Five Quarterly Issue No. 3 by Five Quarterly

GUEST EDITORS Hillary Eaton lives and writes in Los Angeles and is the co-founder and Editor-inChief of Undertow Magazine. Matt Goodmark works in media and has performed independent stand-up and sketch comedy for over seven years. Amy Linden is a music and culture critic/journalist, the former co-host of VH1′s 4 on the Floor, and founder of the Brooklyn-based monthly reading series, (reading) our words. Lara Stapleton is a writer of prose, poetry, and screenplays, including The Lowest Blue Flame Before Nothing, which won the Pen Open Book Award. Charles Torres-Chae is a contract analyst at NYU Medical Center.

FOUNDERS Vanessa Gabb Crissy Van Meter

INTERN Jessica Gray

Cover art by Ian Sautner

O. Ayes | litany of no pattern except trouble and escapism

oh strange beds on sunday mornings—the light of one less heartbreak. to hold back against rust, talk to me about the sky. oh how we go on mending. if we were to leave this now, if these were scenes from a life more convinced of easy happiness. the fall’s burnt ochre. i slept on the bathroom floor. this blue period, if authentic, won’t last very long. even in night rain, the unlit parking lot, your eyes are brilliant. what is the last thing you believe? monsters are born too strong and far too heavy. dear city: i prefer to leave you behind, but listen for the next ridge; its compliant shape— i tell you, i can’t explain—it’s merely a feeling. we will not remember the dates, just these endless wants of ours. three years from now, when the wind catches my hair.

BIO: O. is a queer writer, educator, and agent of change, who serves on the Board of Directors for The Mama Project, which promotes women’s literacy in developing countries.

James P. Mullaney Jr. | The Hoarding Till The seed that fell among thorns stands for those who hear, but as they go on their way they are choked by life’s worries, riches and pleasures, and they do not mature. - Gospel of Luke 8:14 They constructed games to ensure the children didn’t remain idle long enough to become scared. Paper stars were created from old newspapers and weekly periodicals advertising the most useless of items. The yellowed pages were folded over into crude angles, then within themselves, with the hope of illuminating some of the darkness that had come over the campsite. They were too tired for anything else. When the rains started they cursed themselves for not being better prepared. They cursed their gods for not sparing them the added burden. And they cursed each other because it showed they were not alone. The women began packing first before the men took notice. The coffee grounds ran cold in their tin mugs and some took to chewing the flavor, the caffeinated effect absorbed directly through the gums. When the site lay barren, save the last few empty tents around them, the men finally joined in and the cavalcade collapsed into a smaller version of itself and moved out to find another spot. At dawn they slogged off the side of the road past the break-down and drainage ditches. A hundred yards beyond the ramble of passing trucks and the violent echoes vibrating out the steel overpass. Within the hour the gullies were filled and two paper stars meandering to lower ground passed them before dropping out of sight around the first bend. Each person had lost material possessions that over time confused their own sense of worth, and then each lost something of far greater importance. Although no one would admit it, each settlement brought the promise of sanctuary. Not merely from the elements, or from the law or memory, but from the looks of strangers not yet so desperate. It wasn’t vanity but rather a form of confirmation. For every person gains some salt of confidence despite intentions when encountering those less fortunate and the times weren’t much for giving anything. But as the rain continued to fall heavily, its weight slackened their shoulders and quickly began to form pools around them. Two foot ravines dug by tires abutted the roads and Foster, running rear lookout, watched Maddie Ellison’s delicate ankles with a hint of pride swell the size of a small rodent. The

first day out of Glendale he remembered glimpsing her legs through the wooden floor slats while she showered inside one of the outdoor stalls. The development lay sodden behind them and would completely flood within a few hours. Steel foundation sprouted from the ground ahead of them, the promise a contradiction to the malleable earth. All seventeen people–six separate families, the six different tents which had housed most of their belongings now soaked inside canvas mission packs–working their tired and thin limbs while tasting the drops as they fell, sharp as sulfur, upon their tongues. “Who remembers the words that first night?” someone asked, but no one responded and they continued lugging their remaining belongings and the question was left behind too. A few had travelled from El Paso. Others from as far as Birmingham and Jacksonville. The group had bandied together on a campsite just outside Sun City. Factories had closed decades earlier. Then the strip malls, soon the surrounding commerce hubs. It spread out so far eventually the ripples flowed into those emanating from other towns, from other cities. When the banks got scared, they reacted as the unadaptable do. They brought a fight against those whose hands they helped bound. And around them the margins crushed the heath blossoms and blew gusts strong enough to take a man’s hat. The margin’s that had been creeping closer bore down and some of the men could hear it within the ground, could hear it in the way the bird’s had sung before fleeing the rain. The omen of the land pushed them onward and if they were able to acknowledge such belief nobody mentioned it. Neither husband to wife, nor parent to child. Nothing was passed between them for fear the cracks inside would become something else. They moved onward like a broken fist tethered against the pounding of the rain. By mid-afternoon the greyness in the sky fractured out a pale bruise. Morris reached behind into his pack and staked the support poles and tamped the first tent out. As he leveled the stakes against the buried rock, those immediately behind him stopped trundling through the slick heavy earth and staked their claim as well. The next family followed in a ripple effect as the group did not function in unison but rather a form of mirrored succession. The youngest, a boy of eight, began to cry. His father, a man whose weathered face bore an aged resemblance, picked up his walking stick, which also served as a tool of discipline, and tapped the boy gently upon his shoulder. The

boy slumped too easily to his knees. His crying bore no sound because it had already begun developing roots. “You should take care with him. He don’t understand,” Dalton told the man and was careful to drain the words of any threat. As the accredited head of the group he sought to keep an emotionless balance. Names still didn’t come easily unless he pulled the list out from his notebooks pressing up against his neck from inside a slung knapsack. Harry’s eyes were callous and pitted and the warmth in them had been long stamped out. Dust rose instead and now those eyes held irritation more than anything else, despite the man standing before him. “Hell if I understand. He ain’t hurt. He’s just looking for some comfort. They’re all gonna have to understand sooner than later. The line runs too deep and hell if they ain’t standing at the end.” “Still the same, this is all any of us has left. Best to keep things moderate, no unnecessary ups or downs. You strike that match and there’s no telling where the fire might start.” And Harry understood even though he wished he didn’t and felt the rawness of anger rise inside his breast and knew despite his understanding something would break soon. You stuff these mission packs with too much sundry and soon the canvas straps tear out and the stitching busts open, Harry thought. It had too. And that anger took the inverse shape of the things given rise to such conflict. If someone had asked him Harry would have said it looked like a horse with legs rooted out the top of its body instead of below and with a head facing backwards, towards its ass. They’d been on the road somewhere around eleven days. Their primary rations, foods they were used to eating, had run out day eight. Dalton understood they were less than two, at most three, days from starvation. He also understood they were more than the allotment from the nearest town. And there was no telling how deep times cut elsewhere. They had traded all their phones in exchange for water a quarter mile outside Bakersfield. In order to resolve the race against time, the following night Dalton had collected all the watches from the group and threw them into the fire. The elders watched without questioning as the embers first cracked the glass-front pieces, the seconds and minutes billowing up into finite gray smoke. When the watches lost their

shape, time no longer existed, to be marked instead only through sickness and in death. And because there was no longer time there were no longer any memories. For when a man gives up on time he accepts the fate his hands may no longer grasp hold of anything, even emptiness. Now the elders hoped the rains didn’t signal the beginning of the season. They were several days out the Santa Maria Valley and the only threat the washes posed were coyotes, slackened shapes bearing fangs as desperate as a breached newborn. These threats of the West, like setting course to the Far East where the shape of eyes and the roll of language, marked differences as great and unique as the land they tread. Huddled underneath the large unfolded tarps, they made their way back to the road, walking first through the deepest juncture in the ravines, some of them soaking their pants up to the waist, valuables and small children held aloft as though carrying some kind of burdened offering. Then, when they reached the other side, they held the children close as they walked up the incline to the broken concrete, growing ever suspicious of their worst fears and thoughts. At a hiker’s outpost they found shelter beneath a sandstone overhang. They unhitched themselves of their damp haversacks. The bearings of the last few pull wagons were rusted through the wheel bed, locking the wheels in place. The wagons skated over the slick ground. When the skeletal shape of the site took form the children grew restless. It was not exhaustion but a raw hunger emerging for the first time, and it made them act and cry out in ways unfamiliar. Brent Oscola found a field mouse and cut off its tail with a box cutter. The teenage Krone twins forced some of the younger children to stuff their mouths full with pebbles. Donegal Harten pushed Connor Lange too close to a saguaro, and afterwards, the boy cried meekly from the heat softening the quivers sticking out his legs and lower back. The last of the newspapers were used for kindling. A few of the adults looked at the sky, searching for help, for signs. A few of the others watched those adults for fear the strains of faith might redeem in other ways. Foster pulled a small bag of confection from a leather wrapping housing his buckskin knives. Before leaving Sarasota he packed the bag with a keen idea towards celebration for the children, for Foster believed the flow of happiness moved upward, from young to old. But the idea of a final destination faded further into ambiguity with each passing day. Foster forgot about the bag until, worried Stephens would look to

exact his own penance, he went to open his knives and was surprised his hunger and the drawn faces of the group hadn’t given him pause earlier. He understood there was no excuse for greed. But his hunger had leavened out and the coarse ember of anger heated and crackled and shrunk his insides and everything he still possessed. The others were too tired to question or fight him. Too tired to understand what consequences such actions meant to achieve. The children gathered like sickened javelinas around Foster as he held out the opened bag and let each of them grab one, slapping away any hands reaching for more. Most of the adults kept busy. Darcey and Paul Weeks rinsed and strung out some of the laundry across taut lines pulled from the tarp cords. Dalton sat inside his tent by lamplight and took account of the number of people, their rations and the miles they had just covered. Foster believed Dalton was a man pushed by time and the whole of the watch incident was actually a selfish one. He glanced for a moment as Dalton’s silhouette drew a small slash line through a list of figures and then watched the silhouette sit back to study the variants. Morris ran off with Maddie Allison, Stephens’ wife. Off somewhere to listen to cheap country music and shoot some stick, they consoled Stephens. Because there was nothing else to say, because the only feeling they could muster was a kind of diminutive relief they didn’t have to endure such further troubles. Because each of them knew there was no place to run to and they didn’t dare speak so. The elders took to bed early for hope resided in their dreams of yesterday. Foster tucked the candy beneath his sweatshirt and walked away from the site to quarter some of the trash. When he finished, he walked on even further to see what lay ahead and stopped by a small overgrown lot to take a leak. Low guttural moans came from one of the broken-down autos eviscerated like some animal carcass rotting in the coarse, colorless grass. Foster took his time finishing up and then turned back towards camp. Stephens stood cantered to the group’s water station chording fire wood. The man’s effort seemed to outweigh his size. At the same time the light inside Dalton’s tent blinked out and Dalton stepped from his tent to clear his eyes and unwind his thoughts. He finished applying math to the group’s prospects, and in the crescent darkness it took him a few seconds to reacquaint his balance. He recognized Stephens by the man’s bowed legs. “No need to bother. That there wood is soaked through. We’d be lucky to smoke ourselves out let alone any bugs,” Dalton told Stephens without giving it much thought.

