H.O.P.E. Volume I Issue II (Literature and Art) by hopehumanities

Art and Literature

F L

H.O.P.E. VOLUME I ISSUE II

Photo By Lynn Zhou

About Humanities Online Platform for Everyone (HOPE) is an independent, student-run online journal that creates opportunities for high school students in the United States and around the world who are interested in the humanities to publish their outstanding works. These include creative writings (poetry and prose), research papers, editorial reviews, and visual arts. We realize that publication opportunities for high school students interested in the humanities are very limited. Thus, we hope to create this platform to help high school students to earn credit for what they have written or created. This is not merely a journal, but a place for lovers of the humanities to express themselves and receive recognition.

Submissions Submissions are published on a monthly basis. You may submit at the following link: www.hopehumanities.org

Staff Design

Jiahua Chen Lucy Lu Andy Xu Holly Zhuang

Editors-in-Chief

Editors

Tim Mei Michael Zhang Holly Zhuang Asya Lyubavina Linda Pang Tony He Jack Cai Elaine Shao Isabel Cai Mona Zhao Yuhui Huang Seth Amofa

Contents 0

Take You to Another Honeymoon Lynn Z.

Home Sweet Home Annie C.

Wet Shoes Cheryl L.

Illustration QQ Y.

Illustration Annie Y.

Modern Cinderella Isabel C.

adam, eve, and the snake Tony H.

Illustration Jessica J.

Photography Yifei L.

Illustration Suzie L.

A Comprehensive Guide on the Art of Feeling Human, Counting Backwards from Infinity, and Perpectual Performances Alexandra T.

Photography Jack C.

Illustration Rosie D.

summer lovin' Alexandra T.

Photography Tony H.

Chronicler Andy Z.

Depression. Holly Z.

A Rocking Chair Frank Z.

Sculture

Cover Lia F.

Wet Shoes

dolls, too old for anything I once had, damn

Prose By Cheryl Li

him for making me do this to myself, what on earth am I lying for? Because a lie is a lie when it is a lie, and here I am the resident

I will show you fear in a handful of dust.

expert on density. Bell, book, candle.

Oh? Ring it, then. Ring the bells for have you

-T.S. Eliot

Wet grey slabs of cement glistening coldly

heard, a broken door is still a door. I can’t go

in the morning light. A drizzle, then, to suit

back, not when there is no way forward. He

the iciness, another sham to make my shoes

knows how to use a feather. No doors behind

freeze and God he must be laughing. Laugh-

me, and none in front. Trapped. When the

ing his head off like a merry-go-round so he

sidewalk is slippery, down into a puddle and

can watch me flail and flounder and make a

then six feet under. I know complaints are bit-

fool of myself. Watch him laugh. Watch me

ing the dust. If I had wanted someone to lie to

watch him laugh.

me I would have done it myself. Not him. He’s pathetic. He who cried when I lay on that hos-

Half a dozen steps and already I am soaked to

pital bed, reaching up to grope at the dancing

the bone. Small bones, showing through like

lights I thought were stars. He said he would

brittle eggshells whenever I clench my fist,

give them to me if he could. Avec ta morale de

a flexing of fingers – tap tap – another pair

bigote, tu prends ton pied quand tu tricote. Liar.

of shoes out the door and I breathe a sigh of

No one lies to himself, but he’s done it and

relief so he can’t hear, so nobody can hear,

now I’m doing it too. Shall I weep for you?

because that’s all nobody is good for, that and

spewing nonsense. Which is basically sense

One more corner. A car engine screeches and

standing on its own head, going first one way

dies. We’re pretty the way we’re not meant to

and then the other tap-tap like a paint-spat-

be, wet shoes and all. Raindrops drip down

tered canvas, all filth and nonsense, dashing

my neck, winces and wintry moods. The

me against the rocks. Another tap.

career girl without a career. This isn’t how it’s supposed to be. I could keep stumbling,

Each step squelches. Muddy water, why

or else stay here until the sky and the clouds

am I doing this to myself. Always the same

swallow me whole and there is nothing left.

question. If I had wanted an answer I would

Pourquoi ce chemin de croix. No, I don’t see. Of

have shaken my name off, this name that is

what use are eyes when one is staring into a

a hand-puppet I’ve been forced to contort,

void that reflects no light? Yawning, tired. Still

the wax doll melting by the stove. Too old for

there. Still laughing. His scythe is tacky.

Illustration By Annie Yang

3 Nervously I rub my bracelet, turning over each rounded pearl. Pearls are cheap these days, but they’re still worth more than tears. Two little fishes hammered out of a thin sheet of silver. I am a drowning Pisces. That’s hilarious – is he laughing? Are you laughing? Because if he doesn’t, if you don’t, then this is all for naught. Don’t lie to me, don’t waste my breath, I can barely walk as it is. One shoe in front of the other, when I get back I’ll turn on the air-conditioning full blast... Get back where? My grave-worms are on loan. Curses don’t work here. Drink too much wormwood, and your face will stay puckered long after your hands have lowered the beaker. The things I do to live this lie. I’ve scarce the heart to plague the wretched creature. He doesn’t know. I can shut the door in his face, but then I would’ve shut myself out. Draw the blinds first. He is not my keeper. If a mistake is all that there is, then a mistake will mend the damage done. Not every stumbling woman is a hussy. Everybody knows... wine and brandy and vodka burns. It doesn’t chase away the wet. I can mutter to myself. It’s not the same as a staying silence, a flood on the floor since it’s still drizzling. Still tapping. He and nobody and the hospital lights that dance. I don’t remember reaching for them – too ill, too calm, too ready. Unlike today. The inverse functions of fortune. When God is gone and

4 the devil takes hold, who’ll have mercy on your

soaked through. A conscious decision.

soul?

