Illuminati: a Journal of the Arts Spring 2021 by notthatilluminati

A Journal of the Arts / Miami University Regionals © 2021 The Illuminati Press All rights reserved. This publication may be freely distributed only in its entirety and without modification, and only for private use. It may not be sold for profit. Excerpts may only be reproduced and distributed with permission from the copyright owners, except for classroom use or in the case of brief quotations used for book reviews and interviews. The creative works published in Illuminati do not necessarily represent the views and opinions of its staff or of Miami University. Editorial Offices: 129 Johnston Hall, Miami University Middletown, Middletown, Ohio 45042 Cover art: Charlotte Waldron. 2021.

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President/Editor in Chief Tyler Hall

Vice President/Assistant Editor Charlotte Waldron

Treasurer & Editorial Assistant Miya Alsip

Secretary & Editorial Assistant Olivia Gronvall

Staff Savannah Barbossa Kasie Bowman Michael Edwards Leah Fugate Ashley Massie Jose Reyes Nolan Schlamersdorf

Faculty Advisors Michelle Lawrence Eric Melbye

Like/Follow/Contact Web: notthatilluminati.wordpress.com Twitter: @illuminatiMU Instagram: @notthatilluminati Facebook: facebook.com/notthatilluminati Email: illuminati@miamioh.edu

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CONTENTS Foreword

Keep it to Yourself

Missing Miami

See What I See

Annika Baldwin

The Fairy’s Wings

Claire Barrington*

A Visitor

Therefore, I Am

Constant Questioning

Fantasize

Sense

My Life is Pretty Much

Body Image

Dear Daddy

In the Eyes

Brian Fitch*

Two or Three Things I Didn't Know I Had in Me

Olivia Gronvall

Murder of Crows

Thumbelina: A Tale Retold

Miya Alsip

Katie Dougherty

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Kayla Hull

Don’t Babysit for the Skalbecks

Hal Hutton*

Carrion

Like Stained Glass

It’s Something in the Way

Untitled

Letting Go

Kara Reedy*

The Hand

Kayla Roberts*

Phantoms in Their Eyes

110

But Really, I’m Fine

117

Charlotte Waldron*

We All Live in the Woods

122

Adam Ward

Am I Not Special Enough?

132

Eyes of Disappointment

145

Moving Along

159

Sonnet of the Remembered

160

Do You Believe in the Wheel of Fortune?

161

My Dream in the Pandemic

166

Delaney O’Brien

Youngsun (Amber) Yu*

Contributors’ Notes

167

* denotes Malcolm Sedam winner

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FOREWORD Spring is a time for change, growth, and new beginnings. Never has this been more relevant than this semester. Like the winter turning to spring, we return to campus gradually and our community begins to flourish once more. This semester’s publication, too, reminds me of the changing seasons. It has been a year in the making, after both the pandemic and a delayed change in leadership. And though the 2020-2021 academic year has been a long one for all of us, I still can’t believe how much has changed. I’m incredibly grateful to be a part of Illuminati, and proud to have a hand in publishing the work of so many talented writers and artists. Miami Regionals is a diverse community with individuals from all backgrounds, and it is truly my hope that our publication represents a diverse array of experiences, thoughts, and artistic styles. First, I want to thank our amazing faculty advisors Eric Melbye and Michelle Lawrence for their support and encouragement this past year. This was the first semester that many of our Illuminati members were involved, and my first time in a leadership role. Another big thank you goes to my fellow officers and editing team. Coordinating our busy schedules and planning our publication remotely was not without challenges, but I know I am not alone when I say it paid off in the end! Finally, I would like to thank everyone who submitted their work to us: you are the reason for our publication, and this would not be possible without you. On behalf of the Illuminati editors, I present our Spring 2021 Journal of the Arts!

—Charlotte Waldron Illuminati Assistant Editor

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MIYA ALSIP Keep it to Yourself Keep quiet when you wish to shout in fright from the twisted form just within your sight. Keep still as you feel it’s hand, you are around others and cannot make a stand. Keep your eyes forward, never to tore you won’t see what owns the eyes that bore. Keep your form calm and steady, do not bolt unless you are ready. But most of all dearest friend, Keep it to yourselfOthers see your truth as madness from within.

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Missing Miami Our school colors are red Our feelings are blue Oh, Miami, how much we miss you Your wonderful teachers, your smiling staff We never realized just how much you kept us on track Your classes are empty, class discussions on mute Your computers are turned off, and your books are stuck shelved Imagine how many of us want our beloved libraries back Your flowers and butterfly gardens are blooming How we wish we could watch them grow Oh, Miami, imagine how much we are fighting to come back to you

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See What I See You want to know the biggest downfall to moving? Moving the stuff! That’s right, packing all your stuff into organized boxes and realizing, to your horror, how much junk you have. Then, if that isn’t enough you have to put all of your stuff, plus your family’s stuff, into a giant truck only to get to your destination and unload all of it. The plus side is that it is a new start. New school, new house, and new hope that just maybe you will not be as big of a freak show as the last school. Though the hope is small, it being my third school in two years and with each new school the amount of how much I am a freak to everyone seems to get bigger… I need someone to talk to. This inner monologue is not helping my attempt to at least appear normal. “I still have no idea how you can read while in a moving car. When I was younger, I would get so nauseous I would almost puke.” Mom jokes out, a smile on her weary face. I jolt out of my head, focusing back into reality. That is, riding in a car with my mom on our way to the new place and my stepfather behind us with the U-Haul truck. I quickly realize I have been on the exact same page of “Ghost dog secrets” for five minutes. Huffing lightly, I tug my bookmark from where it is pinned between my thigh and shorts. “I wish I knew too. I could avoid my reading homework that way.” I reply absently as I tuck the bumblebee themed bookmark into my book, saving my spot for later. “You and I both know you are not the kind of student to do homework on the way to school.” Mom replies as I stuff my book into my overnight bag. Rule number one of moving: Always have an overnight bag with at least two days’ worth of essentials in it, trust me, I once spent four days with hair dripping oil because the shampoo had been packed with the bathroom

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supplies. The box of which conveniently went missing and had been found in with the kitchen boxes. “Never know, this new school may try to make me read Shakespeare and we both know how slow it takes me to read it. How far away are we from this place anyway?” I question as I glance out the moving car window. Seeing varying shades of green and brown blur as we pass the thick woods surrounding the road we were currently on. “Not long, we are actually here.” Mom states as she turns into a long gravel driveway. The driveway leads straight back to the house deep into the woods. There are spaces cleared around the two-story house. It’s old, with some painting needed at some places. Definitely not the worst place I have lived in since the divorce. But anything beats the old, stiff loveseat at grandma’s any day. Mom parks the car in the grass to allow the guys room to move the big stuff in but allows us a short trip with bringing in the fragile glass decorations and my cat Onyx with her carrier. “What do you think kiddo?” Mom questions, beaming with pride. I look up at the house for another scrutinizing analysis. I looked from the roof to each of the windows on the second floor, passed the boy on the porch’s roof, and … wait boy?! I jolt my eyes back to see a boy around my age smirking at me, knowing I saw him. I blink, he’s gone. What? “Earth to Coraline! Anyone in there? What do you think?” mom asks again. “Uh…” I look up into her eyes shining with pride set into a tired face. Tired from being a single mom, from working late nights at the hospital, and tired of keeping my stepfather happy. “Looks perfect!” Looks perfectly haunted…

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2 Okay, maybe he wants to give me time to relax after the move? Or maybe he fell asleep? It’s already nine o’clock, he’s supposed to call at 8:40 on the dot. I ponder as I unpack my room in order to pass the time. Sharky, my phone, lays on the freshly made bed face up, almost mocking me as I take quick glances at it. Seems like an eternity has passed waiting for the stupid screen to light up to show a call coming in. He might be out late getting some last minute groceries or something for grandma. I rationalize, glancing at the alarm clock. It’s neon green numbers and black face mocking me on the fact that it was now 9:30. I slowly move my sight to my phone, silent as the dead as it had been all night. I huff, aggravated at the stupid phone’s silent confirmation of how alone I truly am. Dashing to the phone, I flip it onto its face to reveal the slime themed back cover.

“Hey sweetie, we’re heading to bed. How’s it coming along?” Mom cracks my door open more as she leans in to look at the progress of my unpacking. I straighten up from one of my three big boxes of books. “Good, the major stuff is done. I’m just setting up the smaller details.” I say absent-mindedly, determining the set up order of my books while scrutinizing my bookshelf. Horror books or murder mysteries in front this time? So many choices and so little space. “Well, do not stay up all night. We have to head into town for groceries and getting you registered for school.” Mom chuckles out as she glances around my almost finished bedroom. “You are so fast at unpacking, you’ve only been up here a couple of hours,” she mumbles.

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“I’ve lightened up on the junk I move. Less of a hassle that way. The only big thing beside my bed set is these three boxes,” I state matter of factly as I lightly kick the last box of books and look at my mom. She smiles and laughs soundlessly at my giant book collection. She looks young in this moment, as if almost seventeen years of life and sucky marriage hadn’t gone by. She continues looking around my new room until she stops at my phone as it lays face down on my newly made bed. “Did he call at 8:40 like he said he would?” Mom questions with a sigh, already knowing my answer. “No, he probably thought I would be too busy or tired to talk,” I mumble, focusing on the random book in my hand and not looking up to see her expression. The look of sadness and disappointment as, yet again, my dad does not call me to say goodnight. “Maybe tomorrow we can also set up a library card for you. The library in town looked to be a decent size and it wouldn’t be a long walk for you in the future,” Mom mentions, eyes twinkling as she waits for my depressed expression to shift into an excited one. She knows exactly how to cheer me up. “Sure, that sounds like a plan. I’ll see you tomorrow mom. I love you, good night!” I whisper excitedly while contemplating where I put my library bag last. “Night sunshine,” she replies as she gently shuts my door. I turn back to finish my quest of book shelving with new vigour, wanting to get done fast so I can relax before bed. “Wow sunshine, it is a mystery what you like to do in your spare time!” an unknown voice jokingly exclaims. I practically rip the top half of my body out of the box it was in, whipping my head in the direction of the voice. My eyes widen in horror at the slightly

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transparent boy standing in my room. “On second thought, sunshine is your mom’s thing. I need to come up with something else,” he mutters as he flips through one of my few comic books. “Who are you? What are you doing in my house?” I whisper in fright, dropping the books in my hand back into the box. I turn my body towards his direction. “Hmmm,” he responds, analyzing me and taking in my thick rimmed glasses, black shorts, and dracula shirt. I would say it would be creepy if I wasn’t doing the same thing. Analyzing his ripped blue jeans, black shirt, and a football varsity jacket all making up the transparent boy’s figure. “I got it! I will call you bookworm,” he stated proudly, giving me the now familiar smirk I received from him while he was on top of the porch earlier. “If I'm being called bookworm then you’re going to be jock. What do you want anyway?” I huff out while crossing my arms over my chest. “Sounds like a deal bookworm. As for your questions, my name is Eric and quite frankly, I am here because I feel like you are going to need the help,” he replies laughing lightly while placing the comic book down. He then proceeds to lie back in my desk chair. “Any other questions?” “What are you? What do I need your help with,” I growl out. He wasn’t supposed to find being called a jock funny. “Not sure what I am. All I know is that I am here to prevent you from ending up like I did.” He sadly smiles. I deflate slightly in both relief and sadness for this strange boy. “So you are a protector spirit? Why protect me?” I question. “I guess I am and why not protect you? I have only seen you for a couple of hours but you seem nice. The kind of person who I would be friends with if given the chance. Besides, no

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one should have to go up with whatever I did alone,” he states seriously. “So, friends?” he asks, holding out his hand in offering. In all the horror movies I’ve seen, it is never a good idea to trust a random stranger but looking into this guy’s green eyes, all I can see is sincerity. He does not give off any bad vibes either, I’ve read enough books to know the feelings of a bad spirit. Though, his sanity should be taken into question as he appears to be a jock trying to make friends with a nerd like me. “Friends.” I sigh as I gently put my hand in his, shaking them in surprise when I grasp firmly onto a solid hand. From the look in his eyes, he’s surprised too. “What do you have to protect me from? What happened to you?” I question. He opens his mouth to reply when suddenly there’s cackling from outside my window. We look at each other, eyes beginning to widen while bolting to the window. Outside there is a tall dark mass with a wrinkled face and a large twisted grin staring up at us. A shiver runs down my spine as I look into “her” eyes as they glint with malice. “Did you make a new friend Eric? Come here my boy, did you really think I wouldn’t find her?” The being taunted, chuckling lightly while almost gliding forward. It’s voice whispers in my mind as a sudden fog creeps into my consciousness...

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ANNIKA BALDWIN The Fairy’s Wings Once upon a time… There was a forest filled with eleven fairies. Among these fairies was a silver-haired creature called Stone. While silver hair was normal in the fairy world, wings like a mood ring were not. This was what was most striking about Stone: the enormous color-shifting wings that stretched from her spine. These changed shade based on Stone’s emotions, and sometimes they would shimmer in every color. When Stone became the age that fairies were taught to channel their magic, she entered school. Here, she met many different fairies—all of whom she was unused to. Every night, after work was done, the fairies gathered in a canopy treehouse and danced. In the past, one of the fairies created a special drink made of moonshine and stardust. Many of them had been drinking it for many years. They were used to it. It was their normal. And the drink had caused their wings to grow in a thin, straight way—like a dragonfly’s wings. But this, too, was their normal. Ever since she was a tiny, little fairy living in a hazelnut shell, an acorn top on her head, Stone’s wings shone golden when she was around people. Especially when she saw them as creatures to love. And Stone loved anyone who had a heartbeat. Which was everyone. Stone’s wings pulsed with gold as she immersed herself in the other fairies’ lives. And this made her stand out in a very noticeable way.

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Stone tasted the fairies’ drink, but she never really drank one herself. She didn’t play with the smoke rising from the firewood. She didn’t give anyone a scale from her skin—which was a way that fairies expressed interest and temporarily bound themselves to another. But Stone loved all the fairies just the same. And the fairies loved Stone just the same. She was like their own little sunshine, fluttering around, trying to warm them all and hugging everyone. And no matter what—rain, snow, hurricane—Stone showed up, and she smiled. But over time, her wings looked less and less a single color, and more and more all at once. And more time passed, and the many colors all blurred together—until they were more a gray than anything else. Stone was exceptional at the magic the fairies learned and practiced. She learned quickly, worked hard, and held this power within her. So, Stone began to use the magic. She had always loved standing out. Yet some part of her wished her wings weren’t so noticeable—that she wasn’t so odd. The fairies may have loved Stone, but Stone felt like she was an outsider. So, though she didn’t drink their potion, Stone poured some magic into a gorgeous dagger. And every morning and every night, for four months, Stone sliced off the edges of her wings, slimming them down. Until, at the end of four months, thin, tattered strips uselessly hung from Stone’s shoulder-blades.

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This was done so gradually that none of the fairies really noticed. And Stone smiled, and she limped around, her body aching more and more. Though Stone’s wings were smaller, they were still nothing like the others’ sharp dragonfly shape. She was nothing like them, she told herself. And what was left of Stone’s wings faded. One night, after a day of magic, the fairies were celebrating life. Stone wandered away from the partying, deep in thought. Sitting on the edge of the treehouse, sipping a drink, was a boy in her class—a shapeshifter type. The fairy shapeshifter only took one other form, and this boy’s form was a wolf. And Stone sat beside him, and they just talked. “What’s with your wings?” The boy finally asked, playfully tugging on the rags. Stone winced in pain, though she expertly turned it into a sharp grin. She shrugged. “You trying to be like everyone else?” He asked. Stone fiercely replied, “No! I’m completely different than them—than you—” she motioned to the music and lights, “—than this.” “No, you’re not,” the boy said, not meaning any harm. “You’re just like every fairy.” And Stone felt her back ache. As the night went on, the shapeshifters lost their normal form, and the fairies grew wilder—as night tends to do to people.

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And as the stars peppered the skies, Stone shakily felt her tattered wings. And she told the boy, “I think I’m lost.” The boy—more wolf, now—replied, “So am I.” The next morning, very early, before the sun rose, Stone woke and faintly remembered. The right side of her chest throbbed from a bite mark. The section was bruised, and a piece of scale was missing. And the last four months, and trying to help all the fairies, and wanting to look like them, and maybe being like them, and staying up late, and working hard to learn magic, and just trying to make everything okay with everyone and everything, all washed over Stone like a flood. She screamed in frustration. So, Stone climbed—as her wings were useless—to the very top of a tree. And right before the sun rose, she took that knife and sawed off what was left of her now-pathetic, once-beautiful wings. For hurting people sometimes do desperate things. And Stone knew that she still stood out among the fairies- for now she had no wings at all. Nothing had changed. And yet—realizing what she had done—everything had changed. And the silver-haired fairy with no wings had never felt more lost than she did then, surrounded by the deep night, sticky blood staining her hands and dagger. A few days passed, and each day, Stone slumbered, somehow drifted into school, and drifted home again and slept. Every day, she was more like a ghost than a fairy. A few of the other fairies noticed, and Stone smiled because of this—but she said nothing. She hugged her arms to herself, her body engulfed in a large, black cloak.

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In the middle of one night, Stone found no sleep. So, she ran into the middle of the forest, and she began to dig into the earth with her bare hands. She dug and she dug and she dug until there was a hole big enough to climb into. Then Stone covered herself in layers of dirt. And there she lay, her tears watering the soil. Stone’s body burned, and she cared so little, that it didn’t bother her when she heard slow, heavy footsteps approaching. She welcomed whatever wild animal had come to devour her. The creature slowly drew nearer. It came so close that Stone could feel the hot breath on her soiled face. And the creature began to unbury her. Stone kept her eyes tightly shut. But the creature’s nose merely touched her own. Then its large head nudged hers insistently, causing Stone’s eyes to flutter open. And there, inches from her face, was a great, golden lion. Stone froze in fear. The lion backed up, and then it spoke. This shouldn’t have surprised the fairy, but it did. “Get up,” the lion said. When she didn’t move, he repeated, “Get up. You are not dead yet.” So, Stone nervously pulled herself out of the dirt, brushing off her clothes and cloak. The fairy and the lion stared at each other, neither one moving.

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As they stared, Stone’s loosened cloak slipped from her shoulders and fell to the ground, revealing the deep, puffy slashes on her back. The lion surprised Stone further by sitting back on its haunches, rather like a dog. “Where are your wings?” He asked. As if the fairy had come over for tea. Stone shuddered slightly. “They are gone,” she finally answered. “But why?” The lion asked. And Stone didn’t answer; there was no answer, she realized. Because what creature intentionally cuts off their own wings? When the lion saw that Stone could not answer, he stood and circled closer. “Are you going to eat me?” Stone whispered. The lion seemed taken-aback. “Why would I do that?” He thought a bit. “Is that what they say about me…?” He looked at Stone, “No—I don’t want to eat you.” His eyes were deep and dark, and something stirred inside Stone. “Your wings—” “Maybe I was never meant to fly,” Stone dismissed the lion, relieved after all that he wasn’t going to eat her. “Maybe I wasn’t meant to be a lion,” the lion seemed to shrug. “Yet here we are.” The lion continued, stopping inches from Stone’s face, “Why would you choose the ground and its grave when you could have the sky?” Stone plopped down in the dirt, aimlessly looking at the stars. So, the lion sat, too.

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“It doesn’t matter,” Stone said. “Yes, it does,” the lion replied. He maybe smiled. But he was a lion. “I don’t know who I am,” the fairy sadly admitted. The lion stood again. “Then,” he said, “let me show you.” And he moved behind Stone, and he bowed his head. His nose touched the cuts, and Stone made a pained noise. The lion began to lick her wounds. And the pain worsened and worsened until it burned so badly that Stone thought she was on fire. The scream wrenched free from her throat. Then a pair of enormous wings tore from her back, shattering the dark with its colored light. Stone gasped in pain and astonishment. The lion smiled, all pleased with himself. “You are meant to fly—not to hide,” he told her. The lion moved forward, and he bumped Stone’s shaking hand with his maned head. “Climb on my back,” he turned, “and I will show you.” So, Stone did. And the lion ran through the dark woods, Stone’s wings fluttering in the breeze. As the lion ran faster and faster, she gripped tighter to the fur of his back. Her wings caught the wind, flexing on their own. They reached a clearing as her wings’ muscles began to ache in response to the sky. And the lion’s feet left the ground as her wings beat the air. With every stroke, they soared higher and higher. And the lion and the fairy flew into the moon.

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CLAIRE BARRINGTON Malcolm Sedam Winner 2021 A Visitor Growing up hearing about my Scandinavian heritage, I always dreamed of living in Norway. As I arrived at the Gardermoen Airport, it was hard to believe that this was my new reality. I had overcome a lot to get to this point in my life. Bouts of family drama, anxiety, eating disorders, and perfectionism consistently perpetuated my underlying condition. I had grown tired of hearing, “We are concerned with your mental state.” No one thought I was capable of being well. I had finally proven them wrong. Maturity provided me with inner strength and a newfound confidence that allowed my chance for freedom. It was time I gained a personal sense of my identity, and I was hopeful that this experience would help me find my way. The University of Oslo had been amazing. A place of independence and a fresh start. However, like a cloud gradually covering the shining sun, loneliness became an interruption. I contemplated, “Maybe it’s time I put myself out there?” As I approached the café, I felt the cool Norwegian breeze send chills through my body, as reminiscent as the nervous excited energy that ran from head to toe. I took one last check of my reflection in the window and shook off the agitation of my own imperfection. I opened the door and there he was, seated in the booth ahead. I recognized him immediately. Suave thick dark hair, piercing blue eyes, and a contagious smile, even better than I imagined. We got to talking and the conversation flowed seamlessly. “What are you studying?” he asked. “I’m an International Communications major,” I replied.

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“Nice. I do a lot of international business, so I am constantly traveling for work. Have you learned much Norwegian?” “Ummm, nei,” I giggled. The banter continued, transitioning into deeper conversation. I was pleasantly surprised my anxiety didn’t interfere. Our focus was zeroed in on one another. His story was as unique as my own. Some hours passed and we continued the evening, feeling a pull together not yet ready to be drawn apart. Venturing out into the damp cool air, I didn’t even consider the rain, didn’t consider the time, I just didn’t want it to end. The humidity undid all my date preparation. I blushed in embarrassment of my hair, now a mane of wild frizzy curls. He could sense my insecurity. “I love your hair that way. You’re beautiful,” he reassured me. We settled into a cozy spot and took a seat by the warm romantic glow of the fireplace and attempted to dry off from the wintry mix of January weather. The wine list came. I was not supposed to mix alcohol with my medication, but I needed to be a different person that night. Someone not constantly riddled by internal voices, but a girl with a carefree persona. That is what I sensed he’d be attracted to. He poured us the red and with it came more remnants of his unique swirl of a Spanish-Norwegian accent. I was smitten. Caught up in one another, we didn’t realize how quickly time was passing. Our waiter came over, “I’m sorry we’ve got to lock up. Here’s the check.” “I’ve got this,” he gestured. “Can I walk you home?” The butterflies, the skipping heart, I had it all. Hand in hand we strolled along in no rush, despite the late weeknight hour. The silence and stillness of Oslo past midnight acted as our

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soundtrack. My usual flood of worrying thoughts had quieted. The occasional squeal of a seagull tried to interrupt, like a little reminder of my usual uneasiness attempting to break through, but I was no longer consumed by the stresses of tomorrow. We reached my door and I anticipated the possibility. We both leaned in for a sweet and gentle end to the perfect night. I finally understood what it felt like to live in the moment. Merely a month later and my apprehension was still out the window. “Let’s get away! I’d love to show you a bit of Spain,” he exclaimed. I nodded my head in agreement, trying to hide that I was bursting with excitement. There was no doubt that I needed a break from the rigid ice and snow of Oslo’s worst winter in ten years. He booked us a week in Mallorca, and I couldn’t wait to get a taste of his country. The spontaneity of the situation was so unlike me. I made sure my family wouldn’t find out. I constantly reassured them that I was doing well, but they were concerned that my stability was unsustainable. I feared how they would react to my impulsive decision. I knew however that it wasn’t too soon. I already knew his heart, his kindness. I was confident that in a few weeks the two of us would be even closer, ready to embark on the exciting adventure of a lifetime. The long-awaited travel day finally arrived. As the altitude rose, so did my spirit. I was soaring as high as the plane at 30,000 feet. As we disembarked, I felt like I was dozing off into a romantic dreamworld. “Pinch me, so I know this is real,” I flirtily requested. Smirking, “Never mind, I don’t want to wake up.” He laughed at my corny joke. I never imagined something like this would happen to me. This was my chance to see the world, and my chance at love. I had defied the odds.

