A Little S’more Time Jesse Friend

Letter From the Editor

As COVID-19 continues to be a looming presence in the world, conversations revolving around what people missed began popping up online. It fascinated me to see the mixed emotions many had about travel and how their perception on travel had shifted. Some wished to have the ability to jump on a plane to see a loved one; others began to grow afraid of traveling far and getting stuck miles from home. Regardless of what people felt, one could not escape this intense desire to escape the mundane and see the world again.

I wanted this edition to focus heavily on wanderlust, this intense urge and desire to travel. In our call for submissions, we asked for pieces that focus on a variety of topics revolving around travel, including the exploration of emotions that may be tied to travel (such as joy or fear) or how traveling affects our relationship with the world. I believe it is our jobs as writers and artists to be the voices for the voiceless and to hone in on the emotions of the masses. We use our skills and talents to create spaces where people can sink into our creations and find comfort in knowing they are not alone in their experiences.

The response we received was astronomical. The nonfiction piece “Airport Relay” is a tense, awe-inspiring piece that explores the anxiety that comes with catching a plane and the impact one act of kindness can have. In the poem “The Adventuress,” we are reminded of the freedom that comes when we live without limits and explore all that the world has to offer without fear. In the visual arts piece “Galactic Wandering,” we see a painting of an immense sky riddled with stars. It serves as a reminder of the vastness of the universe and how it is up to us to decide how far we are willing to go during our lives. Title When I was approached with the opportunity to serve as Editor-inChief back in May, no one had any idea what this issue would hold Author for us. I want to thank this semester’s staff for taking this journey with me and for all their work on our first-ever summer journal. We have created something truly remarkable during our short time together, and I am in awe over the amount of love and support that went into this beautiful journal. And to our readers, I hope that everyone who picks up a copy of Sheepshead Reviewis able to find a little piece of themselves in these pages. Sincerely,

Brooke Poarch

Editor-in-Chief

The Adventuress Title

Christina E. Petrides Author

She refused to be put upon. She simply did everything no one thought to mention was impossible. It wasn’t a matter of overcoming, but of her always moving towards the sun. The world was her pearl, her unexplored ocean floor, and she dove into action as if born flying. Her spiritual household numbered in the thousands, she maintained a dozen friends, and kept no lovers. Many would have followed her if they could; her path was too swift and terrible for ordinary men. For her struggling sisters she cut a bright trail of what could be when fearless passion guides an unfettered life. Story

Title Galactic Wandering

Author Kelly Sargent

Oil on Canvas

At Evening, from the Portuguese Coast

Andrew Gudgel

And as the stars appear, I turn my thoughts, Imagine you with coffee, enrobed, While I sit, pensive, upon this dusky beach, My twilight fled to become your morning. Endlessly marching waves in ranks between. While just beyond the southern horizon, Ephemeral pulses--a lighthouse unseen Calls from afar, beckoning sailors home. We're growing closer, a hair's-breadth a year, And if we had but space enough and time, I would wait, granite-like, enduring, Till I need but step over the ocean To take your hand again.

A Little S’more Time

Jesse Friend

An aggressive knock on the front door stopped Vaughn from finishing his last drink. Setting the icy cocktail on his notepad, he stumbled through miles of shag carpet towards the noise.

The pounding came again before he could reach the front of the house, persistent and jolting, like the police serving a warrant with a battering ram.

“Whaddayawant?” Vaughn barked at the uninvited visitor. It had been weeks since he’d pulled the blackout curtains shut. He’d convinced himself the world had ended for everybody, not just for him, and was surprised to see a tiny girl silhouetted in the sunset.

She was no taller than his waist, with three right hands stuck out to introduce herself. “Hi there, I’m Tara with Troop 1331...” She pushed on without waiting for his name, nearly breathless, “...and I’m here tonight selling cookies, do you wanna buy some?”

“No.” Vaughn shoved the door, but a white light-up sneaker and two sweaty little hands kept it from closing.

“Wait!” Her voice was a helium balloon about to pop. “Why not?”

“What?”

The pink and purple lights on her right shoe were still flashing in the door frame as she repeated, “Why don’t you want to buy my cookies?”

His truth was biting, like a fierce snake with fangs dripping venom. He wanted to say, “Well, ya see, when you’re old as shit, and you have to watch the woman you’ve loved for 35 years slowly die as she’s eaten alive from the inside by malignant tumors, leaving you more alone in the world than it turns out you can live with, guess what, Buttercup? You won’t give a shit about cookies either.”

But the voice in his head was still Becca’s, and she wouldn’t allow it.

The glass waiting for him in the kitchen was beginning to sweat. A ring of blue words he’d scribbled on the notepad was starting to bleed, and Vaughn didn’t know what to do.

“I’ll tell ya what.” Tara put her hands on her hips like a used-car salesman and stood up straight. Looking Vaughn in his bloodshot eyes, she said, “Since we’re neighbors, I’m prepared to give you the friends and family discount. That takes a box of Slim Minties from $25 to $18. What do you say to that?”