Grief glossed over with quick, clean strokes, trailing water all over the carpet.

Does this road never end? I’ve lost track again.

Lobotomy was a solution like no other.

All roads lead somewhere, but I don’t re-

For liars like me like no other. If you lie

member where. This one doesn’t go to Rome.

to me, that means I can lie to him and he

Almost. Almost is not there, not quite. A fake

will lie to you. We’ve come a long way.

grin. Two blocks of ice. He must be laughing

Full circle. Still broken. Still silent. Still

his head off, that’s what he always does. It’s all

the Least Important Player. I’m not one of

about him, and what I mean. Can fish breathe

those people with white plastic sticking

in rain? Well enough to be stared at. A hos-

out of their ears.

pital is no place for dreaming. Twenty-four hours of pointing my fingers at the ceiling, and I don’t recall any of it. Was I a dream too, then? Was I. Wasn’t. I do remember telling him he talks too much, because he’s a dream and one I can’t wake from. That makes him real. A looming face above, staring down at me with all the anxiety of a cat at a dead bird. I’d rip the needle from my arm if I could. Falling trees. I didn’t smile when I finally woke up, so he wasn’t supposed to either, but somehow he did. I’d rip the needle out if I could. If this is nothing, then perhaps I like it. When I walk with my eyes shut because the cold tap water didn’t quite work the way the way it was supposed to and I woke up again. Delirium Tremens. You can’t teach an old dog new tricks. Sometimes I wonder what could have been if I chose. Choices are lies, don’t make me repeat myself. If they don’t work then people wouldn’t keep telling them. My shoes are

adam, eve, and the snake

Poem By Tony He Photo By Yifei Liu

there is a garden of eden in a city, in a house, in a mind: it is grainy granite tabletop and it is a weeping willow in the backyard and it is the bones of a pet it is painted gold with mother’s lemon’s rinds it is mama’s smell baked into the wood and it is dada’s summer sweat it is grainy granite tabletop and it is a weeping willow in the backyard and it is the bones of a pet now i lie in the heat of the old mahogany bedroom, aged and with dust and realize that my eyes can’t smell mama’s smell baked into the wood and dada’s summer sweat, my heart can no longer see the home in this house of rust, now i lie in the heat of the old mahogany bedroom, aged and with dust i ask myself where mama and dada went my heart can no longer see the home in this house of rust, it can only see mama’s mascara and dada’s shaowded eyes, discontent i ask myself where mama and dada went lying in the heat of our lost garden of eden, heart pried open to find the home that once was it can only see mama’s mascara and dada’s shadowed eyes, discontent in our garden of eden, all that’s left now is flaws lying in the heat of our lost garden of eden, heart pried open to find the home that once was dust over mahogany, the only outline the traces of the snake in our garden of eden, all that’s left: flaws slithering, divorce’s tail: heartache

adam, eve, and the snake

A Comprehensive Guide on the Art of Feel from Infinity, and Perpectual Permanence

ling Human, Counting Backwards es

By Alexandra Tan

Introduction

Reader, I would like you to imagine this. (In order to learn how to feel human, we must figure out first what it means to n otbe human.) Close your eyes, take in three deep, slow breaths. Close your eyes, and imagine yourself surrounded by nothing. What does nothing look like to you? Is it pink? Or perhaps periwinkle blue? Is it shiny? Hot? Cold? Most importantly, d id you imagine anyone else with you? Reader, here is what I think it means to be human. It means to not be forgotten. What I really mean to say is, you must not be alone.

Act I: Permanence

1) In math, an asymptote is a line that continually approaches a given curve, but does not meet it at any finite distance. In other words, it goes on forever. In the light of this infinity, my thought process goes somewhat like this. First, that a lot of my friends talk about what they’re going to do when they get older, and move out of their house, and away from everything they’ve ever known. That for one, is not what concerns me. ( It is quite hard for me to define whether I am afraid of something, or it just excites me to the point where I feel nothing but adrenaline.)What concerns me is that I am a horrible, terrible person because one day a friend of mine suggests getting a tattoo, and that alone makes my stomach twist in knots. I hate the idea of a black mark getting stuck on my vulnerable, stainable flesh so much that I try to avoid looking at the little scars on my body in the morning. I suppose it is true that mirrors hide truth in them, after all. Little permances, I think, is what is truly terrifying. At night, I lay in bed and think about tattoos and perennials and things that last, like Hollywood love stories and asymptotes and fairy tales with happy endings. T hen, I wonder if the difference between them really matters at all.

Act II: What I think about when someone says, “future”.

