Montage 2014 by Montage at Quinnipiac University

M O N TAG E VO LU M E 3 3 2014

Quinnipiac University Hamden, CT

STAFF JUSTIN GOLDSMITH

editor-in-chief

JOE VIRGILLITO

editor

TANNER CELESTIN

editor

KIRA SMELSER

editor

NICHOLAS BALDONI KEN CORMIER LILA CARNEY

designer faculty advisor assistant director of student media

cover image by Tanner Celestin front image by Jessica Wharton

EDITORS’ NOTE “As you may have heard, several Quinnipiac students have managed, through hard work and persistence, to revive Montage, the college literary magazine. I urge you all to give the magazine your support in whatever way possible...” - Mark Johnston, 1994 Like all issues since its birth, this magazine is a product of the creativity of the students of Quinnipiac University.

TABLE OF CONTENTS 15 POETRY 16

The Bedtime Routine

Last Words

Season of Mist

Ode to Blythe

Of Tune

Ode to Debbie B White

On Marrying a Polish Woman

Eleven at Night

Deliberately Faceless

Medicine

L’echafaudge

SAMANTHA AUSTIN

KELSEY BROWN

TANNER CELESTIN

RACHEL CORSO

SHANNON DELAHANTY

ANTHONY DIMARTINO

JUSTIN GOLDSMITH

WELLS GRIFFIN

LAUREN LOCKS

My Subconscious Hates Me CLARE MICHALAK

Italian Dinner

NICOLE MARESCA

Cheese and Crackers JULIA PERKINS

Divorce

JULIA PERKINS

Mr. Darcy Has Abnormal Biology KIRA SMELSER

Helen JOE VIRGILLITO

47 48

VISUAL Spiderman OSAAMA AWAN

Wolverine OSAAMA AWAN

Catalina Sails JACYLNN CLAY

Young Love JACYLNN CLAY

Rosy Roses KIRA DIAZ

Fall Photography JEFF FARBER

Foggy Baseball Fields at Night DEVAN KINGSTON

Abandoned Train Tracks DEVAN KINGSTON

Power of Time

TESS PELLICANO

Lighthouse

KRISTEN RIELLO

Untitled 83

JOSHUA VICTOR

Untitled

JESSICA WHARTON

61 62

PROSE Letters to IHOP KIM FEARS

The Sandpiper

KARA FORTIER

Intruders

JUSTIN GOLDSMITH

Dad’s Song

BRETT KASELOUSKAS

In Context Kyle Liang

Avalon

DANIEL MORO

Why Space Jam Won the ‘90s JOE ROMANO

Problems

KIRA SMELSER

105

Red BILLY VESSIO

108 113

CONTRIBUTOR BIOS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

POETRY

LITERARY DEATH MATCH WINNER

The Bedtime Routine SAMANTHA AUSTIN

At night, my father used to tuck me in. He would grab the covers and sheets and place me neatly beneath them, use his arms, thick and strong, to center me on the oversized mattress, and plant a kiss on my forehead before flicking off the light and walking away. I remember his footsteps more than the man himself in stages of ages I can no longer describejust his paces, swollen patterns of carpet reflected in a stained glass mirror hanging to the left of the door.

POETRY

Most mornings, I am envious of a sun that rises more evenly than my chest. My days are hollowed with a desperate need to hide and be seen, if only to see: I am not alone. Yet I’ve traced your steps for ages, thousands of miles spent translating coded pages of direction and expectation desperate to age the way you’ve envisioned, to clog the veins with a humility based collision of all you need me to be and all I have become.

But when do the years give fruit to life of its own? Vines cast into soil made of petrified ash, a young woman born into an ancient soul afraid of all she’s meant to give back?

SAMANTHA AUSTIN

My father used to tuck me in but nowadays I go to bed alone, determined to keep promises to a man centered on a mattress of his own. I lie awake. And feel pauses in the night air too still to be silent. I simply wait. And see devils in the cracks beneath my door, gnats circling like pending mythological fates and a stoic prayer to a God I fear to admit I hate. I walked into a room last Friday and spoke with a man twice my age. I sat in a hard-boiled seat and watched him direct himself into my mind, all flashing lights and bright orange cones, sirens, whistles, ignition in origami flammable bones and he asked me, “What do you want?” I want to sleep in a bed without sacrifice, just desire, to be the best and the worst of all you’ve ever known. I want to stick my hands into chimneys and escape with the ash to resurrect the fire, admire a warmth I barely know. I want to kiss a real man because I still feel like a child and I want to laugh when someone falls and cry when they return. I want to feel nervous, angry, spiteful, regretful and full of love just to lose it all when I become full. I want to shed my skin like sheets in front of you tonight. I want to line my prints in grease and mark the walls of this room. I want to flirt, fuck, and curse, a triple threat of my creation

SAMANTHA AUSTIN

just to discover functions of my body separate from your foundation. I want to collect pennies from phone booths and count the change in groups of three, rub the copper against my skin to make an olive tint appear. I want to sleep through the night and be upset when I realize you’re gone. I want the flesh on my fingers to grow faster just so there’s more to feed on.

