Lonicera

Lonicera: 2017 Flash Fiction Chapbook Anthology

Copyright Š 2017 Pittsburgh CAPA 6-12, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania The copyright to individual stories remains the property of each author.

Printed in the United States of America First Edition Printed January 2017 Designed by Emily Nagin Reproduction in any form by any means without specific written permission from the individual authors is prohibited.

For copies or inquiries: Pittsburgh CAPA 6-12 Mara Cregan, Literary Arts Chair 111 Ninth Street Pittsburgh, PA 15222 mcregan1@pghboe.net (412) 529 6131 (phone) Melissa Pearlman, Principal

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I’m fourteen. I’m a wind from nowhere.

I can break your heart.

—Ai, “The Kid”

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Table of Contents Editor’s Note……………………………………………………………………………..5 History/Place 1. Isabella Victoria, Red Like An Ember…………………………………………….7 2. Ryan Andrews, Drowning Delight…………………………………………….…26 3. Hope Schall-Buchanan, A People’s History of Talontown…………………….46 4. Ciara Sing, many thousand gone………………………………………………..72 Family/Relationships 5. Chelsea Lewis, Songs from the Brownstone…………………………………..89 6. Serena Zets, A Book of Things You Won’t Tell Your Mother or Father…….119 7. Caden Molin, The Boy Who Never Cries……………………………………..141 8. Liv Benning, Flowers in Coffee Pots…………………………………………..164 9. Suhail Gharaibeh, a laying on of hands……………………………………….185 10. Chyna McClendon, Sustenance for the Soul…………………………………209 11. Pay Kish, Love Always………………………………………………………….229 12. Dominique Green, The Claddagh Ring………………………………………..247 13. Weston Custer, Pennsylvanian Hunger…………………………………….…269 The Body 14. Jessica Kunkel, Sick………………………………………………………….…288 15. Maya Frizzell, The Human Connection is a Deadly Thing………………..…304 16. Veronika Gillespe, Extrinsic…………………………………………………….319 Loss 17. Noor El-Dehaibi, Challenger Deep…………………………………………….337 18. Maisha Baton-Stawson, Famous Last Words………………………………..356 19. Will Thayer, Climate Change in the Time of God Fearing Christians………373

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Editor’s Note We began Fiction 3 with the goal of producing individual collections of linked flash fiction. This was no small task. It involved a great deal of drafting and revising. And although flash pieces are short (typically between 250-1,000 words), flash is not an easy form to master. For one thing, no one really knows what it is, where the border between a short short story and a prose poem lies. Flash combines the structural elements of fiction—character, setting, conflict—with the often surreal vividness of poetry. A flash piece can contain a full story arc or focus in on one bright, unforgettable moment.

This mutability is both exciting and challenging.

Before they began composing their chapbooks, each writer was asked to propose an “anchoring concept,” a character, setting, or theme which would unify their story collection. The only requirement was that the anchoring concept be something the writer cared about deeply. The list of anchoring concepts was diverse, ranging from heavy metal, to immigration, to chronic illness, to apocalypse, yet as the chapbooks began to develop, it became clear that the same emotional currents ran through each. In one way or another, all of the chapbooks dealt with the weight of history, whether global, national, or familial. Loss was also a common thread: loss of homeland, of bodily autonomy, of loved ones. But the themes of love and loyalty, the ways different communities show up for and protect each other, were the most evident and moving. Without any formal planning or coordination, the students in Fiction 3 produced an elegant, unified flash fiction anthology.

“Lonicera” is the scientific name for “honeysuckle.” Honeysuckle can thrive almost anywhere, and wherever it is found, it brings unexpected sweetness. I can’t think of a more fitting image to link these collections. Each chapbook contains a hidden honeysuckle. As you read, keep an eye out.

Emily Nagin

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History/Place

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Red Like An Ember

by Isabella Victoria

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For Oma and Granddad

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Table of Contents 1. The Iara 2. February 8th 3. Angel 4. Fire 5. Facts and Figures 6. Living Colors 7. Outlaws 8. Sombra

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The Iara

My mama says that her mama told her that her mama’s great-grandma is the Iara. I think about this as I watch float after float pass me by. The one that catches my eye is shaped like a serpent and it makes me want to learn how to swim. The blue and green of its bejeweled scales glitter in my eyes and I can almost feel the feathers surrounding it tickle my cheeks like the tips of my hair in wind.

The Iara was a strong warrior, my mama told me. She was kind to everyone too, except for her brothers. Mama says her brothers didn’t deserve the kindness though, she says that they were jealous. My grandma says that a true lady should be kind no matter what. I try to be. I really do. Tonight I am watching floats pass by and a boy about my age, obviously a tourist, who is recording every second of Carnival on his phone, has pushed his way right in front of me. Grandma always tells me to let tourists have their moment, that I get to see this every year and this could be once in a lifetime for them. I bite my lip until I have bitten all the chapped off and stand on my toes to try to see over him until I can’t feel them anymore. I can’t always be kind like Grandma tells me to; I can’t just “let him have his moment.” I tell the tourist boy that he is blocking my view and that he really doesn’t need to be recording this anyway. His eyes grow wide, he mumbles “Sorry,” and then rushes back to find his parents.

The Iara killed her brothers after they attempted to kill her in her sleep. Mama says she did the right thing, that you can’t let anyone push you around. Grandma agrees with the Iara’s father who had her thrown into a river and expected her to drown.

I don’t think Grandma would want anyone to drown exactly, but she thinks that it is im-

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portant to teach sinners a lesson, so that they can start paving their way to forgiveness.

As I stand here watching the samba dancers shake in front of elaborate floats, I can feel the elbow of the tall man standing next to me digging into my ribs. He throws his arms up in excitement every time a new float rolls across the road and every time, he brings his arms down right into my ribs. I ask him to stop three times; he looks down at me in disgust. When the next dancers shuffle by I jump up and down in excitement and “accidentally” land on his big toe.

The Iara didn’t drown like her father had planned: the fish at the bottom of the lake transformed her into a half fish-half person. Mama’s cheeks light up when she tells this part. She loves telling me about the way that the Iara tricks people into coming into the water. Once men fall for the Iara she catches them and eats them. She thinks it’s what they deserve after the way they treated her. Grandma tells me that the Iara treats the men well at the bottom of the lake. I like to think that she does both.

Once when I was little, six or seven, my Mama and Grandma took me to the lake.

While they weren’t looking I jumped in because it was so hot and there was no breeze. I can’t swim now and couldn’t then either. Mama says she looked over and saw me struggling in the lake. She said she could see my dark hair under the water. Grandma tells me she was taking off her shoes and was going to jump in to save me when all of a sudden something pushed me to the shore where I could grab onto a branch. Mama tells me that she swears she saw a scaly fin flap underneath a tiny ripple. And when we get to this part of the story Grandma tells me that Mama is a drama queen.

I remember being saved. At least, I think I do. I’m not sure if it’s a real memory or if it’s just on repeat in my head because Mama and Grandma love telling the story.

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When I close my eyes, before I go to sleep, I can picture being surrounded by long seaweed like hair. I feel familiar chills in my spine like wet yet comforting hands are grabbing my waist.

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February 8

I can’t seem to close my eyes. I got to Rio yesterday and my eyes have been peeled ever since. The second Sambadrome Parade is today and I can’t wait to be standing on the side of a road, seeing the first float roll past. I have always loved parades. As a little kid I would march in our neighborhood parade every year, the light up shoes that I refused to give up sparkling brightly against the dark pavement. I don’t know what it was that made me so happy in parades: whether it was the fact that my dad told me never to walk in the streets, so when I marched in the parade, right down the middle of the street, I felt like the coolest kid to ever walk the planet, or if it was simply all the free candy I got that Mom usually never let me have.

As long as I can remember my parents have been separated. They were always too lazy to actually go through all the paperwork to get an official divorce. When I was little, my stuffed animals told me that my parents loved each other too much to be separated like that forever. But each time a family holiday came around there would be fighting. At first they would attempt to celebrate with me so we’d all be together. But then Mom would end up slamming a door and sitting in a room with her sisters. Dad would chuckle and shake his head. He crunched on popcorn loudly like it was no big deal. He would stretch his arms around the couch with a beer in his left hand and the T.V. remote in his right.

They knew that being together was important for me. I slept with all my stuffed animals on my bed because I didn’t want any of them to feel lonely or left out. I mixed cream cheese and peanut butter and spread it on crackers because I couldn’t have ei-

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ther thinking that I liked it less than the other. I think it was these kinds of things that made my parents feel like they had to continue to have some kind of relationship.

Standing on the side of the road yesterday with complete strangers, who were happy and excited to see such an important celebration being performed on the street right in front of them, made me realize that being together is still important to me. It’s worth it to travel 3,555 miles from home to Rio if it means I get to be apart of something like this. From my light up sneakers to now, parades have always meant something important to me. They give me something that nothing else ever has.

I want to call my mom and tell her that I am sorry that I won’t be home for Easter.

I want to tell her that I am sorry for missing Christmas every year since I started college.

I want to ask her how Dad is, if she’s talked to him. Maybe my stuffed animals were right.

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Angel

My mom wants me to enjoy going to church. When I sing she points to the corners of her mouth, signaling that she wants me to smile. My sister loves it. Her eyes shine like crystals as she stares at stain glass windows. She is only eleven and is growing up to be the angel she is named after.

It is Lent. Lent makes me feel like the world is ending. On Ash Wednesday my head was crossed with ashes. I wanted to wash them off. We give up meat and dessert and we don’t say “Hallelujah.”

I wear pants to church. It is a compromise Mom made with me. She says that I can wear what I want “within reason” if I cooperate. My sister wears fancy dresses with matching shoes and hair bows. I feel out of place. I only wear them so that Mom doesn’t think that she’s right.

When I walk into church on the Second Sunday of Lent everyone is quiet. I feel like I am breathing too loudly. I hold my breath for thirty seconds, and then let all the air out of my chest in one silent release. My sister shakes hands with familiar strangers who sit in the pews in front of us and behind us. I shake her hand and my mom’s and sit down. I watch as my sister in her purple dress clicks out of our pew and over to where some of her friends are. The seat cushion underneath me slides out of place.

During the sermon I pick at my nails and peel off the last traces of polish from weeks ago. As I watch the pieces fall and land in a dusting on my shoes, my sister sits with her legs crossed and eyes wide. She is patient without thinking about it, calm without reminding herself to be. When the sermon is over she always puts her hands to-

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gether like she is going to clap, but then remembers she isn’t supposed to. I am mad at her because she is so good at being good. I am mad at her because church is boring. I am mad at her because when we pray before dinner she is always the one who says, “Shall we pray?”

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Fire It was a summer of fires and shark attacks.

–David Brooks, “Blue” It is a week of ashes and dancing. New people every day for two weeks. Each time I walk down the streets a new roadblock is up. The float we are building is coming together slowly, but each day we build a new feather.

It is one of the biggest ones I have ever worked on. There will be samba dancers on top of it and all around. Its blue beak stabs the black night sky, underneath is a patch of red that stands out from the rest of the silver and white bird.

Orange dances and swishes around the bottom of the float in tune with the dancers that we watch practice at lunch breaks. They look like sparks setting the bird on fire; white feathers like the tips of hot flames. I can picture the moon behind it shining like a spotlight.

It will fly down the road with a green skirt trailing underneath it, a skirt that tornadoes as dancers move back and forth. As we work to build it, I picture the way every one will stare in amazement. Big eyes, wet with tears, will follow its long neck as it passes. I picture the way the bird will appear to make eye contact with everyone watching.

It was a week of ashes and dancing. It was a week of building. It was a week of fire sprouting up and swirling through my eyes. It was a week of celebration.

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Facts and Figures

He never understood what Carnival was. His mom would tell him stories and explain Lent and Ash Wednesday, but they didn’t make sense. They didn’t seem real He needed everything to be proven. He thought of the tales his mom told him as just that: stories. He needed facts and numbers and written proof. The Bible didn’t mean anything to him. It seemed just like a book of fairy tales.

His grandma made him copy down the Psalms with a pen in a journal. He had to write one a day and had to read one Gospel story a day. His brother asked him why he didn’t believe in it. He said why should he, when nothing seemed to be working out?

His dad was a minister. The family was at church almost every day of the week and on Sundays they were there for most of the day. This was until his dad got sick.

First, he couldn’t make his way up the three stairs to the church platform. Then he started having to sit in a wheelchair and push himself around.

The rest of the family brought communion home to his father and his mom learned how to preform the service. His dad said she did it wrong, but she was patient. She kept trying. She read books and asked the interim minister how to do it.

These were the facts for him. There was nothing he could do but move through his days slowly. He never believed that anything would change for their family and it didn’t.

He fell asleep one night with his mom’s wet eyes burned into his brain. He woke up with a newfound belief. He believed because he saw. He saw his dad in a dream and his dad was happier than he been in years. He looked younger and cleaner and fresher.

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With the image of his father in mind, he copied down his daily Psalms peacefully.

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Living Colors I am standing on the side of a street lit only by sparkles. The long hair on the arms of the person next to me makes my skin tingle. My mom is standing next to me and she has her hand pressed to my forehead. She says that I am burning up. She pours cold water from her water bottle onto her hand and presses it on my hand. A few droplets fall and become tangled with my eyelashes. I am ten years old and I am much too old for naps, but as my mom’s gentle fingers march calmly across my arm I want to doze off.

I stay awake only because my mom is sliding her hand up and down my back. I feel light pink paint slip down my back in time with her fingers. I open my eyes and realize that I don’t only feel light pink. Quickly I turn my head to see that drops of the color from my pink shirt are dancing around my hips. I jump abruptly, pulling away from my mom’s comforting hands. My mom asks me what’s wrong and I don’t answer. I squeeze my eyes shut; I squeeze them so hard that my head hurts and then I open them, and look at the dark ground at my feet. Instead of a blank, empty street I see a large group of tiny black swirls. They run about my toes, back and forth, racing. I widen my eyes and look around. Then I blink and look around again. The green in my mom’s eyes is zigzagging and it’s making me dizzy.

“What’s wrong sweetie?”

The auburn of her hair swims towards me. I jerk backwards. I run out of the crowd until I am alone. I am ten years old and I am much too old to be scared, but I am.

Before long I hear my mom’s slow footsteps and feel her warm touch on my shoulder.

She asks me what’s wrong.

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“I need you to tell me sweetie,” she says. I can hear concern in her level voice. I know she is worried and I know I should tell her, but I can’t. I can’t put into words that the colors around me are suddenly…moving. I don’t want to worry her; after all, I am ten years old and can take care of myself. I tell Mom that my headache is worse and I feel nauseous. She asks if I need anything and I tell her I don’t.

Suddenly, families of color are bouncing around and toward me.

“Look at this confetti!” my mom cheers in excitement.

The red little strips that are fluttering to the ground burst in my eyes. The blue slithers back and forth. But, the colors only stay in the shape they’ve always been in.

They don’t blend. It’s like the colors are trapped.

Without thinking I pick up a yellow piece of confetti from the ground. Suddenly, I feel a little quiver between my fingers. I put the piece of confetti into my other hand and it scoots off and falls to the ground. I try to watch it as it falls, but I lose it quickly in the mash of movement. I regret letting it go, I hate how I just watched it fall and get lost. I catch piece and again, watch it fall to the color on the ground.

I walk with my mom back to where we will be able to better see the massive floats rolling down the street. The green and silver from a float designed as a serpent swish up into the air like smoke.

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Outlaws

When we dance in the streets together our bond is magnified and broadcast to the whole world. His steps, like attempts at a whisper, are graceful yet rushed. Mine are rabbits darting up and down a grassy hill. They race his. Our feet are tied together, twisted and knotted. We are wasps, flying around teasing, but never stinging.

We leave breadcrumbs so we can always find the way back to each other. They are stale crusts, nothing to anyone else. We kill time. We are flicking pieces of ourselves into the wind in hopes that they will find each other and bring us closer again. *** I am clumsy without you. I try to pick up my feet for myself now that you are older and gone. They only drag. Dad says that I’m not strong enough, that I need to do something else. You are going on to better things is what Dad tells me. He only talks to me when I’m in trouble. Come home. *** I am tripping over thin threads now. My shirts are in tatters. I only wear one anyway. Mom says I will never be as good as you were and that I should just quit. Dad says that’s what he’s been trying to get me to do for months. You said not to stop dancing.

You said you would write.

***

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One evening Dad left the house. He came back hours later. He looked down at the floor and said that he had gotten lost. He was lying. I knew it. Mom knew it. We are lost without you. You said you’d be my compass.

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Sombra The summer Tabby is nineteen and tired of being the girl whose college instructors forget her name – Kim Henderson, “Vaquera” When she is seventeen Luiza decides that she can’t be the girl who hides behind her own shadow. She is eighteen now and her shadow has burned away and charred in the licking flame of the spotlight. Her shadow has been flattened into the hot pavement and steam rolled by float after float after float. Luiza sees it in the reflection of silver sparkles stuck in her hair after Ash Wednesday. They stick to her fingers when she washes her hands and when she tries to pick them off they get stuck to other fingers.

Luiza’s shadow shakes with her hips that move smoothly while she dances.

Her eyelids are caked with her shadow and if she blinks for too long she says that someone will notice. She says that someone will be able to tell that she is dancing away from her mistakes. Someone from the crowds of thousands that watch her perform, someone with ashes on their forehead swept into the shape of a cross. She says that everyone will only see her as a tough honeysuckle stem that even the sharpest fingernail struggles to break. And that no one will be able to tell that she is trying, really trying to find the little bit of good, sweet honey that is in her.

Luiza says that she is ashamed of who she was at age seventeen. She crosses her cold face out in old pictures and replaces it with ones of herself in new costumes.

She wears a smile that zips across her face.

For a week at the end of February Luiza comes home tired, with excitement bulging in her cheeks and anticipation buzzing on the tip of her tongue. Luiza falls asleep with samba dance steps shivering like pins and needles in her toes. As she clos24

es her eyes, her shadow slips off her eyelids and gently lays itself like a blanket on top of her.

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Drowning Delight

by Ryan Andrews

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For Century 3 Mall May you live on forever

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Table of Contents 1.

Welcome

2.

I Should Sleep

3.

Flickering Lights

4.

Flowing Soil

5.

Box Full of Nothing

6.

Here

7.

A Steal

8.

It Was An Accident


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Welcome Many years ago, a large mall was built atop an old railroad company yard. This was the first mall of its kind, with sunlight shining through the ceiling. The sunlight seemed to wake up the mall every morning. Everyone in the growing town had been at the opening ceremonies. Even people from other towns came along. They all wanted to see what was expected to be the best shopping plaza around. A young businesswoman, native to the community, stood in the center of the mall on opening day.

“Welcome, everyone. Today is a great day. It is a day filled with joy and excitement for the town. I now announce that The Hills is open. Join me in welcoming our brand new shops and business owners into this great community.”

The woman stood, looking at everyone until they clapped for a couple of seconds. She then stepped down off the stage, and made her way around to other business people. They shook hands, and talked louder than they had to. Their voices echoed throughout the mall. They were delighted with the opening of this grand shopping center. They thought it was a place for community involvement, for growth. Shoppers shifted from one end of the mall to the other, stomping on the fresh carpet, making it dirtier than it was at sunrise.

“They just don’t care,” the woman thought to herself. To all her hard work in making this property look fabulous, these people acted savagely. Trash overflowed the garbage cans, stains were already forming on the carpet. Customers even tried stealing from many independent local businesses. Things were getting bad before they had a chance to get good. The businesswoman took mental note of this, and wondered if it was her fault.

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Some years later, this same woman became known to property investors, owners, agents, everyone involved. She began to gain more and more properties, and with each new one, a part of her left The Hills. The Hills had added security, deterred the bus from stopping on mall property, and even made sure each store had a sensor attached to every piece of merchandise. Alarms and buzzers would still ring on occasion. But The Hills’ condition began to decline. With each new grand opening of another property, The Hills had gained a problem. Leaks began to drip onto the worn carpet. Facilities began to fall in disrepair. Elevators and escalators ran slower and slower until they completely stopped working. Business after business began to vacate the mall.

The businesswoman had now gained fifteen properties across the country. When she wasn’t flying to appear at the forefront of a grand opening, she was attending an event at a larger, more important location, filled with important happenings and important people. Important people who would get her further than she already was in life.

Professionals stood on a stage in an important city.

“You all are looking at our new executive district manager,” a hefty man said into a wireless microphone. His tie was longer than the businesswoman’s arm. She shook everyone’s hand on the stage. This event was televised, and a man at The Hills was watching it in the back of his nail shop.

“I remember meeting her at the school one day. She sure seemed to like it here,” the nail stylist thought to himself.

The Hills was continuing to fall apart. The news stations would never dare give them any positive air time, they would only show the vibrant new properties that came into existence. Any broadcast would be negative—about stealing, violence, etc. The

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businesswoman made it back on Thanksgiving Day to the town where The Hills was located. She rushed into the small red brick house, and apologized for being late. “I was so busy with work, I just haven’t had time to let myself think, let alone get here in time for dinner,” she explained to her family. Her family looked depressed.

“Have you seen The Hills lately?” her brother asked her.

“Can we not talk about The Hills?” she responded. “Many of my other properties are so much better.”

The following day, her heels thumped on the thin carpet. Guilt tripped her. She browsed the empty storefronts, remembering everything that used to be here. Her face fell with sadness, wondering why she had let the mall go down as well. She walked into the Nail Shop, one of the few remaining tenants.

“I’m surprised you still remember we exist down here!” said the nail stylist. “It’s like you forgot we were your first, that we were your home.” The nail stylist pushed the businesswoman out of his shop and closed the security gates, locking them for the night.

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I Should Sleep No one does anything here.

I shouldn’t have to stay every night until midnight, and I shouldn’t be keeping myself up worrying about whether or not my employees did what they get paid to do. I shouldn’t be kept up thinking about a way to catch whoever is stealing money from the drawer… every night. There are no cameras; there is no way I can prove anything.

I definitely should not have my whole brain occupied by the job I get paid under ten dollars an hour to perform for a person who makes hundreds of millions. I didn’t make enough to-go cups full of dressing. What if we have a lunch rush tomorrow? It will be a Thursday. I only have one full bin of Italian. There’s room for another. You can never have enough dressing. This one lady who works at Bath and Body Works asks for five dressings every time she gets a full size house salad with chicken and double croutons to go. She gets five of them. I don’t think she even uses them, but here I am at one thirty in the morning wondering if I can be prepared enough for the rush that will most likely not occur tomorrow afternoon.

Last week a district manager came in to observe and my store got failing scores.

Failing scores. My store. I shouldn’t be failing, I’ve managed the store for over three years; we failed the last three inspections. What if I had been there while this happened.

Would we have passed? Would people have acted differently?

My employees are sweet to me, but I can’t fathom what they are apparently like when I am not present. I teach and reteach aspects of the job. They know they can come to me anytime for guidance on anything—job related or not. Jasmine just lost a mother—in the same year she lost her father. She talked about where she wanted to go,

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who she was going to live with, all while crafting a blueberry smoothie. I’ve known Jasmine for quite some time, and I offered the spare bedroom in my house. She respectfully declined, saying that she would stay with her grandma. That’s fine. I was just trying to help.

I want to make a difference in young people’s lives. I have some of the power to shape them into caring and compassionate adults. I just don’t know how to get them to listen to me when I am not physically over their shoulders. I get blamed for their laziness and mistakes. It’s like they want me to get in trouble. I’m not well liked, I can feel the anger and sighs when staff members see my name next to theirs on the schedule. They think they’re on death row.

Half the time when this happens they simply will not show up. I can’t fire them.

No one is applying, and it would most likely be considered my own fault if we somehow don’t have enough employees. I wasn’t recruiting hard enough. I’m not nice enough.

Have these people ever thought that teenagers these day are lazy? I have never met a more lazy group of people in my entire life. I literally check all the job apps everyday, and I barely ever have anyone. When I do, they aren’t old enough, or they can only work one day a week, it’s always something. I should get to bed. I have less than six hours until I have to be back at the store. I just can’t wait.

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Flickering Lights And that’s what it did.

—“The School” by Donald Barthelme Lindsey walked into Macy’s for an interview. Ms. Leonard, the woman interviewing her, was sitting in the back office waiting. Lindsey walked through a set of glass doors, making her way to the Customer Service desk. As soon as Lindsey approached the desk, her phone powered off, forcing her to look at the associate.

“How can I help you?” Jackie, the associate, said, as a strip of fluorescent lights flickered.

“I’m, um, here for an interview with Ms. Leonard. She told me to be here by five, so here I am,” Lindsey said, flustered.

“Don’t worry about the lights. Weird things are always happening around here.

But anyway, about the interview, it’s probably in the back office. I think Ms. Leonard is back there. Here I’ll show you.”

Jackie walked Lindsey to the back room. Lindsey sat down and an arm on the wooden chair snapped off. Lindsey apologized to Jackie up and down.

“Honey, if you only knew.” Jackie closed the door and jolted back to her register in designer purses, where she saw a customer wandering like a shirt without its hanger.

Ms. Leonard walked in holding a doorknob.

“The doorknob fell off, that’s why it’s in my hand. It just fell right off. Anyway, I’m Ms. Leonard. Great to meet you, Lindsey. You sound very promising, and we’d love to have you aboard for our holiday staff!” Lindsey thought that this would be great. She would finally have a job after searching endlessly. She needed things normal young adults need—a used car, gas for that used car, air fresheners for that used car.

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“Tell me about yourself. Just a quick snippet. Let me get to know you!” Ms. Leonard said cheerfully, lighting up the dim room.

“I feel I’d be a great salesperson. I’m very nice, I’d like to think, and I’m very kind, and very helpful. I’m very hardworking; I’m very available. I’m—” “That’s great! Just what we’re looking for, actually. If you could just sign these papers for me, you can start Monday. I’ll put you on the schedule for Monday.”

Lindsey and Ms. Leonard shook hands.

“You don’t have any more questions for me or anything? Anything else I should know?”

“Just don’t be too thrown off by things here.”

On her way out, Lindsey stepped on a piece of tile flooring, and it came up with her shoe. Walking to the shelves of socks, she picked one pair and the whole shelf fell down. Each pair of the varieties fell onto the floor. Lindsey looked around, wondering if anyone else saw her. She was safe. Lindsey decided to exit the store, and returned with her employee discount on Monday. She pushed open the glass door, shattering it on her way out.

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Flowing Soil Timmy and his girlfriend Nicole were walking through The Hills on a Saturday night in December. They had expected it to be more busy than it was. They sped through the mall, reaching the end in a little over an hour. After they completed their shopping, they decided to sit by the fountain until their bus came.

“I love this fountain. It’s one of the only ones left,” Timmy said.

“Yeah, I know. It’s a shame,” Nicole replied.

“These are some of the best qualities of malls. At least I think so.”

After ten minutes of sitting by the fountain, watching water spew to the second level and throwing every penny in Timmy’s wallet into the basin, the couple strolled to the opposite end of the mall. They came across an older fountain on the most deserted side. It had the same musty, and stormy blue tiles as the one in the center, but the water poured out of the wall. This fountain was dry, however. It looked like it had been for several years. The couple sat on the ledge, smelling the eroded soil that filled the basin, blinded by the reflection of the moon on the plastic plants around the lip.

“They should have real plants here. I propose a honeysuckle bush,” Nicole said.

“And why’s that?”

“Because. The food court barely has any options. And a honeysuckle plant would give me sweet snacks every time I—we, sit here.”

“Don’t you think it would die?” Timmy asked.

“I didn’t think about that. If only water from a previous fountain were around to keep it alive.”

“Yeah, then maybe it could take over this mall, give it some purpose.”

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“I’m with you there.” Nicole shifted her bones to lie against Timmy’s side. She brushed against him, warming the tiles they sat on. Nicole tore a plastic leaf off of an artificial bush. “If only we could eat these, we wouldn’t have to leave…”

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Box Full of Nothing

The Hills shopping mall is never the first choice when shoppers venture out of their homes. Consumers tend to go to smaller strip malls, or larger, more well kept shopping venues. As this trend carries on throughout the years, The Hills sees decreases in mall foot traffic. They see lower sales, which lead to fewer amounts of tenants occupying the once grand mall. Certain businesses will never leave. They built their business parallel to the original success of The Hills. They owe it to the mall to stay until it closes. They must have bragging rights after it’s all over. They started with The Hills.

They’re ending with The Hills.

These hardworking people feel they have a legacy to uphold, some kind of greatness that exists within them. They all have promises in their cash registers to stay in this mall until they get forced out. Their storerooms are filled with common sense, screaming at them to just move on. Inside every clothes rack and price tag is a sense of hope and optimism pleading for them to stay. Their brains are fully consumed with carrying on the American Dream that doesn’t exist within these five walls, since The Hills is in the shape of a pentagon.

Joey says his pizza shop is doing fine, and that he will renew the lease until one isn’t presented to him. Roxanne’s homemade salsa and dips will always a staple in The Hills. Martha just can’t find anything better to do with her time other than run a homemade cell phone case kiosk.

The fountain in the center of the mall spews water toward the sun, but it gets lower and lower each day. The water isn’t clear anymore. Pennies have been submerged for years. Kids pick out the quarters when they want a gumball. An elevator in 38

the center of the mall opens to the upper level, with no one inside. Not a soul is around the vicinity of the elevator, and the door closes. The down arrow illuminates, since that is the only way it can go. It reaches the lower level, and remains closed.

*This title was drawn from Samantha Murray’s “Boxes and Lockets and Clocks” published on Flash Fiction Online.

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Here Tyler struts from the kitchen to the front counter, seeing people, real people, coming through the doors of The Hills. He is slightly shocked. Tyler likes when the mall isn’t busy. He adores not having to make pizzas all day. He thinks it’s a great gig, getting paid ten dollars an hour to sit around with his Game Boy. A family of six approaches, baffled that no pizza has been prepared. Tyler stands up from his seat on the pumpkin-orange crates topped with cardboard from box of pepperoni.

“Hey guys.”

“It looks like you don’t have a damn thing!” says the father.

“Yeah, I’ll have to make things fresh. Pizza would be about ten minutes.”

The entire family scowls. “Well I guess we have no choice then,” they say, staring around the vacant food court. “We want a large pizza, actually, give us a number four combo. An extra large cheese pizza, four drinks, and breadsticks. And two water cups.”

“But I don’t want water,” one of the children says abruptly. The father points strictly at the child, glaring at his four foot frame.

“Is that all for you today sir?” Tyler quickly spits out.

“That should do it.” The two exchange money that looks like it was found under the mall’s crusty carpet.

“Thanks. It will just be 10 minutes.” Tyler hands over four regular soda cups along with two clear ones. He knows they are going to fill them with soda. The child jogs to the soda machine, pushes his clear up against the Dr. Pepper lever, attempting to bubble

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his cup to the brim. The machine makes a loud noise, and the Dr. Pepper turns from brown to white.

I can’t tell him that the Dr. Pepper is broken because I’m supposed to be drinking water, the boy thinks. He tells his mother instead.

“It probably ran out honey,” the mother says, with a disappointed look on her face. She glances around and notices they are the only ones here.

Twenty minutes passes, and the Larson family is still without food. They are lost in reminiscing about their memories shared within the mall’s cracking granite.

“Man, it’s been like a half an hour where’s the food?” Tyler checks the oven, which has begun to smoke.

“You did not burn it. You’re kidding.”

The pizza is charcoal, good for burning. Baked-on cheese smell fills the food court, displeasing the family. The father throws a container of straws into the air and knocks down two chairs. Tyler stares, holding the pan of darkness.

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A Steal I walked with my older brother, Ricky, to the corner store. Ricky always tells me not to call it that, because the store is actually inside the mall, so “it’s more like a convenience store.” Anyway, I hated being in Bath and Body Works with my mom. Her and all the girls in my class always have their sanitizers, soaps, lotions, everything. My mom must have become obsessed with this store before I was born, because there’s never been a time when our whole house wasn’t decked out in a seasonal fragrance. My favorite is Winter’s Snow. The hand sanitizer is easy to steal. Sometimes I tell my mom I’ll carry her bag when she’s finished, and plop one in. The only problem with my mom is that she goes into Bath and Body Works everyday. They haven’t had any suspicions yet. I always go with her to get a chance to get out of the house. Everyday, they have posters advertising a different sale. “They’re great steals,” my mom always says. She sounded like stained stainless steel elevator doors opening whenever she got to talk about her favorite store. “And they’re never out of my favorites, because no one shops here!” she boasted.

She gave Ricky and me two dollars each, allowing us to leave Bath and Body Works and shop for ourselves. I never thought to save my two dollars everyday so that I could eventually buy something other than candy, so we walked to the corner store.

Ricky always thought he was the boss of me because he was older, but I didn’t let him boss me around. He said not to touch anything unless I knew I was going to buy it, but I didn’t listen. I ran off to the back of the store where all the good candy is. I wanted a pack of bubble gum and an orange soda, but each were over a dollar. I knew I wouldn’t have enough money because I passed first grade math; I knew that one dollar and one

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dollar and 29 cents added up to be over two dollars. The bubble gum was smaller, so I slipped it into my coat pocket, making sure no one had seen, especially Ricky. We went to the counter to pay. I handed over my orange soda and my two dollars.

“Is that all?” the man asked me. I got nervous, wondering if he had seen me slip the bubble gum into my pocket. I thought I had been so slick. I’ve never been caught before.

“Yes.” I started to sweat. He gave me my change, continuing to awkwardly smile at my brother and I. Ricky paid, with plenty of change to spare. I’m sure he has tons of money sitting at home in his piggy bank. He’s probably saving up for another one.

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It Was An Accident We had been busy all day. It was the Saturday before Christmas, and the mall was as packed as it would ever be. I had three call offs on an already bare-boned staff.

We only had the capacity to have four registers open on one of the busiest shopping days of the year. Our general manager was on vacation, and he’d be coincidentally returning tomorrow, so he wouldn’t have to help us with any of the complicated holiday thrills of retail—restocking, irate customers, and closing at midnight.

Recently, I had been threatened by upper-level management to keep things in tip top shape. We were due for a mystery shopper any day now, and the score we get has a huge effect on how we’re viewed throughout the corporation. Corporate people love Sandra, our mystery shopper. It’s the same lady each time, but she will be dressed in different disguises. If she doesn’t like you, you will be terminated, regardless of how long you’ve been there. I once saw a manager that had been with us for twenty years get terminated because she didn’t drop everything she was doing to follow an order Sandra gave her.

It was past midnight, and we were closed. We still had quite a long line, but I hadn’t even counted a single cash drawer. I wasn’t going to get home until at least one in the morning, at the earliest. We were supposed to make the store look perfect for the next day, but I was too tired. I didn’t make sure that the store was swept. I didn’t make sure each shelf was appropriately stocked. I didn’t even count every nickel and dime.

On my way out, just before locking up, Sandra walked through the door. It was 1:35 AM. “I’ll lock up for you honey,” she said, flinging her badge in my face.

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I was frightened. Sandra would report my store to corporate. She would take pictures; she would write paragraphs listing everything wrong, but would not help me recruit new staff. She would refuse to ever count a drawer. She would never hop on a register. Anything to make my life more complicated.

I know that Sandra is hired to be a snake, but she is way too good at her job. It’s not like I want to be fired. People have thrown merchandise at my head, aiming like I was a net, and a hanger was a basketball. I have taken care of a baby who was left in my store overnight. I have caught hundreds of thieves, about ten a month. Sometimes, it gets old. Variety and new things are amazing when they benefit you.

*Title drawn from “A Family Barbecue” by Louie Richmond, published on Flash Fiction Magazine Website.

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A People’s History of Talontown

by Hope Shall-Buchanan

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To Mr. Loskoch For teaching me everything I needed to know to write these stories.

And to Fidel Castro For struggling your whole life for the masses. Rest in Peace.

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Table of Contents 1. Introduction 2. The Bird Woman 3. The Black Suffragette 4. The Sawmill Scab 5. The Neighborhood 6. “His Sharp Accountant’s Pencil” 7. Eva’s Words 8. “From the First His Hands Fascinated”

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Introduction This is the five-centuries-long story of a fictional American city called Talontown.

It is told through the lives of ordinary people, with the purpose of showing that there is no typical American experience. However, each character feels the oppression of their respective societies and has to live with it, or fight it off.

Talontown is meant to capture the history of America and show that it is shaped by struggles that we are never truly free of.

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1650 The Bird-Woman

This is one of those stories you hear all the time growing up—in the schoolyard, at your friend’s slumber party, or at lunch, and you kind of know the plot, but the details often conflict depending on who’s telling it. But unlike most of those stories, it was almost always told by girls. Every school and summer camp had their own version, but it usually followed this plot: In the Puritan village that would come to be known as Talontown, there lived a young woman. She, like most other women of her age, was pushed into marriage. Her family chose a suitor for her, a man from a wealthy family of politicians.

The woman appeared happy. She was married to a high-ranking member of the Church, and lived in a far more comfortable house than anyone else in her family did.

She birthed one child, then another, and raised them herself while her husband was busy in the Church. Her oldest child, a daughter, was the apple of her eye, and soon she became a beautiful young woman, old enough to be married off herself. The father came home one night with a young man he had met at the church.

“He’ll be perfect for you,” he said to his daughter. “He is highly committed to studying the words of God, and seeks a young woman to share His love with.”

The young man spent many nights with the family, getting to know his future bride, and impressing her father still more. Almost immediately after the wedding, the young man began to prepare to leave their town for an expedition far North. He spoke of

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a prophecy he had found in the Bible, of a cache of all the wealth that had been stolen in history.

“If we can find the cache in the Northern mountains,” he told his wife, “both of our families will be the richest in the world!”

The girl was not entirely convinced, but agreed to go with him. The mother was sad to lose her daughter, but was swayed by his convictions. After all, he knew the Bible far better than she did.

Two years later, her daughter returned alone, claiming she had run away.

“We froze every night, and often went hungry,” she said. “I couldn’t stand it. I tried to convince him to give it up, but he wouldn’t listen.”

It was completely unheard of for a wife to desert her husband, and her father raged at her, calling her an atrocity and a deviant. This terrified her mother.

“Why should my daughter stay in such discomfort for such a far-fetched promise?” she asked. “If he hadn’t found the cache by now, what are the chances he ever will?”

But the father threatened to send the girl back up North. This was unbearable for both the mother and daughter, and they ran away into the forest to escape him.

The father went to the town square and rallied the other villagers to find his disobedient wife and daughter. They tracked the mother and daughter deep into the forest and surrounded them.

The wife was terrified. She and her daughter would be cruelly punished for trying to protect themselves. As the villagers surrounded them, the mother felt her stomach

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grow hot. The sensation spread throughout her body down to the tips of her fingers and nose.

Suddenly, her fingernails began to grow. They became razor-sharp talons,each half a foot long. Her nose lengthened and hardened into a cruel beak. She slashed through the air with her new weapons, scaring the villagers away from her daughter.

The bird-woman and her daughter vanished into the forest, and were never seen again. But the incident was seared into the town’s memory, and the town later came to be known as Talontown among its inhabitants, as a warning about the deadly weapons that lay under the surface of a seemingly agreeable woman.

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1890 The Black Suffragette

I walked out of the theater and into the street. The chilly November air cut through the thin fabric of my coat, and the cold words I had just been witness to cut through my mind again and again: Our sisters in the South deserve praise for their commitment to the preservation of their race. Only by achieving the vote for women can we ensure white supremacy.

Blacks already have their suffrage. It is now the task of white women to gain ours.

I was no woman to them. My grandparents had been chained in the fields that belonged to the white Southerners that the suffragists idolized, and they did nothing about it. Why did I think it would be any different now?

Then I remembered. It was because of my daughter, Lisa. We had been downtown, about a year ago, shopping. It was a glorious spring day, bright with the smell of honeysuckle. We had made a detour through Dimmesdale Park, where a debate for the mayoral election was taking place. Mayor Jonathan Weber was clearly in the lead, and it wasn’t hard to see why. He was charismatic, likable, and had treated Talontown with great care while in office. We had paused and stood listening to the debate for a while.

“My opponent here,” he said, “believes that too many resources are put into maintaining our public parks, that your tax money would be better spent paying the salaries of our police and county judges. But personally, I have pride in our parks. They are an intrinsic part of Talontown and make it a great city. How many idyllic weekends

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have you spent in Dimmesdale Park, for example, watching your children play on the merry-go-round?”

Here Lisa had beamed. She loved that merry-go-round, and spent nearly all of her allowance on it. She couldn’t go on unless there were no white children on it, and when we went to the park, it killed her whenever she couldn’t go. It was clear to her that the local elections would affect her, but I knew she would not be able to participate in them. It broke my heart, seeing her hopeful face as she listened to her Mayor.

So when the Suffragettes came to Talontown, I went naively to their meetings, hoping that they could guarantee my daughter the right to vote when she was old enough. But my daughter’s constitutional rights clearly were not on their agenda.

Lost in my thoughts, I came to the Omnibus station. A few other black women from the Lumber District had gathered there, huddling together against the cold. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a deep purple banner embroidered with gold thread. Somebody must have hung it up on the wall while I was in the meeting, because I hadn’t noticed it when I arrived this morning. It read: Talontown Federation of Colored Women First Meeting 1st of December Come to Achieve the Vote for Black Men and Black Women Alike!

Come to Improve the Lot of Black Women in Poverty!

I was suddenly overcome with emotion. We, who lay below the surface of society, barely getting ourselves and our children by? Why shouldn’t we organize to better our miserable lot in life?