2) My high school algebra teacher marks a problem on the whiteboard in red ink. She draws a curve, a cross, two arrow heads. The lights of the classroom are dim, and I sit at the back of the class. I have forgotten my glasses. She asks for us to identify the leading coefficient, and the degree of the function. I can do noth-

Illustration By Rosie Ding

ing but watch the world move around me, forever sucking up the slow, honey-golden drops of time. I suppose in this function, the degree is unknown. The leading coefficient is unknown. As the curve goes on, it’s future is unknown. I am thirteen when I begin to think (and admittedly worry) about the future. I know it won’t be like I imagined. Perhaps I have a significant other with messy hair and loving hands that takes me to places like botanical gardens and planetariums and as we sit stargazing confessing our love in the dark, they tell me I’m lovelier than all the stars in the sky. Maybe I am sitting in law school studying with a huge book that I checked out from the college library like it’s not $150; and I see that someone has scribbled their initials in the margins in sparkly blue pen. I n this future, I will smile and add my own, hoping that I won’t be forgotten either. Perhaps someone climbs through my window at 3 AM and before I can say anything, they grip my shoulders and tell me that I’m probably going to break their heart, and they would gladly let me. M aybe it is dusk and I sit on top of a building watching the sunset, and thinking how the streets below would look if set on fire, and it is very, very still. I hope that I do not become lost at the bottom of myself. I think it is safe for me to judge the meticulous things that lie within the boundary of my own character, and it is plausible this will never happen. However, it is in this future I become a tragedy, because I am only mortal and a catastrophe of human nature, and I will be the dead god that history has always wanted to tell stories about. I n this paradise-lost, I am content with finding pieces of myself, and losing them all at once.

Act III: Leminescate and fatal flaws

3) My little permanence: I had heart surgery at 13. I play sports. I write poetry. I tell the stars about myself so when I am gone, I will not be forgotten. I wish that I bled silver and gold so I could be anything other than human. I don’t like the dry texture of fake fur, but I like cats. I am five foot two and wish that I would grow so people could stop looking down on me and start looking up. I am Chinese and wish I could speak it as well as I used to, and I get straight A’s, even though people say it’s just because I’m asian. My favorite book is T he Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde, and art really is quite useless, once you think about it. I have a mole above my right eye and hair that hangs to my waist, and I don’t wear makeup because I think it’s suffocating. I cry during sad movies and I watch old chinese dramas with my dad without subtitles so I can prove to myself that I’m not slipping away from my heritage, I’ve played piano for nine years and my favorite composer is Chopin, because his music is so heartbreakingly lovely and it sounds like the song the ocean sings at night. I am waiting for the moon to talk to me, and I like the smell of rain. The dictionary of obscure words says it’s called a“pluviophile”. I think it’s just being human. I watch Ted Talks on string theory in my spare time and entertain the

idea of opposite dimensions at night, and ever since I traveled to Tokyo it stole my heart and never looked back. I write love letters to beautiful things on scraps of old newspapers, and tear them up right after. I don’t want to be forgotten. I don’t want to be forgotten. I don’t want to be forgotten.

Act IV: Polynomials and the Function of the Universe

4) It is 10 PM on a Wednesday night in which I begin to ponder two values; zero, and infinity. I have chosen the word “values” because to me, these concepts appear ever increasingly hard to think about. Zero is the absence of everything. Infinity is the absence of nothing.Likewise, the zero power rule states anything raised to the zero power is one. I see that it is not just in our world that empty things are given a place to belong.In my math class on Monday, my teacher hands out a paper that asks, w hat is zero raised to the power of zero?I answer in simple terms:Zero to the power of zero is undefined.It is then when I am sitting at my desk that I think everything is utterly, utterly useless when it comes to understanding numbers. A nd by numbers, I mean the nature of infinity, the nature of humanity, and the nature of the end of the world. Of course, I am not a mathematician. I am a tired high school student slouched over a worksheet and trying to wrap my mind around infinity, and zero. Now what has begun as a simple experiment to finish my math homework, I am here wondering if zero or infinity or impossible things really exist at all.

Act V: Fear

5) Considerably, the concept of death does not frighten me as much as it should. Like I have said before, the only thing more terrifying than the absence of nothing is the absence of everything. Being human, in retrospect, is just as constricting. It is difficult for me to imagine what the definition of humanity is. Of course, I suppose one could define it as standing in the rain on a late summer evening without an umbrella, or maybe walking along the beach barefoot, so you can read the sea’s heart and her yours, or driving down a lone highway as the sky turns from pale peach-pragne to a torrent of black clouds and all the things what we lost, or finally, (and I think this is the most believable definition) being human means being skilled in the art of losing things. For that matter, being human is like the value zero. Humanity cannot exist without loss. Zero cannot exist without another number with a tangible value. In the light of this realization, while I sit at my desk on a late Wednesday night I then ask this question: if you cannot exist without something else, do you really even exist at all? - Nothing responds, and I am left to my own perpetual silence.