But Stephens didn’t stop hacking at the broken mesquite. Instead, his pace quickened a bit. A few dramatic chops and the wood multiplied in smaller renditions. For emphasis, he stopped once the top of the cleave diveted off a trunk thick as a man’s leg. He removed his faded cap and wiped down his brow. His eyes burned with sweat. And then he slapped the cap back atop his blistery cracked skull and continued butchering the fractured wood, sending splinters in shards instead of burnable logs, creating an unusable mess. “I thought we brought enough for the night, but maybe I’m mistaken. The site can’t have too much wood.” Dalton smiled at the man reassuringly, though Stephens couldn’t hear him above the deep punctures penetrating the dead wood. The children had gathered around the pathetic fire and grew ever more boisterous from the sugar coating their empty stomachs, scratching like a scar prodded with a heated knife. The ones who had eaten the candy whole sat with gloomy faces watching the others gnawing slowly at the white sponge, while the rest had poked small sticks and twigs through the middles and extended them high above the dusty flame and watched the lifting smoke swirl in dance around their prize with envy. “Bring them down just a little, close enough, so the flame can’t touch or else they’ll burn.” “I remember liking the burnt ones best.” “What if I drop mine?” And a pair of boys joisted the sticks against the other until one boy’s stick fell empty and then all the children hushed down and grew a bit somber. Foster cleared his throat of disgust and stepped forward into the silence. The children cleared a space for him to sit. “Listen up now. You lose one and you lose it. You move on. But you don’t forget about it so you remember and don’t ever lose another one again.” The children looked across at each other and then the boy who lost the stick fight. None held their sticks any longer over the fire. “You see here, now here’s a lesson for you.” Foster continued and turned the bag he was holding within his lap upside down and dropped the white squares onto the thicket patch beside him. He grabbed two handfuls. “Let’s say we start with ten of

these marshmallows,” he told them and was a bit too eager in his motions and the children became confused despite holding their curiosity. “You belong to a village or town, maybe like this one here, and you get up each day and go to work to earn one of these so you can pay for food, for clothing, for a home and stuff. Somebody needs a marshmallow or earns a marshmallow. It gets pulled out of the pile. The police, teachers, development workers,” and he looked past the fire at Stephens’ tent. Webspinners poked at the dim bulb. The mosquito patch above the door reminded Foster of a one-way confessional. “Each of these workers earns one a week and then uses that marshmallow to buy food, shelter, whatever is necessary and can be afforded with just one marshmallow. So that marshmallow they use to buy stuff goes back into the pile and the person who sells the things takes the marshmallow. And then that person buys the things they need with their marshmallow, could be from the person they just got it from, or someone else. But the important thing is the marshmallows move around. They stay inside the pile, inside that circle.” “So you always have the ten marshmallows, how can you tell them apart?” One of the Krone twins asked. The other twin nodded towards his sister in agreement as though he were a few seconds shy of asking the same question. “As long as someone different buys and someone different sells.” “Yes, the ten marshmallows have to keep moving from hand to hand. So there are always ten in the pile. But it keeps things moving, keeps people buying and selling. Keeps them fed, inside their homes. The main thing is everyone has to participate.” The children rustled up the dry red clay with their feet because they didn’t fully understand. One of them sprayed bug repellant across his sunburned legs and when the medicine began to burn, skulked away to his find mother. “But you see, a problem arises when one person somehow accumulates a nest of these here marshmallows. When one person has taken and removed them from the rest of the community. What happens when one person takes a marshmallow out of the group and...” Foster tossed one of the marshmallows straight into the grey fire. The outer shell of sugar crystallized quickly to brown, then black as the candy dehydrated and wrinkled

into a decayed pulpy mass. Foster could smell the burnt syrup, and he remembered how as a child he himself once ate an entire bag without sharing any with his family. “How did that person get those marshmallows?” “Sheldon,” Kendra Brown called out, soft enough not to unsettle the other children, from the water station. Foster leaned in closer to the struggling fire gasping at smoke rather than giving smoke off. “Someone takes one out and the groups got to make do with nine instead of ten. Then two more disappear, another one goes. Soon the group struggles to survive on only three.” Stephens appeared from the shadowed bellow, his arms crossed supporting a pile of wood. “I think the kids might be too young for these kinds of stories,” Kendra Brown bent down and pulled her son up towards her. “Shush, Jasper, the kids know nothing about that.” The adults began to all set upon the fire. Maddie Allison shuttled over half a dozen parkas for the children. “The kids know nothing about nothing.” Dalton suddenly let out a high-pitched call meant to attract mating birds. The group hushed down awaiting some form of response. For a brief moment the land drew silent and attentive. Then a coyote giggled maniacally out beyond the southwest border. “They don’t need to listen, they’ll be living it all soon enough.” “Now, now. Let’s settle it down. You children may want to step away from the fire. The smoke may change your voices before you’re good and ready.” The children obeyed Dalton because they respected him, because they feared him without knowing why. Some of the parents stepped to order behind them. The rustle of the tents’ doors soon interrupted the night insects. Those still remaining drew in closer, as though their language could control the masses, but only in secret. “People living according to emotion rather than reason. And they don’t know how to reconcile those emotions,” Morris said, speaking to the things he saw billowing off the smoke wisps.

Stephens whistled deep and low and stared up at the sky. “People aren’t honest no more. Sad thing is they know it and they don’t care.” “What’s this got to do with marshmallows?” Foster asked. “Nothing,” Jaspar said and raised the cuffs collaring his parka against the mosquitoes. “Don’t lie to them Darwin,” Stephens rasped, “It’s got everything to do with it.” And Foster gathered the remaining marshmallows and threw each of them into the fire, one by one, until the entire bag plopped and glowed red and melted into fiery red crystals.

The following morning sun broke an early dawn and the heat of the arroyo burned off like a reptile sloughing dead skin, lifting a mist of heavy dust off the newly dry land. Maddie Allison and Siobhan Thomas were the only ones up and about. Worry robbed them of sleep as they sensed boundaries swept asunder clouds of red clay. They snuck out their tents at first light and began wrapping rain soaked towels around the small embers of the extinguished fire and raised the smoldering wood away from their legs and bodies. Then they began scraping the dried coal sugars as though they were skinning a chicken into large tin bowls filled with water or milk. “I can’t believe he carried that bag so long.” Siobhan Thomas spoke, her voice raspy with sleep. “And never thought twice this entire time.” “I don’t understand it either, even if it was his bag.” Maddie Allison stopped to roll her wet sleeves up past her elbows. “Morris says it don’t matter much either way. That all we’re doing is treading water.” “He’s nothing but a fool. And same for any woman listening to him instead of her husband.” At the bestowed judgment both women stopped what they were doing. Siohban Thomas and Maddie Allison stared without reservation at the other for a long time. The heat off the embers bore through the towels and warmed their palms. The women seemed to bear the struggles worse than the men. Their silent worry nestled in the dark sacs beneath their eyes and in lines newly written by austerity. Their bellies distended in hunger. Their skin became road maps. Siobhan almost broke first out of maturity,

but a tired restlessness rooted through five births saw the world’s bloom in different shades. “A woman’s business is hers alone unless it trespasses onto others. Filling your time with corrupt distractions is not an answer. It’s avoidance. What you need is faith, faith that things will turn for the better. Faith that you’ll recognize your own sins and repent for those you’ve hurt.” “Look here now, I’m not trying to start something,” but Maddie Allison thought to herself harder than she ever thought before and the result was something she sought her entire life to curtail. “Don’t mention anything to me about faith. Every day we go about the same routine. Dalton checks the food levels and marks things inside his notebooks. Thelma, Jade and Darcey wash the clothes worn through with yesterday’s stink. And you and I try our best to make each of these sites feel like some kind of home. We set up stations for eating, for cleaning, for relieving ourselves. But faith can’t put food in my kids’ stomachs, can’t get me back my house, can’t give my husband back his pride, can’t build any bridges back to the past. All faith can do is restore the lies in order to keep hold for another day.” And with her words she paused the scrapings and slapped the knife against the edge of the table. The skin of the dead eucalyptus dropped off in pieces large as a horse’s tongue. “And I’m bone tired of it that’s all.” Siohban Thomas looked quizzically back at the younger women and for a second her vanity held an image of herself at the same age, and with the comparison her bosom swelled. There was nothing left to say and Siohban Thomas searched for the wisdom contained within every moment. As usual, she found it only in silence. Minutes passed and soon the silence required abutment. “When you feel the need for distraction, remember, the difference between the just and the unjust is solidified by the very existence of the other.” But her words were just that and the hardened shells thickened further into callous, curling around their egos sheltered beneath exhaustion and a singular focus. For there were many things they could not articulate.

Dalton had stepped out his tent carrying his notebook with him because there was nothing left to calculate and sat across from the two women. He peered over into their two tin bowls and the women waited for his reaction. “It’s a shame it’s all come to this,” was all he said. The two women continued on with the embers and the towels and the dulled knives. Soon more wood fell than sugar and only when the wood changed color did both women finally stop. Beyond the arroyo, the margins waited with yellowed eyes peering through the strong-eyed saguaros and through the hardened leave stalks of the ocotillo. They arrested close enough any further encroachment would overtake the site. There the margins paused with tense, emaciated muscles and panting tongues heavy with thirst, waiting for the moment of complete silence when the world stretched tight enough it became possible to rip a hole through it. But the people couldn’t see them. They couldn’t see them because they weren’t looking and because they lacked the visual acuity to notice such things. The margins drew closer and still the people didn’t notice. And then the margins were upon them, ready for the moment of justification, and they encircled them for the margins had become like blinders against the vastness of the open world beyond their lamentable, solitary existence, connecting them and separating them at the same time, all and everything, together and yet, divisively alone. “It’s all a shame,” Dalton spoke again but he sat by himself as the families huddled inside and around their separate tents making preparations for the day. The women swept the canvas floors. The men stared forlorn waiting for the cleansing effects of the dull coffee. Children brushed their teeth using their forefingers dipped inside plastic cups. Dalton was resolute, ashamed to acknowledge not one person ever asking about or voicing concern over the dwindling food supply. And so the final day arrived without them noticing and he thought over their naiveté, assuming things could go on forever. As Dalton watched them working inside their personal spaces, he didn’t recognize any of their faces, he didn’t see any determinate features carried by these people who, during such intimate and raw times, should have been more than strangers. Instead, he saw beaten footprints where their faces should have been. Instead of recessed eyes, wide-set foreheads, irregular curvatures outlining different

shaped noses, instead of brows creased by determination, by consternation, fear or levity, Dalton saw distracted footprints splayed across a dying landscape, the weathered ground spreading around their feet, around their shoes, taking them in slowly as though the earth were unsure of the carnage, as though by doing it slowly no one would take notice.