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As the Omnibus pulled up to the station, a grin spread across my face. I imagined the possibilities that could come of organizing black women. Lisa and I had lived hand to mouth off of my wages from the sawmill since her father died. But with the support of a federation, my toil could easily pay for both of us. We could fight to become first-class citizens!

I mounted the Omnibus and paid my fare. The driver looked at me, disgruntled, then pointed to the back of the bus.

I sighed and moved to the back. There was much to be done before I was truly seen as an equal. But for once in my life, I believed it can be done. I smiled again as I imagined the look on Lisa’s face when I would tell her that I was going to fight for our suffrage – with our own movement.

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1910 The Sawmill Scab

December 18, 1910 I got a job today in the sawmill. It's not difficult work, but it's dark and there's a lot of sawdust in the air, so I have to tie my handkerchief around my mouth. The foreman doesn't seem to want anything to do with me. He just showed me how to feed the logs into the machines at the right angle, and how to make sure they're the right size when they come out, and left.

It's not like anything I've ever experienced, walking to the sawmill in the morning. I'm used to seeing the sun rise over the bare ground in Nevada; here it's fractured, shining in the cracks between the trees. The sawmill itself stretches along the border of Talontown's Lumber District, gnawing at the edge of the forest like a huge rodent and passing it out as wooden planks ready for construction. The only distasteful part of the walk to work is the picket lines. They've taken over all of the main streets to the sawmill, and when I went there to get a job, they yelled obscenities at me, spit at me. I took an alley on to way back so as to avoid the brunt of the strikers’ anger. There's whole families out on the picket lines – working men, their wives, old men and women, and little children who huddle together against the cold.

Fools. Fools the strikers are for letting their children go hungry because they would rather stand on the picket line than work. There are only so many jobs in the world.

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They should be grateful they don’t live in Nevada – I left my family there because there were no jobs. I miss my parents terribly, and my little sister Margaret. But they all depend on me to send them the money I make at the sawmill.

December 24th, 1910 I sent most of my first salary home today. I’m sore all over. It’s worst in the morning, walking to work. The foreman says that it’ll go away eventually, but it’s never been this bad, even when I worked in the mines in Nevada.

Talontown looked beautiful today, lightly dusted with snow. I watched the horses pulling the lumber in. They had to work twice as hard to move the logs over the icy ground, their sweat freezing in their coats and their breath forming white clouds around their heads. It isn’t much warmer in the sawmill – the only source of heat is the machines.

Mind you, you don’t notice the cold after a while, when you’re racing to keep up with them.

I urgently need a warmer pair of boots, but all the money I didn’t need for room and board I sent to my family – I couldn’t bear to send less.

It’s Christmas tomorrow. The feeling is unmistakable – the very air smells of Christmas.

The strikers are singing Christmas carols mingled with union songs, and there’s a potted Christmas tree every block or so that they’ve taken over. The other workers are all anticipating spending tomorrow with their families, and I only wish I could be with mine.

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It’s Margaret’s favorite holiday. She always makes me and both of our parents a little present. I wonder if she made one for me this year.

The strikers depress me. When I left the mill today, an old man walked a few steps in front of the picket line to yell at me.

“I’ve been working here fifty years!” he cried. “My son and all his grandchildren work in this mill because one wage isn’t enough for his family, and you dare steal what little he has!”

I couldn’t look at him. I know now that he and his family are suffering, but I need this job too. There’s nothing I can do to help his situation. Still, I can’t get the image of his lined, browbeaten face out of my mind.

January 3rd, 1911 The temperature has dropped dramatically since Christmas. What few winter clothes I can afford barely make a difference in the factory – there’s still no source of heat, and we workers are constantly at risk for frostbite. Men are always leaving the mill with frozen ears, noses, and fingers, and it’s only by luck that I haven’t joined them.

The old man on the picket line and what he said haunts me. When I cross the picket line now, I can’t help but imagine the children on it in the mill, inches away from the machine’s razor-sharp blades, trying to feed it pieces of wood that grown men struggle to lift.

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The strikers don’t sing anymore; they seem too cold. They huddle around little fires, under mounds of blankets. Even so, they seem to get frostbite at the same rate that we do.Yesterday I saw a little girl, no older than nine or ten, being treated for frostbite by the union’s doctor. The old man was there, watching anxiously. I’m convinced the girl is one of his grandchildren.

Two weeks ago I would have blamed him for dragging his kin out into the cold, but I can no longer delude myself that way. The sickening fact is that that girl was out there defending her own job.

She’s nearly the same age as Margaret. What if she had been Margaret, and I had been usurping her only means of existence every day that I crossed that picket line – forcing her to stay out in the cold?

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1945 The Neighborhood

What was it like growing up during World War Two? Let me see. . . We lived in an apartment downtown. It got cold in the winter sometimes, because the central heating wasn’t too reliable. It was better at first, because we had a wood stove, but my father made us give it to the war effort for scrap.

Why? Because he loved his country! Everyone was donating what they could – scrap metal, rubber, clothes. And if you didn’t, people would start to get suspicious.

Like how?

They would think that you didn’t care about who won the war. It started getting scary, seeing Hitler take over Europe. And Japan invading China.

Did people actually think you didn’t care?

They – they started thinking my father didn’t want America to win, because it had been a while since he’d made a donation.

But how could you think that? Why would he want Hitler to win?

Well, it wasn’t Hitler, exactly. It started after Pearl Harbor; people would come up to us and ask us which side we were on. So he donated our stove. He thought it would get the neighbors off our backs.

Did it?

Well, not really. A month or so after Pearl Harbor, my father lost his job, so we moved to California.

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Where in California?

Oh. . . it’s not really that important. You wouldn’t be interested.

Of course I’m interested, Grandpa. I love listening to you.

Well, we went to a. . . a neighborhood with a lot of other Japanese people. I was really young, so I don’t remember it very well. But I remember that it was very close-knit. The community built churches and organized boys-and-girls clubs, and we had our own newspaper.

Did you like it there?

God, I was just a kid, about six or seven. I think I did.

What about your father?

He. . . he made a lot of friends down there. He was very involved in the community. But he always said he wished he didn’t have to go. He said it was unfair that we couldn’t just stay in Talontown.

He didn’t have to leave.

We did. I mean, life was just getting too difficult down there.

But you didn’t have to leave just because the neighbors were talking. Who cares what they think? ...

Grandpa?

We had to leave! You wouldn’t understand unless you had been there! If you lived with us you would understand, but you didn’t, so don’t you pretend you know what it was like better than I do!

I’m sorry, Grandpa, I didn’t mean to upset you.

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I know, I. . . you’ll understand it better when you’re older.

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1980 His Sharp Accountant’s Pencil

I sat patiently in the hall, staring down at the floor. I could hear somebody walking up. They walked with a self-important air, trying to appear intimidating. Or rather, practicing trying to be intimidating. It wasn’t hard to spot the ones that relied entirely on appearances. They were quite common in the business world.

None of the other applicants appeared to notice the footsteps. They got steadily louder as the interviewer approached. There was a bit more confidence in his step now.

Like he was back in his element – intimidating young people trying to enter the company. The footsteps were now joined by a voice – a male voice, talking into a phone.

“Yeah, I’ve got a bunch of them waiting outside my office now. They all look pretty young. They’ve got high standards to meet if they want a job at Talontown Insurance.”

The true meaning of his words was palpable. He thought we were entitled children trying to suck a paycheck out of him while giving back nothing in return. He believed that his rank in the company gave him absolute control over his employees. I could relieve him of that fantasy quite quickly.

He reached the door to his office and looked at the applicants sitting outside.

“Miss Patterson?” he said, glancing at the list in his hand. I stood up, smiled politely and pushed my way into his office before he had the chance to open the door.

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I could tell that he was already thrown off. He glanced back at the other applicants, who stared nervously back, and then at me, giving him a confident, slightly impatient smile. He followed me into his office and closed the door behind him.

“Well, Miss Patterson,” he said, “I’ve looked through your portfolio and application, and I have some questions for you.”

“Very well,” I said. “But before you start, I’d like to know a bit about who I would be working for. Do you get along well with people? Do you consider yourself a team player? Are you polite and considerate?”

This jarred him further. I had the upper hand now.

“Well, yes, I think I am, but. . . that’s not the point.”

“It’s not?”

“No, I – you’re working for me, remember?” he asked, trying to regain his footing.

I raised my eyebrows, giving the impression that I was offended. He seemed to retreat within himself, embarrassed. His arbitrary position of power was beginning to disintegrate within his head.

I was going to get this job. And not long after, I would be his boss. It was just a matter of seizing, stealing control over the situation.

Title from “I Get Smart” by Pamela Painter

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2015 Eva’s Words

Eva was born to Alexandra and Joshua Wen at 2:45 p.m. on a Wednesday.

When she slid out of her mother’s womb, she was quiet. When the doctor picked her up and wrapped her in a towel, she was quiet. It wasn’t until the doctor had passed her to her father, that she opened her mouth and uttered a gurgling cry. Joshua and Alexandra were overjoyed. It had been a perfectly normal pregnancy. Alexandra was always cautious about her baby’s health, being careful not to drink, eat unhealthy foods, or expose herself to pollutants and radiation. Her vigilance had been rewarded with a completely normal baby. Or so she thought.

Back in the baby’s room, Joshua laid Eva on the table and ceremoniously unwrapped her from the towel. She reached out and grasped Joshua’s thumb with her tiny hand. He repressed a sob of joy. He was truly blessed.

He took the first diaper out of the box and carefully fitted it onto her pelvis. As he picked her back up to take her back to their living room, he saw something so shocking that he almost dropped his daughter. Letters had appeared on Eva’s lower back. Capital letters, in Times New Roman, 12-point font: AAAAAAAAAAAAAA He carried Eva into the living room, where his wife was lying on the couch.

“Alexandra?” he asked. “Did the doctor write anything on Eva?” “What? Why do you ask?”

He turned Eva around to show her the letters on her back. Alexandra looked as confused as he felt.

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“I don’t remember anyone writing on her,” she said. Then, after a moment, she added, “I’m sure it’ll wash off.”

Joshua nodded, and went to wipe it off with a baby wipe. It did not come off, however. The cool wipe tickled her skin, and she giggled. Above the A’s, more letters appeared, again frightening him: EEEEE HEE HEE Joshua stared at his child, his heart filling with dread, imagining her growing up, every word she said written on her body, shining black against her beige skin.

After Alexandra and Joshua had contacted every doctor in Talontown and sworn each one to secrecy, and after each one had determined that she was completely healthy and that the letters on her skin were a complete anomaly, they began to adjust to the idea. Each noise Eva made appeared on her skin, spreading up and down her back. Her first word appeared on the edge of her right shoulder.

As much as the parents loved their new daughter, they lived in fear of the first day Eva would have to go to school. When she turned five, the right age for kindergarten, the words began to creep up her chest toward her neck. Until that point, they had kept her abnormality a secret, even from her grandparents. But what would the other children say? The teacher?

After much thought and debate, they agreed to make sure all of her words were well-covered with clothing and would remain that way. Alexandra sat her daughter down the night before her first day of school.

“Dear, before you go to school, we need you to agree to something,” she said.

“What, Mama?”

“When you’re in class, you need to talk as little as you can, okay?”

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“Why?” Alexandra paused.

“Because of my words?” Eva asked.

Alexandra nodded. “Most people don’t have words like you do, and they might get scared. You need to not scare them.”

Eva looked taken aback. “But I like my words! I want my friends to see them!”

As she spoke, Alexandra saw words creep out from under the collar of her dress.

“Eva, listen to me!” she said insistently. “Nobody wants to see your words! They won’t understand them.”

Eva stared at the ground, looking downtrodden. “Okay.”

Alexandra relaxed. “Thank you,” she said. “It will be better for all of us this way.”

Even as she spoke, she felt a stab of guilt at the unhappy expression on her daughter’s face. It’s better this way, she tried to convince herself. She can’t go through life being laughed at.

And thus Eva went to school, every day covering the words with layers of fabric.

When they spread to her face and hands, where she could not cover with clothing, she used foundation. With coaching from her parents, she eventually learned to speak as little as possible, but she couldn’t go her entire life without speaking. Soon the words began to overlap, until they were no longer legible.

When Eva was eight years old, her skin had become inky black from the words, and she had to look for a long time for even a speck of skin not covered with ink.

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One day, she stood in a bathroom stall in her school. She searched her body obsessively, every inch, for any skin not covered by words, but found none. It’s all gone, she thought. I’m just a glut of words.

Tears welled in her eyes as she stared at herself in the mirror, seeing the reflection of her every expression on her skin. She had gone her entire life stifling herself, but it had not made a difference. Why try to hide it any longer?

She threw away the can of foundation and wiped it off her face and hands, then walked to the bathroom door. Here she paused, steeling herself.

She walked out of the bathroom, into the deserted hallway. The school day was over, and she walked almost out of the building before meeting anyone. But before she could get out the doors and into her mother’s waiting car, two of her classmates walked around the corner and spotted her.

One of them laughed. “Hey look, it’s the Chinese ghost! Why don’t you say something -- can’t communicate with our dimension?”

Eva froze, afraid to turn around. They constantly teased her about being so quiet in class, and now they would have something else to bully her about.

They danced around behind her, making squinty eyes and ghost noises, until one of them grabbed her shoulder and turned her around. He scowled at her.

“Why’s your face all black, ghost? Didn’t your immigrant parents teach you to wash?”

Eva felt her stomach contents boil. This is what being silent her whole life had amounted to. It had not stop the words from spreading, and it had not stopped her from being laughed at. She loved her words and her parents, and was ready to defend them both.

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“DON’T YOU DARE TALK ABOUT MY PARENTS LIKE THAT!” she yelled.

“LEAVE ME ALONE, YOU JERKS!” The boy in front of her jumped back, frightened. New words, the ones she had just spoken, burned red on her forehead. He stared for a moment, then turned and ran away.

“You’re a f-freak!” he yelled over his shoulder.

Eva stood there for a moment, stunned. She turned back to the door and walked out to her mother’s car. Alexandra got out and looked at her, concerned.

“Eva, you took your foundation off, what’s wrong --” She stopped suddenly, seeing the new words that had appeared on Eva’s forehead. “Oh. . .”

“Mama?” Eva said. The word appeared on her forehead, but this time it was beige.

Alexandra squatted down next to Eva and held her close. Her daughter didn’t need to hide. She could defend herself, and her beautiful words.

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2016 “From the First His Hands Fascinated�

Eva Wen, the girl with the words, could never resist an old photograph. She would go to the library after school on Fridays, and look for the most ancient books she could find. When she found them, preferably books that were no longer in print that you could cut holes through with just your fingernails, she would stare at the photos, taking in every detail, trying to form a picture of what it was like living in that era. She placed herself in the subjects position -- as a movie star dressed in extravagant furs, or an infamous dictator giving a speech, or poor immigrants crowding onto a ship, ready to become American citizens.

One day Eva found a book from around 1870, chronicling the experiences of immigrant workers. One of the pictures, in a chapter about Chinese laborers, made her heart stop: a man wearing a straw hat and a pair of overalls, pounding in a railroad spike, the hand holding the hammer covered in writing, just like her own!

Lee Wen, a Chinese immigrant, had the unique ability to make his speech appear on his skin. Turning down many offers of fame in return for selling himself as a public spectacle, he worked on the railroads expanding into the West with his family. Later he became a sheriff for a small town in Oregon. He was famous among outlaws for his intimidation techniques: Staring down a criminal, he would recite the laws they had broken and the penalties for breaking said laws. These words would appear on his face and hands, effectively branding them into the criminal’s memory.

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Eva stared at the page, mesmerized. For her entire life, she thought that she was the only person in the world with her gift. But here was another person – an ancestor – who had words on his skin! She couldn’t describe her excitement – her relief.

She looked furtively around her. Assured that nobody was watching, she tore the page with a photo of her ancestor out of the book, folded it up, and hid it in her coat pocket.

Title from “Hands and Gloves” by Judy French

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many thousand gone by ciara sing

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To those who were left out to wither and dry but sowed love and strength deep within my roots

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Table Of Contents 1. Unpicking Cotton 2. The Magnolia Tree 3. Cynthia 4. Weeping Time 5. The Steel Driving Man 6. Waves 7. Why I Let Him Touch My Hair 8. Endings

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Unpicking Cotton Inspired by W.S. Merwin’s “Unchopping A Tree” Open your mouth when the beatings come. The master pulls his whip from inside his pants pocket. The scale measures twenty pounds more than it did yesterday. The cotton has been weighed in the gin house. Walk back to the fields. The moon is midrise. Step over the branches that broke off the stalk. Use your blood to re-stick the branch on the stalk. Your strength causes the crop to regrow because cotton will not bloom from a broken branch. The branches layer each other above the water furrow.

Let the bottom of the sack brush the ground. Hold the mouth of the sack breast level for quick access. Put the strap back over your neck and fasten. Take the cotton from the sack. With nimble fingers, dodge the bur and quickly put cotton back on the ripening boll. You look at the moon beginning to rise and realize you still have plenty of rows to pick on this twenty-five week harvest. Don’t think that you can miss any open bolls for the next picking.

Lick your fingers. Wipe the sweat from your forehead as you look into the sky and see the sun at its highest point. It is two past noon and you are six rows over. Drink the drop of water you are offered. Bite your tongue when he tells you to “lick the sweat off his body if you’re still thirsty.” Only stop working when he rides the horse along your cotton row. Start picking cotton from the row that does not smell like death.

Let the bottom of the sack hit the ground. Hold the mouth of the sack breast level for quick access. Put the strap over your neck and fasten. Say your prayers to God before you start. You haven’t gotten any sleep. Your insides burn as the master forces you out of the stable, buckling his pants. It is still dark outside and you can only see a

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sliver of sun beginning to rise. The horn is blown.

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The Magnolia Tree Inspired by Nine Simone’s Rendition Of “Strange Fruit” Black bodies swinging in the Southern trees and hanging in the classrooms.

Black bodies swinging in the back of your consciousness every time the wind blows.

Their burnt skin planted seeds deep within the Poplar trees.

Back and forth. Back and forth. Black and forced. Strange fruit left hanging in the sun to rot. Strange fruit, father’s son hanging left to rot.

Children with bright faces have exchanged pulpits with tree trunks, with rivers with quiet gravestones. It’s the pastoral scene.

Black bodies blanched by the sun tearing at the gut. Black bodies’ screams chewing on the eardrums in order to digest.

They have sat with tears and faith streaming down on their Sunday clothes, streaming down on their lips. Lemons and innocence and salt are what strange fruit taste like sitting by the honeysuckle weeds.

White sheets force black bodies to bloom in gloomy shade. They have opened the wound forcing black bodies into unwanted spaces. They have yet to harvest the obscurity with praying and clinging to bitter crops.

Blood on the leaves, blood in the streets, blood in the roots. Black bodies swinging, hanging, stretching with the breeze.

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Cynthia Cynthia hates her big lips. She hates her broad nose. She hates her course hair.

She despises and curses at the world every day, questioning why everyone walks around assuming she is an angry black woman. Cynthia hates her black skin. Cynthia hates that her skin is black. The truth is, she has never felt this way before.

During slavery, all blacks were taught that they were nothing. They were taught that submission was their only God given right. Blacks were taught that they didn’t have any history. Blacks are still taught that they don’t have any history. So today, yesterday, and tomorrow, Cynthia does not want to be black any longer.

Cynthia was taught a homemade remedy by her grandmother. Her grandmother used to apply the cream every morning before going out into the fields. She hoped that soon she’d become light enough to leave the fields and work in the house with the mistress. Cynthia knows that her grandmother hated her black skin, hated her broad nose, and hated her big lips. Cynthia has recently adapted her grandmother’s whitening paste into a bleaching cream.

Cynthia learned how to grind the almonds with the wooden herb grinder. In order to get the perfect powder, she only needs turn for a minute. Quickly mix it into one cup of yogurt, add two teaspoon of honey, bleach and lemon juice. Cynthia realized that when she applies it every night, men just tell her she is beautiful. No more, “You look okay for a black girl.”

Post-slavery blacks like Cynthia are told that in order to master life, they must become “house slaves.” Every day on the streets they are offered the same remedy

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Cynthia’s grandmother passed down, except a white hand juts the container in their faces. 

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Weeping Time After Bruce Holland Rogers’ “The House Of Women” “Look at this wonderful creature.” Creature-like white hands gripped my arm, rubbed them along my bare stomach and sent unwanted chills down my spine. Spines aren’t meant to be ripped out in order for women to crumple. Crumpling clothes cause the men to cheer. Cheers echo in their nightmare.

“Nightmares,” I whispered, hoping I would believe it, and clenched my eyes shut tighter, my breath trembling. Trembling faces erupt pleasure to God. God please why are you doing this to me. “Me” is no longer a pronoun everything will always be his. His hands twist in my hair and yank my head back. Backs shouldn’t be ripped out in order to make women crumble. Crumbling clothes caused a yelp to come out of my mouth.

Mouths are made for this.

“This abomination to the world came from a white daddy. Doesn’t she look like one hell of a breeder?” Breeder. Breeder.

Breeder causes a few tears to run down my face. Faces don’t even look like faces.

“Face the fact, she’d bring more pleasure to you as a slave than any of your mistresses would. Would God create these Niggers if he didn’t want us to feel the flavors of their insides and save them?”

Them, the others. Other men come up and rub their hands against my legs, grip my chin, force my mouth open and feel all over. Over near the houses, we’ll gladly paint dead faces in their peaks.

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The Steel Driving Man See, we all know John Henry around here. Yes sir. After the war, you couldn’t walk around the planation or the factories without hearing mutters of his name. Every little boy dreamed to be just like him.

He was born a slave, just like his mama, just like his papa. He was blessed with what all of us wanted after the war. He was a free man. He was a free man but still working for the white man. No longer was he in the fields, he was now on the railroads.

It seemed like he was bred for the job. John Henry was the strongest black man. John Henry was the most powerful black man. John Henry was as strong as the hammer that he carried with him everywhere. People don’t like to say it but the white man only used him for his power.

John Henry would sweat during the day and drill holes with steel spikes. Everyone thought that God himself was inside John. Men came from all over trying to out drill John Henry, but there was no one who could beat him. There was no railroad that he couldn’t build. There was nothing John Henry couldn’t do.

There was only one enemy that some said John Henry couldn’t defeat: the Big Bend Mountain. The Railroad Company didn’t want to go around the mountain: instead, they wanted to drill straight through the center. To John Henry, it seemed like the mountain stretched right along with the horizon. They wanted John Henry to drill right through the heart.

The Railroad Company sent man after man after man to try and defeat the mountain. The mountain still looked like a mountain stretched across the horizon. Still man after man after man tried to drill, yet none of the men had strong enough arms. They 81

could barely lay one full foot of track without quitting. John Henry wasn’t like any of the other men. He worked all day and night, him and his 14-pound hammer, putting the railroad down. He was the only one who could do it.

Then one day it seemed like the devil himself came to town. A salesman with a steam powered engine that looked strong, mighty and powerful just like John Henry.

The salesman pointed at John Henry and told the Railroad Company that his worse drill could out drill any man even the strongest Nigger they owned. That caused a riot. John Henry wouldn’t be a slave to a man any longer. He wouldn’t be a slave to the machine, either. So they set up a contest between John Henry and the drill.

John Henry had two 30-pound hammers, one in each hand. His shadow seemed like God compared to the drill. As soon as the Sun cracked over the mountain they went off. John Henry worked and worked and worked. He drilled right along with the drill, putting railroad track down all through the mountain. Everyone was cheering, but it seemed like they’d rather see the machine win than cheer for the black man. He beat the machine and held his hands up in triumph. Out of exhaustion and victory he fell down and died right along the railroad track achieving his one goal in life: never allow a white man ever tell him what to do again. It took twenty men and the salesman to carry John Henry home and burry him.

No one will ever forget the story of John Henry. If a black man can beat machines, then they can rise up. Yes sir, the story of John Henry sometimes can even be heard in the whistles and whines of the trains.

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Waves

Hold your breath on the ship; stay alive; make sure the milk is always sweet; hang the leaves out to dry; say yes sir; speak yes ma’am; befriend the mistress; if their eyes bleed red blood, stay away.

Bite your tongue until it bleeds; always swallow; wrap your hands with scrap cloth when you are in the fields; survive; cotton is only good when it isn’t red; hurt people hurt people; love those who hurt you; put a smile on your face when the master come; survive; when the master come smile; under the floorboards are always a good hiding spot; when the master come don’t look into his eyes; swallow; swallow; swallow. Survive.

Their God is not our God; sing while you are working; sing even when your mouth is bloody and bruised; sing even when you feel like you can’t move it any longer; sing “Swing Low Sweet Chariot”; sing in the fields; sing while you are dreaming; sing when you are in the stable; sing when you’re left out to wither; sing after the first whip; sing after the second whip; don’t forget to “swing lower and lower”; sing after the third whip; sing even after you know God is no longer listening.

Learn to love the taste of bitterness; swallow; swallow; swallow; skin heals quicker from a burn; keep the sage under the hay; melted tallow helps the boils heal; compromise; make tea with rue to help with stomach worms; tea with corn shuck is good for measles; think about poisoning the master; never poison the master; only think about poisoning the master; your children are more important; you survive for them.

When you’re meeting in the stable use hushed voice; take care of the master’s child like your own; love the innocent; never let the master see his white baby sucking

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on your black nipples; make sure the calabash is always clean; let the children eat first; speak loud to your masters; mutter to your babies; whisper to your ancestors; don’t speak about home; praise God when he rises; praise God when he sets; keep your eyes open wide and bright; watch your brothers and sisters swing from the tree; pour water into the ground before you drink so you honor them; swallow; swallow; swallow; “swing all the way around me.”

Send secrets in the wind; watch it drift away in the fire; hide it under the cane; wrap it with tobacco; pass it a long in the cotton; tuck it inside of the tree trunk; force it down their throat; force it down your throat; send it away in the river; survive; swallow; swallow; swallow; hold your breath when you are under water; remember you need to survive for your children; swallow; swallow; swallow.

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Why I Let Him Touch My Hair

I sat beside the white boy on the front porch. His hands blended in with the wooden slates and no sign of sun could be seen in his skin. He was new here. He had a knife in his left hand and a chunk of wood in his right. His thumb and pointer finger were glazed with dried blood and day old splinters, just like my daddy. His blue eyes met mine and focused back on the wood in his hand. He pushed the blade against it and a smooth sliver fell to the porch. He picked it up and leaned towards me. My eyes squinted, following his finger. He rubbed his bloody pointer finger and thumb together over my head.

“It’s stuck,” he said.

I ran my fingers along the course braid, fingers snagging against the pattern, trying to feel for the wood chip.

“When I did that to my sister it fell straight to the ground.”

I followed his left hand, eyes zeroing in on the knife again. He cut off another piece of wood and put it in my hair.

“My mama says that colored hair feels like the side of a tree.”

I tilted my head towards his right hand. His pointer finger feathered my hair. He looked back up at me and smiled. He went back to chipping at the piece of wood.

“But I like it,” he said.

My lips pressed together upwards.

“The only person who tells me my hair is beautiful is my mom.”

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Endings After Margart Atwood’s “Happy Endings”

Cota and Fugra are forced on a ship.

What happens next?

If you want a happy ending, try A.

A. There is not a happy ending. There will never be a happy ending. Please do not pretend that slavery has a happy ending. Please do not pretend that we don’t shutter and flinch and have tears well in our eyes every time we hear the world slave dance off someone’s lips.

B. Fugra and Cota have never met before. Cota is thrown on the deck. He is one of five of the cargo who is allowed to have fresh air. Cota sleeps beside the door and is able to hear the groans, the shrieks of the women, and the children’s whimpers. Fugra is in chains alongside her two other sisters. She is confined directly underneath the door to the deck. Fugra is sitting in her bile and in her perspiration and in her blood. She no longer hears crying and her eyes glaze over.

Fugra and Cota don’t ever see each other during the two months that they are on the ship but become very familiar with each other’s stench and the feeling of their insides. Fugra’s open wounds become infected. She dies before her stomach gets to fully swell. Cota is now the only one who gets awoken by streams of sunlight and bird’s shrieks in the sky.

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C. Fugra can’t lift her hands to wipe the fly out of her eye. Cota begins to cry. He can longer move his mouth to smile at Fugra. They get their feet tied with rope but can never make out the faces of those tying them. Fugra doesn’t have any skin on her back. Her face is so dry it begins to bleed. Cota doesn’t keep his eyes open. It takes away from his focus on breathing. He gags every time air comes in through his nose. Fugra’s head falls into another women’s lap. She watches Cota get dragged into the sunlight. Cota is finally able to stand and breathe through his mouth. He stares off into the distance, becomes mesmerized by white foam crashing into blue waves disappearing into nothing. No one could stop him from jumping. If this story disturbed you and you want a happy ending please read A.

D. Cota and Fugra huddle in the corner together naked. The men who owned the ship took what little clothing they had and threw it into the water. They heard the splash and laughter and banging of wood. Cota and Fugra don’t get warmth from each other. Fugra tries to wrap herself around Cota but screams a scream that pierces all of their wounds. No one around them bats an eye. Fugra and Cota can no longer remember the sounds of each other’s voices. Fugra’s leg gets skinned. She is not moving. The drifting of the boat and warmth of the blood that surrounds her legs lull her to sleep. Cota watches Fugra stop breathing.

E. Read A.

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.2.

Family/Relationships

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Songs from the Brownstone

By Chelsea Lewis

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I dedicate this chapbook to my mother, who taught me at a young age that music is power and love, and to BeyoncĂŠ for creating the album, 4, that this chapbook is inspired by.

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Table of Contents 1. Prelude 2. I Miss You 3. Schoolin’ Life 4. Rather Die Young 5. Dance for You 6. Countdown 7. Party 8. I Care 9. Love on Top 10. 1 + 1

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Prelude There once was a boy who walked into a record store. His mother gave him change to go to the market, but rebelliously, he wandered in there instead. The young boy stood in front of the rock section but he didn’t like what he saw. A tall man approached him.

“You a little young to be in here. You must have some parents around.” He leaned down.

“They sent me in here,” he lied, and continued on his way.

The ceiling was lit with low-hung bulbs. The small record store had five long rows that stretched the width of it. He observed the people around him as he strolled. An old man in plaid searched in the hip hop section, a young girl, not too much older than he, looked in the classical section, and a man who reminded him of his daddy sat in the corner with headphones over his head.

The boy browsed and browsed, looking for something of worth. Somehow, he ended up in the rhythm and blues section. It was his mother’s favorite and he thought he might as well get something from here to soften the blow once he came in the house without groceries.

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He flipped through the soft record covers and something caught his eye. The lady was dressed in a bright purple top with black embroidery. Her hands were placed on her head and her blonde hair flew freely. Her name was in bold font at the top and a smaller sized number 4 was placed in the bottom corner.

She was pretty like Mama, so he figured that she would like it. He clutched it to his chest and walked up to the counter, setting it down.

“Eight dollars,” the clerk said without looking up.

The boy silently prayed because that was a high fee, but he wanted it. They exchanged the money for the record in a bag and he started in the direction of his house.

Inside the familiar brownstone, he looked around for his mother. He heard something in the living room and went towards it, to find his father sitting there with a newspaper.

“What you got there?” His dad looked up through his glasses.

“Music,” he said, low.

“That’s cool, man. Hey, when you come back down, we need to talk about some school stuff.” He put his head back down to read.

The boy went up towards his room when he heard his mother’s voice calling his name.

“You got my groceries?” She tapped her cigar, ashes disappearing in the carpet.

“I actually got us a record instead…” He held it out in front of him.

She shook her head, deciding what to say to her boy. “Give me that and go to your room.”

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He handed it to her, disappointed, and walked away. In his room, he threw a ball against the wall and caught it. He wondered why she was so mean to him and why didn’t she like her gift.

The sudden beat booming from the downstairs radio cut the silence. It was nothing that he’d ever heard before; he had memorized all the records that they owned. The lady’s voice commanded his attention immediately and he smiled; his mother must have liked his gift to her. He wasn’t listening to the words because he didn’t understand all of them, but he enjoyed the drums and bass and percussion.

The boy found himself leaving his room and going closer to the music. Downstairs, he inched towards the kitchen, slowly, in fear that his mother would be mad that he was out of his room. He peeked into the kitchen where his father was cooking something on the stove and his mother was sitting by the stereo, listening. Her head bobbed and she tapped her nails on the wooden table.

“I think it’s great. We can go without butter and vegetables for a little while. I’ll get it for you next week.” His dad bumped his hips around and looked back at her.

“He’s got good taste. Come here baby, I know you around here.” She smirked and waited for him.

He came into the kitchen, exposing himself from his previous position. He drew towards her lap and stared into her eyes. They didn’t speak words but they both loved what they were hearing and knew they would play it forever.

His daddy came over with a spoon dipped in sauce and let the boy try it. He smiled in satisfaction of the taste and burst into a fit of giggles once his dad broke out into dance. He slid around the linoleum and stirred the pot some more.

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His mother shook her head at his antics and hummed along to the beat. She wasn’t a singer but the boy couldn’t get enough of her voice. In that moment, he knew that this is what mattered. Music brought them together and it would for a very long time after.

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I Miss You Love, Your Only Mother.

-David Michael Kaplan, “Love, Your Only Mother” Some days were easier than others. I never stopped thinking about my momma, but on occasion I knew how to be strong and control it.

I turned the key to open my slot in the Mail Center and pulled out a few envelopes and the box on top. I decided to go back to my room to open them, so I walked back, briefly enjoying the warm weather.

I was saving my dad’s box for last. His care packages made me the happiest. I flipped through the crisp envelopes, seeing nothing but advertisements, until I stopped on this one. It was short and square, not elongated like the others.

My name, dorm address and city and state was scribbled neatly on the front and the sender sticker was slightly faded and illegible but the picture was an outline of Texas.

I opened it and a familiar scent of lilacs came from the folded piece of paper, which I read aloud to myself.

“My baby boy, Ezekiel, I miss you so much honey. I’ve rewritten this so many times because I don’t know what to say to you. Every day, I beat myself up for not being there for you and your brothers to help finish raising you. Your father and I always had this dream of raising good, strong men and I folded on them. You’re old enough to know that your father and I just didn’t work out; I didn’t own up to my responsibilities and I ran away from them instead. I can’t imagine how much I hurt you but I love you and your brothers more than anything in this world. You only have one mother and I promise we’ll be brought back together soon. I’m so proud of you, I know you’re doing well up there at 96

school. Just always remember, keep music in your heart and everything will be fine.

Love, Mommy.”

I felt ashamed at the tears falling; Dad always said that we weren’t weak. I didn’t understand where this emotion was coming from. I thought I was getting better but I was still a little Momma’s boy. I needed her. I pictured her every day and she always wore blue jeans and hoodies, her straight hair draped around her shoulders. I always counted on seeing her after school to make me feel better after a hard day. She always sang to me.

I was seven when she left. We had all come home from school and sat around the dining room table, eating fruit snacks. J was the first to hear screaming. Mom and Dad’s voices increasingly got louder, going back and forth. I waited for it to die down because it usually did. Momma said it was healthy for grown-ups to argue sometimes. It did get quiet but then rapid footsteps clanked down the stairs. We ran out into the living room to see Mom with big bags in her hand and Dad right behind her. She bent down to us and kissed each one of us. We continuously asked her what was going on and she dodged every question. I clenched onto her but she shrugged me off and I remember lying in my dad’s arms, coating them with tears. Evan ran up to his room and Jeremiah went to his friend’s house across the street after punching a wall. It’s crazy because the one person I wanted to run to was the one who caused the pain.

I threw the letter on my desk and sat with my head in my hands. She had this unhealthy hold on me and it was scary because I knew I could never get out of it. She was my mother. I didn’t care to know how she found me and I didn’t want to know where she was. At that moment, I only wanted to go back to that night and clench onto her so

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tight that she couldn’t move. I knew if I looked at her with my big, glossy, brown eyes that she would stay; she gave in to them every time and would have no choice but to stay.

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Schoolin’ Life I plopped down on my bed, exhausted from the beginning of high school and by my father. I yearned to be little again and innocent from any scrutiny.

I grabbed my phone, plugged my earphones in and played my mom’s favorite CD. I bought it for her and it turned out to be our favorite to listen to together; I couldn’t miss her more than I already did every moment.

I got lost in the upbeat tempo, tapping my fingers against my legs and humming.

Clunky footsteps caught my attention in the distance. Knowing that they were my dad’s work boots, I ripped the ear buds out and scrambled to grab a notebook and pencil. He would yell at me if I wasn’t doing my work as soon as I got home, but luckily he didn’t come in.

Yesterday, he sat me down to say that this was the most important time of my life and that I had to help him with the “manly” duties of the household. Dad had grown up in the Bronx with his mother and sister. He told me that it wasn’t easy staying out of the streets and he worked to take care of his two ladies. A Superman. When he met Momma, he had his degree in his pocket and they started our little family.

As he was raising us, I always admired his ability to take care of us three without breaking a sweat. He drilled into our heads that we were to never be afraid of anything, to not be soft; it got worse after Momma left. But I was, and still am, afraid. I’m not ready to be bound by responsibility and bruised by disappointment or defeat. Dad made it seem that it wasn’t okay to fail. Je looked at us with shame if we didn’t being home A’s or B’s. No one could be perfect like him.

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My love for my dad is unconditional, and even though he’s not big on emotion, I always let him know. He groomed us to be men and never stopped believing in us; it was comforting, especially when our other parent wasn’t present. I believed in myself more. I wanted to play the guitar and produce songs for people. I got excited thinking about it but I knew that my dad wouldn’t approve because college wasn’t needed in my equation.

Truth is, I didn’t really want to grow up. I didn’t want to be an adult. I wanted to hit the pause button on my life because mentally, Dad was tearing me apart.

The clanking sound grew close to my door and it opened.

“You got homework, Ezekiel?” Dad popped his head in.

“Uh, yes, sir.” I looked up at him.

“Alright, get to work and don’t come downstairs until you’re completely done.” He shut the door behind him and I listened until I couldn’t hear him anymore.

I placed my music back in my ears and tried to drown out all thoughts. I was ready to be free from his microscope.

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Rather Die Young I gave myself a look over in the mirror hanging on my door. My brothers were coming for my birthday, which was in a few days. Evan had turned 21 last month and now I was turning 22. It wasn’t the most fun age but I was thankful to see my brothers after awhile.

I went downstairs and left my dorm, my hands shoved into my coat pockets from the February cold. They were meeting me at a steakhouse not too far off campus so I decided to just walk.

“What’s up kid? Missed you, boy.” Jeremiah pulled me into a hug and nudged my head.

“I missed you too J, but just cause you’re 26 don’t make you anymore grown than us.” I laughed and patted his back.

“Okay, enough introductions, cocktail anyone?” Evan made a beeline for the bar, passing the table where we were set to be seated.

“Boy, turned legal and went crazy.” We laughed at the sight.

During dinner, I questioned myself about why I hadn’t stayed closer to my brothers. Jeremiah headed off to Stanford, and even though he was graduated, he’d stayed in California. Evan followed and went to UCLA, but I stayed here in Seattle. I was comfortable and I felt like this school was the right fit for me but I was missing my two best friends.

I glanced at them, noticing how much they’d changed. It had been a little under a year since I’ve seen them both together. We were rarely all available at the same time.

Jeremiah had a stronger build, his body used to be so scrawny. He had a beard with 101

surrounding scruff on his cheeks and his soft face became chiseled and defined. Evan was still the same, tall and slightly chubby. Now, he was less shy; he talked much more and had become outgoing. His cheeks still wiggled when he laughed though, just like I remembered.

J drove us back to my campus, the cobalt sky whizzing by and stars turning into blurry streaks.

We decided to walk around for a little bit until we got tired. The whole time including dinner, we’d been catching up on all of our lives and telling crazy stories from now and our childhood.

Evan hummed lowly, mumbling some lyrics. “Cause I’d rather die young, than live my life without you. I’d rather not live at all, than live my life without you.”

I looked over at him, realizing what he was singing and hung my head back down low with a sigh.

“It’s so ironic how she sung that to me all the time,” Evan sniffed.

“Mom wasn’t supposed to leave. She did anyway but we made it alright. You know, I got my promotion a couple weeks ago and she was the first person I wanted to call,” Jeremiah spoke up.

“I just wish it wasn’t on my mind. One minute I’m hating her, the next I wanna see her again.” I watched my feet step on the pavement one after the other.

“Hey, look at me.” J stopped walking. “Don’t ever think that we could’ve did anything different to change her mind, it was all her. Look what Dad did for us and never forget it. We always got each other.”

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Evan wiped away a few tears and pulled us into a hug. We put all of our foreheads together like we did when we were little, a sign that everything was going to continue to be fine. 

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Dance For You My brother Jeremiah was four years older than me. Evan and I were only one year apart, him being the baby. J took after my dad the most: charismatic, ladies-man, tough and temperamental.

I remember when I was in sixth grade, and we had our first school dance coming up. I was going to go and I planned on dancing with Avery Johnson. I was in love with her and wanted to make her feel the same about me.

I knocked on my brother’s door and he opened it, rubbing his eyes.

“What man?”

“I need help with dancing to get this girl, please.” I spoke quickly.

He looked me up and down before smiling. He didn’t say a word and walked down the steps. I followed. J went over to the radio in the living room and played one of the records I got for Mom. A slow song filled the room.

“Mama!” he called from the bottom of the steps.

She came down in a panic, thinking something was wrong.

