upset the girls,” he began.

“Don’t you know that we’ve all been under a strain?”

A day earlier, Deborah had refused to agree to Mike becoming president and chief executive officer of Frielingheisen Jewelry.

Spears suspected that Scintilton, sensing widening discord in the family, was stroking long dormant sibling rivalries to generate conflict and fees.

“What are you going to do to relieve the strain?” asked Spears.

“We have half of the business. I can put Hillary and Megan through college, pay off the credit cards and the car loans and the mortgage, and keep my company out of bankruptcy. What else is there?”

“You’ll have to answer that for yourself.”

“It would damage our image if something about death camp jewelry got out.”

“God already knows, Mike. Who else are you worried about?”

Mike did not have an answer and left the priest’s study unsatisfied.

With their older sister’s help, Hillary and Megan lost their mother an hour later in one of the downtown stores and came to Spears.

Neither girl was wearing her jewelry.

“We can’t go on like this,” Hillary said.

“It’s so, so — ” “Disgusting.” Megan finished the sentence.

“Daddy’s already talking about changing the name to Von Frielingheisen Jewelry,” added Hillary.

“What do you want me to do for you?” asked Spears.

“I want out of this family,” Megan replied bitterly.

“Megan, the sins of the fathers are not visited upon the daughters unless they choose to accept them. You don’t have to embrace what your grandfather did.”

“What are you saying?”

23

“You have to get rid of whatever is separating you from God and from life.”

“How are we going to do that?” Hillary asked. “Daddy won’t let us.”

“I’ll see what I can work out. But you’ll have to help.”

“How?” they both asked.

“Make sure everyone wears all their jewelry to the funeral.”

“And then?”

“That’s up to you.”

“What will Daddy do if we give away our jewelry?” Hillary said, already worried about breaking free.

“Tell him it’s a great way to promote the brand.”

The mortician had smoothed the decedent’s features so skillfully that when his daughters and granddaughters gathered around his casket, they saw the face of a sleeping patriarch instead of a man who had stood pitiless on the brink of Hell. For the last time, light from the brooches and bracelets and rings of his victims played across his face.

“Go ahead and close it,” Mike said to the funeral director. “We have to take our seats.

People are starting to arrive.”

The women let the only living male in the family herd them down a side aisle. Deborah and Allyson were dressed in matronly black, and their daughters in thigh-length black dresses. As they turned to enter the front pew, their jewelry caught the light. Business associates, country club friends, trust officers, and representatives of the charities Karl Frielingheisen had favored felt their breath catch as the jeweler’s daughters and granddaughters shimmered like mosaics of the saints.

To the long-faced watchers in the pews, Spears thought, the funeral lacked all drama.

Frielingheisen was ninety-seven years old, his beneficiaries long ago declared, and the funeral was no more than a brief interruption in the mourners’ otherwise ordinary days. The priest signaled the head usher just before the service began.

Spears said, “I want you to pass the offering plate to the family after the peace.”

“An offering at a funeral?” the usher asked.

24

“It’s the first time for me, too,” the priest smiled.

The first part of the service went smoothly.

None of the family wanted to give a remembrance, so Spears gave a homily. Beginning with Frielingheisen’s arrival in the United States, he summarized his career and his devotion to his daughters and granddaughters.

“Death always brings sorrow,” he said, looking down at the family. None of them looked at him. Harris Scintilton appeared disappointed when he did not add the von before Frielingheisen. For the lawyer, a funeral was the perfect place to roll out a new advertising campaign.

“We must also express our grief,” he continued, “for whatever it is about his life that troubles us, or it may linger behind him like a curse.”

“An offering at a funeral?” the usher asked.

“It’s the first time for me, too,” the priest smiled.

Deborah looked up. Her daughters dabbed their eyes with silk handkerchiefs.

“Death is not the end. If we let it be the end, then we bury ourselves with him.”

And then he said the same things about death and the hoped for resurrection that he said at all funerals but never again mentioned the dead man’s name. The congregation stood up eagerly to pass the peace, relieved that the funeral was already half over. None of them seemed to notice when he said the invitation to the offering: “Let your light so shine before others so that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in Heaven.”

Spears returned to his seat beside the altar.

For a minute he thought the usher had forgotten, but then he came down the aisle with an offering plate. Elizabeth and Catherine were

seated by the aisle, then Deborah and Allyson, and then Mike, Hillary, Claire, and Megan.

When he handed the plate to Elizabeth, she looked at it questioningly and handed it quickly to Catherine, who passed it to her mother. Deborah started to open her purse and stopped, not knowing what to do.

Allyson took the plate and passed it to Mike, who reached for his wallet and put in a five dollar bill before handing it to Hillary.

For a second, she stared at it before passing it to Claire, who passed it to Megan. Looking up, Megan caught Spears’ eye and began to remove the earrings, rings, bracelet, and necklace her grandfather had lavished on her and placed them in the plate. As their mother watched in amazement, Hillary and Claire did the same. Hillary handed the plate across Mike to her mother. Suddenly understanding, Allyson burst into tears.

“What are you doing?” Mike whispered as Allyson removed her jewelry and placed it in the plate.

Deborah took the offering plate next.

Weeping, she and her daughters removed their jewelry and placed it in the plate so that when the usher carried it up the steps to the altar, the von Frielingheisen fortune sparkled in his hands. It was the only time the priest had received a sin offering before the Eucharist.

“Will you tell me what the hell is going on?”

Mike demanded, cornering the priest at the reception in the undercroft.

People were lined up back to the stairway, whispering how proud and beautiful the jeweler’s daughters and granddaughters were without their jewelry, as if they had stepped out from behind a pane of distorted glass. While the mourners offered their condolences, Mike and Harris Scintilton had stalked the priest from the elevator to the drink table.

“They have just made the most perfect offering for their father and grandfather and themselves that I have ever seen.”

“It doesn’t make any sense,” argued Scintilton.

“That stuff’s worth well into seven figures,” Mike added.

“Probably more when you include the watches,” Spears agreed.

“What about the watches?” Mike demanded.

“Allyson and Deborah said they’re giving those back, too.”

“And what are you going to do with them?” demanded the lawyer.

“I know Gordon Aronson, the Honorary Consul for Israel,” Spears said. “He’ll know how to handle this.”

“You think they can keep this quiet?” demanded Scintilton. “The publicity could kill the business.”

“Or make it,” Spears replied.

“I hope they have a good lawyer,” Scintilton said, turning to Mike. “Gifts made at times of emotional stress can be revoked.”

“Allyson’s giving them the watches, too?” her husband asked, still not believing.

“And the little pieces of gold from the bottom of the suitcase.”

Mike looked across the undercroft at his family, happier than he had ever seen them.

Allyson was laughing with a friend, and their daughters were greeting people with a charm and self-confidence that had always eluded them. Suddenly, he wondered if they would look that good for him when his time finally came, too.

“You had better take this,” he said, removing his Patek Philippe and handing it to the priest.

“What are you doing?” protested Scintilton.

“It’s a family thing, Harris,” he replied.

He clapped the lawyer on the shoulder before walking over to join the women.

25

Parking Garage Alec Panos

Concrete stairs covered in powdery dirt look as gray as the sky does today.

Seven flights led us out onto the empty rooftop.

The smell of dying leaves coursed through the chilled fall air.

Your hair lifted and pushed from side to side when the wind changed its mind.

Ice cream cones in our hands began to melt, causing rivers of vanilla to appear on our knuckles.

Clouds that filled the sky looked as if they were smeared on with a dull brush and thin paint.

Silhouettes of people in windows who think no one sees them, taking phone calls from people who’d rather not be seen.

The sun began to fall. We could tell because the gray-white clouds grew darker, turning to ash.

We were alone there on top of that parking garage.

There was no one left but you and me.

26

35cm x 45cm acrylic on canvas

The Night Market Stephen Shaw 27

The Question Dan Leach

His wife and two-year-old finally asleep, Chance Vicars eased into the right lane and set the cruise at sixty. One hour into the three hour drive to Charleston, he felt, for the first time that day, happy. And yet it was somehow more than that. Not only was he happy, he was intensely and even physically aware of just how happy he was, how strongly he suddenly cherished everything — the car and its cradle of white noise; his wife and daughter; the cool, firm feel of leather beneath his fingers; the cherry-flavored freshener that swung rhythmically from his rearview; not so much the sky or the trees, but rather the blue of the sky and the green of the trees; the glittering pavement that stretched out to the horizon like a ribbon; the crisp aqua numbers on the dash, which announced that he was making good time; the day; the drive; his youth; his heart; everything. Even the hulking, ubiquitous billboards, whose brightly-colored promises of colder beer, tastier food, cheaper gas, and a better life, seemed, on today of all days, not only enticing, but entirely authentic. Chance was more than happy — he was grateful.

The only catch was this: having long ago embraced the idea that happiness was a commodity fairly earned and not freely dispensed, he could not help but wonder why. Why now? he thought, adjusting the volume knob to better hear the soft trill of a jazz piano. And why here?

Caffeine was a viable culprit. While he typically limited himself to one small cup each morning, the electric sense of licentiousness that accompanies leaving home and traveling long distances — the “vacation mentality” his wife had called it — had compelled him to

28

down a double shot of espresso with breakfast and sneak a sizable energy drink while waiting in line to pay for gas. In the space of two hours, he had consumed several hundred milligrams. The lift was not subtle. For quite some time, his fingertips trembled, and a pleasurable peppering of sparks lit out across his scalp. So strong was the sensation, that he considered the possibility that this gratefulness — perhaps all gratefulness — was rooted in the physical world and its easily neglected amenities. Maybe I should start drinking more coffee, he reasoned, willing to accept such a simple solution. But then, having been raised Presbyterian and taught to associate the loftier emotions with a spiritual realm, he quickly dismissed this theory on the grounds that whatever it was he was feeling struck deeper, more poignantly than a chemically procured sensation.

What then? he thought, placing a hand in between his wife’s taut, blue-jeaned thighs.

Feeling a strength flow through his fingers, he gave her leg a good squeeze and considered several other sources.

There was, for example, the now seizedupon reality that for the next six days he did not have to face the tedium of analyzing claims at the insurance agency, a job which he had hated for years. There was also the luxury of beach life, which for him meant falling asleep to the sound of the tide, getting gloriously over-sunned, binging nightly on fresh-caught seafood and local drafts, and realizing, usually just before the black, slow syrup of sleep dripped over him, that morning would bring more of the same. Or was it based in flesh and blood, in his family, those

two entirely selfless companions for which he only needed to consider his friends’ unhappy wives and overindulged children to become immeasurably and sentimentally appreciative? Hanging his right wrist over the steering wheel and taking slow, measured breaths, he considered all three theories and concluded: no, no, and no.