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We arrived at the resort. Palace de Muro had breathtakingly stunning views. The shimmering turquoise water and crystalline white sandy beach were juxtaposed by the striking dark rock cliffs that broke the waves. As we stood on the balcony that overlooked the endless ocean, we took a deep inhale of the salty air. “Welcome to Spain!” he said, stretching his arms out wide. “This is unbelievable.” “Well get used to it because this is our reality for the next seven days,” he replied. Everything he did made me smile. His cute little moves, witty little jokes, cheeky little winks. On the open Spanish roads, in the petite baby blue Fiat, nothing else mattered. Sitting there beside him felt right. I’d love to take quick glances when he wasn’t looking, feeling my heart swell and swoon at his nonchalant attractiveness. We left everything behind in the trail of dust. Miles and miles, we explored quaint villages and impressive views. The salty green olives and crisp sparkling water fueling us as we’d go. Our visit to Cathedral de Santa María de Mallorca constituted a day that really meant something. The cathedral’s expansive beauty almost went unnoticed as he completely enveloped my fascination. Standing in the church beside him, I knew I was in love. An almost indescribable feeling I’d never experienced before. It’s true, they say you feel sick, somehow so complete but so empty all at once. Like you could almost crawl out of your own skin. Feeling his hand snugly fitting in mine, I imagined forever. Could he be the one? I could picture it, as if I were in white, walking down the aisle towards him, my future. Our last night in Spain, and I was still on cloud nine. Love had consumed me. Love had healed me. I left the shower running so he wouldn’t suspect anything. Then I popped the bottle

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and watched each little suppressor drown in demise. I wanted to wholeheartedly feel everything. I didn’t need it. “Hey, you okay in there?” He noticed I’d been taking a while. “I’m perfect,” I answered. Something I had wished to say my entire life. It seemed that everyone had always tried to make me believe it wouldn’t be possible; happiness, satisfaction, peace. They were wrong. I finally understood what it meant to be content, and it was because of him. First came the dizziness, but it was hard to differentiate between withdrawal, jetlag, and lovesickness. Back in Oslo, things weren’t quite the same. I blamed it on the holiday mirage, but what I deliberately ignored was becoming harder and harder to avoid. I couldn’t give him what he wanted. A perpetual need to be good and the fear of showing desire or pleasure prevented me from allowing that part of myself to be unlocked. Not even he had the key. I began to keep my distance. I drove myself mad wishing things were different, but I couldn’t make it feel right. I put up walls that his perfection wasn’t able to demolish. Yet somehow, I was always met with gentle patience and unwavering respect. “It’s alright, we don’t have to rush into anything,” he’d tell me. But although he tried to hide it, I could see it behind his eyes. Deep as the ocean is blue, they dove into my soul. His frustration almost outweighed my own, but he still held on. “I’ll wait,” he promised. “You’re worth it.” “But I don’t deserve this. I don’t deserve you!” I cried. Naturally, a whirlwind romance is accompanied by a whirlwind of emotions. Twisted, confused, overwhelmed, and obsessed, I denied the changes in my thought pattern and in my

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personality. My infatuation became toxic. Poisoning everything. Bringing about a violent illness. I was completely obsessed. Growing more delusional each day, I tried my best to suppress feelings of doubt, but they took over anyway. A dominating ruler, a dictator no one could overthrow. My own inadequacy made me question his faithfulness. I thought to myself, “Why would the handsome prince wait around for the wretched and contemptible wench?” It felt like he was constantly gone. Each time he traveled for work I would construct a new nightmare in my mind featuring him in the throes of passion with some exotic mistress. Despite my insecurity, he continuously met the obsessive questioning with opposition. “You’re crazy, how could you think I’d ever be able to love anyone else? Why don’t you trust me?” “Don’t ever call me crazy again,” I fumed, slammed the door, and stormed off. The next symptom to takeover was the dark haze. A suffocating fog hijacked my identity. Every particle of my being was consumed by isolating insanity. Like acid slowly eating away. Like leaves falling, leaving me barren, empty. The pace accelerated. Building brick by brick, the weight crumbled my essence. Until one day there was too little left to hold me. My inner demons seeping through my now porous body. I completely lost sight of any sense of reality. I couldn’t escape myself. My situation: dire, unfixable, unchangeable. I struggled to hold on, but it was impossible, hopeless. My grip slipped off the rigid icy cliff into the abyss of my own twisted existence. The relentless unwavering storm could not be tamed. It would not subside. The pain increased as I felt a growing internal rage of self-hatred. Day after day, a perpetual repeat. Again,

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and again, sleepless nights. I was completely out of control. No end in sight, I could only see one possible way for it to be over. Unhinged and deranged, I became reclusive. The missed exams and missed calls piled up, adding to the incessant tornado. He would reach out leaving message after message, but I wouldn’t respond. His voice cracked over the recording, “I don’t understand. You’re breaking my heart.” I felt so undeserving of his love, a shattered and broken disgusting excuse of a human being. How couldn’t he realize how screwed up I was. He should’ve known I was bad for him. I thought I was holding on to a shred of decency by letting him go. My mailbox was flooded with what seemed like a thousand emails from the university. After not showing up for weeks, they were concerned. I was failing all of my classes, and I was going to be expelled. But I didn’t care because nothing mattered anymore. Multiple bangs on the door startled me from my practically incoherent state. The police found me hysterical, cradled on the bathroom floor, scraped and bruised. They attempted to wipe up the puddle of my limp body, but every drop of me was dispersed and left behind. I heard the loud shrill of the ambulance as it approached my apartment building. The paramedics took over. Squirming, I resisted being strapped to the gurney. “No, leave me alone!” I screamed and contested. I wanted to be the master of my own destruction. The ambulance ride seemed endless. My agitation grew from being constricted. I tried to break free, but large hands held me down. “Take deep breaths,” the strong intimidating man said. I couldn’t, it felt like the confined space’s limited amount of oxygen was being sucked out before

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it could reach me. As it continuously became harder to inhale, I grew lightheaded. Dazed and confused. Then for a moment everything went black. Radiating heat of the Spanish sun. The invigorating coolness of the crystal turquoise sea. There he was, straight ahead on the shore, coming towards me. His beauty, his grace, enveloping my world, protecting my soul. I started in his direction, but the perpetual pull of the ocean held me back. Suddenly a dark cloud appeared overhead, and I was engulfed by an enormous wave, dragging me under. I managed to get my head above the water. I saw him trying to come and save me, but he couldn’t get through. Like a huge wall of glass separating us. Banging and yelling, but to no avail. I struggled to stay afloat. Growing tired and weak I went under. Water filling my lungs. I gasped, waking to a strange unfamiliar place. An unapologetically stark room that smelled strongly of alcohol and ammonia. Blinking my heavy eyes and attempting to turn my pounding head, I saw my mother seated in a chair beside the bed that contained me. She looked sick, tired. Bloodshot eyes and deep moon sunken cheeks. Very different from her usual high-class flawlessness. “Mom?” I groaned. Was she really here? “Oh, you poor thing. Honey, why didn’t you tell me you were struggling?” She went on with her plastered look of concern and condescending tone, “I’m here to help you now. We will make sure you get better.” What irony behind her facade? It was like she was oblivious to the fact that she originated a lot of my problems. Her disinterest, the pressure of perfection, and her constant disapproval bundled together to create a daughter that was never good enough. The damage was done. She

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was just a reminder of the constant war against inadequacy that I had fought against my entire life. “I don’t want you here. All you ever do is make things worse.” “You’re sick, you don’t know what you’re saying.” “He was the only person who ever made me feel like I was worth anything. He is the only one that can make me better.” “Who are you talking about?” She looked confused. “I’ve hardly seen him since we’ve been back from Spain. He doesn’t know where I am or what happened? I need to talk to him. I have to see him! He is the only reason to breathe,” I contested. “What? They said it looked like you hadn’t left your apartment in a long time,” she uttered. My recovery was inhibited by the panic that set in, slowly burning, eventually becoming a raging inferno. They would never understand. Trapped and helpless, I was forced to confront the past as a means of moving forward, but I knew I would never be able to move on. I constantly relived the love but also endured the pain, over and over again. The overwhelming emotions of the fond memories and endless regret were all consuming. It was like sweet torture. Sometimes I thought I saw him, heard him, smelled him, but I was always reminded by the doctors and my mother that I was sick. They’d try to tell me, “Your mind is playing tricks on you and creating these stories in your head.” They didn’t believe that he was real or that any of it had happened.

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They almost began to convince me that his presence had always been imaginary, like a whispering ghost released from my ailing brain, but I knew better. They were wrong. He was the most real thing that I had ever had in my life. I tried to cling so tightly to every piece of him, to every piece of us. I didn’t want to forget a thing, not the feelings, not his touch, not his words, not his smile, not his laugh, not his eyes. I repeatedly wondered if he ever thought about me. “Does he hate me? Does he even care? Was it all a lie?” I laid there wasting away in my own agony, the ache of torment rarely subsiding. The only relief coming in my dreams where I was surrounded and protected by the shield of his love. Although time had passed, the doctor’s concern was unwavering. “You’re not showing much progress. You will have to be with us a while longer.” He upped my dosages and introduced even more brain altering chemicals. It reached the point where I felt completely changed, a skeleton of myself. My spirit outside of my body, observing from a distance. I couldn’t continue like this, but I had no control. I had lost my chance at love, and my chance to find my identity. I had lost my chance at life. I began to close my eyes, hoping to enter my world of escape, but I was startled as the nurse knocked on the door. “You have a visitor.”

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Therefore, I am What is left when my identity is taken away? Is it a chance for new possibilities or Does it result in endless pain? Can I step out from beneath my shadow, To see the world that is today? Will I find a greater purpose? What do I have to say? Am I waiting for normal, Or hoping for change? Can I heal what is broken, When something is taken away? Who will I become? And If I have the chance, will I decide to stay?

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Constant Questioning Here on the train, Can’t feel the pain. No end in sight, Again, long night. It never stays, Goes on for days. Split second and changed, I feel deranged. Perpetual repeat, It means defeat. Little time to devote, Just stay afloat. So heavy, so sore, A need for more. Is there an end, Or just pretend. Are you okay? Once I figure out my way.

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I confine me. am a suppressor, am a prisoner. hold me back, weigh me down. am left feeling out of control. define me. am the decider, am the survivor. dictate my day, decide my worth. deserve disapproval. consume me. am the depressing, am the obsessing. hate the image, am constantly checking. can’t accept imperfection. assume me. am the painful, am the shameful. am unrecognizable, am feeling constricted. have no room left to breathe.

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Fantasize Is it possible Is it reality Is it obtainable Or just a formality Is it everyone Is it few Is if happening For me and you Is it easy Is it hard Is it shiny Or already marred Is it feeling Is it true Is it lasting for us two?

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Sense Pang Hurts again, sharp and aching. A constant reminder. Shiny Pulled back, slick and tight. A brain numbing tug. Heavy Perpetual weight, growing and breaking. A complicated fight. Listen Melody approaching, soothing and refreshing. A sense of calm. Breathe Freedom is coming, confident and strong. A chance to heal.

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My Life is Pretty Much Who are you? A veiny bluish purple compilation, happy stuck. Ever the best? I’m not really sure anymore, after the question. I kept going. Time. Are you alone? I think so. To be kind, that’s complicated. It depends on the day, I guess. Have you eaten, Love? No, I wish I did. I’m not sure I’m capable. Going where? There. Always, know the answer to a good question.

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KATIE DOUGHERTY Body Image Scrolling through your feed You stare blankly at the photo. You eye her up and down. Study her curves. Look for anything imperfect. One photo leads to another and soon You find yourself two years deep. Looking for a rough past. A past with imperfections and a past that compares to yours. Did she go through a fat stage? Was she made fun of too? When she stares back at her reflection, what does she see? Sad eyes and a blank expression. Some days are good. Some days are bad. You ate a cookie last night and you’re up two pounds. Here we go again. It’s a never-ending cycle. A cycle of change, of mistakes, and of love. Love for food and love for the gym. But how? You put on your best leggings, And walk confident into the gym. But you see eyes staring. Staring at you, but what for? Do they see your little tummy bulge? Or the cellulite through your pants? Or your armpit fat? Why are they staring? You walk away red faced Afraid to look anyone in the eye. Lack of confidence. That’s what they say. But I thought you were confident? ✦37✦

So did the girl in the Instagram photo. You thought she was too. But looks can deceive. Truth is, she’s just as scared as you are. Scared of what others think Scared of how others perceive her Scared of her reputation Scared of herself.

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Dear Daddy, Late at night or alone in my apartment Sometimes I wonder. How would things be different if only I stayed. How would things be different if only I obeyed. My pen starts to write. Dad and I never got along. Fighting about this and thatNever ending arguments that seemed to get worse and worse as we got older. Sometimes I wonder Do you think about the times I sat at the table drying your tears Holding your hand Telling you that everything’s gonna be okay? Do you think about the times I was a little girl Sitting on your lap Playing ball with you in the back? But so much has changed. So much hate and debate yelling and telling screaming and leaving So much has changed. Nothing will ever be the same. Not the same moments we shared Sitting down at dinner excited to tell you about my day So much has changed. A girl who relied on you For life, for food, for shelter For good times and bad times To keep me safe. This life doesn’t exist anymore. Like a flash of that camera ✦39✦

We took on Christmas Day, Or the plane we flew on For family vacay So much has changed. You look at me different Like a stranger Blank and confused You don’t know who I am anymore. I explain my goals My aspirations and had-dones But it’s all in the past. Where were you? Where were you when I needed help I needed a shoulder to cry on I needed a body to hold I needed reassurance that everything is gonna be okay. Where were you when I needed my dad I needed a strong personality I needed a kick in the ass I needed the man who gave me half his genes. As much as I hate to admit it You are me and I am you. I’ve got your almond-shaped hazel eyes Your strong will Your stubborn German descent. I’ve got your on-the-go attitude Your talk as loud as you can for no reason Your be friends with everyone you meet. But I am me. I have become someone who is not you anymore. Who has learned to be on her own Who has learned to rely on no one but herself. I am me. I have learned to become her own person I have become that independent woman I was brought up to be. I have become self-sustained and pay for only what you need. ✦40✦

That life is in the past. The life I had as a child That I get anything I want at any time Regardless of cost or what it takes to get it. That life is in the past. Like a ghost of the dog I cried on in my room That I painted green then pink then blue. But the past is the past and now is now. I tend to wonder--do you think about that too? Think about how you made me feel Alone and forgotten A girl without a father. You were dead to me. I tend to wonder--do you feel sorry? Sorry for kicking me out For the words you said For the hate you left in my heart That sometimes I still have for you. But I should be thanking you. Thanking you for forcing me out Forcing me to be on my own. I should be thanking you. Thanking you for making me realize What it takes to live and suffer alone. I should be thanking you. Thanking you for showing me how not to act as a parent How I will treat my daughter one day. Thank you, dad For showing me how I am to love and cherish my child. To always put them first no matter who comes into your life. So thank you dad For teaching me things no one could possibly learn Unless otherwise gone through themselves. Thank you for the lessons I’ve learned The hardships I’ve gone through ✦41✦

The days with only one parent The struggle of living on your own. Thank you for making me who I am today ‘Cuz without you I wouldn’t be where I am. I drop my pen, tears streaming down my face. Pick up the paper and fold it in half. I shove it into the envelope, take it in both hands and rip it into shreds. As if it never ever existed.

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In the Eyes Young, innocent, quietA boy with no big plans. Grew up before thine eyesTo march among the seas and sands. My heart was very numbWorried and afraid. Quickly oh that day a cameThe whole family thought and prayed. Waiting for that callOff to the submarine you said. To us you gave your final hoorahAnd I whispered, please don’t come home dead. Waking up that next morningEmpty and unknown. No contact, no, we cannot haveLeft me feeling alone. As a sister, a role modelA teacher and a friend. My heart will not stop from that worryUntil I see you again. Safely on that shoreYou will land your feet. A strong, proud, boy turned a manIs who I will then greet.

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BRIAN FITCH Malcolm Sedam Winner 2021 Two or Three Things I Didn't Know I Had In Me (With My Apologies to Dorothy Allison) We wake up late on a cool, clear February morning, get sloppily dressed and take a cab to San Francisco City Hall. There’s a line wrapping around the block when we arrive and we get in it. It’s a beautiful day. We can wait. It’s 2004 and we’re getting married. We find friends in line. There’s a festive air and donuts are being passed around. Of the two or three things I know for sure, one of them is that any two people should be able to marry whoever they want to marry. The line moves in gulps. We’re two couples away from getting in the building. The deputies tell us they don’t know if anyone else will get in today. Maybe we should go home and try tomorrow, they seem to suggest. I didn’t take the day off for this. Wait here, this can’t be right, I say. I walk to a side entrance where a deputy recognizes me and waves me through security like he would any other day. I find the line of couples snaking away from the Clerk’s Office and add myself to the end of it. I call my partner and tell him to find another way in the building and to have our friends do the same. We gather and then we wait. The line moves slowly. Quite a few more people ultimately do get let in. Every time a couple gets married, thunderous applause echoes and reverberates through the cavernous, stone building. Every time a couple gets married, they’re being gifted bouquets of

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flowers anonymously, some from as far away as Boston. Of the two or three things I know for sure, one is that there are a lot of really, really good people out there. We make new friends with the people in line around us because that’s what you do. We are two couples away from walking into the County Clerk’s office and the realization of a barely-imagined dream, when a group of men walk down the hall past all of us. They drop to their knees and they begin to sing. A serenade? How sweet. No, wait ... Spirituals? The look of horror on my new friend’s face is one I’ll never forget. I barely remember her, but I remember that wide-eyed look. What do we do? She seemed to say. We’re so close! Of the two or three things I know for sure, one of them is that some people aren’t as clever as they think they are. I looked at my partner. In an instant he began with the pick-up note, at the top of his lungs, “Oh!” and as he descended on that single word through the fifth to the third to the first, I added my own voice to his, “Say!” I don’t sing, but we all know the words. My new friend followed, adding her voice, “Can,” and her partner’s voice, “You,” and by the time we got to “See,” the entire line had joined us. Two or three things I know for sure and one of them is that you don’t always need to fight hate with your fists. Hundreds of queers defiantly sang the “Star-Spangled Banner” as loudly and as

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proudly as they possibly could, while drowning out intolerance and shaming the intruders in the most spirited, patriotic way possible. The crowd roared with approval as the interlopers were hauled away. And because we were a queer choir, we sounded fabulous, and the deputies told us so, and it was true. We did get married that day, and it was annulled by the State a few years later. We remarried again years after that; but, one of the things I know for sure is that moment in that hallway is one I will never forget.

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OLIVIA GRONVALL Murder of Crows I saw a murder of crows fly Ebony wings outspread Cluster together like a cloud A mass of quills and croaking. They linked their scaly claws together Sharp and curled and Writhing and flailing in the light of day Lost themselves in A singularity of disgusting beauty. Who could see their individual faces Amongst the void of flurried dark? Sometimes a pointed beak Would rasp outward like a thorn, But the eyes always glinted Red and luminous like bloodied stars, Blinking and burning within the swarm Blinking and burning as one. I saw its arm appear Amongst the thrashing wings Ashen grey and stone cold, A clawed foot, taloned, and then Sliding silently out of the night A grasped sword, iron-wrought Shining dull and dim. At the center a face unfurled Rising outward as A dead man’s body rises Out of the ocean’s embrace, Peering out, unblinking A tombstone, hard and smooth Merciless, benevolent Immutable. Hanging in the air A twisted seraph.

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Thumbelina: A Tale Retold Once upon a time, in a beautiful field of flowers, there was a little fairy girl named Thumbelina. She was named so because she was no bigger than your thumb. She was cheerful and spunky, but most of all, she had a kind heart. She loved to play with the rest of the fairy children, where they would pretend to be official flower fairies like their parents. You see, adult flower fairies help flowers grow healthy and strong. They ride the wind to skip across the petals, directing the bumblebees to pollinate the flowers, and use a little magic to help the plants bloom. At the end of the day, when all the work was done, they’d dance in the moonlight, their wings shining blue and silver like the stars. Thumbelina, more than anyone else, dreamed of the day when they grew old enough to do these things. Yet, there was only one problem… She didn’t have wings! This meant she couldn’t skip across the flowers, direct the bees, or ride the wind. Worst of all, when all the fairy children fluttered away to catch the breeze, she couldn’t join them. “Wait for me!” she would cry, trying to run with them as they flew away. The nicer ones would stay long enough to smile sadly and tell her they’d be right back. But most of them would just laugh. She was always left behind. This made her feel very sad and very, very lonely. One day, she couldn’t take it anymore. She made her way across the field. She walked and walked until the flowers thinned and she reached the edge of the meadow. On the other side lay the thick and wild woods. The older fairies warned the children to never go there. They said it was full of beasts that ate little fairies as a sweet treat. But Thumbelina didn’t care.

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“There must be people like me somewhere,” she said. So, she left the sunny fields and walked into the cool darkness of the forest. The trees towered over her so far, higher than any of the flowers she was used to. Their rustling leaves cast shadows on the ground. Strange chattering and squeaking came from the branches. She bravely climbed over mossy rocks as big as mountains. She crept under huge roots that yawned over her. She strolled past big red mushrooms with spotted caps, appetizing but obviously poisonous. When she felt like she couldn’t walk further, she ran into a wood-mouse collecting acorns. “Hello, small beast!” Thumbelina said, always happy to make new friends. “Why, hello, mouseling” the wood mouse said kindly, “What is a dainty fairy like yourself out in the middle of the woods?” “I’m no fairy,” Thumbelina mumbled sadly, “I have no wings. I can’t reach the flowers, direct the bumblebees, or ride the wind. I’ve come to find if there are people like me out in the world.” “Oh, dear me,” the mouse said, “That doesn’t mean you’re not a fairy! There’s much more to it than that. You might have to work harder than others, but that means you learn to be patient! That is important when helping things grow.” “But I can’t even reach the tops of flowers,” she protested, “I try to climb them, but it tires me out.”

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“That just means you need practice, mouseling! I can show you how with this little dandelion,” she said, gesturing to the bright weed, “But you must understand that it takes time to learn new things.” The flower looked like it went on forever to Thumbelina. But she decided to not let it stop her. As the mouse showed her how to climb, she often felt like giving up, but she kept trying anyway. The mouse encouraged her on, showing her how to place her feet and hands. Soon, after practicing this many times, Thumbelina was able to climb up and down the flower with ease. She felt so happy, she did a couple cartwheels. But then she remembered her quest. “Thank you much,” she said to the mouse, “I must be going now, but is there anything I can do to repay you?” “No need, dear” the wood-mouse smiled, “But I know someone who can help you on your journey. His name is Mr. Doodlebug, and he lives in a clearing near here. Just tell him Mrs. Wood-mouse sent you.”

After saying goodbye to the mouse, Thumbelina followed her directions towards the clearing. After a while, the trees thinned, and in an open space lay a small patch of wildflowers. Some bumblebees were flying there, humming a spring tune. And there, sitting politely on a daisy, was Mr. Doodlebug dressed modestly in brown. “Oh, how jolly! A fairy!” he exclaimed happily when he saw her. He waved his feathery antenna as one would tip a hat. “To whom do I owe the pleasure?”