“Zeke wants to learn to slow dance. I needed my favorite partner,” he said.

“Oh sure, watch and learn baby.” She grabbed Jeremiah’s hand.

They started to step, in unison, back and forth. Their hands were intertwined until J swiftly unlocked them to complete a spin and then they were back in form.

I hummed along to the familiar song while I studied them.

Jeremiah stopped dancing and stood in front of me.

“It’s easy. The key is to keep your footsteps in harmony with hers and your hand on her back. Make sure to add in a wink, too. Kills the ladies every time,” he laughed.

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“Come here, baby, just try it.” My mom pulled me over.

I mimicked J’s movements and followed the melody. I couldn’t spin Mom because she was taller than me, but Avery’s height was perfect to try it out on.

Mommy sang along and kept dancing with me. She called me “little golden toes” because I caught on so well. My dad came down and they all cheered for me and wished me good luck with my girl.

At the dance, I had been sitting at a table by myself, all night. I talked to a few friends and grabbed some snacks but I was really waiting for the perfect chance to dance with Avery. The DJ announced that this was the last song of the night so it had to happen.

I stood up, straightened out my new suit and tie, and made my way over to where she was standing alone. I cleared my throat and asked her to dance, to which she smiled and said, “Sure.”

Avery was a little shorter than me, dark, chocolate skin and tight curly hair. She wore a sky blue dress with ruffles around the waist. I held her, just like Mom had taught me, and it seemed to go smoothly. Her feet went with mine perfectly. She was feeling the music just as much as I was.

I took a big breath because it was time for the spin. I held her fingertips as I began to twirl her but they slipped out of mine and she fell flat on her face. Time froze as everyone noticed and Avery got up to run out of the cafeteria.

Needless to say, she didn’t fall in love with me.

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Countdown 10.

I’ll never forget how cold it was that morning, the visible chill on the window in my dorm. I had just got off the phone with my dad, listening to his daily motivational lecture before I headed off to class. I strolled out of my building and headed to another across campus. My head was usually down but that day, I caught a glimpse of bright purple passing me. I looked up and spotted her. Her sweater was that shade of bright purple; she had light denim jeans on with boots and her hair draped over her shoulders and white scarf.

9.

In the coming weeks, Naya became my best friend. There was a homecoming party one night and I remember how she asked me to go. “Dress up with me.” So, we did. I dressed in a classic black tux with a pink tie and Nay stepped out in a silk pink knee length dress.

8.

I remember missing her like crazy all the time; she was my only friend on campus. I memorized her schedule and related it to mine to see what times we both had available. Between four classes a day each and a couple clubs combined with workstudy, we didn’t have much free time. One day, I waited for her to get out of her one o’clock class. I hadn’t heard from her and I knew she was stressed for upcoming midterms. She strolled out, with her shoulders slumped. I waited for her to notice me 106

and when she did, her smile spread across her face, and I knew that she missed me too.

7.

Knocks disturbed my silent studying. That day I was out of it. I hadn’t talked to my dad or eaten or finished my six-page paper. I was working tirelessly, my eyes burning into the bright screen until I got up to open the door. There she stood, with a smile and bags of Chinese takeout. I tried to explain that I was very busy but she didn’t listen and barged past me. She opened up the cartons of food, forcing me to eat and laugh. I couldn’t figure out how I was so lucky.

6.

Before she left that one night, I made sure to kiss her cheek in gratitude.

5.

I knew I loved her, but friendship was all that we both needed. I didn’t love her for her looks or because she brought me food all the time. I loved her for the way she talked so passionately, wrapped up in her own dreams and how her face lifted up instantly every time she laughed. Reminded me of my momma.

4.

One day towards the end of the semester, I planned on skipping all my classes. I was tired and even though I had a test that I knew I could ace, I figured I could make it

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up another time. As I laid my head back down, my phone rang obnoxiously loud. I answered and Naya asked why I wasn’t downstairs. She was waiting on me with coffee. I pretended that I was sick, but she wasn’t buying it. Almost identical to my dad, she told me that I was too intelligent to waste it and that if I didn’t get my butt down there then she would come up herself.

3.

I told my dad about her in the beginning of sophomore year. He said I sounded like a “lovesick puppy” and he remembered feeling like that. My dad thought that I should make us a couple but I was happy with what we were.

2.

Everything comes in pairs. Shoes, jeans, scissors, Naya and I.

1.

Still today, in junior year, we’re together. Just friends, but dedicated to each other.

I didn’t mind, but one day I knew I would end up making her mine. This wasn’t something that could be forgotten or let go, it was forever.

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Party This is their wedding picture.

-Siv Cedering, “Family Album” I sat at the confetti-covered table gleefully dipping my chicken wings in ketchup. I maneuvered around the bones with my tiny teeth as I watched the people around me.

Momma and Dad had been married for 15 years, which was cause for celebration. Everybody came: friends, cousins, grandparents and people that I’d never seen before who claim that they were family.

Momma always said that Daddy was arrogant and thought that he could have her anytime but she wasn’t having it and it made him want her even more. He called it a “spark in her eyes” and he never looked away. When they finally got married, they had my brother Jeremiah first and then me, ending with Evan.

Still munching on chicken, I watched my grandmother next to me. She carefully peeled an orange with her wrinkled fingers. I hadn’t seen her in a long time and I missed her. She gave the best hugs. I climbed on her lap and she stroked my cheek softly.

“You remind me so much of your mama.” She smiled.

I turned so my head was on her chest and my legs dangled down off of her lap.

My parents were centered in my view, in the middle of the dance floor. They fast danced to the catchy song while holding hands. Mom mouthed the words to him as he laughed and mimicked her movements perfectly. They were one.

In that moment, I remembered all the times when they yelled at each other in the nighttime and the next morning, Dad would bring flowers to a pouting Mom. I wondered

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how they stayed so strong, especially with us kids who needed so much, and how they never broke.

I tapped a heart shaped balloon around in the air and stared at the pictures lining the walls. My favorite was the one at their wedding reception. Mom was dressed in a silky, white gown and her hair hung straight down. Dad held her hand up and his other was stretched wide. He was dressed in a black tux.

I never understood how love could work the way it did for them. I felt as if I was a tiny speck in their world of each other, because it was so robust. I knew they loved me and took care of me but I was worried I would never find something like that. I felt as if it was my job to carry that kind of affection through the family.

I ran up to my parents who were still dancing and said, “I wanna be just like you guys.”

My dad squatted down to my height. “You’re too young son but one day, you will be able to.”

I looked into his eyes, trying to read and imitate everything in them but I only could hope that I could turn out the exact same.

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I Care Evan was one year younger than me. I was a baby myself when they told me I’d be getting a baby brother, and I didn’t understand so it was okay with me. I wasn’t the typical middle child: I didn’t feel neglected or unheard, and my brothers were my best friends. Dad said that men needed to stick together.

Evan was the quietest of all of us. Anything he was thinking remained unknown unless he said something. One day, when we were around nine or ten, we were walking to the basketball court together. I looked over because he was being even quieter than usual, to find tears rolling down his face. I stopped walking and stood in front of him.

“What’s the matter?”

“I’m scared, man.” He wiped his face and looked up at me.

“Of?” “Well, I got a D in history a few days ago and I heard Dad talking on the phone before we left. That’s why I rushed out the house.”

“Why didn’t you say anything? I could’ve helped you explain or something.”

“Man, y’all don’t care about my problems. You and Jeremiah are worried about not disappointing Mom and Dad yourselves that you don’t have time for me and that’s fine. I keep to myself.”

I glanced at him in disbelief, not understanding where these feelings were coming from. I didn’t know how to feel because Dad said that we were supposed to look after one another but I thought that’s what I was doing. Evan never mentioned me as a bad brother, so who knew that I was in the wrong or not doing enough for him.

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I turned around and started to walk again. I didn’t care if he was behind me or not, but I soon heard the clunking of his shoes bounce off the pavement. I hated to feel like I let someone down. He was right. We all were trying to shine in our own lane and feelings were hardly ever expressed aloud.

I spotted a honeysuckle bush ahead and stopped once I got to it. I picked one gently and pulled out its long stems to reveal a glistening drop of honey. I side eyed Evan who was right beside me, knowing that these were our favorites. We stood there in silence, repeating the melodic pattern of pluck, pull, eat.

We never made it to the court that day. We sat on the sidewalk, rolling the basketball between us. Our fingers and lips were sticky as the sun set, turning the sky pink.

“I’ll always be here to listen, even when you think I won’t. I will.”

He looked at me, briefly and then turned to the other side. Evan picked one of the last honeysuckle flowers up from our pile on the ground and handed it to me. I knew he was thanking me in his own way for assuring him. I nudged his head like I always do and we fist bumped softly. Our pile of flowers slowly dwindled down and the remains coated the blacktop pavement. I looked over to see Evan staring at the sky, watching it set, and I stayed with him until the streetlights came on.

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Love on Top We rolled our tiny clenched fists in front of us and snapped our hips to the trumpet blasts.

-Justin Torres, “Heritage” I rubbed my eyes vigorously as I rounded the corner, heading to the source of the noise. I creaked my parent’s bedroom door open and the ringing of the speakers woke me up immediately. Evan crept up behind me, taking in the same sight that I had; my other brother somehow slept through this. I remember always waking up suddenly, a little joyed that Momma was playing music.

My mother, covered in her nightgown, swayed around the bedroom followed by the scent of whiskey.

“Baby, it’s you!” She sang loudly. “No it’s not you because you’re not here, you…”

She stopped talking over the song once she noticed us in the doorway.

She dragged us into the center of the floor and stood in front of us like an instructor. Momma swung her arms from side to side with the beat and her feet alternated; once tapping one and then the other. She took a swig from her glass, stained with lipstick now. In one hand, she grabbed Evan and me in the other. She spun us around and brought our bodies into her, I took in the scent of faint daisies.

The room was clouded from the cigarette burning on the bedside table and I wished for Dad to come home at this moment. He worked later a couple days out of the week, sometimes until one in the morning. Mom was missing her dancing partner. While she cooked, he always swooped in and began to dance with her to whatever the stereo was playing. I always paid attention to the look in his eyes. They radiated with admiration as he laughed with her to the rhythm.

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Momma shuffled over to the stereo and turned it up even louder. As her mouth moved, I only heard the melodic voice on the record with the upbeat background sounds to match.

Evan ran around in tiny rhythmic circles, trying to imitate her smooth moves.

She shouted, “Put some soul in it, baby! Them is black bones you workin’ with!”

She scooped me up from my spot and danced with me in her arms. Her wide hips bumped my leg around and Evan snapped and shook as if he’s been doing this for as long as she had.

I heard her sing lowly, eyes closed with a smile on her lips. “When I need you make everything stop, finally you put my love on top.”

A few tears threatened to fall from her eyes. Momma wasn’t right. Something was wrong but she was mine. She didn’t notice me studying her. She put me down to continue our stepping.

Our movements were goofy compared to hers. Her back was curved, her arms fully extended, her hands in snapping position and her feet crossing each other. The command of her waist and the passion pouring out with every shrug of the shoulders was something that we would never be able to achieve.

“This is how you do it up on 2nd, never let your blackness hide.” She took another swig and sang along until Daddy came home.

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1+1 I sat my book bag down in the corner by my door, grabbed a bowl, filled it with Apple Jacks and flooded it with milk. Now as a senior in college, I was used to this routine, but I was ready to end it.

I’d prolonged talking to my dad about my goals of becoming a guitar player and music producer. I didn’t want him to scrutinize me or make me feel bad for what I wanted to do with my life. Last week, I had booked a gig for tonight at a local club to play guitar for the evening. I wanted to call my dad right away, but realized that I couldn’t because he didn’t know about my intentions on being a musician. I told Naya and she was proud of me but she said that I needed to tell my dad because hiding it was only hurting me. She was right so I decided that the time was now.

“What’s going on, son?” he said, his voice made rougher by the phone.

“Hey Dad. Nothing much. How are you?”

“Pretty good. I got the roof fixed. But enough about me, how’s first week going?”

“My classes are easy. I’ve been doing it so long it’s looking pretty alright.”

“That’s what I like to hear. I talked to one of your professors from last year and he talked so highly of you, said you were ready for success in graduate school and could zoom straight through at the top of your class,” “I wanted to talk to you about that.” I shifted from my relaxing position and sat up.

“What’s there to talk about? You’re going, Ezekiel,” “Just hear me out real quick Dad.” I chose my words carefully. “When I was in high school, I didn’t want to go to college but you didn’t let me quit and looking back, I thank you. This has been one of the best experiences of my life. I learned how strong 115

my intelligence is and I learned to be on my own and be a true man, just like you taught me. But, it’s not my passion. I want to pursue music. I want to produce it for people and play my guitar. That’s the life I want.” I sighed.

He was silent for a few moments and then came back with a harsh, cold tone.

“Ezekiel. You are not going to waste a degree that you earned and that I paid for.

I won’t allow it. You’re filling your head up with nonsense and you’re losing sight of what’s important,” “That’s just it, that’s not what’s important to me. I’m getting my degree and I’ll always have it in case I need it. Why are you so against my aspirations? You’re supposed to be proud and supportive of them.”

I waited for a response but I only heard a click, indicating that he had hung up. I stared at the phone, in disbelief. I fought back tears of frustration and soon, my fist balled up and came in contact with the wall.

I took deep breaths in an attempt to calm myself down but unfortunately I had inherited my temper from my father; he knew exactly how to play on it.

I decided to walk around for a while, calm my nerves until he decided to stop being childish. Taking the stairs instead of the elevator, I found myself in the café downstairs. I ordered a large coffee with cream and sugar and waited.

My phone vibrated in my pocket but I didn’t bother to look. I grabbed my coffee and went back up to my room; I felt my phone for the third consecutive time and decided to answer this time. I had nothing else to lose.

“Ezekiel.” My dad’s tone was softer.

“Yeah.”

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“You’re so much like her.” He sighed and sniffed.

“And you hate that don’t you? It’s not like I can help who I am.”

“I could never hate you, you’re my son. It just reminds me of how much I miss her. I never really talked to you guys when everything happened. I had to be strong for y’all.”

“You were always so passionate, and all about the music even before you knew what it was. When your mom and I, uh, first got together, she would take me to her favorite park in the city. We would lay beside each other and stare up at the sky. She would sing any song she could think of and talk my ear off about her dreams. She had so many,” he chuckled.

“I never heard you talk about her like this,” “I didn’t want to but you guys are definitely old enough and I owe it to you. Look, I’m sorry that all these years I’ve been tough and guarded but as a man, it was so hard for me to accept everything that happened to me. I just wanted the best for all of us.” He paused. “But I see now that I’ve done everything I needed to do. You’re a fine young man that I’m proud to call my son and whatever you want to do, I’m behind it, forever.”

So much was going through my mind. I wanted him to talk more about Mom but in that moment, I was so thankful for him supporting me. I couldn’t find words to say back to him.

“I love you, Dad.” After the call, I left my room with my guitar gripped in my hand. I found myself walking across campus to the yard. It wasn’t very populated and I sat under the biggest tree there was. My dad’s words replayed in my head and his reassurance made me

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smile. I looked up at the sky and thought about my mom. Maybe she wasn’t meant to stay our whole lives but for the short time she did, she found a permanent place in my heart no matter what she did. I wished I could see her again but if it wasn’t meant to happen then I wouldn’t force it.

I played with the strings of my guitar and the tune of Momma’s favorite song filled the air. So when the world’s at a war, let our love heal us all.

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A Book of Things You Won’t Tell Your Mother or Father

by Serena Zets

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To Alex for encouraging me to write.

To my parents for supporting everything I write.

To Ciara for giving me something to write about.

To Amaal Said for the beautiful cover image.

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Table of Contents 1. Victorian 2. The Girl Named Kali 3. Curious 4. Things You Won’t Tell Your Father 5. Ways to Come Out Throughout your Life 6. Olivia 7. Have Faith 8. Burlington

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Victorian

Shelly and Gregg got an apartment on Chestnut Street: the back half of the second floor of an old Victorian.

-Shasta Grant, “A Lesson to You Girls”

I’ll never forget the house I grew up in. It was a run down Victorian with blue shutters and flower boxes. Throughout my childhood, my parents were constantly repairing it, so it grew and changed as I did. The only constant were the house’s inhabitants: my mom, dad, and me.

My mom had an eclectic home office that never moved from its spot on the first floor. Its walls were the colors of tamarind and saffron; the rich tones and ever-changing rotation of photographs reminded her of her family in Kolkota. She loved to be reminded of home. Her style contrasted my father’s streamlined taste. The whole house was a compromise between them, while my mother’s curries simmered in pots, the countertops were white marble. I’m a blend of their styles and cultures.

With each renovation, my room changed. I went from my nursery in a converted maid’s quarters to the second floor to the attic. I moved up in the household as I moved up in age. The attic became my sanctuary. Seeing as I was constantly moving from room to room, my life was held in boxes, so I constantly explored the attic’s ample storage space. My toys, books, and clothes were held in storage crates and shipping containers. My parents always lost my laundry. My socks disappeared to the land of no return. Luckily, this sense of disarray made it easier to hide things from them.

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When I was younger, my saris hung in the back of my closet. My mother wanted me to retain some tenants of her heritage but I never got the chance to wear them, so they gathered mothballs and grew musty. In between their folds, I hid books. There was a used bookstore down the street from the Victorian and I frequented it. I went there as much as other kids went to the toy store. Among the endless shelves, I found myself drawn to the extensive LGBT+ section. I embarrassedly bought book after book and when the cashier asked who they were for, I told him it was for a project for school. He always laughed and said, “Seems like every kid is doing that project nowadays. We can’t keep those books on the shelves.” In a strange way, that made me feel less alone.

I knew my parents would question me if they discovered my ever-growing stash, so I hid them all around the house. They could be found at the bottom of crates, under my bed, between my saris, and in a forgotten storage room. Luckily, my parents never discovered them.

I hid the books because I was scared of my parents’ reaction to my exploration.

As progressive as my mother is, she’s still an old-fashioned Indian mother. While she wants me to do what I want with my life, she also teaches me how to make round chapatis that will satisfy any man. She wants a happy but conventional life and I can’t blame her. Even though I knew I wasn’t alone, I still wasn’t ready to tell her what I was discovering—both in the pages of those books and in myself.

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The Girl Named Kali

Once upon a time, there lived a Bengali girl who was raised in an unfamiliar land.

Her father’s skin was dark yet her mother’s was fair. Her mother was beautiful, as beautiful as a goddess. Her hair flowed like the river Ganges down her back and her skin glowed as though it had been perpetually painted with blusher. Fortunately, the young girl got most of her mother’s genes. When she was birthed, her blue veins could be seen through her seemingly opaque skin and her long tongue frightened the doctors.

Because of these traits, her parents named her Kali. In the mother tongues, Sanskrit, Kali means Kala, or force of time. In a short span of time, the baby named Kali had made an impression on everyone she came into contact with. She was a force of time and nature, skin and bone, soul and flesh.

Kali had a common upbringing. They lived in a foreign village named Pittsburgh.

Its rivers reminded Kali’s mother of the goddess Ganga, whose duty was to protect the native Ganges river. Kali’s mother felt alienated in their new land, but Kali felt at home.

Kali was raised in this foreign land and it was all she had ever known. She felt at home in their house. She felt loved; her parents showered her with love and raised her to love others. Outside of home, Kali felt different from her peers. They didn't quite understand her. They mocked her for her looks and her clothes. Her classmates mocked her boyish clothing and called her a “dyke”. She didn’t know what that word meant but she could tell it was dangerous. They tormented her constantly and chanted this word over and over, as if they were performing a Hindu worship.

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One day the bullying became too much. Kali ran home as fast as she could and she asked her mother what the unfamiliar word meant. Her mom shrieked at her in horror. When Kali asked why she reacted like that, she instructed Kali to never say that word again. Kali only became more and more confused. She asked her father the same question and he refused to tell her. He only reminded her that her namesake was not only the goddess of creation, empowerment, and shakti but also sexuality. Kali didn’t understand why he told her this but she kept it in her mind.

As she grew older, Kali yearned to know what the word meant but everyone refused to tell her. Finally, she found an omen that lead her to the answer. Kali frequented the local bookstore and on this particular day, she found a book she had never seen before. It was leather bound and matted with dust. It appeared mystical. She blew the dust off and fingered the engraved cover which read A Modern History of Slurs and Their Origins. Kali flipped the pages and found that the copyright was from just a few years before. Despite its youth, it looked like an epic from a different time. Kali felt compelled to keep turning the pages. Page after page listed the etymology of the words her parents had taught her to never say. She felt uncomfortable but couldn’t keep herself from flipping the pages. Soon she reached the ‘d’ section of the book and she skimmed the pages until she reached the word she had been searching for. She had found it: “dyke is an offensive noun used to refer to lesbians”. She purchased the book that had taught her so much and kept it hidden in her room.

Kali couldn’t understand. Why had everyone been so reluctant to tell her what it meant? What was wrong with lesbians? These questions plagued her mind for years

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and years. As she grew older and older, the questions faded from the forefront of her mind until she had forgotten them.

Years later, Kali was about to graduate high school and leave home. On the day before her departure, she was sitting under an oak tree with a female friend talking about their futures. Then in the middle of the conversation, her friend leaned in and kissed her. It took her by surprise, yet Kali kissed her back and enjoyed it. Then when she realized what had just happened, she ran home and unearthed her epic book from the back of her closet and she turned to the ‘d’ section. As she did, something dawned on her. Kali realized she had always been fascinated with the particular word because she felt attached to it. When she heard or read it, she felt pain in her temples. She realized she felt this pain because the word meant something to her, it hurt her, it consumed her, it was her.

She was named after the goddess of sexuality; it just so happened that this Kali had a sexuality that was divergent from the norm. The girl named after the goddess was a lesbian. She felt it was the gods’ way of telling her something, they had sent her a sign through her name. She believed everything happened for a reason and this coincidence proved that everything was right in the world.

From that day forward, Kali was never embarrassed by her sexuality. She embraced it.

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Curious

If anyone asks about college, tell them you’re going to Princeton. I know it’s too early to apply, but that’s the story we’re going with. If they ask about a boyfriend, tell them Raj is yours. But Mama, Raj and I are just friends. I know that, but the masis don’t have to. Treat your family with respect, especially your elders. Never question them.

They know more than you ever will. But Mama, if they know more than I ever will, what’s the purpose of going to Princeton. Do not question your mother’s word.

When making luchis, dust the counter and your rolling pan with flour, then mound the luchi dough into a small ball in your hands. Then use the rolling pan to flatten the dough into a smooth round circle. Drop the dough into the boiling ghee and let it puff up.

They should blister with oil like your skin does after a summer spent in India. You are not cut out for the heat, only the monsoons. Always serve luchis when hot. If you need to make a quick dessert for a puja, paint luchis with rosewater and crushed almonds.

The rosewater will coat your tongue in a syrupy sweet that remains for days. But, if you don’t have dough, just serve pistachio kulfi. It pairs well with any meat, especially lamb curry. No Bengali man will marry a woman who can’t think quickly or whose luchis aren’t made the old-fashioned way. But Mama, I don’t want to marry an Indian man.

The key is to find one that is pale enough to pass for white, like I did. Your father has made airport travel much easier than you could ever imagine. I only get “randomly selected” when I’m with you. That reminds me, never wear chappals to the airport. Their

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minimal coverage will leave your feet grimy from the disgusting airport floor. It’s even dirtier than the kitchen floor after an annaprashan. Always pack a light snack and a warm blanket in your carryon; it’s always chilly in the airport and planes are usually delayed. Be sure to take prashad every day, even when you’re traveling. Nuts and dried fruit pack well. Never raise suspicion at the airport. Our complexion is enough to make us suspects, so don’t push boundaries.

Be sure to not push boundaries around your Nani. Ever since she watched Bend it Like Beckham with us last year, she’s been afraid you're a lesbian, so don’t be too affectionate with your female friends when she’s around…But Mama, being a lesbian isn’t a bad thing. In our culture, it is a bad thing. Not American culture. In Bengali culture, being gay is taboo and I don’t you to fall into the fringes of society, like the Dalits. To Nani, gay people are as doomed as the untouchables and she believes they should be shunned.

Why are you asking so many questions? No reason, Mama. I’m just curious.

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Things You Won’t Tell Your Father

He taught you everything you knew.

-Colleen Kearney Rich, “Things You Won’t Tell Your Therapist”

The reason you don’t tell your father anything is because he doesn’t understand you. But you can’t explain that to him because he gets offended when you bring the subject up. He likes to think you’re the one who’s broken—not him. He’s a very sensitive man, you received that trait from him. You also got his thick hair and long eyelashes that dance along high cheekbones. He danced with you at the countless weddings that peppered your childhood; you always lead. You can’t tell him that because his foreign masculinity is too fragile to hear that. He’s too fragile to hear that his daughter likes women.

He’s too fragile to hear that his only daughter won’t have kids to carry on the family name. His swell of pride at your college graduation was erased when he came across a Facebook photo of you kissing your ex-girlfriend. You tried to explain it to him but he wouldn’t listen.

When you visit home, he reads the paper as you sit in awkward silence. When you were younger, he read the articles aloud to you. Now, he barely acknowledges you.

Your mother has come around and accepted you as much as she possibly can but it’s harder for your father. He never fit into the West and your life doesn’t align with his orthodox thoughts. He tried to pray the gay away and now you can’t trust him. He turned his back on his daughter because he could never turn his back on his religion.

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He loves you in his own special way—because he is required to—not because he wants to.

You have accepted that he’ll never walk you down the aisle and that he’ll never meet your wife. You have accepted that he’s more likely to return to India in his old age than move in with you. He’d rather die alone, comforted by his motherland, than live with his own daughter. You must learn to accept that.

He loves you.

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Ways to Come Out Throughout Your Life

Sell hope to anyone dumb enough.

-Angela Palm, “Ways to Make Money in Prison”

Post about it on your secret Tumblr so your parents won’t see. Find an online community that accepts you. Keep your queer identity restricted to the internet. Don’t tell your friends. Tell only your best friend. Let her follow your Tumblr but make her promise to not tell anyone. Your best friend accidentally tells your other friend. She tells another friend and he tells someone else until the whole school knows. Get a “coming out haircut” that won’t tip off your parents. Join your school’s GSA. Actually come out to a couple of the members that you instantly click with. Tell them the truth and not the rumors. Cry onto their shoulders as they tell you about their parents’ disapproval and pray that your parents will accept you. Go home and check your Tumblr account. Go back to GSA for the next three years. Create your own queer family that accepts you no matter what. Never act on your feelings because they’re too risky. When you talk to a girl that you met on Tumblr and lives an hour away, use the distance as an excuse to never see each other; after all your family has friends in that town and they could hear through the grapevine. Break that girl’s heart by telling her you realized you’re straight, even though you’re lying. Live in denial. On the last day of school before graduation, kiss Taylor, the friend who you’ve had a crush on forever. Enjoy the kiss. Keep in touch with her through college, always pining for her until you fall for someone even better. When frat boys ask you out, tell them you have a significant other back home named Taylor. It isn’t techni-

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cally a lie. Join your college’s GSA. Hang a rainbow banner above your bed, so your roommate will get the hint. She does get the hint and avoids you like the plague. Fall in love with Taylor when she comes to visit for a weekend. Let Taylor break your heart.

She gives you a taste of your own medicine by saying the distance is too much for her.

When you go home and see her during Christmas break, feel your heart break again.

Her face captivates you as much as it crushes you. Return to college. Join Tinder. Go to parties. Meet people. Experiment with guys until you can confirm it’s not for you. Despite all of this, in graduation photos, your hands are linked with your girlfriend’s. There is hope. Go to grad school. Fall in love again. Repeat.

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Olivia

College was complete culture shock. I left my parents’ traditional Indian household for the liberal environment of Carnegie Mellon University. My parents had always thought they understood me, but never actually did. I think it’s hard for you to truly know someone without having knowledge of their identities and that was the issue with my parents; their naivety about my sexuality lead them to believe that they knew me when they never actually could. But at CMU, I was out and I was finally surrounded by people who understood me and it was liberating.

My classes were as eyeopening as the people in them. In my gender studies and South Asian history classes, I finally learned a view of history that reflected me. I learned about the history of the international queer rights movement and the story of India’s rajahs rather than relearning the dull stories of the founding fathers. Those two semester long classes taught me more than my entire K-12 education ever could have.

One day I found myself in the library searching for a collection of Rabindranath Tagore’s poems for my South Asian history course. I searched all of the poetry and history stacks and I still couldn’t find the book I was looking for. I asked the librarian about its whereabouts and she looked it up in the system. She said it had already been checked out by another student, presumably one in my class.

So I spent the next week reading and annotating Tagore’s pieces on the internet but I still yearned for the hard copy, so I went back to the library. This time the librarian informed me that the book was set to be returned later that afternoon, so I waited. I sat down at a desk and researched Tagore. While my mother read his pieces as my bed-

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time stories and I did an independent project on him in high school, I had never fully explored his pieces’ meanings until this class. I couldn’t get enough of his work.

After an hour of loitering in the library, I got in line to speak with the librarian again, but I had to wait in a long line because it was finals week. I recognized the girl in front of me from my gender studies class. She always led class discussions and was quite knowledgable, but I was too shy to ever approach her on my own. She was also strikingly beautiful. I noticed she was reading a book and I was so curious that I peeked over her shoulder to see what it was. The problem was that as I raised on my tiptoes, I tripped on my shoelace and knocked into her. My chin slammed into her shoulder and she jerked around to see who had accosted her. While her eyes projected a slight stink eye, her lips slowly turned into a smile.

“Hey sorry about that. I was just trying to catch a peek at what you’re reading.

But that obviously didn’t go as planned because I tripped on my shoelace and knocked into you. God I am so sorry about that. You probably don't recognize me, but I’m in your Intro to Gender Studies class…” I rambled until she cut in.

Recognition glimmered in her eyes and she said, “I know who you are! You’re the girl who always looks like she's going to talk in class discussions, but they just as you’re about to raise your hand, you write whatever you were going to say down.”

“Yeah I guess that’s me.” I was dumbfounded. She wedged her book under her armpit and reached her hand to shake mine. As I shook her hand, I remained speechless until I realized I should probably say something. “I’m Kali. It’s nice to finally meet you.

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“I’m Olivia. But you probably already know that because I never shut up in class.”

She laughed at herself and her eyes gleamed so much that they caught me off guard as she made eye contact with me. God, she was gorgeous. She was animated and her hands captivated me as they illustrated her points.

“Now that we finally know each other’s names, can I ask what book you’re reading?”

“Oh yeah sorry I got distracted.”

“What did you get distracted by?” I wondered. The library was dead silent except for us.

“Just by the fact that we’re talking right now. If I’m being honest, I’ve had a tiny crush on you since the first week of class,” she replied.

“You had a crush on me?” I was flabbergasted.

“Have.”

“What?”

“I have—not had—a crush on you,” she retorted. We were inching forward in the line and I dreaded the moment that our conversation would end. “Oh and about the book, it’s Tagore’s collection, My Boyhood Days.”

It dawned on me. “You’re the person who checked the book out!” She looked confused, so I clarified. “I’ve been awaiting the return of that book for a project in my South Asian History course…You’re not in that class, so why are you reading that book?”

“I enjoy reading his work for fun,” she replied. That sealed it.

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“Sorry for being so forward, I know we just met and all…but would you like to go on a date sometime?”

“I thought you’d never ask.” The librarian called for Olivia to step up to the desk.

Our conversation was over but just a couple minutes later, I got to leave with insight, a date, and my long awaited book; it was all I could ever want.

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Have Faith

Her beauty and the moonlight overthrew you…

-Leonard Cohen, “Hallelujah”

On our second date, Olivia explained her complex faith to me and I listened. Religion had always intrigued me and I was hoping to take a theology class at some point.

Olivia and I bonded over our intricate practices. She had been raised by her Jewish mother but had always felt more connected to her father’s Catholicism. She nervously explained the purpose of the rosary and communion. She said that she was worried I would judge her religion as past girlfriends had. I reiterated that I loved everything about her, including her spirituality.

The following month, she took me to my first Mass. Olivia held my hand as we listened to the service and she sang along to all of the hymns. I was stricken by the juxtaposition of the holy church and the sinful union of our clasped hands; the sun shone through the stained glass windows and reflected a beautiful pattern on her face and that was the moment I realized the depth of my love.

After we waited in the pews to greet the priest, she asked me about Hinduism and I explained the rituals of Temple. She wanted to witness them. So the next month, I took her to Temple. She took prashad and prayed to my namesake. As I introduced her to my guru, she never let go of my hand.

That was a couple years ago. Since then, our lives have been tilted and complicated. Olivia wants to travel the world. I want to establish my career. Olivia wants to

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have kids. I want a dog. Olivia still wants to get married in a Catholic ceremony in a church; the problem is that she doesn’t want to get married to me.

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Burlington

Olivia and I separated a week before marriage equality passed in Pennsylvania.

We had been sitting together at the kitchen room table, looking at centerpiece designs, when she broke the silence and said, “I don’t think we should get married.” I dropped the mason jar that held honeysuckle in it and it shattered onto the floor, striking my bare foot in the process. Her first reaction was to immediately rush to the bathroom. It was as automatic as when she called me during downpour, not to say anything, just to hear me breath. We were each other’s safety nets; something to fall into when nothing was certain.

I needed her comfort in that moment, but she was the one person I couldn’t ask.

We had been together for seven years and we had fought our way to obtaining a marriage license in our county; I had taken up the fight while she worked her way up the ranks of the startup she was working for. Now, she was a program manager with a six figure salary and I was an unemployed writer with a failed screenplay in one hand and a marriage license in the other. Now I was losing what little I had.

As she bandaged my foot, I asked her why she had said what she did. Without looking up, she said that we were at different places in our lives and that our futures weren’t compatible. I heard her say I wasn’t carrying my weight in our relationship and I crumbled under the significance of what that meant. I tried to maintain composure through my tears and I explained to her that I had been accepted into a prestigious MFA program in Vermont. She said maybe it would be best if I accepted it. I reluctantly agreed.

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The next day was a strange juxtaposition to our typical morning. I usually stood at the door in my pajamas with my coffee mug in hand and sleep in my eyes to say goodbye to her, but this time it was her wishing farewell to me. She wished me well and I worried that this was it‌that I would never see her again.

So the next day as she boarded the subway to work, I waited at the train station for my ride to Burlington. As I listened the morning news from the boarding platform, a CNN alert blared into my earbuds the breaking news that marriage equality had been passed in Pennsylvania. It took all of my willpower to not text Olivia; I typed her name in countless times but in the end I turned my phone off, put it in my bag, and boarded my train.

To this day, I swear the train car smelled like honeysuckle.

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The Boy Who Never Cries

By Caden Molin

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to cody who encourages me, who taught me to see goodness in every corner of the world, who helped me stay loyal to myself

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Table of Contents 1. The Boy Who Never Cries 2. Patio 3. Raindrops 4. Icing 5. Sweets 6. Division 7. Soup Night 8. Business

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The Boy Who Never Cries

Once upon a time, a young woman delivered a baby boy. He came so peacefully, quietly, and calmly, that she worried her son was different.

Her husband shook his head. “My dear, why are you upset? He is a happy young boy. Isn’t this a good thing?”

The woman supposed her husband was right. She thought, “Why am I worried, when a healthy, happy baby is all I want?” But a fear lingered within her that something was wrong.

A month after giving birth, this fear continued. Apart from his yelps of hunger, the child did not cry. One day, the woman stepped into her doctor’s office.

“You seem very healthy! Do you have any questions?” her doctor said after her check- up. She sank to the floor.

“My doctor, why do I worry that my son does not cry?” the woman asked.

“You’ve been given a blessing. Every baby is different,” he said. The woman was skeptical but left to go home to her silent child.

While running a warm bath for her child, the woman thought to herself. Why might my child be so silent and happy? she asked herself. She removed his clothing and diaper and lowered his small body into her little tub. She quickly washed his body with soap before coming up with an idea.

She picked up her little child and laid him out on a towel. As she wrapped her baby into a baby-sized towel roll, she made up her mind. She did not know what would happen but she had to find out. She took two fingers and pinched her little baby’s

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cheek. He just giggled and squeezed his eyes shut. She was too scared to do anything that could truly hurt her baby.

She brought him down the steps into the little kitchen, where she grabbed a pot and threw it on the floor. It made a loud, echoing noise, but her child did not budge. His face softened a little, looking a bit sad, but no tears came from his eyes.

“Why aren’t you crying? Aren’t normal babies supposed to cry?” The woman yelled, and her baby began to cry. As the tears came from the boy’s eyes, the woman truly understood her gift. She did not like the tears, and she did not like to see her child crying. “I’m sorry, my son, I will never yell at you again. I love you.”

And the woman kept her promise, remembering that her son loved her very much, just as much as she loved her son.

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Patio

I couldn’t have remembered it better; the house I lived in before we moved to our home in the city was a small, fairy-like cottage in a nearby suburb.

My mother would carry me strapped to her chest so that I could experience the world the way she did. We went to local markets and on long walks and old women would come and tell my mother that I was a lovely child, and very happy looking. My mother would thank them shyly and go on her way.

My dad spent time taking photographs of my mother and me; he put the pictures on the walls of our city house to make it feel like home. My favorite was the one of me sitting on our grand piano—the one that no city family would have the space for— as my mother played. When we moved we bought a narrow wall piano with a short bench to sit on.

My mother’s favorite thing to do was to plop me onto a child sized lawn chair on the patio as she sunbathed, drew portraits and knit little hats and scarves for me. The patio was wide and tan and surrounded by nature, potted trees and a large honeysuckle bush. At times, my mother pulled the flowers off the bush and fed me the nectar that leaked out.

But when she got her city job, my mother no longer cared for out little house. She said it took too long to drive to the city and back. She was too tired when she got home, falling asleep and leaving my father to make me dinner.

My father worked from home most days. He said it was important for my mom to work, and so he set up office in our home, only leaving once or twice a week to go to

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the city. Dad emailed and called and fixed me food in between what he called his ‘meetings’.

One of the last days at our old house, my mother and I walked down onto the patio and drank as much nectar as we could pull of the bushes. I was four now, and able to waddle around to get the better flowers. I sat next to my mom and stared at the big “for sale” sign in front of my house. My mother said she was happy to move. She said it with a blank face.

In our new home, my mother painted the walls with pictures and kept indoor plants on shelves. My dad went back to working at the office in the city, as we had no room for a home-office here. My mom put me in Kindergarten and she went to work every day. The condo had no yard, just several large windows that my mother often sat by and stared as cars ran by.

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Raindrops

There was no asking my father a short-answered question.

For him, a question that didn’t fit into the categories of math or a yes-or-no question meant you wanted a story. When I asked him why it had to rain on a day I wanted to go out with my friends, he sat me down in front of a window and told me how the clouds cried when they got too heavy.

My father had me watch as he took apart appliances to fix them. When I got a big scrape on my knee at three and a half, he taught me to always keep a wound covered, not let too much hair get to it, and to always use anti-biotic, or else it wouldn’t heal as fast.

My mother and I were the other way around. I told her my youthful wonderings and she silently listened. The world I heard more than ever was ‘why, why, why’ from her. When I told her the rain made me sad, I went on to tell her I loved going outside and a day was not a day without a short walk, and that it made me sad it was not bright out, and I didn’t like the way everything was wet afterwards.

After the rain, my mother took me into the yard and had me jump in a puddle.

She did not tell me why, but I knew she did not want to see me sad. Mom said that my sadness was her sadness. From then on, we sat quietly by the window while it rained.

The day my mother got her job, she loaded into the car with my father in the mornings and I wouldn’t see them until an hour past getting home. When my parents got home, Dad scooped me up in his arms but Mom was quiet as always.

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One day as it rained, I curled up to my mother and closed my eyes. “Can you stay home tomorrow?”

My mother laughed. “Why?” she asked. I told her I missed her; I told her she kept things feeling normal here and she laughed.

“Paul, baby, I have to work. I keep things going at work. They need enough people in my job, or else there could be problems in other people’s lives.”

“Aren’t there enough doctors in the world?” I asked.

“It’s not like that, Paul,” she said.

I looked down and frowned. I missed my mother but I knew she had made her point. I found my father in the savory kitchen where he was preparing dinner, and sat on a chair. I could hear rain tiptoeing on the roof.

“Daddy, what do you do at work?” I asked.

As he stirred the pot in front of him, my father peeked behind himself and gave me a grin. “Son, every day after I drop your mom off at the clinic, I drive to an office in a small building uptown, and I call my client, and we talk about her old husband, and all the details of our relationship. I take notes and I write essays and I argue, all to help her win.”

“Who did that for you and Mom? Who won?” I asked.

My dad chuckled and took out a large bowl. “Your mother and I are still married. I work so that people can end their marriages.”

My jaw dropped, and my brain had a bloody, splitting itch. “Who would want to end a marriage?”

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My dad dumped the large pot of noodles on the stove into a strainer, and poured the pasta and the sauce in the big bowl. “People who aren’t safe and happy. A lot of people are mistaken as to what kind of marriage they got into.”

I stared at the pasta in the bowl, and my stomach leaped to the ground. “So, some marriages are bad?” He nodded. The rain began pouring down harder. “What about you and Mom?” Dad grinned and took my hand. “I love your mother more and more every day, and I want to protect her from any harm.”

“Harm?” I yelped. “Who’s trying to hurt her?”