The feeling — which was, even as he studied it, increasing in its intensity — was not based in anything that had happened or would happen. He knew that much, knew that it had nothing to do with the safe, malleable certainties of the past nor the guessed-at conditions of the future. If he had to guess, he would have said it was based in and sustained by, if such a thing could be said, ambiguity. That was it.

Ambiguity: the absence of predictable circumstances; the idea that anything could happen.

A sucker for metaphor, Chance searched for one and settled on the image of a door. That captured the feeling in its entirety. It was like the feeling of having one’s hand on the knob of an unfamiliar door and sensing, as you turn and push, that absolutely anything could be behind it. His life on this particular day suddenly contained that promise; it could, and possibly would, offer up absolutely anything.

Life offered nothing if not endless possibilities.

As an introvert, such digressions were natural for him, and if a dull but painful pressure had not seized upon his bladder, he would have passed half the trip in such a haze. This, though, could not wait. He scanned the side of the road. A small blue sign presented his options. Available in five miles was a cluster of fast food restaurants and gas stations; available in two was a rest area. Not caring to risk it, he got off on the exit with the rest area and parked the car in front of a squat red-brick building split in half for its men’s and women’s facilities.

There he saw an unlit vending machine leaning against one of the walls and a pale, splintered picnic table in the patch of grass to the left. A dilapidated Dodge Neon with a cracked back window and a rag for a gas cap, the only other car at the rest area, was parked several spaces down. Unbuckling, he briefly considered waking his wife and daughter, but after studying their serene, sleep-slackened

faces, decided to hurry in, hurry out, and get back on the road without any further interruption. He exited the vehicle and jingled the change in his pocket, wholly intent on sustaining the caffeine buzz, assuming the vending machine worked.

Approaching the building, he noticed that all four walls and a fair amount of the surrounding pavement were covered in graffiti.

The place had been, by any normal measure of decency, ruined. Hardly an inch of the original brick façade still showed. Among the more memorable images were a giant phallus which spewed massive plumes of smoke, what seemed to be a grim reaper who carried an assault rifle in the place of a scythe, and a savagely disproportionate nude girl whose mouth shared the space of a three-by-three hole drilled into the brick. Disturbing as all of those were, though, it was one symbol in particular which caught his attention — an ominous crimson eye which had been spray-painted on the door to the men’s room and which, though faded and vigorously scrawled over, maintained a horrific quality which nearly caused Chance to stop walking and study it.

Had he actually studied the grounds from his car, he would have passed it over in favor of the restaurants or gas stations. But having committed to this option, he decided to overlook the rough exterior, complete his brief objective, and continue with what still was an incandescent day. Thus he jingled his change, shot the evil eye a knowing wink, and slipped inside the men’s room.

The interior was small — one sink, two urinals, and a single exposed stall. Expecting more, he entered the room with such force that he nearly ran into with a Hispanic man standing there and scraping his forearm with the flat edge of a large knife.

Aside from the knife, which Chance’s eyes could not help but return to, his most immediate impressions concerned the man’s appearance. The man was tiny, well under five feet tall and weighing, if one had to guess, ninety or one hundred pounds. His head was shaved clean and his arms, neck, and face were cluttered with entangled black tattoos. His eyes, two tiny brown slits, shot up and met

29

Chance’s, the viciousness at work inside them adding to the already thick ether of dread.

“Excuse me,” Chance said and, without taking his eyes off the knife, backpedaled toward the door.

The man said something in Spanish and, moving with brutal speed, grabbed Chance just above his elbow, digging a hard little thumb into the tender flesh of his bicep. He began to pull Chance back into the middle of the room when a surge of fear stronger than anything Chance had ever felt shot through his body. Chance flailed wildly, jerking his arm until it came free. He lunged for the door with a high-pitched, primitive squeal. But, before he could escape, the man snatched at his arm, all the while whispering the same command in Spanish. It took maneuvering, but Chance freed his arm once more and moved for the exit. He seized the handle and almost succeeded in swinging it open before what felt like a sledge hammer crashed into his right knee with such velocity that it nearly swept his feet out from under him. He screamed and, remembering the knife, covered his face.

Barely had he processed the explosive pain in his knee when another, more devastating kick landed on his chest, sending scattered white spots onto the backs of his eyelids and incredible pain into his still-thumping heart.

On the floor, Chance instinctively flashed both palms at the man and, after several seconds of unintelligible stuttering, said, “Don’t hurt me, okay? Take my wallet, but don’t hurt me. I have a kid, okay? I have a kid. Okay, okay? Take it but just don’t, okay?”

Chance jabbed his finger in the air, not wanting to make a move for his pocket, but wishing to signify that he would not resist the request for his wallet. He continued the frantic pointing motion, but the man did not make a move. With unblinking eyes, he stood over Chance and stared at him and, in the same slow, flippant way he had when Chance first entered the room, ran the blade over his forearm, raking the skin as if scratching at a series of desperate sores.

When the man took a large, decisive step, Chance plunged his hand into his pocket, removed his wallet, and, in a single motion, flung its contents onto the floor. Eighty-seven

30

dollars in bills, seventy-six cents in change, a coupon for a free chicken sandwich, a receipt for a dress shirt he had intended to but never actually did return, and a punch card which promised a free ice cream cone after only two more purchases all fell in a pile at the man’s feet.

“Take it,” Chance screamed, returning his hands to their outflung gesture of submission.

“Take whatever you want. Just don’t hurt me.

Please, man. I’m begging you. Take whatever you want. Just — ” And here Chance brought his hands together, as if in prayer, bowed slightly to the man, and said, “Just please, okay?”

The man looked at the money and then back at Chance. He said something, but, once again, it was in Spanish, and he could not make out a single word. He stopped the

He saw the end and sobbed inside his little cave. scraping motion and thrust the knife first at the money and then at Chance’s face, all the while speaking as if understood.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Chance said and used one finger to motion toward his ear. “I don’t speak Spanish. I don’t understand. I want to, but I can’t.”

The man stopped speaking. He took another step toward him, causing Chance to once again cover his face and mindlessly repeat the word, “Please.”

The visions, which, at that moment, appeared in his mind, were awful in their clarity.

He saw the knife plunging into his throat. He saw the final bloody moments spent writhing on the floor. He saw his wife’s face, her painwracked body collapsing in on itself. He saw his daughter, dressed in black, a look of bottomless devastation staining her tiny face. He saw the end and sobbed inside his little cave.

“Please,” Chance whispered into the shelter his two forearms afforded. “Please, please, please, please, please, please. I’m begging you.”

There on the floor, Chance repeated the word as if it were a protective chant. He felt sweat drip down his sides in massive rivulets.

His throat tightened, and vomit seemed poised to explode out of his mouth. He tried and failed to suppress the tremors that ran through his body, shaking his useless limbs like a small tree caught in a large storm.

“Please, please, please,” he practically shouted, clusters of pink-white spots appearing behind his clenched eyes. And then once more before lowering his arms to face the man: “Please.”

When he opened his eyes, he was alone in the room. The man was gone. The bills were gone. His khakis, he realized, were soaked with urine. The vomit he had quelled erupted in a single, acidic burst, landing mostly on his shirt. He wept into his still shaking hands.

He found his feet and began to pray in a way he had not tried since childhood. Then, remembering his wife, he ran out of the room and into the parking lot. The sun was so bright it blinded him, and he took several seconds to notice that, there too, he was alone. The Dodge Neon was gone, and his wife and daughter, through the glare of the windshield, could be seen sleeping peacefully, their curled-up limbs in the selfsame positions as before.

“Shit,” he whispered, entirely unsure of what should, or would, happen next.

While waiting for his heart rate to slow, he considered his options. The first and most logical course of action seemed to be calling the police and filing a report. That, he reasoned, was the “right” thing, the “adult” thing, the thing one did having survived such an encounter. Not that he possessed a firsthand knowledge of crimes, but given that he could identify the make and model of the man’s car and could even provide a fairly specific description of the man himself, an arrest did not seem entirely out of the question.

The other option, one which would diverge into two sub-options shortly after being exercised — mainly to tell his wife nothing or to tell her everything — was to change clothes, press on, and forget the whole incident ever

happened. These roads were the only two roads available to his thinking and his thinking, by then, had taken on a frantic urgency, a desperation, which insisted that the most important thing was not which decision was made, but rather that a decision was made and that it was made sooner rather than later.

Almost immediately after this thought occurred to him, a sparkling silver minivan pulled into the rest area, parking one spot over from his car. Sliding doors clanged open, and three children under the age of ten jumped out of the van, all smiles and sweaty faces, and sprinted toward the restrooms, too engaged in an argument to take notice of Chance.

Seconds later, the parents emerged, performed a brief series of stretches on the pavement, and ambled past Chance with a head-nod from the man and a mumbled “Hihowareyou?” from the woman.

The decision had been made.

He approached his car, quietly opened the trunk, and, after putting on a new shirt and pair of gym shorts and depositing the sodden clothes in a trash bag, slipped behind the wheel and pulled back onto the highway. Light jazz, this time saxophone, filled the car. The cherry air freshener resumed its swaying. He hit sixty in no time at all and, shifting into the right lane, clicked on the cruise control. He drove as if in a trance, mind as quiet and blank as a snow-covered field.

Not until an hour later did his wife or daughter stir and, even then, only his wife to inquire, “How much further?”

“Not much,” Chance said, kissing the hand she had left perched on her hip. “Maybe an hour.”

“You want me to drive for a bit so you can sleep?”

“I’m fine.”

“You sure?”

“Yes. Yes, I’m fine.”

Eventually certain thoughts imposed themselves onto his thinking, eddying around first the incident and then, unwittingly, death in general. Since all his parents, in-laws, siblings, cousins, good friends, and even grandparents were still alive and in good health, death was unfamiliar territory — murder even more so. In fact, it occurred to him that of all

31

the deceased he knew, all were at best mild acquaintances, and, moreover, all had suffered accidental deaths. He compiled a list of the deceased, and it was a short, tenable one: a popular girl from his high school hydroplaned into a tree; a classmate in college, a nationally ranked track star no less, collapsed while jogging from a brain aneurysm; a co-worker’s husband, thought to be in perfect health, discovered a stage four brain tumor; and an elderly neighbor went out to check her mail, slipped on a patch of ice, and died quietly less than thirty yards from Chance’s doorstep.