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“My name is Thumbelina,” she said, remembering her manners “I’m not a real fairy, since I have no wings. I’m trying to find people like me.” Then she told him about the mouse. “Oh! You know Mrs. W! She’s a good friend of mine,” he said, hopping off the flower “Now, what’s this about not being a real fairy? There’s more to it than just having wings.” “That’s what Mrs. Wood-mouse said,’ she sighed, “But without them, I can’t help direct the bees or ride the wind.” “Poppycock!” he exclaimed cheerfully, “One doesn’t have to be a fairy to be friends with the bees. You just have to be a good friend yourself. How about you try talking to one, wot?” Thumbelina agreed, and he hopped down and helped her up the flower. She felt a bit shy, as the bees buzzed loudly and had big stingers. Yet she did not let that stop her. “Hello, Ms. Bee! How are you today?” she said to a bee flying by. “Oh, abzzzolutely sour!” the bee buzzed grumpily, “I’m in a terrible mood!” “Oh, dear,” Thumbelina mumbled, unsure of what to say. Even Mr. Doodlebug coughed awkwardly. She thought about what the beetle said about being a friend. She remembered how she wished someone would talk to her when she felt bad. “I’m sorry you’re not having a good day,” she continued, “What’s wrong?” “It’zzz just those flower fairies,” the bee rambled, letting out everything it never had the chance to say, “They boss us bees around all the time, and without a thank you! They think the know everything! We can smell where the best flowers are. We could tell them which flowers are sick! We could help them! But nooo, they say they’re just too busy! Ha! Azz if we beezzz weren’t!” She let out a humming harrumph.

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“Oh, that’s awful!” Thumbelina exclaimed, concerned. She never knew that the bees felt so neglected. “Positively dreadful,” Mr. Doodlebug chimed in, shaking his antenna in sympathy. “If I ever get back to the flower fields,” Thumbelina huffed, “I’ll tell everyone to listen to what the bees have to say. No one should feel ignored like that!” The bee looked down at her, surprised, realizing someone had finally listened to her concerns. “Why, you’re a fairy child yourself!” the bee exclaimed, “I didn’t recognize you…” The bee flew in a nervous circle, embarrassed. “It’s okay!” Thumbelina said, not wanting her to feel uncomfortable, “I don’t have any wings, so I’m not really a fairy. I’m on a quest to find people like me somewhere.” “Tsk, tsk,” Mr. Doodlebug sighed, “Now, what were we just talking about with wings not making a fairy?” The bee landed on the daisy. “You are different, honeybug” the bee hummed gently, “But that’zzz not a bad thing.” Thumbelina sighed and played with the hem of her leaf dress. She just couldn’t think of going back to being left behind again. “You miss your home, I can tell. We beezz miss our hive when we are gone too long. You have the same look in your eyes.’ “N-no,” Thumbelina looked up, “I can’t go home. Not yet. I haven’t found if there’s somebody like me. There has to be someone out there! I just know, if I just keep looking, I’ll find someone.”

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Mr. Doodlebug put a comforting foreleg on her shoulder. “It’s all right, Thumb.” He was going to say something more, but Thumbelina couldn’t help but interrupt. “Can you help me, Ms. Bee?” she blurted out, “I know you’re busy, but you’ve been to a lot of places, and maybe you’ve seen someone, and…” She trailed off, but then the bee patted her head gently with her antenna. “I haven’t seen a fairy without wingzz before,” she said, “But I know someone who might. His name is Hans, and he’s traveled to farther places than I have. My sisters and I can lead you to him. We beezz are never too busy to help a friend in need.” Thumbelina’s face broke out into a huge smile. “Oh, thank you, thank you!” she said, and she almost would’ve done another cartwheel if Mr. Doodlebug hadn’t stopped her. “Oh, ho, ho! Be careful, little lady!” he laughed, “Full of vim and vigor, wot?” Thumbelina laughed too as he carried her down to the ground. “Sorry I can’t come with,” he apologized, “I have a date with beautiful Doodlelady this evening.” He waggled his antenna cheekily. “It’s okay!” Thumbelina giggled, “I hope you sweep her off her feet!” Suddenly, a great, loud buzzing was heard as the bee returned with her sisters. “We’ll make a line for you!” she said, “Juzzzt follow us!”

Once she thanked the Doodlebug and said goodbye, she followed the line of bees leading her back to the woods. She kept them in sight, and soon she reached a pond. It looked like a vast lake to the tiny girl.

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“Thizzz is the place,” the bee said, “He’z probably resting in the trees somewhere. I sent a sister ahead to find him. Now, we must leave you, honeybug. We need to return to the hive before it izz dark.” “Thank you for your help!” Thumbelina said and waved as they flew away. It was now close to evening, and she was starting to feel tired from her long journey. She crept up to the edge of the pond as close as she dared. The water shimmered orange in the evening sun. It was going to be night soon. She felt her heart drop as she realized she’d have to go home. With a flutter of feathers, a blue swallow swooped in, making her nearly fall into the water in surprise. She cried out in fear, but then she felt a beak gently tug on her dress to pull her back. “So, sorry, little one!” the bird said as she dusted herself off, “I’m Hans! You must be the little Thumbelina the bees were telling me about. You’re a brave little fairy, aren’t you?” “I’m not a fairy! Why does everyone keep calling me that?” she snapped, surprising herself. Almost drowning in the water had frazzled her nerves. “I don’t have any wings!” Hans cocked his head, his black eyes quizzical. Immediately, she regretted what she said. “I’m so sorry,” she said. She didn’t know why she was being mean for no reason. “I just…I’m trying to find if there’s somebody like me somewhere. So, I can’t…I won’t…” “So, you won’t feel so lonely, dear?” he said gently. She nodded, looking at her feet. He put a wing over her. “Listen, little one. I have flown the whole world over,” he chirped softly, “I’ve seen many places and many creatures. There are so many unique things, and even amongst similar beings

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not one is the same. Every life is a fairy tale written by God’s fingers. And it is such a wonderful, beautiful thing! You are a part of this wonder!” “The other fairies don’t think so,” she sniffled in disbelief, “I’m too different. I can’t fit in. And I can’t be a flower fairy.” “Ach, there will always be people who don’t understand this beauty,” he said, wiping her tears with a feather, “You mustn’t take it too hard. Despite what you think, many of them feel the same way as you do. Some decide to hurt others to not feel their own pain. You mustn’t assume all fairies dislike you.” She breathed out a shaky sigh and this time, she listened. “And, little one, there is more to being a fairy than skipping across flowers, leading bees, or flying. True magic begins in here.” He gestured at her chest, where her heart was. “Love begets growth in all things. You have longsuffering, kindness and courage. The potential is already within you. But you must allow this love into your heart.” She felt her fears and doubts swirl in her as she mused over what he said. Could she believe this? She wanted to. Deep, deep down, she knew that it was true. It would take her time to understand this, to grow, to learn what this love was. Maybe it would take a long time. Despite this, she decided to not let this stop her. She decided to trust in this love. She looked up at him and smiled. She didn’t have to say anything. “Ah, there it is!” Hans’ eyes sparkled, “There’s that magic. Now, come now. It is late, and your kin must be looking for you.” Thumbelina looked around and saw that he was right. The sky was a dark blue, pale at the edges, and the water reflected the early night stars. Hans bent down and offered her a wing. “Are you ready to go home?” he asked.

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“Oh…oh!” she realized he was wanting her to climb onto his back. He was going to fly her home! She was going to fly! “Yes!” she replied, barely containing her excitement, and climbed onto his back. She clasped the feathers behind his neck so she wouldn’t fall off. “All right then!” he stated, ruffling his feathers and shaking his wings. He took a ready stance. “Here…we…goooo!” He flapped his wings powerfully, and before she could think, they were up in the air high above the ground. The wind whooshed past her ears and made her hair stream wildly behind her, and she found herself closing her eyes in the shock of it. The wind smelled sweet, carrying the green scent of the forest along with the musty scent of Hans’ feathers. She slowly opened her eyes, and the wide cloudless expanse of the sky greeted her with open arms. The stars sped past her, and looking down, she saw the forest run across the land like a herd of deer. Looking ahead was the horizon, and she could see where heaven and earth merged. She felt infinitesimally small, enveloped by the wonder of the world. She was so full of joy, it radiated out of her. The moon rose out of the clouds as if to meet her as a sister. All she could do was laugh out loud and squeal ecstatically to the wind.

Soon, she saw the flower fields ahead, sleeping peacefully Although she wanted to go home, she was not completely ready yet. Sensing this, Hans curved in a loop back towards the forest for another round of flight. He knew this was an experience she would hold in her heart all her life.

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This time, he flew slower and a bit closer to the trees, allowing her to soak in the sight of the forest from above. It was like an emerald sea billowing the wind. The wind died down a bit and all was at peace. Suddenly, she heard a small cry in the stillness. Her eyes followed the sound. It had come from the trees somewhere. “Hans…?” she spoke up, feeling disturbed. “I heard it too,” he said loud enough for her to hear him over the breeze, “I’ll take a closer look.” He looped around again to the source of the noise and landed warily in one of the trees. It was another clearing, only smaller. There was nothing of interest other than a dead tree. It was so rotted through that it was hollow on the inside. “I don’t see anything…” Hans murmured. Thumbelina peered in the darkness, her eyes adjusting to the moonlight, and scanned for any sign of life. The voice had sounded so distressed and alone, and it had pricked at her heart. The person must be here somewhere! The voice rang out again, a terrified and angry yell. “Get away from you, you wicked beast!” it shouted out from the blighted trunk. Thumbelina looked at the darkness of the hole and saw a glimmer of silvery string. “Hans! Over there!” she pointed, and Hans wordlessly flew over in haste. The hole was too small enough for him to perch on, but the tree hadn’t rotted out enough for him to squeeze into. He bent his head down low while she hopped off his back. The yelling continued, only now with frenzied grunts. “I…said…back off…! Any closer, and I-I’ll cut you in two!”

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Thumbelina could see the string closer now, thin strands of milky thread that kept being pulled taut. She warily stood beside Hans, and as her eyes adjusted to the darkness, she looked down, seeing a long pit. There, at the bottom, lay a spider’s web with a little figure caught in it. He was a boy, and upon his back, wrapped in the sticky trappings, was a pair of glistening wings. She clamped her hands to her mouth, trying to stifle a scream, as two scarlet triangles crept silently from the middle of the web. A black widow spider. Thumbelina looked at Hans, who was trying to keep as quiet as possible. They both did not want to alert the foul insect, so he quietly ducked his head out of the hole as to not be seen. The bird’s eyes were dull with worry. He couldn’t get in to help the fairy boy, and his face told her this. Thumbelina looked at the boy, then at the spider, and at Hans again. She closed her eyes and thought hard. Then she slowly removed her hands from her mouth. She went to Hans’ side and whispered in his ear. “I have an idea,” she stated, “You must find the bees and tell them to come here.” “That might take some time,” Hans replied worriedly, “I don’t know how long the spider will continue playing with her food.” “Don’t worry,” she affirmed, “I’ll distract her while you’re gone.” She knew he wouldn’t take this idea too well, but nothing prepared her for the awful fear that clouded his eyes. “Don’t be ridiculous!” he nearly squawked, “You can’t go down there! You’ll get stuck in the web too!” “Well, if you pluck a small leaf and drop it down there, I can stand on that,” she continued, unfazed, “It will also block the spider. Just find a small enough one that won’t break the web…the pit seems to go down pretty far.”

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“Thumbelina…!” he exclaimed, but surprisingly a different tone than concern bled through. She had been so focused on studying the web, she was taken aback by his chest swelling in pride. “I told you there was potential in you,” he smiled. Letting go of the bark, he let himself drop from his perch before flying, swift and silent. He returned with a small leaf. He also dropped a small needle. “A rose leaf and thorn,” he muttered, “Please, use them well.” He let the leaf drop into the pit and it fortunately landed near the boy without breaking the web. Both he and the spider froze, taken by surprise. “Who’s there?” he called out, his young voice both hopeful and wary. The spider simply hissed and backed away. “Thank you, Hans,’ Thumbelina smiled, not bothering to whisper, her heart threatening to burst. “I’ll be back as soon as I can,” he said, and he flew away as fast as his wings could carry him. “Hello?” the boy called, more concerned, “Oh, golly, I’m imagining things now, aren’t I?” He laughed a nervous laugh, still carrying a sense of humor despite his terror. “Don’t worry!” she called down, “I’m coming to help you!” She was hoping the louder she was, the more the spider it would distract the spider. Thumbelina did not tarry but started to climb down the inside of the trunk. She remembered what the mouse taught her to do with her feet, and she used the thorn as a make-shift pickaxe.

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“Well, while you’re doing that, and this spider keeps edging closer to us,” the boy laughed, again charmingly comical despite the odds, “I might as well confess as how I got caught in such an embarrassing predicament, mysterious stranger.” “Go on,” she grunted. She gave a glance at the spider. It wasn’t moving, making up its mind. “I might as well get to the point,” he began, “I’m Prince Antonio, the son of King Oberon and Queen Tatiana, ruler of all flower fairies, and so on and so forth.” This nearly made her hand slip. “I know, amazing, right? A clumsy fellow like me?” he laughed, trying to cut the tension, but it came out bitter. “As a prince,” he continued, “I am treated, well, as royally as a prince. I don’t want to seem ungrateful—I love my parents. I hope to rule the kingdom as wisely as they. But that pampered life is a tad suffocating. I wanted to see the kingdom, not in history books or routine visits.” His voice wavered a bit as the spider started to move again. He started to talk faster. “I wanted to meet the people, to be treated…as a normal person. I was surrounded by servants and advisors and nobles but none of them cared for me as a friend. I was sick of the fake smiles, the overt politeness, the greed in their eyes. I couldn’t take it anymore. You must think me an arrogant fool for wishing all of this. It’s just…I can admit I felt a bit…” “Lonely?” she asked, landing on the leaf next to him. “Why, yes,” he said absently-mindedly, being able to see her for the first time. She offered him a smile; she knew he had probably never seen a fairy without wings before. He

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blinked, coming to, giving her a little grin. She was surprised that no feelings of pity or contempt appeared in his face, and she felt hers burn. She was just from all the exertion, that was all. “We need to distract the spider long enough until my friend returns with help,” she whispered to him, raising her thorn defensively as the insect crawled hesitantly closer. “Well, threatening doesn’t work, I’ll tell you that,” he grumbled, “Waving my sword sure didn’t help. It caused me to fall in here. I dropped it, and then I dropped right into its trap. Darn it, why did I have to get so fancy with the footwork?” “Oh, well, I don’t even know how to use a sword,” she laughed shyly, “But maybe I won’t have to.” Before the prince could protest, she said loudly, “Hello, Miss Spider. How do you do?” The spider stopped approaching, standing inches before her and the prince. “What is it to you?” she asked in a thin, raspy voice. Her multiple eyes glowed in the dark. The fairies shivered. “Oh, well, I just wanted to say sorry for barging in your home so suddenly,” Thumbelina continued, smiling warmly, “Me and my friend didn’t mean to. We’re both a bit lost.” “Yes, yes, and all lost things come to me,” she chuckled, voice dry as sand, “Lonely and wandering things, with sad and broken hearts, like little Prince Fly. Poor things, I give them the rest they so desire.” “That is not true!” Anthony spoke up, shuddering, “I was looking to ask for directions and then you spooked me into falling!” “Yes, well, that is so,” the spider giggled, inching closer, “But what I said still stands.”

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Thumbelina knew she was toying with them, but that is what she wanted. She noticed the arachnid weaving back and forth, and realized she was studying her. “You seem to be very wise, Miss Spider,” she continued politely, “Would you know what I am then?” “Hmmm,” she rasped, circling the girl, her movement making the web vibrate, “You look like Prince Fly, but you have no wings. Strange, strange. You must be an injured fly, or a different bug entirely. Perhaps you are only one of a kind, hm?” Her voice dripped with honeyed malice. Anthony recognized the insult and gave Thumbelina a concerned look, but she didn’t budge. She kept smiling and holding her thorn. “Yes, that is so,” she agreed, “Yet I am also a fairy. I am a world wonder.” “My, my, how wondrous, indeed!” the spider finally laughed, high and sickly, “A creature of contradictions. That is a favorite meal of mine.” She edged closer, cautiously towards her thorn, but her eyes sparkled like rubies. “You’ll make a lovely dessert, crumpet.” Thumbelina stepped closer to the Prince to protect him and slashed her thorn. She broke some of the web in front of her, leaving a small gap. The spider paused. “Please don’t come any further,” she said, “Or you’ll lose both dinner and dessert.” She hoped the spider didn’t see her trembling. Where was Hans? “Oh, ho, don’t be silly,” the spider laughed, but there was a twinge of nervousness. The pit yawned below all of them. “You won’t be able to escape. Little prince is stuck, and you cannot fly. Poor, poor things.”

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Thumbelina didn’t answer but cut at some of the web again. She came awfully close to removing the strands near the bark which held the web in place. “Uh, miss?” the prince muttered, wobbling precariously as the web loosened, “I don’t mean to be rude, but, uh…she does have a point.” “It’s going to be okay, I promise,” she comforted, her smile so firm and true, it almost seemed like she was glowing. One couldn’t refuse that. He nodded and put his trust in her. “Poor thing, lost thing,” the spider crooned, trying to weave a web of words, “You’ve been always left behind, haven’t you?” She started to creep across the gap, long legs stretching. “The only one of your kind. Wingless, useless. You must be so sad, so alone.” Thumbelina was now visibly trembling, her thorn quivering. “Come to me, crumpet,” she whispered, “I can make the pain end.” Thumbelina started to lower her arms. “I already told you,” the fairy murmured. She looked up, fire in her eyes, and raised her sword over her head. “I am a fairy!” The spider hissed, about to pounce on her and the prince, but suddenly stopped. A strange buzzing rang in the air, causing the web to vibrate, making the widow squirm. “What-?” A frenzy of yellow and black burst through the opening like a fuzzy flood. They crawled on the inside of the wood, surrounding the spider and avoiding the webs. The rapid flapping of hundreds of wings caused the whole wood to vibrate. The spider screeched as the web shook madly, falling apart. She fell below into the darkness after it, the bees swarming after her. A

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small group of bees caught the two fairies before they followed her descent. They carried them outside, where they gently placed them on the ground before an ecstatic swallow. “Hans!” Thumbelina cried dropping the thorn, tears streaming down her face. She ran to him and he opened his wings wide to receive the hug, “I did it.” And that’s all she needed to say. “You were absolutely fantastic!” the prince beamed behind her with a lopsided grin. He tried to untangle himself from the webbing. “I must…please help me up.” “Oh! So sorry,” Hans said, and he cut through the bonds with a single nip of his beak. The prince jumped up, not caring to remove the strands that stuck to his clothes. He immediately walked up to Thumbelina and kneeled before her on one knee. He took her hand and kissed it, which made her as red as the rose the thorn came from. “You are my savior, dear lady,” he stated nobly, “I owe you my very life. If there is anything I can do to repay you , please say it. Whatever it is you desire, it will be done.” “Oh, no, it’s all right!” she said, helping him up, “I don’t want anything. Really! You’re too kind.” “No, no,” the prince insisted, clasping her hand, “You risked your life for me! That simply can’t be ignored. At least let me present you to the king and queen.” “If I may,” Hans interrupted, “Let me offer a suggestion. How about I fly both of you to Thumbelina’s home? You’d have a chance to talk about this. And maybe get to know each other better on the way.” He winked at the small group of bees, who giggled knowingly in response. “Thumbelina? Is that your name?” Antonio smiled, “Is this alright with you?” She looked into his blue eyes and smiled back. She confidently put her hand on his. Now, it was his turn to blush. “Yes,” she said, “I would really like that.”

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They climbed onto Hans back together, and hand in hand, and clung to his feathers. Effortlessly, he took to the air, the bees trailing behind him as a golden entourage. The forest faded away in the night and the fields rose before them, the flowers glowing like jewels. The two fairies laughed together, their souls dancing in the moonlight, completely happy and completely free.

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KAYLA HULL Don’t Babysit for the Skalbecks Gnarled branches reach up to the stark sky, yearning for the warmth that once laid beyond the thick fog-like clouds. Only a few reddish leaves remain on the naked limbs that shiver in the bitter wind. On the ground, the decaying leafy remains stir, creating a light scraping noise on the cracked sidewalk. The harsh sound of crunching leaves crescendo as a figure makes their way down the path. The footsteps are quick and purposeful, and the figure emerges underneath a dimly lit street light.

“Great,” she groans as she checks her watch, knowing that she needs this job. Her steps

quicken as nightfall approaches. She unravels the crinkled paper in her hand and peers down at it.

“110 Havoc Court,” she whispers, glancing at every address on the street. Each

brownstone is nearly identical with the same rustic color and elegant walkup. Her worn, black flats stop at the townhouse with 110 plated near the front door. She carefully walks up the stairs to the door and takes a deep breath. Her delicate hand smooths her A-line skirt and then moves to her head to fix a stray hair. She summons the courage to knock firmly on the door. Sound stirs from inside the house, and she instinctively takes a step back. The door opens swiftly.

“Hello! You must be Blair! I’m Mrs. Skalbeck, but you can call me Mara,” the woman

greets. “Please, come in.” She gestures with her hand for Blair to enter.

“Nice to meet you. Thank you for giving me this opportunity,” Blair stutters in a higher

than usual tone once she enters the foyer.

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“No, thank you for helping us out on such short notice! We know most college students

would rather be out on a Friday night, so this shows us how dedicated you are. The Johnsons had nothing but good things to say about you as well.” Mrs. Skalbeck’s voice is sickly sweet and lingers in the air.

Blair briefly studies Mrs. Skalbeck. Her hair is fiery red and kept in a formal updo that

matches her dressy attire. Blair stares into her dark, sorrowful eyes and glances away quickly.

“I’m happy to help, honestly,” she states with dollar signs in her eyes. I’d rather go out

too but unlike other college students here, I’m broke, she thinks.

“Wonderful. I have put emergency phone numbers on the fridge if you cannot reach us.

We left money on the counter to cover dinner, and you are welcome to anything in the fridge,” she says as she puts on her coat. “I made a list of reminders that is in the kitchen as well. Most importantly, Leila’s bedtime is at 8 pm.”

A tall, lanky man enters the foyer. His hair is dark with silver hues, and he is in formal

attire like Mrs. Skalbeck. His eyes are beady and rest above dark circles.

“Hello, Blair. I’m Harvey,” he began in a low tone. “Thank you again for being here

tonight. Leila is in the living room down the hall.” He looks to his wife, “Shall we head out?”

“Yes, I’m ready to go. Blair, if you need hel—I mean anything, please give one of us a

call.”

“I’m sure we will be alright. I hope you both have a fun night away.”

Mr. and Mrs. Skalbeck say their goodbyes and promptly leave. Blair follows the light at

the end of the dark hallway that leads to the living room. Family pictures adorn the walls, and the smiles on Mr. and Mrs. Skalbeck’s face slowly fade as time passes. Blair enters the living room,

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and sees Leila on the couch watching a movie on the large television. Leila’s hair is pin straight and darker than her father’s. She has impeccable posture and remains very still as she watches the movie. Blair turns on her best babysitter voice.

“Hi, Leila! I’m Blair, your babysitter for the night.”

The young girl turns her head slowly to Blair. Her eyes are dark like her mother’s,

mystery dwelling within them.

“Hello, Blair,” Leila mutters monotonically. Scenes depicting violence with blood and gore ensue on the television. Worry floods over Blair, “Wow, this movie doesn’t seem appropriate. Are your parents

okay with you watching this?” Leila turns her head back to the movie, “They know it’s my favorite one.” Blood-curdling screams fill the silence between them. “Uh... I’m going to the kitchen,” Blair stutters, “Would you like a snack with your movie? Are you hungry?” “Not yet. You’ll know when I am, though,” Leila promises. Perplexity grows on Blair’s face but quickly shifts to annoyance as she rolls her eyes and turns away to the other doorway close to the hallway. She better not get me in trouble for that movie, she thinks to herself. Her soft footsteps are careful against the walnut-colored flooring as she enters the threshold. The room is full of matching Victorian dining room furniture, and the dark red theme is almost macabre. The dining table is a duller red in comparison to the rest of the furniture. Blair glides her index finger over the surface of the table, leaving a visible trail.