My dad stirred the sauce into the pasta and I watched as the noodles became saturated with red sauce. “Your Mom’s job is very important, sweetie, but some people don’t agree with what she does. But it’s not your job to worry, Paul. Mom is safe. Now call her in for dinner.”

“Dad,” I said. “It’s raining.” I scurried into the other room to see my mother sitting on the windowsill. I pulled my body onto the cushion and sat next to her. I took her hand and asked her how work was. She did not answer this.

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Icing

The trees were frosted like vanilla icing and the wheels on the bus spun through the slush on the ground, rolling and I could hear it plenty well because there were cars on either side of the curb and the big kids talked in the back of the bus and I just sat in the first seat I saw empty. When we approached the second stop and a girl with dark skin and puffy hair sat down next to me and I wanted to touch it I wanted to touch her hair but I was so little I couldn’t even try.

The big yellow bus parked in front of the school we got out we went into the school and I swear the other kids sounded like dinosaurs in Jurassic Park and I remembered my mom telling me this is the year I am a big boy this is the year I get my sister this is the year my grades start to count mom said.

When I get to the classroom in the morning the teachers tell us that we are smart and we play the name game and we drink juice boxes and the puffy-haired girl from the bus said she liked my hair and I said thanks my mom gave it to me and she laughed and I laughed too and her name is Sadie and she likes ponies and I said I like her hair too.

Sadie sat next to me in reading class and saw me reading my magic tree-house book and asked me what I was doing and I laughed and she said what and I said it’s one of my favorite series and she said she could not read and I asked did her dad teach her and she said no my dad has a job but mine has a job too and we like to sit down and talk about words and every time I didn’t know a word I took my pencil and drew a

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circle around it and we sounded it out together and I said I know works like perseverance and responsibility but I couldn’t spell them yet.

We counted in math and then we counted by 2s and then by 5s and then by 10s because mom likes to count and sing as I play my piano and so she sings one two three four five six seven eight and she sings two four six eight and she sings five ten fifteen twenty and she sings ten twenty thirty forty fifty. When the boy next to me told me my voice sounded like Justin Bieber and I didn’t know what that meant and so I frowned but my mom always says some people don’t know how to turn their frown upside down and then I asked what a frown was and she said it’s when you aren’t being happy but you should be so I tried to smile but it was less easy when my mom wasn’t behind me and the boy didn’t know why I was smiling at him.

And on the bus home I told Sadie that my dad argues for women who hate their husbands and she said her dad always complains that her mom is always telling him to do stuff and I said that didn’t sound like fun but Sadie said her mom was always overwhelmed and never had time for play and I said I thought that did not sound fun and she shrugged and said it was fine and she got off the bus and soon I did too and I walked the block up to our side of the half of the house and sat down and told myself I’d try harder tomorrow.

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Sweets

Is it, isn’t it? Has she, hasn’t she?

- Sally-Ann Murray, “Eating her”

She hastily threw the baby onto my lap and went to the kitchen and opened the fridge. A cold, netted bag of oranges sat in the bottom drawer. She removed one and slid a knife into its skin, deep enough for juice to pop up around the blade but not quite deep enough to have an orange corpse on the counter. Her eyes focused like camera lenses on the way the knife slipped into the orange’s skin.

Especially after Louna was born, my mother craved sweetness in any form she could have it. My father said my mother was carrying on as if Louna still lived in her tummy. He told me my mother used to have to eat plenty to feed herself and her daughter. He told me not to ask questions.

My favorite food as a toddler was bananas, and we used to keep a well- stocked supply of Oreos in the cabinet. My mom’s sugar craze was gone by my fifth birthday but was born again just a few months before Louna. Once, when I was little, my mother went to make a cake but crashed out on the couch while it was in the oven. When I smelled burning, I woke her up and she rushed to the oven and cried. The only thing I thought to do was to offer her a speckled banana from the counter.

“I could eat as much sugar as I wanted and you are still the sweetest thing that’s ever been in my stomach,” my mother told me. I laughed because it was funny, then I

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laughed because it was odd, and then my mother and I cleaned up her mess, and threw away the blackened cake remains.

Now, I carried my little sister through the hall, into the kitchen. I saw her force a smile as her eyes landed on my sister, and then she gazed up to me.

“Mother?” I asked. “Could I have a slice?”

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Division

Put the pot in the stove, the water into the pot, add two cups of oats and three of water. Put on simmer. Check the coffee.

Take off glasses, wipe them, wipe eyes, and put them back on. Scratch behind left ear. Pour a tall glass of orange juice, drink it down, and then regret drinking it so fast. Take a deep breath and forget all regrets.

Stir the oats and watch them. Really, watch them. As they thicken, plan the day.

Be ready.

First class. English. Turn in that essay and pray for the best mark in the class.

Pray that the hours of the past week spent frantically searching the internet were valid, pray that grades are valid, pray that class is valid and do not pray for anything else. Do not divide that attention.

Second class. Geometry. Wonder if watching YouTube videos to review the concept counts as ‘studying’ and wonder if studying is knowing the material or practicing it.

Answer all the problems on a worksheet that will be graded, returned, and thrown in the trash. Check each answer and divide the correct by the total. Multiply by 100. Be right.

Test brains. Ask for brains to be stretched. Ask how.

Third class. Biology. Repeat the process of mitosis within the brain and explain why life is life. Understand how one cell divides into two and how two divide into even more and how humanity is a cabinet of cells. Think about failure. Ask if failure to divide is failure to live.

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Fourth class. Civics. Learn the propaganda that’s on the TV. Learn the parties and why they divide people and learn what a democracy is and learn that America is barely one.

And stir and stir and stir and decide when to go to lockers and when to turn in homework and what is being done and who is doing it. And take little bowls from the cabinet and divide the oatmeal into four parts.

And consume one fourth of it and ask why the fitness gram pacer test is appropriate and what advanced mathematics will help the art kids, with and if all these numbers mean anything. Pack a lunch for school. Add an apple and a water bottle. Think of where that plastic came from. Think of where that water is bottled and continue to pack it for later.

Pour coffee and drink it quicker than intended. Regret this.

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Soup Night

You might live with the danger, but you’re dancing with the dead –Wolf at Your Door, SIXX: A. M.

I found myself—old enough to be making plans on Friday nights—sitting outside of your door, knocking, occasionally trying to speak with you. “Louna,” I said. You didn’t answer.

My fist hovered by your door. “Louna, can you come out?” I stared down the narrow hall, away from your door, at our mother, rushing around in the kitchen and putting chopped carrots into a large pot on the stove.

“Dinner is soon!” I called through the door. “You could, y’know, try and join us for dinner today!”

I sat, the scent of dinner growing thicker, and your silence growing more eerie.

“Do you need help with your homework? Is it already done? I could help you if you need it.” I knocked shallowly, and dropped my fist.

“I’m coming in Louna,” I called. I twisted the nob, cold in my hand, and slowly I pushed the door open, pushing some dirty laundry across the floor.

Your room was dark, and scattered with laundry, books, and school supplies. My feet stepped on pencils and likely dirty clothes, but I remained silent as I gazed across to your bed.

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There you laid, a burrow of sheets atop a bare, large mattress. I saw the pile moving ever so slightly. I flicked on the light over your room, and it lit up to reveal your crying face.

“Go away,” you said. “I’m fine, I have no schoolwork, I don’t need company or dinner. Just leave.”

“Louna. Tell me what’s happening. How long have you been sleeping?”

You sat up a little in your bed, pushing your red-blonde hair back into its shape.

“Not long enough,” you laughed, sarcastically.

I gazed across your room. Your desk chair was in the corner, seating a hoodie and a copy of The Giver. I put them on your desk, cluttered with drawings and loose-leaf paper. Your face was pale and your hands covered your eyes. “You’ll thank me for this later,” I said, and I scooped you into my arms.

You shrieked. “Paul, what are you doing? Let me down!”

I carried you across the room and put you onto your desk chair. “What was that for?” you asked.

“Do you have a laundry basket?” I asked. You gestured to the purple basket in the corner, and I picked up various garments off the floor, along with the sheets and pillows on your bed. I dropped them in the basket.

“Paul, what are you doing?”

“You can’t lie in bed forever. And your room’s a mess.”

You slumped forward and frowned. “Why do you care?”

I opened your small closet and picked out a sundress. “Go take a shower. Really wash yourself off, okay? Your hair, and your body, and behind your ears. And put this

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dress on.” I held the dress out to you. “And then meet us at dinner. I’ll get your room all tidied up.

“Paul, what is all of this? What are you doing?”

I frowned. “You can’t always feel like this. And you can’t live like this.”

“You don’t get it,” you said.

“No, I don’t.” I said. “But I care. Take your shower, take your time. And then sit at the table with us.”

You gave a sad smile that I hadn’t seen for too long. “You’re lucky it’s soup night,” you said.

“You can’t pass up a chance to eat some good soup.”

You laughed and headed to the bathroom. I heard the shower and the fan turn on, and I began to stack your papers into a pile on your desk, put your books on your bookshelf, and brought your hamper to the laundry room. And soon enough, I’d eat soup.

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Business He didn’t call back. End of story.

-Shellie Zacharia

You see, for the longest amount of time, I thought college meant ‘no more parents’. It’s not a mystery that would have scared little me, and within my first week of being among other recent adults, my heart was frightened once again, the same was it was when I was a little boy.

Wednesday nights were quiet for me. The hall of my dorm was almost empty, as everyone who wasn’t being a hermit in their dorm was out at classes or clubs or the library. My roommate, Jason, had some type of Eurasian studies class on Wednesday nights, leaving me alone.

My third Wednesday night, I woke up from a deep sleep to a small package on my desk. As I dragged myself out of bed, I ran my hand through my hair and yawned.

I had no memory of this package, but nonetheless I opened it to find a copy of Freakenomics by Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner, along with a notecard reading “you’ll find this good”.

I entered the common area, barefoot, and crossed my legs up on the couch. I could hear it in my head, my father telling me to always keep my feet on the floor, and I planted them firmly in front of me. I spread the book and began reading.

A good few pages in, the silence was broken; I heard someone walking up the stairs. My eyes scurried to the door from the stairway to see the girl from across the hall, Mimi, wearing a black cap and long, pink socks.

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Mimi had the same red hair as my mother and I, and every time she opened her door, she filled the floor with hot, steamy air and the smell of grapefruit and pomegranate. “Can I join you?” she asked.

“Um, sure,” I said. She sat down on the other side of the couch and put her bag on the floor. She tucked her legs under her body, snug and fitted in the corner of the couch.

“I don’t see you out here all that much,” she said. I shook my head. She leaned in and looked at the jacket of my book. “Freakenomics?”

I opened my mouth to speak, but she interrupted me. “I’ve always wondered about nominative determinism. Good book.”

“I haven’t gotten quite that far yet, my dad just sent this to me earlier,” I stated blankly, my eyes still scanning the page.

She sat quietly for once, her eyes gazing on my book. “Would you like some tea?”

“Excuse me?”

She giggled. “Tea, silly. It’s herbal. Want some?”

I nodded, not entirely sure what I was signing up for. She dashed into her room. I closed my book and put it on the floor in front of me.

A few minutes later, Mimi emerged holding a few light pink mugs. I smelled a sweet mango scent, followed by the warm, steamy feeling of having my face inches above a cup of hot tea. I put it on the coffee table and thanked Mimi.

“You’re welcome…. uh… what’s your name again?” She asked.

“Paul.”

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She winked. “Gotcha.” She curled back up into the couch with her mug in hand.

“So Paul, what classes are you in?”

“Women’s history, Calculus, Intro to Econ, English Literature,” She put her fist under her chin to hold up her face. “Econ? You an business kinda guy?”

I sat, dumfounded at the question. “No, I don’t think so.”

Mimi laughed. “You seem confused.”

I nodded. “My dad thinks I would be into it, but I don’t really think so. It feels too… big.”

She bit her lip and let her eyes explore me. “Why’re you sitting like that?”

“What?” I asked.

“Your stance. You’re sitting like you’re at a desk. You look uncomfortable.”

I frowned. Was I uncomfortable? “I always sit like this,” I said.

Mimi shrugged. “As you will. I just notice you’re really trying to keep your feet on the floor. Are you stressed?”

My brain fizzled a little. “I am now,” I said, as I stood up and dashed to my room.

My phone sat on my nightstand.

Mimi scurried up behind me, and into the door to my room, which I had left open.

She held my book and the mug of tea I had been holding earlier. “Paul, are you alright?”

I nodded and started searching my phone for my father’s contact. Mimi tiptoed into my room and put my book and tea onto my desk. “I’ll leave this here, can you return it later?”

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I pressed call. “Thank you Mimi.” She smiled and walked away, and my phone rang and rang.

I’m sorry, my phone said, this number has a voice mailbox that has not been set up yet.

I called again, but there was no use. And he didn’t call back. End of story.

The epigraph and last two sentences of this story are pulled from Shellie Zacharia’s “Why This Isn’t A Good Story To Tell”

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Flowers in Coffeepots

By Liv Benning

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To the people who never know the right things to say, the ones who always say too much, and the friends who know how to make it all better.

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Table of Contents

1. Mrs. Mason 2. Hidden Witches, Goblins, and Zombies 3. Journal Entry #24 4. Attractions 5. Kissimmee Storms in May 6. Powdered Perception 7. Baggage 8. Flowers in Coffeepots

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Mrs. Mason If they knew, they’d ask me what she says, and sometimes, those things aren’t very nice.

—Teri D. Rouvelas, “Bachon” Momma always tells me to be nice to people, even if I have a good reason for not liking them. I never liked Mrs. Mason but Momma didn't care.

Mrs. Mason was mean and heavyset. She always looked ready to yell at anything that made her mad and that’s usually me. Every morning Momma gets up, I do too, rubbing the sleep from my eyes and picking out an outfit. She’s always works long hours at the hospital and ever since I gave myself a nasty burn on my hand, she won’t let me stay home alone anymore. Every morning I walk out the house with my mom, us parting ways and not looking back.

Mrs. Mason never lets me outside to play with the rest of the kids. She tells me they’re trouble and none of them have any sense. She frowns when I near the window, looking outside to watch the girls jump rope and the boys toss a ball around. I’ve never played the games they play but I’d never tell Mrs. Mason that or else she’d lecture me about why I’m not allowed to play with them. The boy across the street from her house is always the leader of the group, deciding which game they’ll play. His curly hair and rosy cheeks give him a girlish look but I think he’s the cutest boy out of all of them. I tell Mrs. Mason this but she shoos me out the house with money in my hand and orders to get her a can of green beans from the store.

I smile at the adults in the store like Mom tells me to, trying to be respectful. Mrs. Mason says they’re all terrible parents for letting their kids stay outside so late. She complains that we need to go to school all year round, summer only rotting our brains. I 167

once asked her if she would let her child go outside but she looked away and turned the radio up. We sat in silence as songs played, the noise of the kids outside only background noise. Sometimes I felt bad when I looked at Mrs. Mason, her eyes weary and face contorted in discomfort. She was sad, I knew it but would never say it.

I wondered about her even when Momma returned, sitting outside on my porch steps and watching the kids go inside their homes.

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Hidden Witches, Goblins, and Zombies

Before the beginning of everything, I never believed in monsters. Then the little girl across the street became drained of color. Murphy and Lewis talked about seeing things and turning on the lights in their bedrooms to find nothing. I liked to think I wasn’t scared of anything, especially anything my two best friends were horrified of. The thought of witches, goblins, and zombies made my skin crawl but I knew I would do everything I could to fend them off if they were real. I liked to be tough and make my friends believe I could do anything, but the day I laid eyes on that terrified girl that never liked to play with us, I knew something was wrong. She looked pale, shoulders slumped as she walked down the street. A shadow followed her as she walked, the sun suddenly hiding behind the clouds. All of my friends played in front of my house but I sat on the curb, watching the girl kick tiny rocks with her shiny Mary Jane’s. Mrs. Mason came outside telling the girl to get back onto the porch or else she’d regret it. At the time, I didn't know her mother had been diagnosed with lung caner. Even so, I had never been so sure that people could also be monsters.

That night I poked at my food, watching my mother feed my baby brother. Dad frowned at me. “Lucas, eat your food, your mother worked hard to make us dinner.”

“Do you believe in monsters, Dad? I don't but…people are monsters, right?”

My parents looked at me with such confusion, I felt like I said something terrible.

Mom laughed, “Where-“ “Of course I believe in monsters.” Dad set down his fork and looked at me, telling me that this was not a laughing matter. “There are monsters in everything.”

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Dad never agreed with me on things like this, usually telling me to be quiet. I used that moment to talk as much as I could with him. “In houses?”

“Yes.” “Outside?”

“Of course.”

“In people?”

I will never forget the look on my father’s face as I said those two words, something telling me he knew all about monster people.

“Yes son, especially in people.”

The next day I sat outside all day, waiting for the little girl across the street to come out of her house. It was a Saturday and I knew she stayed home with her mom, who always seemed to be going somewhere. I tried not to stare, my mother telling me that was rude, but something changed in the little girl when her mom left. She looked sad and sometimes mad. Her hands would curl into fists and she would cry so hard that her body shook. It scared me. I knew from the scary movies Murphy showed me that there was no other explanation but a monster.

I gave Murphy and Lewis walkie talkies and told them to go to each end of the street in case they saw her. I wanted to know why she let something like this happen to her. I assumed you couldn't let something like that happen to you if you fought against it.

I really wanted to help her, not sure how to but I knew something had to change. I thought if something like this could take her then it could do the same to me.

The girl across the street never came out of her house. I sat there all day, listening to Murphy and Lewis talk about comics. My parents made me come inside for bed

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and I didn't argue, unable to keep my eyes open. I laid in bed that night thinking that I wanted to be a monster hunter. I wanted to help people with monsters and then they’d be themselves.

I came to the conclusion that people weren't born monsters, but maybe monsters are born alongside people.

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Journal Entry #24

Mrs. Lincoln called my mom today because instead of practicing naming subjects and predicts, I drew dinosaurs all over the paper. I was afraid Mom was going to be ticked off at me because I didn't pay attention. Instead, I got home and she was crying on the couch with her phone in her lap. I asked her what was wrong but she told me “grown up things” and to go to my room.

I hate adults and listening to what they tell me to do. I never want to grow up into a boring person who goes to work all the time and never spends time with my kids. I want to be a good man. I want to help people and be home for my kids and wife because I know they will need me. Like on the TV, I won't show favoritism and make my kids listen to stupid adults. By then, I’ll be so smart that I’ll be able to tell them everything I know. I want to see all of the beautiful places Gram would show me from her past vacations. I want to journal down everything so I can tell my kids about all the good things that have happened to me.

I want my family to know that I love them. I want to be able to be a good person but honestly, I don’t know. I want to be able to understand but I can’t with all these adults putting me down.

I wish Dad took me out to the park more and asked me if I wanted to play catch in the backyard. I want to sit at the table and have dinner as a family more often, for us all to talk about our days and how we’re all doing. I wish Lewis never left.

I don’t even know what I’m talking about anymore. I hate Wednesdays.

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Attractions I hated Florida. The humid heat made my skin sticky and hair puffy. Walks home from the bus stop after school were agonizing without my pocket sized fan kids made fun of me for even having. With every step I took, zebra grass attacked my ankles. I never saw your usual advertisements, like Giant Eagle, just Sea World, causing me to have no desire to go there at all. Aunt Opal thought I was happy and I let her, not seeing the point in complaining when she gave me everything.

Opal was a vegetarian and loved plants. The house was always filled with potted plants, and you had to be careful or else you would lose your footing and knock one over. I learned how to kill bugs even if I was afraid of them. Opal suggested I put some plants in my new room to decorate it, and I had a hard time saying no to her so I just cried. I became used to this schedule of going to school, killing bugs, crying, and eating something with eggplant in it twice a week. No matter how upset I was, I could never be mad at Opal, seeing how much she did for me, so I always ended up mad at myself.

Why couldn't I like plants? Why did I hate the heat so much? Couldn't I at least suck it up and make a couple of friends? Yet, no matter how much I beat myself up about these things, I never made any effort to change.

I didn't know how to have fun. I thought having fun was listening to Yo-Yo Ma in my bedroom while doing a word search puzzle while Opal shopped online with a glass of dry wine in hand. I didn't know why girls painted their nails or wore makeup, let alone how to do those things myself. The girls at school always made fun of me because I had a phone that used minutes and played solitaire instead of paying attention to pop cul-

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ture. I never cried about it because I decided early on that I hated them. The boys didn't care about that so I hung around them, more listening than actually talking to them.

The sun made me mad because it gave me sunburn too often. The grass was too high for my liking if it wasn't cut, leaving all the bugs to hide along my feet. I wished Opal hated plants and sometimes bought chicken to eat. I wished I could speak up instead of biting my tongue so often. My curls were too tight and I wished I was fully something instead of half and half. I wanted to know how to paint my nails and match my jewelry with my outfits. I wanted my old life back and everything I had. My Mother, the bedroom full of stuffed animals, and the cold winters. Instead, I ate okra and murdered bugs.

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Kissimmee Storms in May I know I am dreaming you but I don't know whether you are dreaming me.

—Jorge Luis Borges, “August 25, 1983” I wasn’t home anymore and it wasn't cold outside like I had anticipated it would be. There were no more leaves in the driveway and shriveling grass but palm trees and a dangerous wind lashing at my face.

“Stop standing there and get inside!”

The small and trembling voice I had known all too well called to me. A loud rumble of thunder coursed through my body. I step inside the warm house, leaving the storm behind and inhaling deeply the scent of pine from the polished wood floors. I felt sick, looking down at myself remembering this night all too well.

“Where’s Aunt Opal? I thought tonight—” “What are you doing here?”

Coat hung up, shoes off and now sitting in the living room with my favorite blanket wrapped around my shoulders, she spoke. Her voice felt like a warm breeze and from what I had come to know, rain was to come afterwards. The storm outside was going on internally in us and I knew that but didn't care. She needed to be strong and I know she thought she was, and it fueled the constant fire inside of me.

“It’s just temporary. I don’t think I’m physically here right now.”

Her eyes flicker over to the flat screen television Aunt Opal had gotten us as a house warming gift our first day living in Florida. The news reporter went on about the incoming storm, a red banner across the screen reading flood warnings. I know she hated watching the news, not wanting to hear the things that made us sad, but Opal was out there and losing her too wasn't an option.

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“We’re scared…” her eyes widening as we speak at the same time. She sits on the couch adjacent to me, eyes watering to put out my internal fire.

“She’s going to be fine.” I start to feel the cold once again. “We’re going to be just fine.”

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Powdered Perception

She didn't even look my way and it hurt me more than it should have. We were kids last time we saw each other. I couldn't find a way to tell her I knew her. It was strange that I knew all about her mother and how I’ve seen the most sensitive side of her. I had wondered multiple times where she went off to when her mom passed and the house got sold. Over the years, certain features of hers had become more vivid than others, leaving her appearance misconfigured every time I thought of her.

My family never moved out of the house I grew up in. Everything from my first words, first day of school, first kiss, the day of graduation, fit in that house. My baby sister was also born and raised in the home, two years after the girl across the street vanished. I’ve come to realize it was probably for the best anyhow. The summers became more focused on forgetting the past school year, deeming it terrible, and dreading the next. I lost friends due to enjoying summer reading projects and constantly going on road trips with my family. Murphy started playing football and hung out with all of the sporty kids in school, leaving Lewis and me behind. Lewis ended up moving the summer before seventh grade. I cried and had a existential crisis, realizing school was about finding your place and if you didn’t, you were an outcast. I had to roughen up around the edges, to deal with the fact that I was becoming a know it all.

High school was different. I made friends, joined clubs, gave myself a voice, and suddenly became popular. I still studied hard and made sure to focus on grades, but the attention from others started to shape me into a egotistic manic. I talked to every female student, and some male, just because I knew I could. The thought of dating seemed so

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pointless, and I couldn’t forget the girl across the street, my feelings clouding any good judgements. I became overly concerned about experiencing feelings that made me think about them afterwards. I wanted to feel a connection with somebody but I didn't understand how to go about it.

I wondered if it was strange that I kept thinking about a girl I had barely knew but somehow felt connected with. That or what she looked like now and where she was.

Sometimes I sat in our front yard, looking over at the house, picking at the grass and mulling over life’s anxieties. College, a job, a car, a wife, and possibly kids. Just thinking about these things ticked me off.

When I saw her sitting in the coffee shop close to campus, fingers typing furiously on a Macbook, and music loudly playing through a pair of neon green headphones, I found it hard not to stare. Without a doubt, I knew it was her, dark curls resting on her shoulder and big brown eyes focused on the glowing screen. I felt like I needed to know her or else I’d be missing out on a relationship with someone I actually cared about. It made no sense to me in the moment but I didn’t care.

Her beauty made me feel inferior. I slid the powdered donut I had bought for myself across the table to catch her attention. I sat in the chair across from her.

Her eyes narrowed at me as she took out a headphone, giving me a smile. With that, I let out a breathy, “You look familiar.”

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Baggage

I wasn't very experienced with dating. Opal told me boys were trouble and would get in the way of all the important things I had to do. I was a smart girl, according to all of my high school teachers, and they saw a bright future for me. I decided to forget about boys entirely and focus on getting the grades I knew I needed to then to college back home.

I was used to being in Florida, but I also grew to despise living there. I yearned to go back home, even if I’d be living in a dorm. It took Opal awhile, but she agreed. She told me I was a mature woman and it was time for me to find myself. We were taking a big risk, sending me back home with nobody there to support me. I hadn't visited in such a long time, and Opal was scared that I would get homesick. I told her that I would be home, and if anything, she’d be sending for me. It was a joke, but I often cried at night realizing that once again I would be alone. I thought about how I would be living on campus with plenty of people to meet, but I wanted to pack more than just items. I wanted to pack memories.

I remember getting a polaroid camera for my 16th birthday. Opal and I went overboard with all the film. I packed every single photo in my suitcase.

When Oliver sat across from me in the coffee shop, tempting me with a powdered donut, I felt at ease for the first time. I didn't recognize him at first, but he mentioned living across the street and remembering helping my family when Mom was sick.

He told me that I looked the same, not in a bad way, but I couldn't say the same for him.

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All I could see was the man in front of me, not the little boy that always seemed too busy to talk to me.

In a time of loneliness I couldn't afford to be shy. We became close friends, spending the majority of our time together. I didn't notice his small gestures, such as walking me to class or taking my shopping list when I was busy, as anything special. It wasn't until others started to point them out to me.

Our first summer together, when the bushes on campus were flourished with honeysuckle, and the grass looked too green to be real, I called Florida. I told him I was going to visit family and he told me it would be nice to see where I grew up after seeing polaroids of palm trees. It was sudden, but I said that I would take him with me. I would take him home.

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Flowers in Coffeepots She’s distressed.

—Bud Smith, “Junior in the Tunnels”

1.

I didn't understand love, but I knew that must be what I felt for Lu. Her Aunt Opal called her Louise and I watched her cringe, finding it the cutest thing. I was whipped.

“Is she anything like your mom?”

We sat on the barely there patio, in two white chairs hidden in the garage.

She shrugged. “Not really. They have similar interests I guess.”

“Yeah, like what?”

“They both like flowers even though Opal is more of a fern person.” She smiled at me and I felt like getting down on one knee. “And coffee.”

1.5

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Lu told me that her childhood was anything but pleasant, only discussing this in the confinement of her old bedroom. It didn't bother me much because she said she wasn't sad or anything, just feeling nostalgic.

The silence never felt too suffocating, only this time, she was falling asleep and I felt like if I didn't say anything in that moment, I would lose my chance. I never knew what to say and if it was the right or wrong time, but something about being in the room she despised so much made me want to comfort her. What better way to do that than expressing your true feelings?

2

I asked a lot of questions and she hated that.

“Have you ever been there?” I asked her for about the sixth time as we drove past another store.

Lu rolled her eyes, “Yeah, most likely.”

She wouldn't talk, mostly because she put a lot of focus into driving. “Alright, fine. Tell me about a place we’re relatively close to where something memorable happened.”

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I knew I had caught her attention because she pursed her lips and gripped the steering wheel.

“There’s a little convince store up ahead and I was friends with this guy—are you sure you want to hear this?”

“Please, do continue.”

“Okay. We were getting some snacks cause we had soccer practice that afternoon and all of a sudden he pulls me aside and tells me how much he likes me. I didn't know what to say so I started crying.”

Lu glanced over at me and I frowned. “Why?”

“I didn't like him back and that made me sad.”

3

Opal liked to pinch my cheeks and call me sweetheart. It made Lu laugh so I didn't mind.

I enjoyed her company, even trying vegetarian dishes she would make that Lu refused to eat. Opal would ask me to dice peppers while she fervently checked on the contents

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inside the silver pot, Lu watching us both with interest. Being with them felt warm and safe, making me wonder if this is what is was like to really be in a happy family. I wanted that for Lu.

Opal asked Lu if we were romantically involved, Lu shrugging in response with a quiet, “I don’t know.�

I waited for the tears but she didn't cry.

4 Opal helped me plan a surprise dinner date for Lu and me. I had never been so scared in my life, rejection being something I wasn't familiar with. I wasted no time in asking her if she would be mine officially, and she simply nodded. Lu told me I was important to her, which meant she would take me to visit her Mother.

We held hands across the table and planned to take a coffee pot filled with flowers.

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a laying on of hands by suhail gharaibeh

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para mi pueblo

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table of contents 1. The Genesis 2. Grandmother’s House, 1975 3. An Eastern Paradise 4. El Rio 5. Dolores, Colorado 6. White Picket Fences 7. Minority 8. Autopsy

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The Genesis

“If you are silent about your pain, they will kill you and say you enjoyed it.”

—Zora Neale Hurston

It was a dark and stormy night. A woman howled, writhing on a bed drenched with the rich blood of childbirth. The room was heavy with candlewax, heavy breaths, piercing screams. Three midwives, tall and strong as banana trees, stood around her dressed in white gowns. The woman’s screams woke all of the children of the village and kept all of the adults from sleeping. Selfishly, the villagers groaned and complained at the woman’s anguish.

“Is the baby coming?” howled the woman.

“Not yet,” replied the first midwife. “Keep pushing. Harder.”

And so the woman pushed harder. She pushed her long, tangled black hair out of her face, and pushed until she felt her body release something.

“Is it here? Is the baby here?” asked the woman.

“No, not yet,” replied the second midwife.

The woman leaned up onto her elbows and looked over her swollen belly, down onto the sheets dyed a brilliant red with her blood. Between her thighs, which glistened with shiny beads of sweat, was a small hummingbird. It quivered and awoke, shaking the blood from its wings, and flew quickly into the air. The woman threw her head back and screamed in pain while the second midwife tenderly grabbed the bird from midair and placed it in a copper birdcage.

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“Empuja! Push, my love, push!” The third midwife smoothed the woman’s hair away from her face.

“Ay!” The woman let a long peal of a shriek escape her throat. Soon, a passion fruit rolled out of her. The first midwife grabbed it and held it out of the window to let the rain wash it off. She then placed it on a table and chopped it in half with a small knife.

“Eat,” the midwife said, holding the fruit to the woman’s mouth. And the woman ate the soft flesh of the fruit. But soon, she was again howling in pain. The villagers were now all awake, leaning out of their windows in annoyance, a couple pounding on the door.

“Hush up, lady!”

“We’re trying to sleep!”

She just wanted the baby to be born so she could be quiet. She pushed and pushed and pushed, but nothing would come out. But as soon as she felt as though she couldn’t push any more, something finally came—the woman screamed louder than ever as a river burst from her body. It flowed out of her, strong and heavy, and cold as ice. The midwives heaved open the door to the room to let the water out, so that when the baby came it would not drown.

But the woman was not strong enough to survive a river coursing from her body.

On her last push, her breath caught up in her throat, and her head fell back. She was dead. But the last push was enough, and finally the baby was there, out of her womb, filling the house with its shrill weeping. The midwives wrapped the baby in a thick cloth and placed it in a large clay pot so that it would stay warm during the cold mountain night to come.

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*** The next morning, the midwives prepared the woman’s body for her funeral. They wrapped her in a thin white shroud, draped her neck with jade and turquoise beads, and placed her on the large clay table in the center of the village. They then left to nurse the baby. All of the village’s families gathered to sing to her, guiding her to the afterlife. They felt guilty that they had complained at the woman’s screams the night before, so they all sang with their heads bowed slightly in shame. But soon, something very strange started happening. One villager began to howl in pain and fell to the ground like a wounded animal, kicking up a cloud of dust. All the villagers gathered around.

Soon, another villager fell to the ground in anguish. He screamed and kicked at the dirt with his heels. Then, another villager fell into a fit, and then another. Soon, all of the villagers at the funeral were having fits, on the ground flailing their arms and legs.

They screamed and shrieked, beating the ground and crying. Their candles fell on the ground and were snuffed out in the sandy dirt. They felt as though their bodies were being torn apart.

Soon, the three midwives returned. They looked at all of the villagers writhing on the ground in their colorful funeral clothing and threw their wizened faces back and cackled.

“She is angry!” said one midwife.

“Yes, she’s really giving it to them!”

“Should we let them go?” asked another.

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“Yes, perhaps,” replied the third midwife, who held the hummingbird’s cage on her head as though it were a jug of water she was bringing home from a well. She opened the door of the cage, and the hummingbird peeped its head out tentatively before it flitted away quickly, buzzing over the funeral-goers. In an instant, they all fell out of the fit, and their bodies softened. Some of them began sitting up to dust themselves off. Others looked around, confused, before standing and running away. The three midwives stood, hand in hand, around the altar where the woman’s body lay, until all of the funeral-goers had gone to their homes. The midwives buried her body in the garden, under a papaya tree that was dying, so that her body could feed it back to health.

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Grandmother’s House, 1975

Abuela hated when we stole her honeysuckle. She would, in fury only semiearnest, shake a ransacked pot of honeysuckle in front of our faces. Look! There’s hardly a flower left on the whole plant! But that night, in the warm summer rain, I indulged.

Her house was our shelter in the night, when rivers of white coursed through the sky’s domed purple haze—a watershed of lightning. Bright flashes pulsed through the valley as webs of light bisected in the sky above the volcanoes. The thunder was not the calamitous kind that cracked above your head and made children cover their ears; it was low, rolling, elegant. It was the kind of thunder that made you bend over and fall to your knees, weep and worship the skies.

We sat around my Abuela’s little cedar coffee table, trapped there by the raging outside, uncommonly strong even for the Sierra Norte in the summertime. My mother and grandmother ate limes and drank aged tequila from small clay shot glasses—they called the evening a tarde tequilera—while, out of my mother’s fear about the cold rain getting us sick, us kids drank bougainvillea tea.

She was a hoarder, my Abuela, this much was certain, but a hoarder of beautiful things. She collected flowers, ferns, small trees, palms. Houseplants were her vice, lining her bookshelves, hanging over stairwells, sitting on every countertop. In the rain the entire house smelled of the jungle where she grew up, where we had spent bits and pieces of our childhood, playing between banana trees, pretending to climb up vines like Tarzan. The scent, almost palpable, like thick green steam, rose from the leaves and branches around us. It was an ancient smell, heavy and wise.

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I played with a pot of honeysuckle that flowed over the edge of the coffee table.

Discreetly I plucked a little blossom from the plant. I was a surgeon, pulling the antenna out of the end of the flower, releasing a droplet of syrup. I dragged it across my tongue, breathing deep so I could taste the floral sweetness, the smallest delicacy known to a child like me.

My grandmother didn’t notice. But later that night, peeking around from the edge of her stucco walls, I saw her pick one off, and close her eyes slowly as she tasted the gift locked inside.

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An Eastern Paradise

Only a hair’s breadth had saved them...They could have killed something to make the rain fall.

—Bessie Head, “Looking for a Rain God”

Nayeli woke up choking. Ash covered her face and exposed legs, and had piled an inch high on her floor. It coated the inside of her nose and clung to her throat. She tasted it on her tongue, powdery and bitter.

She had awoken to the sound of her mother and grandmother talking, loudly, the television blaring breaking news. The militants ransacked the city halls of San Cristóbal de las Casas, Altamirano, Las Margaritas, Ocosingo…She threw her legs over the edge of her bed, tilting her head down over her lap to shake the dust from her long hair. Padding through the dust on the floor, each step making a sharp crunching noise, she peered through the adobe doorway, which her mother had covered with a large flowery sheet. Her grandmother, Concepción, sat in a plastic lawn chair, sniffing and dabbing at her face with a handkerchief, her mother strenuously sweeping the ash from the ground in their tiny living-dining room and piling it outside the front door.

“Those damned leftists. Always trying to fix something that isn’t broken!”

“He joined the Ejercito by his own free will, Mamá. You cannot blame anyone for that.”

“Well, I do. And I hope they all die in the Lacandon Jungle.”

Her mother sighed.

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“Nayeli!” Concepción said, turning her face up from her tissue. Her mouth fell open in shock before she threw her head back and cackled at Nayeli, all covered in ash.

Her mother turned and did the same. Nayeli looked down at her arms and body and realized she was caked with fine ash. Out of the corner of her eye, she caught a slip of turquoise zoom past.

A hummingbird had flown into the room. It buzzed over their heads, held their gazes captive. The iridescent sheen of its throat, blue-green and glimmering and set against the rich black of its wings and head, an oasis in the desert of ash.

“Badund,” Concepción said. “A hummingbird.”

Nayeli’s mother walked over to one corner of the room, where a

houseplant

overflowed its pot, and brushed off some of the soot. The hummingbird approached the plant carefully as her mother backed away. It hovered near a flower a few moments before drinking.

At night, rains came to turn the ash into mud, which ran all the way down the mountainside in a cascade until it reached the river, where bougainvilleas fought hard against the deluge to keep their roots in the riverbank. A bright moon hung over the village that night, and into the next morning. A full and knowing moon.

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El Rio

“Go up to this land that flows with milk and honey. But I will not travel among you, for you are a stubborn and rebellious people. If I did, I would surely destroy you along the way."

—Exodus 33:3

“If I die, and my soul be lost, nobody’s fault but mine.”

—Nina Simone, “Nobody’s Fault But Mine”

We sleep with coyotes surrounding us, their yellow eyes glinting in the pitch black, needles of fur bristling. Their haunches rise and fall as they circle the nine of us, in time with our sleeping breath. The moon is half-lit, cradling its dark side. Shards of white light, broken by mesquite branches, are scattered over our heads, feet, fingers.

We sleep tonight with cactus blossoms coquettish—they spread themselves open to us only when our eyes are closed. But we know they are there, drinking the milk of moonlight, their pure petals licking the wounds of the night. When it is time to go the coyotes nudge our foreheads with their rough noses, lick at our hands and necks with long tongues. It is time to go when there is only a fistful of stars left in the sky, when the sun begins lifting itself higher and the black of night dissolves into daybreak.

We have nothing except dirty plastic jugs of water and knit blankets. Dirty change chimes in our pockets—useless currency where we’re going. Blood rhythms pound deep in the river. Water drumming speaks the eulogy of our people.

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Only fish survive these rapids. Indignant, the coyotes push into the moist earth with their paws—they won’t go any further. We’re stupid to think we can wade through to the other side, they say, with their teeth gritted and bared slightly. At The Crossing, where the others go to glide across the river in a wooden boat, the sky is thick with vultures. If you go there, we decided, you are asking to be eaten alive.

But here, the river turns over backwards, rushing, breaking, frothing. It eats itself alive. And it thirsts for us, hungering for skin the color of clay, for long ropes of black hair. Mother-of-pearl teeth set into glorious mouths. If we are wanted anywhere, it is in the riverbed, in the muddy bank, in the roots of the mesquite trees, swallowed by the murky whirlpool. We are precious here.

So we cross. The coyotes howl. The river’s current rips us down like weeds, pushes us up like spring flowers. But somehow, with lungs full and running over with silt and murky water, we emerge heaving on the other side. Breath escapes us as our lungs pour out small creeks, as we vomit the apple cores and meat left in our stomachs. Two vultures fly out from where they were hidden amongst the mesquite, crowing out their squeaky call, laughing at our calamity.

Across the river, two sets of amber eyes retreat into the brush. It would take days to find six bodies, bobbing and dipping into the brownish water like fishing flies, shoved into ruts and ditches, pressed flush against rocks. Time that we do not have. We turn our backs to the riverbank, and step forward, feet bare, into the red dirt of this new land.

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Dolores, Colorado

Esta luz, este fuego que devora.

Este paisaje gris que me rodea.

—Federico García Lorca I. Sister Snow. Nothing could make me feel emptier. My skin hisses, flexes out waves of goose bumps each time a snowflake melts on an arm or cheek. Here, the air cuts like a switchblade, tightening my muscles into sheets of steel cold enough to feel white-hot.

Each wind a vendetta fulfilled. Each snowflake an elegy for what is lost when one slips across the Plains in dead night, when one awakens in a strange town of God-like mountains and purple skies.

My hands are reddening from the cold, the tips of my knuckles slightly purplish and cracking. My brother stands next to me. I look in his face. He must think this is just amazing, in the even gray light of Dolores’ winter his eyes are blown wide, enraptured, steam swelling from his lips with each breath. I suppose I should be amazed too—my tongue lolling out of my mouth as I run around in glee trying to catch the flakes, my first time ever seeing snow fall.

But I’m not amazed. I’ve seen snow on television before, even dreamed about touching it. But today, nothing could change the way I hurt. The cavity in my chest where the sun was ripped from me, nothing could fill it here. Not the majesty of the Indians’ sacred hill, not the purple clouds. Not the dark river so cold and clear you could braid your hair in its reflection.