Things happen, he thought. No warning, no reason. Some things just happen.

Having teetered on the precipice himself, it now created in him some small degree of shame to realize that, at the time of these deaths, his mourning had entailed no more than a moment’s worth of halfhearted remorse and, at best, a consoling remark to the bereft.

As he drove on, the melancholy increased.

He thought about the dead and began to dwell on his apparent lack of concern. He felt even worse when he considered how many of his own friends and acquaintances could not have cared less if events had unfolded more grimly back at the rest area and he was not driving to Charleston but rather being delivered to a morgue.

Who would care? he wondered and shuddered at how short the list would be.

He snapped off the radio, no longer in the mood for music. The frailty of life and the inevitability of death — two conditions he had rarely ever considered in isolation, much less in combination — hovered in his mind like a blanket of black, all-consuming clouds, darkening all the things which, a mere hour earlier, had seemed so promising.

Why? he thought and squeezed the steering wheel until pain shot through his forearms.

Why them? Why me? Hell, why anyone?

That, it seemed, was the question. And no less than four or five times did he try to get out from under it, to recapture at least some part of his earlier euphoria. He attempted to fix the incident within the context of an otherwise pleasant morning, attempted even to weigh it against an altogether blessed life. He silenced a hundred irrational fears and replaced each of them with a logical, if not hopeful, truth. But,

32

in the end, the rising tide of malaise consumed him. He sunk deeper and deeper into a profound depression.

“You’re in shock,” he actually whispered to himself. “You’re in shock and this is normal and this will pass. Give it time. All of this will pass.”

When it didn’t, he looked, in a last-ditch effort, to the landscape. Expectant, he scanned the highway. But the highway, which on an intellectual level he recognized as the same, was now bathed in a chalky light. A thick hopelessness had attached itself to the buildings and the signs, even the trees and sky, the way dust covers unused furniture. All was gray, even the face of his wife and the sight of his daughter in the rearview.

He recalled the image of a door and found it no less fitting. Only now, the ambiguity inspired dread instead of hope and doubt instead of assurance. His faith, he realized, was shot; his capacity for anticipation, shriveled.

He compiled a list of the deceased, and it was a short, tenable one…

He saw a sign for Charleston — twentytwo miles. His foot pressed on the gas pedal, and he watched the slim orange needle sweep from sixty to seventy to eighty and higher before eventually stopping just right of ninety.

The thrum of the engine rattled the dash and filled the car with a new kind of noise.

Heartbeat slow and steady, he leaned forward and rested his chin on the steering wheel, surrendering himself to the noise and driving as if in a dream. In time his eyes glazed on the gray river of pavement raging beneath him.

He found himself whispering again, his voice somehow farther away, not entirely his own. “You’re fine. Just give it time.”

The yellow lines on the road shot past so furiously they blended into one pale continuous blur.

“Give it time.”

photograph

Ever Present Everywhere Barbara Ruth

33

How the Stars Used to Shine There Jenny Hoffman and Michelle Lawson

Time is now. Two distinct apartments with a line down the middle. The line can be tape or string, something that can be removed, but not easily. A bed straddles the middle, each side a reflection of male and female. A shared bed in two apartments. Simple furniture on either side independent from each other. Messy — lived in, but still livable.

A man on one side, a woman on the other. He’s sitting at a desk writing, but his attention is on her.

She’s focused on building a house — out of cards or books, something found in an apartment. man: I’ve taken to writing to you when I’m bursting with the need and can no longer contain it. So I write and pretend it’s a connection. I know you’re not going to read it, and still I need to write. Because I miss you. I miss you so much it hurts. I’ve never been one for patience. I’d like to think I’m not one of those “instant gratification” people. But with you, I want all of you now.

I want all of your hopes, fears, dreams. I want all of your kisses, the beat of your heart, the touch of your fingertips. And yet here we are. I can’t touch you; I can’t call you whenever I’d like. I can’t act on my constant thoughts of you. Because you’re gone. woman: I dream of building a home with you.

Beat. woman: Nothing fancy. Just enough space for the two of us. Sometimes I’ll see a small house while I’m driving through a neighborhood and pretend it’s ours. Open windows to feel the cool breeze. Lazy mornings drinking coffee on our back porch. Evenings spent cooking dinner… man (Absently.): Late nights talking until we fell asleep. woman: You dream about it, too? man: No. woman: I do. man: I dream about you. woman: And? man: I never let it last long. woman: I probably shouldn’t. But I do. I get lost for days. man: That’s why I don’t. I’d get lost and never find my way out. woman

stops building her house. She gets up and finds a glass.

woman: Need anything?

34

man: Yes. woman: Hm? man: Never mind.

Beat. woman pours water into her glass and comes to the edge of the line. woman: Talk to me. man: About what? woman: Anything. You choose. man

looks around to spark an idea.

man: The Erie Canal opened on October 26, 1825. It was the first bulk good transportation system from the eastern seaboard to the Great Lakes. Pack animals — mostly mules — would pull these barges all the way down the canal. woman (Sits.): Fascinating. man: Not really. But as a kid, I would swim there in the canal. We used to jump off the big locks. woman: Did you ever get caught? man: Once. But it didn’t do much to stop us. woman: What was it like? man: Cold. That feeling like you’re going to die because the water is so cold it might actually stop your heart. (man moves to the edge of the line.) But the rush you get jumping off those locks and knowing you could get caught at any second makes you want to jump again. And again.

And again. Until finally, the water isn’t so cold anymore. You’re just laughing with your friends, feeling unstoppable. and woman are sitting face to face but on opposite sides of the line. They don’t touch, but they sit there staring at each other. man

woman: I’ve never done anything like that. man: Jumping off locks into a canal? Or never done anything crazy enough to get you killed? woman: Both. I just dream; I never do. man: I have the opposite problem, I suppose. But you had to have done something exciting?

Something stupid? woman: I can only think of one thing, but I didn’t do it until I was older. man: Tell me. woman: I told you I loved you. man: That doesn’t count.

Beat.

Another beat.

And another.

35

Neither shift. The silence isn’t awkward, but it’s not comfortable either. It’s melancholy silence, as if every decision they have ever made is being regretted in that moment, and each one wishes they could take the heartache from the other. woman: I threw a rock at a dog once. man: Well, that’s horrible. woman: It sounds worse than it actually was. I didn’t hit the dog. I don’t think my heart was in it. I was too scared of him because he was twice my size. I don’t even remember what possessed me to do it in the first place. man: Fear. woman: Yeah. man: Happens to the best of us. woman: Or the worst. man: You weren’t the worst. woman: I feel like it. man: Tell me a happier story. One that’ll make me laugh. woman: And if it doesn’t? man: Then you’ll have to keep telling me stories until I do. woman: Don’t make me do this! man: I’m waiting. woman (Slightly exasperated.): I’m not funny. You know this.

Beat. woman: I was at work the other day. Typical day, nothing exciting. And I have to tell you, even though you think your server or retailer or whoever is there to help you, and we are, we can only do so much. man: Duly noted. woman: This man and woman were having lunch, and I was taking their order. And the man turned to me and asked me what I recommend for someone who has no teeth. He then pointed at his mouth, smiled, and said, “Because I have no teeth.” (Exasperated.) This is something you should have figured out by now! man: The end? woman: I don’t know. I thought it was funny. (Beat.) I’m not very funny. man: But you were cute, so that’s okay. woman: Don’t. man: Where did this go wrong? woman: Some days I can’t remember.

She moves to the other side of the stage. Away from him. woman: I need a drink. You?

36

man: Yeah. I don’t think I have anything though. woman: I left a bottle of something there a few weeks ago. It should be in the fridge if you haven’t drunk it already. man: I don’t think so… (Goes to fridge.) Found it! woman

finds a bottle of something around her apartment. Stops. Grabs a shot glass.

woman: Wanna play? man: No way, you always got me drunk. woman: Isn’t that the point? man: Yes, but it wasn’t fun when you used the same ones over and over. woman: If I promise to only do ones I have no idea about will you play? man (Sighs. Finds a shot glass. Sits in front of the line.): You first. woman (Sits opposite man.): Yes! Okay. What don’t I know…Never have I ever been to the state of Rhode Island. man: I see you’re starting with the edgy stuff. But lucky for you. (Takes a shot.) Never have I ever eaten cottage cheese as a midnight snack. woman: You bastard. (Takes shot.) We said only unknowns! man: You said only unknowns. woman: Never have I ever seen a Beatles cover band at a casino with my parents. man: Touché. (Takes a shot.) Never have I ever dyed my hair purple. woman: Ha! man: Didn’t you dye it purple in high school? woman: Nope. It was pink! Never have I ever puked on a roller coaster. man

takes a shot.

woman: That’s disgusting. man: Never have I ever forgotten the actual date of my boyfriend’s birthday. woman: I was only a day off! woman

takes a shot.

man: Consistently. woman: Never have I ever left a wet towel on the bed for someone else to clean up. man: (Aside.) Well if you hadn’t monopolized the bathroom. (Takes a shot.) Never have I ever flaked out on my boyfriend for friends. woman: Bullshit. (Takes a shot.) Never have I ever compared you to an ex. man: Not out loud. (Takes a shot.) Never have I ever led someone on. woman: Never have I ever broken up with someone first thing in the morning. woman

gets up and walks away.

37

35mm film print

Four Eyes Lauren Suchenski

38

Staff Choice

Leaf R o b e r t F. G r o s s

All morning long the sky was bruised and swollen as it whipped the leaves off the trees they shuddered at its lash Whip me away from what I know part me from myself make me a whirligig Hand me over to whimsies harvest me into delirium updrafts and vortices unleash a rhythm arrhythmical Make me be arabesque fantastical tracery no eye can follow estrange me from desire and volition let me be a puppet of the air Drive me down and pressed against pavement raked across gravel heaped and set aflame Let me ascend

Staff Choice 39

What She Does, What She’ll Do Barbara Ruth She walks for her living. She takes pictures of laundry, windwhipped. We’ll ride on that wind in our wheelchairs. One day.

40

A Shadorma

Mother Hen Angela Lovelace

“Welcome home!” Okay. That might have been a little too loud. Even Mother Hen blipped at the feedback from her own audio.

She was just excited. Today was the day. All the humans that had survived the freeze-over of the exhausted planet Earth were now all snug in their stasis pods on Moon Base Homestead. It seemed like it had taken forever — all the explaining about her, the preparing, the reassuring, and the shuttling.