BIO: James holds an MFA from The New School. He is the author of The Ministry of Culture and is currently at work on his second novel.

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Carolyn Martin | What my mother’s stroke said Get this straight, kid. I swiped her nouns. That’s it. Hid them in her brain. She recalls what she likes – coffee hot, floors washed, Jersey pizza dripping grease – but her mind can’t tell her mouth. So your stubborn mother scrounges verbs to smash through my detours. What I drink ... scrubbed ... ate on Friday night. With one impatient stall, Mrs. Feisty-ness drives a meaning home. And can she still direct from Lower Ferry Street! Go left. Two rights. Turn ... into parking lots where banks, doctors, groceries sit where they always were. Or talk about the Jersey Shore before the hurricane and she pinpoints every beach from Seaside Park to Manasquan. But here’s the deal: Call her twice a day from your Douglas firs three thousand miles west. She says she pays her bills and then forgets she’s paid. Can’t work the DVD or answering machine. Try to small-talk love, care, apologies between The doctor said ... and How is so-and-so? And listen up: Beneath the beat of her radio, she’s mapping the clearing out – room by room, piece by piece.

BIO: Carolyn is happily retired in Clackamas, OR where she gardens, writes and plays.

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J. Scott Brownlee | The Last Time I Saw Aron Anderson

He played ball like a king—toking hard on cheap blunts in the batting cage. No one could say shit to him because he had it grooved to where his swing stayed smooth even after contact. He said, "My parents left the same day they named me Aron—with just one a in it—at the town hospital. At least they gave me that. Someday I'm gonna' be All-State. I'll make my name famous." People knew about him in five counties at least—so much so that word spread. Big scouts showed up to watch our team play and get whipped by whoever bussed in from the city to teach us a lesson—that we were just poor, po-dunk kids, ultimately: practice for the bourgeoisie elite. But in the district championship, we played a too-wealthy Wimberley team we defeated barely. And it was sweet, let me tell you, to stand on that field after it with Aron saying, "Shit. We did it. We did it." "Fuckin' 'aye, man. We did"—because he started slinging meth, and even though he got away and the cops couldn't keep him from coming back here, we've not spoken since then.

BIO: J. Scott is a Writers in the Public Schools Fellow at NYU, where he teaches poetry to undergraduates and second graders through the Teachers & Writers Collaborative.

Paul Stenis | The Review For Luke Gideon Caldwell, lead singer of Interstellar Pig, lay naked in an unfamiliar bed. He lifted a shaky hand to his forehead where the pain reverberated like the sound of a shoegazer working a whammy bar. Complementing this and other hangover symptoms was a coat of cat hair that clung to the sheets, the comforter, and much of Gideon’s bare skin. Allergic reactions had not yet begun, but they would if he stayed much longer. Next to him was the woman he’d met at his gig the night before. Her hands were tucked between her knees. A sleeping mask covered her eyes, and her snores showed no signs of letting up. She was wearing men’s striped pajamas. Gideon’s first thought was of broken promises to himself, promises he had kept for months. One, no drinking the night of a show. Two, no one-night stands. Annette was her name, he remembered, which was good. The name was important. The morning wouldn’t be an immediate disaster, but sometimes an immediate disaster was better than the pretense of making a go of it. This was precisely the situation that had led to the promises. Still, he remembered the script: make small talk, avoid promises of any kind, and skedaddle. Gideon had learned long ago to avoid ego-bruising subjects (his sexual performance, for example) in the fraught moments of the next morning. No matter what was said, the truth was impossible to get at. Now he remembered muttering a running metanarrative of their hookup to Annette as they stumbled across the subway platform. Remembered telling her he didn’t think of her as a groupie. Her saying that he was the groupie. Sharing a laugh about the New York scene’s love affair with The Strokes. Learning with surprise that she was thirty-two, and therefore older than he. Telling her he was no poster boy for adulthood. Her not seeming bothered. Annette’s long brown hair fanned like a hood from the strap of her sleep mask, evidence of a before-bed ritual she must have undertaken after he’d passed out. An

unfamiliar feeling fluttered through his chest, a feeling of excitement that prevented flight. Perhaps breakfast lay in the near future. Gideon and the cat were the only naked ones, so he rolled out of bed, gathered his clothes, and carried them across the hardwood floor toward the bathroom. He spied Annette’s open laptop on a loveseat. He pulled on his underwear and settled beneath the heavily breathing computer, hoping for an email from his bass player Lucien assuring him his gear got home. God bless that homely, responsible man. When the laptop monitor flickered to life, there was a file open in Annette’s word processor. Gideon’s eye caught on “Interstellar Pig.” Interstellar Pig’s debut, the ironically titled Islands in Space, is grandiose and melancholy, paying tribute to “OX4” and “Cool Your Boots,” a trenchant pair of tracks on Ride’s classic shoegaze album, Going Blank Again. Unfortunately, the meticulousness with which Gideon Caldwell replicates Ride songs only emphasizes Interstellar Pig’s weakness. “Moonbeam,” IP’s operatic opener, swirls with tantalizing hooks that fade beneath layered rhythm guitars. “Lake of the Sky” is self-reflective and lovely but loses its way in unearned sonic dissonance and streams of feedback. At best the songwriting is naive and painfully self-aware; at worst, cough-into-your-fist embarrassing, which is especially disappointing when you consider IP have played the Manhattan circuit for almost a decade. Which begs the question any discerning indie fan is asking herself right now: what’s left for shoegaze to accomplish? Is it not the mid-aughts? The genre peaked in the early 90s with My Bloody Valentine’s Loveless and Ride’s Nowhere, then died a swift death at the hands of Nevermind. You can’t fault IP for trying. Their intentions are pure. Their emotions are genuine. Too bad nobody gives a rat’s ass. Instead of a band on the rise, Interstellar Pig are pretenders to a forgotten throne, a shell of a band that no longer exists. Here they are, nowhere. --Annette Borden, March 2003

Gideon read the review three times then slumped into the seat. So this is what happened when you spent ten years trying to get a decent gig in this city. Some chick got you drunk… but he couldn’t bear to complete the thought. No email from Lucien. Annette’s indie rock police probably burned his guitar in effigy and smashed Lucien’s bass to pieces. Through a gathering cloud of chagrin, Gideon noticed his brother Bradley had emailed him another short story. He owed the kid a response, but the foulness of the review lingered. “Shit,” Annette said behind him. “You didn’t read that, did you?” Her voice was amused in a way Gideon didn’t like. Not at all. “I was going to rewrite it completely this weekend.” She finally had the grace to seem embarrassed. “Yeah, right,” he said. “Hey,” she said. “That’s what you get for digging around on my hard drive. Don’t tell me you never write rough drafts.” Gideon started putting on his clothes. “I appreciate your honesty,” he said. Annette began dressing as well, quickly. “Take it easy,” she said. “Let me buy you breakfast.” But his throat constricted, so he pushed into the bathroom in case he couldn’t control himself. He’d be damned if he let her see that. The smell of the litter box sent a wave of nausea through him, but somehow he didn’t vomit. The cat arched its back on the john and leapt to the floor at his feet. Gideon was surprised the damn thing had any hair left. All he could think was: how embarrassing. How fucking embarrassing. He rinsed his face, then picked up a silver iPod lying on the sink and slipped it into his pocket. He told himself he didn’t want to see her again, but there was something besides curiosity about her music library that motivated the theft. Unearned sonic dissonance, my ass. It was easy to say goodbye. Annette seemed about to ask forgiveness but instead followed him toward the door, her hand against the back of her neck. Her face fell into that rueful look Gideon thought he recognized. The one that seemed to say, it was all in fun anyway, right?

Gideon headed into the street. Recognized Greenpoint. The Polish were everywhere. Someone pointed him toward the G train, and he got her iPod going. He made the mistake of looking for Interstellar Pig, and found nada. At least she had some Ride, of course she did. He slipped the iPod into the inside pocket of his pea coat and ducked into a bakery for coffee and a cheese Danish before heading for the subway. He ate the pastry with gusto, then set off along the dirty sidewalk, firing up the music to full volume. Her collection of Ride tunes was impressive. He settled on “Leave Them All Behind,” the opening track on Going Blank Again, the album he and Brad had received one otherwise forgettable Easter morning his sophomore year of high school. With purple ties choking their Adam’s apples, they unwrapped the album, a gift to both of them from their mother. It was tightly packed in one of those hollow cardboard rectangles CDs used to come in. He’d never forget watching Brad unwrap the album. The artwork was strange, a man with pickle eyes, with swaths of orange, yellow, red, and blue. They’d placed the disc gingerly into their CD boom box and spun the first track. The opening teased with an echoing keyboard riff, then the rhythm section kicked in with a bass hook they would hear in their dreams. Guitars erupted into a frenzied buzz with backward loops squealing over the top. His scalp tingled. His cheeks warmed. After how many shitty school days had he and his brother drowned in this sonic bath as it spilled from the speakers of their dad’s blue Chevy Cavalier? Gideon prepared for the long wait for the G train, but it was his lucky day, because the train squealed into the station pronto. He lowered the volume as he slipped through the subway doors and onto a patch of vacant orange bench. Across the aisle from him was a family of five with matching sunburns crammed next to a homeless guy wearing three trucker hats, near some rocker dude in leather pants so tight his ass must have been nearly bare against the seat back. To Gideon’s left was an old couple arguing loudly and without self-consciousness about someone named Andy. Gideon reflected on recent events as the caffeine and the music woke him up. He had known last night that Annette was a rock critic. He’d known she was interested in him. He just hadn’t known why. She might have even mentioned she was writing a piece

on Interstellar Pig. It was the kind of thing he had missed in the past. Maybe this was my comeuppance, he thought, for the other one-night stands. The feelings he’d trampled. The calls he’d never returned. Certainly Annette wasn’t the first girl who had inspired Gideon, but she may have been the first to put him in his place, albeit accidentally. His ego was definitely bruised, but he had begun to suspect her of integrity. Stealing her iPod, he knew, was pretty lame, but he wasn’t above lameness when he thought he might want someone. He dumped the rest of the coffee at the transfer from the G to the F. This time he found a car that was nearly vacant. A middle-aged woman across the way smiled at him, a breach of subway etiquette. Her black hair was in a net; it reminded him of his mother’s bobbed black hair. Next to her leg was a cart full of corn tortillas and canned beans in plastic bags. His mother would have loved it in New York, glutton for Experience that she was. On one particularly long road trip Brad had joked that they’d seen every rock formation west of the Mississippi. No kitsch mart was left unexplored. No rest stop unwizzed at. If Gideon could ever get decent accommodations, he’d talk his mom into visiting. He found himself thinking about his family a lot these days. Last night during the gig he’d spaced on the third verse of “Moonbeam,” nearly hadn’t come in at all, he was so spaced. Used to be the adrenaline rush of the performance got him focused. Now he could barely finish a show without thinking of Mom, Brad, or even Dad. The 4th Avenue and 9th Street stop was a block from his apartment. With relief Gideon tromped into the basement he shared with an Indian dude named Karim he met via Craig’s List a year before. “Please tell me Lucien dropped my gear off,” he said. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Karim said, “Gear? What gear could you mean?” “Don’t do this to me, Karim.” Karim led Gideon back into the apartment, a finger to his lip as though trying to remember something. They entered the small common room where his guitar, amp, and mixer had been dumped, filling the room. “I don’t see any gear here.” He indicated a

