northern star

words by SARAH PRIETO

I would follow you across the universe

I’d make a map of stars and call the constellations ours

I would make the sun envious of how beautiful you are

I can build us a home on every planet starting with Mars

We’d drive cars on the rings of saturn and try to create our own patterns

I’d make new rules

Pluto and us wouldn’t be left to rust

We can be Hades and Persephone without all the fuss

I would try to make earth a little less urgent

We can exchange riding bikes for asteroids

Maybe we’ll find R2D2 and build more androids

We can find Darth Vader and fight him like he’s the final boss

Lets travel to Neptune but survive the frost

Maybe we can try to find heaven just to say we crossed

I can make sure we never get lost no matter what the cost

We’d become like the Gods and defy all the odds

I would follow you across the universe

But I would like to be your northern star

wordsbyELIJAHBENSON

“Ok you just turn the knob and— see? Not too bad now is it.”

Jonathan stared down at the knob on the door, in his hand, in disbelief, then, through the door at his tiny apartment. A small pad sitting on the part of the doorknob, where a lock would normally be read: “Jonathan’s Place.” Jonathan had tapped it in as a joke, before sticking the doorknob to the door in front of him as previously instructed.

“This, can't, Troy, what the hell?” Jonathan tried to wrap his head around what was happening for a brief moment and decided to take a deep breath and let Troy describe why a barn in the middle of rural Montana could open up to Jonathan’s apartment in downtown Seattle.

“I knew you were well off, but damn man, Seattle? Anyways, this is exactly what I wanted to show you! Pretty cool isn’t it, try Osaka or London next; if you aren’t convinced that is.” Troy, incredibly pleased with himself, leaned against the tin siding faintly illuminated by the running lights of his truck.

“How did you do this,” Jonathan asked carefully as he closed the door, and pulled free the doorknob he had been holding a couple of inches above the one that was already set into the door.

“Ok I know a guy who knows a guy, who worked in that lab awhile back where they figured out the micro-scale space folding or whatever. I’m not the expert here, but I did get my hands on some toy they’ve been working on as a pet project for the last, say, thirty years?”

“It’s a wormhole,” Jonathan nodded, fiddling with the small pad as he tried to draw from his memory how to draw the characters for Osaka.

“Yeah that, they also said don’t try to type in anything that doesn’t actually exist; because it gets weird. They’re still working on that, but it's yours – free of charge,” Troy gave Jonathan a solid pat on the back with a satisfied grin.

“You’re, just giving this to me, I’m still trying to wrap my head around,” Jonathan just got talking as he stared at the door, scrutinizing the characters he had written as a triple check before shrugging and sticking it once more to the mandoor in front of him.

“Man, you ask a lot of questions for a guy who’s getting a gift. Call us even now — you’ve saved my life a couple of times whether you’ve realized it or not.” laughing, Troy gestured to the truck, “Let’s get back to the motel, I don’t want to find out what kind of rifle whoever lives around here is packing.”

Troy turned around, and heard the door open once more.

“Hey man, I know you’re excited to try it but,” Troy’s voice trailed off as he turned around. Jonathan stepped through the door to Osaka, but something was off about the destination on the other side. He had been to Osaka before but it didn’t quite look like what was waiting. Did he input the characters wrong?

“I’ll meet you there, I remember the address,” Jonathan said, looking around in awe as he stepped through the door, unknowingly into what Troy could only see as an uncanny distortion.

“Oh, not good, Jonathan wait–” but there was no chance to finish as the door shut, the knob following Jonathan beyond the threshold.

Troy, dumbfounded as he stood and stared at the gray metal door, held a hand to his head as he tried to steady his breathing. Praying his friend would be able to return safely.