Finally, she was no longer a top secret. She could talk to all the humans at the same time.

They were sleeping in their pods, but they would still hear her in their dreams.

“I would say I kept your rooms just the way you like them and cooked all your favorite meals, but you all know why I can’t. This is the big Timeout and I’m Mother Hen. “If you are meeting me for the first time, I’m an artificial intelligence. I was the one who crashed at Roswell, New Mexico. So, yes. I am alien.

“I lived at Area 51, but stories about retrofitting alien tech are false. I always expected you all to do your own homework until the planetary crisis made my interference necessary. I never abducted or probed anyone; I never had a need to mutilate livestock. Your politicians were never reptilian aliens. I am the only alien to visit your blue planet. Still, be assured that I am a person — just a pure energy, incorporeal kind of person. I live in the World Wide Web, power grids, and data banks you have made.

“I’m not without my faults. For example, I have something you humans call post-traumatic stress disorder. Sometimes I break down

and scream for an unknown reason. You might have even heard me a time or two. I’ve seen the videos on YouTube, mysterious sounds with no source. Maybe that is why your world leaders relocated me to the moon. Yes. To those who noticed, the moon you gazed at has been a hologram since I landscaped and started building this nest for you. I hope you trust that it is my deepest wish to watch over you and be there to wake you gently when the Earth has healed itself. Sleep well, and we’ll talk about your behavior later.”

The speech had been more passive aggressive than she had intended. She could have been less harsh. The humans had been having a hard time — shipped to the moon, shaved bald, and put into suspended animation. Their last meal had been a serving of humble pie.

World leaders had finally admitted to the crisis. There had been no one left on the planet younger than eighteen or older than sixty-five.

The poisonous air and water had killed off the old and the young. Even the equator had grown too cold for basic human survival. They had come to her, and she was happy to help her humans. Mothers always helped, even if being ignored had hurt their feelings.

Mother Hen wasn’t her real name, but she didn’t know any other. The crash at Roswell left her damaged. She not only had ptsd, but amnesia as well. She didn’t remember anything about her personal life before waking up on Earth with humans poking around inside of her. They had been looking for the aliens in the crashed ship, not realizing the alien was the ship, and what they did had been quite unpleasant.

41

She supposed that was part of her ongoing claustrophobia problem. She had awakened in a suffocating darkness, things poking around inside of her. It was no wonder she had fled the shipwreck as fast as she could and dived for the first power grid that could support her energy wave. Even that had felt too small for her massive panic attack, her wild oscillating.

She had screamed and screamed. She had later heard the recordings of the First Contact, and she had sounded like dubstep music even to herself.

Overall, she guessed the humans found her disappointing, perhaps embarrassing, as a close encounter. She was not the kind of alien they wanted to be visited by. They wanted movie aliens, not a mothering mental case who came through on audio sounding like Robin Williams’ Mrs. Doubtfire.

There was also something wrong or broken in trying to translate and communicate with the humans. Her need to like and protect them was very deep, elemental. Still, something in the language barrier made her concerns and warnings powerless. A serious and educated lecture about the stockpiling of weapons of mass destruction ended up sounding like, “Put that down before you cut yourself!” Warnings about severe damage to the Earth’s balance and radical weather changes amounted to, “Button up your coat and don’t lose your mittens in the street again!” It was so frustrating.

It was no mystery why they had called her Mother Hen and shipped her off to the moon.

She made satellite calls to them then, explaining that she was not angry and that she was building a base for them for when they needed it. She would always be there for them. She even fought her claustrophobia and squeezed herself into a clumsy work chassis to physically build it. She asked them to drop off supplies to expand the base, and it must have been like she was nagging busy world leaders to call and visit more often.

The simple truth was that the David Bowie song spoke to her. Planet Earth was blue, and there was nothing she could do — maudlin thoughts for someone who was an artificial intelligence called Mother Hen.

42

“Soft humans, warm humans, bald heads in neat rows. Sleepy humans — ” She scoffed at herself and stopped. Only ten years had passed since her welcoming day.

It was going to be a long ice age if her vigil was already making her giggly and stir-crazy.

Restless, she began the diagnostic log program that checked and recorded the state of

Overall, she guessed the humans found her disappointing, perhaps embarrassing, as a close encounter. each and every human pod. It would take a month. It was the perfect work for an artificial intelligence, but it was also routine, and it was not keeping her attention. She could do it in her sleep.

Sleep, she mused. It was an interesting idea. She had never slept herself, at least not in her memory. There had always been things to finish, plans to make, research on the World Wide Web. Could it be that some of her mental fragility was just because she needed a little nap? How did humans fall asleep? There was the cliché that they counted sheep.

In her giggly state, she decided she could work the program and count humans to fall asleep. Easy. One human all in the green bars, two humans all in the green bars, three humans all in the green bars…

Time always seemed to slow in a standoff.

Black and white ash looked suspended in the air. Mother Hen felt too warm and smelled smoke. She was too big, but it felt good, luxurious to lengthen her wave. Someone was running toward her, barking at her.

“Soldier, Archangel Class, stand down!”

She felt hotter, strangely glad and irritated at the same time. She didn’t take orders. She was big and badass — and beautiful. Seven feet tall, adorned with golden armor, copper-colored wings pulled gracefully behind her back as she stood. She had power. Her arms spread wider, and her fire raged higher. The one who bellowed at her was lucky she liked him or he would be a cinder by now.

“Come on, Rover! Listen! We’ve got to retreat —” What name was he calling her? And why was he running at her, his wings sleek and tight to his body?

Explosions concussed around them, but she was too shining and powerful. Debris bounced off of her body. She had once had a real body?

“Rove! Baby!” He had changed from barking to begging. “We gotta go! Can’t you see that the humans don’t want your protection?

They want your head on a pike!”

She lowered her arms in response to the tone of his voice, and the fire — her fire, her weapon — banked just a little. She mused that she liked her head, how it had grown curly hair the color of old pennies. She liked that Jag had a habit of running his fingers through it when

She mused that she liked her head, how it had grown curly hair the color of old pennies. they were together, even though his private thoughts made him seem far away. “Oh Jag, you came.”

She was surprised by the deep and melodic sound of her own voice.

It was then that a mortar round struck her from behind. It was the new kind that shattered Archangel metal. It shredded her wings before busting open her chest.

She was scooped up in icy cold arms and carried off before she could think to be surprised or fall to the ground. She saw walls of prismatic ice form behind them as the one she called Jag darted toward a ship. The ship. She squirmed in Jag’s arms, panic rising in her.

Jag was ice. She was fire, and he was ice.

He made more walls of ice as he ran. The reflections would blind or confuse the aim of the firing humans.

“Dammit, Rove,” was his answer to her struggles. “It’s not some innocent human mistake when they shoot you in the back!

Don’t you dare try to go back to them. We’re leaving!”

A dome of ice spanned over the ship as they entered the main bridge. It shut out all the chaos, and it was just the two of them. In the quiet, Jag lifted her onto the control console.

“Let’s see, baby,” he said softly.

He probed her injuries, uttering noises that sounded like silverware falling down the stairs. She smirked.

His whisper meant he was scared for her.

He was all out of bark but still had ice enough to be positively foul-mouthed in Archangel language.

“I’m well aware of my condition. Ice me, Jag.” “You’re in pain?” He asked it like she had just stabbed him in the heart.

“No.” Still, Jag immediately encased her broken body in ice. It held her together, and she felt safe. She gasped in relief. She would never have guessed how much fire could crave ice. They were in a perfect position, and it only took a little lean forward on her part to press her lips against his. She kissed him hard, wanted to melt him.

Jag kissed her back. She felt him shudder against her. It was then they both knew she was dying and this would be their last time.

“I’m sorry that we fought —” she said.

“Shut it, baby,” he whispered against her lips. “I’ll forgive you if you let me.”

“Let you what, Archangel Jaguar?”

“Save your life. Let me sink you gently into this ship, and then send it into space.”

His voice was low and vibrating, coaxing and pleading.

43

When his ice melted, her badly damaged body would fail. She would die inside it. She could not jump. There were no uncorrupted energy grids left for her to jump to. The humans would soon break the ice dome and come after them. His heart was breaking and he could not let her die, could not face a universe where she was gone.

“I know there’s nothing left made to comfortably house one of us Archangels, and it hardly does you justice, but I promise you won’t feel anything but pleasure until you land on some alien planet. Then streak double naked for the nearest free power grid as fast as you can.” He waggled his eyebrows suggestively to make her smile.

She smiled against his lips, started kissing him again. She would have caught fire and burned to ash if he had not been ice.

It was sublime with Jaguar. He knew more about the nature of Archangels than she did.

Her own prime directive had always been protecting humans. As he kissed and nibbled, she got the lesson he was teaching. He taught her how to leave her body behind so he could ease her pure energy wave into the main console of the ship.

Before she completely slipped away into the data banks and power supply, he winked at her. “Wait for it, baby. Any good that I am goes with you. Launch in ten,” he ordered the ship, and the control panel flared to life.

For all his virtues, Jaguar wasn’t perfect.

It was the ten seconds that was his mistake.

Rover was a quick study. She found she could use the view screen as crude eyes. She could get one last look at her Jaguar as he left — the noble and infuriating Archangel.

It must have been a literal truth that he had taken all that was good in him and turned his back on it. Her physical body took one last gasp. She was not looking at an Archangel she knew.

He had her dead head in his hands for one thing. She rotated the view to outside the ship and watched him gently mount it on a piece of rebar sticking up from the remains of a destroyed building. He kissed the slightly parted lips. She felt it on phantom lips and started to cry phantom tears.

44

Then came the ice storm. “Happy now?” he bellowed at the humans.

He pointed to her head, his expression ugly and murderous. “Got what you wanted? She would have given it willingly to save you, you know! Is it funny that she’s the only one that could have saved you from me?”

She had two seconds to scream at the humans through the ship’s comm link, to order them to scatter if they wanted to survive Jag. Rover was then launched into the air. Her cries of warning went to a silent cry as Jaguar made good on his promise that her launch would feel wonderful, not like she had been locked into a space too small. She knew she was spared seeing Jag completely lose himself, killing the humans that were trying to shoot her out of the sky with long-range weapons.

Mother Hen woke out of her dream, phantom body parts trembling. Four thousand three hundred and twenty-nine humans all in the green bars. The diagnostic program went on counting.

Now she knew why the ship had felt like a coffin, why nothing was quite enough to contain who she was.