Photo By Tony He

Photo By Holly Zhuang

A Rocking Chair

In the living room of our old house in North Carolina stood a wooden rocking chair. Flanked by Chinese calligraphy prints and family pictures, it was the centerpiece of our living room, the cradle of a family’s most treasured memories. Its creaky wooden frame dated back to the grad-school days of two parents-to-be at the University of Minnesota. Skip a few years, one returned to Short Story By Frank Zhou China to start a company. The other remained in the States, a Illustration By Annie Chang loving husband and father to a second-grade boy. This is a story of that boy. -- Dad’s favorite rocking chair appeared even more antique under North Carolina’s bright, early autumn sun. My tired eyes traced the faded patterns of its corduroy cushions. Along its worn seatback and creaky wooden frame. All the way down to the gentle indentations in the carpet where rockers met ground. To the unknowing eye, the chair was just another part of an average suburban home. Two floors. Nice lawn. Everything a kid and his dad could wish for. But everything was so… deathly silent. Forget a pin—I could hear a feather drop. I sighed, my mind caught in a cross-fire of warring thoughts. It was something about the ABC’s. No, not the ABC’s, even though yesterday I had been fascinated by the alphabet wall art lining Ms. Brundage’s classroom. No, it was Dad’s words from last night that rang in my head. American Born Chinese, he’d said. He had been slowly rocking back and forth in that wooden rocking chair. Like he always does. Like Mom did. Before she and I went to China last summer. Before first grade at that run-down but homey local public school. Before I came back a few weeks ago. Before second grade at Green Hope Elementary. ABC’s are Americans of Asian descent, he’d said. Like any second grader, I’d only been half-listening to my father, but for some reason I entertained the thought now. After all, it was an afternoon after school in America; there was nothing else to do. And that silence wasn’t going anywhere anytime soon. Does being ABC make me Chinese? Fake Chinese? Fake American? Who was I? -- Dad wouldn’t be home for another three hours. My only companion for now was the silence of a desolate house. Upwards a dozen silent, lifeless rooms. Every inch, eerily still. As if permanently frozen in a frame of the stop-motion film of life. That was the States. At least the way I saw it. Just months before, I was trotting alongside Grandpa through Hangzhou’s brutal, late-spring

15 heat. We passed stretches of street paved by pied, cracked cement tiles. Kids, still in school uniform, eating local snacks and gamboling along the sidewalk. A shop-lined street vaguely resembling a once-prosperous outlet. We finally reached the ring of shops that lined the local park—specifically, the derelict, beat-up office unit sandwiched between the dry-cleaner and daycare. On better days, the afternoon sun shed just enough light to illuminate the ping-pong table within. Inside, the walls were peeling; the place smelled of mildew and lingering hints of cigarette smoke. I would throw my schoolbag in a corner, unclip my school tie. We’d set down our paddles on the dusty table and scavenge for the cobweb-ridden ping-pong balls hiding in the shadows. Next thing we knew, the place would fill with the familiar pop of bouncing balls. Serve, parry, slice, drive, smash. I stood at an impressive four feet—barely enough to see over the net—facing Grandpa, over a foot taller and ten times in age. No matter; we’d spend every afternoon there, breathing in the mildew and smoke, our laughter echoing off the high ceiling and peeling walls as we played. It must have been an eccentric, boisterous sight. Yet, to me, it was a beautifully orchestrated dance—two minds and bodies working in unison, a transcendence of age and place. A film I could rewatch a thousand times. Serve, parry, slice, drive, smash. Serve, parry, slice, drive, smash. -- Back in the States, during each painfully slow American afternoon, I longed to see a hollow ball flying gracefully between two wooden paddles once more. In my mind’s eye, I desperately relived each smoke-and-mildew afternoon, drinking in every second of that bygone time. Relived my grandfather’s booming laughter. The delight of finding an undented ball at the foot of the wall. It was a sort of indulgence, an attempt to escape to memory, to ignore, even for just an instant, that painfully confusing dual-identity. Ping-pong was my anesthesia of the mind. Yet, after it wore off each day, I was left even more pained than before. The truly embittered are desperate to rationalize their sorrow. In time, I began to think that I was torn by two countries. Seared by the flames of two clashing identities. And so, for years I burned. -- It was seven years and countless meditative afternoons later before I realized that I was not torn by two countries, but rather by two upbringings. For years, my life in China meant good food and spirited discussion. Evenings playing Gomoku with Grandpa on his bamboo-sheeted bed, doing my best to ignore the bitter aroma

16 of his glass tea flask. Mornings putting out the laundry with Grandma, using a hooked bamboo stick to reach the washing lines high above. A life. One not rich in material, but rich in experience. A life that was my grandparents’ upbringing. My grandpa—the man whose laughter filled my every joyful memory. Who bent down beside me to blow the cobwebs off of each ball. Who taught me, miss by miss, every shot I know. Who showed me, day by day, a culture whose richness is impossible to fathom, let alone describe. I was struck by loneliness in America not because of the nation I was in, but because of the upbringing that was stripped away. I found America to be quiet because of a lack of the only sounds I knew: my grandpa’s laughter. The bouncing of ping-pong balls. The sounds of my life in China. In the States, I was thrust into a different upbringing: one of Ticonderoga pencils scratching on Common Core worksheets. The clicking of the old Toshiba’s keys. Kumon and Spelling City. Weekly spelling tests. Technology class, whatever that means. It wasn’t exactly “better” or “worse”. Simply different. Well, I eventually found that America is loud in a different way. A loudness apparent in the spirited primaries I saw on TV. In the elated shrieks of our neighbors as we played tag, scrambling through sprinklers and over each other’s lawns. In the NPR programs I listened to every evening. In the cheers over Dominos while watching Sunday Football. These are the sounds of my life in America. In my mind, these sounds are not confined to any country. The click of a Gomoku piece. The elated shrieks of tag. The buzz of the bustling bystreets of Hangzhou. The muffled roar of driving down the tree-lined highways of North Carolina. New Hampshire. Texas. These are the sounds of my upbringing. The memories of my life. -- Today, that wooden rocking chair sitting in the living room of our house in Dallas is still the cradle of memories it was before. It’s just now, the memories of two University of Minnesota grad students have been joined by those of my own. When I see that chair, frayed cushions and all, I see a boy who found joy in wooden paddles and hollow, plastic balls. A boy who, seven years ago, stared at that same antique chair, torn by longing for a bygone time. A boy who grew to love not only the life he longed for, but the life he had. A boy once split by two upbringings, but now at home equally in both. I see the faded patterns of its corduroy cushions. The worn seatback and creaky wooden frame. The gentle indentations in the carpet where rockers meet ground. I see myself. I see two different lives, embraced as one. I see Dad’s favorite rocking chair.