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Not many family dinners, I guess, she ponders as she wipes the dust from her finger onto her skirt. I didn’t know I was babysitting for the Addams family, she jokes in her head. She enters the kitchen from the dining room and glances around. The counters and fixtures are mental-institution white and contrast the warmth of the walls and flooring. The list of emergency contacts waits on the refrigerator. Blair opens the door and is met with barren shelves save for a few unopened snacks. Wow, can’t wait to help myself, she thinks sarcastically. As she pushes the door closed with her arm, she pans the kitchen for the list of reminders. She finds it on the island counter, along with the money left for dinner. The list reads: For Blair, Important Reminders 1. Please call Mr. or Mrs. Skalbeck first if you have any problems. 2. Order dinner at least an hour before bedtime at 8 pm. 3. Keep Leila within your sights. 4. Don’t touch anything you don’t have to. She folds the note and puts it in her cardigan pocket. These people are so weird. Holding the money, she heads back to the living room. “Leila, do you want me to order pizza for us?” Blair asks from the dining room as she considers tipping low and pocketing the change. As she makes her way to the living room, the displayed contents of the large hutch catch her eye. Jars of various sizes containing a transparent yellow liquid fill the shelves. What is in those jars? She steps closer focusing on the largest jar. Are they stones? Why are they collecting so many of them? Blair steps even closer. Are those… teeth?

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THUD.

The startling noise turns Blair back to the living room. She turns the corner unaware of

the small figure in front of her. “AH!” She gasps and puts a hand on her chest, “Sorry, I didn’t expect you to be right there.” Watch where you are going, little brat. Leila stands near the threshold of the dining room with a cold stare. “Oops,” Leila’s face twists into a grin, which quickly vanishes, “Sure, brats like pizza.” Blair’s jaw drops slightly. “Is cheese okay?” Blair inquires slightly frightened. Leila nods and forces a smile, “I’m going to finish my movie.” That was just a coincidence, Blair. Calm down, she tries to convince herself. Blair’s thumbs dance on her phone before she puts the device to her ear. The ringtone drones as she makes her way back to the hallway. Her hand smooths the wall to find a light switch. Click. The hallway fills with a yellow glow that illuminates more photographs. The ringing stops, and a person’s voice begins on the other line. Blair recites the pizza order as her eyes linger on the photos of Leila. Her displeased face permeates each photograph despite the warm collage made with love. Blair thinks, Isn’t she just filled with sunshine? Although most photos consist of just Leila, several show a uniformed woman in the background. Blair focuses on the woman in each one. Her smile is tight, and her eyes are wide. Upon closer inspection, Blair notices that the woman is not the same in each photograph. She wraps up the phone call and puts her phone away. Cool air hits Blair’s neck which triggers a shiver down her spine. “Jeez, how many nannies does this kid need?” she whispers to herself. “Not enough,” Leila’s monotonous voice rattles within Blair’s head.

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Blair whips herself around, but no one is there. Her bulging eyes wildly search the hallway, “Leila? Where are you?” Her chest rhythmically rises and falls. She runs to the living room. Upon entering, she sees the reflection of her bewildered expression on the dark television. Leila is gone. “Leila, this isn’t funny!” she groans with frustration. “What about now?” Leila giggles. The lights go out, and the electrical hum ceases. Heavy feet shuffle near Blair, but her eyes struggle to adjust in time to identify where the sound is coming from. Her pupils grow with darkness as they dilate. Blair takes small steps with her arm outstretched to find a wall. As soon as the cold, dry paint grazes her fingertips, she puts her back to the wall and scrambles for her phone. Her thumb uncontrollably shakes as she turns on the flashlight, and the light anxiously waivers across the room. The light searches the room casting ominous shadows. “You are in big trouble, Leila! I’m not supposed to let you run off alone!” That rule might be for my safety, Blair wonders, but immediately banishes the thought. “I’m not playing your game. We need to come together and wait for the power to come back on, Leila.” Blair’s phone notifies her that the battery is low. Shit. Keeping her back to the wall, Blair shuffles from the living room to the hallway. Hopefully, there is a closet with candles, or else I’m waiting outside. The wind smacks a tree branch against the house with force. The only constant sound is of the wind whistling through the windows. Okay, maybe not. Her light finds an ajar door near the foyer and she opens it slowly, shining the light inside the doorway onto a toilet. She searches the cabinets, finding a small candle and matches. Where’s the gothic candelabra? Blair strikes a match and lights the candle, allowing her phone to conserve battery. The room glows with

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yellow light except for the bathtub, which reflects the moonlight from the window. Blair peels back the shower curtain to look out the window. The streetlights illuminate the empty street along with the faces of the brownstones across the street. A man walks up the stairs to one of the townhouses and opens the front door, allowing Blair to see multiple lights on in the home. Huh, maybe they have a backup generator, she rationalizes. She looks at another townhouse and notices the light from a television shifting between the blinds of an upper-level window. It’s just this house without power. Blair can feel her heart pounding in her chest. Blair steps back onto a balled-up piece of paper that missed the trash. She picks it up and notices that it is from the newspaper. A corner of the paper unravels and reads, “Have you seen them?” Blair unravels the paper completely, revealing familiar faces. The eyes are wide, and the smiles are tight. Blair knows that they are the women from the photographs. Blair frantically pulls out her phone. Should I call the cops? She thinks as she places the call to Mrs. Skalbeck. Maybe. The line rings one time before she hears a faint buzzing noise coming from upstairs. “What the fu—” Blair begins before the sound of the doorbell interrupts her. Leaving the candle, she runs from the bathroom to answer the door. Her body trembles and sweat breaks on her forehead. She reaches for the doorknob. “Blair?” Leila’s voice sounds from the middle of the hallway with childlike fear. Blair turns around cautiously, retracting her hand from the doorknob. She positions the light of her phone at Leila. She illuminates the scared expression on the girl’s face. “Leila, are you okay?” She inches toward her. Leila’s eyes overcome with obsidian darkness and her eyebrows furrow. Her head tips forward as she leans into her sinister stare. Blue and green veins

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emerge on Leila’s face and limbs as the color drains from her skin. The corners of her mouth turn upward. Blair’s body goes cold with dread. “I’m hungry now,” she purrs in a deep, demonic voice. Blair shifts for the door, but a strong force lifts her body. Her phone drops and spins on the ground. She shrieks with raw panic as the force carries her into the darkness of the house. Her screams stop and the power resumes as if nothing happened.

The stinging wind whips the shaggy strands of hair around the teenager’s face, and the bitterness penetrates his ill-equipped attire with ease. He pushes his index finger to the doorbell while bouncing slightly to stay warm. The square insulated bag switches from one hand to the other. The harsh hum of his jalopy cuts through the wind, he periodically glances at it. He raises a tight fist to the door and winds it back to prepare for an assertive knock. Shuffling begins from behind the door, and the doorknob vigorously rattles. The pizza delivery guy steps back instinctively and puts his hand down. A whoosh of warm air escapes as the door opens swiftly. “Hello! I was having a hard time finding my purse, my apologies,” Mrs. Skalbeck trills with a smile. “It’s no problem, ma’am,” the teenager exclaims with sincerity, “here’s your pizza.” Mrs. Skalbeck takes it and thrusts out a crinkled 20 dollar bill with her other hand. The teenager quickly snatches the bill, oblivious to the crimson stains. “Keep the change,” her smile twists, closely resembling that of a Cheshire cat. “Thank you, ma’am,” he stammers and waves. He quickly returns to his car to escape the cold.

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Mrs. Skalbeck closes the door and looks at her husband as he picks up Blair’s cell phone from the ground. “At least one of us is fed,” Mr. Skalbeck grunts while touching his stomach. “Pizza?” she questions, holding the box in the air. He chuckles tiredly. “How long do you think it will take to cover her tracks tonight?” he gestures subtly to the end of the hallway. “It depends on how many things were unnecessarily touched. I write down the helpful reminders for a reason. Now, let’s hurry up before she takes it all for herself.”

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HAL HUTTON Malcolm Sedam Winner 2021 Carrion My best friend is a crow. I met him—well, I don’t know if he’s a boy or a girl, but I’ve decided to call him ‘him’ arbitrarily—one day in autumn on my walk to school. It was late enough in the season that most of the leaves were on the ground already, and by now, they’d lost their color and their crunch, leaving bare branches to reach like black skeleton hands up into a sky the color of wet cement. He was perched on a trash can, his head buried in the top layer of discarded bottles, cans, and plastic wrappers, flicking periodically to toss aside some unwanted scrap of garbage, probably in search of something to eat. His tail feathers stuck up above him, shaking this way and that in his search. I remembered hearing stories about crows--how intelligent they are, how they remember faces. I was curious, so I dug in my pocket for the half a granola bar I had left over from my breakfast and gave a whistle. He looked up from his scavenger hunt and turned one beady eye on me, head twitching one way, then the other. His feathers were black and glossy, shining almost navy in the watery grey light of the morning. Slowly, I broke off a piece and crumbled it in my hand, then dropped the grainy handful of oats, nuts, and little cranberry pieces onto the sidewalk. I rubbed my hands together to shake off the last of the crumbs and stood, taking a dozen steps back. A chill breeze picked up, stinging my nose and cheeks, and I pulled my knit scarf up a little further. As if mirroring me, the crow fluffed his feathers up, watching me warily. I kept still as a statue, trying to tell him with my eyes that I just wanted to be friends.

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He jumped off the lip of the can, flapping his wings twice as he glided down to where I’d left the granola crumbs. He kept one eye on me the entire time, picking out the dried berries first, then the nuts, then the oats. When the ground was picked clean, he straightened back up, fluffed his feathers out again, and cawed once. I smiled. “You’re welcome,” I told him. He flew off.

I didn’t see Russel Crow again for a little more than a week. I started calling him that in my head a few days after I first met him. I thought it was funny. I assumed it was him that I saw again, anyway. I don’t think a stranger crow would look at me with that kind of expectancy in his eyes. I had a paper cup with a red cardboard sleeve in one hand, steam and the earthy scent of coffee rising from within. The warmth of the hot drink kept my fingers from going numb after the sudden cold snap in the weather. In my other hand was a huge blueberry muffin dusted with rough sugar crystals on top, still warm from the coffee shop’s toaster oven. I don’t usually get breakfast out of the house, but I’d managed to turn my work in on time for once, and I thought that deserved a treat-myself kind of morning. The muffin was sweet, soft, and moist, and each bite came with these little bursts of bright blueberry flavor, and it practically fell apart in my hands as I bit into it. It was impossible to keep from making a mess as I walked and ate, but I was outside, so it didn’t matter that I trailed crumbs like footprints. I didn’t notice Russel following me until he gave a sudden, impetuous caw, and I turned around to see him pecking at the crumbs I left behind. “Well, hi there,” I said to him, a smile growing across my wind-stung cheeks. “You

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having a good morning?” He cawed again, and I had the strange feeling that he was saying, no small talk, feed me again, will you? I laughed and nodded. “Alright, alright, here, you can have some of my muffin.” Tearing off a chunk, I gave a gentle underhand toss, and it landed a foot in front of him. He immediately dove forward, breaking the muffin apart with a few eager pecks and turning his beak skyward to swallow down the bite sized pieces. Russel gave another caw and flapped his wings twice before taking off into the air. I smiled and stuck a sticky thumb in between my lips to suck the blueberry juice off, watching the little black speck that he was disappear into the uniform gray. I kept walking then, happy to have seen him again. I could see the street sign marking the turn into the school when I heard him caw again, and I looked over my shoulder, my eyebrows shooting up beneath my bangs. “Hello again. Twice in one morning?” I asked him. Russel dropped something bright onto the ground and pecked at it twice, then gave me a meaningful look and flew off again. Curious, I turned around. There on the ground was a buttercup-yellow button about the size of a nickel with two holes in the center.

I rolled the button between my fingers throughout the school day, rubbing a thumb against its time-roughened edges until it grew warm in my hand. When I was restless, I’d slot the little disk between two fingers and tap out a rhythm on my desk. I thought about Russel and

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wondered where he’d gotten a hold of such a thing. What kind of places did he get to see, being what he was? Unlike me, he could fly anywhere he wanted to. People wouldn’t pay him any mind. He was just a bird. Maybe he’d stolen it off of someone’s laundry drying on a line. Maybe it came from a dog toy left out in someone’s yard. “Hey, what’s it got in its hand?” Catherine’s acid drawl cut through my musings, and on instinct I closed my fist around the button, hiding it from view. I tucked my hand into my lap under my desk and turned an impassive face up at her. She was beautiful--there was no denying that. Her hair was always a perfect sun-kissed blonde, though I knew she was naturally brunette because I’d known her since we were kids. She was just as awful back then as she was now. “You’re not allowed to use my hopscotch square” had simply become “Who said you were allowed to sit on this side of the room? I’m holding that desk for Allie.” “It’s nothing,” I rasped, then cleared my throat and tried again, firmly. “It’s none of your business.” Cat rolled her eyes and laughed. “Is it playing with trash now?” she asked aloud. From around the room, there was a scattered snickering. I felt my classmates’ gazes burning into me. I refused to look at them and kept my gaze fixed on Cat’s eyes. “You wouldn’t know trash if it kissed you on the mouth,” I countered, hoping my voice wasn’t shaking as much as it felt like it was. “And neither would your boyfriend, obviously.” The snickers picked up in volume, with a few outright laughs, and a low murmuring of “Ooooooh…”. The smile dropped off and her face became frigid. She put a hand on my shoulder, pale

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peach manicured claws digging into my shirt. As she leaned over me, her hair slid off one shoulder, falling around her like a curtain so that her face was all I could see. Her eyes were grey and strained. “You’ll regret that,” she said. I swallowed and said, “The only thing I regret is the fact that you didn’t brush your teeth this morning.” With a hiss, she straightened up and took her hand off me like she’d been burned. The bell rang, and she glanced toward the door where the teacher was stepping in. Cat’s winning smile was back on her face, and she waggled her fingers at me in a precious mockery of a friendly wave. “See you in gym class, Leona,” she said in a sing-song whisper then spun away.

I always hated gym class for the locker rooms. The lingering stench of old sweat and deodorant didn’t bother me too much. They were always a little dirty, with a thin layer of brownish grime outlining the grout between the muddy orange tiles, and the lockers didn’t have proper locks on them, so I had to be careful what I left in them, but neither of these things was the reason why either. I hated undressing, really. Hated being around all those girls, feeling out of place somewhere I was told I should belong, a stranger in my own skin, so I’d picked a corner locker all the way in the back and always changed with my back to the rest of the room, hoping that if I didn’t look at anyone else I could convince myself they weren’t there. It never worked. This time, Cat was waiting for me at my locker, leaning with one hand on the blue-grey metal, her claws going tap tap tap. Tap tap tap. Tap tap tap. Counting out a lazy, menacing rhythm. “Leonaaaaa,” she said, drawing out the last syllable with the voice of someone surprised to see me. “You made it, I’m so happy to see you.” Her words were thin and insincere.

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“My name is Leo,” I said firmly. “And that’s my locker. Could you move?” “Oh, is it?” she gasped in mock surprise, holding one hand before the perfect pink “O” of her lips. It was impossible to tell whether she was reacting to my name or my claim of a right to that space. “Gee, I had no idea, so very sorry,” she frowned as though she actually meant her apology, but again, the sarcasm saturating her voice made sure I knew the truth. “Let me just move, yeah?” I pressed myself back against the opposite row of lockers to give her room to pass, but she bumped into me as she walked by anyway with too much force for it to have been an accident, then picked a locker at the end of that same row. I looked away from her, my shoulders drawn up in a tight line, and began to undress. I was folding my sweatshirt up to shove it into the locker when Cat’s voice shrieked shrilly again. “Oh my god, ew, I think there’s a cockroach in the locker room! Quick, someone squish it!” Then a pause, a titter of laughter. “Oh, nevermind. It’s just Leona.” The giggles around the room rose and fell like a wave, and I felt my cheeks grow hot. “Nice bra, by the way. What dumpster did you dig that out of?” “Shut up, Cat,” I ground out, then quickly pulled on my gym shirt. I exchanged my jeans for cotton shorts as quickly as I could and bustled out of the locker room, more jeers hot on my heels.

My clothes were in the toilet. They weren’t in my locker when I came back. I’d begun pulling open the surrounding lockers, wondering if maybe I’d put them in a different one by

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mistake thanks to Cat’s distraction, but then she’d leaned around the corner, her lips drawn wide in a cheshire grin, and said, “Why don’t you check the middle stall?” So that was it. My day clothes were soaked in toilet water. My gym clothes were soaked in sweat. I had to pick the lesser of two evils, I suppose. I was late to my next class because I’d spent ten minutes wringing my clothes out into the locker room sink until they weren’t dripping any more. That earned me a detention. Ms. Andrews wasn’t known for her leniency. It started snowing on my walk home from school, and by the time I got to my house I couldn’t feel my legs, and my body wouldn’t stop shivering.

Over the next week Russel visited me a few times. I’d taken to making sure I always had something on me that he would like. He seemed to favor nuts and fruit, so I’d bought a bulk bag of trail mix that had cashews, almonds, dried bananas and apricots, and raisins, and I always made sure to have a handful of it in one of my pockets. He didn’t seem to mind when there was a bit of lint in it, either. On Wednesday, Russel brought a long piece of thin ruby-red ribbon and a friend. The other bird was slightly larger, their feathers a little messier, and when I fed the both of them, I smiled at Russel and told him “You keep yourself a lot neater than your friend there. You must be a particularly beautiful crow, huh? Have anyone you like? I bet you could get them in a heartbeat, handsome boy.” He watched me silently for a moment, then answered me with a noise that sounded

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almost like he was echoing my voice—handsome boy. I grinned so wide my cheeks hurt. At school that day, I threaded the button he’d brought me onto the ribbon and tied it around my wrist like a bracelet, and every time I glanced at it, I smiled.

On Friday, Cat found me on the walk to school. It must have been on purpose. She usually drove. My heart sank when I heard her voice instead of Russel’s coming up behind me, chattering idly away with someone else. I tried not to look at them, hoped maybe they wouldn’t notice it was me. Then I heard her voice calling out, “Look! There it is! I told you it was weird looking!” I sped up, pretending like I didn’t hear. “Hey, wait up,” a male voice--Cat’s boyfriend, Zeke--called out, and I could hear his footsteps as he jogged lazily up to me. He was a wall of a guy, had to be at least six foot two and two hundred fifty pounds, seemed a little slow on the uptake at times thanks to at least two concussions throughout his football career, but he had a kind of unexpected wit — he always knew just what to say to hurt you the most. When Zeke caught up with me, he turned around, walking backwards to stare at my face. “You were right, Kitty,” he shook his head, giving a breathy whistle of disbelief. “Is it a boy or a girl?” “It has tits at least!” Cat called back. “No way,” Zeke said, then stopped me dead with a heavy hand on my shoulder. “Prove it. C’mon, take your top off.”

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I stood my ground, chin held high though my eyes were downcast. “Get out of my way, Zeke,” I said, my voice low. Jerking my shoulder out of his grip, I made to walk around him. “Awwww, don’t play coy. I’m dying to know,” he stopped me again, clamping a hand around my wrist with an iron grip. Russel’s button dug into my skin, and I worried Zeke might pull it loose or try to take it. “What is it? What’s in your pants, huh?” Zeke leaned in close, looming over me, and grabbed at the front of my jeans. “Back off, Zeke!” I shouted, hating the way my voice shrilled through a range of terrified high notes. “Don’t touch me.” “C’mon, don’t be that way. Show us the goods. What are you packing?” Zeke was grinning. Cat was laughing. My throat closed up as my heart rattled around in my chest like a bird throwing itself against the walls of a cage. This wasn’t happening. This wasn’t happening. A loud croaking caw broke through the sound of their laughter. Cat and Zeke turned to look at each other, then behind me. It was Russel, his feathers fluffed up around his neck like a dog with its hackles raised. “What the-? Shoo, shoo,” Cat began to wave a hand at him, her lip drawn up in a snarl of disgust. “Sorry, Russel,” I said to him, my voice shaking. “I don’t have any food today.” I lied. I didn’t want him coming any closer to Cat or Zeke. I waved and tried to look sorry. “You’re talking to it?” Cat’s upper lip pulled up in disgust as she looked between the two of us. “Maybe that’s why you’re so weird. You’re just an animal.”

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Russel seemed to pause, his head flicking back and forth like he was considering the situation, then took flight. I sighed, a wave of subdued relief washing over me. At least Cat wouldn’t hurt him, too. His appearance had jostled me out of my panic into some other odd state. I felt resigned to this, whatever they were going to do. At least they won’t hurt him, I thought again, as a strange sense of calm settled over me. “Filthy animal,” Cat sneered under her breath, pulling a thumb through her hair to push it back from her face as she strode around to my front. When she looked back to me, she scoffed, running her eyes over me. “You’re still here?” she asked. “Not gonna fly off like your vermin pet over there?” I shrugged. “Maybe I’m just a glutton for punishment,” I mused. “I thought you might have more in store. Didn’t want this to end prematurely. I’m sure you know all about that.” Cat’s face turned bright red. She drew a hand back and slapped me across the face. My head snapped back with the impact, and the sound of it rang out in the cold air like a gunshot. My cheek stung, though the feeling was numbed by the cold. Wincing, I turned my face slowly back toward her and rubbed a hand over the place she’d struck. “Ow…” I said bluntly. “You listen here you little… whatever you think you are,” Cat growled, stepping too close to me and jabbing a claw into my chest. “The next time you talk to me like that I am going to crucify you. You hear? I’ll-“ Cat was interrupted by cawing again, but this time it was different. A multitude of caws of different pitches, tones, and volumes tumbled over one another in a cacophony of sound. I

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looked up into the sky and a disbelieving laugh bubbled up out of me. A mass of tiny dark bodies was coming over the horizon, wheeling through the sky headed straight in our direction. In moments, they were on her, and I stepped back, hands raised in innocent surrender, to watch the show. Cat shrieked and cursed and flailed as the crows descended upon her, pecking and pulling and battering their wings against her. Zeke fled, tailed by a few straggling birds. “Get off! Get off, oh my god get these animals off me!” Turning, Cat too began to run, and the crows followed her like swarming bees, pulling out strands of her perfect hair, tearing holes in her totally fashionable and definitely expensive puff coat. Only one crow remained behind, bent low to the ground and watching me with his shiny black eye. I smiled at him, then squatted down, holding out a hand. Russel strode, bobbing slightly, over to me and gave my open hand a peck. “Yeah, yeah,” I said, rolling my eyes. “I’ll bring you something good tomorrow.”

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Like Stained Glass It’s always harder to judge how tall something is when you’re at the base of it. As I float beneath the high golden-tan cliffs of the many little nooks and coves of the Laurel River Lake, I lean my head back to look toward the sky, peering up, up, up the cliff face at its top. My cousin is up there, barefoot and snug in his neon purple life vest. He leans over the edge to look down below, then takes a few steps back, disappearing from view. A few moments later, he reappears, leaping off the precipice and letting out a jubilant howl as he plunges toward the water. The scream is cut off as he submerges. There’s the space of a breath, then he bobs back up to the surface like a cork, clutching at the neck of his vest and laughing. He turns to me and grins. “Your go!” he says, then pauses for a moment to blow lake water out of his nose. I swallow thickly. I can jump that, I think. It’s not that high up. Paddling over to the water’s edge, I crawl onto the leaf-littered rock and totter to my feet. The rocks are dusty and cluttered with twigs, and a damp path has been marked out by the passage of many feet before mine. My eyes follow the narrow trail as it leaps abruptly up a steep slope, then inches along a narrow walkway on the outside of the cliff before widening out in front of a series of ledges like steps half as tall as I am. “How—how do I get up there?” I stammer down to Ben, already able to imagine slipping and twisting my ankle on that first steep climb. “There’s a rope. On the tree—“ he calls back to me, already swimming toward the shore for another jump. “Hang onto it.”

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Now that he’s mentioned it, I see a dirty off-white nylon mooring cord knotted around a sturdy looking tree at the top of the slope, its end trailing down just far enough that I can grab onto it. Pursing my lips, I take it and begin my methodical ascent. The pebbles of the trail grit beneath me and sting my bare feet. I have to hold half my weight in my arms to make it up, but I breathe a sigh of relief when the ground levels out. Pressing myself up against the cliff face, I inch across the walking ledge to the other side and heave myself up the ledges until I’m standing at the very top of the cliff.