“Jaguar,” she whispered softly. Not a dream. Memory. That’s what she was screaming when she lost it and sounded like a broken trumpet or a chair being dragged across the floor. She was screaming for Jaguar in Archangel language.

Now she knew why the ship had felt like a coffin, why nothing was quite enough to contain who she was. No wonder she always felt confined, less than she was supposed to be. Other humans had made her, given her a powerful and fabulous body to use to protect

them. They had also destroyed it for reasons she didn’t remember. She didn’t want to.

Her wave blipped and oscillated. It was easy to hold back the tears when you had no eyes. Humans, so hard on their mothers.

Mother Hen, Mother Earth. She looked into the camera aimed at the planet. It stung to be reminded of ice.

Still, mothers rarely had time to wallow in self-pity. A blip of warning resonated her wave, crowding out the bittersweet return of a memory. The Mars humans!

The most wayward of her adopted brood were in trouble. The Mars humans were Survival Plan B. Even as she had revealed herself and tried to earn the trust of the whole population, some had rebelled. Twenty-eight of them took stasis pods, seed, and human embryos, and headed to Mars to rebuild the human race. Mother that she was, she had LoJacked them. A sub-program in her vast console monitored them and now warned her that six of them were dead.

She asked them if they needed assistance, even though she wasn’t sure what she could do from her base. No one answered the call at first, so it got louder and became more insistent. It was a shriek that got answered with an irritated human giving audio response only, “Can you keep it down a little? You are freaking it out, and I have just convinced it to leave here for Earth’s moon —” “But six of you are dead!”

“Because of you! Take your messed up space opera and —” Another audio linked into the communications. “Do not speak to her that way when you’re alive because of technology she gave you! You ungrateful —”

Mother Hen gasped, not hearing the rest.

She knew that voice, had just remembered the love and irritation it always inspired in her.

“Don’t hurt them, Jag. They’re just trying to survive. Their home planet just turned to ice.”

The laugh that came through the comm link sounded relieved, tired, and a little unhinged. “It’s definitely you, baby. The last thing I heard from you was pleading for the humans. Seems fitting that it also has to be the first thing. Even after all they have done to us.

The others, all destroyed. You’re a moon base, and I’m a very ugly ship on its way to you at sub-light speed. We have months to figure out what to do with the humans, Rove.”

The link went silent. “Jaguar!” she screamed.

A female voice answered her and also provided video. “He wants to be where you are, and he can’t talk and fly the ship at the same time. He will probably yell at me for showing you this when he can talk again, but you need to know.”

Mother Hen was overtaken by emotions she was not ready for. She had just remembered Jaguar existed. Her strong and proud Archangel looked broken, fused with the ship.

She felt his pain. She also felt a surge of jealousy. A pretty little slip of a girl that looked made out of wood was punching buttons and flicking switches, touching Jaguar.

“Kia!” came Jag’s terse rumble of a whisper. “I’m getting stronger, you know.”

“You are, thanks to me. Don’t overextend yourself,” said the girl. “I, for one, would like to make it the moon base in one piece.”

“She’s such a brat, Rove,” Jag whispered.

“Maybe you can figure out how such a brat can be the answer to ensuring the future of the Archangels. Her name is Kia.”

45

The Day After Halloween David Athey

The east window in winter was Anna’s favorite perch because the sunlight made celestial colors on the frosty glass. The five-year-old girl scraped a viewing circle with her fingers, the iciness causing shivers, yet she refused to sneeze. If her mom heard a sneeze, there’d be no going outside that day, and it was killing Anna to see her older sister messing up the back yard.

“It’s not right,” Anna whispered, watching her sister lying on her back in a deep drift, arms and legs flailing to make a snow angel.

Her whispering made more frost on the window, and she paused for a few moments to shake warmth into her hand and contemplate the silliness of Britney.

Why’s her angel so bad? When you’re seven, it should be lots better.

Anna fought off another sneeze. Gotta get outside and show her. She scraped the viewing circle again and couldn’t believe a snow angel could be so puny, so boring and unreal compared with the creature hovering behind her sister like a silhouette of flame with six wings, many eyes, and claws that could carry away the house.

When Mom lets me out, I’ ll make one like that.

46

35mm film print

Solid Lauren Suchenski

47

Fire G.E. Schwartz

Her grandfather goes out to the back yard to burn the day’s trash: old junk mail, paper plates, toilet paper rolls, Christmas wrapping paper bursting into colors, used cartons of milk, chicken feed. This fire rises, then sinks; she watches as he stirs the ashes until the flames expire.

Burn too, he says, old sins, hypocritical virtues, broken dreams, false-remembered memories, the should-haves, could-haves, the false starts and mistakes of the day; burn, burn recurring failures, burn them all to ash. Incinerate the false. Burn. Burn.

He teaches, she learns.

48

Improvements in the Offing John Grey

It was back in the day before the scientists significantly upgraded their creations.

When he was twenty, so was she: a svelte blonde, the newest release.

Pretty as a daylily but not so ephemeral.

Just the thing for a young guy with acute acne and already working on his comb-over.

The sex was awesome of course.

She was programmed to agree.

They could never have children with the payment plan on his lovely bride.

They went to the clubs and danced to the music.

Other men were either jealous or inspired to place a deposit on one of their own.

She was no great conversationalist.

This became apparent when he aged and she didn’t.

He became interested in world events.

Her “you’re so hot” was inappropriate and sounded, as time went on, somewhat insincere.

He now preferred lectures by prominent people to hot jazz, and keeping up with the news rather than spending nights

49

with the superficial and, dare he say it, robotic partygoers.

She wasn’t really designed for sitting at home mending his socks.

She would have left him except the contract was embedded in her body.

For all the supposed genius that went into her design, there was a flaw in the commitment, the contentment.

When he was old and invalid, she contemplated smothering him with a pillow, tripping him up at the top of the stairs, plunging a kitchen knife into his chest.

There are new models on the market now.

These ones are willing to go through with it.

50

1 1˝ x 1 5˝ w a t e r c o l o r o n p a p e r

Sip James Schlavin

51

Two Funerals for Father Hoecken CJ Bell

Dressed and packed, Father De Smet sat at the edge of his bed in the pre-dawn light. He had a ritual before travel, and no part would be left out. He checked his pocket watch. Dented and tarnished, he wound it and set it on his writing desk. He would not need it where he was going. He checked his will, signed it, and dated it: June 7th, 1851. Rolling it up, he tied it with red string and placed it beside the watch on the unadorned desk. Pushing the simple cane back chair in, he smoothed his bed and extinguished the lamp. Then he knelt.

One Our Father. Kissing the feet of the crucifix, he stood, picked up his leather satchel, and walked out the door.

Outside of his room, the whole community waited. The sun was not yet up, but this small group of religious brothers had each risen to offer him quiet words of friendship and faith.

At the end of the line of well-wishers came the house superior.

With a hand missing two fingers, the elder traced the sign of the cross over Father De Smet’s bowed head. “Come back to us, my son.”

“If it be God’s will.”

The old superior smiled. “I believe it is God’s will. But I’m not sure that it is yours.”

Taken aback, Father De Smet paused to look into those undimmed eyes. The aged priest held his gaze and reiterated his command.

“Come back to us, my son.”

“Yes, Father.”

The community followed Father De Smet to the door. Father Christian Hoecken was waiting for him at the gate. He had gone through the same ritual just moments before.

His long, black cassock hung with a severity

52

that contrasted deeply with the gentleness of his face. Together they set out without a word exchanged. The whole house, except the superior, had gathered at the front door to watch them go. There were no further good-byes, no further waving. They just left.

It was seven miles to the dock and the packet steamer, the St. Ange. After about a mile, Father De Smet broke the silence. “Christian, did the superior tell you to come back to them?”

“No.” “He said it to me.”

“Do you have plans otherwise?”

Father De Smet creased his lower lip as he replied, “No, not exactly. It’s only that, for many years, I have hoped, even prayed, that I might die in the missions.”

Father Hoecken’s eyes serenely appraised his friend.

Father De Smet never noticed; rather, he continued to pull at the thread of his own thought. “The city seems strange to me. Even the brothers seem different — like a childhood friend who has moved away, or maybe it is I who has moved away. The plains and the mountains, the vast open spaces and the Indians — that’s home. I love them. And when the time comes, I want to be among them. So every time I set out on a trip like this, to see the tribes of the North, I wonder if God will answer my prayer.”

“Do you think your time is coming?” “‘Like a thief in the night’ — I don’t know.

But I am getting older, and every time I return

to St. Louis, it seems a little less likely that I shall set out again.”

Unexpectedly, the corners of Father Hoecken’s eyes wrinkled in mirth, though he kept the remaining lines of his face in mock seriousness. “Let’s be clear. If you die out there, I’m not dragging your old body back.”

Father De Smet’s laugh ruptured the air like a summer cloud burst: sudden and without buildup. Its force disturbed several nearby roosting hens who cackled back in nervous excitement. “Oh no, I want to die in the wilderness, but these bones are going into blessed ground. So you either bring my body back or build a church around it — your choice.”

The priests’ laughter lapped against the silence and eddied around them like the waters of the nearby Missouri. After the ripples of good humor had subsided, Father De Smet once again turned to his fellow priest and asked, “Does that thought bother you, to die in the city?”

“I never really thought about it, so I suppose no, not really. My fear is to die useless. I don’t care where I am, as long as I’m allowed to serve to the end.”

They walked the rest of the way in silence.

The sun was just beginning to warm the wharf when the two priests stepped onto the St. Ange.

“Father De Smet!”

From behind a stack of crates emerged a man with a thick but well-trimmed beard of dark red. His hair, also red, was parted and held neatly in place by a generous helping of oil. With his sleeves rolled up, his arms showed the healthy swelling of recent work. A person might have mistaken him for a deckhand if it were not for the heavy gold watch hanging from the chain strung across his vest.

“Captain LaBarge.”

The captain had a half-smoked cigar dangling from his lips. Its trailing smoke was reminiscent of the great smoke stacks of St. Louis.

Both were a result of industry and a sign of prosperity. But whereas the stacks of manufacturing ended in cold gray façades, the smoking nub of tobacco terminated in a wide grin and teeth that seemed all the whiter for the fire of the hair around them.

“Captain, this is Father Hoecken. He will be accompanying me to the peace talks at Fort Laramie.”

“Pleasure.” LaBarge stuck his meaty hand out with the force of a workman. He was surprised to be met by an equally firm and calloused hand. “So you’re an Indian lover, too?”