Illustration By QQ Yi

Modern Cinderella

The metal rack was crowded; pumps, ballerinas, mules, loafers, and moccasins, all stood tightly against each other. But a pair of black patent stilettos with crimson soles stood out from the rest. Placing her powder brush next to the small mirror on her dresser, Leila walked towards the shoe rack at the other side of the room. Under the sunset’s light coming in from the windows, the stilettos gave off a matted shine, unlike the cheaply flamboyant sheen that synthetic leather shoes have. The dark surface contrasted against the vivid soles, yet the hem between the two parts was done so delicately that the entire shoe seemed to be made from one piece of leather. Mesmerized by those shoes, she knelt down on the carpeted floor and held out her right hand hesitantly. Slowly stroking the calfskin leather with her index finger, she indulged in its velvet-like softness. Even the texture felt expensive. The more she looked, the more the quietly radiant leather and boldly red soles enchanted her. She took the stilettos off the rack and gently placed them on the floor next to her. Her legs were numb from kneeling on the ground, so she stumbled slightly as she tried to stand up. Admiring the shoes from above, she wondered if she should wear them to the Winter Formal tonight. Finally, she stepped into the pair of stilettoes, which were a bit small for her. She did not mind; she could always curl her toes up a bit more firmly. The calfskin enveloped her feet tightly, and her calf muscles tensed up as

Short Story By Isabel Cai

the heels arched her feet into a crescent. She savored the sensation. Leila scuttled in excitement towards the full-length mirror that hanged on the door and examined herself in it. The curvature of the shoes fit the soles to form a smoothly elongated S shape and the slim heels bolstered the feet securely at the perfect angel from the floor. Leila wished that the pair of Christian Louboutins was hers. One thousand two hundred and forty-five dollars. One thousand two hundred and forty-five dollars—this was how much the pair of stilettos worth. Leila remembered from the official website she had browsed over and over again. This was how much she earned the entire summer by tutoring science to elementary school kids. It was more than what her entire wardrobe cost. However, the Christian Louboutins were only one of many pairs sitting silently on the metal rack, as if abandoned by her roommate. The shoe rack was filled with Jimmy Choos, Manolo Blahniks, and other brands that Leila had seen at Barney’s New York when she went window shopping with her mother. Window shopping in the City was something that Leila’s mother did with her every holiday since she had been in elementary school. They would amble down the Fifth Avenue from 68th Street, passing by the Plaza and the large Tiffany flagship store. Her mother would point out the clothes, shoes, and bags meticulously displayed in the windows to her, asking if she thought they

looked gorgeous. She would just nod in silence, for she didn’t understand what these things carried with their price tags as a second grader at the time. One thing she knew was that they did look gorgeous. The first time she had seen those Christian Louboutins was on the fourth floor of the Barney’s New York next to Central Park. Sitting proudly on the spiraling glass display shelf, they had a brassy sheen that the ones her mother wore—bought at DSW—didn’t have. Leila imagined herself growing up and wearing those shoes, like one of the ladies coming out of the lounges, walking so confidently and steadily as if they were on flat ground. However, by fifth grade, Leila had realized they were never actually going to own anything they browsed, anything she longed to have. Every time, her mother would tell her that if she really wanted them, she would have to study hard and get into a good school so she could get a well-paid job. After all, her mother was a nurse at the community hospital and her father taught history at the local high school, where she would have attended if she had not won the scholarship to Stowe. She spent her life being told to work harder and look for something better. She did. She was now at the boarding school meant to be a spring board to that better life, but also a place where girls casually wore what she had been denied her entire life. As Leila continued to observe herself in the mirror, a sudden surge of defeat inundated her. She had expected herself to look more different in those Christian Louboutins, more like the other full-tuition girls at Stowe.

The black satin slip dress she was wearing, which she found at a Goodwill store in her neighborhood over thanksgiving break, seemed especially gaudy now. She had thought the dress beautiful when she first bought it—it was the best one she could get considering the monthly allowances her parents had given her. However, the glossy fabric was dimmed by the lustrous surface of the stilettos. Her ruby lipstick, which she had received for her sixteenth birthday and only used for special occasions, seemed a bit too dull compared to the vibrant soles. There was a knock on the door. Before Leila had time to open it, a girl in a lace embroidered dress also worth more than Leila’s entire wardrobe pushed in. She caught Leila looking at herself in front the mirror. “Oh, that’s a nice dress. Where did you get it?” She exclaimed with an air of appreciation that almost allowed her to sound as if she actually thought it was a nice dress. It was Saskia, one of Leila’s best friends at Stowe. She had been boarding at the school since sixth grade, but she did not mind the fact that Leila was a scholarship student like some of the other girls who started off as sixth graders did. “Just at a local boutique, you probably never heard of it,” Leila mumbled, wiping her hands on her dress uncomfortably. “Oh cool, it really suits you,” Saskia complimented as she squeezed out a saccharine smile. Leila walked away from the mirror with her back to Saskia, towards her dresser. “Which one do I wear, Hermès or Chanel?” Leila picked up two bottles of perfume from the tabletop, one in each hand, and presented them to Saskia like when she used to proudly show her report cards to her parents.

