Graphite - Volume 1

About Us: GRAPHITE

COVER PHOTO

BODDAH

Toni Greo

What can be seen looking through the peephole?

The milkiness of the floor tiles is not what i seek.

I seek the vermilion protruding from my own bare walls Deep, deep down inside. Cover up your looking glass.

I’d rather not have you see me of an unsound mind.

Can you see the tub?

It fills with water—just as your eyes do Can you see my interior?

I apologize for the clutter. No one has been in here for quite a while.

The water is an alien color as it clashes the wall

Like the sea does to a ship

‘Look out’ you may yell, But i might have heard that before.

Let us get in this tub together

Youll see all of me. And you will become part of me. The walls crack and mold from the water We are what you see through the peephole. Vulnerable, naked, filthy.

Are you regretful?

Do you feel how ive always felt?

I apologize, this was only for viewing—but you are becoming. Drown yourself in me, for it is all you can do now.

I should not have allowed you to look at me. Now i hate to love looking at you. Youre nothing but me.

Bella Knowles 12

This cracked vase form of mine lies shattered ‘pon the floor. Strewn about the garden weeds, porcelain chipped, paint dulled. It was smashed a while back when someone knocked it in the grass, and the sun’s been yellowing the paint ever since.

One day, not too long ago, someone walked into the overgrown brush and bent down, looking over the broken pottery,

and piece by piece, she picked me up gathering everything gently in her palms, placing all I am, have been, will ever be ever-so-gently on a dusty dining room table.

“I cannot make you perfect,” she said, assembling each piece back to where it should have been,

“But there is no use in being broken. I cannot make you perfect, But I can make you better.”

So she pulled out a soldering iron, touched it to ceramic fragments, and made something new- shiny and better. The vase was put back together, cracked veins of gold, gold holding me together. You could tell I had been cracked, but you could tell I was healed, Imperfectly beautifully renewed.

Bella Knowles 12

Kintsugi Nobody Mirror

It feels as if every month I am relearning that I am loved, redefining love over and over again until my definition turns abstract and I am just left to understand, sitting in a teenager’s beat-up car going 60 on a 30 and blasting music, three windows rolled down, screaming the words; (complete with voice cracks) this is love, unconditional and raw. I love you.

Bella Knowles 12

She asked me who I was. Thad to look her in the eyes and act like I hadn’t loved her for years, mourned over her, looked at myself in the mirror and saw her, saw her under me, heard her say she loved me saw her die in my arms over and over again. She asked me who I was

Jazmin Simpson

NONVERSATION

Iveigh Bock 10

When there are no words ready to sail, When they’ll try to escape your lips to no avail. When desperate to let out a syllable, but fail. Nonversation.

The perfect word to describe the feeling of fear That steals your words when the time to speak is near. Your words, they’ll never hear. Nonversation.

Your desperation for conversation, Muffled by your determination, To remain silent and scared, Afraid to engage, afraid to let words be shared. Nonversation-when too afraid to talk to others.

The Control of the Young Girl

Emily Poulin 11

The following piece has mentions of suicide, self harm, sexual assault, abuse, and misogyny. If any of these may trigger you, please skip this article and just look at the collage made along with it.

In Darren Aronofsky’s film Black Swan, starring Natalie Portman, there is a constant theme of how a woman feels behind closed doors. Seeing how Natalie Portman’s character, Nina, engages in self-harm after dealing with being controlled by those in her life, more specifically her rivals, her mother, and her ballet director. This film was released in 2010. In 2022, teenage girls are uploading whisper memes on Twitter about how they are Nina. Not that they relate to her, but that they are her. Obviously, this is a joke, they aren’t all actually a mentally deranged ballerina who hallucinates becoming a swan. However, when does the joke end and the hard reality of being a young girl in a patriarchal society end? These young girls posting these memes aren’t completely joking, our society has a problem with controlling young girls.