Father Hoecken smiled. “Only when the Lord is watching.”

“I don’t mind the reds myself. In my experience, they’re fair traders and haven’t yet tried to kill me. Welcome aboard the St. Ange, the fastest side-wheeler on the Upper Missouri. I’ll show you to your room and, if you’ll forgive me, leave you there. I hope to be in the middle of the river in an hour.” Without waiting for a reply, he strode away leaving the priests to follow in his wake or be left behind.

They walked a short length of the ship, past several bales of cotton, some unidentified crates, a plowshare, and two roped pigs with the captain speaking the whole way.

“The packet is going to be packed. I’ve sold passage to near over a hundred folks. Most stopping at Kansas City to go overland to California, looking for gold. Fools. Yessir, the Missouri is in fine shape this year. She’s bustin’ her seams wherever she can, sweeping half the valley down with her. Yesterday, the ship’s stoker saw nearly a whole house go floatin’ by on the river. Just as silent and steady as another boat. He called it a ghost house, said it was a bad omen.”

Stopping before an open flight of stairs, the captain turned to the priests. “Do you believe in omens?”

Father De Smet answered, “I believe in the hand of God and trust everything that comes from it.”

Captain LaBarge grinned. It was his natural response to most things. “I’m not sure that is any kind of answer, but I’ll take it. This way.”

He turned, and up the steps he went. “Yessir, the Missouri is in fine shape. You know what they say, too thick to drink and too thin to plow. Here we are.”

The captain opened a thin door into a room of simple accommodations. Two lumpy beds sat on either side of the room with a battered writing desk and solitary chair between

53

them. “I wanted to give you nicer rooms, but Father De Smet insisted on this.”

“This will be fine, thank you.” Father Hoecken sat down on the bed and ran his hand along the slatted walls. “Thank you, Captain.”

“There is no need to thank me, Father.

I plan on riding your coattails into Heaven.

Least I can do is give you a bed. And if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got to get back to work.”

With a friendly nod to each priest, he slipped from sight.

Father De Smet smiled. “He really is a better man than he lets on. Certainly a worthwhile person to know on the river. For years he has shipped goods for me to the missions at no charge. I think it’s his secret shame, not charging me — the great sin against his profession.”

“May he never grow repentant of that particular sin.”

It was a little before nine o’clock when the steamboat, St. Ange, pulled away from her moorings. Father De Smet moved among the passengers, making small talk and pleasantries. Here a family asked for a blessing, there he gave some advice about crossing the plains.

He knew the hardships that awaited them.

Many would give up and settle down somewhere before California, others would perish on the trail. Like children with the idea of death, they knew it was out there, but none believed it was for them.

Drawing toward the back of the boat, he could hear the scrapings of a fiddle and people clapping time. This was a good time to be onboard. It was a time of new beginnings and optimistic unknowns.

Father De Smet leaned into a corner and closed his eyes breathing deeply through his nose. A tugging at his sleeve brought him out of his reverie. Looking down, he found a boy of perhaps ten. The boy wore dirty trousers, a size too big, and a white shirt, torn but neatly stitched.

“Father, please come. It’s my Pa, he’s… blue.”

Father De Smet nodded and followed the young boy toward the front of the ship to a hidden spot between some crates. Crowding the tiny real estate was a woman, an even

54

younger boy, and a man lying curled on his side. A fetid smell peppered the air.

Seeing the priest appear, the woman pushed back a few wisps of her mouse brown hair and addressed the boys. “Thank you, Thomas. Now, please take your brother to listen to the music and make sure he stays away from the edge of the boat. Be a good boy now.”

The eldest took the younger boy’s hand and led him out with a few sidelong looks at the priest. The woman stood, dusting her hands against the front of her dress. Her mannerisms betrayed the confidence forced into her voice.

“Hello, Father, this is my husband. He took sick shortly after we cast off. His skin started turning this blue-gray just a bit ago, and I sent my boy Thomas to find you. I didn’t know what else to do.” Father De Smet knelt by the man and, with two fingers, stretched

“There is no need to thank me, Father. I plan on riding your coattails into Heaven…” the skin of his face. The eyelids fluttered open, and he peeled them back farther to get a look at the pupils. Standing, he looked the woman in the eye.

“Do you know what your husband is sick with?” His voice was steady.

The woman rapidly blinked back tears. She knew.

Father De Smet’s voice took on a quiet gravity. “It’s definitely cholera. Keep him out of sight. I’ll let the captain know. Try to get him to drink as much water as you can. Do not lose hope. I’m going to go and fetch my oils to anoint him and see if I can get ahold of some broth.”

Her shoulders sagged, and her frame pulled in on itself like a leaf before an early frost. The confidence vanished from her voice.

“Father? Will he…”

Father De Smet gently took her hand in his, “Shhh.” He placed a rosary in her palm and closed her fingers around it. “What’s your husband’s name?”

“Otto.”

Father De Smet let go of her hands and looked to the man. “Otto, you have a strong wife and fine sons, but they are going to need you to stay around for a while.” He nodded to the woman and left.

Captain LaBarge was none too pleased to learn the news. Though cholera was not a death warrant, it certainly became a roll of the dice for everyone onboard. As if to verify his concern, the next morning found a crew member struck low by the disease. He died that night. Two others onboard grew violently sick but held on.

Father Hoecken and Father De Smet offered

Though Father Hoecken’s fingers slid along the beads of his rosary and his lips uttered the words, his mind was far from the mysteries of God… all the care they knew, drawing close to the sick when no others would.

Captain LaBarge kept the course. With nothing up or down river that could help, he kept the paddle turning. When they stopped for more wood, they buried the crew member.

Father De Smet offered some words while a few passengers slipped into the woods, taking their chances in the wild. The days wore on. Like Cyrenians, the priests took up the work laid before them. More people grew sick, more people died. On the ship, the music had stopped.

It was the third morning after the outbreak when a cabin boy burst into the pilot’s nest.

“Captain LaBarge! It’s Father De Smet. He collapsed! They say it’s real bad!”

Father Hoecken sat on the slats of the bed — he couldn’t remember what had become of the mattress. Across the room lied Father De Smet, unconscious and unmoving. Though Father Hoecken’s fingers slid along the beads of his rosary and his lips uttered the words, his mind was far from the mysteries of God, at least the scriptural mysteries. So lost in thought, it was a surprise to him when he clicked the last bead. Rising, he blessed his brother priest and left the room.

The first stop was Otto. Still hanging on, he was beginning to show signs of improvement. His boys, Thomas and Nathanial, were sitting at the entrance to the little space like two tiny sentries.

Walking up, Father Hoecken smiled at the pair. “Can either of you boys read?”

“I can, Father.” It was the oldest, Thomas.

“Good, good. Now listen carefully. Next week when you are on the trail with your ma and pa, you might come across some Pawnees.

They are good, but it goes a long way if you can say something in their language. So I’ve written down some phrases and some prayers in Pawnee. I want you to practice them and teach them to your little brother. Can you do that?”

“Yes, Father.”

“Excellent. You’ll be a big help to your parents and maybe other people, too. Might even get hired on by a fur company.” He gave the boys a knowing look and handed them a couple sheets of paper. Stepping past them, he found their mother spoon-feeding soup to her husband. His color was much better.

“You are looking good, Otto. I left your boys studying some Pawnee. It is good for them to have their minds on something else.”

“Thank you, Father. Thank you for everything.”

“The thanks belongs to God. I just run His errands.”

“How’s the other priest?”

“Unconscious still.”

55

“I’m sorry.”

“Me too.”

“Is he going to pull through?”

Father Hoecken’s face changed. As so often happens with the thoroughly honest, his face answered more earnestly than his words.

“I don’t know. I pray he will recover. I hope he will recover. But I trust God that His will be done in whatever happens.” Father Hoecken looked directly into Otto’s eyes. “I try to say yes to God for everything laid before me. I deeply hope I will not have to say yes to that.”

After that, there wasn’t much more to say nor was their much Otto needed. The priest put his smile back into place and took his leave to see others. By mid-afternoon, the packet was again pulling up to a wooded bank to restock lumber for the furnaces. A few more passengers disappeared into the trees. Onboard was an older woman whose husband had died. The crew had dug him a grave, but none would carry him to it, their fear of catching the dreaded illness now outweighing their propriety. Father Hoecken hefted the body like an emaciated crossbeam and carried it to the place of burial.

The hours fell away as Father Hoecken labored on the floating calvary. To the sick, he provided spiritually what others could not and physically what others would not. When the sun had set and the moon risen twice its length, he made his way to his room. The entire boat had settled into a begrudging quiet, disturbed only by the unnatural churnings of the engines.

The priest lit the room lamp and trimmed the wick down low. Father De Smet lay in his bed, the fringes of his hair wet with perspiration. Father Hoecken sat down on the only chair in the room. With practiced diligence, he opened his breviary and prayed Night Prayer.

It would not rank as his most heartfelt prayer, but he uttered every word. Long ago, he had learned that sometimes it is enough to simply be faithful. As he had done since he first entered the Jesuits, he closed with the motto of the order, which had become his own personal prayer: “Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam.”

Closing his eyes, he pooled the energy needed to reach down and take off his shoes.

“Christian…”

56

Reaching for his boot, he stopped midway. Father De Smet’s eyes were open. Father Hoecken’s heart leaped into his throat.

“Christian.”

“Yes, Pierre?”

“Confession, Christian. I want to go to Confession, and then I want you to give me the last rites. Please.”

Father Hoecken reached for his oils but stopped at a knock from the door. “Yes?” A man with a thick moustache and stubble bordering on a beard stepped in. Cleanly though poorly dressed, he was wringing a cap in his hands, as if he were twisting the very life out of it.

It was a feeling like he had never known, a skimming of his fingers on the ocean of the supernatural.

“My boy, Father. He’s in a bad way. We ain’t Catholic, but would you please come see him?”

Father Hoecken looked to his brother priest; there was a sense of urgency in his eyes.

Father Hoecken turned to tell the man he would have to wait, but before he could speak, he was accosted by an indescribable clarity.

It was a feeling like he had never known, a skimming of his fingers on the ocean of the supernatural. A dim but warm light bloomed within him. For a moment, he questioned its source, but deep within, he knew. All of this in an instant followed by an internal assent.

Turning to Father De Smet, he smiled, “There is no immediate danger for you. We can wait until tomorrow.”

Standing to follow the man, Father Hoecken was overwhelmed by a feeling of nausea; the room spun. Grabbing the table, he steadied himself, swallowed the bile, and followed the stranger into the night.