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II. Brother Here, the mountains talk to one another. Massive and gray, sort of like headstones. They’re covered in Christmas trees. They stand in a ring and chat all day long.

The little lake is quiet, though, because it gets frozen in the wintertime, but the purple sky talks back to the mountains. It’s brilliant, the sky. It sings and cries and sometimes laughs when the sun is playing hide-and-seek with the clouds. I like Colorado. I like the long yellow boats and the log cabins. I like our fireplace and the fact that Papá cuts our very own firewood from our trees in our backyard. I like the hills and rocks. And I like the Indians. Their thick black hair and noses and brown skin remind me of my family. They remind me of Mexico.

It doesn’t look like the movies. Snow doesn’t just pour down from the sky and pile up on the ground and get slippery or slushy. It’s beautiful. It falls like tiny feathers from the sky. It makes red birds stand out, and bluejays look bluer than ever. It lays in the trees and crunches when you walk on it and mounds up in tiny piles on the windowsill.

It’s the purest white you’ll ever see. My sister walks beside me, holding my hand very tight.

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White Picket Fences

When we open our eyes today and look around America, we see America not through the eyes of someone who has enjoyed the fruits of Americanism…we don't see any American dream. We've experienced only the American nightmare. ― Malcolm X Concrete under the soles of our feet, the beating sun spun puddles of heat up at us as we ran on the track. The back of our elementary school loomed over us, a yellow brick megalith designed like a factory, with two huge smokestacks rising from the building’s core. We ran fast in those days. Our thighs burned red hot. Our gym teacher, a man whose skin burnt red during track and field season, yelled at us like a drill sergeant from the other end of the track. We were panting by the end of warm-ups, our sweaty brown and black skins glistening like geodes in the unrelenting sun.

Relay races were the activity that day. The holographic baton flitted between us, a dragonfly, as busted tennis shoes slapped hard and quick onto the pavement. My shoes—a hand-me-down pair of red Converse a size too small, given to me by my brother Ramón when the soles of my running shoes split open—pressed into my heels and toes. My eyes were fixed on Coach Miller at the far side, his hands pressed firmly into his doughy hips. The trees above him cast long shadows over his twisted face. I was running slower than usual.

I lulled to the end of the track and he leaned in deep towards me, as though he couldn’t hear something I was saying. My feet felt numb. He breathed into my face.

“Run like you ran across the border.”

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I swiveled away from him, all of the blood in my head plummeting down into my neck, my stomach, my feet. I didn’t turn back around when I reached the far side of the track. My face burned under the heat of his disgust. I ran until the sticky black concrete gave way to dust, through the private streets past white picket fences, century-old houses, azaleas weeping over brilliant green lawns, all the way home.

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Minority Jan 12th I can bearly walk now. my feet ar smaller than my hands. my eyes ar sinking back into my head. Im having trubel holding a pen. i havent seen my mother in days. but I think she comes to look at me at nite becus in the morning there is a candul burning on my dresser.

Jan. 11th I never lived in the world. Out there in America. This gravyard has bin my home for my whole life. Im nothing but a squatter in this country, just waiting. just waiting to go home. right?

Jan. 9 I am wasting away in an armchair, a vegetabel in some hellish living room. There is a TV in front of me, booming with noise and the sound of static. It plays the news, but all of the anchors are groteskly mutated, their skin papery and stuningly white, teeth filed down to blunt points. Their voices are choral and indistinct.

“Immigration has come to a boiling point,” a pundit chants.

“They bring rape, they bring drugs, and they bring murder. They are monsters.”

“Super-predators,” another exclaims, her blond coiffure trembeling.

“Rapists. They will rape our mothers and our daughters.”

“They will make our children shoot up heroin.”

“Kill illegal aliens.”

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This was last nite’s dream. It made me remember why I started shrinking.

Jan. 7 My boss called me today and told me I was fired. When I went to pick up the land line, it slid out of my small hand and clattered to the ground, little bits of plastic shooting off like sparks. The LED screen burst and burnt over. His voice crackeld through the ansering machine when nobody picked up the phone.

“Raf. Rafael, you haven’t showed up to the site for three days now. Three days. Do you know how much progress you set back? You know what, don’t even bother coming back. Mediocre workers like you are a dime a dozen in this city.”

I ripped the ansering machine out of the wall and smashed it hard on the ground.

Jan. 6 I woke up at three o’clock today and my feet no longer hung over the edge of the bed. I looked at my hands and my feet and touched things all around me. Craning my neck to look out of my window, I saw the basketball court slick with rain; no kids playing Horse like usual. I knew exactly how the rain would feel if I cracked the window open and stuck my little hand out into the cold. I could feel it, the pricks of rain falling like shards of cool glass.

Nothing makes sense anymore. My body is getting smaller every hour. My mother doesn’t know—she’s been tending to me at my bedside as if I have the flu, wiping my forehead, bringing me water and broth. My bones feel frailer, lighter. I wonder how birds must feel, with hollow bamboo bones inside of them. The number of mother birds who

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must lament for their babies, falling from the nest, their bodies not yet strong enough to fly, their bones all too fragile as they land, mangled, far below.

Memories can be destroyed. I’m trying desperately to remember the last time I wasn’t shrinking. It’s like trying too hard to remember a dream—it’s there, it really is, but with some kind of filmy veil draped over it. Nothing is distinguishable, and the harder you try, the more it deteriorates.

Jan. 3 I am shrinking. I don’t know why. Each day I’m smaller, changing size at uncomfortable intervals: noticeable yet unspectacular. The custodian who says excuse me to sweep under my feet at the train station, or the girl who works at the bodega on my street, they wouldn’t know. I still might not have known if it weren’t for my mother.

It was two weeks ago. Traditional morning time at my place—news blaring on the television, the kitchen heavy with the smoke from hot oil singing bread. Eggs were congealed and overcooking in a pan slick with lard. I kissed my mom goodbye.

“Raf?” “Que?” “Did you get shorter?”

“What do you mean?”

“You didn’t have to lean down to kiss me.”

I ignored her—of course I wasn’t getting shorter, that was impossible. I thought this until I tried putting my work boots on the next morning and my ankles rattled in them like loose change. The ring my father gave me fell through a sidewalk grate on 126th today

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as I walked with my hands jangling at my sides, my once well-fitted jeans now shuffling down my hips. Hoodie pulled tighter than usual over my head. How small can I get?

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Autopsy

Based heavily on a report about conditions in New York State men’s prisons for transgender, gender nonconforming, and intersex inmates by the Sylvia Rivera Law Project.

[The guards’] faces, one brown and one white, are wide open with emotion. Not pity or disgust or resentment—I can recognize those. This is less familiar.

—Sandra Gail Lambert, “Poster Children”

1.

Bend over. It is today’s fifth search: after chow, before bedtime. I’m in the little office that looks over my cellblock. It stinks in here, like knockoff Lysol and cigarettes. I wonder if they come in here during chowtime, huff cigarettes quick and deep even though they aren’t supposed to. I wonder if they even know what they aren’t supposed to do anymore. I think, these people are trained; they read handbooks or codes of conduct. Maybe I’m fooling myself. Maybe they don’t even know the alphabet. They are animals.

I breathe in sharp when my nipples touch the cold metal of the table. They love doing this shit to me. Cough. They spread me open. I am alive at my own autopsy. Dissect my body, Correctional Officers. Write dissertations on the nature of my sex. Examine me; take biopsies of my genitals to pore over with the warden. One points to the insides of my thighs, where cuts from dull shaves spread like stretch marks. Rough shave, huh? Fucking tranny. They laugh. They always laugh.

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2.

I wake up to a wet pool in the hollow of my right eye. When I open it, something seeps in, and drools down the side of my face. My hand flies to my eye and as soon as I touch the glob of spit I know what it is. A C.O. stands over me, mouth curled tightly; his thin lips are smirking down at me, shiny with saliva. I lean over the side of my bed and retch. Nausea’s a side effect of your AIDS pills, ain’t it? His words are drawling, slow, like he’s drunk or something. Look at you. You poor thing.

3.

When I was nine I used to dress up in my mother’s clothes. I would walk through the halls when she worked her night shifts, red lipstick spread messily over my small lips, thick lines of black rimming my eyes. Once, I heard the door unlock while I played.

It sounded like a gunshot in my ears. I ran to the bathroom, but she saw me shutting the door. My breath expanded and clenched in my chest. She opened the door to stare down at my small body shivering behind it, grabbed me like a cat, dragged me down the corridor. She threw me onto my bed.

“No me vas a convertir en un maricón.”

The lock to my room clacked shut behind her.

4.

The secret is, I’ve been cheeking my pills for months. Any day now. Will they call me a queen when I take the life from their bodies, when I steal their dignity in cold blood? What will I be then? Will I still be a faggot?

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Or will I be something else entirely?

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Sustenance for the Soul

by Chyna McClendon

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For my Grandmother and Mother. They inspired me to follow my passion with food.

Enjoy

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Table of Contents 1. With Love 2. Non Stick 3. Godfather 4. Bitter and Sweet 5. Feel the Heat 6. Reality and Dreams 7. The Lodge 8. Cast Iron

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With Love Before you even think of getting out the pots for your dish, before you even formulate the idea of what you want to make, wash your hands.

Never make a meal with dirty hands.

When making a family meal on Sunday do not watch any TV. Make sure that the family eats at the table. Do not let them eat in their rooms. Eating is meant to be done with your family.

Be stern.

Set the table with the nice cloth and place the plates 90 degrees from each other.

Making sure it is a perfect square. During the hottest part of summer go outside and collect flowers. Outside there are honeysuckle bushes that bloom bright yellow like the sun. Refrain from eating more than three. Savor the sweet honey that comes from the thin stem. Pluck them by the base and mix them with Queen Ann’s Lace. Then put them in a crystal vase. Be careful: they are delicate. Use this as your center piece.

In the market when looking for fresh limes, roll them in your hands to see how they are, and let the juices stick to your skin. Pick out apples that are shiny and firm, and greens that smell like grass and morning dew. Buying peppers that are dented is 212

not a smart choice. When shopping for spices always grab the ones in the back. The ones in the front have been touched by other people. This is how you find the perfect ingredients to feed your family.

Grab the tomatoes that are crimson and onions that still have their yellow translucent skin.

When cutting foods always hold the knife with a bent elbow and squared shoulders. Cut in fluid motions that are sharp and precise.

A happy household is reflected on your kitchen so keep it clean. Wipe down your counters with lemon scented cleaner and Lysol wipes. Rub the stove top with soap and water. Scrub in circles and use force. Clean out cabinets and rearrange your values so they are in alphabetical order. This is for easy access and tidiness. You never want a cluttered cabinet. Make sure that the floors are spotless too and that the fridge door is clear of any smudges.

The kitchen is the window to the soul.

The thing that I cannot stress enough is never cook angry. Do not create food unless your emotions are stable. Cooking is meant for when your happy and full of passion. When you make food it is not just for you, it’s for others. Food made with hatred

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makes food bitter and others bitter around you. Do not pass your anger through your food. Wait. Food is precious.

When cooking make sure that you of all things enjoy yourself. Make food with love and dedication. Make sure that there is passion and emotion when making food.

Put your all into everything that you create and everything will come out like perfection.

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Non Stick

I don't know how it started or what popped the idea into the crevices of my brain, but it’s there now. I’ve got this nagging feeling. It started when I was watching Food Network at five years old. Instead of watching Looney Tunes, and other Saturday morning cartoons I watched cooking shows. Emeril Lagasse and Rachel Ray were my favorite. I curled up with a bowl of Fruity Pebbles and became fascinated with every word they were saying. Holding on to their knowledge like my life depended on it.

Eyes glued to the screen, I couldn't get enough. Later on I ranted to my mother about what I watched. And how Bobby Flay didn't add the right amount of salt to his gazpacho. I told her that I wanted to cook now. She listened to me and patted my head and said “when you’re older honey”. She looked at me the way all mothers do when they dismiss their child for having wild ideas. I looked at her and climbed back up the stairs.

So I waited.

Here I was, the ripe age of twelve, and my mother still hadn’t let me touch the stove. She’d been using the same line that she said when I was five. “Maybe when you’re older.” Well I was older and I was ready. I was itching to make anything. I would settle for boiling water for crying out loud. I told her how I felt and she still replied no.

One day a miracle was sent to me in the form of my grandmother. She was coming to stay with us for awhile, and things were always exciting when she was around.

On Tuesday my mom was going to work for a couple of hours. I was in the kitchen at

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the time, looking at the pots and pans. My mother shouted, “I’m leaving” and hurried outside.

As soon as the doors closed my grandmother said, “Let’s go kid, now is your chance.” She ran into the kitchen and grabbed the pot off the wall and placed them on the burner.

I looked at her in disbelief.

Was she serious? She was letting me cook.

I was beyond excited, but in the back of my mind a nagging voice told me I wasn't prepared. Sensing my hesitance she said we should start out with eggs. “Eggs I can do eggs,” I whispered out loud. My grandmother had gotten them out from the fridge. They sat pristine and alarmingly white in the carton. Turning on the stove, the clicks of the gasoline calmed me. Grabbing an egg I tapped it on the corner split it open.

Hearing the satisfying sizzle of butter and eggs placed a smile on my face. I scrambled them with a spatula until they were done. Feeling confident, I made my grandmother some ,not caring if she was hungry or not.

I was finally cooking.

We sat down to eat and I eyed my grandma carefully. She said they were the best eggs she ever had. And told me I was born to cook. The smile on my lips stretched even further.

Later my mother came home and asked me how our day was. My grandma and I replied, “Perfect”.

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Godfather Jamaican meat Pie Recipe: Combine flour, water, salt, and curry powder. Add margarine at room temperature and carefully mix. Don't over mix, the dough needs to be soft. Make your meat with white onions, curry, salt, and thyme. Pour in beef broth and bread crumbs. Wait until your meat absorbs the flavors and take off heat. Assemble your dough and spoon some of your filling into the dough. Fold over pastry and seal in sides with a fork. Brush with egg wash and cook until golden brown. Last step enjoy.

This recipe was embedded in my mind every time my Godfather repeated it.

Shrugging off my puffy jacket and kicking off my boots, I am welcomed by my godfather. His smile is big and bright as the sun. Pearly white teeth lined like chiclet gum. My mom’s cheeks are red from the cold. She gives him a hug and they talk for a little before she leaves. The smell of spices and a bubbling pot carries me to the kitchen.

There was never a time when we came over that it didn't smell like food. He would always have something concocting on the stove.

The aroma wraps around my nose and fills it with peppers and meat. Hearing the door slam I know that my mom has left. I live for the days sitting on a stool watching him. He moves fluid even in the small marble kitchen.

Waiting for the food I constantly ask him questions. Not caring if I am annoying him. He doesn't seem bothered and chuckles when I ask him about what spices he uses what cut of meat, and how to knead dough.

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Tonight he is making ox tails and rice. At first I was nervous to try them, I mean it’s an animal’s tail. But he convinced me that it would taste like beef. It did, and I was so glad I tried it. The meat is tender and falls off the bone. He cooks the rice to the perfect consistency, sticky yet firm. He piles my plate high with rice, a meat pie, and ox tail. I eat the pie first, savoring the flavor of curry and onions and beef. The dough is flaky and creates a light grease on my fingertips. He asks if I like it and I nod my head quickly and dig back in.

Later, my mom comes back from her job and smiles greatly when she sees the pies and rice on a plate waiting for her. She sits down with us and talks about her day while eating all of the great food. When she finishes we go, and I thank Tom for the food and the tips about cooking. We leave in the cold winter air with the wind biting at my heels. On the way home I fall asleep slumping over with my head on the window.

Dreaming of the day when I can make dishes that will make everyone happy.

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Bitter and Sweet Her mother had taught her that each meal, each dish was made with her own fingers was a gift.

-Kristine Kathryn Rusch, “Eating It Too”

The sun shone brightly through the kitchen and landed on my momma’s glistening forehead. She was hard at work fixing an extravagant dinner. Momma spent hours cooking amazing food. She said that every meal you make should be made with passion. Food cooked right portrayed how together you were as a family. A bad meal reflected on what was flawed in your life.

Momma’s food was always perfect, even when the world around her wasn’t.

There were little things about my momma I knew. I could tell when she was upset. She would knead the dough for biscuits too hard. Or she added too much salt into a stew. Noticing her mistakes she would sigh in defeat and start again, because thats how she was.

I started to see Momma and Daddy acting distant. He came home late, or only grabbed food and went back out. They didn't look at each other the same anymore.

Momma put on a good act when guests came over. She kissed his cheek and gave everyone fantastic food, and talked about how happy they were. She didn't want people to see her crumbling household.

Momma came home one day from shopping with a deep crease in her brow. She quickly unloaded the groceries and started cooking. She whispered “hi” to me and continued. I asked her what was wrong.

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I figured it had to do with Daddy.

She kneeled down to my level, her knees cracking in the process. Cupping my face she said, “You’ll know when you’re older. Until that time stay a child.” I looked at her curious, wondering what she could be talking about. Shaking my head I just sat on the stool in the kitchen and watched her cook and took mental notes.

She made roasted chicken and potatoes. It was delicious as always. Daddy came home late again and sat down at the table, digging into the food without saying hello. Momma frowned and nudged me to the table and followed suit. We all ate and then he went upstairs to go in his study. Momma and I cleaned up the dishes and then she sent me upstairs to bed.

Early the next morning, things were back to normal. Momma kissed Daddy on the cheek and made breakfast. He sat in his chair with the sun light reflecting on the wrinkles on his forehead. Sipping coffee and chatting with her it seemed like he would never make her upset like he usually did. Before he went to work I grabbed his jacket sleeve. He turned to me and looked down asking what I needed. “Can you not make Momma sad anymore?” Shocked, he looked at me and merely nodded his head, and placed a kiss on my cheek. Then he grabbed his lunch from Momma, hugged her, and went to work. I took my seat on the stool and watched my Momma dance around the kitchen getting ready to prep for lunch.

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Feel the Heat

8:30 a.m. and the strong vibration of a bass line seeps into my pillow. Letting a groan escape my lips, I realize that it is Sunday. Sunday means cleaning the house with my mom and then cooking a big meal. I don't mind the cooking part, but for most of the day my clothes are going to smell like lemon and Clorox. Turning over, I try to go back to sleep, but I’m unsuccessful. My mother storms up the stairs playing Earth Wind and Fire’s “September,” signaling me that she knew I wasn't sleeping anymore. “Come on honey the dishes need washing.”

I come down the stairs and am greeted by Mother dancing around the kitchen and food bubbling on the stove. She smiles at me and continues to shake her hips and belt out notes. She gestures to the pile of dishes in the sink. Reluctantly I shuffle over and begin.

After a while, I am done, and now my mother has started on the food. The song that comes on is “I Wanna Dance With Somebody” by Whitney Houston. I have heard this song countless times throughout the years. She quotes, “That they don’t make music like this anymore.” I go to lift the lid, and she slaps my hand away. Saying, “Mo not until it’s ready.” Frowning I go and sit at the dining room table and wait for her to be done. She doesn't let me cook, because I'm not old enough. It makes me mad because I’m so eager to start and she won’t let me. “I wanna feel the heat with somebody yeah, I wanna dance with somebody, with somebody who loves me” continues to play in the background and I sway my head and kick my feet. I yearn to be helping her but I can’t.

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So I resort to standing behind her and asking questions about what she is doing. Which annoys her sometimes.

Later she calls me, signaling that she is done. She brings out a piping hot plate of parmesan chicken rolls, with mozzarella cheese oozing out the sides. She says that it is a new recipe and it might be bad. But nothing from her is bad. Digging in I ask her about what she used and how much was in it. Making sure if I ever made it, it would be to her standards. I cherish these moments when we just eat and enjoy each other’s company.

Finishing up, my mother goes back into the kitchen to wash the dishes. She turns Whitney Houston back on and the strong melody of her voice makes me cherish the moments that my mom and I share.

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Reality and Dreams You’ll have to face it, the endings are the same however you slice it. Don’t be deluded by any other endings, they’re all fake.

-Margaret Atwood, “Happy Endings” A. You are feeling adventurous that day and decide to thumb though the family cookbook. Eyes widely scanning for new recipes to test on the stove. Your finger stops on Chicken Alfredo. Excited, you rip out the page and run into the kitchen to start your masterpiece. Throwing open the fridge door you pull out chicken, cream, lemons, butter, and parmesan cheese. Then you grab flour, salt and Alfredo noodles from the cabinet. With ease you make the rue, a thickening agent for the base of the creamy cheese sauce. Next you add lemon, cream, and salt for a pop of flavor. The noodles are boiled quickly to a perfect al dente and you put everything together with the largest grin your face. You show your mother and she grins proud. Calls your food a masterpiece and tells the rest of your family what a prodigy you are.

B. You get all of all of your ingredients and in your excitement you drop the cream on the floor and break the bottle. Things are not getting off to a great start. While making the rue, your attention goes elsewhere and it turns from buttery gold (what its supposed to be) to a charcoal black. The smell of burnt flour stains the air in the house. You still carry on, but you have lost the motivation to try again.

Stomps are heard and your mother comes charging in the kitchen yelling about what the smell is. You tell her that you were trying to make Alfredo but it didn't turn out right. You were trying to cook like her. You were only trying to be like her.

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But she doesn't understand and asks you to clean up your failure. She just sees you as a child playing around with utensils. With a huge sigh you throw the pots from the stove in the sink, and turn the water on.

C. Today is the day that you will try to convince your mom that you are ready to cook again. She looks at you with motherly eyes and says your not ready. She doesn't trust you after what happened the first time. And says that the burnt pans are proof. Crushed, you tell her that it was a one time mistake and will never happen again. But she doesn't believe you. So instead you are confined to that chair in the kitchen watching her make food. Mentally you take notes and watch how she chops up onions and peppers. How she tastes every single thing that goes into the pot. How she always has another spoon on hand. And long to be at her side helping her craft masterpieces.

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The Lodge Tom his sister and their mother were driving to a barbecue hosted by his father’s family.

He looked out the window that was up despite the summer’s heat.

—Louie Richmond

The road stretches on as we drive into the cold winter air, and my breath fogs up the window. It is December and that means going to the annual family get together.

It is a time when relatives say “do you remember me” even though you were only a year old. You still say yes because you don’t want to hurt their feelings and give them a huge hug. Which leaves you smelling like stale perfume. We pull up to the Forest Hills Lodge that my uncle rents out. Many of the cars are already outside and relatives with steaming hot pans can be seen in the cold. Trudging up to the stairs, we pass people and say hello, giving out hugs and compliments. The warmth from the building thaws out my face and hands.

My grandad smiles with all of his teeth and gestures to our table. Sitting down, we are bombarded with family and the smell of food. After being run down by people, my cousin stands up on a table and announces that the food is ready. Scrambling, we scrape back our chairs and go up to the line. The sound of hands digging to into a cooler snatching the best drinks can be heard throughout the line. We continue forward and pile on tons and tons of foods. My plate is loaded with chicken, macaroni and cheese, and buffalo chicken dip, and a baked noodle dish. The same thing I get every year. I sit back down at the table with my mom, grandad, step grandmother, and cousin Brandon.

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We eat in silence and comment how the food gets better every year. My mom says the same thing on how a cousin of ours needs to give her the recipe of Buffalo Chicken Dip. They banter back and forth about sharing recipes and laugh about cooking disasters.

The day comes to an end when my two cousins get up on the table and yell at people to move their cars so we can all leave. They make other announcements and jokes then get down. Every one laughs and we hug each other and end the night on new memories.

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Cast Iron

Saturdays are when I go over my great grandmother’s house. When I go over, she always has ice-cream and treats. She also tells amazing stories and cooks amazing food.

It was spring and fresh dew was on the blades of grass. My great grandmother lived in an apartment building away from the city. She said to me once that she didn't like the noise of cars and she said that she couldn't hear her food cooking. That’s why she moved away. She said it was peaceful away from the city.

She was bustling around in the kitchen making my favorite, baked macaroni and cheese and fried chicken with crisp green beans. They were so fresh that when raw they made a satisfying crack that echoed in the kitchen. She was pulling out pan for the chicken and it immediately caught my eye. It was a dark charcoal color and was extremely deep. It had been withered down and had crusted-on marks.

My grandmother saw me looking and chuckled. “Come her baby I want to tell you a little story about this here pot.” I walked over to her and sat near her in the kitchen. I waited in anticipation and cocked my head to the side. She leaned against the counter and told me.

“This pot has been passed down for generation to generation. This pot has never been sold. Think of it as a family heirloom,” she told me. “This pot is essential to cooking when you get older. Every bit of food that our family has made was created in this pot.

Spices from far away lands were smoked in this pot. Even recipes that have succeeded

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and failed have been cooked in this pot. One day this will be yours love. This pot holds our whole family and what we have stood for. Take care of it when you get it.�

My eyes were wide when she finished. I couldn't believe it. She smiled and then got out ingredients for the chicken. She pulled out a brown paper bag and seasonings for the chicken. Plopping the wings and drumsticks in the bag and shaking it, she told me that this was the only way to make chicken taste good. I just sat there as she hummed and danced around the kitchen. I couldn't wait to start cooking.

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Love Always

by Pay Kish

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For my mother, I love you.

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Table of Contents 1. $7.99 Lunch Special 2. Fruitful 3. Please Don’t Forget 4. A Face for a Child to Love 5. Bleach 6. Tire Swing 7. Heart of Glass 8. Love Always

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$7.99 Lunch Special This story was inspired by “Abandoned Chinese Restaurant” by Clueless Wonder.

Down on Penn, near Garfield, there’s an abandoned Chinese restaurant. It’s a small, windowless brick building stained with pale mud and bright honeysuckle yellow signs with bold, red type advertising a “$7.99 LUNCH SPECIAL.” A wooden board is nailed between the door handles.

It’s 6:08, dead of summer, and my mom and I are sitting in her car. She rests her head in her arms, which are propped up on the steering wheel, and I have my feet on the dashboard. A melancholy song whispers through the radio.

I play with the but-

tons on my blouse when my mom lifts her head.

“My God! Where is he!”

I remain quiet. It’s only been eight minutes since we were supposed to meet him and recently my dad’s been late all the time. Does she even realize this place is abandoned?

Dark clouds begin to roll in, trapping a petrichor smell in the air. It’s been awhile since the last rain, and I know the impending storm will be brutal. Not too much later our car plunges into darkness. The sky mimics dirty pigeon feathers, and that’s when my dad shows up.

We get out of the car at the same time and she angrily marches up to him, heels scraping the ground as she walks.

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“Where were you? We were waiting on you for fifteen minutes! Where were you!”

She lifts a ruby painted finger and stabs at his chest while she speaks—demands answers—from a man who has nothing but lies resting on his tongue. In her world, nothing exists besides the two of them. I remain leaning against her parked car.

My dad fumbles for words before spitting that he was caught up at work.

“Bullshit you were caught up at work! You smell like perfume, my God! Where the hell were you?”

Silence falls the same way you fall into water: sudden and irreversible. And that’s when it starts to rain. My mom drops to the ground—a delicate rose wilted. My dad gets in his car.

As he backs away, I ask, “Mom, did you know this restaurant was abandoned in the first place?”

She doesn’t answer. I wonder if she knows how much she has in common with the abandoned Chinese restaurant.

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Fruitful A basket of rotting fruit sits in the middle of our kitchen table. I debate taking a piece and eating it. I don’t. The only thing worse than being hungry, is being hungry and sick.

My little brother skips into the kitchen, a fresh apple in hand. He takes a bite. The sound of the apple’s flesh snapping when it meets his teeth pierces the previously silent air.

“Where did you get that?”

“I took it from my friend’s lunchbox,” he answers.

“You can’t do that.”

“Why not?”

“Because its not yours. That’s stealing.”

My mom walks into the kitchen briskly. She begins typing her knotty thick, black hair into a bun. She is wearing a floral dress—her Church dress—and a pair of shiny black shoes. She walks to the fridge, opens it, and closes it not even a second later.

She pulls her lips, coated in dollar store lipstick, into a bright smile.

“Today’s the day!” she chirps.

“Mom we’re hungry,” I reply.

“Not for long babygirl. There won’t be a day after this one that I send you kids to bed hungry. I’ve got a job interview.”

The air is thick with tension. She has said stuff like this for years and nothing changes. The beaming grin on her face begins to wilt. She catches herself, straightens her shoulders, and holds her head high.

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My brother and I wait for what feels like an eternity for her return. Being home alone isn’t fun when you don’t have a TV or anything in your stomach. The sound of keys jiggling rattles against the apartment door. When she bursts through it it’s like she brings the sunshine with her. She twirls, the floral pattern on her dress like a smeared paint palette as she sings, “I got the job! I got the job! Things are finally changing!”

My brother jumps into her arms. I pick up the paper that flew from her purse.

Application for Employment: Denied

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Please Don’t Forget Mom, while I’m away please follow these instructions: Make your bed. Take a shower. Brush your teeth (morning and night). Make something easy for breakfast. Catch up on the news. Take a walk outside. Dust the fans. Reorganize the china closet—the thing hasn’t been touched in decades. Do your laundry. Don’t forget to take your meds. Consider buying a dog to keep you company.

You always talked about wanting a pug. If you follow through with the dog idea, do not forget to take care of it. Sweep the floors. Do not stare at the walls for hours. Do not sleep until dinnertime. Eat something easy for lunch. Do not burn yourself if you make soup. Call Grandma and ask her how she’s doing. Tell her how you’re dating. Do not be afraid to ask. Don’t forget to go grocery shopping. Put the groceries away. Do not leave any food out. Do not let the food rot in the fridge. Start reading a book. If you start reading a book, don’t forget to finish it. Take a drive. Be extra careful on the roads. Do not call Dad. Do not call Dad. Do not. Clean the bathroom. Clean the living room. Clean the dining room. Clean the kitchen. Sing while you clean—remember, the songs from Church? It’s okay now. Don’t forget to take your meds. Watch TV. Not too much TV. One episode should be enough. Cash your check. Get a haircut when you need one. Listen to music when you get the chance. Try knitting. Try dancing. Try cooking. Try gardening.

Try photography. Don’t give up if you like it. Please don’t give up. Call me if anything goes wrong. Ask me about my grades. Tell me about the shows you watch. Tell me about the book you’re reading. Update me on the dog. Buy a plant. Don’t forget to water the plant. Turn the lights on when it gets dark. Make something for dinner—not just if you feel like it. Do the dishes when you’re done eating. Don’t forget the soap. Don’t for-

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get to run the dishwasher. Watch a movie—I have plenty left in my room, you can borrow any of them. Please don’t call Dad. When it gets dark, don’t get sad. Remember: the sun needs a break too. Don’t buy liquor; you don’t need it. Take Benadryl before you go to bed. Take one Benadryl before you go to bed. Don’t stay up to overthink. Do not overthink. Call me when you start to overthink. It’s okay, it’s okay, it’s okay. I’m glad you called. I will come home when you need me. I will tell the school that my mother is sick.

Yes you are. And I’ll always take care of you. Don’t forget to turn the lights off before you get in bed. Don’t forget to put the dishes away. Feed the dog. Don’t forget to let the dog out. Always let the dog back in. When you get tired, sleep. Please remember I love you. Please remember to take your meds.

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A Face for a Child to Love The first time I held her, she changed something inside me.

--Alexis A. Hunter, “Molten Heart” We sit in her cave. A warm glow from the fire is cast upon the glistening walls and the moons of our faces. My mother is a monster—not her personality, but her appearance—two, golden fangs sink into her swollen, red lips. Her skin is scaly and purple as a bruise, and three eyes, bulging and green form a triangle right above the place where her nose would be. She doesn’t have any hair and she is bloated as a whale.

I think she’s beautiful.

We had first met when I was only an infant. She peered over my crib where I had been laying all day and I instantly started to wail. I felt her eyes pierce the depth of my being and it hurt. I didn’t stop until I heard her breathy voice hush me. She said, “It’s okay, baby. It’s okay.”

She reached into my cradle and took me into her fat, purple arms. She held me close—skin-to-skin—and for the first time in my short life I felt loved. When she brushed a few strands of stringy hair away from my eyes and placed a sweet kiss to my forehead I decided I wanted to stay with her forever.

So when she tucked me under her arm and carried me into the deep night, I didn’t cry. I didn’t scream, or sob; I didn’t try to writhe away. I just cuddled closer.

The saying goes “you’ve got a face only a mother could love.” But what if it was your mother’s face that needed the love?

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Bleach My mother cleans like Cinderella. She scrubs dishes until you can see your reflection in them, does the laundry daily, and bleaches the tub after every use. She attempts to mask the smell of bleach with heavily scented cinnamon candles, but it only blends to create a scent so strong it burns upon inhaling. But she won’t have it any other way. In my mother’s world, her house is the only space she controls.

We live alone—just my mother and me. Sometimes the house feels big and empty and I often attribute my mother’s cleaning to a longing to fill space. I thought paintings would be a good way to fill that space—we don’t have anything on our walls—but when I gifted my mother a rose painting I made for her birthday, she never got around to hanging it. It sits in our basement collecting dust. I pretend not to mind.

Our days are nothing but a routine.

It’s Monday. The house is silent and still aside from the creaking wood echoing off the bare walls. I was expecting my mother to be sitting at the kitchen table—round, white, spotless—drinking coffee and thumbing through a newspaper. I was surprised to see her standing in front of the kitchen sink, washing dishes that had already been done.

She does not notice my entrance and continues staring out the window at dark, low hanging clouds. Under her breath, she counts as she scrubs. A few moments pass.

“Mom what are you doing?” I ask. She shushes me immediately.

“Not right now, I’m counting.”

I don’t say anything else, excusing her odd behavior as being part of her odd lifestyle. I eat Cheerios and go to school.

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When I get home, I’m immediately met with the stench of bleach and absence of cinnamon, so intense my eyes start to sting.

The stairs sigh under my weight when I take them by two. The smell of bleach only becomes stronger as I near the bathroom door. I pull my shirt over my nose before I enter.

My mother—in typical long, pink cleaning gloves and a surgical mask—stands next to the toilet pouring bleach into the bowl. Four empty bottles lay beneath her feet like animal carcasses. Our eyes lock. She doesn’t stop.

“What are you—?” She cuts me off.

“Quiet. I’m counting.”

That night we eat dinner in silence.

It’s Thursday when she finally breaks. In one moment, I hear the sloshing of mop water and in the next, a crash followed by a loud whimper.

My mother, crumpled like a deteriorated castle, lies on the floor sobbing.

I get on my knees across from her and take her head between my palms—thin and papery just like hers. Under her breath, she is counting. A residual bleach smell hangs in the air.

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Tire Swing But he’s dead! said the midwife.

—Bruce Holland Rogers, “The Dead Boy at Your Window” My mother props her daughter up in the highchair. I glare as I watch her though her cold, dead eyes will never meet mine. She tucks a snowy, white napkin into my sister’s blouse and begins feeding her applesauce. Whenever some gets on the corner of her mouth, she’s quick to wipe it off.

Through the window you can see the acres upon acres of green grass that stretch and fall with the earth. A single tree stands in the distance and from that, a tire swing hangs. I remember spending my days there with my mother. We watched the days turn to evening before we went inside. We sang.

I haven’t bee out there since my “sister” was born.

“Lucy,” my mother says. “Why don’t you take Grace out to play today? You two can play on the swing.”

I don’t say a thing. I look at my mother, and then back to the window outside. My mother slurps a sip of orange juice.

“No thanks.”

“Lucy.”

I roll my eyes before hopping of the chair. My mother helps Grace out of her highchair and she follows me to the door. The fresh spring air greets us in a delicate whisper. We run to the swings without a word, leaping as we go. The sun hangs low and quiet in the sky.

Grace crawls into the tire swing and I push her.

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“You know Mother used to bring me out here to play.”

A push.

“This was before you were born.”

A push.

“Things were much better back then.”

A push.

“Now she likes you more.”

A shove.

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Heart of Glass It can take fourteen years to avenge the day your older sister set you on fire, and lifetime to realize your heart turned to glass.

--Eileen Merriman, “Prismatic” I am sixteen years old and here are four facts about hospitals and me: (1) everything is cold and white. (2) The doctors and the nurses will talk about you even if they promise to keep information “confidential.” (3) No lighters allowed. (4) I only speaks in facts now.

I only speak in facts because that’s all they want to hear. It always starts with “Why?” I told them, “Audrey hates me, no wait, Audrey always hated me. But when she stopped talking to me—stopped using the words she stole from me—I started to hate her too.”

In my room, I sit on my windowsill. It is morning. Fresh rays of sun leak into the room, casting mini light spectrums on the wood in front of me. I trace my finger along it intently watching the colors stain my milky skin. I no longer like prisms. I only like facts.

I didn’t hear the nurse enter. I only look up when I hear the snap of the door shutting. She keeps her distance and does not smile, only opens her mouth to say, “You have a visitor.”

I stop running my fingers along the spectrum and pull it back into the shadows.

Fact: I haven’t spoken to anyone since the incident. I swallow hard despite there being no words resting on my tongue. The nurse motions for me to follow her and, reluctantly, I do.

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The hospital corridors are long and white and silent. Buildings can’t feel emotions but this is a different kind of hospital. I know this hospital’s for the sad. I drag my feet as I walk.

The visiting rooms are set up like the ones in jails. Upon entry from my side there is nothing but a table, a white chair, and a piece of glass separating the patient from the visitor. My mother is sitting in the chair across from mine.

“You did this!”

Smiling, I drive my fist into the barrier. The glass and my glass heart shatter at the same time.

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Love Always Dear Mom, I know things have been hard lately—that’s an understatement. But I’m writing this because I want you to know how proud I am of you. I want to thank you. I want you to know that I love you.

We weren’t expecting this to happen. When I came home from ghost hunting that night, I didn’t know the only ghosts I’d find would be in our house. At that point, Dad’s stuff was still there. We were expecting him to come back. Our frantic phone conversation still haunts me. Despite this, I have yet to see you shed a single tear. I know you cry in private and that’s okay—I do too—but my admiration of your strength will forever be unwavering. I know it may seem unnoticed, but I see your struggle. I appreciate it. I want to make art out of it because if there’s three things you taught me it’s 1) do as you say not as you do 2) respect and 3) to love an appreciate art. Please know that I’ll listen.

You do so much for us. Ever since I was a kid I’ve never known you to take some time for yourself. Everything we’ve ever needed you’ve bent over backwards to provide.

I know it feels as if you’ve built us houses from your bones, and for that I am eternally grateful. I am grateful that you respect my decision in not speaking to Dad. I am grateful that you love all six kids as individuals. I am grateful for letting me sleep in your bed because I am afraid of the dark. Most of all, I am grateful for you.

I don’t know if you remember the Mother’s Day card I made for you in the fifth grade. But I do. I wrote, “If I had to choose a flower in a garden of Mother’s, I’d always pick you.” I just want you to know that still holds true.

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Love Always, Your Daughter

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The Claddagh Ring

By Dominique Green

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For my great grandmother May you never be ashamed of your past

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Table of contents 1) Pure Silver 2) Something Better 3) Lucy My Angel 4) Where Angel’s Trod 5) A night Of Thrills 6) A lover’s Ear 7) Disconnected

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Pure Silver Claddagh

My family was very well known in Ireland. They were of noble blood and only wanted the best. I was young, no older than fifteen, but I was madly in love. He was a poor boy by the name of Ardan. He was different: while everyone else had light hair and grey eyes, he had beautiful black lock and dark blue eyes. I wanted to marry him but we would never work. I had to marry someone that would strengthen my family bonds and a servant boy could never do that.

I felt special though; I was the only girl he had promised himself to.

“Ailis I promise I will find a way for us to be together if it kills me,” Ardan would whisper in my ear as he kissed my hand. Every other night we would sneak away from our homes and meet in the forest to talk about our future together.

“I long for you everyday.”

“I will take your hand in marriage and buy you big house, bigger then the one you have now.”

“Or we could run away now, get a small cottage and raise a couple of kids.” He stared at me getting up from the ground and pulling me up with him.

“Running away would be cowardice. I want to prove to your family that I am an honorable man and I will protect you. I don’t want you to have to want or long for anything.” He held my hand and looked into my eyes.

“But I long for you.”

“You will not have to long for me much more. You will be mine soon.” With that he laid a kiss on my cheek and was on his way. After that he stopped coming to meet me in

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the forest. He couldn’t be found at his home or at the bakery he worked at. He had fled without me. I cried for days thinking about the man I loved, the man who had left me. I couldn’t help but think about him running away with another. He would marry the other girl and she would give him the family they had always spoke of. It felt as if I were poking at a raw wound. I had let myself blindly believe that e had a chance to be together and no I was going to pay for it.

Three weeks later I felt more like myself. I truly believed that I can get over Arden. It only seemed right that when I finally start to forget him, he would return. He requested the presence of my father and came dressed in noble man clothes. I was furious with how well off he appeared to be. He looked even more handsome then the last time I saw him. I had lost many nights of sleep thinking only of him. I hated that our separating had no effect on him. I hated myself even more for blushing when his eye landed on me.

“My Laird, I have been blessed by the fairies. They have granted me with wealth and land to call my own.”

My father looked at him curiously as he pulled gold from his pockets.

“What have you done to earn the favor of the fairies boy?”

“I made a deal with them but I have not come to flash my fortune in your face I have come to share it.” Everyone stared at Ardan, all thinking the same thing. Why would he want to share his wealth?

“What would you like in return?” Father asked “The hand of your daughter.” My father and mother looked at me motioning for me to come to them. Ardan wore a big smile on his face.