POETRY

I still own those covers and sheets from the nights my father tucked me in. All pressed and cleaned and folded in a wooden engraved chest, haven’t used them in years, but I still imagine myself in that bed.

Last Words KELSEY BROWN

My tongue is a draw-bridge That keeps trapped the words I never got to say to you “It is with great sadness that I write to inform you...” Let’s pretend it’s hide and seek Come out, come out wherever you are “...made a lasting impression” I thought I heard your voice in the ocean’s song, Your gentle melody riding the waves “all we could talk about was the future” I found you in my mind’s tornado, Making friends with the cobwebs in the corners “...admired by his peers” When I felt you slipping through my fingers like sand, I called in the search party “extending our thoughts and prayers...” So here is what I never got to say: I was a little mad at you the day you crushed my stress ball

KELSEY BROWN

“...in an automobile accident” And I was more mad the morning You flipped your car without calling me to say goodbye “in the wake of this tragic event”

POETRY

May you rest in the sweetest of peace, While I start picking up my own pieces.

DONALD HALL POETRY PRIZE WINNER

Season of Mist TANNER CELESTIN

Underneath a canopy of leaves you teach me how to build a fire, twisting sticks between my hands until my palms are blistered red and I have to soak them in the stream. My conjured flames offset the cold. Inside the tent at night we fight the cold by falling together like dying leaves into sleep lulled by the babbling stream and the comfort of body heat like fire. And in the morning when my nose is red you breathe warmth back into my hands. I cup breakfast berries in my hands because I like to feel them when theyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re cold. They stain the creases of my palms red no matter how hard I scrub, leaving a mark against my skin as bright as a fire that cannot be quelled by the stream. Light breaks through the trees in a stream too beautiful to be created by hand, yet destructive enough to start forest fires. Sometimes your love makes me cold. I know that everyone in this world leaves and that blood cannot retain its red. You love to camp in autumn because red is your favorite color, and the stream

TANNER CELESTIN

is just high enough that it leaves you breathless after you plunge your hands, your arms, your chest into the cold until you emerge cleansed, phoenix out of the fire. At twilight I always build you a fire and rub your arms until theyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re red and Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve fought off your impending cold. The sounds of embers sizzling as they hit the stream fade as you turn pages in your hands and read to me words of grass and leaves.

POETRY

The fire dies as the smoke streams and leaves a heap of embers glowing red. We breathe warmth back into our cold hands.

DONALD HALL POETRY PRIZE WINNER

Ode to Blythe TANNER CELESTIN

On a river on a boat on a towel in California there’s a seat cushioned enough for my head when I lie down and cold enough from the midnight air that I wrap myself in the towel there When I look up there’s no edge to the sky black enough to absorb my pupils until the constellations burst behind my eyes I want to share the constellations there with you so we can wonder how the blackened river bled into the vastness of the Milky Way and broke the dam there inside me and all the colors absorbed by black bleed out of my mouth I whisper to you that you make me wish my favorite color was green but all that’s ever there inside me is blue and this blackness of the desert sky and how I’ve tried finding my future in the connection of stars that are right there above us but all I know is I am in a place in a boat in a body wrapped in a towel that’s lost all its warmth and my fingers have turned blue

Of Tune RACHEL CORSO

Lover’s kisses and double suicides Play out like low adagios across old piano keys. An infinite melancholy masked by uptilted harmony; The infamous joie de vivre— The American Dream: A smug nosed symphony of how we should be. A rhythm filled with continuous blue-collared kisses near white picket fences— The same stable beat where: Suburban women in saucer-skirts and aprons Make love to their honorable veterans Based solely on the premise that this is what is expected— An expectation placed on this soiled land—A land— Complete with a list of latent demands All composed by the notorious stork shaped hand—I want you— To pledge your love in sweet sanctioned melodies To this bourgeois l’échafaudage under god.

POETRY

Yes, I want you— My dear Uncle Sam, To remove your trigger tired finger off that double suicide gun And stop making bold threats of a mushroom cloud death.

Because after all—It is in you, That we so proudly trust.