“I don’t have the money,” Vaughn lied. He was paid under the table for working

nights as Whitby Cove’s gravedigger. Or, he used to be. It paid $25 a plot. Most of the cash was still in a wicker basket shoved under the sofa, but now that Becca was buried in the cemetery instead of in her art or upstairs in their bed, he wasn’t sure he could work anymore. He wasn’t sure he could keep getting up in the morning.

“That’s okay,” The little scout interrupted, oblivious to his struggle. “I can take orders. I have the slip in my backpack.” She dropped the pink and white bag off her shoulders. Rainbow-colored stuffed animals bounced from every zipper as she tugged them all open to find a tri-colored order form. “All you do is fill out the boxes. You keep the pink one, and I take the other two. When your order arrives, I’ll deliver it, and you can pay me then.”

“I don’t like Slim Minties.”

It was nearly dark now, but her little smile was still shining bright. “I have seven other kinds of cookies if you don’t like mint. I have Sammies, or Thirdwheels. There’s Hokey-Pokeys, Lemon-Lips…” Glancing around the porch like Santa might be eavesdropping, she whispered, “I don’t recommend the Lemon-Lips.”

Vaughn couldn’t help but laugh when Tara tried to wink but shut both eyes

“Um, Sammies, Thirdwheels, Hokey-Pokeys, Lemon-Lips…” She bit her tongue, trying to remember where she’d left off before exclaiming, “Oh! Um, we also have ToffeeCoffee, Carmel Drops, and S’mores.”

“Don’t you have to go home now?” Vaughn asked after she’d exhausted her list.

“Yup!” she said, still unmoving.

The streetlights finally buzzed on as the last of the sun fell beneath the trees. Vaughn was sure that somewhere this kid’s mother was looking for her. There’s no way a clean, confident child like this didn’t have one or two parents who gave a damn.

He and Becca never had children of their own, and for the 1,000th time since the apocalypse of her absence, Vaughn was desperate for her. She was the kind, Good Witch to his flying monkey, the innocent bride to Frankenstein’s monster. She would’ve loved the guts on this kid so much that only God knows how much she’d have spent to reward Tara’s courage.

“Why do you want me to buy a box of cookies so bad? Doesn’t your mom sell these for you at her office or something?” Vaughn was growing nervous. Sweat was beading on his forehead, and he was anxious to finish what he’d started in the kitchen before Becca’s ghost could talk him out of it again.

The girl dropped her head. Her dark hair tumbled in frizzy waves over the badges on her brown vest as she finally knelt to zip her bag shut. Worried he’d offended her, Vaughn was actually relieved when she looked back up at him with her snake-oil grin and asked, “If I tell you the truth, will you buy a box of cookies?”

Defeated, Vaughn snatched the paperwork from her and held his hand out, waiting for her honest answer and something to write with.

Her pen was gel, and purple, and glittered. The fuzzy ball on top bobbed on a spring as Vaughn scratched his information into the ballot-style boxes. She didn’t answer until he was finished and even then only started to speak when Vaughn refused to let go of the order form.

“Fine.” She pouted, keeping her grip on the paper too. “Every year the Scouts hold a contest for what troop can sell the most cookies and every year stupid Myla Babbis and Troop 419 win, and the winners get a week at summer camp totally paid for with horses and a big lake raft thingy.”

Sucking in a deep breath, she continued, “And every year Myla Babbis comes back to school and does her ‘What I Did This Summer’ report on how some pop-star came and did a concert or how some actor did a volcano-making workshop, and I’m so sick of it!”

Trying not to laugh, Vaughn asked, “So, how does my one box of cookies win your troop a trip to summer camp?”

She shrugged her backpack on and stood up. “It might not, but I know Myla is afraid to come here -- no offense -- because she thinks you’re a serial killer, and any sale I get that Myla can’t has to help at least a little. Right?”

The windchimes laughed like Becca used to. Every time she came home from errands in town, she’d have a new rumor from some grass-stained kid about how Vaughn was a serial killer, or a ghost, or a zombie.

Becca would say, “It’s your fault, you know.” Putting groceries away on pantry shelves, she’d tease, “You’re the Bigfoot-sized recluse who refuses to clean up the exterior of this big ol’ murder-looking manor. What are those poor kids supposed to think?”

Sighing, Vaughn pulled on the form until Tara let go again. The puff-ball pen bobbed as he scratched out and rewrote a portion of his order.

Tara ripped the pink copy off and ran down the drive, yelling over her shoulder, “Thank you!”

“Hey!” He yelled after her, and she turned around, stepping backward but not stopping completely. “What if I was a serial killer?”

Without hesitation, she shouted, “At least I wouldn’t have to hear Myla’s ‘What I Did This Summer’ report!” Giggling, Tara and her light-up shoes ran off without seeing that his order had been changed to $900 worth of S’mores—Becca’s favorite.