I take a moment to breathe, the climb having winded me slightly, then inch my way out toward the edge of the cliff. From up here, the water seems impossibly far away, glittering green and gold in the noonday sun, like the shards of a broken bottle. Like a stained glass window. It looks miles away, and the pit of my stomach drops out. “I—I don’t think I can do this,” I call down to the rest of my family waiting below. There’s dozens of them, bobbing along in the water, my uncles and aunts with cans of Miller Lite tucked into floating can koozies, the cousins fighting over who gets to use the vacant pool floaty. “Well you can’t climb down,” Ben calls up, already halfway up the trail. “There’s only one way down!” I feel a little sick, because I know he’s right. I’m not happy about it. Screwing my face up, I take a few steps back from the edge like I’d seen him do. In my head, I see myself soaring off the edge of the cliff, but not far enough, dashing myself on the rocks only a foot from the

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base and snapping my legs, or worse, hitting my head. If I floated up wrong, I’d end up face-down and I’d surely drown. Then, regardless of that, I take a few loping strides forward and throw myself off the cliff, one hand fisted over my nose, the other clinging to my life jacket. The ground drops out from beneath me, my stomach twists with vertigo, and before I can even scream, the sun-warmed water closes around me, and the world is silent.

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It’s Something in the Way It's something in the way they look at you with one eyebrow huddled down over one eye like a hiker on Mount Everest hiding from the cold, the other stretching up, up, up to the sky, above you, looking down on you. Their mouth is pulled up to one side like someone’s got a fishook stabbed through the corner of it and is pulling, pulling, their teeth exposed like a snarl, that mocking half smile that says can you believe this guy? It’s something in the way they whisper when you’re around. That’s how you know they’re saying something mean about you. The soft susurration of their silent syllables is insidious, skittering along your spine. It gets you paranoid. What am I doing wrong? It’s something in the way you learn that it’s safer not to be, than to be seen. ✦89✦

If you’re quiet, your presence can’t offend their delicate sensibilities. If they don’t notice you, they won’t notice the way your hair is a little too messy your sweater doesn’t fit quite right, your eyes look so tired, only because you couldn’t sleep because you were thinking about ways you could fix yourself so you wouldn’t deserve to feel like this. So it’s something in the way you keep your head down, you don’t speak unless spoken to, you sit in the corner of the class by yourself because if you disappear then they can’t see you and if they can’t see you, they can’t hurt you.

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DELANEY O’BRIEN Untitled

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Letting Go You were a soft Sunday morning sunrise. You were a breath of fresh air, when I felt like I was drowning. You were everything I needed and so much more. But things that are good never last, especially for me. All good things come to end and the you ares become you weres And you were the love of my life.

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KARA REEDY Malcolm Sedam Winner 2021 Content Warning: child abuse, child death, graphic violence The Hand The drive up to Mother’s house was a difficult one. I didn’t want to break the news to her that I lost yet another job, the third one in the past two months. A block of ice settled into the pit of my stomach, fear twisting its way up my spine. I felt devastated, and I knew that my mother would be upset. I can hear her now; her spiteful words echo deep in the back of my mind, much the same as my ex-wife when she told me to leave. “You’re my greatest regret; you disgust me; I should’ve left you out on the side of the street; why couldn’t you have been a beautiful baby girl?” Her anguish over my existence was the only form of attention I’d ever received from her. I knew that she didn’t love me, but she’s all I had: just Mother and my baby girl, Dolores. Doe was nothing like her mother or grandmother. She was sweet and quiet; she looked at me with caring eyes. Mother was ecstatic when I came home with her, the little girl she’d always wanted. The house had been unstable for the past few weeks now. I came home to silence every day. Doe was usually sleeping in her crib, her little mobile circling her head. Up the hall from my baby’s room usually sat my mother in her own room, leaning back in her old moth-bitten chair. There she sat, watching the days go by without any emotion crossing her face. Every now and then, when I passed by her room, I saw her staring out at the sun. She’d started to look directly into the light, making me worry for her well-being. Every time I tried to warn her about possible blindness, she just looked at me blankly and turned to look back out at the glare.

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I feared what she might do to me that day. She’d never been one to shy away from violence. When I was seven, she threw a glass at me. It shattered, splintering into shards that cut into the skin around my eyes. When I was in the eighth grade, she threw me down the stairwell in the kitchen, said I was too nosey when she had brought home one of her “friends.” My body is littered with scars, courtesy of stupidity on my behalf. What new blemish would I be gifted with today? I pulled up to our driveway, the farmhouse coming into view. The path was flanked by massive elm trees. The sun had just set, leaving a purple hue spread across the horizon to my left, the moon rising slightly above the treeline to my right. As I brought my car to a stop just shy of the front porch, I looked out of my driver's side window to see the two-year-old maple tree standing across from the doorway. Leaves slowly floated down from the branches to the ground, spreading out over the grass and soil. As I watched one leaf hit the ground, I noticed a freshly covered hole to the side of the tree, a single dandelion placed gently on top of the mound. I didn’t spend much time wondering about the strange displacement of soil. Instead, I was preoccupied with an intense sensation of terror pulsating from within my heart. Pulling my keys from the ignition, I noticed a rapid jingling sound. My hands were shaking viciously, my vision was blurred a bit at the sides. Panic flowed through me as I turned in my seat, preparing to enter the house. Stalking my way through into the front room, passing by the beaten furniture, I made my way towards the kitchen. The smell of something wretched filled my nostrils, discomfort churning in my stomach. I peeked my head cautiously through the door to find an empty

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stovetop. The smell of burnt hair and something murky filtered slowly out through the sink’s drain. A bump from above my head came from Doe’s room, distracting me. “Mom? You alright?” I cautiously made my way to the steps, climbing upwards into the dark expanse of the second floor. I assumed that Mother had simply bumped into something above. Arriving at the top of the landing, I noticed all the doors are shut except for the one closest to the top of the stairs: Doe’s room. The door was cracked open, allowing for only a sliver of light from the hallway to seep into her room. There was no sound from the other side of the door as I pushed through and turned on the light. The scene that met my eyes was heartbreaking. Blood had soaked through the fabric that covers the crib, spilling down towards the ground. Droplets were splattered on the carpet, forming a small, splotchy pool. A heavy scent of iron filled the air, making my eyes water. Or were those just tears welling up? I moved forward, hoping to whatever higher power there is that she would be alright, that the blood belonged to Mother instead. No, it belonged to Doe, and she wasn't alright. There she was, lying motionless in her crib. Her eyes were open, but there was no light inside them. Her face was pale, lips tinged blue, and there was blood spread across her tiny, fragile body. That’s when I noticed that she no longer had a right arm. A meaty nub at her shoulder was the only reminder of what had once been another appendage. It looked as though the limb had been roughly carved off with a saw. I felt my body crumble as I sank down to the floor, clutching at the newly stained fabric. I could feel tears stream down my cheeks as I turned my body to look back into the hallway. Straight ahead of me, a faint glow peered out from underneath the bathroom door. Mother. I thought she must have been in there. How could she let this happen to my baby girl? I

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pulled myself up, slipping slightly on the pool of blood that had dripped down from my daughter’s body. There wasn’t much happening in my mind anymore, nothing but a broken shamble walking sluggishly towards the bathroom door. A wet squelching sound followed me as the blood that I’d tripped in coated my shoe, leaving footprints that will last for all of eternity. I shoved the bathroom door open, revealing the humid air of the bath, warmth prickling at my skin. The light that I saw underneath the door frame had been from three candles lit on the top of the toilet seat. The wax had melted downwards onto the seat covering, leaving a colorless film over the plaster. I looked over at the tub to see my mother. Her entire body was submerged in the water, head to toe. She was still dressed; her shoes were even still on. Her hair had been singed off, leaving unsightly boils on top of her scalp. There were three red droplets spread over the surface of the water, but Mother had no cuts as far as I can tell. It wasn’t Mother’s blood. The droplets belonged to Dolores.

“Hold up, so you’re saying that the old lady and the baby are dead? Who chops a baby’s arm off?” Jonny looks at me, bewilderment clear on his face. He had only been half-listening to me, tired of my dramatic retelling. “Yep, straight up dead. The investigation labeled the incident as a murder-suicide by the mother. Poor guy ended up going crazy and dying a year later in a mental asylum.” I close the book of confessionals, sealing it shut for probably another decade or two. We've been looking for days through the library for something about this old farmhouse we want to explore. Needless to say, we found a lot more than we expected.

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“That happened in 1967, a long time ago. No one has lived in this place since then. There was a fire in the barn next to the house sometime in the 80s during a party. My mom said that she was there when it happened. She told me that nobody wanted to go into the house, so they all stayed in the barn. Apparently, the party got out of hand, and some drunk guy accidentally started a huge blaze by lighting a match on top of a hay bale. It completely engulfed the barn. Lucky for them, no one got hurt. Unluckily, they got in trouble with the cops.” I always do a little research before heading to an abandoned property. I don't want to get caught in a situation like breaking any trespassing laws, not again, at least. Every little bit of information helps when going to a new place. I'm stupid, but not that stupid. I always want to be prepared. “I think it's worth it. We haven't explored a place in over a month. I promise I won't get you killed or anything.” Joking tends to put Jonny at ease, but we usually get serious when we are actually inside an abandoned place. Jonny knows I'm his friend and won't let him get hurt. We've known each other for a long time, and we both know we can rely on one another if things get dangerous. “Alright, I’m sure everything will be fine. We usually don’t have any issues.” Jonny looks excited now, intrigue overwhelming the fear that I know is still prevalent inside him. We’ll be okay, as long as we don’t do anything too stupid. The trip between the library and the house is a long one, about an hour and a half. The scorching weather has me second-guessing the decision to go exploring; here’s hoping it cools off. The leather seat clings to my thighs; every slight turn I make pulls my skin painfully. Jonny is putting his hair up into an ugly and ratted man-bun. “Too hot,” he stammers out in a quiet tone.

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The air conditioner is on full-blast, blowing into our faces as beads of sweat run down our foreheads. I hate the summertime; why can't it be cold year-round? This road is jarring. It’s probably been a few years since it's been repaved. The radio has started to play static instead of commercials, letting us know how far we are from civilization. The house isn't that much further, maybe a few more miles. I've gone to this place a few times, always with other people. Out here, it's just rows upon rows of decaying trees and dusty fields. No one comes out here anymore. Well, nobody but us. The homestead is back in one of the clearings situated off the side of the road. It's had quite a brutal history, probably the craziest backstory of any place we’ve gone to. My mind drifts back to the baby, wondering where the arm went. Why would someone even cut off a limb? What’s even the point of that? My eyes catch back onto the road, snapping me back to the main objective: getting to the house. I doubt that anyone will be out this far. Most of the people around here stay in town and avoid these parts. Maybe they're afraid. Perhaps they don’t want to destroy their tires. Why should we worry? It's just a beaten-up shack. I know we'll be fine; hardly anything ever happens to us when we go out and explore. Potholes litter the road ahead, forcing me to dodge one every few feet. The entrance up to the farm is just to the right of me, a rusted mailbox being the only indicator of the hovel’s existence. As I turn up into the path going to the farmhouse, the radio makes a high-pitched scratchy sound. Some sort of strange feedback. I'm not too worried though, radios do that sort of thing, right? Rocks crunch underneath my tires, kicking up dirt behind me as I drive up the track. The path leading up to the house is lined with trees bending inwards towards us, almost like a cage closing in around us. It's quiet out, and the trees are still. There aren't any birds, I

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don't hear any squirrels, and I don't see any deer. It's just quiet, ominously still. Weeds cascade along the path up to the house, engulfing the road entirely in some parts. The clearing in front of us opens up to the house, overgrown fields blocking us in. The sun is just starting to set, the radiance slowly burning out as the air cools ever so slightly, bathing the hemisphere in a violet wash. I look to my left and see the rubble of what used to be the barn, scorched and crumbled. Burn marks rake across the old wood planks that had once been the upstairs flooring inside, a remnant of the fire set all those years ago. I turn my car around so that the hood is pointing out back to the road. I want to make a quick escape if there is any danger while we're here. Something is making me feel uneasy.

“Hey, can you pass me that flashlight? I am not getting stuck inside a dark room without one.” I was turning off the engine, untangling my phone from the cords around it. Jonny just rolls his eyes at me. “We'll be okay. This place doesn't look like it gets very dark inside. Did you grab extra batteries from your house?” Jonny is sifting through the glove compartment, wrenching out two flashlights. Incomprehensible receipts spill out onto the floor beside his boots. “Yeah, they're in the trunk. Let's hope we don't have to deal with any rats or spiders; I hate those things. They always steal my cheese puffs.” I climb my way out of the driver seat, heading to the trunk to grab a few things. Opening the trunk, I see all of the things that we packed. Jonny had grabbed several snacks from his house: a mixture of Cheetos, potato chips, and candy. He also brought his Nintendo Switch. Sometimes, these overnights get boring, so we gotta be prepared, just in case.

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Hopefully, we won’t be bored, though we usually end up asleep halfway through the night. We aren’t very good at being explorers. The main reason I like this place is because of the tree out front. Ivy creeps up the sides of the trunk, and the entire base is cloaked in thick weeds. It has clearly been quite a long time since leaves have decorated every branch. Some bits are dead up at the top, giving off a skeletal form. What amazes me the most about the tree is that it looks eerily like a right hand at some angels. The farmhouse goes up what looks like two stories and has slated sides, yellowed with age. The front porch has a sort of fencing enclosing the sides, hiding the door from view. We step up onto the stoop, dancing around nails and missing floorboards. The door is wide open in an admittedly uninviting way. We venture forwards, cautiously peering around what looks to have maybe been a parlor room at one point. There isn't any furniture to give us a hint otherwise. Beer bottles and plastic wraps litter the floor. People have been here, but the scraps look old, which eases a bit of the tension from our shoulders. We enter what looks to be the kitchen. There is a table with two chairs, and a kitchenette with all of the cabinet doors swung open. There are a few surviving china plates and dishes strewn about, as well as a few canned goods set on top of the cabinets. It's a little odd that there is anything left at all, let alone cutlery and cans. That's rare in an abandoned place. We shift over to a set of stairs situated in the corner, and suddenly Jonny hears a noise. “Hey, did you hear that? It sounds like someone is talking outside.” Jonny walks over towards a window that looks outwards into a field. As he looks out into the area behind the house, I feel a vibration in the ground. I look upstairs, and I see old wallpaper peeling down the

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sides. Out of the corner of my eye, a shadow moves awkwardly. Probably just a bird flying around, not a big deal. “Is anyone out there? I didn't hear anything.” I tiptoe over to where Jonny is looking out. All I see is an empty field overrun with weeds and grass. “Nah, I think I just heard an animal. Probably a deer or something.” Jonny looks back towards the stairs. He doesn’t sound very convinced, especially since we didn't see any signs of wildlife on the drive over. “Let's look upstairs. I wonder if there is stuff still up there.” He makes his way to the stairwell, looking up, clearly trying and failing to play off his discomfort. As we creep up the stairs, we hear a fluttering sound. We barely have time to duck as a bird flies past us and out through the window we’d just been looking out of. I knew it was just a bird, no reason to worry. As we step up onto the landing, we take in our new surroundings. Every door is open, except for one at the end of the landing, furthest from us. The door looks odd. It's a darker color than the others and has scratches going upwards in long strokes. There is a dim light coming from the other side, just visible through the gap between the door and the floor. “We should probably check that one out, just in case someone is in there.” I slowly move to open the door when it suddenly cracks open, ever so slightly. I freeze, waiting for someone to open the door, but no one does. I figure that maybe my weight has shifted the boards causing the door to pop open. I continue towards the door, pushing it open to find a bathroom, a very moldy and disgusting bathroom. I take in a short glimpse of the whole thing. The toilet is overflowing with all sorts of vile waste. The tub has a deep brown stain along the bottom and something

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slimy hanging off the side. My mind flashes back to the man's mother, and I quickly back out of the room, closing the door, the stench of rot sticking in my nose. “Ok, now I know why the door was closed. That was really gross, man.” I walk back towards Jonny, my nose still scrunched up in disgust. We begin to search through the rest of the rooms, one-by-one. There are three bedrooms upstairs and one bathroom, although I’d prefer to never go anywhere near that bathroom ever again. Only one of the bedrooms has a bed inside. Surprisingly enough, the bed frame still has a mattress on top. Unfortunately, the mattress is heavily stained and is currently nesting what looks to be a family of raccoons. We decide not to disturb them, so we move on to the other rooms. Eventually, we settle on the room closest to the staircase. It is the only room that looks remotely clean, and we can lock the doors in case of emergency. I decide to call the room the “Baby Room” because of the singular picture hanging up next to the door. The portrait is of little baby Dolores, sitting with a teddy bear in a frilly dress. She looks happy; it’s horrible to think about what had happened to such a sweet-looking baby. I try to push past the unease at being in the same room that the killing had occurred, instead opting to focus on setting up for the night.

Midnight rolls around, and boredom has set in. We've been sitting up here all night, playing games on Jonny's Switch, munching on the assortment of snacks. The air has cooled significantly, adding a slight chill to the atmosphere. The temperature drop makes me happy that I brought blankets. We've heard a few noises here and there, but nothing that really worried us. There are definitely rats in the walls; they've been clawing inside the paneling for hours now, searching for their next meal. It's starting to grate on my ears, but I doubt moving to a different

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room would curb the annoyance. More than likely, the rest of the house is littered with all matter of pests. We haven’t really talked all that much, remaining mostly in silence. Silence can sometimes play tricks on the mind. “Hey, did you just hear that?” Jonny is looking at the door, alarm clear on his face. “Nah, I didn't hear anything. You're probably just hearing stuff again.” I am far too preoccupied with the cheese puff I’m munching on to worry about imaginary talking again. “I swear, I can hear footsteps coming from the hallway. We didn't really check the ground floor. Maybe we should look around?” Jonny is standing now, holding his flashlight at the door in a defensive manner. “Do we have to? I'd really rather not stumble around in the dark.” I wouldn't admit it to Jonny, but I am definitely still on edge. I’ve never been to this place at night; it definitely takes on a different aura when the sun goes down. “Oh, come on. It'll only take a couple minutes. Besides, we've been sitting for hours; my legs are numb.” Jonny is acting pretty anxious. I figure that I should cut him some slack; I don’t want to put too much pressure on him. “Okay, I guess it couldn't hurt to check.” I stand up, clutching onto my flashlight. We'll just walk around the house as quickly as we can. I don't want to stick around too long outside of our makeshift panic room. We open the door that looks out onto the landing. It is pitch black now, almost like the night has swallowed up the house. We switch on our flashlights, illuminating the upstairs. Shadows bounce across the walls and ceiling, shifting through the floorboards as the light moves. Reflections of the radiance hit something in front of us. It takes us both a few seconds to realize

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the smell. I recognize it first, lifting my flashlight up to point towards the bathroom door. The door’s wide open, even though I knew I had closed it. It wasn't particularly windy tonight, but I figure the door could've been pushed open if a strong enough gust had blown through. I‘m not too bothered by it, but Jonny is visibly shaken, shrinking back a bit. I take the lead going towards the bathroom, a false sense of fearlessness surging through me. I have to hold my breath to avoid the stench of what can only be described as death. I look around inside the bathroom and see everything is still in the same position. Nothing has changed, except for what looks like a few leaves that have blown in. “It's okay. I'm pretty sure it was just the wind.” I close the door behind me, making sure that the door is actually shut, as I walk back over to where Jonny is. Jonny relaxes a bit, still slightly poised for any sign of danger. We slink down into the kitchen. Everything has remained in an orderly sort of disarray. As we head towards the door leading out into what looks to be a living room, a crashing sound draws our attention back into the kitchen. A dish has fallen from the table, covering the floor in jagged little pieces. We must've been moving around too much. Jonny looks at the broken parts with disdain, wary of the new obstacle. Neither of us really question the china; we simply move on, figuring gravity was just doing its thing. The only other room on the first floor is a little sitting-room situated just behind what we assume to be the parlor room and to the side of the kitchen. There's a couch set up to the back of the room. It's placed in front of a back door held shut by the rear of the seat. The sofa is torn up, almost beyond recognition. The stuffing is spilling out, exposing rusted springs within the cushions. A lamp is fixed just off to the sofa's side, a blown bulb still twisted in the center of the

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shade. An aged TV is placed up against the wall, the antenna bent slightly down. Above the TV hangs a family picture. The portrait is of four people. There's a newborn infant up front, cradled in the arms of an older woman. The elderly woman is shockingly frightening to look at. Her skin is leathery, and black dots riddle her face, spreading out from the bridge of her nose. She looks as though she has never been inside, away from the sun. I'm willing to bet that she was a farmer back in her day. Her eyes are what give me chills. They are a deep onyx, sparkling roughly from the flash of whatever camera was used to take the picture. There is a glint of red twisting in between the edge of her cornea. Even her smile scrunching up at the corners of her cheeks looks like it was drawn on as if she was never smiling in the first place. She pulls the focus within the picture. A couple is standing behind her and the baby. They are almost unnoticeable, hiding behind the shroud of the woman in the foreground. The couple in the background are definitely the parents of the baby, sharing the same features. The man looks solemn and depressed; his face drooped and sagged. He has a forced smile, but the smile doesn’t reach his eyes. He seems utterly hopeless, like a kicked puppy. I can’t help but feel sorry for the man. The woman standing next to him appears utterly ordinary and out of place within the portrait. She has bumped up hair, reaching towards the ceiling, chunky orange earrings frame her face. She’s wearing a short, flowery dress that clings tightly to her sides. The woman’s retro appearance reminds me of the father's story about the night he lost both his child and his mother.

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“Hey, Kyra? Do you think this door could lead to the basement?” Jonny's voice snaps me out of the trance I'd been placed in, staring into the photo. He's pointing at a door that's poorly nailed shut just beside the TV. “Maybe. Did you wanna check it out?” I’m not exactly keen on walking through a basement, but I am curious about what we might find. I've never been to a basement that I didn't find anything interesting. “I’m curious about what might be down there. It’s not often that we go to a place and find a part that's undisturbed.” Jonny uses the heavy end of the flashlight to undo the loose nails. It isn’t hard to get through. The nails are practically dust at this point. Jonny inches the door open, shining his light down into the hole. I join him where he is standing at the head of the staircase, peering down into the dark abyss below. We come to a soundless agreement to venture forth. The darkness swallows us whole as we take the first few steps. We slowly sneak our way deep into the dark expanse of the basement, each step resulting in the stairs creaking loudly. The cellar looks untouched, a thick layer of dust hanging in the air as well as on the shelves lined up around the area. Cobwebs are strung up in almost every corner of the room. Insects scatter about, both moving and not. There is a window on the cavern's far left side, far too small to allow even a glimpse of light into the desolate space. The most unnerving bit about the basement is the windowsill. Dozens of insects lie motionless against the windowpane. The creatures look as though they died trying to escape from something. Perhaps we should take the insects as a warning. Standing there, staring at the dead creatures, we don’t notice a shadow crawling up behind us. The door to the basement slams shut, and we are thrown into darkness. We quickly turn around, intending to run, but we can’t move an

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inch. There, standing in front of us, is the elderly woman from the portrait above. Her deep-set eyes stare at us; her face sprayed with little black freckles. She is pale and gangly, a frightening visage to behold. And there, in her arms, is a little girl missing her right arm entirely. Jonny and I faint, falling unconscious before our bodies even touch the jagged rocks serving as the floor of the cellar. All we can remember when we wake up are the woman’s eyes and the child’s missing appendage.

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KAYLA ROBERTS Malcolm Sedam Winner 2021 Phantoms in Their Eyes As the carriage softly bounced back and forth, I could not help but to feel relief to be home. France was beautiful, undoubtedly. The parties and the luxury were unrivaled, but things like that can be shadowed by one’s longing for the familiar. There is an overwhelming sense of comfort in the quiet stability of the English countryside. Reminiscent of a mother’s hand, urging you to go carve your place in the world, but always at the ready to guide you back home. How I wish I had the time to stop and enjoy it properly, delay for a few days and lay about reading upon the little lakeshore. I glanced at the letter poking from my bag, its edges becoming worn and ratted, and remembered what my father’s beautiful, meticulous script contained. No, there would be no time for such things. While his unwritten goal was unarguably to find me a good husband in place of the first botched attempt, whatever the motives were, the Queen would not be kept waiting. As it turns out, the idea of “lady in waiting” sounds far more glamorous than it truly is. The days spent following and fretting over an unassuming woman tend to be grating on the soul. First, Queen Claude’s chronic timidness and everlasting pregnancies, and now the devout and obstinate Catherine. She was marginally preferable, and the people liked her, but nonetheless the regal entitlement can become cumbersome. On this occasion, we had changed no less than four dresses for her dinner with the King. The tying of each ribbon was marred with her sighs of disapproval. A dress of deep maroon was settled upon, and while it was certainly a hue I would never choose to adorn myself with, I was glad for the ordeal to come to a conclusion. As I

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clasped her necklace, the final piece of ensemble, she turned and spoke directly to me. Her eyes filled with something I had not yet seen in her before- hesitation. “Lady Anne, ready yourself with haste. It is long overdue that I present my newest member to His Majesty, the King.”