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“Ailis you look beautiful.” Ardan told. I frowned at him. He frowned as well and looked back at my father. “My Laird, do you mind if I talk to Ailis alone?” I look at my father pleading, with my eyes for him to say no.

“I see no reason why not, it will give you more bonding time.” With that father kissed my cheek and he and the rest of the family left the room. I looked longingly at the door not wanting to talk to Ardan.

“You are not happy with me Ailis? I did what I told you I would do I got a big house just for you.” I turned to him, glaring.

“You left me. I went out looking for you everyday and suddenly you come back here with some gold and new clothes and think that all is forgiven?” Ardan came closer and tried to hug me.

“I’m sorry I was gone so long and I promise I’ll explain everything one day but I have something for you.” He pulled a small silver Claddagh ring out of his pocket. They were a special Irish ring meant to signify love and an unyielding bond. I’d never seen one that shone like this one. He started twirling it between his fingers looking at me. “ The fairies gave it to me.” He said twirling I between his thumb and forefinger.

“It’s pure silver and said to be protected by angel tears. It was made from the key to our new home to show that everything that’s mine is yours,” he whispered, slowly putting the ring on my finger.

“Ardan…”

“It’s also the key to my wealth, so as long as you wear that you’ll never have to want for anything because my fortune belongs to you,” he said, staring into my eyes.

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“I only want you,” I whispered as my arms wrapped around his shoulders and his around my waist.

“Then you shall never want for me again,” he told me as we sealed our fate with a kiss.

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Something Better

My mother is a proud Irish woman and I have never seen her cry a tear. She argued with my father for days on end about leaving her beloved homeland. Father was going to find a small place outside of Ireland to work until he felt we had enough money to survive somewhere else. We are still better off than most families. We have the money to survive here, but the deaths have made everyone angry and weary of the ongoing famine and diseases. I think that’s the only reason why mother really agreed to go to the Americas. We are being sent to live with my uncle Cullen. He had been living America three years before the famine and already has a stable life there. He will support us until Papa is able to come.

We were very fortunate with our places on the boat. We weren’t first class but we where doing better than the other immigrants. When we got to our cabin, there were only two beds, but luckily we didn’t have to share a room with anyone else. I would share a bed with my two younger sisters while Mother stayed with the baby. It was scary being on the boat, not really knowing what to expect. That night when the kids were asleep I listened to Mother silently cry. She was giving up everything she knew for a future she didn’t want. Irish woman are taught to teach the children Irish heritage. Maybe she thinks she failed us by taking us away from our home. My baby brother might never know what it’s like to grow up on Irish ground, my sister may lose her beautiful accent. It was all decided by the famine We stayed on the boat for three days before we finally made it to Ellis Island. We took the fairy over to New York where Uncle Cullen took us to

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his apartment. It had three bedrooms and was a lot bigger then our room on the ship but it was still smaller than our home in Ireland.

We stayed with Uncle Cullen for two years. Mother and I got jobs as maids to help bring in money for all the food my siblings consumed. We had stopped expecting my father to come to America and were just happy with the letters he sent to us. I was seventeen and had received the family ring. My mother told me it’s true magic would only work in Ireland, but I think she was wrong because I had met a boy. He was an Irish immigrant just like me and we instantly fell in love.

I planned on moving To Pennsylvania with him and starting a family of our own in America. My mother hated the idea and thought threatened to take the family ring away from me if I didn’t go back to Ireland with her and my siblings. I couldn’t take the thought of leaving the man I loved. I ran away with him and went to America stealing the Claddagh ring. All I could think of was what my mother said to me. It’s real luck was in Ireland.

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Lucy My Angel

The Irish Famine had ended many years ago but my mother had decided not to go back to Ireland. She fell in love with my father who was also an Irish immigrant. My grandmother, Aunts, and uncles went back to Ireland to burry my grandfather while my mother moved to Pennsylvania to start a family. Pittsburgh was full of Irish immigrants, which made my mother feel right at home.

I on the other hand hated it. I didn’t have an accent, I didn’t like the Irish cuisines, and I do not want to know about my mother’s Claddagh ring. I am different from everyone else; I have dark blue eyes, black hair, my skin tanned to a honey orange and my cheeks have become freckled. I look nothing like the light eyed, light haired Irish people I came from. I looked like an American girl and I didn’t want to be seen as anything else. I was a disappointment to my mother. I guess that’s why she had my sister Lucy.

She was everything I’m not. Lucy had beautiful red curls, bright blue eyes, and talked in a weird mixture of Irish and American dialect. My mother would always tell us that Lucy was a true Irish beauty and I know mother wanted to give the Claddagh ring to her. She would have gotten it too if I didn’t let her die.

I remember setting the flowers on her daisy yellow casket. My mother cried for father to lay her favorite bear with her because their little girl never stopped being afraid of the dark. The fairies where intricately painted onto the sides, meant to ward off the evil spirits for her journey to peace. My mother had a

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them carve the Claddagh symbol on the top. Her way of honoring the daughter that was meant to have the family jewel.

The day after the funeral I slept in late. I knew that mother and father still blamed me for letting Lucy go. I didn’t want to leave my room but I was to hungry to not go. I walked down the steps and saw my mother and father crouching next to a bright light. The figure was a little girl with long red hair.

Mother reached out her hand to touch the little girl. Her hand went to the girl’s cheek and then she hugged her. “My little girl I’ve missed you so much.”

“I know I’m sorry mama.”

My father joined the hug and they all sat there crying. “How are you here Lucy, please tell me your staying.”

“I can’t papa my time is up.”

He clenched his fist and held tightened his grip on Lucy. “No your not, your to young you’re my baby.”

“I’m older now Papa they teach me some much up there, and I still get to watch you and hear your prayers.”

Mother cried harder and I tried to catch my breath. I can’t believe she wasn’t going to stay.

“What are we supposed to do without you, why did it have to be you?” I said as I walk towards Lucy, surprising my mother and father as they pull me down to them. Lucy looks at me wrapping me in her little arms filling me with warmth.

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“It had to be me so you could become a better you.” I start to feel Lucy slip something onto my finger. “My death is not your fault so promise me you’ll let me go.” I nod my head yes while looking at the Claddagh ring on my finger.

With that she disappears and my parents hug me like Lucy did. My mother wiped my tears away as she caressed my hand. I was the one who was going to wear the ring.

I was going to be like Lucy, My angel in the sky

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“Where Angels Trod”

My mother always said to me Aggie, Angels will watch over you as long as you wear this Claddagh ring. It was the most prized possession of the women in my family.

My mother used to tell me that it would give me bravery like it did my ancestors, as well as helps me find love. Although during the Great Depression love was the last thing on my, I found it anyway. Or maybe I was in love with the idea of not going hungry.

In 1935 you would do anything for shelter and food. The Depression had caused people to lose their homes moving into Hoovervilles. My family should have been one of the first to lose their homes but Maxwell saved us. We met at a speakeasy where we instantly hit it off. Five weeks into meeting we decided to marry. A year into our marriage I gave birth to our first daughter Mary. For five years we lived a peaceful life the three of us but I could tell that Max was getting tired of me.

I was no longer exciting to him. I wasn’t the girl who went out to drink and dance with men. I had my daughter to think about. She is my heart; my legacy. But my husband is the reason I have this life. With that thought in mind I decide to buy my daughter a nanny. I decide on a colored nanny because they’re cheaper and my daughter will be culturally aware. It seemed like a win for the whole family. Mary was read bedtime stories, Max got more time with me, and I was making the two people I loved happy.

I thought things had gotten until the day I saw Max kissing my daughter’s nanny. I had never been so embarrassed in my life. It’s one thing to have your husband cheat on you with a younger, prettier girl but for him to be with a colored woman. What does that say about me as a wife if my husband has to run to a colored woman for love? When

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Max finally noticed me, he didn’t rush to pull away from her. He kissed her on the cheek and made his way over to me. We stare at each other when he finally tells me what I’ve been expecting to hear. He’s in love with her. I didn’t want to hear whatever he had to say after that. I walked to our daughter’s room and kissed her. She should never know the troubles I’ve gone through. Happiness is overrated anyway.

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A Night Of Thrills

Elizabeth Michelson is a straight “A” student, top of her class. She was born in 1966 and was proud of her Irish ancestry, which, was taught to her at a young age.

1981 she received the family ring after her mother died in a car accident.

December 1, 1983, my senior year of High School. I had already been accepted to Columbia University and had everything set up for me. All I had to do was wait for the school year to end and graduate. All my life I was told how little my family had when they came to America. The Irish weren’t accepted and my family fought for their rights and believed every immigrant should be treated equally. I wanted to keep my ancestors stories going and become someone great, someone my family could be proud of. That’s why my mother gave the ring to me. She said it stood for bravery and honor and she believed that I had that. I hope I’ll prove her right.

The day started just like any other day I went to school, went through my classes, and talked to my friends. But at lunch everyone was talking about one thing Michael Jackson’s new video, Thriller. It was supposed to be playing at the movies tomorrow and everyone was going to be skipping school to see it, everyone except for me. I didn’t have the heart to skip when I’d already done so much to get where I was. I started to walk out of the lunchroom because I didn’t feel like hearing everyone else brag about tomorrow. Just as I was about to leave, this boy Matthew stopped me. He was fairly popular around the school and was said to have a new girlfriend every day. His eyes

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where a murky brown, so different from my gray eyes. He wore his mocha brown proudly and in my eyes it only made him more beautiful. He rubbed the back of his neck like he was nervous and I couldn’t help but stare at him, interested in a boy I could never have.

“Hey Elizabeth, I’m not sure if you heard about the Thriller, but I an extra ticket so I was wondering if maybe you wanted to go with me?” There was an awkward silence between us before I spoke again.

“Like a date?”

“Yes, if you want to go of course.” He said looking at me expectantly. Did I want to go? It’s one thing to look at each other longingly across the lunchroom but to actually go out with each other. “I know it would be a big step but I like you and I know you like me too so we should at least try right?”

My family is very judgmental and disapproving of interracial dating. It was my grandmother who started the hatred of other races. My grandfather had, had an affair with a black woman; as grandmother put it tainting the family name. She’s taught my whole family that anything that wasn’t Irish wasn’t of God. They liked the idea of being purely Irish. I believed that, that was the right way to live but something’s changed. I knew it the first day I met Matthew I just never really accepted it until now. When my great great grandmother came to America because of the famine she had a hard time because the Irish were greatly discriminated against. So they only married other Irish people and that might have made sense for their time but things have changed. I looked back up at Matthew and gave him a big smile.

“I would love to go on a date with you.”

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A Lover’s Ear

Today was the day we were going to tell my family. I had secretly married Matthew and I wanted them to be happy for us. We’ve had been dating for four years and for two of those years we were a secret. I didn’t officially tell them until my brother found us kissing in front of the house in my car. My father and brother were upset that I wouldn’t tell them and just thought of it as a phase. My grandmother was a lot less forgiving and pretended that Matt didn’t exist for months. She had tried to take the family ring away from me telling me that I wasn’t deserving of it but she never had the heart to actually take it away. It hurt that they didn’t want to accept my love for Matt but we believed that if they saw how much we loved each other they would eventually accept us.

Matt had asked my father many times for my hand and each time he rejected him and said I wasn’t ready. It was a very big deal for Matt to earn my father’s blessing and respect. After years of asking I decided that I didn’t want to wait and convinced Matt to have a quiet marriage.

We all sat around the dinner table eating our meals. I found myself clutching Matt’s hand under the table suddenly feeling nauseas, not sure if it was from being excited or scared or just something else entirely.

“Are you okay sweetheart,” my father asked looking at me worriedly.

“I’m fine. It’s just that Matt and I have some big news we want to share,” I told them looking at Matt. Matt looked nervous and I could tell he was desperately afraid. I know that he felt like we should have just waited until we had my father’s permission but

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it was never going to come. So he didn’t need my father’s blessing because he had mine. My family looked at us curiously waiting for an explanation.

“We’re married.” Matt said with confidence.

My family took a minute to adjust to the news. Before my grandmother got up peacefully and left the room, my brother shook his head and started to angrily laugh.

“Who do you think you are!” he spat at Matt. “Do you really think you can give her anything. Do you want her to be scrutinized for the rest of life? Because that’s what’s goanna happen if she stys with you.”

“You’re talking about me like I don’t make my own decisions.” I bite back at my brother.

“No I’m talking about you making dumb decisions,” he says, coming towards me and poking me in the chest. That causes Matt to get up and push him back. “Don’t you touch me!” my brother yells, punching Matt. Matt starts fighting back both of them tumbling to the floor. My father finally gets up and pulls Matt off of my brother, grabbing him by his collar. I am so scared of what my father might do that I jumped at him. Without looking he backhands me sending me flying to the floor. Matt pushes my father off him and goes to me. My father looked at me sadly.

“I’m so sorry Elizabeth,” he says, coming towards me.

“Don’t you dare touch me!” I bite at my father as Matt helps me get up. We walk out the door. Matt sits me on the steps as I try to process what just happened.

“I am so sorry this happened. If you want an annulment we can get it, whatever you want I’m so sorry Elizabeth….”

“Matt I want to go,” I whisper.

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“What?”

“I don’t want to do this anymore I want to run away with you lets go away to the north or somewhere far away from them.”

“Elizabeth they’re your family you can’t just…”

“Matt I’m pregnant,” I say looking up at him. “I’m pregnant with a child that they would never love and I don’t want my child to be treated differently by their family so I want to leave with you.” He thinks about what I said for a couple of moments sitting there stunned.

“When did you find out?” he asks a little terrified.

“Two weeks ago I wasn’t sure what to do, but I know what I want now.” Matt takes my hand and kisses my cheek.

“Then let’s go,” he says pulling me from the stairs. We run to his car and start driving away from the only home I’ve known. I grab my necklace from inside my shirt.

Connected to it is my family ring. I roll down the window ready to throw it out the window. Matt sees me staring at it and covers my hand.

“You should keep it, it’s apart of who you are and it’s going to be a big part of our child too.”

I put the ring down and look out the window. The only part I have of my old life.

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Disconnected

My name is Lora Smith and I am seventeen years old. My parents are Elizabeth and Matthew Smith. They are a mixed race couple. Interracial marriages were legalized in 1967, and my parents met in 1983. On my mother’s side it was an unspoken rule that you only marry a person of Irish decent. Her family abandoned her with only the clothes on her back and her family ring on her finger. My parents moved out of Pennsylvania and went to California to start a new life. They had me and never contacted her family again.

When I was younger she would always tell me about our rich heritage and the family ring that was filled with the courage of our ancestors. I never understood how Mom could long for a family that didn’t want us. We were just as much of a family as anyone else. It was me my mom and my dad and that’s all we needed.

Today, it was just Mom and I in the house. Dad was going to night classes, trying to get his degree in accounting. Mom and I planned on doing our regular movie night. Usually I would pop the popcorn and Mom would get the movie ready but tonight we felt like pizza. We sat on the couch joking around until finally there was a knock at the door.

“I’ll get the door you go get the drinks,” Mom said, smiling at me. Mom grabbed some money and headed to the door while I went into the kitchen.

“What are you doing here?” I could hear Mom saying. I took a peek to see what was going on but I couldn’t quite see who was at the door.

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“I came to see you,” a soft, melodic voice replied.

“Why are you here? How did you find me?”

“It would be better if I explained everything inside.” Mom hesitated looking back to were I was but not noticing me. She slowly backed away and let the older woman into the house. The woman swept her feet as she blew on her hands heating herself up.

“It’ cozy,” The woman said, pulling her scarf from her head letting her black, gray streaked hair down. Her bright blue eyes scanned the room.

“What are you doing here?” Mom said with more authority. She seemed a little more than irritated.

“I miss you, your family misses you.” Mom laughed, glaring at her.

“My family misses me?” Mom angrily spat. “My family abandoned me!”

“Elizabeth?”

“No, my family is here with my husband and my dau…” Mom stopped herself backtracking. “There’s no place for any of you in my life anymore.” The woman got closer to Mom, pointing her well-polished finger at her chest.

“Don’t you dare talk to me like that, I am still your grandmother and you will show me some respect.” Grandmother? This woman was Mom’s grandmother? I believe this is a great time to introduce myself I think as I stepped out of the kitchen and into the living room. No one noticed me as I walked in, so I decided make myself known.

“Mom, who’s this you’re talking to?” I question while mom looks mortified.

The supposed grandmother looked at me shocked.

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“You have a daughter?” She looked at my hand. “And she’s wearing my ring.”

For some reason, I held my hand behind my back, feeling as if I wasn’t supposed to have it.

“A ring she is entitled to.”

“If she weren’t a half breed.”

“She is my daughter and that’s all that should matter.” Mother defended.

“I did not come to fight with you about this child’s parentage…”

“Then why did you come here?” I questioned her, feeling very annoyed.

The woman stared at me for a while before turning back to mom.

“Your father’s dying. He wants you to come back to him. We all do, and we have money now, a sort of an inheritance from your mother’s death apparently we own land in Ireland, which gave us a small fortune.” Mom looked at grandmother with tears in her eyes.

“You want me and my family to come back to Pennsylvania?”

“We want you. Your father has already forgiven you for leaving and we can all start over.” This woman couldn’t be serious. I waited for my mother to say something to her, maybe to yell at her and kick her out. When she doesn’t say anything I looked at the tears streaking down her face.

“He’s not made at me?” she said softly. The woman wrapped her arms around my mother and hugged her.

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“He’s missed you so much. He’s just too prideful to call you.” Mom cried a little harder and I glared at both of them. This woman had asked her to leave her family and all she could worry about was forgiveness.

“I miss him too. I miss how things used to be,” she said, hugging the older woman back. I look at the ring on my finger and slowly slide it off my finger throwing it at them. I don’t want their history or their Irish blood.

“Take your stupid ring with you and get out my house.” I say choking on my own tears. I threw the ring at them and ran to my room my mother calling after me, and the woman calling after Mom. I don’t want to be Irish anymore. I don’t want anything to do with that side of the family.

The next day mom’s things were gone. Dad went unhinged looking for her.

She left a note on the kitchen island that said it was better this way and that she would send money. On the note was the Claddagh ring. After what she’s done after all this time she thinks I would want that ring. She picked a father that didn’t want her over us. I had gripped it in my fist ready to throw it out when my father grabbed my hand.

“I think you should keep it.” He said tears in his eyes. This must have been so painful for him. He had given up everything for her and she just left him. “It’s apart of who you are no matter what. Please keep it for me.” He was the only family I had now. I would keep it for him. It was my heritage my history.

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Pennsylvanian Hunger

by Weston Custer

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ONLY BLACK IS TRUE ONLY DEATH IS REAL R.I.P. PER YNGVE OHLIN

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Table of Contents 1. Ice Cream 2. I Tried To Come Up With A Good Title For This One, I Really Did 3. LaVeyan Garbage 4. Kvlt 5. Snรถr 6. Remove//Belong 7. Wowee Zowee 8. You Fail Me (I Do Too)

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ICE CREAM On and on and on and on it goes.

Call yr friends, ask them to play a show.

I don’t know why I’m here.

I don’t know why yr here.

Dark Tones, “Untitled #4” “I think it would have been kind of sick to manage a band like The Replacements.”

I’m laying spread eagled on Kim’s floor, staring out her window but really kind of staring at her. I assume the trees outside are skeletal and bare but who can say for sure? She’s sitting cross-legged on her bed, idly letting Quincy climb and stumble through her fingers. Her room smells like honeysuckle.

“I don’t know,” I say. “Don’t you think that’s like the lamest part of the whole music making process? The administrative side?”

“I don’t know. I think it would be sick.”

Kim pauses. She’s playing Let it Be right now (the good one, duh) but the volume is down so low we’re pretty much just listening to tape hiss. I sneeze, twice. Kim stands up and puts Quincy back in his tank and then lays down on the floor next to me.

I’m freaking out, but you knew that.

“Also, The Replacements would have been the worst to manage because they were never not acting up.”

“Alright! Fine! I get it!” Kim throws up her hands in mock resignation and I feel a little bad about it. She scratches at her nose a little.

“Did you know Ian MacKaye used to manage an ice cream shop?”

“Whoa. That’s next level straight edge.”

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Kim laughs. It sounds nice. Whatever. Might as well give all the gay stuff a break for a sec.

“Milk and Coke for life, dude.”

She laughs again. I’ve always felt a little strange laughing at my own jokes, so I don’t, and I think she notices.

“Anyway, the guys at Dischord used to be so poor that Ian would steal ice cream from his job and take it to them back at the house because they had nothing else to eat.”

“Oh, word?”

“Yeah, totally. I think I remember him saying something in, like, an interview or something like that about trying to get some kind of ice cream with nuts in it because that was fractionally closer to being real food.”

“That’s wild. I mean, sincerely.”

Another pause. Typically, I would be scrambling to find something to fill the silence but I guess it feels natural. Quincy skitters around a little bit.

“My uncle saw them,” I finally manage to spit out. It sounds a little bit croaky.

The time between that string of words entering my mind and exiting my mouth was not nearly long enough. And to think I’d spent so many years stretching it out as long as possible.

“Minor Threat or Fugazi?”

“Minor Threat.”

“That’s awesome!”

“Yeah, I guess he was like Thee Scene Veteran or something.”

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“Huh. Apparently one time they were crossing the Canadian border on a tour, right? And the border patrol sees a bunch of scruffy looking kids and figures they better check the van out. But since they knew they didn’t have anything, Ian and Jeff Nelson, their drummer- was that his name? Jeff Nelson?”

“I don’t know, dude.”

“Huh. But anyway, since they both knew they didn’t have anything, Ian and Jeff were like, totally mocking these officers the whole time. And then one of them finds a little hollowed out space inside the plastic molding of the van and is all like ‘ah HAH!’ And Ian goes ‘Oh shit, they found the stash!’”

“Wait, what?”

“But see, the cop starts to pull at the plastic a little, and like eight hundred pieces of bubblegum fall out.”

I hate the sound of my laugh. I’m not going to even attempt to write it in. It’s one of those super quiet guinea pig type things. But let it be known that I almost pissed myself laughing just then, and I don’t think it was entirely because of how funny the story was.

“Ian MacKaye the LEGEND.” I’ve always thought it’s kind of screwed up that you can exist inside someone’s head without really consenting to it. Ian MacKaye probably doesn’t think of himself as a legend. To the people around him, he isn’t. He’s just Ian. I don’t want to exist in anybody’s head, really. I guess it’s some sort of runaway desire to be liked combined with paranoia? Who can say, really.

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I TRIED TO COME UP WITH A GOOD TITLE FOR THIS ONE, I REALLY DID

The thing about listening to music while you cut your hair is that you can’t hear it over the clippers. I guess I could have maybe predicted that one. I put on De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas and now I can’t turn it off because I’m covered in hair and don’t want to even think about stepping out of the bathroom. I’ll sometimes catch the odd shriek or drum fill between passes of the razor, front to back. The effect is not totally unpleasant.

Is “Freezing Moon” not the “Wonderwall” of black metal?

This is only really the second time I’ve ever cut my own hair. The first time was when I was four, with a pair of craft scissors. The old moms wasn’t terribly pleased about that. I actually kind of remember it—I remember snipping off the first lock and knowing way deep down that I had made a massive mistake. A boner of elephantine proportions. And then I remember steeling my resolve and deciding to keep going because, well, I had already started. I’m starting to get a similar feeling right now.

This one is a performance piece called “Kill Me Before My Mother Does.”

I ended up looking something like a depression era homeless kid, or like a mutant hairball that somehow attached itself to a human host. I don’t know, I can’t really do the image justice. I looked terrible. I’ve heard it said that regret and nostalgia are equally paralyzing. “Cursed in Eternity” gives way to “Pagan Fears.”

I decide to let the strangled scream of Attila Csihar combined with the buzz of the cheap Walmart clippers drown out any and all second thoughts. Because, well, I already started. I’m sure somebody knows why I feel this way. I’m sure somebody knows why I do these things.

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LAVEYAN GARBAGE The fog is here again.

Mayhem, “Funeral Fog” It’s super foggy out and I’d be lying if I said we weren’t a little bit lost. Or a lot lost? Kim said she knew were she was going. She’s walking faster than me and it reminds me of when somebody in a video game wants you to follow them. The ground is wet, so nothing crunches and for as gray as everything looks, I feel deep purple. Deep Purple. Sorry.

“Hey, the fog is here again.”

I’m not scared. But the fact that I’m not scared is a little scary, I think.

“Do you ever get the urge to like. Do you ever get the urge to rip off all of your clothes and run away into the woods and never be heard from again?” Kim’s hands are shoved deep in her pockets, and she’s talking quieter than usual. I’m not at all sure how to respond.

“No offense dude, but…not really.”

“Oh.” She looks embarrassed.

“But sometimes I wish I could somehow become a part of nature.”

“You are a part of nature.”

“Right now I guess I am.”

Kim scratches the back of her head, then tucks a few strands of hair behind her ear.

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“I’ve just been thinking about like anxiety as a fear response I guess. Like everybody knows what it’s like to want to run away and hide, right?”

“Right.”

“But when an animal gets scared, it actually does it. I’m sick of being forced to just deal with being afraid. It bites.”

I don’t think I understand what she’s talking about, but she continues to explain it.

Running on all fours. I breathe in fog. I breathe out fog.

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KVLT

Is that girl’s patch jacket cooler than mine?

HIRS… Note to self: should probably look them up later.

Yeah, start yr set with three and a half minutes of feedback. Real crowd-pleaser.

Open this pit up? Oh, why didn’t you say so!

Is it really black metal if you don’t have an enormous sweaty man crushing you the whole time? How true could the whole experience be without him?

Thanks for

keeping it real, dude.

God, this space is totally wrecked. Is that asbestos? That looks like asbestos.

Lmao, nice Nachtmystium patch, plebe. How’d you feel about The Ark Work?

The constant inner turmoil between P4K approved garbage and P4K panned garbage continues…

Seriously, guy, 3 songs in a row is a little bit much.

Should I push him? I feel like pushing this guy won’t do much if he already doesn’t have enough self awareness to like. Not suffocate the people around him maybe.

These guys are like black metal ABBA. (Whatever that means.)

Is their bassist wearing a shirt for their own band?

Too illegible to tell. Schroedinger’s flex move, I guess.

I want him to get off of me.

Should have brought earplugs. Does thinking that make me old?

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Yes. Definitely should have brought earplugs.

Go to the lame black metal show: check.

Hear someone defending Jef Whitehead: check.

Good to know this isn’t a safe space!

(No offense dude but at what point were you even remotely under the illusion that this gig was going to be a “safe space”? There’s not a single non-white person in the room. Yr one of like, maybe 4 girls. Wait, one of them left. Three girls.)

And Lord howdy, if it ain’t one 300 pound d-bag slamming you into a brick wall repeatedly…it’s another!

Ok bands like Joyce Manor and Speedy Ortiz calling people out for stage diving and stuff? I get it now.

Alright so now that the brocore-masquerading-as-USBM guys are done, we got a homie with a…Homeboy’s got a uh..Looks like we got a uhhhhhh. Hammered dulcimer?

At least nobody can mosh to this.

Dulcimer… metal…

Dulcimer metal?

That guy has a Burzum tattoo. Why not just go all the way and get a swastika on yr tongue, man? Maybe a little SS or something?

Obligatory noise side project: check.

This guy looks like he’s twelve. Props?

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Gigs like these are always a great reminder of all of the things that keep me from coming to gigs. There’s really nothing appealing about feeling uncomfortable physically, mentally, and, like, spiritually, all in one night.

But how stupid is it to complain about an art form based on aggression and disgust making me uncomfortable? Why should I feel safe and assured while trying to experience music like this?

That’s B.S. That’s B.S. and you know it.

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SNÖR How much can I expect from this routine?

1994!, “A+ brain” The weather is railing against both ends of the spectrum. It snowed on Monday, got up to 56 on Tuesday, and today thunderclouds are gathering like spilled milk. While I was enjoying the novelty of this week at first, it’s getting pretty confusing.

A warm rain in January. A squirrel flattened to the pavement.

My brother sometimes refers to dying as “taking a dirt nap.” I could use the ultimate nap. Interpret that how you will, I guess. I nudge what used to be a head with the toe of my shoe. It peels up a little bit, then folds backwards.

My mom told me yesterday that I look tired. Which I’ve always thought is just a polite way of telling someone that they look like garbage. She’s right, I do look like garbage. Despite what Kim said when I asked her, I know I’ve been looking like garbage a lot recently. I’m breaking out, I’m biting my nails. I’ve put on some weight, too, and the real kicker is that I’m finally not too worried about it. Which has its pros and cons. Kim asked me if I was tired.

Remember what it was like walking next to someone and knowing they didn’t like you half as much as you liked them? Remember how sometimes that was ok and other times it was terrible? I don’t know. What do you do when Sabbath doesn’t help?

The squirrel is not yet wet from the rain. I don’t want to see what it will look like when it is.

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REMOVE//BELONG

I’m standing in the backyard of the Sickhouse. I’m listening to feedback and spastic tom rolls echo against each other from inside, but I’m not really hearing it. The band kind of reminded me of a Power Trip cover band. God, can you imagine?

I’m far too aware of my own body and the blood that flows through it and the air that I breathe in and the air that I breathe back out and the constant tiny muscle adjustments that it takes just to stand upright and keep your balance.

I’m far too aware of any and all of these things to be comfortable. Is what I’m getting at, here.

It’s starting to snow. Kim’s still inside but I don’t want to text her because it’s cold out here and although it sounds like I’m totally freaking out, make no mistake: I’m only freaking out a little bit. Sometimes all it takes is a little dandruff to remind you that you inhabit a corporeal form and throw off your whole day. Nothing I can’t handle? I hate every individual snowflake. Every goddamned one.

It sounds like they’re finishing their set.

Cold face, cold legs. It’s nice to have one simple thing that you can package your whole terrible day into. Most of the time, it’s “I look like garbage.” Other days it’s period cramps or barely keeping your eyes open during calculus. Today, it’s “Holy crow, it’s cold.” But then, bad circulation runs in the family.

Maybe it’s not that cold. Maybe it’s just me.

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WOWEE ZOWEE Caught my dad crying.

Pavement, “Rattled by La Rush” Chalk it up to SSRI’s prescribed, acid dropped, sleep neglected, words swallowed. Did my third eye open or something? Did my pineal gland decalcify?

I mean, all art is arrogant, I think. How are so many people fooling themselves into not only like supporting a scene with their time and hard earned money, but also making music? Pouring your literal soul into something that amounts to approximately zilch? I can’t imagine what it’s like to actually be excited about the new Metallica album, much less to have had a hand in recording it. Hardwired… to Self-Destruct sucked.

Metallica used to be monstrous and now they’ve got hair plugs.

But then, look at art that objectively doesn’t suck! Look at Wind’s Poem. It’s immense, it’s lush, it’s murky, blah blah blah. But that album, like the rest of Phil’s music and like 90% of guitar oriented music basically boils down to: I’m white and I’m sad.

I’m talking myself in circles. Sometimes I have trouble keeping up with my own thoughts until my entire thought process just collapses in on itself like a dying star.

I guess what I’m trying to say is: If pretty much all art is ultimately worthless, and life imitates art, then I’ve really got noooooooo reason to not live in the desert and eat only whipped cream. Nietzsche said that if, in one instant we can, like, feel peace, then it verifies that all other instants matter because they lead up to you feeling peace. But how could you not take that to mean that nothing matters?

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We, as a species, would have been no worse off without a new Metallica album.

And if Lars can’t save us, who can? The only thing worse than a nihilistic fit is a nihilistic fit that doesn’t end up meaning anything.

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YOU FAIL ME (I DO TOO)

Everyone has that one metal album. It may not be a person’s favorite metal album, but I think everyone has at least one album that’s stuck with them almost indefinitely, for whatever reason. Most often, it was that person’s introduction to heavy music (anything by Converge). Sometimes it’s a hometown classic (Black Mask, Lost Below).

Other people swear by a genre defining game changer (Weakling, Dead as Dreams). If your favorite metal album is Sunbather, please feel free to never speak to me. Also to never speak to anyone ever again.

But I digress.

I’m serious about this. I think in the same way that some people are seriously into astrology, or astronomy, or whatever. Kim’s album of choice is Satanica, Behemoth’s fourth release. Christ, but that’s a good one. As far as I can tell, it means that Kim is a force to be reckoned with. I can’t help but agree. It takes a special band to dress up in leather and corpse paint and yet somehow manage to still be taken seriously. Everyone in corpse paint takes themselves seriously, but Nergal demands reverence.

This was before Behemoth had lost most of their blackened touch. The guitars on that album are still cold, trebly, and rotting. Inferno plays like he’s taking personal revenge on each and every one of his drums. I can’t do the album justice like this.

We’re standing on her front porch and the opening from “Ceremony of Shiva” is stuck in my head. It’s just cold enough that I can’t quite feel my fingers. You know, like nose runny type weather. Her house is old and the wooden porch is kind of totally

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wrecked. Kim looks at me, smiles, and then reaches for her keys. I’m resisting every urge to not bang my head so hard it snaps right off of my puny neck, to not wind up and punch the splintery floorboards. I mean this all in a good way. I’d like to feel warm but I guess I’m not too worried about it. I’d like to burn.

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.3.

The Body

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Sick

by Jessica Kunkel

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For everyone who has been sick.

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Table of Contents 1. My Mother the Goddess 2. In Sequence 3. From the Highest Floor 4. By Numbers 5. Cough Syrup 6. The End 7. Memory 8. Teddy

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My Mother the Goddess I had no idea how Aphrodite did it. She was a goddess, yes, but I would bet that even if she got a cold people would tell her she looked beautiful. I was no Aphrodite. I stood in front of the bathroom mirror, my reflection framed by the steam I hadn’t wiped off. My nose was red and my eyes were bleary. My cheeks were flushed, and even in the shower’s steam, I was freezing. I let the water run before I got in to make sure it was scalding. My mother hated it. She insisted that I was being wasteful.

Mom could have taken Aphrodite any day. I was a teenager and sleazy men would ask if she was my sister. I loved her, but I knew I looked more like my father: short with the face of a Raggedy Anne doll.

My parents always told me I was prone to sickness. It seemed like I had a cold every week. My father didn’t want to take me to a doctor because hospitals bothered him. My mother didn’t go against his wishes. He was the giant to her Aphrodite.

Once, when I was really sick, when I felt like my head was exploding and my eyes couldn’t open, I called my friend’s mom. She heard my coughing and took me to a local clinic, ranting about my parents for the entire ride. I was thirteen and exhausted. I couldn’t see clearly, and I couldn’t stop thinking about my goddess mother. She was working late all week, it wasn’t her fault I was so bad. I could close my eyes and see her blond hair hanging over my face as she held her hand to my forehead. When I was older I learned that she would have taken me to a hospital if Dad hadn’t thrown a fit any time it was mentioned.

I lay on an examination table, eyes closed and facing the fluorescent lights above me. I let them turn my vision peach, filled my pounding head with their hum. I believed 292

my mother would never choose this for me. I still had hope that her genetics were on my side, and that my father hadn’t ruined my chances with his shoddy genes.

My mother the goddess. She would read Greek mythology to me, pausing when I coughed. She was always patient. I thought that was why she stayed with my father. He was no match for her. On the few days I wasn’t bedridden, she would take me to the park. She brought packages of applesauce and ham sandwiches with her, and I’d hold her hand as she gave every homeless person the food she packed. She would welcome them with open arms and they would thank her for what seemed like forever.

The clinic doctors prescribed antibiotics for a sinus infection. They called my mother, told her I would be fine, and sent me home. It was nearly midnight when she came through the door. Her hair was in a loose bun, her eyes were red, and she held a wad of tissues in her hand. But she was still beautiful. I knew she wouldn’t look perpetually sick—be perpetually sick like I was.

Any other night she would make a cup of tea and sit down next to me, holding my head in her lap. That night she sat on the floor in front of me, took my hand in hers and held it to her heart.

“I am so sorry—” Her voice cracked. “I am so sorry I wasn’t there.” She was on the verge of tears. I held up the tissue box that was next to me and she laughed, shaking her head and taking a tissue. She wiped away her tears and makeup.

“Your father, he won’t change, baby. He won’t change.” I nodded my head slowly, trying not to jar my headache. “Hide your pills, okay? He won’t find them.” She paused for a moment. Still holding my hand she said, “I love you. I love all of you.”

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In Sequence

The girl sat on the edge of the hospital bed, still waiting.

It was dark, and the city was lit outside the window. It was winter, and she could see a Christmas tree in the distance. The doctor told her that they had implanted a pacemaker, that he should be fine, that he needed his rest. She was unconvinced. Before that, she rested in the only chair in his room, her feet propped against his bed. She held a cup of coffee in her hands and watched, waiting for him to wake up. Before that, she stood at the side of the bed, holding the hand of the boy she had known long before.

His was the first hand she’d ever held. She stared at his shaky heart monitor. Before that, she rushed into the room from the hallway, waving away the concerned nurses. Her scarf was still hanging out of her sleeve; she didn’t have time to take it out before she tugged on her coat. Before that, she screeched into the parking garage, whiteknuckled as she waited for admission.

Her phone still showed her most recent call from the hospital. Before that, she sat in a coffee shop, an emptied cup of tea and a half-eaten scone on the worn table.

She tapped her foot as she waited, checking her phone for his text.

Before that, he collapsed in his hallway, right in front of the neighbor’s door. He was clean-shaven and wore his nicest flannel, the one he knew she would love. Before that, he looked at himself in the mirror, healthy, normal. * “His was the first hand she’d ever held” pulled from the story “Currents” by Hannah Bottomy 294

From the Highest Floor Things around them were shining and dripping…

—Jim Heynen, “What Happened During the Ice Storm” She sat in the corner of the hospital room, watching as the therapist took her brother through his exercises. He smiled any time he looked to her corner. The therapist, Beth, was talking for the fourth time about the benefits of staying on a feeding tube for a few more days. It was raining outside.

She looked at the streams of water running down the window, twirling her engagement ring around her finger. It was spring; flowers were blooming blood red in the decorative garden in front of the building. She was high enough up to see the blooms in the pattern of the hospital’s logo, the tops of buildings darkened by rainclouds. It was the lunchtime rush, and she knew businesspeople would be out for lunch even in the weather. She should have been in one of those buildings, working, normal, not in the hospital with Jack.

“Anne.” His speech was slow as he pieced the new sounds together. They’re new to his brain, she thought, not new to him. She smiled brightly and looked up at the speech therapist, who smiled in return.

Anne moved the chair closer to the bed. “Hey, can you say your name?” She was hopeful, tears in her eyes. Hers was the first name he could say. “Can you say ‘Jack’?”

“Ja… J… ck…” He frowned and shook his head. “Aa…” He looked frustrated.

“It’s alright,” Anne said. “We’ll keep trying.”

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She liked to think there was relief somewhere in his frustration. Relief that she would be there, that someone would hold his hand and make sure he followed the doctor’s orders. It started raining harder.

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By Numbers 1. is for the red that makes the scene. Her 1. lips bleeding, chapped, even in spring, 1. is the flowers in the garden she passes on her way to work. For her insides as they react to intruder particles, as they react and spasm. 2. is for white, the tissues she carries, stained with 1. and 3. yellow like the bees that buzz around the 1. flowers, poppies like in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, her favorite book. 4. is the grass as she sneezes into the new 2. tissue, groaning, the 3. pollen coating her nostrils as she stains the 2. tissue with her 3. sneeze. A friend walks with her in bright 4., and hands her another 2. tissue, which she waves away, insisting “I’m fine.” Her friend crosses the 5. black street at the 1. light, as the 6. orange hand flashes. Her friend likes to live on the ironic edge. Stepping into her building, she removes her 5. sunglasses, wiping her 1. nose with the edge of a tissue. Her 5. dress dusted with 2. tissue dust. She swats at it with her 7. silverringed hand which gleams in the sunlight filtering in through the skylight. She takes out an 8. electric blue packet with a 2. pill and pops it in her mouth, swallowing dry. She has an hour or two until her meeting. The 7. modern clock in the lobby reads 8:00, she is right on time, impeccable in her punctuality even as her body falls apart in response to the 3. pollen.

* “1.is for the red that makes the scene” pulled from “Paint by Numbers” by Malachi McIntosh

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Cough Syrup The cough syrup slid down my throat, its bitter taste coating my mouth. I had taken two doses within the last hour, and I barely had a head cold. I had heard from some friends that cough syrup would give you a buzz but I needed to see for myself. I stood outside in the snow for an hour and a half to get a cold because I needed a reason to put myself through its flavor. I didn’t know what I was doing.

“Life’s too short to even care at all…” my friends said. “I’m losing my mind, losing control.”

By the time I made it to school the next day I felt worse. I was coughing and burning up. My mother didn’t want me home alone; I had important classes that day. A friend handed me a metal water bottle, and the smell of cough syrup made me want to throw up. Two doses, I knew, wasn’t enough to cause any kind of high. I decided I was okay with that. I felt so wrong the night before that I threw up into the toilet bowl and my mom made me soup. I didn’t need a high. I needed some semblance of control.

I’m not in control as my body sends out its white cells to fight off my cold. I’m not in control and that’s okay. My body cares about me. Every day it keeps me alive, defending against infection, making my heart continue to beat, making my blood circulate.