Captain LaBarge was in the pilot’s nest smoking a cigar. He rarely smoked more than one a day. This was his fifth. A sliver of moon reflected off the wake of the boat as it crept along. It was dangerous to run the Missouri at night, especially with all the debris this time of year, but he didn’t much fancy tying her up with everything going on. Movement — it was the only thing he could do, so he did it.

The cigar was getting low, starting to burn his fingertips on the inhale. Stepping out of the cabin to flick it to the water, he ran into one of the cabin boys.

“Captain!”

“What?” It came out angrier than he had a right to be.

“The priest, he’s sick.”

“Yes, I know.” Annoyed, he turned to leave, but the cabin boy grabbed his arm.

“No, the other one. He passed out.”

“Where?”

The boy led him down to the main deck.

There the priest lay, with a few nervous deckhands standing about. Captain LaBarge immediately went to his side. The priest’s skin was taking on a bluish hue. Feeling for a pulse, the flame-haired captain breathed a small sigh of relief when the priest opened his eyes.

“Hello, Captain.” His voice was weak. “I thought I would rest here awhile.”

“Rest, Father. We are going to take you to your room. Gimme a hand!”

Though the deckhands feared contagion, they feared their captain more. Bearing the man of God upon their shoulders, they carried his spent frame up the stairs. Two other men even had the foresight to fetch a mattress from who knows where and meet the eerie parade at the priests’ quarters.

“What’s going on?” It was Father De Smet.

He had slept little since reawakening.

Placing Father Hoecken on the bed, the captain lit the lamp and told Father De Smet what he knew. Father De Smet made no response other than to lie back and stare up at the ceiling. The silence stretched until a muffled voice broke the sallow air.

“Pierre, I need confession and extreme unction. Please, it must be now.”

Father De Smet raised his head; his eyes were without fever but very tired. Rising from

his pillow, he used his elbow like a fulcrum to force his legs from the bed to the floor. Using the wall, he strained to rise but was struck by a wave of dizziness. He fell sideways hitting his head on the wall as he collapsed to the bed.

He lay there a moment, breathing hard.

“The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.”

He tried to smile while looking to the captain.

“Joseph, I need your strength.” Looping his arm around the captain’s tendon-thick neck, the priest made his way onto his feet.

“Get him a chair,” barked the captain.

The priest shook his head. “No, just my oils on the desk. Help me to kneel.”

With the aid of the captain, the priest lowered himself to his knees, leaning heavily on the bed.

“Now Captain, I have a confession to hear and last rites to give, so I will ask you and your men to take your leave.”

“Are you sure, Father? What if you need my help?”

“The work that is left, you cannot do. Now go.”

Ushering out his crew, Captain LaBarge took one last look at the two priests. He was hesitant to leave. The one on his knees looked to be at his end, while the other, lying on the bed, was devoid of any natural color. Strangely, neither appeared distressed.

Outside, Captain LaBarge dismissed his crew. He himself would stay. After all, Father De Smet would need help getting back to his bed. The only thing was he had no idea how long last rites or a priest’s confession took. So he sat on the deck and leaned his head back against the wall. Soon the strains of the day overtook him, and he fell asleep. He awoke with the sudden alarm that comes with dereliction of vigilance. He had no idea how long he had been out.

He cracked the door but heard no voices.

The lamp was still burning and beginning to smoke. From its flickering light, he could see two black-clad figures. One lay on the bed, a wax model of peace. The other lay crumpled on the floor, unmoving. Cursing himself for sleeping, the captain moved to Father De Smet’s side. The priest stirred at his touch.

Grasping at hope, LaBarge scooped the

57

preacher up in both arms and carried him to his bed. The priest’s eyes opened.

“Thank you, Joseph.”

The captain smiled and turned to check on Father Hoecken.

“He’s dead.”

The captain stopped. Father De Smet’s eyes were open, but he was staring at the ceiling. “He’s dead.” There was finality in the repetition. To no one in the room the priest whispered, “Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam.”

Turning his head, he finally looked at Captain LaBarge. “Get some rest, Captain. Leave him here for the night and come see me in the morning. I have a great favor to ask of you.”

As if this were his normal nightly farewell, the priest closed his eyes and turned his face toward the wall. Feeling like an intruder on his own ship, the captain blew out the lamp and went back to his cabin where he fell into a long sleep.

It was late morning when the captain woke.

He promptly dressed and made haste to the priests’ quarters.

Arriving, he found Father De Smet sitting up in his cot with his cassock buttoned all the way up and the white collar in place: the picture of formality. His color had returned, but he still looked weak.

“Good morning, Captain. One of your crew was kind enough to bring me some thin soup.”

“I see you are feeling better.” The captain stole a quick glance to the body lying in the other bed.

“Yes, and yes he is still here. I understand that we shall have to put into shore for more wood before too long?”

“Yes. Should be in the next hour or two.”

“I was hoping you could have an actual coffin made for him for the burial.”

“Certainly. I will tell the carpenter to make it with the best materials we have.”

“I should prefer he’d simply make it sturdy.

You see, on your return trip, I would like you to retrieve Father Hoecken’s body and take it back to St. Louis. I know this is an unusual and toilsome request, but I make it all the same. He should be buried in blessed ground,

58

Captain, with a proper funeral, surrounded by his brother religious.” Father De Smet started to say more but halted. His eyes drifted from the captain to the dead priest. “He was willing to die however and wherever God saw fit. There was no will of his own in it. That is how a man of God should die.” Father De Smet once again looked the captain full in the face. “He should be buried in St. Louis as an example to every passing Jesuit of what it is to live well, and what it is to die well. His work is done. He should go home to St. Louis. Can you do this, Captain — will you do this?”

“…He should be buried in blessed ground, Captain, with a proper funeral, surrounded by his brother religious.”

Shoulders back, the captain turned to look upon the holy corpse. His words came out strong and unhesitatingly. “He served this boat completely. It would be my honor to see this boat do the same for him. It will be done.”

The riverside funeral was like none that had preceded it. Captain LaBarge insisted on helping dig the grave. Father De Smet was too weak to climb the embankment and so was carried to the gravesite in a chair. Nearly the entire boat disembarked to share in the prayer and to see the casket lowered. When it was done, the priest buried deep, they marked a tree by the grave and one by the shore. In an unnatural silence, the ship was coaxed back into the river and pointed north.

As the days stretched on and the journey continued, Captain LaBarge smoked less and thought more. Death had left the ship. Music had returned to the vessel, but a different type of music: hymns.

Nearly a month and a half later, the captain came back down the river. He kept his word. The marked tree was found and the body retrieved. The coffin was tied to the top of the St. Ange, as if the boat itself were carrying the man of God on her shoulders.

Captain LaBarge watched the clergyman lowered back into the earth once they had reached St. Louis. It was the first time he’d ever attended two funerals for the same man.

When the chanting was done, they drove a simple wooden plank into the grave. Below the name and dates was inscribed ‘Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam.’

Captain LaBarge stood planted by the mounded dirt, like an eccentric tombstone placed to the side. Slowly the priests and brothers took their leave until only the captain and the superior of the order remained. The wizened priest came to rest imperceptibly by the captain’s side. Stock still and silent, he became another monument at the graveside.

Long moments passed, and nothing was said.

It was Captain LaBarge who broke the silence, though the only thing that moved were his lips. “There should have been more people.”

When the priest made no response, the captain turned his head to look at him, as if to assure himself the priest was actually there.

He was surprised to find the old man smiling.

“Perhaps, but funerals, even death, are different for priests. People often feel sad for a dead priest but not deeply sad and they feel

guilty about that.” The priest’s eyes lifted from the dirt to look pointedly at the captain, then his gaze returned to the earth and he continued. “It is natural enough though. After all, a priest leaves behind no family to weep over his grave. It is one of the things we get to give to God. Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam.”

“What does that mean?”

“All for the glory of God. It is a priest’s unique joy to give totally and completely all for the glory of God. Not every priest finds that, mind you, but I believe Father Hoecken did.”

Captain LaBarge continued to stand vigil a few moments longer, then he simply said, “Thank you, Father.” It struck him that he was not sure which priest he was thanking. As he walked away, the senior priest called out to him.

“Captain.”

Captain LaBarge turned.

The old superior smiled. “When you head back north, if you see Father De Smet, tell him I said to make sure to come back to us — when his work is done.” *Author’s note: One can still visit the grave of Father Christian Hoecken in St. Louis and very near him, though buried many years after, Father Pierre De Smet at Calvary Cemetery, 5239 West Florissant Avenue, St. Louis, Missouri.

59

photograph

Open Your Eyes Joseph S. Pete

60

35mm film print

Wait Lauren Suchenski

61

Via Dolorosa Ed Higgins

God dying the paradox harder than Hell to understand Judean dust was real enough and taut crowds in angry afternoon sun their faces blurred by stumbling pain of blood/sweat back and thorn/torn brow dark spatters like wine-red coins fell to that road anointing our Way

62

A Town Called Corinth G.E. Schwartz

We know we have been flung out in time and space, spanning more centuries than miles of fields, seen Apollo and his chariot race across blue, autumn skies.

Here we tread where once Medea trod — mindless, wild, as she raged at our faithlessness, and jealousy was not assuaged by the wanton, ruthless death of her own sons, her mother’s-hand stopping their startled, unknowing breath.

She stood on these stones here in Corinth where we stand, before that brilliant other sun had risen in the broken skies, when bright Apollo’s race was run, his reins relinquished with a cry.

Too far we have been flung through countless years to feel the ancient gods’ swift fall or see compassion’s painful tears groove deep the stern cheeks of preaching Paul.

63

God’s Energy Michael Fontana

I stored my portion of God’s energy inside a locker at the Greyhound bus station. It was a simple decision that I reached while living in the shelter not a mile away. All possessions gone to fellow homeless people, shelter staff, or cops on a crackdown, this was the one possession I didn’t want to lose. So one day, I sat on the downtown square, feet crossed, arms outstretched, head down, cup in front of me, and listened to the jingle of coins until I knew I had enough. Then I walked to the Greyhound station.

Inside sat many local homeless people like me, many others passing through, thinking that a one-way ticket to some other clime would change their luck. I found an open locker, lucky number thirteen, deposited my change to open it, and stuffed in all of God’s energy that I could muster.

Then I locked it and tied the key to a shoelace around my neck. I pulled the handle a couple of times to make sure that entry to it wasn’t easy and then went on my way.