Like a January snowfall She came barreling in Full of vivid dream Full of forbidden wonder The threat of frostbite a breath away Like a raging fire burning She spins effortlessly Through the room Through my soul A step beyond the charring For a moment her eyes meet mine Torrential waves of a storm unknown Sailors cast to the abyss For fear of realization Covertly her hand grazes my own With currents of electricity Such pain in the spark Of every atom stirring Frozen, burned Drowned, fried Little matter in the method My torture is hers to give She may be the end of me

Mistress? Me? The thought of it burns a hole in the very pit of my stomach. I was

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comforted in my decision to leave, escape from the castle and the never-ending gaze of Henry. Each corridor I used to avoid his passes never stayed safe for long. Each pathway I found that granted solitude was soon filled with his presence. The soul-searching glances, the soft whispers only I could hear, the brief and secretive touches of my hand, my shoulder, my hair all came to a blow when he first proposed a visit to my bedchamber. To leave me tarnished, to leave me pregnant with children he could not claim? No, leaving was the right thing to do. However, the reprieve was cut short. First came the letters, begging my return, begging forgiveness, professing his love. How does one deny a King? I tried my best to civilly and properly proclaim that I could not be a mistress. It was unsuitable, and I would dutifully wait until marriage was blessed upon me. As it turns out, that was less than sufficient. Hever Castle was soon graced with the presence of His Majesty. One must admire the sheer perseverance. There is a certain appeal to feelings that are forbidden. I did not begin this journey with inclinations toward the scandal that would ensue, but in all the persuasion, all the begging, there was something undeniably alluring in the danger behind his eyes. I could not help but to believe that he would move the heavens and Earth to marry me. The voracity in which he spoke I daresay may have softened my heart. I found myself considering possibilities that were outright deplorable, but he was right. The Queen was indeed married to his brother first, and the Bible expressly forbids such a thing. And by rights, he is the King. He is the divine on Earth. Who would I be to deny him? If his marriage were unfounded, would I not be a suitable option? I am a woman of good breeding, of an age to give him the sons he so desperately needs, and I can say without a shadow of a doubt, he loves me immensely. What lady would not be flattered to be the object of such adoration—from a King, no less? His unhidden desire for me awakens feelings

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that I cannot express, for it would be improper to put such words to page. I will say that I find my heart quickening in his presence, my breath grows more rapid at his touch. Yes, I believe marrying the King is the only possible outcome, for his will and my desire are aligned.

Insolence, infidelity become commonplace for you Diversion and deception, your native tongue Kill me with your secrets, annihilate me with lies Love is just a fantasy, a fallacy Of children’s’ blissful slumber Leaping beyond constraints of bitter reality If only you adored me wholly Divinized my gnawing flaws Granted such forgiveness, redemption As the pardon you’ve given countless others Found at ease in our bed, until the breaking light I Lost You

My dearest Elizabeth, as I sit and admire your beautiful little face, I am flooded with waves of regret. Regret of a life I will never have the privilege of knowing; of the nurturing I will never give you. As your plump, rosy cheeks begin to slim into the more angular structure of womanhood, I will have a long-forgotten memory. As you soundly drift away into childhood dreams, I hope that you feel my presence there. I will always be with you, just beneath the surface. I hope that you can cast aside the rumors of me. Whatever they tell you, know this—I

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am your mother and I have always loved you with everything I have, everything I am. I fear I do not have enough time left to adequately say all the things you will need to hear, but above all else, know that you are my heart and soul. Know that you have value, not in spite of being a woman, but because of it. There will be many along your journey that will attempt to coerce you into believing that all sources of power, of relevance, coms from the men in your life. But my little girl, I beg you to take heed of my downfall. Take heed of the outcast I fear your father will make of you. Learn to be great my dear one, of your own accord. Do not fall into the traps they lay for you. Do not give your life as willingly as I have. If my end teaches you anything, I hope it teaches you the importance of keeping one’s self as the utmost priority. If love finds you, I applaud it. Just promise to never lose yourself within its constraints. My time has come, little one. They are beckoning me to the Tower, where I will spend my last days; void of your presence, your laughter, and the little kisses you lay upon my cheeks. I find it impossible to leave you in such a cruel world alone, but I must go with dignity and grace. I will not give them reason to believe these ridiculous accusations hold any weight, nor will I give them the satisfaction of begging and tears. Know that in my final moments, your sweet face will give me all the comfort and all the strength that I need to endure. You are my life, my light, and everything I could have hoped for. The love I have for you will carry me peacefully to the Heavens, where one day we shall meet again.

A barren, empty wasteland This house no longer home I can feel it in the woodwork This place is not my own

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The windows started cracking There are missing chunks of glass The singles, barely hanging on There are patches in the grass The roof is caving in now The floor unduly worn The water pipes are leaking The curtains are all torn The frames stand nearly vacant I can no longer see your face The rug stained with your blood The artistry erased I should burn it to the ground Set fire to your memory Watch the flames eat it whole Pain becomes your entity No, I will walk away Find complacency afar For even the most scorched Earth Leaves forever-present scars.

“Jane,” he called, with a certain detachment I found rather unsettling, “we have preparations to make for the announcement tomorrow, come.” I could not help but to linger on the sight before me. Just moments ago, she stood tall, without a hint of hate in her eyes. She did not accuse him; she did not rebuke him. It was a public display of acceptance of fate. She looked peaceful, almost relieved, and shrouded in an armor of grace which I do not believe any of the thousands of onlookers expected to witness. She never admitted guilt, even in her very last moments. She never begged forgiveness or salvation. One would assume that the gravity of what she had been accused of would warrant admittance at the

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brink of meeting God. Why? Why did she not confess? Little did I know then, but this thought would always lurk in the recesses of my mind, a mystery that seemingly dictated many months to come. As did her memory; the ghost of the woman before me. The one that held his heart and set it ablaze in a way that only real passion could. The halls were still filled with her finery and lavishness. Excess that must be removed. No, this castle would not see the traces of her French extravagance and entertainment. I would not involve myself in his decisions as she did. I must stay quiet, stay subservient, and above all- stay secondary. For as long as I can keep out of the spotlight, I can keep from meeting the same fate. As long as I remain her direct opposite, I will keep my head. But what value does that head hold when it is haunted? Her image surrounds me like a phantom, ever-present, but just out of reach. I see her hiding behind his eyes, the traces of her smile curled into the corners of his lips. His fingers twitch in memory of the softness of her skin. He does not look at me. He looks through me, as if it were I that had died, and that garish woman lingers just beyond the blockade that is my mediocre form. At last! At last, I have solidified my standing in his heart. Only I could give him the very thing he desires. I did what she could never properly do. I have given him a son. I have preserved his legacy. I am his true and final Queen. As I drift to sleep and feel my senses begin to fade, I can hear the midwife yelling. It matters not. I have won.

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But Really, I’m Fine I just googled whether or not depression is considered a disability. I was flooded with links to social security and disability benefits, national helplines, and countless organizations that would provide therapy. I suppose that is a telling enough sign as how I have progressed through life. I am a fairly average woman, of average means. I’ve prided myself on my ability to go unnoticed, to never make waves. My boat looks just like everyone else’s boat, floating through the murky waters of existence. I’ve painted it a color of neutrality to camouflage its very presence. There are no major holes on the outside, very little rusting on the hull. There may be a couple of cracks underneath that immerse the floor with water sometimes, but generally I can scoop it out with my faithful little bucket before anyone notices. Cover them up with a few strips of duct tape and just like that, it’s fine. I’ve never considered the notion that I could have a disability. I don’t look like someone with a disability. I don’t function like someone with a disability (or so I let myself think). I am employed, in college, successfully raising five amazing children, and I have a husband that loves me. My life reeks of mundane normalcy. I couldn’t possibly have a disability. Disabilities are apparent, right? If I had one, I certainly wouldn’t have to google it. Really, I’m fine. As I look at my phone, I am actively trying to dodge a message from my close friend Shelly. Shelly is a wonderful woman, a surgical nurse, and a mother. She is beautiful, well organized, and probably the most nurturing person I have ever met. She just fits so fluently in any crowd she encounters, finding and befriending every walk of life. Conversation is effortless for her. She is like a professional surfer, waiting for the next hurricane so she can ride the waves with an ease you only ever see in movies. I cannot recall a moment that there has not been a

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smile on her face. The message is quite simple: “Hey, are you guys still coming over on Saturday?” This is the third day in a row that she has gone unanswered. My Saturday is free. I have no obligations to bar me from attending a cookout at Shelly’s immaculate farmhouse. I enjoy being there. She is a phenomenal cook, and I have a decent relationship with everyone she has invited. I have even had it marked on my calendar for quite some time. Still I find myself grasping for reasons to back out. It seems that the duct tape has lifted a bit, and I am not sure I can repair it in time for the party. Depression is a covert struggle, ever swimming just beneath the surface. It is the voice whispering to me that I will never be good enough, that I am not loved. It is the driving force either keeping me awake until the sun rises or making me sleep for twelve-hour increments, with no in-between. It makes me forget to eat, forget simple tasks, forget how to feel basic human emotions. It makes me cry when I should laugh; it makes me lash out unprovoked. It makes me stand in the shower for an hour-and-a-half, scorching water burning my face and my mind filled with the vast emptiness of nothing at all. It is sitting at the dinner table, surrounded by my family, and fighting the urge to scream uncontrollably, as loud as I can. It is looking into my children’s faces and feeling like I have failed them. It is the plaguing sense that my husband doesn’t actually love me, he merely tolerates me. That he walks around me like he’s dodging the rocks and broken shells because if he steps on one of them, I may capsize. It is feeling eels slithering under my skin, trying desperately to break free. It is the constant wounds around my fingertips caused by incessant picking because I just don’t know what to do with my hands. It is the siren song that beckons me to envision driving my car full speed off a bridge, plunging gracefully into the river below. But really, I’m fine, because I would never actually do it.

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I have read that depression stems from various inherent biological and environmental factors. I can attest to the fact that yes—my brain is probably a little broken, and yes—I likely have a solid familial tidal wave of ineffective coping abilities. But the trauma? The trauma is torrential. My life thus far has been a series of situations meant to drown me. I have faced things that have harbored bitterness and self-depreciation. I was abused by those meant to care for me. I was abandoned by those meant to protect me. I was betrayed by those meant to love me. I guess if you hear often enough that you’ll amount to nothing, you tend to believe it. As a small child, I found myself questioning my worth, my place in life, my abilities. From a young age, I learned to keep quiet, stay hidden, and above all, always look like everyone else. If I could blend seamlessly into a crowd, if I could disappear, then I wasn’t broken. If I was polite, if I got good grades, if I didn’t draw attention to myself, then I was fine. I forced myself into a placid exterior existence, all the while my interior raged at a Category 5. I guess that is the problem with researching a topic about yourself. All of the things I’ve pushed into the darkest, least visible parts of my mind are brought to light, served openly and publicly on a silver platter for the world to see. Forcing myself to read about this topic, to come to terms with the unavoidable symptoms I face was my biggest struggle in writing this piece. I have spent my life masking it, and personifying this on paper for other people to read was a grueling strike to the secrecy I have learned to value. To write about it for myself was fine. To write about it for public consumption was akin to being stranded in the middle of the Atlantic, with a chunk of plywood as a raft. Putting a name, a classification to the malady in my subconscious makes it a real, tangible being. Much like water and existence are codependent, I have been dependent on hiding my depression, tucking it away neatly into a vault. Under the best

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circumstances, water gives life. Under the worst, you drown. Survival is contingent on the stability of your vessel, much like success in life is contingent on the stability of your mind. To let others know that my boat is damaged has equated to highlighting my shortcomings. I am reminded of the time I won a little orange goldfish at a county fair. I begged to play the game where you throw a ping pong ball into a cup of water. If you make it in, you get a goldfish. With all my determination, my tiny little hand threw that ball directly into the cup. To my mother’s horror, I was handed a plastic bag filled with water and a bug-eyed fish swimming inside. She told me not to name it, because it would likely die. Those cheap, ill-begotten fish couldn’t live very long, and it was better not to get attached. I have spent thirty-three years avoiding the label of depression. If I named it, I would get attached. I named the fish, and of course in a short amount of time, it died. I haven’t named this, and it just won’t die. Maybe that’s the trick. I stood over the toilet, face stained with tears, sobbing this poor little fish’s name. If I can do the same now, have a funeral for the omnipresent sea monster named Depression, then maybe I can send it back into the depths from which it came. I know it can never truly die. Even after writing this, I faked a headache to avoid going to Shelly’s. I had my clothes picked out, everything was ready, and still I spent the night entombed in a blanket, zombified by the TV screen. The guilt I feel is overwhelming, but the impossibility of putting on my “happy face” and mingling outweighed my shame. It will always be just under the surface, waiting to chip away at the little cracks in my boat. But now maybe I’ll see it more clearly. Maybe I’ll let other people see it. Rather than patching it up with my limited amount of duct tape, maybe I’ll let someone come onboard with a pail of glue. If I put a name to it, obtain the long-overdue diagnosis and accept it as a part of me, then maybe I can manage it. Maybe I’ll go to the next cookout. Maybe I’ll paint my little boat a

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bright shade of electric green, emblazoned with a capital “D” on the side of it. Maybe I really will be fine.

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CHARLOTTE WALDRON Malcolm Sedam Winner 2021 We All Live in the Woods Once upon a time, there was a girl who lived in the west end of the city. It doesn't matter what city—you can pick your favorite. They're all the same in the end: different street names, different accents, but filled with the same people, the same dangers, the same stories—the same, but different in their own ways. The girl is me, and this is my story. Some people thrive in the woods: living in nature, watching the moon set and the sun rise, listening to the bees hum, walking into cathedrals formed by giant oaks and pines, but we all live in the woods in some way. Cities are just forests made of concrete and steel. The buildings grow, stretching up into the night sky as they reach the heart of the landscape, crashing down when they grow old and making room for new growth. Fireflies blink their red and yellow tail lights as they swarm through the streets, streams make their way in grids past the sidewalks until they disappear into the drains at each corner, wolves prowl through the alleys, howling into the night. Some parents go into the woods and gather food; mine leaves at night to work her shift at the gas station. I’ve lived in this city my whole life. I can’t imagine trading my solid, concrete forest for a natural one. They’re very different battles of survival, yet similar at the same time.

Gran lived just a few miles away in a tiny house shoved between a lumber store and a

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run-down mom and pop pizza place. At 2:30 in the morning, she had called my mom and told her she was coughing and wanted some medicine. “Grape cough syrup,” she had said. “That always does the trick.” It was no good telling her that the flavor made no difference or that drugstore cough syrup wouldn’t fix a smoker’s lungs: when grandma told you to do something, you did it. Mom had protested. She was at work, it was late at night, Gran needed to go to bed. None of it worked. “Get your girl to do it,” she had insisted. “Or is she too lazy?” I didn’t want to go to Gran’s house. Our relationship had never been the best and besides that, walking through town alone set me on edge every time. Nothing ever happened of course, but that didn’t change the fact that it made my skin crawl. Plus, the night was cold. Cold and dark. Yet here I was, walking alone through the grimy streets of the West Side. I listened to the thumping sound of my boots on the pavement as I made my way through town. There was no money to spend on a taxi: a two-mile walk didn’t warrant such an extravagance, and Mom had the car. Halfway into my trip, I decided calling an Uber might almost be worth it, but the cold had already killed the dying battery of my phone. So I walked: eyes down, shoulders forward, hands in my coat. I glanced up briefly, checking the street before I crossed the intersection. It was empty, of course. No one was out at three in the morning in this weather. No one sane, that is. The longer I walked, the more numb my fingers got, and I shoved them deeper into the pockets of my coat, wrapping around the bottle of syrup. The white fog of my breath penetrated

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the darkness briefly each time I exhaled, dissipating as quickly as it formed. Even through my hat, my ears burned from the cold. I bent my head into the cold, my hat a bold, cheerful red that mimicked my chapped skin, almost as bright as the stoplight that swung overhead. I heard a shuffle of feet that snapped me into awareness, and out of the corner of my eye, I saw a figure prowling in the shadows. A tingle went through my body as my heart leapt in my chest. Instinctively, I reached for my back pocket and stared at the dead black screen of my phone, pretending like I had someone to talk to, someone who would know to look for me if I went missing. The figure stayed put for a second, then slunk towards me and hollered, his voice cutting through the empty streets—I ignored him and concentrated harder on my phone. You should look up. They don’t bother you when they know you’ve seen their faces. I glanced up, my eye catching only a flash of white teeth that caught in the beam of a grimy streetlamp. “Nice hat.” I stared at the sidewalk and pretended I hadn’t heard. Maybe he was talking to someone else, a friend from a neighboring alley perhaps. “Hey!” I walked faster. “Little girl—bitch—I’m talking to you!” Call someone. Do something. I put my cellphone to my ear, “Hello? Hi Gran…yeah, I’ll be five minutes…yeah…” I

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rambled into the dead phone. I focused on my footsteps, one at a time: right, left, right—thump thump thump, matching with my cloudy, panicked breaths: out, in, out. He followed me until I exited the thicket of rundown buildings and alleyways. I saw his shadow move down a broken path in my peripheral vision and disappear into the construction work on the other side of the street. I paused against a streetlamp, which buzzed like a swarm of mosquitoes. It threw an oily shadow onto the low-strung telephone wires hanging like blackened vines over the sidewalk. Two more blocks, and I’d be safe. Two more streets until I arrived at Gran’s house. I shivered from the cold, or maybe from the idea of going the rest of the way alone in the dark. I pulled my hat down over my ears and continued walking. Left, right, left—thump, thump, thump. My feet beat along the pavement like a heart. One more block. Right, left, right—thump thump thump. The construction ended. Another streetlamp flickered over the cracks in the sidewalk. I couldn’t shake the feeling I was being followed. Ahead of me, I could just see the porch of Gran’s house. I passed in front of the lumber store, its windows casting a film of warm light across the sidewalk. My breath caught the light, trailing behind me like cigarette smoke. Gran’s house was next. I walked faster and fished my keys out of my pocket as I reached the small porch, jiggling the door key in the stiff lock. Poking my head around the corner of the doorframe, I called out. “Gran?” I waited, but there was no answer, “I’m here with your medicine.” I shut the door behind me and breathed a sigh of relief as I bent over to unlace my boots

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in the cramped entryway. Rule number two of Gran’s house was you take your shoes off when you come in. Rule number one was do what you’re told. Straight ahead of the entryway was the narrow stairwell leading to the second floor. I tiptoed up the creaky stairs in my socks and found her asleep, the pale green lamp by her bed still on and casting a sickly light over the room. Her book was set aside on the table with the lamp, next to the ashtray with a snuffed-out cigarette in it. I sighed and set the cough syrup on her dresser for her to find when she woke up. Not that it’ll do any good. I headed back downstairs to warm up a little. Maybe I’d even spend the night on Gran’s couch instead of walking all the way home again. I went into the kitchen and moved around, pouring myself a glass of water and rooting through the jumbled drawer under the microwave for a charging cord to fit my dead phone. I pulled one out and stuck it into the wall outlet, leaving my phone to charge on the counter next to the toaster. A sound came from the stairwell and I started. “Gran? It’s just me.” Go back to bed. She didn’t answer. I called to her again, but there was still no answer. Fear rising in my chest, I snuck out into the entryway, peering up the stairs to see if she was out of her room. “Gran?” A voice purred behind me. “Yes, little girl?” I spun round in the doorway and saw him. The man from the alley. I opened my mouth to scream, but he took a step closer.

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“Let’s not have any of that.” His eyes narrowed, raking over me as he took another step toward me. I shivered, pressing my back against the wall by the kitchen. I was silent, my throat closing in. The space was too small—he was only an arm’s length from me now. I fought to keep my breathing steady but wasn’t getting enough air. I shuffled to the left. If I can get to the stairs, I can wake Gran. He won’t have me cornered. His eyes followed me. He held out his hand, asking for me to wait, to stay and talk to him. He wasn’t going to hurt me, he said. Why wouldn’t I talk to him? Air filled my lungs and I started up the stairs, but his rough hands yanked me back towards the door, one of them covering my mouth before I even had time to yell. There was barely room to struggle against him in the tiny space. The walls were too close together: every movement sent elbows and feet into them. His arms slammed me into the wall, forcing the air from my chest. Hot breath burned in my ear and I lashed out. Something cracked when my head made contact with him, and he howled. My hat slipped to the floor as his fist tangled into my hair and wrenched my head backwards. Stupid. You stupid idiot. Why didn’t you lock the door? Why did you let the wolf in? His hand released from my mouth for a second and I screamed, louder than I had ever let myself. I could have screamed until my throat was raw and I passed out or until my lungs burst, but the hand clamped over my mouth again, and I slipped on the melted snow our boots had tracked in. We both dropped, his elbow landing in my gut. I choked for air as I squirmed, one arm held above my head, the other pinned under his knee. I heard the stairs creak somewhere above my head and he looked up. I struggled, but he

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grabbed a fistful of hair and pushed my head to one side. My cheek was pressed into the cold tile of the entryway, my view blocked by the hat that had fallen from my head. It pooled on the floor in a mass of red, like tail lights reflected in a gutter. Red like blood. “Hold it there, woman,” he barked. He moved his hand away from my head, but I couldn’t see where it was. Gran said something, and he snarled at her. A cold, blunt object pressed into the soft hollow under my chin. What wolf needs claws to catch his prey when he can put a bullet through it instead? Gran screamed something at him, and he shifted a little, swinging the weapon to face her. That one second of distraction was all I needed. I slammed one knee upwards into him and wrapped the other over his ankle, throwing my shoulders into the arm that pinned me to the ground. His gun fired into the ceiling as I forced my weight into him, and I shoved myself away quickly, head spinning from the sound. He’d dropped the gun. It had fallen under me somewhere, and I felt the warm muzzle against my leg as I scrambled back. He lunged toward me as my fingers wrapped clumsily around the grip and through the guard. He shoved me to the floor again, and pain shot through my head, sharp and concentrated at first—like a knife or a claw stabbing my skull—then duller as the pain spread. I screamed, my hands pressed between his stomach and mine, his hands around my throat. A second gunshot rang in my ears. There was blood on the floor: real blood this time. His full weight fell on me and my gaze fell again at the hat near my face. Red like blood: Red like streetlights. I shut my eyes. We all live in the woods. He was a wolf. I was the prey. Grandma, what big arms you have...

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All the better to hold you with! Grandma, what long legs you have... All the better to run to you! Grandma, what sharp teeth you have... All the better to eat you with, little girl. Everything went stone still for a moment, and then I felt someone drag his body away from me. Gran was beside me, holding me in her arms, shaking all over. Or maybe I was the one shaking. My hands were covered in blood, but not my own: his. I sobbed into Gran’s shoulder and tried not to think about the color, or the smell, or the feeling of it between my fingers. I looked at his body and gagged. I had the gun in my hands still, now covered in his blood. My hat still lay on the floor, garishly bright amid the dark stains on the tile. It’s not the color of blood: it’s too bright. Blood is dark. Lights in puddles and pavement are dark. Everything here was dark. Dark and splotchy and unfocused. I couldn’t feel the blood covering my palms. I could only feel my heartbeat thumping in my chest.