sliver of empty space next to the couch. Then he moved his hands back and forth over a small empty space in front of the television. “Or here so much.” Then he thrust both arms toward the coffee table. “But here, yes, I think there’s some shit right here between my couch and my fucking TV.” Karim’s most notable habits were working out like a motherfucker and eating salads from buckets he piled in the kitchen sink, their interiors coated in ranch dressing and soggy croutons. Their cupboards were filled with enough protein shake mix to stock the Yankees’ locker room. Gideon had a feeling the mice who got into it from time to time ran a rodent fitness center inside the apartment walls. Bring a roach, get the first month free. Karim was good enough to help Gideon cart his shit from the common room to his bedroom, though Gideon suspected he liked to show how easy it was for him to lift the amp. How do you like me now, puny white boy? Gideon unlatched the guitar case and flipped it open. All appeared well. He’d had this cherry burst Epiphone Dot since high school. The one blemish was a circular crack the size of a peach pit along the curved underside. The strap had slipped from his shoulder one day at their practice space in Manhattan and crashed to the hardwood floor. Other than that, no signs of damage. “What happened to you last night?” Karim asked. “Don’t tell me you broke your vow of chastity.” “I broke my vow of chastity,” Gideon said. “I’m really very surprised.” “What is it about women?” Gideon said. “You find one you like and she finds you about as interesting as a Sammy Hagar solo record.” “Let me tell you something. If I knew something about women, I wouldn’t be living with your ass. Did you get her number?” “I stole her iPod.” “Truly, Gideon. You are an idiot.”

-Mark Gardener, former front man for Ride, was playing a solo show at Club 13 that night. If there was anyone who should have gone with Gideon it was his little brother Brad. Where the fuck was he? Gideon often wondered. What was he still doing in Texas? To the Caldwell boys this was a concert of a lifetime. Ride’s fifteen minutes of fame had resulted in one little-publicized American tour when Gideon was on bad terms with his father, and the concert was out of town, a few hours north in Dallas. He hadn’t gone. The height of Ride’s fame culminated in an oft-recounted live show at the 1992 Reading Festival in support of Public Enemy, Nirvana, and The Wonder Stuff. Gardener and lead guitarist Andy Bell began taking credit for their own songs as early as Going Blank Again, and their diverging tastes showed even at that early stage. Shortly thereafter, Bell fell under the toxic spell of Oasis and penned some heinous pop songs that split the band’s personality. By the time their third full-length album Carnival of Light hit shops, Oasis ruled England and Ride was an afterthought. Andy Bell eventually joined Oasis on bass, and occasionally the Gallagher brothers let him put a song or two on their albums, but nothing he’d done since Ride had a lick of soul. Any rock musician worth his own ass would tell you the same thing. Gideon woke his computer, and signed in to email. This time there was a message from Lucien, who was pissed about Gideon’s disappearance last night, of course. He said he was bailing on the Mark Gardener show seeing as he spent half the morning carting Gideon’s shit all over New York City. Lucien was glum company anyway. No loss. Gideon would have asked his drummer, but the dude was in four bands, and it depressed him to hear about their successes. He opened the email from his little brother Bradley, and received his second news flash of the day. Some bullshit about how Brad thought his writing sucked, but Gideon only rolled his eyes and downloaded the story. He actually liked Bradley’s writing, but no matter how often he told Brad so, the kid didn’t believe him. Then came what Gideon saw as the kicker. “I want to move to New York. Can I live with you until I get my shit together?” This helped Gideon remember his cell phone buried in the litter

filled pocket of his pea coat. There were eight missed calls, five from Lucien, two from Brad, one from an unlisted number. Not one message. Thoughts of Bradley now troubled Gideon in ways they hadn’t in previous years. He wasn’t sure exactly when the twinges of regret started, but he’d only recently tied meaning to them. The twinges struck as he stared at girls on the subway, practiced guitar at his apartment, lunched alone in Union Square Park, faked his way through another rendition of “Lake in the Sky.” Something was lost. He wasn’t sure why he felt wounded, but he felt it deeply, despite the numbing effect his lifestyle usually provided. He opened Bradley’s story and started reading. The main characters were brothers, Dolan and Zadock, a year apart, just like they were, and together they rebuilt their parents’ ancient stereo into a time machine by playing Ride’s Today Forever EP backwards on cassette. (Dolan was obviously a thinly veiled Gideon. Zadock was Bradley.) They went back to the 60s when they transformed their father from a biblethumper to a bass player and formed a band called Rolling Moxie, their first hit a cover of the Beatles’ “Tomorrow Never Knows.” Only their dad’s band wrote it before the release of Revolver, so it wasn’t really a cover. The high point happened in the present, and the Bradley brother had to prevent the father from losing control and punching the Gideon brother. Their theory had always been that giving Dad a different adolescence would have made him a different father. But the final scene played out the same no matter what, the way it had played out in real life. Gideon showered, put on clean clothes, shaved, and brushed his teeth, all the while recovering from the blow to the gut that was Bradley’s story. Dammit, Bradley. Real subtle. Gideon never got along with their father, who he’d started calling “Roger” rather than Dad after he’d punched Gideon over the usual religious bullshit. Gideon couldn’t bring himself to talk about it with anyone, even Bradley. What Bradley meant by digging at these wounds, he wasn’t sure. Dealing with shit, he guessed. Trying to be his therapist.

He shut himself in his room and practiced through the afternoon, emerging only twice, once to piss, and once for a bucket of salad with Karim. A passage from Bradley’s story stuck in his mind. The song faltered yet again. Zadock unslung the guitar from his shoulders in anguish and held it out to his father, who didn’t move a muscle. His voice trembled as he spoke. “I want to be better,” he said. “But no matter how hard I try…” But Zadock had to stop speaking or else risk bursting into tears like a child. His big brother, Dolan, grimaced as though in pain but said nothing. His father did not blink. They would not look at Zadock as he stumbled from the room amidst the whine of his amplifier. When he was gone, Dolan and his father played on. -On the way to Club 13, Karim ran Annette’s iPod through his car stereo and they cruised through lower Manhattan blasting Justin Timberlake. When the hipsters aimed their scowls at Karim’s Nissan Stanza, he pulled to the curb, rolled down the window and invited them dancing. They scattered in a panic, shooting beams of contempt at the Stanza through their aviator shades. They stopped for malt liquor in cans that looked like batteries. These things had enough caffeine to jumpstart a dead man not to mention get him drunk, the questionable aspect being their taste, which was somewhere between strawberry soda and black licorice. Cans emptied, Karim dropped Gideon at the corner of 13th and Broadway, where they parted ways for the evening. He was early. Or he must have been, because the place was empty. Blue light was the theme inside. “Don’t even look at me” said the glints in the bartendresses’ eyes. Gideon managed to order a Pilsner Urquell without giving offense but got eye contact only when he dropped two bucks in the tip glass. When he turned around, Mark Gardener was standing behind him, all by himself. The former lead singer of Ride was taller than Gideon expected, and he remembered that Andy Bell, that fucking sellout (who Gideon also loved), was six foot seven. Gardener gave Gideon a smile and an affable nod and stepped past him toward the bar.

Gardener was skinny for a guy in his late thirties. His long hair was gone, replaced with the short haircut of a man who had decided to roll with his impending baldness. Gideon felt something akin to crushing on a girl, like what he felt for Annette but somehow nonsexual and amplified at the same time. This guy raised Gideon on sonic sweetness, hazy guitars, and a wistful turn of phrase. But these were words Gideon couldn’t hope to conjure at that moment. What could he say, facing the big brother he never had? Then it hit him. Mark Gardener had no idea who he was, and probably didn’t care. How many asshole lead singers of up-and-coming bands cracked jokes to him? How many drunk indie rockers kissed his ass about the past when he was trying to sell new material? Gardener turned around, beer in hand. A puzzled smile spread across his face, sending Gideon into a memory of clutching Ride’s liner notes and plotting his own rise to rock stardom, his Discman spinning into the wee hours. This man was pictured there, staring stoically off camera against a gray backdrop. Gardener must have been about nineteen at the time. Gideon saw himself as a poser and a thief. Another passage from Bradley’s story popped into his mind. They always left Zadock behind to tend to the time machine as Rolling Moxie gigged in Hamburg and Manchester, and then later in Berlin and London. Father and Dolan criss-crossed Europe. Wherever they went, they left psychedelic riffs from the future ringing in heads and received sexual favors backstage. In the meantime, Zadock tightened the time machine’s screws and oiled the old stereo parts as best he could. He averted one disaster, then another, once by replacing a snapped belt with a rubber band. Another time he duct-taped a crack in the casing. Unfortunately, Zadock’s tinkering exacted an unforeseen toll. For every jump in time or space he had a bad dream. In every dream he tried to forgive himself for the failures that led to his rejections. In his dreams, as in reality, Dolan’s silences cut deepest. “Have we met, mate?” Gardener asked.

Gideon forced himself to stop staring and stuck out his hand. He wasn’t sure why he decided to lie, but in that moment, he loathed himself. “My name is Brad Caldwell. I’m a writer.” Gardener shook Gideon’s hand. “I like the arts,” he said, then nodded toward a nearby television screen, playing Pink Floyd’s The Wall. “You know this one, don’t you?” Gideon hated Pink Floyd. He told Gardener he worked for Pitchfork and wanted to review the latest release of Ride’s BBC recordings. “Maybe we can meet up sometime,” Gideon said. “So I can ask you a few questions?” “Okay,” he says. “Let me give you my number.” Gideon was appalled at the charade he had constructed. Then he saw Annette smiling at him. They hadn’t planned to meet again, but there she was, holding his arm while he programmed Mark Gardener’s number into his phone. Somehow Gideon knew she would set him straight. “I had a feeling you two would meet,” she said, smiling at Mark. “Gideon’s got a pretty good band of his own, you know?” “I thought you said you were a writer,” Gardener said. The crowd was thickening a bit. Gardener nodded toward someone he knew. Gideon thought he was starting to lose interest. “I’m doing so much,” Gideon said, feeling more timid than he had since teenhood. He knew he was blowing whatever it was that was happening, but he couldn’t seem to right himself. “I guess I lose track of myself sometimes.” “Well, nice meeting you, mate.” And then Gardener was off with an easygoing grin. Gideon moved to the bar intent on getting some drinking done. The bartendress was pouring his Jameson on the rocks when Annette reappeared beside him. “What’s the matter with you? That guy is your hero.”