In the Grecian myth of Medusa, Athena curses a woman who had just gone through a terrifying sexual assault, cursing her with serpentine locks, so that no man would want her. Centuries pass and Marie Aintoinette is taken from Austria to France at about 15 years of age to be wed with King Louis XVI. Some 200 years later, Vladimir Nabokov releases his most famous novel, Lolita, telling the story of a young girl being preyed upon by an older man, in a lesson for the reader about how abusers are hidden in plain sight. Almost 20 years later, Stephen King releases his book Carrie, telling a story of a telekinetic girl with an abusive mother. Another 20 years later, Jeffrey Eugenides publishes his book The Virgin Suicides, telling the story of five sisters, all imprisoned by their parents, causing them to die from suicide by the end of the book. Throughout the 1990’s and the 2000’s, the media tormented young women, Amanda Bynes, Anna Nicole Smith, Britney Spears, Lindsay Lohan, Mariah Carey, Winona Ryder, insisting that they were on a road to self-destruction, that they needed to be stopped, that they were unfit mothers, sisters, girlfriends, etc. We still see these effects today. In Amanda Bynes begging her Instagram followers for help in ending her conservatorship, in Britney Spears’ airing out her family in her captions, in Winona Ryder still being berated as a thief over 20 years later.

Our society has an obsession with building young women up, beating them down completely when they’re at (what we assume to be) their career peak, and banishing them off as if they’re damaged goods. When women are no longer new and shiny toys, they are no longer useful to us. In a CBS interview with pop star Taylor Swift, Swift made a very interesting remark when discussing the repeated misogyny that women face, “There’s a different vocabulary for men and women … a man is allowed to react, a woman can only overreact.” From the second we felt a difference between women and men, misogyny existed. It is ingrained into us. Then if misogyny is ingrained into us, how must we shed this off, how can we fix this centuries old practice? Simply put, we can’t. Not now, at least. The only thing we can really do is learn, study the way that our society treats women, take everything into account, and make sure that it never happens again.

Amanda Negron 10

Rilee Oakman 11

Guilty

Janell Lim 11

The day Tuesday, June 18, was like any other day recorded in the scriptures of history. People bustled to and from work, children played on playgrounds, teenagers spent their weekends going out with friends. Everyone in the world was in their rightful place. There were a few oddities here and there, scattered across the globe, but they were well below the safety threshold, and so all was well. One such oddity was located in the suburbs of Highland, Pennsylvania, among a conversation between two teenagers of a relatively same age and height. The boy, Brennan Kadell, age 16, eyes brown, hair brown, Unregistered. The girl, Emily Asra, age 16, eyes blue, hair black, Registered. The conversation, sourced from Interrogation Room 2, witness: Emily Asra, officer present: Lieutenant Colonel Josh Landon, went as follows: “Hey.” The boy spoke first.

“Hey.” The girl answered appropriately.

“I missed you.”

The girl laughed, a clear, loud, unapologetic laugh the boy knew so well and cherished in his memory. “I saw you just last week.”

The boy slipped his hands into the girl’s, wanting to lose himself in her eyes. “Still.” The girl clasped his hand in return, focusing on the bottom folds of his eyes instead of the warm brown hearth in the center, because in the course of her life, she’s found it easier to look near one’s eyes instead of in them. “Well, now you have me all to yourself for the entire day.” The boy grinned in anticipation of the day he had planned for them, the sleepless nights he spent thinking about what he would do and what he would say on his mind. “I can’t wait.” A moment of hesitation. His smile disappeared in that moment, lips straightening into a firm line across the bottom half of his face. “But first… I need to tell you something.” The girl remained quiet, letting the

silence fill the air. She had an inkling of what could be uttered from her boyfriend’s mouth in the next minutes, but kept the thought to herself. After all, it’s not confirmed. And the Department wouldn’t budge unless it’s confirmed. Ah, well. At least I convinced them to come here.

“I wanted to tell you this before we go any further in our relationship, you know, because you’ve… you’ve become an important part of my life, you know. You know?” The girl’s lips curved into a half-smile, half-teasing and half-sincere. Teasing him because he always repeats words whenever he’s nervous. sincere because it’s cute when he does so. “I know,” she said, her voice soft, because in the course of her life, she’s found it best to use a soft, coaxing voice when dealing with information extraction.