Illustration By Jessica Jia

“It doesn’t matter not tice anyways,” the casual car made Leila feel belittled m have had. It was this carel Stowe possessed, that annoy strolled around the room, o bottle from Charlotte’s make reading the tags on it. “Actu good ones, too bad that Cha gested after a while. Leila’s face twitched roommate’s name. Charlotte wearing her high heels to W haps, she wouldn’t even noti pears from the shoe rack alto wouldn’t come back until the would never know what hap else noticed and told her. Le decided that she was simply stilettos for the night. “Yeah, she’s got a fam Leila commented casually, a neck heating up. “Where at?” “I heard it’s at the Rain in a tone that was a bit too fl guise her desire to be there. Leila had never been to the but she knew it is where she wedding. “That place’s ok, a litt his wedding there too.” Sask her hair nonchalantly. Looking at herself in Leila thought her legs looke the pointed shoes. It no lon rial and cut of her dress wer else’s, nor did it matter wh

t gonna lie, nobody will norelessness in Saskia’s voice more than an insult could lessness, which people at yed her sometimes. Saskia occasionally picking up a e-up shelf on her desk and ually, Charlotte’s got some arlotte isn’t here,” she sug-

slightly upon hearing her e wouldn’t mind that she’s Winter Formal right? Perice if a pair of shoes disapogether. And anyways, she e following Monday, so she ppened as long as no one eila reassured herself. She borrowing her roommate’s

mily wedding in the City,” as she felt the back of her

nbow Room,” Leila replied flat, too indifferent to dis“She must be having fun.” e Rainbow Room herself, e wanted to have her own

tle clichéd, my cousin had kia remarked, fiddling with

n the mirror once again, ed longer and slimmer in nger mattered if the matere cheaper than everybody hether her the red of lip-

22 stick was pure. The pair of Christian Louboutins was enough. As she turned around to see the scarlet soles, the corners of her lips curled upwards. She could now see herself as one of the women inside Barney’s New York, as one of the girls who went to Stowe since sixth grade. “I’m ready,” Leila finally announced. Inside the under-fitted shoes, Leila’s little toes were pushed into the soles and the edge of the leather pressed into her heels. She peered at Saskia to see if she had noticed the Christian Louboutins. As she tried to walk in those high heels, her toes thrusted forward, as if they were going to break out of the leather, and her body was leaning forward too. She bent her knees to keep her balance and made sure that for every pace she took, the heels touched the ground before the soles. On their way to the Schoolroom, where Formals and all-school celebrations were usually held, Leila allowed her feet to sink into the stilettos. Although they were small for her, she luxuriated in the feeling of being embraced by them. She wanted to remember this feeling, to replace her memory of the synthetic leather that smelled of plastic with this one. The winter air was crisp, and the pavement, covered by a thin blanket of ice crystals, sparkled under the street lamps. Leila proceeded each tread with some extra care, not only because she was scared to slip herself, but also that she did not want to scar the crimson soles by grazing them against the ice with too much force. Saskia was shoveling the thin layer of ice with the tip of her high heels to build a little mound of frost in front of her shoes. She then kicked into the pile as she stepped forward, so the crushed ice would land on top of her velvet shoes. The ice melted on the downy burgundy surface, leaving a dark mark, yet Saskia did not seem to be aware. Watching Saskia’s carefree figure, Leila sighed and followed behind in her stilettos. A wave of stifling heat hit Leila and Saskia as soon as they entered the Schoolroom. The hall, twice as big as the gym at Leila’s previous school, was packed with students, all glimmering in their evening dresses. Leila’s eyes swept around the rectangular room fleetingly. The only source of light in the hall came from the few mellow sconces on the walls, but she was able to discern what everyone was wearing—a skill that she has developed after coming to Stowe. The Radcliffe twins, Margaux and Daphne, had a pair of suede Jimmy Choo sling-backs and a pair of Manolo Blahnik d’orsay pumps respectively. Leila lowered her head and glimpsed the reflection of herself on the patent surface. Her face was blurred at the edges and it looked as if she had merged into the background of people. She held Saskia in the arms and ambles towards the photobooth; she made sure that she was going slow enough

so the others would recognize her shoes. They cut through a dense thicket of people, but Leila did not change her pace. She meandered forward, as if she had designated a path in mind, disregarding the jostling crowd around her. As they waited in the queue, Leila placed her weight on one leg and stretched the other one out. Glancing suavely at everyone who passed by her, she raised her chin up and tilted her head slightly. She deliberately turned her back to where the crowd stood, so she could flaunt the blindly crimson soles. In the periphery of her eyes, she caught sight of the Radcliffe sisters glaring at her Christian Louboutins. They seemed to be conversing about something, but they covered their mouths with their hands and their voices were indistinctive in the bustling chatter of the School Room. However, when she turned around, the twins were looking nonchalantly at opposite directions. They both stood arms akimbo and had a trail of smirk at the corners of their mouths. Leila felt her face growing numb and her toes curled up inside that pair of shoes. Her feet were sweating, and she thought they must have been swelling as well, for the under-fitted shoes felt even tighter now. “Sorry, I’ve got to get some water,” she muttered under her breath and scuttered towards the water fountain at the other side of the hall. Saskia followed after her. She seemed to have realized what Leila had been preoccupied