I woke up on the couch, Gran next to me. I tried to sit up and regretted it instantly. My head throbbed where it had hit the floor, and I could tell it had been bleeding. I felt it in my hair when I brushed my fingers against it. I had a concussion, Gran said. I’d never had one before, but I wasn’t surprised: my arms—and my whole body, really—felt like wood. Stiff, clumsy, slow. “Did I—is he…?” I didn’t want to believe what had happened—what had almost

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happened to me—and the words caught. She nodded. “The police are on their way.” I looked at my fingers, still coated in blood. I’d killed the wolf. I was safe. I was strong. Tears burned in my eyes, and I let myself sob into a pillow. It struck me as ironic—that I would cry now, when I was safe—but it was a relief somehow. Tears are cleansing. They washed the sweat off my cheeks and dripped onto my hands, tracing pale lines that stood out through the red and black on my palms. The wolf could have gotten his prey, but not this time. The wolves don’t always have to win.

The last few nights I had a recurring dream. In it, I walk the same alleys I had the night of the attack. Each night the same thing happens. Eyes gather in the shadows, their snarls and howls chilling me to the bone. My hands glow red like blood, and a pack of animals slinks close to the gutter, drawn by the scent. Each creature eyes me, raising his hackles. I run away, but they always chase me, breaking the windows of the house where I find refuge and snapping their jaws at my face. My fear paralyzes me, but I can’t escape, can’t call out. When their claws draw first blood, I wake up. Then last night the dream changed. The same light swung above me, casting its red glow onto the pavement. This time, I raised my hands to the sky, letting the light trickle up my sleeves, and when the wolves appeared, I let the light spill onto my face. The red glow wasn’t blood. Red is courage, strength, beauty—and it filled me. The creatures yapped and whined, tucking their tails and flattening their ears. I stood my ground, watching them shrink and feeling the heat of

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the light that warmed my body.

The next time I walked alone through the streets of the city, I reveled in it. I walked past the hedgerows of chain link and barbed wire, through canopies of steel and concrete, across swarms of fireflies that blinked their amber lights as they passed me by. Once, I met a wolf who snarled and bared its teeth, howling when I wouldn’t cower in fright, but I was done running from them. Never again would I scurry through the paths of my home, keeping my eyes down and ignoring the beauty and the lights in the name of protection. When he growled his threats, I looked into his eyes, and I saw his fear. What big eyes you’ve got… And I laughed.

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ADAM WARD Am I Not Special Enough? It’s easy to forget where you came from, but it’s even easier to forget where you’re going. I don’t know where I’ve heard that before. Maybe I overheard it from the men in the white coats during their highly educated mumblings. Then again, maybe I came up with it all on my own. I am pretty special. I wouldn’t say I’m one of a kind, but I am not like the rest. Everyone else arrived here in different ways. Some came in the backs of trucks or in large vans. They were stacked on top of each other in grey steel cages held in place by black rubber cords. I’ve only seen them coming a few times, I’m not kept with them. I am special, I don’t socialize with all of them. This is fine with me anyways, they are foreigners. All they ever do is scream and cry, they claw at each other through the cages. They are savages, crazed, and wild. I really have nothing in common with them. Overall though it is good that I never take the time to know them, they are never here long. I don’t remember too much of my early years, but I do know I didn’t come from here. I remember the smell of my mother, but not what she looked like. Unlike everyone else I was born in the wild. I got to breathe fresh air and feel the sun on my face. Though it is all but a distant memory now, I at least have memories. I remember living in boxes and small cages as I went from place to place, but I don’t remember where I was going. I was moving a lot back then. I never got to stay long in one place or with one family. I was in constant motion, but it wasn’t all bad. I got to see many children. Though they were different than me and much bigger than me, they loved me. They were always hugging and holding me, I was actually quite fond of it all.

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The children always had the best snacks and toys. I remember their balloons, they would always fly so high. I had been able to fly once, but I couldn’t see anything from the bottom of the plane. It was cold and scary, but even though I was alone I knew I was going somewhere special. I was going to California. California was beautiful, but was very different than the jungle I had known. The air was so dry and the trees…well the few trees I had seen were not the kind I would enjoy climbing. They had no branches to lay across and no vines to swing on. There were so many new sounds and smells. It was pretty awesome, but like before I was always on the move. By the time I was four years old I had found myself living in a large building. This didn’t seem too out of the ordinary for me anymore. I had spent plenty of time inside buildings, but this one was different. This building had no children to play with. I no longer got to roam freely from room to room entertaining myself. No more cute outfits and candy. I was quite fond of one candy: Reese’s pieces. They were my favorite and I would always get them on special occasions. I thought it was clever that everyone knew that they were my favorite, but then again that’s probably why they named me accordingly. My name is Reese and I am a rhesus macaque,although now I am often called R1 by the men in the white coats. I am special. There have been many others—I’ve heard them talk about R2 and on—but I’m the only one who gets to stay close to the men in white and I’m the only one who gets treats. Where I live now is pretty neat if I do say so myself. I have a whole laboratory to myself where I get to do very important work. I have my own cage in the corner, and though it’s a cage it’s pretty nice. It’s much larger than the cages they keep the savages in. I even have a hammock in my cage.

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It’s a pretty large room filled with desks and filing cabinets on one side. On the other side of the room there are big windows that look into our research area. In our research room we have cages of white mice stacked against the wall. I always want to play with them, but they are not my pets. They are important research subjects for the men in the white coats and myself to run tests and experiments with. Through a door adjacent to my cage is a hallway that leads to where they keep the savages. I don’t ever go there and honestly that's fine by me. I don’t know what work they do in there, but I am happy with my current arrangement with my friends. I bet the others don’t get treats like me. Over the years I’ve been a part of many research projects. The men and I have worked with mice, cats, and even once rabbits. We would line their cages up in rows and feed them certain pellets. I tried to eat one once, but apparently they were not meant for me and I was put back into my cage. Our projects were very important. I would hear the men discussing the details all the time. Though I had no idea what they were really talking about, I knew it was very important. I was very proud of my mice, they would always work hard and make the men happy. I would take time to go down the rows of cages and tap on them to let the mice know they have performed very well and to keep up the good work. The roles of these animals shouldn’t be taken lightly. They spend every day once they arrive working hard. Once they have completed their jobs they relax and are taken to a new home. I wonder what their new home is like. I don’t really get the opportunity to say goodbye or see them leave, but I am sure they are rewarded greatly for their time and efforts. I have heard the men talking about how the savages go back and forth between here and another place. It is called the California National Primate Research Center. I have heard them talk in detail about it before. Apparently, a majority of the tests that the men

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worked on with the savages had to be performed there. The men complain how things would be easier if they could just do everything in house. I don’t know why they need to work with all of them though, I am special and can help them out more than any of those savages. I grew fond of my mouse clan. I think in their own way they are special too. Though they are just little creatures who cannot speak or do much of anything really, they are my responsibility. I remember one time I must have messed up. I don’t know what I did, but the men began to do things I’ve never seen before. They had taken some of the mice out of the cages and were looking at them closely under microscopes. It was very odd, especially once I realized that my mice had died. I remember the horror I felt inside. I had failed my colleagues and must have lapsed in my duties. How could I have known that the result would be that the mice would’ve died? The important thing is I needed to be better. I watched the men as they laid out the mice onto small trays filled with a blackish brown waxy bottom. This is the first time I had seen the men do this. They continued on pulling out small tools, I wasn’t quite sure what they were. I clearly remember seeing a knife. They also pulled out a box of small jars. They then began to perform surgeries on the mice. I thought they were long dead, but maybe the men in the white coats could save them. I hoped so, they were such good mice. As the men worked hard to perform these intricate procedures on my mice, I just patiently waited in my cage looking through the window. Though I know I wasn’t supposed to name or get close to the mice because they were my subjects, I couldn’t help that I grew fond of them. I would always find myself feeling bad for them when the men in white would poke them with needles to give them medicine. I shouldn’t have felt bad, the medicine was to help them and that was what was important. They were being taken care of. The men in white were

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working hard to save them, but I realized that it wasn’t going well. The men had begun to cut open the mice and were removing parts of them. They would pull out a pink fleshy colored part and then lay it under the microscope. Taking turns looking, the men would write in their notes. What were they seeing? I was so curious. I wanted to know what they found, what had caused them to die. I really hoped it was a fluke and not something I had done, I don’t think I could have lived with myself. These small mice had been working under me and it was my duty to protect them and keep them safe. If I failed what would that mean for me? Would the men in white fire me? They continued taking notes and then putting small pieces of my mice into the jars then putting the jars into a refrigerator. I don’t really know what the purpose was, but I was very curious. When they had finished all of that the men in white removed the mice and threw them into a large plastic bag. Why would they do that? Why would they not properly bury our mice, my mice? I will always remember the shock and shame I felt in that moment. These mice had worked so well and this is how they were treated. Maybe they were really sick and the men needed to protect the other mice, this is what I told myself. I spent the next few days feeling sullen in my cage. I didn’t want to come out and face my mice. I was ashamed of how I had let them down. I had finally gained the composure to address the mice and assure them that this would never happen again, but they were gone. At some point the men in white had removed all the mice and had sent them on their way. I didn’t get to say goodbye. I didn’t get to thank them for their service. My mice were gone and I was crushed. I had lost my purpose, why would the men in the white coats do this to me? I had tried to work so hard and do a good job. Were they mad at me?

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A month or so had gone by and I would find myself wondering about my mice. Did they go off to another center like the other savages did? I worried about them, I had a lot of time to myself these days. The men in white didn’t come by as often. When they did come, they would just give me a small shot of medicine and then check my health. I didn’t mind the physical exams. It reminded me of the days when I was younger and the children would play with me. I missed the feeling of being held and being loved. I missed socializing with the men in white too. I would even have been okay with some time with the savages. At least then I could know more about them and where they go. I could do my own research even. What makes them tick, why do they fight and scream? Do they not understand the work we are doing is very important? I find myself wondering at times what exactly the work we are doing is. I know it is important, I hear the men in white say it all the time. “R1, we are working on the forefront of this research!” They would always tell me with a smile. How we are making great changes in science. I am special, unlike the savages I am doing this work alone. I remember one day being super excited. During my routine physical one of the men in white told me we had a new study to do. I was so ready to redeem myself from the last study. I was going to do so much better with my mice this time and everyone was going to be so happy in my work. I stood by the window looking as they moved in my mice again, one by one putting them into their individual cages. This time something seemed different though. They must have grown because my mice had doubled and tripled in size. They clearly must have been thriving at their new center while they waited to return. The man in white led me into the room so I could tap on the cages and say hello. Then I realized that these were not my mice. These were not mice

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at all. These were rats! Why were we working with rats? I wish I knew, I still wanted to apologize to my mice. I would never get the chance. The rats were nice and plump, very healthy. This would be a good start for me, I just have to keep them in good health and the men in white will be impressed. The next week I wasn’t able to go into the research room with the men in white as they went into work with the rats. It was frustrating to be stuck in my cage trying to look through a window to see what was going on. How am I supposed to do my job if I cannot go into the room and work alongside them? Did I not matter anymore? I don’t know why I felt so concerned then. Would they send me off like they did the mice? The next week though I was back to my work. I went back into the room with the men in white. I went down the rows of cages and tapped one by one. I noticed something different though with the rats. They have been shaved on parts of their bodies. The soft white fur had pink smooth patches on their backs and on the tops of their heads. This was very strange. What tests were they doing? As the weeks went on I would see the men in white working alone in the room with the rats and then the following weeks I would be allowed back in to conduct my research. I began to notice some of my rats were missing. Where did they go? I would frantically check their empty cage, tapping on them. I would look under the shelves, I was deeply concerned. If I messed up again the men in white would be mad at me. I didn’t want to be held accountable for a second time of a research failure. The men in white could tell I was upset, but this time they did something for the first time… they punished me. I was upset which I thought was completely understandable, but a man in white came up from behind me and stuck me with a needle.

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Everything went blurry then and I woke up in my cage. Why had they done this to me? I am special, did they forget? Angrily I banged on my cage. The need to let me do my work, how dare they! I need to see my rats, some are missing. I remained there for the next week in my cage observing from a distance. The physicals still came routinely, but now I didn’t get my treats. I obviously have upset the men in white and this was my punishment. The next time I was allowed to do my work I had to wear a harness around my waist and shoulders. Attached to the harness was a leash. Did they think I was a dog? They must be confused, but still I was allowed to resume my work. I began to see very strange things over the next couple weeks. The rats still diminished in their numbers, but now I began to see that they had stitches sewn into their shaved spots. I don’t know why, maybe they are getting sick and that’s why they are missing. The rats with the surgeries are the ones who were saved. I felt a bit foolish, how could I have doubted the men in the white coats. They are there to do important things and obviously they want the rats to stay healthy as much as I do. It had been quite a while since I had heard the screams of the savages. They must have been away for a while because I almost had forgotten about them. I always had wondered what their studies were. I know it wasn’t as important as mine, I am special and I work alone. I still wonder what goes on in their research room. Maybe someday the men in white will have me work over the savages. I could be a role model for them, I was very good at my job. It had been a couple months now that we had been working with the rats. I was proud of our work and the men in white were happy also. Then one day something very strange happened. The men in white were working alone in the research room with the rats and I was having my

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physical. I could see into the room very clearly at the moment. What I saw was shocking and I couldn’t grasp what I was seeing. The men were once again huddled over tables like before with the mice during their operations. They had their tools and microscopes out, but this time it was different. I could see my rats in small cages along the table and some of the cages were empty. This was not the normal protocol, something was wrong. I looked closer, there were rats tied down onto white plates. Their legs stretched out and tied firmly so that they couldn’t move. The men had cut the stitches out and were looking with their microscopes. One man had a pointy tool and was poking into the head of a rat. The rat's head has been opened! Why is his head opened? What has happened to my rat? I can see the tail of the rat turning and twisting each time the man pokes. Why are they hurting my rat? These are my rats. I have dedicated my time to them. I am responsible for them. I wait, watching and hoping that they will sew them back up and put them away into their cages. That isn’t what happened. I watched the men in white one by one take a rat from its cage. One by one they were opened up and examined. One by one the men in the white coats pushed their fingers down on the back of my rats’ necks. I watched the men in white snap the necks of each of my rats. I watched each last rat being dropped into the black bag. What has happened? This wasn’t right, this made no sense at all. A part of me grew cold that day and nothing was the same. I didn’t know these men, I don’t know my colleagues anymore. I don’t know who to trust now, I was alone. My concern was growing over the next couple weeks. The lab was quiet again. My rats were dead and now I was left to wonder what happened to my mice. I began to hear the cries of the savages again in the following days, they had returned for their research studies. I began to

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wonder again, was it time for me to move to the other room to help work? That would make sense, I had been training for a very long time and my knowledge would be a great asset to the men in white. One day the men in white came into my room and were talking about a study that was almost completed. This is a great thing for me I’m sure. Finally I will be able to start on new work. I wondered, would I get more mice or rats? I would love to have rabbits again. I felt such excitement again, my purpose was back. We all can move on from the massacre of my rats. I was ready to move on, but then something changed. The next morning when the men in white came into my room they brought in another cage. I didn’t need another cage, mine was perfectly fine. This other cage was identical to mine, though. Why would they need another cage for me, this was very odd. The next day proved to be even more strange and unprecedented, I would receive a guest. Another rhesus macaque was brought into my room. It was a female, she was smaller than me and seemed a little scared. She didn’t scream like the savages, she just hid in the corner of the cage curled up in a ball. I was interested, but still confused as to why she was here. I had heard the man in white say her name, H1: Control. What a strange name, I mean all I’ve ever been called was Reese or R1. I suppose I shouldn’t judge and I should be welcoming to the new colleague. That afternoon a man in white came to give me my physical and then put my harness on me. This was new, I had no need for the harness. I had no subjects to study. I must have been moving on to my next assignment, I was ready to accept the challenge. The man in white walked me to the back of the room where the door leading to the hallway where I could hear the savages crying and screaming. It was time and I was ready to show the men in white all of what I had learned. I hear the man in white speak to another man

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behind the door. “I’ve got R1: Control, ready here.” The door opens and he passes the leash to my harness to the other man. Wait, I thought to myself, why did he call me control? What does that mean? I overheard them talking and saying my experiment had been successful. That at least was comforting, I had been a success. I knew I was special. He walked me down the hall and I entered a room that was eerily similar to my mice and rats’ research room. There were much larger cages though. These were about half the size of my cage and there were no hammocks. There were just empty cages stacked against the wall, this was very odd. Two more men in white walked into the room with us, one of them had a long pole with a rope looped at the end, what a strange object and what was this for. Within a second though that loop was around my neck choking me. I fought for my life, what was happening! Don’t they know who I am? I am special! I have been their friend and colleague for so long. Was this because of the rats? I try hard to pull the rope off of my neck, but before I can I feel the familiar sting of the needle in my back. I begin to feel tired and everything is going blurry. The last thing I remember is one of the men in white saying put him in group A. I wake up to screaming in my ear and a hand pulling at me. I am in the cages with the savages. This has to be a mistake. Did they forget who I was? I’m Reese, I am R1! The savages are slamming their bodies against the cages and howling. I have no idea what is going on, these foreigners must have lost their minds. I don’t belong here, I am not like them, I have important work I should be doing. A man in a white coat walks to my cage, clearly he knows this is a mistake. I wait for him to open my cage and correct this mix up, but instead a pole comes into my cage and pins me to the back. What is this? They have to be confused and with that I feel the pinch of the needle again. This time I didn’t feel tired, just sore and a little angry. I guess I kind

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of understood why the savages were upset all this time. This was anything but friendly, I wasn’t used to this. Over the next few weeks I remained in the cage deafened by the howls of the savages. Every couple days the men in white coats would come and stick me with needles. Sometimes they would put me to sleep, not a real sleep. I still knew what was happening, but I couldn’t move or feel. I would float above the ground in their arms like one of those balloons the children used to play with. They would put me on the table and shine a light on me. This last time they shaved my chest, I immediately remembered the rats. What are they doing? They carry me back to my cage and shut the door. When I finally am back to normal I look at my chest. There are no stitches that I can see so I must not be sick. Why though, why shave my chest? I look down the line of cages and the groggy savages. They too all have been shaved, I don’t understand. I need my friends to come and explain this to me. How can I help work if I am stuck in this cage and constantly being drugged? That’s when I see something new. My neighbor who liked to grab at me had something on his chest. I looked closer, tapping on his cage to get him to look my way so I could see better. There were red and purple spots on his chest, this couldn’t be good for him. The men in white needed to look at him. My neighbor needed the men who fixed the rats. I screamed and banged on my cage trying to get their attention. I shook my door and howled, but no response. Then it hit me, was I now a savage? Is that all the men in white saw from me? I stopped yelling and banging. I am special, I need to not act like this. The lights clicked on in the research room, several of the savages were awake already. The howls started to fill the room. I looked around and the men in white coats were in the room huddled around their table. I saw familiar tools, I saw the knives. It was then I realized my

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neighbor wasn’t howling. He wasn’t doing anything at all. He was curled up in the corner just lying there. The men in white came to his cage and opened it. My neighbor had died. I had known he was sick after seeing the spots. He had been weak and sickly ever since. Poor savage, I actually felt bad for him. I watched as they carried him to the table and laid him out under the bright light. It was painful to watch, I have seen this before. The cut on him and looked inside. They removed pink flesh and put it into jars again like they did before with my mice. They finally put him into a black bag. I felt horrible for my neighbor, but he wasn’t special like me. I am not like the others, I had been doing important work. I have been doing special research on my mice and rats. These poor savages were the same as my mice though, they just didn’t know it. It was just a matter of time I suppose before my colleagues in the white coats were going to put them into black bags too. I leaned back into the corner of my cage and thought back to where I had come from and how I had gotten here to this point. I have done many great important things with the men in the white coats. I look down at my chest, spots. I was mistaken, I guess I wasn’t special after all.

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Eyes of Disappointment He pulls out the hot plate of pizza rolls from the microwave and quickly makes his way to the dining room table. The dim lighting from the two remaining light bulbs still shows the dark shadows from the spiderwebs in the corners of the ceiling. The tannish yellow paint reminding him of how plain his life is and the faded lines from the silhouettes of the frames that used to hang on the wall tell him how alone he truly is. He sits the plate down on the table and looks down at the depressing feast. Fifteen pizza rolls placed randomly across the burgundy plate. They look nothing like they do on the package, these are the most pathetic looking examples of edible garbage he has ever seen. It is a far stretch for the traditional meal most people are used to, but this is where he finds himself. He sits down and sinks deep into his chair; his shoulders almost dip down to his hips. He picks up one of the rolls and softly blows on it. After a brief sigh he takes it into his mouth feeling the burning sensation on the roof of his mouth. He chews, the hot innards squirting out the sides of the soft crusty roll. As he swallows, he looks up at two flickering bulbs and thinks to himself, that a depressing Christmas Eve evening is what he deserves. He has lived a lifetime of disappointments and failures that have all led to this point. He finishes his meal and places his plate into the empty sink of his dark kitchen. He fills his glass from the sink and makes his way to his cold bedroom. Stripping down to his boxers, he then makes his way to the bathroom. Leaning over the sink and staring into the mirror he sees himself. The pale face looking back at him is like a stranger now. The only thing familiar are the blue eyes, now sunken within dark circles. The eyes have lost their once bright outlook on life, now they are filled with pain and regret. The years have left their mark on the face in the mirror.

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The once smooth skin is now covered in stressful creases. The blackness of the beard is now faded and frosted with grey around the edges. With one last look he turns on the water and splashes it against the rough exterior of his once youthful face. He turns off the water and grabs a cloth to dry his hands. He reaches for a bottle of pills next to the sink and unscrews the top. Looking at them he thinks about how he has taken these for years trying to numb his pain, but they haven’t really served him well. He shakes the remaining pills into his hand and looks at them. Telling himself that one more disappointment would be okay, he washes down the pills as he drinks his glass of water and places the glass down. With one last look into the mirror he makes his way back into his bedroom. He walks over to his nightstand and turns off his alarm clock. Opening the drawer, he pulls out a small bottle of whiskey and unscrews the top. He sits down on the edge of his bed, the mattress giving way under him. He drinks the from the bottle, the warm liquid burning his mouth and then follows down his throat until it ignites his gut with heat. He screws the top back on the bottle and places it back into the nightstand. Reaching over he turns off the light and then lies down. He pulls the blanket over himself and looks up at the black ceiling. In the pitch blackness of the room he reflects on what he already knows, he is alone. He closes his eyes and exhales deeply. He begins to think of how he could have lived his life differently as he fades, and sleep overcomes him.

He awakens from his sleep and looks at his alarm clock realizing that he has overslept. With a slight panic he hops out of bed only to remember that he had turned it off before laying into bed. More relaxed now he walks to the bathroom.

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“I’m surprised I don’t feel worse.” While looking into the mirror, he realizes that his eyes are a little brighter than he remembered. The dark circles have faded, and he is pleased as he looks closer at his face. He leans over the sink and begins speaking to the rejuvenated face staring back at him. “Damn, I guess a good night’s sleep was all I really needed after all. Seriously though that dream, what the hell was that all about?” Scratching his chin and looking at his scruff, he realizes he really doesn’t remember much of his dream at all. Which is common for him, with his drinking and the pills it is amazing he even has dreams anymore versus just a black out space in time.

He sits down on a cold park bench looking out over the empty playground. Clutching his coffee, he feels the warmth in the palm of his hand, this is the most warmth he has felt lately. It has been weeks now since he has spoken to Erin. He told her that he would give her the space she needed right before she left with the kids. He initially thought it was just going to be over the holidays when she left for her parents but returning home from work, he discovered the house had lost more than just the lively souls which inhabited it. The house had lost nearly all trace of their past, just small reflections and reminders remained. Snowflakes began to fall freely across the ground in front of him. This used to always make him smile, but now it is only a chilly reminder how these snowflakes all land so distant from each other.

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She just stares at me from across the table. Her eyes still red from crying, blonde hair pulled back into a messy ponytail, and her elbows dug in deep on the tabletop. If there was any doubt before, this time she was standing her ground. “Brian how could you do this? How many times do you think that I would just let it slide? To make things worse, this time you can’t take it back. We can’t just fix it like the last time we did for my father. You have gone too far. I have warned you and warned you! I cannot be around this type of lifestyle anymore. I cannot have our kids thinking that any of this is acceptable!” “Erin I am sorry, I really…” I barely got words out before her hand slammed down on the table. I jerked up straight like a noose had just lifted me off the ground. I remained standing straight at attention, nervously awaiting what would come from her scorned lips next. The look in her eyes, the disappointment and disgust, just scream at me.