“So, you know, I wanted you to hear this from me, and I wanna be honest with you.”

A nod. Of understanding, or at least that’s what the boy perceived.

“It’s okay if you don’t” —his voice breaks for a second— “don’t want to continue this—our—relationship, and I’ll totally be understanding if you do… choose to do that, you know?”

He glanced at his girlfriend, once again, just for reassurance. A deep breath. His girlfriend watched patiently. “So, anyway, here goes. The truth is… I’m… Unregistered.” The boy tried to read the emotions playing out on his girlfriend’s face, a byproduct of his insecurity among his status in society, though he couldn’t determine what said emotions were. The girl, on the other hand, read the insecurity and uncertainty on the boy’s face quite plainly.

Although, one could easily infer why such distinctions between the two are present, given the

“The girl briefly, just wondered what such that in a society that

pertinent information on their previous experiences. The girl felt a twinge of pity—not sympathy— at the boy’s so-plainly seen anxiety. I suppose it can’t be helped, she thought to herself. He did grow up Unregistered. Unregistered. A life destined to be cursed since birth, the word itself taboo in every civilized nation in the world. The girl briefly, just for a moment, wondered what such a life would be like, living like that in a society that rejected your very existence. Had she voiced this thought to her boyfriend, he would have told her, because he wanted her and cared for her and trusted her enough to share what he had never told anyone else. But the thought remained solely a thought, and so it was easily vanquished from the girl’s mind, never to surface again. By now, several seconds have passed in the silence between them, though it felt like hours to the boy. The girl smiled, partly because she knows it will reassure the boy, partly because it will buy her time to think of what to say next.

She didn’t think this far, plan this far, a prod uct of her procrastination on the subject. Her psy chologist always told her to get to the bottom of her procrastination, to find the reason for her de fect. But for some reason, her mind wouldn’t obey, skirting around the topic every time it was brought up, because she didn’t want to think about it, be cause it was too painful to think about it, though the girl wouldn’t have used the word painful. Then it would most likely lead to a series of revelations that would’ve eventually led to traitorous thoughts, thoughts she could not afford.

A few more seconds of silence passed, and when it becomes clear the Department would not intervene, she decided to go with the universally neutral, two-letter response. “Oh.”

The word left much hanging in the air. It was

her intention to do so, even as she knew it would hurt the boy. She gave him another practiced smile. “See you around, then.” On Tuesday, June 18, at 4:55 p.m., a boy is left staring at the back of a girl leaving the bench she sat on seconds earlier. The girl figured it was better to leave him like this, broken-hearted because this pain now will help him process the pain he would feel later. Later, more specifically 6:04 p.m. that same day, Department forces in black riot gear knocked down the rusted door to his home, arrested him, and hauled him to the Court of Justice. 6:48 p.m. Emily Asra finishes her testimony and steps down from the witness stand, recounting the conversation she had with the Accused this afternoon. Her testimony matches that of Department Scout Jemy Harin’s, who was hiding behind a cluster of trees near the location provided by Emily Asra.

No jury adjourns, simply a judge who pounds his gavel and casts his judgment as easily as eating a grilled cheese sandwich for breakfast. The verdict is quick, as expected, and the Accused is rendered Guilty and shipped off to the Outlands he originally came from.

Brennan Kadell says nothing from his mouth and shows nothing on his face. The situation has well-dawned on him in the hours spent in his jail, the betrayal of the girl and the deportation that faces him. Brennan, oddly, feels no feeling in his heart as he’s hauled from the courtroom. Emily, on the other hand, feels a jumble of emotions, too many for her to keep up. But maybe, just maybe, one of those feelings in that

just for a moment, such a life would be like, living like that rejected your very existence.”