head from the metal sink, frowning. “The shoes. Where’d you get them?” A tingling sensation spread across Leila’s skull. Retracting the hand that was resting on the water fountain, she stood up straight suddenly. “In the store,” she blurted out hastily and gave a nervous chortle. “Where else could I get them?” How was it possible for Saskia to recognize these shoes? So many other girls owned Christian Louboutins at Stowe, and Leila was certain Charlotte had never worn the pair to any sit-down dinners so far this year. How did Saskia know that she was wearing Charlotte’s shoes? Leila thought the air felt denser, more difficult to breath in. Meanwhile, the Radcliffe twins passed by, chuckling as they sauntered past. “The color of the soles is a shade darker than they are supposed to be,” Leila heard Margaux say. “And the leather shouldn’t be that shiny,” Daphne added. “I mean, if you have to buy fakes, at least get better quality ones.” Leila caught sight of the two sisters glimpsing at her as they went ahead, as if they wanted to ensure that she had heard what they were just talking about. Saskia was staring blankly at the ground to try to avoid looking at that pair of stilettos. “You see, that’s what I meant.” A crease of concern appeared of her forehead as she raised her head cautiously to check Leila’s expression. Leila’s palms, which had clasped into a fist, relaxed after she realized that Saskia had not been suspecting her of stealing after all.

with, as she shifted her gaze from Leila’s face, down her dress, and onto the pair of stilettos. “You know that you can always borrow mine, right?” “What do you mean?” Leila raised her

Now a greater sense of disgust rose in her. She was certain that the stilettos were real Christian Louboutins; she had seen and felt so many pairs on her window shopping trips that she could tell if they were fake right away. She squinted at the

Illustration By Suzie Lee

girl across her. “I bought this pair of stilettos at a Christian Louboutin store,” she pronounced every single word slowly and loudly, as if she was worried that the other people around would not be able to hear it. “They must be real,” she asserted. There was a short silent. “Well, we aren’t stupid, Leila. I don’t think anyone believes that a scholarship student can afford Christian Louboutins,” she murmured in a tentative voice at last and squeezed Leila on her shoulder. “We know your situation is different and it must be weird coming from a public school, but we are friends with you cause we like you as a person not for what you wear. You really don’t have to dress like us.” Leila nodded. The way that Saskia pronounced us and you sounded especially piercing to her. Her cheeks felt faintly scorching, like she had just been slapped. Her toes were itching now because they were pressed against each other so tightly inside the pointed toe box, and the stilettoes had arched her soles into a morbid bridge-like shape. Her heels had turned red as they chaffed against the leather, and she felt a piercing strain from her heels, along her calves, to the back of her knees. She turned her back to Saskia, expecting her to pull her back, but Saskia simply allowed her hand to slip off Leila’s shoulder. Leila shrugged, ran her fingers through

25 her hair, and walked away defiantly. Saskia stood motionlessly beside the water fountain, as if she was still ruminating on what had just happened. For every step Leila took, her heels burnt and her soles ached. However, she knew that she could not let anyone else notice this pain. It would either consolidate other people’s belief that the Christian Louboutins are fake or pique their suspicion that she was wearing somebody else’s shoes. She curled her toes even more firmly and tightened her calf muscles even more She passed by the Radcliffe twins once again, gaudily gesturing their hands, as they described their holiday house in Cyprus to the Bradford sisters. Antonia, the head prefect, or levée as they called it at Stowe, surrounded by a circle of lower school girls, was complaining about how the ‘quality’ of new students at the school had deteriorated over the years. As Leila shuttled through all these people, their voices became more and more indistinctive. She swallowed and took a deep breath of the air. It was a nauseating smell of sweat mingled with perfume. Everything around her seemed to be melting into one haze of sound and light. She was at the center of the humming vortex, yet she felt detached from everyone else in the hall. All the other girls seemed so at ease in their well-fitted high heels as they glided gracefully in between each other, while she scuffled on her swollen feet, struggling to repress her pain, and squeezed her way through the throng awkwardly. Why couldn’t she be like the rest of them? At one point, Leila stopped and turned around to check if Saskia was still at the water fountain; she saw Saskia giggling garishly with a group of sixth form girls. One of the girls flashed a flicker of red under her soles when she shifted her weight from one foot to another. Leila snorted at the sight and headed towards the exit. Outside the schoolroom, the chatter and laughter turned into a monotonous muffle. The winter wind pierced Leila’s face, blowing strands of hair, which she had carefully moussed for the Formal, across her forehead. She shivered in her slip dress as a gust swept past, and her cheeks, warm from the suffocating heat inside the hall, was becoming chapped. Leila pulled her feet out of the stilettoes—the Christian Louboutins that never belonged to her. The crimson soles looked duller under the dim sconces and the patent surface no longer gave off a matted shine. She seized the pair of shoes in one hand, even the calfskin felt stiffer than it used to be. Leila slowly stretched out her toes on the brick pavement covered by frost. There was a clear red line around her feet where they had been engulfed by the leather, and scratch marks ran across her heels. She stood there in silence, perceiving the coolness and substantiality of the ground with her own feet for the first time. Occasionally, a group of students would come out from the hall, but everyone was so engaged in their own conversations that nobody noticed her. After a few sporadic flows of strange faces passed by her, Leila decided to head back to her dorm. This time, she did not curl her toes up, nor did she feel any strain in her legs. She laid her feet flat on the ground and walked unrestrained. Her feet soon grew numb on the icy path, but she did not mind. She continued to stride ahead, away from the boisterously lit-up schoolroom, with the pair of stilettos that she never owned in her hands.