An Ode to Debbie B White RACHEL CORSO

Oh how it was, How it never should have been— Mundane sounds of laughter Masked with the pale stench of gin— TONIC—clonic— Myoclonic movements to the sequenced strobes; Solely highlighting those in overpriced stilettos. And so it goes, And goes, and goes, and goes, Like these stale scenes in suburban neighborhoods. Where Frat boys, in their parents’ rented homes, Claim that the pre-cut lines of coke will never get blown. But we all know, That the bathroom tile sees best through the nose— And that your box of Reds collects more than just boges. And how it is, These rolled up singles, for singles, who found singular sensation In bumps off the cold. And your claims of this shit “getting old” seem so sincere, I can see it: eyes bulged. And it’s all so clear, With your staggering gonzo fist pumped high—More lines! I mean, lies! More lies about lines— About the Frat boys and their fat lies about the fat lines.

RACHEL CORSO

And so, and so, and so, With your powdered nose, and your gin filled solo, You whisper, in jittered tongue to that dumb blonde, Who canâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t understand your sophomoric proseâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;

POETRY

Oh, how it was, How it never should have been!

On Marrying a Polish Woman SHANNON DELAHANTY

Upon watching the flaming clay Melt and bubble in the tarnished tin can The hot blue-flame, disfiguring the carefully crafted faces He gazed, defeated She had laughed at his work! What he had spent many years on Creating and manipulating The red-clay with his cracked hands He had made the First Man Eyes a-blaze with blissful ignorance His modeled man stood erect, Strong and firm His chest: bare and defined By the articulate impression of the clay And there, resting at his feet, was a Woman Born from his rib Her arms clinging tightly around his shapely calves Her eyes looking up at him, As a dog looks to her owner She was like a little marionette He was as big as a God They both melted away together in the tarnished tin can 27

SHANNON DELAHANTY

He stared vacantly at his work Lost Watching the sizzling clay steam His thoughts were of the snake and the tree and the bitten pomegranate She had asked him during dinner that night, While he was cutting away his Lamb from the bone If he had finished his pottery â&#x20AC;&#x153;I light it on fireâ&#x20AC;?

POETRY

She sipped loudly at her wine And buttered her bread

Eleven at Night ANTHONY DIMARTINO

Eleven thirty at night and the room is still a mess. Basketball shoes, running shoes, and academic shoes, Karate shoes, lacrosse cleats, and Sperry’s Gatorade bottles and torn-up papers from Last semester probably, Playstation and Xbox games never opened Spit cups and dip cans lining the windowsill A mattress found its way into the room last night And now rests atop the futon, Which is on top of the notebooks, worksheets, and The overpriced math and business textbooks you were Looking for all today Before you skipped class for reasons undisclosed There’s uniforms, briefs, and neckties strewn across The floor like impolite strangers, flung into An apocalyptic parallel universe made up of only Trash heaps, and garbage disposals. Eleven at night and there’s nothing to drink up But the countless half-filled water bottles That never seem to disappear.

Deliberately Faceless

JUSTIN GOLDSMITH

My hands are dry I pick up an empty brown bottle And trickle sand down the insides of my fingers Guiding the grains into the glass Until the bottle is full to the brim I pour it out and do it again There are children everywhere I used to be all of them Upstairs I am sealed inside of a crawl space Within it, the laughs have eroded And linger as hot air Breathing onto the wax shavings That a young hand I once knew Dragged into the shape of a fish bowl

POETRY

I am trapped here I am deliberately faceless Put together by a careful hand My body is built from blotches of colors The rest of me is elsewhere Searching for a circle of brown paper That has been dipped in water And plastered to the arm of a wooden chair

Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m sitting on the white carpet next to the glass door I roll a flat metal clown back and forth on the rusted rods I wait for the golden ball in the pinball machine Its paint is nearly gone

JUSTIN GOLDSMITH

I float outside in the cool air Mixing with go kart exhaust And the vapor of a waterfall splashing over a plastic cave All of the other kids take me into their nostrils And I escape through their mouths While they bite their blue-colored ice cream They donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t feel me now But they will miss me one day

Medicine WELLS GRIFFIN

When it became appropriate I drew a line that divided my life from yours. It took some time to sketch, then again with practice I drew a line that divided my life from yours, moving the pencil with precision, then again with practice as the image suited me less and less. As I moved my pencil with precision, I found traces of you in the eraser stains but the image no longer suited me, so I threw the entire page away.

POETRY

Your traces in the eraser stains, when it became appropriate, was thrown away but it took some time to sketch.