Dylan Wisner

Lilia Wilken-Yoder 11

The Forest

Iveigh Bock 10

Whether it was because the fog had not lifted, or the temperature had been a surprising thirty degrees, things felt different that day. It was a cold, crisp autumn day, and the sky was clouded, with no splash of blue against the gray-white. The loud yells and raised laughter rolled around playfully in my ears, aching to pull me back into the childlike playfulness of my best friend, Kayley, as we hiked at a steady pace with the tour group, following gradually behind the guide.

My gaze, however, did not break from the high reaching boughs of the many birch, pine, and maple trees. Each tree seemed to be holding desperately to each brightly colored leaf, their shades orange, red, and yellow brilliant flashes against the dull gray blanket of dense fog.

I felt tense as I continued moving. Slowly, the details of my surroundings became softer and softer… Something suddenly snapped me back to reality. My numb fingers hugged the sides of my dark blue, loose-fitting knit sweater, as I stopped, shivering in the cold.

“You okay?” Kayley asked. Her pale green eyes shined with concern, her tight red curls halting their bounce. I admired her thoughtfulness each time she comforted me.

“Just forgot to bring a jacket,” I laughed half-heartedly before starting to move again. “Where are we going again?”

“Just below the mountain’s peak,” The guide reminded me. “There’s a viewing point no one uses anymore. Hopefully the fog will be lifted by the time we get there.”

“The temperature too,” I said to myself jokingly, but my chattering teeth never paused for a laugh.

As we continued on, I stared at the wall of trees around us, their span of territory seemingly endless. Every once in a while, I thought I caught a glimpse of something, but as I stopped to look closer, I stared at dry foliage.

“Now that’s funny.” We’d stopped, the guide holding up the procession of hikers. He was turned to face the opposite of us, but by the tone of his voice, I could tell his brows were furrowed. In one hand, he held the GPS that had beeped annoyingly every ten seconds, letting the holder know their position. It was now dead silent. The guide’s other hand was scratching his russet beard in thought. We stood around confused, waiting for any further action.

“Maybe the batteries are dead?” A tagalong tourist asked.

“Charged it this morning,” the guide said, his confusion melting into annoyance. “I’m sure it’s nothing, but we can’t continue forward until I fix it.” Our party groaned, though I was too cold to make much of an effort.

When we turned around, however, the groans turned to gasps, then gestures to quieten others. A bizarre creature, at a distance of about thirty feet, was in the way. It was large and spindly, looked similar to a wolf, and was a peculiar gray black, much like that of decaying flesh. When it raised its legs, which had been previously veiled by the ground-level fog, it could be seen that it’s paws had sharp claws like hooks. It’s breath was loud as it sniffed the dirt, and our breath shallowed as the slightest movement of a squirrel on a nearby tree had perked it’s ears. I stood at the edge of the group, frozen like a statue, biting down on my lip to silence any noise I would have made.

The guide had not yet noticed, still focused on fixing his GPS.

“C’mon,” he muttered. The creature’s ears perked. Everyone’s gaze turned towards him, yet mine stayed transfixed on the beast like animal.

The guide started to hit the device against his hand sharply. “What is wrong with this thing?” He whined angrily. The creature’s head turned toward us. I bit down on my lip until I’d tasted blood. Its face was the color of dark smoke, eyes a piercing emerald green, and sharp fang-like teeth, ready to cut like knives. It stalked closer, it’s growls echoing deep and threateningly in its throat.. I swallowed.

“Shut it!” A quiet voice murmured from the group. The guide had not heard. Instead, he’d made a cry out in anger, and threw the GPS over the heads of the hikers. It struck the beast across the face, then landed a few feet away, in dead leaves. As it landed with a crunch, the device finally beeped.

What happened next felt like it was slow motion. Like a gunshot prompting the start of a race, the creature launched with great agility at the sound of the beeping. It was fast and the party behind me had dispersed in a fit of screaming. Desperate and freezing, I waited until the creature leaped to attack me, and at the last second, I rolled under the beast’s underbelly. It landed with grace on the spot where I’d stood.