He walks down the sidewalk and stares at the intersection. He knows that it was bad, but there has to be a way to come back from this. There has to be a way that he can bring his family back together, some grand gesture. There has to be a way to make this right for everyone. He wasn’t charged, but the guilt still came from the eyes of everyone. Anyone who looked at him now just treated him like he didn’t exist. Their gaze just passing through him, he wasn’t worthy of their time anymore, he was society’s pariah now. The black rubber streaks going down the road were the only trace left behind. The wreath that was strapped to the crosswalk signal had been taken down weeks ago. He hoped that time would have made things easier, but the blank faces of the people passing beside him just prove that this wasn’t the case. He knows that he has

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to do something to make people want to forgive him. The police didn’t think he was in the wrong, but social judgement reigns supreme.

I was closing up my tab when Larry came up from behind. “Damnit Brian, you saved our asses last quarter. I don’t know how you keep doing it. I swear if we didn’t have you… well shit I don’t have to tell you. Brian, you know better than anyone.” Squeezing my shoulder, he gives a big grin of appreciation. The compliments are oozing out of Larry’s mouth almost as strongly as the stench of bourbon on his breath. “Larry, I appreciate it. I am just glad that I can be an asset for the team.” “I’m going to close out my tab too, need to get home to the misses before she notices the time.” Larry reaches deep into his pocket and pulls out his wallet. It pops out of his hand and flops down to the floor. When he reaches for it, he about falls over. “Hey Larry, let me grab that for you.” I grab the wallet and help him steady himself so he can pay. “Hey buddy, maybe I should give you a ride home. Erin won’t mind if I am a few minutes late home and besides the kids are probably just finishing their homework. Let me get you home.” Larry’s eyes were squinting at the check as he was trying to figure out a tip. The pen waving back and forth as he scribbled his mark. He passes it forward and braces himself on the counter with his hand.

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“No Brian, I got this taken care of. I called a ride a bit ago, but you get yourself home safe. We can’t do things without you in the office.” He smiles and pats me on the shoulder again and turns to the entrance. Almost falling over his own feet but manages to stay up right. He wasn’t wrong though I have been the saving grace for them for a while now. It’s one reason I like to take a little victory lap for myself here at the bar every now and then. Erin hates it, but she just always worries too much. With her father’s past issues, I suppose I shouldn’t blame her. I don’t know how he has managed to keep his license after all these years.

He stands in the doorway of a light tan hospital room. Watching the boy’s mother sitting next to him holding his small hand tightly. She is worn down; her outfit hasn’t changed in days. Her hair is unkempt from her long nightly visits. She doesn’t see him standing in the doorway. She doesn’t see his hands buried in his pants pockets as he slumps over and leans on the door frame. He sees her though; he can see all the pain in her eyes. The loss that reflects behind them, the images of a life that she will never see for her son. With each pump from his ventilator, pushing the remaining breathes of his life through tubes into his lungs, those images of his future fade more. He knows that she cannot afford the medical bills and that every day she is here she buries herself into an endless debt that will also consume her life also. She rubs her hand across the boy’s bandaged forehead, praying that his eyelids would flutter, and she will know he is there still. Those flutters will never come, and she knows it. He simply says, “I’m so sorry” and walks out of the room.

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I plop into my Lexus, gliding across the black leather seat. I reach for my phone and put it on the dash charger and pause for a second. Should I call her and let her know I’m on my way? No, she will just nag and get worked up. I barely even finished my second beer. There is no reason to even get her going. I am not her father and plus traffic is light right now in the city. I strap on my belt and push the ignition button. The soft humming and vibrations as it starts are almost hypnotic. I don’t know why she hated me getting this car. It was well worth the money and the safety features should be up to her liking. In fact, we should probably get her father one.

He stands by Erin’s car in her parent’s driveway as she is grabbing bags of Christmas gifts from the back of her car. She won’t even look at him. He doesn’t blame her though; he doesn’t want to see that look in her eyes again. He can hear the children yelling and laughing inside the house, but he knows that it isn’t the time that he should face them. He must redeem himself. “Erin, I know you don’t want to hear this, and I don’t expect you to say anything. I will fix this though; I know I cannot change what happened. I understand that you don’t want the kids knowing what happened, but I have a plan that can make it better though. Make things hopefully a bit more forgivable. I love you and the kids so much. Can you please just tell them that I love them?” She gives a sigh and looks at the bag of gifts. On the top is one which is wrapped in red Snoopy paper. There is a small note that says from Dad, written neatly in her gentle handwriting. She cries softly and walks to the house. “Brian, I wish you could be here giving them their gifts this year.”

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I drive down the city street, just enveloped by the holiday music over the stereo. I can’t believe Christmas is just around the corner. I am just smiling and thinking about how the kids’ faces will light up when they get presents, when my phone starts to ring loudly over the speakers. That will teach me to keep the volume down while driving. Clicking over to the call, I hear the voice of my 6-year-old daughter fumbling over her own words in excitement. It’s nice to see I’m not the only one excited for the holidays. She then hands the phone over to Erin. “Brian, where are you?” “Just heading home now, do you need anything?” “Not really, just trying to get the kids to calm down. Where did you go after work?” Of course, I knew she was going to ask me and then scold me, but I had prepared my statement. “I was at the bar for a little bit with Larry, I had to make sure he was safe getting home. He had a few to many and you know, I just wanted to keep him off the road.” “At the bar? Did you have another good week at work?” “Oh, just saving their asses again. You know the way it goes.” “Brian, did you drink? You know what I think about every time you leave the bar.” “I know, I know. I only had a little more than a beer and called it a night. No need to worry.” “Brian, seriously you know how many times my father has said that? The last time they had to tow his car out of the woods, and he spent 2 weeks in the hospital.” “Erin, I know, we go over this all the time. I am not your father and I am careful.”

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He sits down at his dining room table and reaches for a brand-new notepad that is laying on the table. He peels off the plastic wrapping on it and begins to write on the notepad. He thinks he has figured out what he needs to do and makes a list. 1. Take leave from work to spend time with family. 2. Pay for the boy’s medical bills, so the mother can just grieve. 3. Build a living memorial for the boy at the park so that he will always be playing in the hearts of people who remember him. 4. Show Erin that I am still the man she once loved. He stops writing and just sits for a moment. He knows that this isn’t a fix, but this is a start for him. This redemption will be a process. He has made mistakes and he owns them. This will be his new start that he so desperately wants. It is not too late, he has to convince himself hope is not lost after all.

I can’t help but be a little frustrated with Erin about this. I mean yes, she has seen her dad countless times getting into accidents after drinking, but still. I reach down to turn the music back up on the radio and all of a sudden, the car starts to beep, and I look up. I see the top of a head darting out in front of my car right as I am approaching the intersection. Without second thought I instinctively slam on the breaks. The loud squeal of rubber on the road trying to stop still rings in my ears. Before my car came to a stop it was too late. The thud stopped my heart as I watch the small boy shoot through the intersection like a beaten rag doll. Instantly the cars around became as still as the body of the boy laying in the street.

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I rushed out to him as people were calling 911. I couldn’t prepare myself for what I found. This boy, not even 5 years old, laying across the ground. His body twisted and contorted like a twisted GI Joe toy. The side of his head was gushing blood as screamed for help. The minutes which felt like hours for the paramedics to arrive. I just sat next to him not knowing what to do. His little eyes half opened, and his lips parted showing the gaps from missing front teeth. What had I done? In total shock I didn’t move even after the paramedics rushed him off to the hospital. It was only when the police officer placed his hand on my back did, I realize he was gone, and I was sitting in a sea of flashing blue and red lights. I walked to my car and saw the dent in my bumper and hood. The cracked plastic and bent metal in the shape of the boy still remained. The black color of my car helped hide the red drops of blood sprinkled over my hood. “Sir, are you ok? Can you tell me what happened here?” “Officer, I was just heading home and I only took my eyes off the road for a second…” My body started to shake and seize up as I began to cry uncontrollably. “I… I… I just saw him run out in front of me at the crosswalk. I didn’t see him… I didn’t see him until it was too late!” “We understand sir, we talked to other witnesses. You had no way of seeing him. He ran out in front of you from behind that trash can there on the sidewalk.” “Oh my God!! Is he going to be ok? Please can you tell me?” “Sir, may I ask you your name and where you were coming from?” “My name is Brian…”

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He wakes up and looks at his alarm clock, once again he is slightly panicked that he has overslept. He then remembers again that he turned it off and proceeds to the bathroom mirror. He studies his face and begins to smile. The life has begun to return to his eyes. He walks out his room and heads to the dining room table to begin to work on his list. He looks and it is not where he left it. “I must have taken it to the bedroom.” He reassures himself and he makes his way back. He walks into his bedroom and looks across the bed. He just stops and stares in disbelief. Laying across the bed he sees his ultimate disappointment. He sees himself still laying in bed. He walks over and begins to cry. The body is his own, it has lost all color and now is a purplish blue. It is lying flat on its back motionless. The once blue eyes are now glazed over with a pale whiteness. There is a dried vomit crust around the corners of his mouth. He takes a step back and cries out of shock. He falls to his knees sobbing. “I had figured it out! I knew what I needed to do! How can this be!!” He now realizes the truth. He never was in the hospital room and he never was at Erin’s parents’ house. He was never actually talking to anyone and no one saw him at all. He walks from the bed and returns to the mirror in the bathroom. He leans over and just stares into his own blue eyes.

The sun's rays shooting through his bedroom window like beams of heaven trying to break through the bars of the blinds. He slowly sits up and looks at the alarm clock. He had turned it off, he remembers now. He just sits up in his bed calmly looking at the light, the dust is fluttering across the white light, twisting and twirling like a dance. What had he done to get to this point? Why must he be alone? These questions still echo through his mind as he slowly

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turns his legs over the bed to the floor. Even though he is consumed by this feeling of complete emptiness, he doesn't feel weighed down. It is almost like he levitates as he makes his way across the room to the bathroom mirror. If there was an emptiness inside, you couldn't tell. He leans in close to examine his face. It has been years since this face has looked back at him. A face with such youth and hopefully expressions. Maybe it had finally taken hold of him so he could move on and shed the shell of shame he had been hiding behind for all these years. The brightness in his blue eyes reflect the beauty of a sky that has known no sorrow. He is ready to turn the page. He is ready to show that he is committed to a new life. He makes his way to the dining room table and sits down. He reaches for the brand-new notepad sitting on the dining room table. He peels off the plastic wrapping covering it and begins to write out a letter. Erin, I’ve been thinking of what to say to you. I don’t know what I miss more, your smile or the way it felt when you would take my hand into yours. I miss it all really though. I don’t know what specifically has gotten us to where we are now. I do know it was not just one thing, it was a bunch of little things that kept building up. I think we began to lose each other before the accident. I am not saying it was any one person’s fault, but if there was any blame to be made it should be all on me. This time apart has been hard on me, but I know it has to be just as difficult for you and the kids as well if not more. I do love you, I love our family, and I love what we are together. I have felt nothing, but empty since you left. Even as I sit here now writing you this letter, I know there is nothing I can really say that would make it up to you. I can’t make it up to the boy’s family. I don’t think that I can even make

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it up to myself, but I know that I want to try. I know that even if it means nothing more than a gesture, I can do something to try to set things on the right path again. I know I don’t want to give up on what we had. I know that I don’t want to give up on what we could have. I know that if I have any chance, it won’t be an easy one. It will be long and painful for me, but it will be the journey that is important. Please let me have the chance to show you. Love Eternally, Brian

He tears the sheet of paper from the notepad and folds it in half and lays it down next to the notepad. Staring at the empty wall in front of him for a moment, he lets out a sigh. If he was going to make changes, it needs to start now. He pushes himself back from the table and stands up from the chair. His frame was strong for once, his stance was that of determination as he slid the chair back to the table. This was the first step, he thought to himself. This was just a small step, but it was still a step. He starts to walk towards the bedroom when a strange sense of déjà vu comes over him. Shrugging it off as just an echo of the thoughts he has been avoiding all this time. He turns into the doorway and freezes. His brief posture of promise began to sink. His eyes fixed, locked in on the figure laying in the bed. He knows it is too late now. There is nothing left, but his own disappointment. The look that was permanently fixed on the face in the bed. The face which is forever frozen now with empty eyes staring off into the never-ending darkness that can never be changed. The End

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Shameful Creatures A life cannot be lived, without living shame Toils of this despair, we will always show Reliving our memories, denying we are to blame Differently lives are spent, but spent all the same Innocence strived for, we will never know A life cannot be lived, without living shame Trying to silence life, so peace will remain Hidden away deeply, thoughts will always grow Reliving our memories, denying we are to blame We cannot all be victims, there is nothing to gain While all of our souls, can be cast below A life cannot be lived, without living shame Escape is not possible, cursed always by pain Conscious so heavy, the ease is a foe Reliving our memories, denying we are to blame Guilt will always find us, no matter how we refrain Perfection is impossible, even living life slow A life cannot be lived, without living shame Reliving our memories, denying we are to blame

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Moving Along I am damaged I am broken My life will never be the same. I am hurt I am torn I feel I am always to be blamed. I will remember I will live on I have to carry all the shame. I want to live I want to move on I wish I had no more pain. I am damaged I am broken My life will never be the same.

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Sonnet of The Remembered Since time has begun, the blood has been shed Battles lost, even when they had been won Mothers, sisters, fathers, will mourn the dead Tears trail down, empty eyes, for their lost sons We call them heroes, from the wounds they wear With many accolades, they gain their fame Their stories, thru generations we share Yet memories, will cause them all such pain The bond with soldiers though, will never die The love they have for each other, is strong Their shared brotherhood, let no man deny Their fates together, cannot be called wrong The life that is lost, is little in war The love, left unspoken is so much more

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YOUNGSUN (AMBER) YU Malcolm Sedam Winner 2021 Do You Believe in the Wheel of Fortune? In Tarot cards, the Wheel of Fortune card refers to a significant turning point involving a person who is part of one’s destiny. Similarly, people in my country say that individuals have three times to experience their Wheel of Fortune in life. For me, I had three chances to grab my Wheel of Fortune. The person was my husband. Fortune put him in my life and changed it in a positive way. He was my turning point; he was willing to be my karma for the rest of my life in marriage. He is always ready to help me and to try to change my negative thinking and dark side. It was almost twenty years ago that I met him in middle school. As far as I can remember, the first day that I saw him was at a class for gifted students. My mathematics teacher presented us with a very difficult problem. The class was very quiet, and we could only hear each other’s breathing. No one was able to solve the college level mathematics problem, even though the class was designed for students gifted in science and mathematics. It was too difficult for middle school students to solve. “Anybody want to try?” the teacher asked again. One smiling boy raised his hand and wrote the answer on the board even though the teacher had not thought of such a solution. It was a unique and excellent solution. Everyone in the class was so surprised. I just thought he was a super gifted student in mathematics. However, he was also a good soccer player and the top sprinter at school. When he ran sprints on the playground or played soccer, many girls were stuck to the window looking out at him. He was at the top of the popularity list in my school.

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However, I did not understand why people were so impressed by him. From my point of view, he was not handsome, and I was not interested in him at all. He and I had the same class designed for gifted students, so lots of my shy friends asked me to deliver gifts, flowers, and letters to him. He was considered handsome, intelligent, athletic, and personable. The majority of girls in my school loved him, but I didn’t. We were just good friends and I liked him since he gave me tons of chocolates that he received on Valentine’s Day. He did not like any sweets, so on any day that he received candies or chocolates, he shared them with me. Like other teenage girls I was sensitive and had depression. Sometimes I failed to manage my depression and it exploded. One day, which was the worst day of all, my arm was broken during an athletic class, so I could not take an exam. I turned in a doctor’s note to the teacher, but he gave me a “F.” It was unfair. He was so stubborn. Moreover, I made huge mistakes on my English midterm exam during the same period. At that time, my family was experiencing financial issues. I felt I was failing at everything, and depression was completely dominating me. The dark voice from inside me whispered, “Quit school!” I just wanted to run away from the moment, so I ran to the rooftop of the school building. At that moment, my future husband saw me, and he ran after me to catch me. He held my shoulder and told me, “Hey, what’s wrong? Don’t cry. Look at me. If you have some troubles, please tell me. I can help you.” I was touched. It was the first time that he helped me and lifted my spirits. After that he helped me as much as he could. He asked me out, but I turned down his request. I was so stupid. Why didn’t I say yes? After we graduated middle school, we attended different high schools. I was interested in literature and a regular academic track. He chose a

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school for students that were gifted in mathematics and science—and he had a girlfriend there. I felt a little bit empty, but I told myself it would be okay. Years later, I graduated college with a teacher certificate, and I chose to work as a teacher at a school in a small, pretty town to recover from my trauma and depression. When I was there, he contacted me. I was very glad to see him again. He realized I had some problems and tried to help me. We went out several times, but I decided to stop it because at that time he had almost finished his requirements to go abroad to study for his Ph. D. I thought I could not tolerate a long-distance relationship. South Korea and the US were too far away from each other. I gave up our relationship again. I did not want to hurt if we broke up. When he left, I kept telling myself again, “It will be okay. We did not start anything. We just went out a couple of times, that’s all.” When he left, I sank to the bottom because I lost the will to recover from my trauma and depression, and the emptiness hurt me so much. I should have held on to him, but it was too late. I thought that it was really over. I believed that I had messed up everything. But then he tried to contact me again from the States. Around the same time, a crazy stalker interrupted our relationship by hacking my social media and email accounts. He sent an insane message to my future husband. I was scared and irritated. I was not able to report him to the police because in my country, the police and law system were usually on the side of offenders, not on the side of victims. They usually blamed the victim. For these reasons, I thought that we did not have any karma in our relationship because every time we crossed each other, I closed my mind to the possibility of a relationship. I removed his phone number from my cell phone and reset his number as spam. He did not care about the crazy messages from the insane stalker, though. He believed in me and was always supporting me.

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After he finished the first year of his Ph. D tract, he asked me again to be his girlfriend. This was the third time that he had asked me to be his girlfriend. He never gave up giving me a hand. He always treated me sweetly, gently and politely. I changed my mind about things. We became a couple and when he was a second year into his Ph. D tract, we got married. Despite many rejections, he came into my Wheel of Fortune. I didn’t understand why he chose me. Marrying me meant he was sharing my illness—which I may never recover from—and fighting it together. I felt sorry for him, and I thought he was stupid. As soon as we got married, I moved to the United States for my new life with him. It was a really big change. Here, in the United States, he introduced me to good clinics, so I have met lots of good doctors and treatment teams that can help me cope with my illness. He has always been by my side and, during the times I decided to give up, he helped me and cheered me up. Also, if I told him that I was not in a good mood, he gave me a hug right away and listened to me without asking anything from me. Because of him, I have recovered a lot. I decided to study in college again. However, taking classes in English was not easy. When I got stuck and depressed because of studies, he said. “It is not a big deal to fail in classes. Trying is important so do not be afraid of failing. Just keep walking forward step by step.” Some people believe in destiny or karma, but I am not a big fan of forms of divination such as horoscopes or Tarot cards. However, every time I was feeling at the bottom of my life, my husband was there as a guardian angel and helped me despite the fact I was pushing him away. I can say he is my best friend and supporter. I think if God exists, he thought my life was unfair, so he sent my husband to me. Now I believe in the Wheel of Fortune, since I tried not to be in a relationship with him, but eventually we got married. My husband jumped in my Wheel

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of Fortune and we rolled in it together. I really appreciated the fact that he did not give up on me. If any person asks me whether someone is their Wheel of Fortune because of repeated connections during bad situations, I will tell them not to push their destiny away. In my case, my husband was a very stable person and he never gave up on me. Every person is not the same as my husband. They might leave forever. Chances may not come back again. Thus, I want to tell people not to lose their big chance. I also want to tell them not to hurt their partner’s heart harshly, as I did many times. Karma would be their best friend and a big supporter of the rest of their life like it was for us and they won’t regret it. Thanks to Karma or the Wheel of Fortune, I can smile again and live happily. I can also study for my dreams. Yes, he is my only one Destiny. And I say to him, “Thank you my dear for taking a spin with me in the Wheel of Fortune.”

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My Dream in the Pandemic

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CONTRIBUTORS' NOTES Miya Alsip Many words could be used to describe my work and I. In regards to me, I am the youngest child of three who were born from a hard working nurse. I am the only one of my family to go for a Bachelor’s degree as well as dabble in writing. I have a love for ghost stories and anything classified as being a part of the horror genre. The two “darker” pieces of my submission are inspired from a mixture of knowledge, life experience, and late night paranoia courtesy of my imagination. The interesting thing of it all is which part in the short story there is imagination or truth at play. The short story featured is an excerpt from a story I am considering writing. My poem “Missing Miami” was my way of understanding my sorrow at having to leave Miami when the Coronavirus pandemic began. I wish all of you the best and thank you in advance for reading not only my work but everyone who was brave enough to submit to Illuminati as well. I hope this is the first you will be hearing from me and my work.

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Annika Baldwin I am a junior pursuing Applied Communications and English Studies. Writing is my greatest passion, and my main goal is to “write something that means something.” I write about reality in a metaphorical aspect that I use to bring out the fantasy and unreality that I feel perpetuates each person's life. Poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction—I use them all for authentic and honest addresses of mental health, pain, injustice, and more in my work.

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Kayla Hull Hello! My name is Kayla and I am a senior Nutrition major with a minor in Spanish at Miami. I enjoy playing piano, roller skating, and watching movies/television. I have had many creative outlets all my life but for many years I stopped writing. As a child, I loved poetry and even won a few contests for it. Unfortunately, as academic writing increased during my life, especially as a STEM major, I stopped using writing as a creative outlet. Luckily, I chose to take a creative writing class while at Miami and reintroduced myself to writing what I want to. I love the horror genre, so I wanted to write a story about anything as long as it was spooky. I brainstormed a few ideas and landed on a cliché babysitter tragedy with a bit of a twist! I hope it is as enjoyable to read as it was to write.

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Kara Reedy Fear fascinates me and controls my intentions, whether I’m writing, viewing, or learning. Morbid curiosity flows through me when a new idea forms in the back of my mind, twisting my thoughts into something bleak and dark. Nature, in its unkempt and unruly state, inspires me to create. I feel a sensational sense of awe when face-to-face with our world. Emotions run through me, both respect and terror at what could be lurking behind every corner. “The Hand” began as an observation of a tree that I periodically see. The tree has always struck me, appearing in likeness to a gnarled hand. What started as a mere visual grew to become my very first, fully realized story. Through the many months of work, I have grown particularly fond of this piece. I continue working through the details, still not completely satisfied. I’ve never been one to simply finish something; everything can be improved upon, no matter how “perfect” it may appear. For now, I must remain content with my work, biding my time until I set out to further my piece. Until then, I hope you enjoy “The Hand” and all other works involved throughout.

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Charlotte Waldron I am a Sophomore English Studies major and Creative Writing Minor, and I have been fascinated with fairy tales since I was a child. No two retellings are ever quite the same, and they can serve many purposes: as cautionary tales, stories of empowerment, or something in between. Fractured fairy tales are some of my favorite types of retellings, and they often draw on the darker themes buried deep within the familiar stories we know and love. Imagery is my favorite element of writing, and visual cues often act as my favorite prompts. The inspiration for the story came unexpectedly one night while driving: I looked at the stop lights and power lines reflecting off the wet pavement and thought how eerily beautiful it was. “Someone should write a story about it”, I thought. In that moment, the seed for “We All Live in the Woods” was planted, and it eventually grew into what you see now. I don't know what made me notice puddles on that particular night, but I do know that I am honored to share the story with you all, and I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.

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Youngsun (Amber) Yu Hi, my name is Amber (Youngsun) Yu and I am a sophomore majoring in nursing. My collage “My Dream in the Pandemic” is about a hopeful future. Like many people, pandemic makes me depressed. I am trying to focus on a bright future, not a gloomy present. However I believe spring is coming to us as always. My non-fiction entitled Do You Believe in the “Wheel of Fortune?” is about my story. When I was young, I saw a Tarot card and the “Wheel of Fortune” was very impressive to me. Like the card, the story is about how my husband and I met and how I live in the States with my husband now. Definitely, I believe in “destiny.” I hope you can find your destiny. Good luck!

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