“I know,” Gideon said. He handed Annette her iPod. “I stole this from your apartment this morning.” “Hey,” she said. “Didn’t even miss it. Pitchfork gives those things away like candy.” “We got some pretty good mileage out of your J-Tim album.” She punched Gideon’s arm hard, then looked at her shoes. “Listen. I won’t publish that review, if you don’t want me to.” “Do you really find my lyrics embarrassing?” She didn’t answer but took his hand and led him into the crowd. Gardener was onstage, launching into “Vapour Trail.” It was the first and last time Gideon heard Ride songs performed live by someone other than himself. Gideon dialed Bradley’s number and moved near the stage. He didn’t bother holding the phone to his ear. Brad would be there. Sometime during the song Gideon put the phone to his ear and heard Bradley’s voice singing out of tune with Mark Gardener: “And all my time is yours as much as mine. We never have enough time to show our love.”

BIO: Paul Stenis lives in Los Angeles.

Ned Thimmayya | I Am . . . Not Sure

My eyeliner runs. Around the fleshy arcs of my cheeks. Down the sides of my nose. It’s the car’s air conditioning not working. That’s what makes me sweat. I don’t always pay attention—as I dab my face with napkins—to the road. And people get mad. They honk. For me, everything is so hard . . . while driving to work in the summer. I’m driving across the river. Into the little city which used to be a busy port. The river was a highway . . . back in the nineteenth century. Today it’s just an obstacle— each day—for me to cross. No one wants to live in—though they do live in—that city across the river. I’ve seen them. During my lunch breaks. Some work in a deli behind a house on main street. The deli sells candy, soda, newspapers, and cold-cut sandwiches. I wonder whether the people who work there live in the house. I don’t ask them—I don’t know how to ask them. They might think I’m weird. Then I won’t be able to go there for lunch anymore. The roads in the city have potholes. My coffee jumps. Over the rim. My napkins are already soaked. With sweaty eyeliner. I need four hands. There must be an easier way in life . . . to do something as easy as drive to work. But not in this sad city. I know it’s cheap rent and low taxes. Keeping the company here. But I can’t control that. So I shouldn’t ever care . . . to stay: remain in this sad city during each day of my shortening life. I shouldn’t stay. But I am . . . staying. “Shouldn’t” only exists in my mind. I don’t think I’ll ever . . . see it step out my brain and look me in the eye. My eyeliner runs. And I try to catch it. But I get tangled up . . . in my cell phone charger. And my seat belt. And people keep honking. And my drive becomes more uncomfortable. Because I make things so complicated for myself . . . while driving to work. That’s why I can’t trust the “shouldn’t.” It’s in my head. What’s in my head isn’t good . . . for me. I am . . . not sure . . . of much or anything. There are too many women . . . in my family. I could’ve used a brother since I am woman—or a girl—who does not know much for sure . . . about men.

When I go to the third floor, I have something—“work-related”—to do. Does he count how many times? I pass by. He doesn’t look up. A bad sign. But maybe just because he doesn’t know it’s me who likes . . . walking by. His emails to me are strictly work-related—actually work-related. A bad sign? I’m not sure. That’s why I keep trying by. . . walking past him. My feet don’t pay attention to bad signs. I guess it’s because they’re connected to my body and eventually my head. So my feet can’t be trusted like my head can’t be trusted. I mention things to him—things I’ve discovered he likes—several times each week. “Did you see the race this weekend?” “What race, Joyce?” “The Nascar race.” “No, I was out hunting the whole weekend.” “Did you kill anything?” “No, I was up in a hunter’s platform drinking Wild Turkey the whole time.” “What were you hunting?” “Deer, squirrels, rabbits—anything that moves kind of.” “You ever shoot—by accident —someone’s cat or dog?” “No, why would I do that?” “If you—maybe—looked quick . . . you said you shoot anything that moves.’ ” “I never shoot unless I take a second look.” “Oh.” “Yes, firearms are not to be trifled with.” “. . . Oh . . .” “I have some work to do, Joyce. It’s been nice hearing about your weekend.” “Oh, me too—I have work to do too—nice hearing about your hunting and your Wild Turkey.” All that jumbled dialogue. It all wasn’t so confusing . . . while we were talking. But afterwards, in my head, the questions and answers got all mixed up. “It’s been nice hearing about your weekend”—but I didn’t tell him about my weekend. Did that mean he wanted me to tell him . . . about my weekend? I “should” next time. There is the danger. For me, “should” could be just as bad as “shouldn’t” . . . if I let it break out of my brain and into the open.

At night, I search—sometimes—for where I missed—obliviously—men. I had a father—I always had had a father. The problem is I never thought of my father as a man. He was a presence. Now I see him—him as a man—even less than when I lived with him. Boys then men—I’d met real ones—who would talk to me. They might want something from me—some information about a friend or sister or directions to a gas station—but nothing from me. Just a way to get from Point A to Point B. I am . . . Point C, way over—far, far, over—there. What happens after meeting one of them is

something—a “should”—I slosh around inside my mouth preparing to release, only to— once I realize he’s listening—swallow. They don’t care because no one—especially with decent looks to spare—judges a book and ignores the cover. In bed—if I’m still awake—after thinking about my father and boys—I think of my sisters. Two beautiful sisters. Too beautiful, too. I was too, they said. They said, of course. “Was” and not “are.” The difference between the words is everything. It’s my choice of words. But it’s their long distance phone calls blaring at me from their domestic-bliss homes, harmonizing with obliging husbands’ baritones, praising my “shapely” face, my “healthy” hips, my “pretty teeth,” and my “wonderful soul.” And I can’t trust my memories of them . . . telling me encouraging things anymore. Beauties are always doling out beauty—praises of beauty. “Praises of” is not “Beauty” . . . a word that does not apply to me. Finally, I get to my mother. My sisters match her—grace, voice, charisma. All of which also do not apply to me. She definitely knew . . . that I deserved it too. But it’s not something to be deserved. It’s genes. It’s science. It’s supposed to happen. I can make it happen . . . so I dream . . . while lying awake in bed at night.

Back at work, I have nothing . . . but a plan. There is an action that I am taking— to make it happen. First: I’ll say hello . . . to him—or good morning—or good afternoon. Whatever is appropriate. Of course, I should make up . . . my mind and my face. That is why I wish, I so wish, I were . . . decisive and didn’t sweat so much. Then one day—on a day I look in the mirror and am looking better than my worst —I’ll say: “Take me to drink Wild Turkey in a hunting platform and—if I throw up because I haven’t gotten drunk before—don’t laugh at me. Take me to your room where you hang the sheepskin hat you wear in winter, and the Mets jacket you wear in spring, and the dresser stand where you keep that mint-smelling deodorant and those comfy wool socks I’d like to pull up over my arms. And if you don’t keep it all in your bedroom, show me where you do, and wear something different for me, that you don’t at work, that I don’t get to see . . .” . . . maybe: “What are you doing this weekend?” would be the best thing . . . to say to him . . . when I walk down to the third floor on another “important errand” for the Contracts Department.

His potential words to me are something terrifying. It’s because I don’t know about the future and what he’ll . . . say to me. If he says: “What are you doing this weekend,” I would say, “Nothing”—that is honest. I know—in this situation—honesty is my enemy. It would be different if I had many things—widely accepted and normal—to talk about. But I can’t tell him . . . about everything I want to—my clown fish, my ant farm, my valium, my nightmares . . . the way I would sometimes spend whole days standing by the mailbox—alongside the road—on one hand waiting for a letter and on the other hand waiting for the mailman who was . . . someone to talk to. I can’t tell him about . . . . . . me, looking in the full-length mirror, in the dark. I do it sometimes—look in the mirror—so I can see a human face in my apartment. It’s perfect—just seeing the suggestive curve around the shaded oval of my face—because I know someone is there but I don’t have to see . . . who it is. It’s the closest I get to someone . . . at night, because no one else is ever there. Alone each week . . . end. And. Monday. And. Tuesday. And. Wednesday—I “should” . . . answer all of his questions vaguely and halfway.

I follow the third floor’s gray carpet—it runs on a long ramp—wishing the corridor was longer no matter how much—day in and day out—I hated its grayness. Even the usual things—copiers, waste bins, personal desk effects—are absent in that passageway. The sound of my own footsteps—muffled by the carpet—abandons me. I stare out the rectangular window—that parallels the ramp—looking out onto the sewage plant and the train tracks. I try to tell myself that they are part of the world outside the office until I . . . can’t deny that they’re just defects on the window pane.

“Joyce, wait a sec.” “Hi, what can I do for you?” “First of all, I’d just like to ask you how you’re doing.” “Fiiine…what about you?” “Good. Going to the demolition derby this weekend. This guy I know is running a car.” “You’re…going to the demolition derby.” “Yeah. You got something to say about it?” “No—it sounds fun.” “What are you doing?” “This weekend?” “Yeah.” “I’m going to go . . . scuba diving.” “Scuba diving?” “Yeah.” “I didn’t know you were into that.” “Me either—I didn’t know you were into demolition derbies either.” “So anyway.” “So . . . anyway.” “Can you do me a favor?”

“Sure.” “I told Milstead that I would mail out a screening form today and I forgot to fill it out. Mail already went out for the day. Do you think you could run it to the post office for me.” “Run it . . . to the post office. Sure. Yes. I can definitely . . . do that.” “Thank you. Here it is. I don’t have any stamps, but here’s a dollar.” “Thanks. You don’t need to give me . . . a dollar.” “Cool. Have it your way.” “I will. Thanks!” I was very . . . useful to him. I was able to save him by committing . . . the end of my workday to making a post office run. It worked out—me delivering that screening form to the post office—because I was then able to make him happy . . . that evening . . . and maybe through the night.

BIO: Ned is a lawyer who lives in Brooklyn, NY. His fiction and academic articles can be found in Slice Magazine, Lacuna, the Foundling Review, Up the Beanstalk, and the Brooklyn Journal of International Law. He grew up in Kinderhook, NY.

Crazy Al, where are you buried? | Jake St. John I wonder to myself on this bright afternoon where do they bury the bums that everyone knows by first names Crazy Al, everyone greets him with a smile and a “how ya doin pal” no one asked questions when he disappeared just the kids that could see him on the streets through car windows on their way to Sunday school they just kept on moving assuming he went someplace else and finally decided to leave town is there an invisible cemetery for all the invisible people all over the world to be buried in do they have funerals right in front of our eyes down by the railroad tracks asking each other for cigarettes and wine at the reception bury me in an invisible cemetery with all the faces we don’t see and all the stories we never heard

BIO: Jake lives and writes out of New London, CT and is currently the co-editor of Flying Fish, as well as the editor of Elephant.