Photo By Jack Cai

summe (unsent text messages).

listen, i’m longing for our sun hot love, i’m looking for warmth that goes d

it’s alright love, i’ve got you and i’m going to stay. i’m loving you and loving

throwing curls, i love you as the sea loves the sand, endlessly crashing into

and watch the world burn, the way humans love pain because it reminds t

of my 2003 corolla and share a cigarette, and when i kiss your cheek and th

behind smoke and fire and blue purple wanting. i’m pressing my lips to yo

hands lighting paths of bruised red gold pomegranate juice, where the jew

you, you, is that i’m going to let you break my heart.baby, i’m laying out in th

ing dry cherry-red-crimson-crystal-cupid lollipops that leave traces of stic

and over again b ecause god i love you. i love you more than anything. i’m writ

silk sheets, we will caress each other until our hair threads together and tu

to a torrent of sapphire and tourmalines and all the things that we lost, an

tracks off of each other’s faces. just trust me ok, leave your window open a live forever existing in this place, like the way forever means nothing and

each other and melt into one, we can be summer lovers with honey and ve

and hissing, spatting color and peach pine bruised purple stars, gold brow that the only thing on my mind is you.

(...) is typinghey i’m leaving for the store pink or yellow flowers?

yeah. yeah i do.

er lovin'

Prose By Alexandra Tan

down to our bones, that curls around us and strokes our faces and tells us

g you and loving you, i’m loving your sea salt shimmer-shine blue light

o one another, the way fire loves old love letters, the way arson loves to sit

them of living. i’m waiting to take your hand and pull you under the hood

he thousands of freckles that take up residence there like stars, i leave

our hand as we watch the world burn, with stillness and softness and our

wels of your rings scrape my back the only thing on my mind besides you,

he sun while wildflowers weave themselves through my hair, i’m suck-

cky soft lip gloss imprints on your hands, i’m letting my heart flip over

ting you love letters on scraps of old newspaper and clean pressing our

urns to peach pine, my hands will hold you until the sea turns to a sky,

nd together we will cry rivers of blue, purple, green, red and kiss the tree

and i’ll come in like the sea breeze and we can be summer lovers, we can everything at the same time, like how the pit pat of our heartbeats find

elvet dresses stretched right across skin, with long car rides and smoke

wn sun warmed freckles and strawberry champagne and the knowledge

(your connection is unstable. message undelivered. retry?)

(message cancelled)

pink. you know me.

(...) is typing

The Chronicler

No Body Up There Likes Us, Afterall. By Andy Zeng 15387 years later, as he faced the large boulder inscribed with humanity’s last message to its creator, Captain James Murakami was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to eat sushi. “And so it goes,” he had said, dabbing a bit of wasabi onto his toro sashimi, “A lot of people think it’s about them. Want it to be about them. But space is large and cold. Very large and very cold. And if there’s one thing I can tell you, son, it’s that it’s really about no one.” Stepping out of his hibernation chamber, the 21st-century man had no idea why he recalled this moment. As his thoughts tried to sort themselves out into a more coherent mess, he observed the lush vines and green underbrush all around him, dotted with flora and fauna he had never seen before. “GREETINGS, CHRONICLER. THIS IS THE END,” he read, from the rock, his voice course from disuse, his fingers spasming from atrophy. He finished tracing the inscription on the giant boulder as a waterfall splashed in the distance behind him, sunlight refracting off of tiny droplets, weaving them into rainbows. Finding this message solved none of his questions.

Gone were the skyscrapers and automobiles of the 21st Century. Gone were the intelligent androids and AI micro-surveillance drones of the 22nd. Gone were the remnants of the Technocore singularity of the 30th. Is this the end of history? He mused, perusing the beautiful landscape around him, his lips tightening into a bloodless line. He reminisced his past. In 2020, the U.S. and China, the worldâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s superpowers, had access to technology way beyond what they could manage. Rampant authoritarianism combined with godlike tech lead to a destruction of democracy from within and without, on top of the fact that the Earth was slowly turning into hot, liquid goo from warming. It was a living hell. He was more than lucky to have been chosen to be the Chronicler. The authorities knew that a third world war was imminent, so they dedicated him to be the one to record history before it was lost to time. Using untested hibernation technology, he would freeze and defrost his body at will. He had woken many times beforeâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;20 years after the war, 500 years after the war, 5000 years after many more warsâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;but this was likely his last time. They had left this message for him to understand, this final enigma, the only testament to ultimate human ingenuity spanning now 20,000 years of civilization.

Is the ultimate form of existence... inexistence? That to transcend humanity is to let it end how it all began? He stood in thought for a minute, what his father said churning in his mind. And suddenly, the last human on Earth, who had been up until that point engaged in an intellectual impasse, saw the endless pain and destruction he had witnessed in his long life flash before him like a motion picture. Turning towards the rainbow refracting from the undulating current, he said: â&#x20AC;&#x153;So... I guess nobody up there liked us after all...â&#x20AC;? He tried not to take it personally and failed.

Sculpture By Lia Fadiman