Breathing heavily, seeing no one around me, I felt very afraid. However, in a blinding state of shock, I grabbed a large fallen tree limb and turned to face the creature. It turned sharply to look at me, flexing its muscles in preparation to strike. I waited, hoping I could dodge it once again, but it waited too. Emerging from the wall of fog and trees, were four more beasts like the first.

Breathing heavily, fear rebounding off every thought, I spat out the blood from my lip and prepared for the worst.

Josephine Lim 9

The Color of Death

Joshua Krob 10

Growing up in rural Connecticut was blissful. Running by the creek and building forts with branches and leaves after a storm come to mind when I think of my old life, back when nothing mattered and I could float on the wind and roll with the waves. I lament that I never kept that freedom with me.

I grew up in a beautiful Dutch colonial house not a mile down the road from a couple hay fields. I always played near the stream, skipping rocks, often being joined by my little sister Audrey. I remember her smiling face, beaming ear to ear when her rock skipped and hit the tree we always aimed for. I remember her black hair blowing with the wind as I chased her in a game of tag. I remember after a long day of exciting play, we would always come home to a hot meal made by mother, usually hot soup or meatloaf, that always hit the spot.

My father was a tall man with gray streaks in his hair, his hands worn as though he was set to work construction the moment he was born, and a strong eye that would cause any man to recoil if ever he looked at them in anger. But most of all he enjoyed a glass of whiskey after a hard day at work.

Throughout my life, there were many memories that I treasured: the time with my friends, especially in the summer, and the time I spent with my sister exploring the woods or following the stream. But one that I always disliked was the four of us loading into my father’s SUV and driving to church. My father was a devout Mormon and made us follow suit. He would always tell us the ways he wanted us to act, and I listened, but I always wondered why no one I knew went to the same church. Nonetheless, I blindly followed what he told me. It was all I knew; it was black and white. But as I grew older and outgrew my peaceful view of the world I began to dislike Mormonism. Still, my fathers strong hand pushed me to stay quiet. I would always tell my sister of my opinion and she would agree with me, but neither of us knew that she had it worse than I did.

One day when I was 15 and she was 14, she came home late, in tears telling me through sobs and inhales what she was just forced into by a member of the congregation. I remember her running in to talk to father after finishing with me, not knowing he had been drinking more than normal that night. I heard her explaining what she had said, finishing it with “I don’t want to go back daddy, please, they hurt me, they hurt…” trailing off through her tears. Father had started telling her that everything was going to be ok and that it was a normal thing to go through as a Mormon, but when he heard her say that she didn’t want to go back, he snapped. Standing up he looked at her and shouted “WHAT DID YOU SAY?” She paused, as if questioning whether to respond, and said “Please daddy, don’t make me go back…” She caught his anger and reacted to his arm just nearly to slow, as he tossed the bottle of whiskey at her head, shouting “NEVER, NEVER SAY THAT, THOSE RAKES OUTSIDE OF THE CHURCH WILL BURN YOUR SOUL.” Then the painful screams started, ones that still haunt my dreams. My mother tried to stop it, but father kicked her away and said, “Let’s see if your God will let you live.” I never saw Audrey alive again after that. Mother was able to sneak her out as father had passed out from his drunkenness. I could tell she tried her hardest, but the shards of glass had made swiss cheese out of Audrey’s artery. Her red blood was the brightest thing I’d ever seen.

I cried the whole night. I hated my father for doing that to my best friend. Through the night I noticed that my family had been holding me down, so after long contemplation I chose to pack a bag and sneak away overnight, taking the wad of cash my father kept in the cabinet and escaping. I caught a ride to town, said goodbye to my old life, all I ever loved, and wagered on a better life upstate, where I could be free, not running by the creek free, not skipping rocks into the tree free, but free to work, free to chose my religion and free to see the world’s true colors.

Jazmin Simpson 11

2022-2023

OUR STAFF

Editor

Caitlyn Hale

Andy Ayup

Bella Knowles

Hannah Kuerbitz

Janell Lim

Emily Patterson

Adviser

Britton Taylor

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VOLUME 1

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