37 Â

J. A. Bernstein | The Consultant She entered my office on Wilshire and 12th with a spark in her eye. I was reading Chandler, of course. It hadn't been raining, but October was threatening to pour. It was a cool windless Friday. I took her coat. “I need to get my son into Stanford,” she said. We had talked a few times on the phone. She said she would pay cash—cash only. I had accepted. Her son was seventeen. She wouldn't say where he was enrolled. Outside, the evening streetlamps cast hazy red halos, which were mirrored in her Jackie-O shades. “Have a seat.” I offered her a Camel and light. She said she had yoga in the morning and that I shouldn't smoke. “What are his SAT scores?” “1480.” “Well, that's wonderful,” I said. “On three sections.” I brought her some coffee. She drank. “You're not from around here, are you?” “Chicago.” “How long have you done this kind of work?” “Kaplan fired me in May.” “I see. And what assurances do I have that you know what you're doing?” I pulled out a knife, a serrated steel Gerber, army-issue, '98, and sliced off a chunk of the apple I'd been eating. “You don't.”

“Mrs. Olsen said you were the best.” “She should know.” “Then I'll give you a deposit tonight.” With that, she slunk over to my desk, extended her leg—she was wearing a black, satin two-piece, all velvet lace—and flashed her garter belt. As she bent down, her pantyhose ripped. “Oops.” She reached below her hemline—somewhere quite private—and pulled out a smirking Ben Franklin. “There's more on the way.” Then she pranced off into the night. “Mrs. Deakins,” I hollered. She didn't hear. I realized she'd left a manila folder on the table, which was sealed with a lipstick kiss. I held up the file, smelling it gingerly. Cocaine, a scent I knew well. Inside, there were photos of her husband—or what looked like her husband, clutching her and some African prince at a ball. Then, the regular files for her son: test scores, AP slips, transcripts, a list of uneventful activities (soccer team captain, apparently, although the school name was unclear on both that and the transcripts), and finally, a near-naked shot of herself. She was wearing a plunge-cut robe, a tasseled black mortarboard, and clutched a diploma in all the wrong places. The diploma said Stanford, though that wasn't what caught my eye. I noticed she was standing in broad daylight upon USC's lawn. It must have been a Sunday, because there was no one else around, but I recognized the steps of Doheny. I spit out the apple and sighed.

The following Monday, I arrived three hours late for work. I'd like to blame it on traffic on the 405, but in truth, some late-paying client, a perky little senior from Brentwood High, had kept me out late. We had met for drinks along Sunset, and next thing I knew, she was giving me a lift in her Prius at dawn.

“Siri,” I said, closing my blinds, “make me some coffee.” My iPhone didn't respond. Restarting it, I saw that my inbox was bursting. It was time to hire a human assistant, though I could barely make rent. For the next thirty minutes, I fended off calls from France and Beijing—most of my clients were international—and tried not to open my drawer, where the Maker's Mark gleamed. Suddenly, around noon, the dull linoleum squeaked, and a sputtering array of sunlight ignited my cave. A person came in. This never happened on Wilshire, at least not without intent. “My name is Sam,” the kid said. “Sam Deakins.” He was wearing a Burberry's trench coat and a black wool fedora banded with a shiny white stripe. “Ah, your mother was in here last week.” “She's not my mother.” “Who is she?” “My lover. And if you don't mind, I'd prefer to stand.” This required bourbon. “Please have a seat.” I reached down for a swig, and as I did, I noticed he was holding a revolver. “Whoa there.” He raised it at me, pointed, and fired. A window exploded behind me. I thought I was dead. “Sorry,” he said. “Nervous tick.” He put the gun back in his trench coat, which was about six sizes too large for his frame. “Jesus Christ, what the fuck was that?” I said. I leaned towards my desk drawer, where I kept a piece, but decided against it. “I'm sorry.” He slowly sat down. “I carry one for school now.” “Where do you go?” “Mulholland Academy?” “What's that?”

“It's a school for actors,” he said. “So that's where the money—” “No. We're not actors. I just like it because it's close.” “Very well, then.” I was sure the cops were being called as we spoke. Outside, a few people sprinted, hunched over, along Wilshire. “How long have you been living in Los Angeles?” he continued. “Just a couple years.” “I see. It's good that you're new here.” “Why's that?” “Because you're new to assholes like me. Me and my mother.” “She's your mother or your lover?” “Both.” He smiled. “Anyways, we'll pay you in cash, as we said.” A far siren wailed. “Another thing,” he said, rising. “Don't tell anyone I was here. If you do, well, let's just say the application will expire.” He stalked to the door, trench coat lifting behind him, a trail of smoke wisping up from his sleeve. I leaned back in my swivel chair, palmed the birch desk, which I'd hastily bought at IKEA, and wished I had purchased steel. This is better than law school, I thought. I reached down and took a long drink.

Sergeant Crowley and I were old pals—to the extent one can be pals with a cop. “Tom,” he said, eying my desk, upon which the apple core rotted. “We got complaints from the pet store next door. They swore they heard a shot, and it looks like your window is gone.” Glass lay spread along the floor, soaking up the rays of my indifference. I offered him a smoke.

“Shit, man, I wanna help you out. That's why I came down here instead of the Lieut, but Jesus, you know we can't have you firing off guns. Unauthorized discharge— Charlie, what's the time off for that?” He turned to his partner, a scrawny-looking rodent who was shrewishly inspecting the wreckage. “Six to eight months.” “You wanna send me?” I offered my ex-platoonmate a glass. “Look, man, I know shit is rough. But we got counseling. The VA is fine. Don't be doing nothing stupid.” I shook the glass. “Tom, don't make me come back here with an MP. You know what they do in the brigs.” “Nothing Sunset hasn't done to me already, Crow.” The ice glimmered gold. “Just keep your hands clean this month. I'm up for promotion, finally.” Then he leaned into me. “And I'll be frank with you, T, army pay isn't the best.” “I see they have you working really hard down on Ocean. What is that, half an hour on, twelve off?” “At least I make an honest living.” He eyed my diplomas on the wall. The bulk of them were real. Beside him, the rodent was sifting through glass without any gloves on, which I took as a promising sign. “What the fuck did you fire?” the rat asked me. “Who's this?” “This is Charley. 81st Airborne. He's cool.” Charley didn't look like he'd served a damn day in his life. He was holding up a broken piece of glass, which was burnt around the edges. “Looks like a Nitro Express.” I nodded. “I didn't know there were elephants roaming on Wilshire.”

“Cougars,” I said, with a grin.

That night, I worked arduously on the kid's essays, which wasn't easy, given that I barely knew his name. In my line of work—college counseling, that is—the less you know, the better. But basic things are required to get in: turning points, setbacks, achievements, personal obstacles, the like. I was pretty sure he was white, given the complexion of his mother/lover, but that's pretty much all I could deduce. “What do you think, Siri? Is he a psychopath?” “I really can't say.” “Sir, hon, since it's just you and me here, what do you say we have a little fun?” “I don't know what you mean,” she said coolly.

Around eight pm, the phone rang. I normally took calls on Skype, which meant it was either the police pursuing an investigation or Sam Deakins announcing that I would be killed. It was neither, it turned out. It was Sam Deakins' personal attorney. Rico was his name. And he told me to meet them downtown at the Westin at 12. “Come in a suit and unarmed.” I took the bus there, of course. I figure it's part of my civic duty in Los Angeles to ride public transit. Besides, the Prius girl wasn't around. The strange thing about riding the bus in Los Angeles at midnight is how few people notice you, even when you're donning a suit. The subways of Chicago and New York are veritable orgies of staring, all swimming with licentious glares. In Los Angeles, folks are afraid of getting shot, which is just as well, because I came, despite orders, well-armed. “Honey,” she said—the large black woman next to me—“You got something pokin outta yo cage.”

I slowly adjusted my pants. “Surgery.” “Uh-huh.” I got off at Fig. The tall lobby lights gleamed through the sheen of puffed rain— what the cynics call smog and I deem a perpetual fount. My shirt collar snagged, and I adjusted my black linen tie. The suit was $12, and it didn't quite cushion my Colt. “Welcome,” said a sleek young man emerging from the lobby's cool air. He greeted me on 4th and hustled me through the revolving glass door. I imagined grim scenes from The Godfather, but he was eighty-five pounds, Latino, and wearing a charcoal wool two-piece with notched lapels, side flaps, and quarter top pockets in the trousers. It wasn't $12. “You must be Tom.” “And I'm guessing you're the attorney.” “I wish.” Some conventioneers leaned on a fountain-rail. Little kids played. A rubber fan palm glistened in the fake tropic light. “I'm his personal assistant.” “And where's Mr. Deakins?” “Who?” I surveyed the gallery, and I had the grim feeling that I was being watched by someone besides this fag. “Oh, you mean Sam. We just call him Mr. Deakins for fun.” “I see.” “He'll be arriving later on.” “And where's the attorney?” Suddenly, I felt a jab in my spine. I turned around. An umbrella was poking me. “You'll probably want this,” a man said. He was an enormous black bald man without any lips. For a second, I froze. “This is Rico,” said the queer. “Our J.D.” I had thought he'd sounded strange on the phone. But in Los Angeles, one never asks.

They drove me to a joint in Santa Monica. At least, I thought it was Santa Monica, judging by the cool ocean air. I sat blindfolded in back, a canvas hood bagging my face, inhaling the new aniline trim. Imported. Japanese. A SUV Lexus, I figured. They found the Colt, of course. It replaced the umbrella digging into my back. “Stop here,” said Rico. Somebody coughed. I felt a window lower some more, and a woman's voice said, “I told him there was more on the way.” They took off my hood, and I barfed. Fortunately, I hadn't soiled the SUV's tan interior—it turned out it was an Acura, which would have been my next guess—but I had seriously dirtied my suit. “Get that piece of shit off him,” said Mrs. Deakins. We were standing outside of a club, and she was wearing a black satin number. I could see her eyes clearly now. They were dim green, approximately the color of algae, and which is where I figured I would eventually end up. Distant waves crashed along a shoreline. Beside us, ficus roots mangled the sidewalk, and hazy lights bloomed like angels that just didn't care. “Rico, get this boy a tux.” I changed in the SUV at gunpoint, struggling to fasten my cuffs. It was a Lanvin double-breasted two-piece with contrasting insets, welted front pockets and peaked lapels. The shirt was mauve and slim-fitting. Then she handed me a pair of flat-topped smoke-lensed shades. “You know what would look great with this get-up?” I asked. She was still holding my gun. The four of us passed through an alley and descended a staircase into what looked like a Victorian bordello. The rose walls were wainscoted and buckling. A crimson carpet lined the stone steps, which resounded with a thundering bass. Entering a parlor, I almost got stabbed by a moose, which was mounted on a wall beneath a frilly chandelier. House music was pumping, and a couple older blacks lingered by a bar. One nursed a tumbler with a fat slice of orange and an oily pink froth.