So I wait out my fever. I appreciate my chilled body for all it does, and I’ll never look at another bottle of Nyquil. *“Life’s too short to even care at all… I’m losing my mind, losing control” pulled from “Cough Syrup” by Young the Giant

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The End After Robert Olin Butler Andrea I look into his eyes and then at the floor. We’re adults, we should be able to handle this. His hand slides into mine and I smile. He’ll leave me if he knows I went to the doctor; they told me what I should have found out years ago. We wanted children. Our children. We wanted them beautiful, our flesh and blood. We still want them. I still want them. I imagine them having his wide eyes and my dark hair, tall and gangly with his freckles scattered across their noses. Our daughter wouldn’t have my pain; she’d be perfect. Our son would laugh like his father, his smile overtaking his face. We’d take them to soccer games and make hot chocolate after sledding and lay in front of the air conditioners in the summer. We’d be normal. We’d be a family.

How do you tell someone you might never be able to deliver on a promise you made? That you might never be able to deliver? He’ll be crushed, he’ll draw into himself and I won’t be able to comfort him. I should have known from the pain and periods. I should have known. I can’t begin to tell him how sorry I am, how disappointed in myself, how disappointed in my body.

I insisted on going to the appointment alone, giving him vague but satisfying enough details. He reluctantly agreed. When I walked out of our apartment I couldn’t stand. I was on my period; my cramps brought me to the floor. The doctor sent me home with an answer, with little hope. Hormonal therapies, surgery, pain meds. I want normal, I want to be with him and have children and be happy.

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There’s something wrong. I’ve been trying to talk to her for weeks, but she’s pushing me away. She went to her doctor’s appointment alone. I knew I shouldn’t have let her. I can’t bear to let her go. I heard her slide to the floor in the hallway when she left. She hated when I saw her like that. She tried to keep me in the dark but I knew what her appointment was about. I knew about the pain. I’d been with her for years. I’d walked in on her curled up in our bed crying because of it. I wanted to go with her, but I knew she didn’t want me to see her weakness. I’m holding her hand and she looks like she’s about to cry. I know I love her, but in all of her guardedness I can’t tell if she feels the same anymore. I know there isn’t good news. Maybe she found someone else, maybe she grew bored of me, and maybe she didn’t want me in the first place. I shouldn’t ask, I shouldn’t push, I should let her tell me in her own time, let her open up again.

I knew what the appointment was about. I thought I knew but it’s tearing her apart. I can’t stop thinking that I remind her of her pain, that she expects me to hate her because she has weaknesses. I can see it now, her happier with someone else, someone who doesn’t know as much, who doesn’t see what I do. Or maybe her pain worse than I thought. Maybe it’s something more.

We were happy a few months ago. Sometimes I’d come home late after work and find her asleep on the couch with her presentation notes on the floor below. I’d nudge her awake because I knew she would be sore in the morning if she slept on the couch. I would take her to bed and put her notes on the desk. We were happy. Today I can’t speak, but I’ll hold her hand until she tells me. If she tells me we’re done. If she tells me she’s dying. I’ll hold her hand.

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Memory I told my brother that I’d take her this time, even though she remembered him more. I wanted to spend time with my mother, especially when I was losing her. I was losing her. When I got to the house the first thing I noticed was the tire swing in the front yard. I knew she wouldn’t remember pushing my brother and me on the tire swing in the summers, how the rope broke one winter after the ice made it brittle and it snapped with our weight.

I knocked on the door and my father opened it with a sigh. I appreciated how he took care of her even when she didn’t recognize him. Last Christmas he told me how it hurt to care about someone so much, but that he hoped I would find it in myself to care about someone as much as he did my mother. I’d only been home once since then.

“Alice,” he said in surprise. His eyes widened and he took a step back, opening the door further. “I wasn’t— come on in.”

“Oh Dad, I don’t think—” “Is that the door?” my mother yelled from the kitchen. Dad motioned for me to come in, mouthing Please. “Who is it?” She practically sang the phrase, like she did when I was a kid.

“It’s me Mom,” I yelled into the house. As I walked in I saw little notes written on sticky notes in Sharpie. “Take your keys out of the door!” “Tie your shoes!” “Put your keys on the rack!” Dad drew smiley faces on each of them, hoping they’d make her smile when she saw them. I felt my heart in my throat as I read each one.

My mother walked out from the kitchen, wiping her shaking hands. “Hello darling!” She smiled and hugged me. “You’re so beautiful. How are you?”

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“I’m alright Mom. I’m here to take you to your appointment.” I hoped it was a good day for her. “It’s Alice, Mom.” “Oh, Alice.” I smiled. “I have a daughter named Alice. She’s beautiful just like you.” It took all I had not to let my face fall. Dad had moved into the living room and I saw him bite his fist when he heard what she said. How do you react to a woman you’ve known all your life forgetting who you are?

“Are you ready to go?” The words came out strained.

She started to get her shoes on, humming as she slipped them over her feet.

“Where are we going?”

“Your doctor’s appointment, Mom. We’re going to your appointment.”

She shook her head. Dad made his way into the foyer. “Honey,” he said, “you can go with her.”

She looked at him and smiled. “Okay.” I could see tears in my father’s eyes. He would cry as soon as he closed the door behind us.

When my mother stood up I helped her get her coat on. I hoped it was enough; she was always cold. She said goodbye to my father, probably thinking he was just a nice man who took care of her. She probably thought we were all just helpful strangers, fluttering in and out of her life in a matter of seconds. She was sociable enough to stay happy with we kind strangers. I didn’t know how my brother did this every week. I took her arm and led her to the car, waving to Dad as we left.

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Teddy There were good days and bad days. The bad days he was bed-ridden, under the watchful eye of our frazzled mother. He had killer headaches and could barely lift his head from the pain they caused. On the good days we would hike barefoot through the woods in our backyard, sucking the juice from honeysuckles after the rain. He loved to feel the mud between his toes. We would sneak spoonfuls of Domino brown sugar— Mom would never buy any other brand— from the top shelf of the pantry while she was doing laundry. I’d climb the shelves, feet between the canned mushrooms, while he kept watch because I was older and taller. We would hide in my closet with a flashlight, letting the sugar dissolve in our mouths.

My heels are sinking into the grass. I’m trying to keep my weight on the balls of my feet as I look down at the gravestone. It’s weather worn, but the grounds have been kept well enough. I’m clutching a handful of honeysuckles from the bush in my yard. It’s dark and I’m supposed to be on my way home after a dinner meeting with some of the board members. My husband and children are waiting for me.

I didn’t need a flashlight to find the grave; I’ve been here more times than I can count. Mom hasn’t been here in years. She was crushed when he died. Her youngest son. From a brain hemorrhage. She had no control. She escaped into herself, shutting my father and me out. They divorced a year later. Now she’s moving on with a new man in California.

I remember being so angry with her when it happened. I was old enough to know she was responsible for me; that shutting down would only make it worse. Death is ran303

dom; our lives are fragile. Teddy looked the most like Dad. Now I know why she did it, why she couldn’t look at her husband who reminded her of the child she lost. She wanted control. I want control.

“Teddy,” I say to the grave. “I’m sorry buddy. Happy Birthday.” I lay the honeysuckles down in front of the gravestone.

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The Human Connection is a Deadly Thing

By Maya Frizzell

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To Papa I love you so much

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Table of Contents 1. Summer of Disasters 2. Pray You Catch Me 3. Ataa’ Comes Home 4. Abby 5. Honeysuckle (Why Parents Try Harder to Connect Post-Divorce) 6. A Casket Through the Window 7. In a Windy City 8. Advice on Dying

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Summer of Disasters It was the summer of fires and shark attacks. No rain for four months. Everything told us to be safe, stay home, and lock the door. The girl nextdoor was kidnapped, my friend’s dad left the oven on for just a few minutes too long, the lifeguards at the local pool had been too slow more than once. My family ignored the warnings. Danny went out in the rain on a Friday night. He was tired of being stuck indoors; he wanted to see his girl. Lightning struck too close to his car and he swerved off the road right into a tree.

Josie and I went to the beach. She couldn’t resist the water and the riptides became chains as they wrapped around her ankles. Dad worked the graveyard shift for a gas station by the highway. A man paid two tens for a switchblade, then held up the store for money. Twenty dollars for a man’s life. It’s just Mom and me now. We don’t go outside the house. Most days we stay in bed, counting our fingers and toes, scared that we may lose anything more than we already have.

The opening lines are drawn from David Brook’s story, “Blue”

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Pray You Catch Me She leaned her body lightly against the armoire in the corner of her room. She had shared this room with her husband for thirteen years. Thirteen years of sleeping in the same bed, sharing the same house, telling the same stories. Thirteen years of being completely devoted on her part. On his part, there was a mistress. She knew it was just one woman because she could smell her perfume on his suit. She also knew it was frequent because his lips had become tinted by a lipstick color she did not own.

She had tried tirelessly to engage him in their marriage again. She made dinner every night, but he was never home. She tried to speak to him lovingly, the way she imagined the other woman might, but he responded without much emotion. His smile had become a memory to her.

She thought of this woman as young. She wore a sexy perfume rather than the modest one she wore herself. She wore beautiful, expensive clothing and the way she moved could sway even the most faithful of men. She felt as if she knew this woman from all the times she had tortured herself while imagining her.

She picked herself up off the armoire and tucked her robe tightly around her body. Moving to the door, she placed her hand on the knob, took a deep breath, and left the room. She went into the kitchen where dinner had been waiting for the past hour.

She heard her husband enter the house as she tapped her index finger against the glass in her hand. She could smell that perfume again. When he came into the kitchen, she could see that lipstick color that wasn’t hers on his lips. She stood up and crossed the room to rest her hand against his cheek and felt his breath catch. “Who is she?” she asked. “Who is she?” The house was quieter than it had ever been.

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Ataa’ Comes Home Legend says there was once a Navajo woman who was caring for her dying husband in a house separate to her own, as he could not die in the home the couple had lived in or evil spirits would linger there. The woman stayed by her husband’s side along with her two sons and the medicine man day and night until it seemed the husband would not be able to live another day. On this day, her youngest son said goodbye, then left the house so he would not be exposed to the spirits once his father died.

Finally, the man died. The woman, now a widower, held his hand as he passed and did not say a word once the medicine man confirmed he had died. She was ushered from the house by her eldest son so that he and another member of their tribe could prepare the body for burial.

The woman, taking one last look at her husband as she left, began to weep. It started as a soft whimper, which no one noticed. Once she was in the comfort of her home, her youngest son saw his mother’s tears and silently wiped them from her face.

Her weeping grew into a sob, to which the son cried “Ama, no! You mustn’t show such grief!” She paid no mind to what he said and continued her sorrows, tears flowing down her face. Unknown to the son, the woman wished for her husband to return from the afterlife and continue his journey on earth with her.

Night fell and the woman wept still. Even as she lay in bed, she cried to herself.

Her son heard her softly crying and began to fear that his father would hear mother’s crying and would be disrupted from his journey to the afterlife.

The next morning, the woman rose at an early hour so she could watch her son and the other man carry her husband to the area where he would be buried. Tears be-

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gan to fall from her eyes as soon as the light hit her face. Her son, waking up and realizing his mother was not still asleep, went out to stand with her. “Ama, you mustn’t cry as Ataa’ passes our home or he will hear you.” She nodded her head at this, but could not stop her tears.

As the procession passed her house, the woman cried. She was silent, but tears tell down her face still. Her son hoped that his father had not heard her cry as he passed their house, though he could not be sure.

That night, once the man was buried, the woman lay in bed with her youngest son on one side of her and the eldest on the other. The young one hadn’t the heart to tell the older about his mother’s tears.

As the three of them fell asleep, the young son heard a sound, like a scraping against the outside of their home. He reached over his mother and woke his brother. “Ánaaí,” he whispered. “Do you hear that noise?” His brother, who was tired from the day, swatted his hand away. “There is no noise, atsilí. Go to sleep.” The young one did not believe his brother, but nonetheless fell asleep once again.

In a matter of hours, the youngest brother was woken up, yet again, by the same noise. “Ánaaí!” The boy exclaimed. “There was a noise, I heard it!” His brother was about to swat his hand, but this time their mother woke between them. “What’s all this noise?” She asked the both of them. Before the young one could answer, his brother said to her, “Nothing, Ama. Atsilí hears the wind and thinks he is in danger. Go back to sleep.”

The third time the boy woke from the noise, he did not wake his brother. Instead, he carefully climbed out of bed and left the house. His brother heard him rise and silent-

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ly slipped out behind him. Once outside, the two brothers could not believe what they saw. In front of them stood their father. He wore the clothes that the eldest had dressed him in before the burial.

As the brothers stood in shock, staring at their dead father, the woman came from the house, her face streaked with tears. She gasped when she saw her husband, standing before her sons.

They stood in silence for a moment before the dead man spoke. “Why have you done this to me, hwe’ esdzáán?” He asked. “Why do you cry like this?” The woman said no words, but instead stopped her crying instantly. She realized the consequences of her actions. Her husband did not wish to be on this earth any longer. He wished to live on in the afterlife, waiting for her arrival so they could continue their journey together.

Her husband walked toward her and softly, silently, placed his lips against her forehead in the same way he had done in life. Just like that, he was gone. Nobody saw him go, just as he came. The woman never cried again in her life.

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Abby Abby says that dying is a lot like when you get the flu. You feel tired all the time and after awhile you’re just tired of being sick. She already had cancer when I met her.

That was the first thing she told me. “I just want to let you know what you’re getting yourself into,” is how she phrased it. I was too entranced by her eyes to think about it as much as I should have. Looking back, I think she wanted me to be okay with her condition more than she cared about being okay with it herself.

We knew we had a limited time frame. She asked me to move in with her three weeks after we started dating. She and I carried so many boxes that we slept for fourteen hours once we got into the apartment. We had date night every night instead of just once a week. She painted pictures of me instead of nature now. That’s what she loved to do. She regretted never pursuing art. Abby started to talk more and more about dying.

I was the one who asked her to marry me. It was three months into our relationship and I knew I was in love with her. I didn’t know how and I didn’t know why, but I knew that I had to act on my feelings or the wedding might never happen. We got married in a courthouse and Abby was in a wheelchair and she looked beautiful. Her eyes were shining more than ever that day. Neither of us wore wedding dresses.

It’s been three months since our wedding and Abby is bedridden now. She hardly sits up anymore because moving hurts. The lines in her paintings reflect the pain she’s in. The strokes grow more tired as she does too. I quit my job once the doctor started to suggest that her time might be near. Sometimes when Abby isn’t looking, I cry. She’s never once cried about the situation she’s in and I feel like I owe it to her to be as strong

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as she is. She fell asleep last night as I held her hand and I worried that when she woke up she might feel the wetness on her sleeve. I don’t want her to worry about me.

We have date nights in our house now. I order in food and we turn on a movie.

Sometimes, if Abby feels well enough, I’ll climb into bed with her.

It makes me angry that Abby is going to die. It enrages me that we won’t grow old together. I’m not mad at her. I don’t know what I’m mad at. God, I guess. The universe, maybe. Cancer. I’m mad at whatever decided it was a good idea to cut her life short. I need her to keep me sane and to hold my hand and to keep me company and I need to look into her eyes.

I sit here now as she sleeps next to me. She looks as beautiful as the day I met her. I wish I could draw her the way she draws me so I could remember her when I can’t see her anymore. That’s the hardest part of this all. I’m going to miss her eyes.

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Honeysuckle Or Why Parents Try Harder to Connect Post-Divorce

My dad used to take me walking during the summer. We would explore a different trail every weekend. We didn’t mind getting lost so much because that meant a few more hours together. One time, we found a wall that was covered in alluring blooming honeysuckle. Dad plucked a couple of blossoms and showed me how to carefully disassemble the flower and suck out the sweetness inside. My mom was helpful when it came to most things, but my dad was fun.

Dad and I don’t talk much anymore. We don’t walk anymore. We don’t eat honeysuckle anymore. After the divorce, I didn’t want to see him. The whole thing felt like his fault. I lived with my mom during the week and went to visit him on the weekends.

He would suggest going on walks like the ones we used to take, but I didn’t want to.

My mom told me maybe my dad was trying to save any type of sweetness our relationship still had. She said he wanted to connect with me, but how could he? He was the one who had torn our family apart. He was the reason we were living in separate houses. He was my hand suffocating the delicate flower, causing it to lose any sugar it had left between its petals.

Dad got a new girlfriend. Her name is Linda. Such a bland name. Linda doesn’t like honeysuckle. She says the taste is too sweet for her. Linda hates walking. She doesn’t like to get dirty. Linda would “prefer to stay in and watch a movie. Wouldn’t that

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be fun?” I don’t think dad likes Linda very much. She has a sharp face and long, looming lashes. I think that’s why he dates her. I think she looks mean.

Sometimes Linda tries to relate to me. She told me once that she could relate to me because her dog died when she was a child. Linda likes to pretend that my mom’s dead. I think she likes to think that my dad never loved anyone enough to marry them before her.

Dad brought me honeysuckle one Friday night when he came to pick me up from school. I gripped them between my warm palms on the ride home. Once I had shut the door to my room, I delicately placed them on the bed and tried to revive them, searching for any drop of syrup my tongue could find.

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A Casket Through the Window

I watched from the window as a sleek black casket was marched down the street in front of my home. I hadn’t known the man very well. He would nod his head in my direction as I walked to the bus stop. The nod turned into a wave and the wave turned into a quick “Hello,” or “Good morning.” He had said hello to me just a day earlier. That was the extent of my relationship with the man in the casket. He was a young man. Not over thirty, I think. I could see small grey strands trying to work their way into his raven hair, but they weren’t prominent enough for him to have succumbed to age. Once when he waved to me, I caught a glimpse of the rough calluses on his hands from too much work. I tried to create some background for him. I tried to fill in the spaces. I wondered how he had died, but could make no rhyme or reason of it. I couldn’t say why I cried as I watched this family carry their brother, son, husband, friend down the street. I had no emotional connection to this man. He only occupied small moments of my memory and certainly, it was nothing significant. But still, I cried that afternoon. I felt lonely as I got on the bus the next morning. It seemed like something was missing, but I couldn’t tell why it was so important that this man say hello to me. He was another bit of my puzzle and now it felt as though there was a hole, a missing piece, in who I was.

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In a Windy City

I met her in a cocktail bar, but she wasn’t working as a waitress. I don’t remember very clearly. I wasn’t attracted to her, not by any means, but she was a stranger on a Friday night and I was looking for something to do. We exchanged conversation outside of the bar and as we spoke, neither of us noticed the wind whipping around us. An umbrella narrowly missed my shoulder, but our conversation still continued. I wasn’t very intrigued by what she said, but I was entranced by the way she moved as she spoke.

She said words that made her happy and small creases appeared by her eyes. She reminded me of a hurricane. I was lost in her. She was the only thing I could think about, yet at the same time, I wanted all of this nonsense conversation to end. I wanted so desperately to turn around as she spoke and walk away into the depths of New York. All that we said was busy work. Nothing meaningful passed my lips while I was with her and what she said in return was gibberish to my ears. People rushed around us now, shouting about the conditions. Her hair whipped around those creases in her eyes as the city came down around us, but my gaze was still on her. The rain started not soon after. Soon enough, the wind blew her away. Only once I lost sight of her eyes did I notice the storm. I didn’t realize what I had lost until later that night, as I wandered the streets of the city. I was somehow so attached to this woman I had met less than two hours ago. I missed her voice, I missed her hair, and I missed her eyes. But she was gone and I was okay with that.

The first line is drawn from “before the storm” by Alex Sheal

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Advice on Dying

Wake up in the middle of the night. Try to forget that you’re in a hospital. Don’t think about being in a hospital. Pretend that the sheets scratch because they are worn out. These are the sheets you grew up in. Try to fall back asleep. Try to forget the pain you’re in. Don’t think about the pain. Hold yourself in a seemingly uncomfortable position because it grants some kind of relief. Accept that you won’t fall asleep. Read a book to forget you can’t fall asleep. Fall asleep reading with the book on your chest, applying a pressure you’re not unfamiliar with. Wake up at a more normal time. Try to let the nurses help you. Don’t think about how much the nurses have to help you. When your mother cries, deny that you may die. Don’t talk about dying. Whatever you do, don’t discuss the funeral. Your parents are going to want flowers and sad music and everyone dressed in black. No matter how much you want the opposite of that, let them have it.

Funerals are for the living after all, not the dead. Take the medicine the doctors give you. Even if it makes you sick to your stomach, what’s the harm? You’re already sick to your stomach. When your friends talk about what they’re doing without you—the movies, the Friday night dinner parties, the baby showers, the engagement celebrations—don’t think too much about it. They’re probably just as jealous of your hospital movie nights. Above all, don’t cry. When you’re alone and stuck thinking, don’t cry. Don’t wish you were somewhere else. You can’t let it get to you. You can’t let dying get to you.

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Extrinsic

by Veronika Gillespe

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Dedicated to my Aunt Sandy. She is the loneliest woman I know and I hope she never reads this.

And, because he deserves it, J.W.G.

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Table of Contents

1. Delicates 2. Tied 3. Doux, Suave 4. Blood Moon 5. On Sundays 6. Choked Up 7. 5 AM Salmon 8. Visive Collapse

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Delicates

She watches cyclical motions while she sits near a radiator. Fumes from a myriad of detergents aggravate her sinuses as she sees her wet clothing twist and morph into blurred shapes. She can’t get the color of her diluted lilac sheets back, and she’s sure washing doesn’t help that, but what else could she do?

Laundry always scared her. There was always some degree of change in the way her jeans looked, the pigmentation in her t-shirts shifted. Stains she had grown familiar with would eventually neutralize and blend in with the fading fabrics. She wholeheartedly believes that when she takes these clothes out again, they will be different; brand-new with every load.

Her eyes drift down to the profound wrinkles in her hands, how fast they’ve aged.

She notices and doesn’t feel an ounce of shame. Aging feels like some sort of sweet preparation. She feels less like wine, more like...Hard cider, maybe.

She looks over at a poster advertising NEW BEGINNINGS, NO DEPOSIT at some of the latest, soft-beige, indistinguishable condos just a neighborhood over. It looks like a retirement home of sorts, and with the absurdly high rent, she couldn’t imagine it being much different from moving into a glorified bourgeois trailer park with 3-foot patches of grass between every unit.

She runs a hand through short, unevenly thick hair. Some strands come out and curl between her fingers. She pulls so hard they cut off circulation to the top section of her index finger, reddening for just one moment. The lost heat from the pressure dissolves into the air and she sees masks of tissues foam over on her palms. The creases

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in her palms tend to crawl when she looks at them for too long. All her rings have gotten too big for her.

She has fallen into a comfortable schedule with some of the other patrons here.

She has her own designated machines for this time, and the poorly-postured man sitting across from her has a place as well. The crescendos of coughing, his hacked breath, echoes when their respective appliances have these bouts of near-silent whirring for split seconds. She is concerned by the wheezing but thinks nothing of it by the time she leaves. His detergent smells like honeysuckle.

She knows this man does not crowd her thoughts, all she knows is that his attic is horrendous at home. Sometimes, she overhears him on the phone, trying to get his grandchildren to come and help him sort through it, his tone flat and lackluster. He must have so many stories tumbling between his crusted flannels and loose threads in his long johns. Despite that possibility, she still bears no interest.

Their bond is both nonexistent and thriving. It might be the most well-sustained relationship she’s ever had.

A few weeks ago, when her flimsy cardigan got ripped in the wash, he took out a needle and thread. She knew she would have never fixed it if it wasn’t for him. She wants to invite him over someday, if not to her place then to just sit in absolute silence with the laundry and pizza from next door, and watch their things spin.

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Tied

She rubs her spindly arms and tries to think of a time when she felt a pulse. It warms her, if only for a split second. She lives in a forest now, wakes up in the dark.

She works in a nocturnal glaze. The rasp of her morning voice is cut by the wind of the kettle in her kitchen.

Everybody in this local string of cabins is missing some integral part of their being, or have strayed so far from understanding themselves that they lack too much to salvage. There is a general, overwhelming numbness and submission to neutrality here, where it is mistaken for stability. The isolation she’d inflicted upon herself both then and now caused her to fall under many of these categories.

She soon gathers herself and tries not to think about flesh-eating owls or cannibalistic mutants that roam at all times, tries to only think of how good tea would taste right now. This gravitates her towards the stove in the next room.

Everybody in the forest knew that there was some sort of way out, an admittance of defeat, a certain acceptance of whatever mistake you made. Most are embarrassed or too proud. Others just feel stuck. Time and death don’t feel like concepts anymore, and she tests this. She takes walks down to a riverbank full of empty chip bags and wet napkins. She watches her own montage of wasted days in a reflection over the murky water. It is a solid eternity.

One day, she begins to make more of an internal effort. Instead of physically trying to run, she stays inside, refuses to eat, just leaves soft bread crust at her windowsill and watches crows collect it. Even at times when it stays, she lets rain wash it away, lets nature eat for the sake of her own piece of mind.

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Doux, Suave

Her downstairs neighbor speaks fluid French and broken Spanish, both from high school, she tells her one night. Her neighbor is much younger. Her name is Sydney. She hears her through TV noise and through thin walls, rolling her R’s when she says Reste ici, belle. Her dog knows the command “be gentle” in all 3 of Syd’s languages. Sometimes she says them all at once. Gentle, doux, suave, belle. Her dog’s name is not belle but Magnus, after an illegitimate son of a Danish monarch, who soon became a Norwegian king. She never bothered to ask beyond that, because Sydney always seemed to be busy with something. Her hands would be full when she answered the door, whether she was eating or knitting. Sometimes she manages both. She leaves town on nondescript trips sometimes and leaves Magnus to be looked after. It’s always refreshing to be able to tend to some creature that could listen and talk with some garbled and alien accent, and to have a different space to occupy if only for a little while.

She savors nights like these, trying to sound like Syd when Jeopardy! is on and Magnus is waving his tail in her lap. She feeds him wet, microwaved peas, says bien, dear boy and laughs. Her years of language classes are far behind her. It’s easy to accept that she’ll probably never try to learn again.

She can see how old Magnus has gotten over the past five years that he has moved into her life, how he walks closer to the ground, more sluggish. His occasional howls and yips drag on more discordantly. She knows Syd won’t want to take him to the vet; death is an estimation they will refuse to make.

Magnus spends Thanksgiving with her every year when Syd goes to visit her parents in a small town in Georgia called Cecil. Her family makes up a fairly large per326

centage of the population, out of the approximate 280 people who live there. She wonders how Syd could have strayed so far away, hundreds of miles from there. She doesn’t have a Georgian accent. According to her, none of her family does.

She wants all of this to be meaningful. Their conversations never stretch past jokes and discussing errands.

She takes Syd’s laundry down the street the next morning. How does a dog know when to be gentle? She throws a haphazard load in. Could I tell him to be careless?

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Blood Moon

They joked about it at first: the wound wouldn’t heal.

—Ihab Hassan, “The Wound”

There is a large gash exposing the smallest sliver of bone in her knee. Nothing is hurting or cramping. She could wear clothes over it and no one would know. There is no blood coursing through. Veins seem to stop right there.

It is impossible to tell its origin, whether she had been stabbed or somehow bludgeoned. She inexplicably feels ashamed of her body, its brokenness and inability to reform, and she bandages the cavity. There is a deep sense of remorse for something she doesn’t even remember.

At least once a week, she thoroughly inspects it. Prods and pokes, to see if it may bleed. Some days, it does. She begins to notice that this is only on weekends. She considers keeping a log of how often it does, how much comes out. This is ultimately an appalling idea, and she begins to refuse thoughts of it completely, for her own sake. She hasn’t been to a doctor in a while—maybe this is why. Or maybe this is a sign that her body wants to stop growing and trying to save itself over and over again.

She wants to see the visual rotting of a human body. Maybe this is it.

She lies awake and questions this, her restlessness being replaced by curiosity and frustration. Her back and legs ache. She wonders if her bones can scar over somehow, too. If her brain is getting tired of telling cells what to do. She sees the milky tissue of the moon through her curtains and remembers how it will change tomorrow, but ultimately looks the same in space. She is content with this kind of stagnation.

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On Sundays

He clings to my hand as I run him through my fingers, turning his hard bits of bone round and round.

-

Jennifer Todhunter, “My Husband Is Made of Ash”

“A memorial for our love,” she whispers before sliding a duct-taped Priority Mail box underneath her bed. Everything sacred is under there, even the crusty sock her brother had kept on for what seemed like her whole lifetime. She notices how she’s been talking to herself more and laughs to herself at the notion.

She didn’t think anything of making that cardboard time capsule months ago. It had been something she and Ava just felt right about. Although she’s glad they never jumped the gun by talking about any future plans, she still can’t help but wonder. She sees her with a new girlfriend by the first of every month, ranting to them. Telling them she loves them after a week and then collapsing on the same bed they’d fallen asleep together on many times before, crying over the phone to a now-ex later on.

She continues to let Ava come back just to do that to her. They joke about getting back together some days, in the glimpsing heat her furnace delivers. The way its breath almost sounds like an apology.

But she’s content with letting the both of them burn out like a matchstick, quickly and all at once. They’d waited months to say the ultimately tasteless love you when they were together; she could tell that Ava was impatient, but it was necessary. By the time she actually did say it, she tried to make it sound as sincere as possible. Candidness came easily, but the consequences ultimately weren’t worth it in the long run. Ava had 329

been convinced, and happy, as far as she knew. A couple days later, they both made these timid, regretful offerings.

She would have given Ava electric blue incense, and a Batman bobblehead, with some silly poetry full of compounding yet weak deception. She is too lazy to keep pretending there’s love here, but she wants to hold onto something.

She sighs and drags her eyebags down for a moment with her fingers, looking in the mirror and knowing she could expect a concrete, visual representation of horror.

This is not how she was left before. She makes a Post-It note, rests it near the plots of sepultures that already collect dust by the time she leaves them post-haste. She crouches down again and secures it to the lid of the box, and smiles, contented. She laughs again. She’s sure they went on plenty of dates, but she finds that she can’t remember any of them.

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Choked Up

She is walking a dusty tundra, passing broken femurs, bits of noses. Shaking hands with the kind of wind that leaves her breathless. She is walking broken glass highways. She is constantly out of air. She is walking pastures of weeds that growl with sour voices and watching the fizzle of wheat in the air. They look like they’re playing violins. She is walking dirt paved Milky Way moonstone, missing someone, missing having too much cheap jewelry. Her hair curls around her chin and chokes her, a gridded hammock of grease and sticky breath as it becomes harder and harder to move. Her final reduction is a nymph toad. “Gelastocoridae,” memories of a biology major whisper.

She is content with her overflowing mouthfuls of sand, her lack of voice, her lack of identity beyond this single observation from a nearby mirror, as the pasture her feet grind against melts into a flatheaded field.

She wants to close the door and lose her clothes, to melt onto crushed velvet.

She wants to hear a dead relative’s voice teaching her chemistry over the phone. These days, she wants to take mashed, sopping shreds of old fabric and fashion it into a rope to climb down into morning snow. Her creation will freeze her, meld her hands to brittle cotton blends. She wants that ground to be the first thing she touches when she is born again, surrounded by strangers. In this fantasy, her gills will make a terrible screeching sound with her first breath. She will spout blood from her eyes and ears, and repulse her loved ones once again with something beyond her own lax control.

She is walking up against rapacious black currents, the backdraft is sweeping blameless geese past her. Her hands are warm. She repeats movements, slams the door, feels a vibration within cavernous bones. The geese approach and grow louder.

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Sunspots hit their feathers and reveal oily reminiscence. Patterns of nymph toads glint between the feathers. Her laughs are gags of sand.

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5 AM Salmon

She is afraid of the alley, like she is afraid of the nicotine stains on the ceiling in her bedroom and the boiler when it clicks on at night.

-

Ari Braverman, “Little Plum”

She looks down at the sticky film of vomit covering her palms. She flexes her fingers, feeling at soft chunks that linger in between and behind her teeth, the tears wrapped up in the phlegm at the bottom of her tongue. She can hear shoes tumbling through the wash downstairs. Staying at Leela’s always meant throwing up, and she still couldn’t figure out why. It must have just been her body betraying her, time and time again.

Sleeping on this couch again could only remind her of the previous instances when she had done the same, sometimes with Leela close to her, but ever since Leela got a boyfriend they both tend to wrap around each other like ivy. She didn’t mind. She thinks back to eating a single slice of cheese pizza from the Pizza Bell / Taco Hut down the street, the saturated smell of acetic meat in the air, all a rich and humid combination to create the mess she is greeted with now. She is only slightly ashamed of how often she happens to be lying in her own gelatinous bile, but she has learned to stop being surprised by it.

It rests in her oiled hair. She tumbles out from under a thick comforter, hears Leela and her lanky boyfriend waking up, and hesitates before turning on the shower, knowing she’ll lose all the heat she works so hard to accumulate throughout the night.

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She scrubs sour confetti off of her body, its renewed smell coating the air in a more familiar, reposed way. Her eyes slip shut. She keeps her mind on discrepant textures.

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Visive Collapse

The sky sets highlighter yellow, and her tongue is stinging, burning against the roof of her mouth. She rises and falls on jagged dunes at the bottom of this trench. As the sun cascades, the ground is burned dark purple, her toes engraved by a scorching wind. She smells the solid, spiking wax that has settled on the thin follicles that pepper her skin as she sweats, lo mein grease painting her fingertips. Mini corns are plucked and threaded together, suspended in smeared petroleum jelly, draped along her walls at home. She tries to remember them; they will keep her tied to reality. They create a wheezing bridge between two familiar pillows, one clean, the other stained with darkened and crusted bile, dried yolk-colored ectoplasm her body has left behind. She smells Leela and three day old water.

All of her choices have left her with no reward. She imagines, after she gets up from this dream, she will be doing laundry again, trying to clean herself off. She realizes she could have just taken cold, unfeeling showers all this time and let Sydney take her clothes down with her own load. It would be more efficient, but at the same time more of a burden. She would have to step around more interactions—it was just a habit she couldn’t break by now—burn more threads. She misses the unnamed elderly man, the comfortable faces she walks by when she takes Magnus on a walk. She sometimes forgets that dogs still live in winter. Stray dogs still live in winter. Water still freezes the pads of their paws to pavement.

With that, she has the urge to take control of her final moments. Maybe that’s the conclusion people who die in their sleep earn, a long dream that lets everything come together. She wants to live in a botanical garden in hers, she wants the family she 335

never got to know to have a picnic with her, sit down with her and explain where she comes from. The blanket they all sit on will be comprised of all the roadkill she’s tried to save, all the broken bones she’s never felt. She wishes she could grow friendship out of mere dirt and tiredness, families out of shreds of rope and eyelashes she didn’t bother wishing on.

She wants all her painful acquaintances, the ones she’s told herself for the longest time were some form of friend, to assemble a single, haunting and meaningful string of words before her body stretches out completely. She wants to inscribe long, ineffectual memories into the folds of dazed chrysanthemums.

-

(Yet somehow, she knows her final moment will be on Sydney’s sunken armchair. She cries when the dog whines. She chokes on peas in the strained night, with jeopardy illuminating their faces.)

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.4.

Loss

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Challenger Deep

By Noor El-Dehaibi

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This chapbook is dedicated to the ugliest living thing in Marina Trench.

You know who you are.

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Table of Contents 1. The Hunger—A Mini Novel 2. Mother of Pearl, Daughter of Sea 3. Continuity 4. Teeth 5. CGA-CGM 6. 612 Atmospheres 7. Vega de Tera 8. Europa Winter

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The Hunger—A Mini-Novel After John Guzlowski’s “The Last Man on Earth—A Mini-Novel”

CHAPTER ONE: The Hunger The big fish ate the little fish, who ate the coral beneath it, who ate the anemones, who ate the clownfish, who ate the plankton, who ate the skin and bones off the last blue whale, who ate a shark, who ate his brothers, who ate their wives, who became the chum that that they all ate out of the hands of men sick of tourists, who jumped into the water in droves, crying out to their mothers, who turned in their graves in a maternal reflex and lifted their hands in prayer as the sons of their sons sat on white beaches, watching the waves devour the land entirely.

CHAPTER TWO: Desire The ocean had wanted the land since its birth, wanted it instinctually, hungrily. It longed to cover the peaks of its mountains, to rip buildings from their very foundation with currents, to drown the sailors that escaped its storms by fleeing to solid ground. It crept over the sands, inch by inch, pulling its prey tighter in its grasp, closer to its teeth.

At last, it met itself lapping on the sands of the Dzoosotoyn Elisen Desert. The ocean gorged, a starfish having caught its prey.

CHAPTER THREE: Terror The land softened and hardened and dissolved and solidified, churned soil and sprouted mountains and bled lava that splintered into thin threads of scabs.

Its wrath did not stop the ocean in the slightest.

CHAPTER FOUR: Freedom

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The waves ate away at the Earth, eroding mountains and bedrock, wearing through the crust to reach the white-hot mantle. The ocean evaporated, leaving the Earth to melt the salt it left behind. All of the water floated in the atmosphere, trapped between the ground that would boil it and the stratosphere that contained it.

The ocean looked to the Moon in hunger, fantasizing about flooding a body of dust that would crumble under the weakest current. There it waited, dreaming, until the end of time.

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Mother of Pearl, Daughter of Sea

It started at the bellybutton, spreading outwardly in all directions like a flower in bloom. By the time he woke up, it had covered most of his stomach, a sheet of useless plate armor that fit snugly over him.

Aquamarine crystals were growing over his body.

He could feel them inching across his skin, slowly but surely encasing him in a body shaped casket. They were cold, rigid and bulky but light—as if it was made up of something hollow. He flicked at the edge of the crystals, finding it solid but brittle. He hit it with the butt of his hand, hard. Pieces of it crumbled off in chunks and powder. He could feel the growth stop as it recovered from the impact. He was recovering with it.

There were shards of rock embedded in his palm and stomach, leaving bee sting pain all over his body. He tried to pull a splinter of it out, but it crumbled between his fingers into dust. It seemed as though he had only pushed it deeper into his skin.

The layer of crystal matched the azure stone on the end of the of his navel ring. It was his first piercing since he had moved back into his coastal hometown, done by a tattoo artist half a mile away from the mall. With a tip, it cost him $10. He was prepared for a rush job, a rusty needle, diluted cleaning solution, but nothing like this. An infection could be treated. Nothing short of a wizard could stop his Stephen King curse now.

He sat up in bed, wincing at how the sharper growths pinched his rolls. Jagged edges cut into his skin, leaving a line of tiny lacerations. He stood up and stretched. He could feel them filling in to cover the folds of his skin, could feel them digging in when he relaxed. Droplets of blood spotted the ridges of the crystals. He laid down with his arms out, afraid of more blood.

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An hour passed. The crystals had covered him from the top of his thighs to the bottom of his ribcage. The edge that Dylan had picked at grew slower than before, sprouting in small, irregular clumps. He tried to break chunks off of the opposite end creeping down his leg, but the crystals had gotten stronger as time went on. He could only scrape at it, shaving off a blue powder. It stung as if he was scraping off his own skin. He dug his fingernail under a piece and pulled up, cracking the surface into gravel.

His legs swelled into a red-hot pain. It pressed into the layer of rock, trying to stretch the solid surface. Dylan gritted his teeth. He stopped trying to break off fragments. He focused on his breathing, trying to concentrate beyond the splinters under his nails and his inflamed skin.

The growth sped up over time. In another hour, his chest and thighs were covered in crystals. Shallow circles formed where he had broken off pieces of crystal, while the rest of the surface grew thick and heavy. He rubbed one of the thin spots, making a tiny dust cloud that resettled on his torso. He considered calling an ambulance, but knew that it wouldn’t do him any good. A doctor wouldn’t be able to help him. And what if his parents got stuck with an emergency room bill? No one in his family would be able to afford it.

With some effort, he got up and grabbed his phone. “Okay, Google,” he said weakly. “How do you dissolve crystals?”

He only found outlines of high school chemistry experiments with salt and sugar, explaining solubility in gratuitous detail. He limped into the bathroom and poured handfuls of water onto his chest. The residue of what he had already scraped at washed away, but the rest seeming to only get stronger. He tried to rub toothpaste onto his

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chest, thinking that baking soda might react with the crystals. It stung, having found it’s way into the cuts that lined the clumps of rocks. He sat down on the edge of the bathtub. The majority of his torso was covered. Tiny sprouts of rock clung to his collarbone and now crept up his neck. He shuddered, imagining what would happen if they reached his mouth. He took a deep breath, and hobbled down the hallway.

It took him five minutes longer than usual to walk to his closet and get a hammer.

He laid it on his table. Under movie logic, the crystals should stop growing if he broke the stone on his piercing. He just had to steel himself for the impact. He picked up the hammer and swung it around a few times, feeling the weight of it. The crystals began to creep onto his arms. If he waited any longer, he might not be able to move his arms at all. He took a deep breath, and swung the hammer into his stomach.

He collapsed on the floor, rock shattering out in a tidal wave of glittering confetti.

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Continuity

The endoliths sat through the end of time, watching the creatures around them fall into mutated marine snow. The tumors distorted the faces of the dead, making it near impossible to distinguish between each fallen species. As a precaution, the endoliths prayed for the eternal soul of every creature that had ever lived, in order of time period and genus. By the time they had reached their “Amen,� the fallout had settled completely.

The oldest of the endoliths calculated that they only had twenty thousand years left until they would all starve to death. They then calculated that each attempt at reproduction would shave seven thousand years off of that. As the ocean grew more and more still, so did the endoliths. Any child who died prematurely would be effectively shortening the existence of life on Earth by seven thousand years, through loss of energy from hope and subsequent grief. They retreated to the furthest corners of the minerals they lived on, barely in sight of each other. This generation was willing to be the last ones to fall.