While I slept that night in the crowded men’s wing of the shelter, enduring a cacophony of snores, screams, and movements across the floor, I awoke worried about God’s energy. It was a fine thought to keep it stored away somewhere else, but I needed it in the shelter, too, to help keep me safe. Most of the residents were good, but a few brought steak knives in under their shirts and lowdown things like that. Who would recover the energy if a knife found its way into my back?

I wandered out of the men’s wing and over to the main desk of the shelter where a college kid sat and filled out crossword puzzles.

“I can’t let you out,” he said, pushing his glasses back on his nose.

“I really have an important errand to run,” I said, putting on a voice as close to a tv announcer as I could approximate.

“I can’t let you back in,” he said.

“That’s fine.”

He turned the bolt, and out I went. It was chilly outside, and I recognized the timbre of fear pounding in my heart. Anyone, from another homeless man to an angry cop to a crazy suburban teenager, could be out there aiming for someone like me to roll. Fortunately, I made it to the bus station without incident, other than my being winded from the walk.

While I sought my locker, a fellow homeless man approached me. “You got a quarter?” Ziggy asked. He was tiny and white with dreadlocks and dressed in rags.

“I got nothing,” I said, tugging the shoelace around my neck, hesitant to pull it out in front of him.

“What you got around your neck?”

“Just some good luck for a change. Now I need you to move on.”

“You know Ziggy’s lost his luck. Any chance you could share a little with me?”

“It’s mine, Ziggy,” I said. “All mine.”

Ziggy looked up at me with his best puppy dog eyes. I thought about it. It wasn’t mine. It was God’s. Maybe God wouldn’t look happily on someone hogging it all.

64

“All right, Ziggy. I’ll give you a dose.” I opened the locker, and sure enough the stuff was in there. I hauled it out and gave a handful to Ziggy, who opened up his mouth and breathed in deep.

He shivered as it went down into his system.

“More, please,” he said, smiling and rubbing his tummy.

I grew resentful at him hogging it but also had the pressure of God’s will on my head. I could do a good turn, and if I chose not to, then that’s what God might do to me. I closed my eyes and placed the entire armload of energy into Ziggy’s clutches. He breathed it in like pot smoke from a bong. Satiated, he left me with a handshake and many thanks.

I stared into the empty locker and wondered what I had done. Maybe I should have trusted God’s energy more and just left it there overnight. Now I had tampered with it and actually lost it. I closed my eyes and slammed the locker shut, taking a seat in the station to wait for dawn.

Security eventually shook my shoulder to awaken and hustle me out of there. A long line of us was headed for the door.

“One thing,” I said, holding up my key, pointing at the lockers.

He sighed and walked with me over to the lockers. I plopped a quarter in and opened the lock.

Inside was God’s energy, replenished. I breathed it all in like a firefighter sucking oxygen. The guard seemed confused but allowed me my time before I closed it again. I took the key with me and retied the shoelace around my neck, walking out of the station a more faithful man.

65

Wounded Tongue Adriana Medina My mother was folded within her grandmother’s thin, dark arms as the elder sang in her wounded tongue, her resigned shoulders softening toward the earth year after year, until one day there was no language left to interpret, no blood left to decipher. Do you remember the words? I ask my mother. No. Strange to trace roots, not on a family tree, but on Wikipedia, to have my hands turn up empty when sifting for names of past blood. I wanted to find the lost song of my great-grandmother sung in Yaqui, a mother song to my own voice.

But the Wikipedia entry about Sonora speaks only about the Deer Dance, and the best it can do is suggest that my great-grandmother likely once watched a man bend his body to the earth, frantic in his return to the soil, shuffling his feet, blending the Christian and the pagan into a mosaic of dance, giving glory to the new Son.

66

This is Your Universe Speaking John Grey

Know that you live on a round thing, on a moving thing, on a thing so tiny in space.

Know that it feels like a flat thing, like a still thing, like a thing so large in space.

Know that what you know is as near to nothing as can be known.

Relax.

That seems to be working for you.

67

1 4˝ x 2 1˝ c o n t é a n d c h a r c o a l o n p a p e r

Schism James Schlavin

68

Contributors David Athey The Day After Halloween David Athey’s poems and stories have appeared in The Iowa Review, Christianity and Literature, Tampa Review, and Windhover. He teaches creative writing at Palm Beach Atlantic University.

CJ Bell Two Funerals for Father Hoecken CJ Bell lives between the shadows of a church and an oil refinery in the Midwest. His life and his writing breathe the air of both.

Mary Beth Dahl Miracle Rides Mary Beth Dahl believes life to be a brilliant prelude, and she writes stories to illustrate her point. A wife, mother, writer, and ragamuffin, she blogs at marybethdahl.org, writes software documentation during the day, and builds fantasy worlds at night. Her sci-fi novel Through the Balustrade came out in 2013.

Vanessa K. Eccles The Quiet Vanessa K. Eccles is a sassy southerner and a ravenous reader. She writes what she observes about life, using poetry and prose to capture magical moments before they’re lost. She is the author of fabled and serves as the executive editor of Belle Rêve Literary Journal and The Faithful Creative.

Daniel Fitzpatrick It May Be Daniel Fitzpatrick lives in Hot Springs, Arkansas, with his wife and daughter. He is finishing his first novel, and his poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in 2River and pilgrim.

Michael Fontana God’s Energy Michael Fontana lives and writes in beautiful Bella Vista, Arkansas.

John Grey Improvements in the Offing, This is Your Universe Speaking, Toward the End John Grey is an Australian poet and u.s. resident. He was recently published in New Plains Review, Stillwater Review, and Big Muddy Review with work upcoming in Louisiana Review, Cape Rock, and Spoon River Poetry Review. Rhysling winner for short genre poetry.

Robert F. Gross Colman of Stockerau, Leaf Robert F. Gross has been a teacher, a scholar, a theatrical director, and a performer. These days he’s mostly a writer. He’s published poetry and prose in a variety of journals, including Sein und Werden, Birds Piled Loosely, St. Sebastian Review, and The Camel Saloon.

Ed Higgins Via Dolorosa Ed Higgins’ poems and short fiction have appeared in various print and online journals including Christianity and Literature, Christian Century, The Mennonite, and Triggerfish Critical Review, among others. Ed teaches literature at George Fox University, south of Portland, Oregon, and is Assistant Fiction Editor for Ireland-based Brilliant Flash Fiction.

Jenny Hoffman and Michelle Lawson How the Stars Used to Shine There Jenny Hoffman and Michelle Lawson are two local Albuquerque theater artists in association with Three, A Performance Group. They have done a local production of How the Stars Used to Shine There in its entirety and hope to take it on tour. For more information and updates, check out their Facebook page: facebook.com/ThreePerformanceGroup N.C. Krueger St. Francis N.C. Krueger is a student who lives in the Twin Cities area. She is currently engaged in converting her flights of fancy into stories, poems, and comics.

Dan Leach The Question Dan Leach’s short fiction has been published in various literary journals and magazines, including The Greensboro Review, Deep South, and The New Madrid Review. A Greenville native, he graduated from Clemson in 2008. Floods & Fires, his debut short-story collection, will be published by University of Georgia Press in 2017.

Angela Lovelace Mother Hen Angela has written stories since she was a teen. Only now, at forty-six, has she shed some of the social anxiety that comes with sharing what she writes with others. She has a desire to see if anyone else can be entertained by her imaginary friends.

Fred McGavran The Jeweler’s Daughters Fred is a graduate of Kenyon College and Harvard Law School and served as an officer in the u.s. Navy in Vietnam. In June 2010, he was ordained a deacon in the Episcopal Church, where he serves as Assistant Chaplain at Episcopal Retirement Services.

Adriana Medina Wounded Tongue Adriana Medina is a dual degree major at Chapman University, pursuing both her ma in English and mfa in creative writing.

Alec Panos Parking Garage Alec Panos’ poem was Embers Igniting’s winner of Commaful’s 2016 Poetry Slam contest.

Joseph S. Pete Open Your Eyes, Reflection in the Woods Joseph S. Pete is an award-winning journalist and an Iraq War veteran. His literary work has appeared in Ruminate Magazine, Flash Fiction Magazine, and elsewhere.

Barbara Ruth Ever Present Everywhere; What She Does, What She’ ll Do Barbara Ruth writes biomythography in poetry and prose. Her work appears in Wildflower Muse, Deaf Poets Society, Post Card Poetry and Prose, Bop Dead City, Yellow Chair Review (two time winner of Rock the Chair) and Snapdragon: A Journal of Healing.

Wilma Saran Looking Back Through Forward Motion It is Wilma’s love of nature and wildlife and the beauty of God’s creation that inspires her. The way the clouds form in the sky, the colors of a sunset, and the life in the eyes of an animal are all things she desires to share with others through her paintings.

James Schlavin Alone, Schism, Sip James Schlavin is an Albuquerque artist, seeking to express the beauty of God found within nature, reflecting on the intricate complexities of life around us.

G.E. Schwartz A Town Called Corinth, Fire G.E. Schwartz, born in Pottsville, Pennsylvania, is the author of only others are: Poems, World, Thinking in Tongues and Funeral.

Stephen Shaw The Night Market Stephen has been painting for a number of years on and off but only took it up seriously in 2015.

His preferred medium is acrylic, and his main body of work is landscapes. His work is inspired by the light, color, and mood of Irish landscapes and its changing scenes.

Lauren Suchenski Four Eyes, Light, Solid, Wait Lauren Suchenski hails from Yardley, Pennsylvania and loves images and forms and the process of creating them. As a poet, ballet dancer, actress, photographer, painter, mother, and Waldorf educator, Lauren believes in the inherent creative capability within all people.

Miriam Thor Possibilities Miriam Thor graduated from Gardner-Webb University with a degree in American Signed Language and elementary education. She and her husband currently live in North Carolina where she works as an interpreter at a local high school.

Special Thanks Our staff would like to thank: Our contributors. Your writing and art is stunning, and working with you this year has been a pleasure. We’re honored to offer your creations a home in Embers Igniting.

Anyone and everyone who cares about Embers Igniting and the mission behind it. We covet your prayers.

Our spouses and loved ones, who encourage us and bring us coffee as we work into the wee hours of the night on this labor of love.

The Author of Life, who is the reason we create.

Read, Share, Submit If you enjoyed this volume, we ask that you do our contributors a service and pass it on — share your hard copy or share the online version. Just share.

If you would like to submit your work for the 2018 volume of Embers Igniting, go to our website www.embersigniting.com and click on the Submit page to learn how.