Some candlesticks gleamed at his side. The other was twisting the clamp on a snaredrum. “This ma boy?” he exclaimed. “No,” said Mrs. Deakins. “He's my boy tonight, but you're sweet.” Soon the house music died, and the drinking man picked up a trumpet. A bassman joined him, unloading his case, and they cranked out a “Night in Tunisia.” “Have a seat,” she said. Her lover/son was nowhere to be seen, though Rico joined us on some baronial, brown leather chairs. Then the queer Mexican brought me a queer-tasting scotch. “So what did you do in the army?” she asked me. “Kill.” That was only partially true. I had edited Stars and Stripes, which is where I found my knack for penning bullshit. “Good to hear. So here's the deal,” she continued. I noticed that she too was not entirely white, despite the green shade of her eyes and her seemingly straight copper hair. “Have you ever heard of Estonia?” “Yes.” “You ever been there?” “Can't say I have.” “That's good. That's very good.” She looked at Rico and winked. “Because that's where we're going tonight.” “Wait a minute,” I said, choking on the liquor, which I realized had been laced. Then Rico reached over and tapped my leg. “Looks like Rambo here doesn't like to fly.”

I woke in a box, or what I determined to be a box, but was actually the seat of a cockpit. It was stunningly cold; the plane was twin-engine and loud. The pilot was adjusting some gears. As I came to, strapped to a chair, I noticed Mrs. Deakins strutting up the aisle. She entered the cockpit with drinks in each hand. “No more for you,” she

explained to me. The pilot, whom I recognized from the photographs, took a long gulp and surveyed the glittering night. A far orange curve marked the dawn of the horizon. “You'll be starting work soon,” she said. I coughed. “You're not married, are you?” “Not this week.” “That helps.” She gave me a kiss on the cheek. Then it occurred to me suddenly that she might not have been a she. Her lower neck awkwardly bulged, and her shoulders were way too pronounced. “My son will be waiting at home. But before we arrive, maybe you'd like to have fun.” She winked at the pilot, then me. “I don't know what you mean.”

She was a man all right. Fortunately, I didn't have to partake. She and the pilot started up at 40,000 feet, judging by the lines on the dial. When she was finished, she offered me tea. “No smoking in the cockpit,” she sighed. My hands were still bound to the chair, and the dawn had broadened to gold. Suddenly, Rico stormed into the cockpit, slapped the tranny in the face, and said, “We don't have time for this shit.” Then he turned to the pilot. “What's our ETA?” “Couple hours.” “Keep your joystick in gear till we land. As for you, Mr. Writer.” He undid my bind, and I noticed a holster slinking out of his tux. “I understand you're not too bad at writing sentences.” “I can hold my own.” “Well, your reputation precedes you. You got the Schwarzenegger kid in, a couple of Kennedies, Puff Daddy's son, and the Bush girls.” “The last was a personal favor.”

“Well, today you've got an even bigger assignment. Mr. Deakins will explain when we arrive. You might want to rest up a bit. His application's due before noon.” I glanced up sullenly. “You don't work well under pressure?” “Not without a gun in my hands.” “Don't worry,” he said. “We're not gonna hurt you. Assuming our Precious gets in.” Several things struck me as unusual about the night—aside from the queer tranny love, the spiking with sedatives, the unexplained flight, and the guns. For one, this was mid-October, and the early deadline wasn't till November 1st. That was standard at every college, even for athletes and others with questionable ins. Second, who were these people, and why had they called on my services? A new library at Stanford obviously would have done the job. Applications for those types are nominal. Sure, the price tag's gone up, but when you're flying a Gulfstream G550 and have a few tuxedos to spare, an endowed chair isn't hard to afford. And what was with the accents? Russian? Nigerian? Greek? Across from me, Rico was leaning on the console, peering at the dials, clutching the tranny with one arm around her waist, oblivious, or perhaps disregarding, of the hostile look she wore. “ECAM status checked. Standby altimeter,” said the pilot, sipping his scotch. I was soon re-hooded, which was just as well, because I could avoid the sexual theatrics as we landed and then drove along a steep-graded road. I found myself nauseous, and they let me throw up in a bin. Eventually, we arrived at a tall lakeside manor. It was a granite-block Romanesque with more gables and peaks than I could count. The sky was cerulean, if that's what folks call it, and the air a sharp shock to my lungs.

Soon, a trench-coat arrived on a scooter, grinding up the flagstone path. “Well, my good friend, I didn't expect to see you so soon. Did you enjoy the friendly skies?” “Not as much as your mom.” She came rollicking out of the Citroen we'd driven in and gave her young companion a hug. Lipless and the Mexican followed her. The pilot had remained with the plane. “She's my sister,” the kid said and gave her a wet, smearing kiss. Then he smiled at me. “Come. I'll show you upstairs to your room.” He glanced at the lawyer, who gave an approving nod.

My room consisted of inlaid birch floors, gilded winged chairs, and French windows curtained with muslin and lace. Towards the end stood a four-poster bed, a varnished teak desk, and, rather crudely, a Mac. “I believe you've started my application,” said the boy, who was still mounted on his scooter. In fact, he'd expertly ridden it up the steps. “How did you know?” “I hacked into your I-Cloud.” “That's nice.” “Anyways, I like what you did with the first question, my most moving experience, though you never mentioned Robert Mugabe.” “I don't think that would sit well with Stanford.” “Why not?” “It isn't LSE,” I said. “They have principles.” “Very well. As Rico explained, you have three or four hours to finish. Until it's noon in Palo Alto.” “Why so soon?”

“Because I'm hungry.” He laughed. His cohort was trailing up the staircase behind him, pinching their noses at the fumes. “No, actually, I'm gonna need you for a couple more things. We've got some investments to deal with. You know, mid-season reports.”

It turned out Stanford was the least of my ordeals. His family held shares in foreign oil, specifically in Equatorial Guinea, which was on the outs with NATO this month. The ruling general was ailing, and his son, whom no one much liked, was threatening to depose him. Earnings were down, as was investor confidence. “So we need you to rewrite the report. How can we put this...throw a positive spin on the fund.” “Shouldn't be too hard,” I explained. I had done a bit of copy in my day, mostly for temp firms when I was starting out. I didn't know shit about finance, but marketing was always Q&A: Is my investment safe? Should I be concerned about national stability? What if the market share drops? Couldn't have been easier. I finished the reports before ten. Probably would have gone faster had Rico not been pointing his Parkerized Sig at my face. “Okay,” I said. “I'm done.” Their whole cohort slumped on the sofa, while the Mexican poured out chablis. “Are we finished with him?” the kid asked. Rico was changing the magazine. “No, not quite yet.” I knew that was my moment to flee. “Hold on,” Rico said. “We've finished the reports, but if Precious here doesn't get in, we need a backup.” “Can I ask—” I said, rising from the desk. “Sit down,” Rico hollered. I did. “Why Stanford?” I continued.

“Didn't you just answer that question?” “No, I mean, seriously. Why Stanford?” Rico just grimaced, like some strange mouthless fish. “Because that's where the general's son is studying,” said the kid. “Who?” “The incoming Chairman of the Board.” “I see.” “And you want to be his classmate?” “Not exactly,” said the kid. He was checking the discs on his scooter, having worn them out on the stairs. “I'm planning to do him in. And we'll be holding you here till he's gone. Just in case you plan to talk.” At that point, Rico walked over, raised the Sig, and shot the kid in the eye. “Jesus Fucking Christ,” said the tranny. The kid fell over his scooter. His brains had splattered the curtains. Rico re-holstered his Sig. “I always hated that bike.” “My son,” screamed the tranny. “Shut the fuck up.” Rico picked up the brass casing and dropped it inside his tux, beside a red handkerchief that suitably matched the drapes. “To answer your question,” Rico turned to me. “We're gonna short the stock. I'll do the Chairman myself.” “So why the fuck did we invest in the application?” said the tranny. “You can withdraw it,” Rico said to me, approaching the computer. “That was just a test of your skills. But I must say, I like what you did with the reports.” He held out his phone and checked the stock's quote. The reports had been sent out about twenty minutes back, and already the share-price had tripled. “You'll make me very rich.” Then he turned to the tranny. “Get your spic boyfriend down to the basement and make sure the cell is prepared.”

“You,” he said, turning to face me. Then his mouth must have borne an even stranger expression as he noticed the back of my chair. I flashed through the hall.

Unlike the shacks of Mosul, the one thing you notice about running through a medieval manor is that shots have a tendency to echo, which is extremely disorienting. I ducked into a bedroom and locked the tall doors. A blast shattered one of them. Across from me, the massive French windows stood open, and I flung myself through them. I landed two stories down on a myrtle hedge, which padded my fall, and came out rolling down a hill. I skidded to a stop beside a poplar. An explosion shattered its limbs. I cut left, and dove headlong into the lake, which was freezing. The shock nearly killed me. I swam. The small lake was reedy and bedded with moss. As I tussled through it, a gunshot punctured my leg. I sucked in my breath and dove down. I glided until I couldn't see and my lungs were imploding. I came up for air beside a tussock of sedges, quietly wading, trying not to exhale. I heard splashing far behind me. I couldn't see where. The sky had since darkened a shade. I made a break for the shore. For the next twenty minutes I ran, huffing, bleeding, unable to lift my left leg, which was gashed below the calf, somehow forcing myself to gallop past the larches and pines. I heard barking far behind. I knew my only chance was to reach the canal, which I had vaguely descried along my right. I couldn't swim. I had to. I dove. When I reached the mouth, about a thousand meters down, of some larger lake, I climbed out on a neighboring property—what might have been peasants'. Did they still have peasants in Estonia?—then a low maple woodland. I was shivering cold, unable to breathe. It was dark. I was steaming and drenched. I located a blanket amazingly inside someone's boathouse, which is where I crouched and spent the night. My night would have ended there certainly had it not been for one last trick up my sleeve. The boathouse, which was sided with logs and half-toppled onto the rock-shore, was wired for a phone. The sole phone was turned off, of course, as the boathouse had been abandoned for years. I located the pole outside—it was the middle of the night when I did this, and hypothermia was slicing my veins—climbed it, and found the distribution box. Fortunately, it was one of those old residence terminals with a network

box behind the lid. I yanked out the phone, unsheathed its wiring, connected the terminal cables, replaced the resistor, opened the hookswitch, and, what do you know, a small, pink LED gleamed. It felt like the warmth of the sun. It took me half-an-hour to work down the static, and in that time, my hands nearly froze. Finally, I got a dial tone, plugged in the jack, and dialed. “Hello, Siri.” “How can I help you, Tom?” Thinking twice before leaving, I had left her plugged in and allowed her to answer my calls. “Siri, I'm in serious shit.” “I'm sorry, I don't understand the question.” “That's okay. Here's what I need you to do.” “I'm listening.” “I need you to open my Gmail, find my iCloud storage account, and back it up on your hard disk.” She didn't understand, and I had to repeat a few times, guiding her through the process. “Okay, now find 'My Application' for Stanford (off-line).” She found it. “Double-click. It should have a list of files to upload. One of those is a video.” It was a feed I had secretly recorded on the Mac, knowing what they would do. “Okay, I want you to make a copy, save it to the disk, and email it to John Crowley at LAPD. He's in the contacts.” “At your service,” Siri said. “That's my sweet girl.” “Hold it right there,” a voice shouted. Standing below the pole was a soaking wet tranny pointing a Sig. “There's no need to do that,” she said. “Jack's dead.” “Who?”