The endoliths bleached and withered one by one, watching as their brethren faded and crystallized into the stones that they had lived their lives in. They did not dare to comfort the dying, to pray, to even think of their names. All of their energy went to their most vital life functions, the slow metabolizing of sulfur, the desperate cling onto their lifeboat of basalt. In the afterlife, they would learn to regret this or not.

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Thirty thousand years passed. The last endolith looked upon the corpses of all that they had known, looked upon the emptiness of the open sea, looked upon the stillness of the Earth that would outlive even them.

“I’m sorry,” it whispered.

With that, it passed into the abyss, alone.

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Teeth Men filled the streets, drunk on pride. Red streaks of war paint lined pink faces, white “I voted� stickers blending into white sloganed hats. Blue stripes were swatched to bulging neck veins, blue palms clutching stems of flags. They savored their victory, kicked up heels and hollered through the streets. White lights shone off their skin, drawing in others like great masses of moths.

Apart from the crowds, the air hung heavy and low, morning fog lingering in the air. Rain fell out of the low clouds without end. Shallow puddles filled every pothole, crevice, and crack. Minnows swam around car tires, flying out in the aftershocks of buses and being trampled beneath the feet of the crowd.

People trudged out of houses, heavy, sinking lower and lower to the ground with every step. They formed rings around buildings, face down in the muddy pools. Rock salt melted and mingled with the sweat on their foreheads. They laid still, slits forming on their necks, filtering the water in, out.

Hair fell out with each inhale, skin grew tougher with each exhale. Legs bonded together while feet split apart, spreading into fins that sheltered the minnows from reckless boots. Heads grew, mouths elongated, eyes shrank to pupils. They swam through the water with great force, feeling teeth sprout in their mouths like weeds, filling in line after line to steadily reach their lips.

The first few rows sunk into the arms of flagbearers.

The crowds did not run, did not disperse. Their boldness pushed them into action, throwing hats, throwing flags, throwing fists. (If you punch them in the nose, they

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swim away!) The attackers quickly adjusted to their new forms, biting and flopping and crushing those beneath them. But the mob did not escape.

Tattered pieces of the flags settled into the puddles, more red than blue. The beings stopped moving, shed their skin, and crawled out in sullen human forms. They continued to their bus stops, careful to avoid all puddles and minnows in their path.

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CMA-CGM Bulbs of light sway in the current, a constellation in the midnight water. A lone fish swims out of a shipping container towards the brightest of them, the North Star. It inches towards the light in revolutions, each circle smaller than the last, cautious but invested.

The light becomes more still, but the fish cannot see the tension. It drifts closer and closer until the light jerks up suddenly. The fish is swallowed whole.

The light settles back into its original position, glowing more brightly than before.

It reflects off red corrugated steel, dotted with barnacles. The rest of the fish flutter behind a half-torn-off door. They did not see the incident, could not see the incident, but sense an absence. The snails crawling across the other side of the door cluck their tongues and feast on marine snow. A gulper eel stalks past, illuminating the fragments of flesh and whisking it towards the dented roof of the box. The snails sigh, and settle back into rest. Sea spiders scuttle over their backs to their meal, already tasting the snow built up on their shells.

Basket stars glare up at their traitors; they themselves do not trust the metal being that crushed a patch of their kind. The remnants of their tentacles drift against the current, a reflexive action as their legacy. The others plant themselves in semi-circles, spiraling away from its rigid corners and chipping paint. Sea pigs linger over the paint chips, tasting their acrylic acidity and falling dead. They leave rings around the box, a warning.

Wrenches and candy wrappers drift out of the shipping container. They move past the fish and land on these dead sea pigs and cover them up entirely, indifferent.

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612 Atmospheres

The weight of it all cracked her Atlas shoulders and left her crumpled on the kitchen floor. The Earth rolled over top of her, fractures traveling deep through its mountains. Water leaked out of aquifers, mixing in a salty flood with spilled seawater. The water level rose above the counters, filling her cabinets and crushing her glassware. She did not get up. She sank even deeper, floating through the floor into a rapidly darkening ocean.

She felt the push and pull of currents, but the gravitation of grief rooted her to a point on the ocean’s floor. She landed, weakly stirring up sand that settled in a silhouette around her. She wanted it to thicken, to spread over her and bury her. She thought of being buried in her fiancée’s place. She played back the last doctor’s appointments in her mind, the rush to the hospital, the tense waiting room. She let them repeat, the details of her love’s face blurring with every repetition, a sieve filled with sand. Her own mother had flown in to plan the funeral for her almost-daughter-in-law, saw her daughter sink lower and lower in the Earth, bearing the weight that had broken her. She thought back to her Earth, crushed into pieces on her floor. She could still feel it pressing down on her. It did not give her the luxury of disappearing beneath an unfeeling sea, but simply forced itself on her, flattening her on the ocean floor. She laid there, waiting for the weight to consume her.

She felt the ocean drain above her, growing shallower and shallower until it was only her lying on the wet tile, surrounded by mud. She slowly stood up, showered, put on a long black dress. In time, she realized that the weight would never fully break her.

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It would draw her flush to the edge of relief, but would never allow her to cross it. She walked to the funeral alone, back hunched in pain.

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Vega de Tera After Robert Olin Butler

1.

sandbag

More and more caulk accumulates in the backseat of my car until I’m sure that I could build another house out of it. The space under our bed is full of batteries, enough to power an electric chair if we choose to keep capital punishment when we rebuild society. My drawers are lined with dried beans, granola, pouches of powdered milk. I get a rush from fighting off nutjobs in the grocery store, from stealing rolls of clearance toilet paper out of unwatched carts. I feel like I’m fighting off the world. I used to laugh at stockpilers and zombie apocalypse fantasizers, but now I understand. I can control my future. I can control our future. We can live free, eating banana chips and canned tomatoes and water that I filtered through pumps. I can learn to stop dreaming of other women, seeing other women, hiding other women. I can be your roots. I can hold this house to its foundation, even when waves crash over our roof and the tide spreads far past our yard. In olden days, they would offer sacrifices to the gods to save them from their wrath. I’m fighting them off myself, in crank radios and vitamin C supplements.

2. rupture I pray that the waves will rip our house to pieces. I will be out buying groceries, you will be at work, or at a bar that you couldn’t drown out before calling me to tell me that it would be another late night. You will be with a mistress. I will be at home, strapping on heels and wiping lipstick off my teeth. I will float off, vanish into the cool salty air and on the coast of Italy, or France, or another country of lovers where I can learn to forget what it means to feel wounded. I will wear wreaths of honeysuckle and grow to forget 353

your name, a hazy memory that I’ll confuse for deja vu. But I know I would never make it across the Pacific. I know I will sink, the good wife, to a quiet grave among the coral.

The last parts of me will be the root of polyps, unfeeling creatures that cover me like a funeral shroud. I can see regret infusing into the gum that you use to cover up the taste of another woman. I can see you leaving her, reforming yourself, joining a monastery; or leaving her, falling apart, and freezing alone on an unfamiliar street corner in January.

I’ve been wearing waterproof eyeliner in the house, reapplying at every emergency weather update. I want you to find me when I’m beautiful. Belly up, little black dress, running mascara, hair flowing out like a mermaid. I’ve been making comments about running out of canned food in our calls right before you come home, calculating how close you are to the store and what will take you the longest time to find on the shelves.

I can’t bear to have you at home. I’m terrified that we will drown together. You will pull me close, look deep into my eyes, confess your undying love. I will never let you get that close to forgiveness.

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Europa Winter

A tail whips in the current and goes still. Another swishes by it, collides into ice, and freezes. The riptide pulls the single-celled opportunists deep into the pits of sea, while others strain towards the surface.

In centuries, the ice will crack and crumble into the waves, freeing the cells to live above water. In weeks, a rocket will land on the surface of the ice, releasing a robot to find the victims of failed breachings. A man will write an entry on his blog, telling his thirty followers about this moon that could be a “second Earth�. The first Earth cries out to Europa in smog and coalfires, a warning. Europa can already see her ice melting, sense her oceans filling with mercury, feel farmed tuna eating her alive like worms in an apple.

She arms herself against her suitors.

Ice thins beneath landing sites, swallowing ships whole. Their misfiring electricity fries her tiny lifeforms. She considers it chemotherapy. Engineers build waterproof machines that she throws again and again into the ice until they are battered beyond repair. A scientist on Earth watches the budget shrink and shrink until he himself is cut out of it. Europa congratulates herself on the vanishing act.

In twenty years, mankind collapses into itself, having never felt the thick ice slide gently beneath their feet from the churning currents. The Earth heals from their absence, shattering their monuments in earthquakes and burying their graveyards in landslides. Europa admires her ability to remove all traces of something, feeling heavy from the crushed machinery rusting in her depths. She tells herself that scars make her stronger, and eventually grows to forget their weight.

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A family of tails whips in the current, colliding into an ancient propeller. Rust corrodes their loose DNA, and all fall to the sand, going still.

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Famous Last Words

by Maisha Baton-Stawson

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Dedicated to my mother, who taught me that in love, you don’t have to make all the mistakes yourself.

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Table Of Contents 1. Sister 2. On This Night 3. Reasons Why I’ll Never Go Outside Again.

4. Rebel Rebel 5. Change 6. Garbage 7. Farm

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Sister Sister, I want to tell a story where no one gets hurt. A story where you came home last July and we go to sledding the following winter. The snow would crunch under us on our way down, and hot chocolate would crack the film of ice that coated the inside of our stomachs afterwards. A story about one warm summer night that cooked in with the rest of them. Cicadas and your steady hand painting an antiqued canvas. I want to tell you a story where I go home and sunshine still drowns your room on Thursdays at four. No, the sun never stopped shining, but it does not spill from your window like it used to. These days, the sunlight is brittle and cannot even kiss the glass.

I want to tell you a story where the thought of you rips me up and your voice is raw in my head. But, sister, you have left no trace. Your voice has boiled down to a sheet of raw and clean dew, sprinkled across a thick field, unprotected from the storm.

In death, your words have begun to lack the ill temper they grew sharp with so I pluck away your paintbrushes at night, hoping you’ll get angry enough to return and stir storms like you used to. If I don’t rip at your paintbrushes, I’m afraid they will sit and drip with these disposable hot nights you’ve left me with. These are the nights I feel your phantom, carrying your last finished canvases, so they could collect dust and fade into the cheap wood at the end of the hallway for eons.

Sister, these are the days that haunt me. The days that reflect your warnings and are not mourned for my mistakes. I would like to tell you a story where you made the mistakes for me. A story where your words weren’t in vain. A story not about you at all.

Unfortunately, I can not.

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On This Night

On this night, he sees himself as the ignition. Sparks rushing through the fire, or the newest wisps of smoke blurring stars and graying silhouettes. He hears the fire calling for him every time it cracks. He imagines himself as all the faces he’s seen, all the faces that bleed into each other if he thinks about them for too long.

But tomorrow morning, he will remember that he is ember wood that has long collapsed. Still, he continues to listen to soft rain smothering the coals. Smoke and time push themselves into his wrinkles. He stares into the coal, wondering about another chance.

On the rocks he finds a snail, rushing away from the pit. A thin shine lines the grooves, reminding it of everywhere it has been. He looks behind him to find the muted night. No grooves to catch his trail, no thin shine for him to trace back and find where he started or where he should go, just matte night against hot ash that breathes to the cold rain. He briefly recalls engines revving and cars being fired into the dark, but tonight he can’t revive his memories of where the cars have taken him. He thinks hard, but his recollection has grown rusty. His envy silently brews.

The horsepower can no longer carry him from this place between senselessness and anger. The cobwebs and motor oil line his skull, tracing the spots his thoughts used to stir up. Because of this, his body rots. He feels his bones fossilize and collapse like brittle logs into the fire. But it’s the throbbing engines that haunt him the most. On this night, he looks past the fire and straight to the hot decay of wood. As little as he wants to admit it, he sees himself in it. He feels his fingerprints grow smooth. Maybe they’ve

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worn with turns from leather wheels, or maybe they’ve stuck to the handlebars of a rusted moped somewhere.

He imagines the snail as a stationary insect. He imagines it tracing itself back through the rocks. The snail observes streets contrived for capriciousness, leaving a touchable memory of everywhere it has been. Even when the snail grows old and lonely, it will always be able to walk through its own path, taking itself to everywhere it has been. He imagines the snail as someone who is decaying with him for a moment. He follows the snail’s slime with his smooth fingertips, wishing it was his.

At the end of the night, the sun bumps into the horizon. He looks to it for a memory he hasn’t earned yet, for a memory that wasn’t worth remembering, for any reflection of himself from the sun’s fiery tendencies. He puts the fire out of its misery and walks toward daylight.

But for the first time, he has no engines to carry him to his next destination.

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Three Reasons Why I Will Never Go Outside Again

One

I recently found myself staring into the sun. Everyone tells everyone not to do that, but that just made me want to do it even more. Its beauty was blinding, but I found the thought of being released from the polish of fresh life was more relieving than not.

Since gouging my eyes out was out of the question,(I tried once and my mom yelled at me) growing and rotting in my own home was the next best thing.

Two I found myself stealing boxes of Oreos from CVS and instead of letting me go, they let me off with a warning. I’m sick of warnings. Ty, our neighbor, got sent to the state penitentiary the first time he was caught stealing. My spanish teacher said that if you don’t like the way a system works then get into it and change it. So I want to go to jail and preferably become a felon. But you know what? Fuck jail. I’m too good for that anyways. Since their jails are stupid as fuck, I’ll make one of my own. I’ll bar up my own windows and feed myself mush. Sometimes, it feels like I have to do everything myself.

Three

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I watched a dog wander down the street. No collar, no leash to call its own. So careless and borderline inanimate, it made me wonder what I’m trying to prove. It was not a feeling I’d like to have again.

I’m thinking it’s time I close myself off from everyone and let my discontent brew in peace.

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Rebel, Rebel

It could have been the mascara bleeding beneath her eyes that made her glow.

Or maybe it had been the flickering, fluorescent lights in the mirrors that made her emit that hot sheen. She tried to wipe the greasy gleam from under her eyes. The paper towel dispenser creaked and rained dust with every crank. One long breath into the rough sheets sent her in a fit of coughs. She looked up and saw her apparent radiance, staining her cheeks and quietly smirking. She crumpled up the paper towel and threw it in the overflowing trash can.

With no air conditioning or ventilation in the ravished bathroom, it quickly became imbued with expired heat. Sweat soaked through her shirt and hair stuck across her forehead. She splashed cold water on her face as a brief escape from the heat and for one chilled moment, she felt clean.

The water began running brown. She watched it run for a few minutes, thinking about the glaze of rust inside of the faucet. Eventually, she turned the faucet to a slow stop, listening to every creak it sent down the sink. She then began to storm throughout the bathroom for a new remedy.

She listened to the crowd roar after that band had finished their set. She listened to them holler and quietly cheered to herself. She imagined her voice blending in with theirs and quietly being absorbed by the walls and cheap lighting. She stared at her reflection, filtered by the graffiti and grime. In this mirror, she couldn’t see her makeup ooze down her cheeks, or the moth holes down her shirt, or the flyaways that danced 365

every time she tried to shake this feeling. She smudged her thumb into a mirror coated in fingerprints for this bathroom’s next victim, and left to lose her screams in a cloud full of other’s.

Hot tramp, I love you so.

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Change

I step through the amber door, just like how she used to. I drop my bag on the chipping hardwood floors and try to recall what her bag looked like in that spot. I sit quietly in the living room, trying to hear her fumbling through the bathroom. She told me she didn’t, but I know she sat on the sink. I know she’s why the sink shakes when someone walks down the hallway. I look to the creases and folds between my fingers. I felt the tension of the wrinkles in my face shaking and collapsing in on each other. I would coax the drooping bits of my face up with my hands and feel my cheeks, so plagued with age, keep rotting anyways.

And that’s when it became just me, with no one to step through my amber door, or to sit on my sink, or make those scraping sink sounds that were sweet like honeysuckles. So I took up walking. I walked through parks, to furniture stores, to houses of people I used to know. I watched the years peel from my skin with every one of my steps. And that’s when I saw him. Or, it, rather. Its shell was beige like a funeral home and the glossed over with Muggy and reluctant it shivered across abrasive cement. I picked it up by the shell, ripping its suctions from the sidewalk.

The snail watched me with its black beady eyes. Slowly it turned around, trying to desert my salty hold, and I almost asked it why. Laughing at the idea of talking to this snail, I released it back into the sidewalk to sit down on a nearby bench and watch it bitterly shuffle away. I listened closely to the pebbles that crumbled to dust under my boots as I watched it struggle over shards of glass and rubble, defying every last obstacle in

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its path. Leaving a trail of remainders everywhere it went, leaving my hands glazed in its residue, leaving me.

In that moment, I couldn’t help but wish to be more like that snail.

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Garbage

Sometimes, I do recall wiping the heat from my eyelids and watching sunlight bleed through thin curtains and soak my bed. Hearing the anger of a siren’s cry and the subtle of car chatter seeping under the daylight. The hardwood creaking down a hallway, those disoriented morning were something that could only be felt on skin. Something we took as a right instead of a privilege.

Being constantly consumed by twilight was hard to adjust to at first, but in time, everyone has accepted it. In the beginning, when the news first began discussing the issue at hand, NASA put a livestream out so everyone could watch as the reflective trash that was thrown into space carried dawn throughout the globe. The actual sun had been burning out at alarming rates for a decade, but the hot speculum of sunlight kept us alive. They told us everyday for 2 years. CNN had a countdown of days until the end of the world on their website between the weather and current events.

You’d think a person would prepare, but many didn’t accept this as fact. Maybe it’s something a person just doesn’t want to believe. I’ll admit, it was hard to go on with things as they are when one of the only constants in your life is getting washed up into the masses of garbage left across the milky way. To be fair, everyone thought we were going to die via ice age, or floods or by erratic temperatures. Instead we’re getting an earthly supernova. One more ‘big bang’, if you will.

You’d also think such a situation would cause a decline in the purchasing of goods, but in fact this did the exact opposite. The emptying of our life source from space caused the economy to grow at exponential rates. Companies began capitalizing on people’s sadness and acceptance of their mortality. A few companies, in an almost sus369

piciously quick manner, released boxes made for harvesting light the day after the news announced the tragedy. Boxed lives, they called them. ‘Grasp this life between your fingertips’. the packaging would read. I bought a few a couple of months ago, only because I found a coupon under my mattress. I’ve yet to find how it got there, but a buy seven get one free offer on 30$ boxes was something I couldn’t pass up.

There was also a surplus in movies. Everyone needed something to distract them from their newfound inevitable demise. The movie industry had already been booming, but now that no one worried much about appearances or expensive cameras, they were able to uproot garbage like never before. In one of them, Leonardo DiCaprio played a ‘small ambitionless can of chili’. Rotten Tomatoes gave it five stars. I watched it and I’m pretty sure it was just Dicaprio rolling in chili while static played, but I guess that’s art or something.

It doesn’t sound like much, but really there aren’t many markets to go into in which the entire world is your demographic. These companies grew at alarming rates.

16 days before the sun was supposed to become completely consumed by garbage, all of the CEO’s and higher ups of the companies and Leonardo Dicaprio disappeared into space, taking off in 30 different spacecrafts into the ozone. They hadn’t made it very far until they hit the thick blankets of trash.

There we stood in decayed skyscrapers, watching the thousands of tons of flaming titanium and burning bodies snow down. I think that was the moment everyone understood. 16 days until the world was going to end, knowing that in the morning the solemn dirt would collect useless dew for us to drag ourselves through and mourn into.

On our bodies stood useless in tattered shoes, in our wallets stood useless coins, but

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between our fingertips, for once, we found our abrasive thoughts almost comforting.

Regardless, there we stood, in vain, like we had been for the past two years. But only now had it become more noticeable.

The sun had been circling the drain for a while, but by this point it was only a shimmer in the corner of the clouds. The skies had filled with gray a few months ago, grass browned out down streets and forests, and rivers that once flourished slowed to a drip. The people who had been sweeping the streets of skeletons and litter had stopped weeks ago, and by that day it had become impossible to walk anywhere without stepping on someone’s elbow joint.

But the next morning, after the metal rain, the air became flushed with the smell of muggy metal.

The sun’s eyes slowly closed as we all took in a deep breath, and welcomed the dawn of a new era.

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Farm

You were tired of rust and ash, of flake and gray. You were tired of rotting from the inside out, and watching that trail of compost follow you everywhere you went. You were tired of your slow fade into air; you were tired. I was tired of trying to make sense of your thinning skin and wanting to see it as framed paintings instead of wilted wallpaper. I was tired of hoping these fabricated thoughts I had would come true. I was tired of your face, glacial and raw, still draining hot tears that melted through your cheeks.

Something about knowing when you would die seemed to make you peel away faster. Every day, a few more of your thoughts would drift into space. You used to tell me that the factory emissions slowly, but surely, wrong memory after memory from a person’s brain.

“When the suits breathes out,” you’d say “we’re breathing it in.”

It was my fault. You would never admit it, you’d say it could happen to anyone, but I felt it every time you threw on that beige suit with your misspelled name embroidered in the white rectangle. I never absorbed your nurturing tendencies and grew sick of feeding chickens and milking cows.

With an urgent need for staff and your refusal to work for them, they did the only thing they could do. I watched the men in suits the night they opened the big white gates you built and let the cows out. I could have called the police, I could have stopped them or threw rocks at them or woken you up. But instead, I just watched.

With no income for a month or two, you had no choice but to sell the few acres of land that once flourished with life. Against your better judgement, you began pumping 372

chemicals from the thick steel tubes and watching it wade through the rivers for minimum wage. Instead of protecting the animals, you were pushing lifeless fish to the top of the waters and watching them ride the currents. Most mornings, your envy of them was evident.

But yesterday, ruined by age, you told me you want to see something that would heal over what you’d lost. And me, ruined by guilt, felt like I didn’t have much of a choice.

We drove until the road became a thin divide between one field and another.

When we got there, you sat down at its border. Ass on the hot tar and feet in the fields, I watched you grab for memories that were long out of reach. Shaken to the core, you dove into the grass and tried to force the memories back. The grime polishing your shoes and thick wind combing your hair in late fall. Sugar and frost across hills. The snow’s initial melt in March, and cicadas screaming to a starry night. Somewhere, on the shelves of that factory, those memories will be melted down, pumped through the steel tubes, and run down the rivers. I could have held you close. I could have assembled the words you needed to hear, or let you cry into me. But instead, I just watched.

I’m very sorry.

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Climate Change in the Time of God Fearing Christians

By Will Thayer

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For Ben

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Table of Contents 1. Turpentine 2. Good Crystals 3. The Regurgitation of Salt Point, Ireland 4. The Void as Blue Whale 5. Climate Change in the Time of God Fearing Christians 6. Narwhal 7. Aspics 8. The End of the World Circus is Going Great!

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Turpentine

When the fisherman ripped the fish out of the water, a wild, ceremonial line flickering in the spine of the boat, he did not know that this was the beginning of the end.

Immediately, he began to gut it. Gills splayed into a full flower. Scales turning to rainbows in his hand. He split the fish in two, body drumming violently. Organs still bumping in aquarium liquids spilled into the canoe. He wondered if fish became ghosts because he didn’t need that kind of light. There were too many. He didn’t know that this is the last fish he’d ever taste.

Bodies had first started floating the day before, but nobody had thought anything of it. A few tuna had washed up somewhere in England. They exploded after an hour.

Over the next week, more fish rose to the surface, bobbing like cranberries, until the entire Atlantic had become a bog. It wasn’t just fish though. Dolphins began to crest over waves and crash into beaches, whales lay dead on icebergs. Strange and alien creatures surfaced, uncooked and half-formed, dead.

When the fisherman returned to his house, a pastel cottage on the edge of the shoal that stuck out like a sea anemone, he threw the fish in the fridge and turned on the stove. He burnt spices into hot oil, and cooked the fish. He ate in front of the T.V and watched the news. Some lightning-haired women talked about the ocean. He didn’t really care. The shoal was inky-black but was bursting with life. Each time he plucked a fish from the water it was different, almost prehistoric in appearance. He had never seen those colors before. Each once was bright and alive, burning like lanterns. There were entire lifetimes submerged beneath his waters.

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Somewhere else, people rationalized the ocean’s death. Some spoke of plagues and divine intervention, others of pollution. Sunken trash had mixed, and like a middle school volcano, exploded. Something vile that had bubbled and spilled over. Test tubes full of water flooded laboratories, but no answers turned up.

Time under water had started to invert itself. Coral reefs twisted out on their skeletons, wearing their insect hearts out. Plankton blooms ate at themselves, searching for some kind of oxygen, and imploded. Even the sand began to turn dark brown.

Shells unwound themselves and jellyfish dissolved into sea foam. The whole thing had become sterile and antiseptic, incapable of life. Turpentine.

News of the apocalypse hit the world like a missile salvo. What had started as phenomena became apocalypse. Housewives were crying doomsday and children were pulled out of school. Parents began to prepare. For what: they did not know. Groats were bottled in basements, fresh water pooled into barrels. Preserved lemon and berries gluey with pectin piled on counter tops. Something sour pickled on every windowsill. Entire families boarded themselves in basements.

The first human deaths were seafarers. There was no oxygen left over the ocean, and cargo captains choked in their seats. Ships popped and sputtered and gave out. Across the shoal, the horizon was full of lights. Empty boats piled up into a graveyard, signal lights still spinning. Aircraft carries, cruise liners and fishing vessels mashed together like shantytowns. He couldn’t count how many he lights he saw. He wondered what happened to ghosts lost at sea.

Elsewhere, governments fell quietly. Borders evaporated into steam. The entire world had burrowed deep underground. There was no mass hysteria, death was an in-

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dividual thing. People still living became ghosts. Nobody talked about this. Nobody acknowledged the lives they lived yesterday. There was no talk about homework, plans for the weekend, foreign policy. Everybody sat and waited for the air to be sucked out of their lungs.

And in November it happened. The fisherman was out to sea, cleaning up the bodies of the fish he once thought were invincible. Emptiness grew in barnacles around his life. The shoal was still black and he couldn’t tell what was mud and what was ocean. Where the shoal met the ocean he could see the water, opaque and ripe as pinene. The scent burned his nostrils.

The fisherman had noticed it and he found himself gasping for air in his own house. But now he was outside. This unrecognizable ocean beneath him. The stink of death hot in the air and for a brief moment, he swore he saw something rise beneath the waters. A tiny polyp, he thought, something ripped out from the undertow of prehistory and back into light. Something alive. That life could be anywhere.

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Good Crystals

Phosphorescent dots spangle the domed roof of the atmosphere. Solar winds flash green and pink and neutrinos boil into antimatter. Above you, the expanse of space is silent and looming. Gas giants ripen, pinned by great arms of light. A folding nebula of color and gravity and sea worms. A sphere of ice rockets towards you: this must be the good crystal. Try imposing something into the great beyond. It’s human instinct, constellating randomness. Memorize their names. Pretend you can see them: the sapphire hair of Pleiades, mars clay red. Trace the orbit of the stars around you. Watch the Almagest calcify into shells.

Realize that life is just simple physics. You are a real-time calculation. A Newtonian equation. Derive the acceleration of the human heart. Teach yourself astronomy; teach yourself how gravity wells inside you; teach yourself the attraction between two objects; teach yourself to resist the attraction between two objects because you are untethered. You are a mylar balloon floating into an empty void. You are rootless on this planet. Don’t smell the hot metal, the riots in the streets. Don’t count those bodies. Pretend that today is something like Thursday. Don’t give into the the good crystal. Give into the good crystal but don’t let it take you in hysterics. Let it take you on a Thursday.

Thursday. Let it take you when you’re washing dishes, when you’re watching the 5 o’clock news, but don’t think about it. Don’t think above the planet that hangs above you. Don’t think about the impact: don’t think about the waves that the good crystal brings.

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Set the table. Boil water and slice the vegetables into ribbons. Make a stew. Collect ham hock bones and watch the marrow flare and vaporize. Spice it accordingly.

Think of your family but not in a sentimental way. Think of them in resentment, like they had just forgotten your birthday. Don’t let the good crystal take them from you.

Become a mathematician; the calculus of one’s life is a hitching sadness. Don’t try to manipulate those variables. The good crystal crashes into the ocean. Hot water and light rises over to take you to the great beyond. Before you leave, add the sums of your time together. Trace the trajectory of your existence. What horrifying math it is, to relive your own life.

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The Regurgitation of Salt Point, Ireland

Peat is harvested from dry bogs, but undrained water still sparkles under the larch trees. The earth yawns open and drinks in the heavy liquid—cold, acidic, anaerobic—growth is impossible but Death lives in unworkable conditions. Between pockets of air one can still spot the preserved face of an arctic fox, slathered in the chemical spell of Sphagnum moss. Every now and then someone will rip an entire lifetime from the peat: suits of armor, Neolithic pottery, the mummified arm of a bride-to-be. Things sporadically bubble and spring back into existence. For a second the whole world seems to revolve around the undead, but the ancient things eventually fade and get thrown back into the peat.

But that was when the bog still dried up in the summertimes. Now the peatlands gurgle with ancient water and the people on the island are beginning to panic. Households in Salt Point orbit around peat fuel. Without it there is no gravity and everything becomes light as air, questionable. How are children going to eat? How are the elderly going to live without warmth? Answers become scarce as fires and mothers begin praying to the bog. They hold communion in the mangroves and throw alms into the water.

At night Salt Point is filled with the prayer songs of worried citizens.

And the bog listens. After a few days, it begins to return their prayers. Crucifixes thrown in just yesterday rocket out of the water, glistening comets of ice and fire. Money and ceremonial food begin to spill over into the drylands. The peat has rejected their offerings. This water is endless and oceanic. But then the strangest thing happens: the bog begins to purge itself of all humanity. Entire bodies float to the surface like water lilies. Dynasties of human evolution cannonball out of the peatlands and into the city.

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Artifacts rain like artillery shells. The bog vomits every last piece of human interaction until it is nothing but chemicals. Grand Vicar Patrick and Sister Aoife have already deemed the peatland a hellmouth and evacuated the village.

Salt Point is more or less a coral reef by now. Stone structures stand knee-deep in water clear as oceans. The moss has turned to seafoam and if you look hard enough you can see waves beginning to form. Fish fly out of the water like bodies in orbit, life teeters on the edge of explosion.

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The Void as Blue Whale

You wonder if the end of the world will sound like craters. Like acid twinges and megaton bombs. The slow hum of octane gas. Will asteroids rain on the countryside?

Will earthquakes dance and crack against seaboards? You imagine fire spitting, the water wild and expanding, a billion voices ululating as if to call something unspeakable into existence.

From space you can no longer hear the music. Solar winds whistle past your ear.

Sometimes you can find it in constellations, between the panels, but it slips between your fingers. You begin to hear evaporation, an insectile drone. This empty tune of suspension, like a charcoal drawing of Icarus. It’s a rattling sound that settles in your stomach like a rock and rings you hollow. All catastrophe sings the same octave.

Music is nowhere. In this empty space, earthsong slipping behind you, everything is aquatic and something deep is singing an unimaginable message. The bellowing of an ancient god. You can’t help but think of yourself as nothing, krill filtered through the baleen mouth of the universe.

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Climate Change in the Time of God Fearing Christians

Somewhere above the water there is a church full of people who love the Lord.

People with calloused hands and ribs like lobster cages. People who eat mangos with pepper and grow honeysuckle and call it manna. The church itself is an old shack that dangles moribund off the side of a limestone cliff, and if it wasn’t for the almost Lovecraftian roots of the giant lemon tree next to it, would probably be in the ocean by now.

The head of the commune, Aurochs, is an alligator of a man: ancient and scaled and constantly salivating. Aurochs gives a sermon every Sunday at noon, before the stingrays fly into the cove below the cliffs.

From the altar there is no fire and brimstone: Aurochs is as tight lipped as an oyster. He can’t seem to fish the faith from his throat. He knows his passion for preaching is vanishing but he doesn’t like to test God and these days can’t seem to find Him anywhere. Even the bright planets are just pinpricks to him, hiccups of blurry lights.

The congregation is still afraid. They are afraid of the water below them. They are afraid of the stingrays undulation, the frictionless spines that remind them of Jesus at the cross. Honeysuckle doesn’t grow in saltwater, God has no light there. They say there is a reason Jonah served damnation underwater.

So, when the water flooded the church for the first time, Aurochs thought it was a message. Urchins darted like tumbleweeds under the pews, the congregation clinging to the drywall, Aurochs saw God bending up to meet them. When the ocean receded he measured the distance, the space between heaven and earth, church and Shelob, ground and water, exactly 15ft. 15ft. The sea had risen 15ft up into the air and into their lives. He found the congregation surrounding the cliff, counting like lemons that had 385

been ripped off the tree. The fruit looked thick and solar like citrines in the water. The tree had been stripped of its fruits and the congregation had been stripped of their church. Without the lemon tree the church would surely fall into the water. But this, this had to be a message. This was a message from the Lord himself. God had given him a sign. God had sensed his faith low-tide and had flooded his church with his word. He was wading knee deep in it. And when the congregation started to leave one-by-one (nobody wanted to deal with the peeling drywall) he just saw it as a test.

So when the second flood plucked the church off the cliff, Aurochs was the only person who thought God was still there. He saw God in the skeletal house that sunk deep below. He began to see God everywhere after that. Because to have everything pulled out into the undertow of infinity gave him the power to create the words to describe his Lord. “God is the moon, the tidal pull that keeps us marching forward. We are islands and faith is peninsular, the isthmus between humanity and salvation-a leg of land over deep waters.�

Even after the congregation left him wading, Auroch’s faith kept his feet firmly planted on the cliffside until, for the third time, the water rose up above the ground and took him to some place unspeakable, as if the words to describe it have not been invented yet.

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Narwhal

After the ice everything left her: her house, her family, the bones inside her. The earth beneath her feet had flooded and frozen over. The freezing had been swift and effervescent, almost chemical in execution, like a neuron signaling across the eastern seaboard. One day she woke up and what used to be her historic Brooklyn apartment became a full on iceberg. The entire city submerged under a thin sheet of ice. From the glacier she watches harp seals twist between alleyways dizzy as stars. Then she sees the Narwhal.

Her bones had just started to atrophy when she met the Narwhal. In fact, she had just gotten home from the orthopedist when the ice started to creep its way past Ellis Island. It was Osteoporosis. That’s why she hates the Narwhal. The beast bobs its massive horn in and out of the ice and she can’t help but feel as if it’s some cosmic reminder of her own death. The Narwhal wears it’s body with pride and breathes ice like air. Her two separate deaths are just the beginnings of the beast.

She wonders how the beast must feel, to own itself. To have its horn—its spine— under control. The Narwhal is the master of its skeleton and the girl has no concept of infrastructure. Her spine is an alien creature. A limbic other that lives within her, the one with a name the Narwhal is so desperately trying to teach her. Spine. Spine. Spine. The thought of her spine fills her with a thrilling claustrophobia; the concept of self. The concept that not everything has been taken from her, that she is very much still alive. There is so much life on that old stem. The girl exists. The Narwhal exists. And nothing can take this from her, the larval knowledge of existence.

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Aspics

My brother and I sit in the bunker and play I Spy, but I can’t find anything green.

Walter gets mad at me when I say I’ve seen green before because what is his cannot be mine. He talks about real greens, plants with white sticky blood and leaves like elephant ears. He talks about trees split by lightning and bushes like green suns, but he’s an easy grave to rob. I tell him about Christmas trees he and asks me how I knew. I wasn’t even born. I tell him that I saw everything, that some unborn child was looking right through him from the hole inside Mom’s face. Walter thinks he’s the only person who ever lived on that Earth.

I’ve been outside before. After Walter and Grama go to sleep, sometimes I slip out through the porthole. I make sure it’s raining so they can’t hear me. Outside, there is a great rusted train, buckled like a spinal column, that lies overturned. It’s over the hill.

Sometimes I go there and sit and pretend what it’s like to live. What it’s like to have homework. What a cellphone looks like and how the internet works. I imagine it makes the air thick and syrupy with knowledge. The train is empty, hollowed by bandits.

“What does a cell phone look like?”

“Want to find out?”

Walter begins to tell me about the Aspic Witch. A woman, he says, pre-war, who cooked for the whole block every night. She would slaughter a pig right on her kitchen counter, blood peppering the drywall. Crushed onions, garlic, leeks. The pig was quartered and pinned like a insect. She’d boil gelatin and chicken stock until it became a milky white light, drowned moonbeams, he says. Magical, like witchcraft. She’d serve the pig whole, preserved in the aspic as if death itself had eluded it. The dinner always 388

horrified the crowd. After the war, she’d lost herself. Most of the pigs had died and the others became wild, tusky and unkillable. She had no monster to curate. Her husband and her neighbors passed with the war and she was left alone with an empty kitchen and an empty table. So she took it upon herself. The witch became a scavenger. It’s dubious booty, stealing from the dead. But she walked the waste land and stole anything she found. Wallets, shells, laptops, femurs. Lives all coagulated in aspic. Or at least that’s how Walter told it. If you leave anything outside, she steals it and puts it in her wicked dinners.

All I could think about was green. She probably has pure chlorophyll preserved in a perfect sphere. Moss and mothballs. The only green I can think of is the ocean. During the war it became so polluted that it turned something short of battery acid. The color of the end. Or at least that’s what Walter told me.

“Where does she live?’ I asked, not expecting an answer.

“I’ll show you.”

We left two days later, when it was raining and Grama was asleep. Walter said that she lived in the caboose. Inside the train felt like a whole different world with Walter there. The only place that I’d had known without him had been infected. Brothers are like viruses. I felt like an oceanographer in my own world. The rusted cabins and broken glass like alien fish. The chandeliers as shiny and wide as jellyfish. Our flashlights are crank powered and we made calliope music as we trekked down the tube. “The Spine of the World” is what Walter calls it. He says that during wartimes, ships dissolved right into seafoam, so suppliers had to rely on trains. This train carried supplies from Canada to America, piercing through mountains and hillsides. He says that a coup destroyed the

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country’s infrastructure, that train tracks and roads were barricaded. Bombed. I was only a baby.

After the end time had slipped away, what had been minutes became angles of the sun, but from inside the train light the sun became lost. It wasn’t black though, orange, the rust emitting a strange chemical glow. Our flashlight brought only pieces back to life, just a few chairs and overhead storage could exist before vanishing into the rust.

Walter and I wore thick flannels and knits that Grama made so we wouldn’t get cut.

From the corner, I saw something. A jar not quite opaque. Suspended in the center was a crab claw foaming at the base, hot red like the heart of the ocean itself. Then dozens of other jars bubble into view. The head of a bird and a geode. The pad of a human finger.

“Where am I?” I thought aloud.

“Dude,” Walter said “It’s before the war, we’re back in time.” He talks like he just cured cancer. Then, on the edge of a shelf, I see it. Green. Somehow, the perfect head of cabbage, green and all, floating in the center of a clear glass pan. All I could think about is green. Green from the ground, alive. Walter pointed out a broken cellphone, but I couldn’t put form back into it.

Later that night, I didn’t think that the witch was real, but I understood what she was. After the war, the world was destroyed. What existed the day before was nothing the next. But the witch was a healer. She took things, broken, mutilated and dead and breathed life back into them. Death implies erasure. But the aspic brought them back to life, reformed them from half baked memories into real life things. Tangible and alive.

Making the aspic was a special kind of necromancy.

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The End of the World Circus is Going Great!

The End of The World Circus is the event of the season. Celebrities and socialites from across the globe came to celebrate the disappearance of the Pacific Ocean. It started as a black-tie gala sort of deal. But after the rest of the population accepted that they’d be dying soon enough everybody got the wild idea to repel down the Mariana Trench and throw a giant clambake.

And as with evolution, what started as a Carol Channing cocktail party turned into lobster fest and eventually morphed into a full-blown apocalypse circus (big-top and all.)

By now the circus is going great! People are renting palanquins and realizing dreams of falconry! Kettle corn is being eaten like cauliflower and clowns are finally getting what they deserve after years of nightmare-stalking! There are ouija boards, freakshows, chicken-on-a-sticks, anesthesiologists, false teeth, elephants, flaming hula-hoops, fishbones—the works At night, when everybody is asleep outside on the sand, the trench likes to remind itself that the world really is ending. It’s an apocalypse sky, a real snakes-and-ladders landscape: skeletal coral; chalk and apricot cliff sides; shallow water filled declivities scummed with algae lime and gold and black. A father remarks on how he feels like Jonah inside the whale. His children don’t know what he means but his wife knows exactly: this great beast has swallowed him whole and is beginning to pull him under. He feels like scrimshaw in his own life.

The circus is just preparation for the afterlife. Having everybody in one place makes Death’s job a little easier. And even though everybody at the circus knows that

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their lives are ending soon, nobody feels scared. Because facing your own death isn’t terrifying; it’s forgetting that you have a life to lose that is.

Because the apocalypse doesn’t exist in the huge tower of bodies that sizzles next to the menagerie tent. There’s no horror in the constant evaporation, or the way cotton candy dissolves into vapor after you bite it. The apocalypse lives in the big top, under the tarps. It coagulates in pots of kettle corn and tastes like caramel. Every time somebody looks into the great infinity of the zebra’s stripes and forgets, just for a moment, the world ends all over again. Calamity lives in the spaces in between. So when a little girl sits and waits for her parents to pick her up from the House of Mirrors, she looks inside and thinks she’s seen a ghost: perhaps she has.

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