“Jack Rico, my attorney. He's gone. He's frozen in the lake with the fag. And I don't want to be connected. Get down from that pole.” She spoke in a voice that was undeniably manly. “If you shoot me, I'll have Siri click send.” “How will you talk when you're dead?” “She knows my voice, and I'm the only one who can cancel. She's uploading now.” “Give me that phone,” she said. “You'll have to come up here and get it.” She started climbing the pole, one latch at a time, each awkwardly snagging her party dress. Yet she had gorilla-like arms. One of them reached up and seized me, throwing me down from the pole. I landed on the icy embankment, shattering my thigh, which was already swollen and roughly the width of her wrist. “Siri, cancel that request,” she said into the phone. Then she screamed the same thing. I ran as fast as I could. I heard a gunshot ring out behind me; I darted past a lawn. Then I jumped into a thick clump of hawthorn, hiding and clutching my knees. It took several hours before the police lights flickered, far beyond the leaves, past the lake. They were gradually approaching. I realized—as I had expected—that Siri had tracked the location, and Old Crow could extract the call. As the police lights broke out across the lake, glimmering brightly on glass, and I huddled shivering, I saw what looked like a grizzly bear starting through the reeds, splashing in a dark, mangled dress. She didn't get far in that outfit, and I was relayed safely home.

After recovering for a week at St. Joseph's, I returned home to Siri, gave her a hug, and found the application to Stanford denied. Too bad. They never knew what they were missing.

Outside, I locked up my office and found a Prius waiting by the curb. “Where you been, Mr.?” “It's the high season, baby. Consulting fees have gone up.” “Well, let's see what we can do about that.” Beside her, her little sister looked up from the driver's seat. “It's never too early to start.

BIO: J.A. is a Ph.D. candidate in the creative writing and literature program at the University of Southern California.

Stacie Burroughs | Palindromes

The heels of my bare feet had been resting on the sundrenched dashboard for 44 miles. The silence in the car, blurred at the edges only by the noise of the wind rushing by, had lasted for at least seventy miles. “What are you thinking about?” Annie asked me, more out of an effort to stay awake than out of any genuine interest. “Oh … nothing,” I replied in one long, quiet exhalation. “Come on. You have to be thinking of something. Your mind can’t be a complete blank,” Annie snapped back. Her overly combative response seemed to be the result of equal parts boredom, exhaustion, and caffeine-fueled hostility. “Fine,” I acquiesced, “I was thinking about palindromes.” A beat. Annie continued to stare at the seemingly endless and perfectly straight highway that kept expanding in front of us. No change of expression until, slowly, her forehead began to crinkle and her upper lip curled up. “Huh?” she asked, only semiinterested. “You know, words that are spelled the same forwards as backwards … I was trying to list as many as I could,” I admitted, realizing the lameness of my mental life and cursing myself for having not been thinking about something more monumental … my schoolwork, where I will live when my lease is up, what I will do with my life. Amid silent self-flagellation, I, having lost all control of how insane I allowed myself to sound, continued rambling. “I only came up with two good ones … racecar and Hannah. The only other ones I could think of were pathetic three-letter ones: mom, dad, pop, wow. God, it’s annoying that I can’t think of any better ones.” Another beat. More crinkles and lip curls from Annie and then, “How in the hell did you get started thinking about palandrones?”

“Not ‘palandrones,’ palindromes,” I corrected and then regretted instantly. “Whatever,” was her weary response. I could tell from the look of the right side of her face that she desperately wished she had invited someone else on this road trip with her. Anyone else. I hesitated, wishing I could just change the subject. Or, better yet, go back in time and come up with something better to think about in the stilled silence. But, I knew, it was too late to just drop it. “Well, today is the 2nd of November, 2011, right? So that’s 11/02/2011. Today is a palindrome,” I whispered with downcast eyes. I could just feel Annie’s brain working, trying to figure out how it is possible that we are related, how such two completely different brains could share the same parent-brains. “I’m starting to think you must be adopted,” she snipped, shutting down further discussion of palindromes for the rest of trip, the rest of all time if it was up to her. My pouting, petulant lips contorted as I tried to craft a biting, caustic, brilliant retort. But, of course, my mind went blank and “Shut up” was all I could come up with. And she did. And I did. We both retreated into our own silences, sealing off our lips and ears. Almost instantly transformed from adults into petulant children. We continued like this for another 25 miles or so until, finally, I extended an olive branch. “I can take over driving whenever you want,” I muttered without shifting my gaze away from my dirt-speckled window. “Thanks,” she replied with an equivalent amount of appeased distance, “I’m good for a bit longer though.” More silence. Nothing to say. We hadn’t seen each other in months and only 105 miles into our 224-mile journey and we had already exhausted our stores of polite, innocuous dialogue. Each mile-marker that passed only served to remind me of all the things that have, must, and, probably will go, unsaid between us. New Jersey Turnpike, Mile Marker 5 N – why she hadn’t been down to DC to visit me lately. New Jersey Turnpike, Mile Marker 6 N – why she hadn’t returned my calls in the last few months. New Jersey Turnpike, Mile Marker 7 N – why she invited me on this road-trip out of the blue. New Jersey Turnpike, Mile Marker 8 N – why I wasn’t brave enough to ask all of

these questions, the questions that should be asked. New Jersey Turnpike, Mile Marker 9N… “Liz,” she said barely moving her lips, like a ventriloquist. “Yeah?” “I’m getting married,” she said quietly. Although the corners of her mouth were slightly up-turned forming the foundations of a radiant smile, the space between her eyebrows was slightly knitted, unsure of how I would react. I, on the other hand, could muster neither a brow-furrow nor a ghost of a smile. The mile-markers continued to pass by, though at a faster speed now—when had she started to drive faster? My thoughts, like the road ahead, continued to roll out in front of me but they passed so quickly that I could not hold any one thought at any one time. A coherent, situation-appropriate response to Annie’s revelation was as impossible to approach as the eternally fleeing horizon. “Liz, for God’s sake say something. I’m getting married. You must have something to say.” Another beat. “God, Annie,” I whispered in a strained response, “I just don’t have any idea what to say. I didn’t even know you were dating anyone. I don’t talk to you for months and now … now you’re getting married? To a stranger.” “He’s not a stranger,” Annie said in defense of her fiancé’s ghost. “Well, I know that it’s strange that I’m marrying someone you’ve never met. But come on, Liz, grow up. You’ll get to know him! Can’t you just be happy for me and not overthink everything like you always do!” “Sooorrrrry,” I retorted with more than a hint of sarcasm, “Sorry that I am not automatically uber happy for you and … and … God, Annie! I don’t even know his name!” “Oh, right. It’s Atom.” “Excuse me?”

“Yeah, you know, like as in molecules and protons and stuff. It was Adam but he changed it to Atom a few years ago,” Annie explained with a full-on glowing smile. I turned my head back toward the window and mouthed an “Oh, God.” Luckily, Annie didn’t seem to notice. She continued her monologue. “We’ve been dating since July. Three months now. You know my lease was up in September? Well, I’ve been living at his place since then.” “Ah,” I said along with a subtle head nod. I had to employ all of my self-restraint in order to keep my facial expressions still and my comments to myself, to keep my skepticism in check. “So that explains why you’ve been a little M.I.A. lately.” Unaware of my utterance and, from all appearances, no longer even registering my continued presence in the car, Annie went on with her effusion of girly gushes. “For my birthday he wrote me a song. And then,” she paused, basking in the private glory of her remembered tale, “on Halloween we were watching my favorite scary movies,” another glory-basking pause, “and before we started watching ‘Friday the 13th’ he suggested that we go outside and have a cigarette. I got up to get my coat and put my house shoes on…” Here, Annie turned her face toward mine and briefly scanned my profile and posture. Trying to detect some level of enthusiasm for her tale but finding none, Annie paused for a split second, let out a semi-weary sigh, and continued her story, at a slightly quicker pace and with a decidedly narrower smile. “And, anyway, some music starts to play and I turn around to face the back porch and lined up on the wall are six pumpkins spelling out ‘Will you marry me?’ and in the last pumpkin was the ring surrounded by candles.” A beat. Silence. Silence punctuated by the swish of passing mile-markers. “Huh,” I finally uttered, “well, where’s the ring now? Why aren’t you wearing it now?” I saw Annie’s annoyed glare flash from the corner of her eye. “Well, I knew that you were going to have a problem with this. So, I thought that telling you the story first would help to soften the shock of it all.”

“I don’t have a problem with this,” I said in a huff of self-defense. “Oh, please, Liz. I know you,” Annie hissed, unable to hold back her frustration anymore. The harsh words now flowed from her in rapid succession. “You are always thinking. Never trusting anyone, always looking for ulterior motives. Always so cynical.” “Hey!” I let out in a burst of reciprocal anger. Kicking my feet down from their dashboard perch and jerking my body to the left to face Annie, I rapidly searched my mind for some sort of linguistic shield. “Hey. Just because I don’t go off and get married on a whim to some random guy doesn’t make me cynical.” “He is not a random guy! You just don’t understand because you could never let yourself feel so much about another person!” With each impassioned outburst, Annie’s fists gripped the steering wheel tighter and tighter, her knuckles becoming a ghostly white. “Your brain is too full of palindromes and shit like that to have enough space for other people! You’re always overanalyzing, never trusting,” she said, her voice in a rapid decrescendo. And then, in a deadly whisper, “you’ll probably end up alone.” My head jerked back from the unsettling shock of her response. My eyes closed under their own power, blocking out the sun that had suddenly seemed unnaturally bright and preventing the stage-one tears from forming. I felt a sharp pain nowhere in particular. I simply ached all over. I could feel myself shutting down. Could no longer even stir up enough energy to argue, to get angry, to defend myself. I focused my gaze once again on the passing of the mile-markers. A deafening silence once again consumed the car. New Jersey Turnpike, Mile Marker 29 N … sagas … New Jersey Turnpike, Mile Marker 30 N … reviver … New Jersey Turnpike, Mile Marker 31 N … redivider … New Jersey Turnpike, Mile Marker 32 N … aha …

BIO: Stacie holds an MA in Literature from The City College of New York and works as an advertising associate in Washington, DC.

The Dream of Eternal Return | Christine Hamm

The downstairs tenants have started a garden in the backyard. They dragged away the blown bags, the children’s t-shirts, the half-sunk pitchforks, the sagging metal drums, the men’s chewed boots. When I lean out and call to them, they don’t understand – point at their mouths. I’ve always thought of the soul as green glass – pale, small, breakable, too distant to touch. The weeds have been stripped, the earth dark, moistened; faint green marks unfold in curls. Now, a dogwood tree arches and moans in the middle of everything. Sparrows cluster like savages, chatting and shrieking, pulling at anything tender. I see it dying at the edges, leaf corners brown. At dusk, fireflies rub themselves against the night. Sometimes a woman sits on her knees in the dirt, touching something with her gloves, trembling.

BIO: Christine is a Ph.D. candidate in English Literature and was a runner-up to the Poet Laureate of Queens, NY.

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