L’echafaudage LAUREN LOCKS

In Macon, summer is a white blouse And chocolate milk. Any other color holds hostage The heat you so desperately Want to be free from and any other Beverage doesn’t spill down your throat In the same refreshing way. I look out The window above the sink, ignoring One grossly impressive mountain for another, and focus on an angle Made of faraway birds. And I Wish the childhood stories were true, that a sack-carrying stork delivered a baby to the doorstep of adults who Were deemed ready and responsible. We Are not ready. We are not responsible. A mound of fur rubs against my calf and I look down to see big black saucer eyes Looking up at me. I kneel and stroke an uptilted ear until she runs away, Taking with her my unsettling train Of thought and leaving me full of your voice In my ears. You are reading a foreign Poem to me, flaunting your skilled tongue And appreciation of the arts, but I Don’t find it impressive and my feelings Are obvious and when you say, in French, “L’echafaudage,” and I quickly interject “God bless you,” my humor doesn’t humor You and the air grows thick with realization. I begin dicing mushrooms

LAUREN LOCKS

POETRY

In a desperate attempt to fill the air But we both know where this is going. We both know weâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re missing more Than we have.

My Subconscious Hates Me CLARE MICHALAK

She’s a red-lipped, foul-toothed lady mauler, A bee-stung, gin-drenched middle finger, A talon-heeled tequila headlock She’s a deep-fried pierced-up smoke cloud A key-scratched high-pitched inked sleeve A blown out tear streaked ashtray She’s a leather-backed torn-up bar stool A downbeat burnt-up gyration A fleshed-out slipped-up sex parade She’s a lemon-lipped bankrupt bar tab A beer-soaked oak-knotted floorboard An umbrella-dipped salt-rimmed grease pool She’s a short-circuit, rusted-over, iron nail A red-lipped taped-up theme park A foul-toothed bear-clawed goddess She’s a red-lipped foul-toothed lady mauler. And she just handed me a drink Spilling some poison from the rim With an umbrella and a salt ring

Italian Dinner

NICOLE MARESCA

First, just an empty glass; no water. You tell the waiter, “I’m fine with just water,” But is it really just water? Doesn’t each gulp of the delicious water Refresh and satisfy your stomach, temporarily, at least until the bread? Now a new friend comes along: the bread Such steamy bread You pick and pull at the hottest piece of bread It is looking rather tan, that bread You allow him to come into your mouth, that piece of bread, Sometimes you’ll even rub oil onto that bread Once gone, though, it becomes meaningless; you now want salad.

POETRY

It has everything you need: a salad Substance, vibrancy; that is one fine salad It’s known to make you grow as a person by being one with salad The dressing is like a warm blanket, allowing more comfort with your salad But other times you’d rather it just be bare-naked salad Sadly, that doesn’t even seem to please you anymore, and you wait for the spaghetti.

Thinking about those blonde wavy locks of spaghetti Fantasizing about being with spaghetti Lusting over spaghetti Being so strong, that spaghetti

NICOLE MARESCA

So sexy and slippery, that spaghetti Hoping that soon you will be filled with spaghetti Just to have it be inside you…oh, spaghetti Now you finally get your spaghetti “Do you ‘I do’ me, spaghetti?” Mr. and Mrs. Spaghetti Two pieces stuck together, of spaghetti We were always friends, spaghetti Not even a knife’s cut can come between us, spaghetti But, you were betrayed by spaghetti, With those two plump, firm meatballs, who enjoyed caressing your spaghetti, being on top of your spaghetti, spewing their sauce over your spaghetti. Don’t they know it’s your spaghetti? Was it a threesome with those meatballs? Stabbing your fork into the meatballs Cutting it into tiny fragments of meatballs Maliciously chomping on the meatballs You can’t even see them anymore, those meatballs. The crime is committed and you have been satisfied. But then the waiter asks, “Would you like to see the dessert menu?” And the first thing that catches your eye is the tiramisu. Why hello there, nice to meet you. You look gorgeous tonight, tiramisu. 37

Cheese and Crackers

POETRY

JULIA PERKINS

You said no thank you when my mother offered you cheese and crackers, the thin Crunchmaster multi-seed kind, which taste too healthy to taste any good. We hid our laughter as the plate flopped on the tile, the ceramic clanging, crackers crushing. You wandered in my sunlight, eyes shadowed over with a straw hat, and threw pinecones at my window and I thought that was cute because it was different and wouldn’t create a diamond of growing cracks on the glass, just a scrape, cling, tink, of wood on window. You took my hand and we ran between the immobile trees, closing our eyes to the dark shadows, seeing only what the slivery cracks of thinning moonlight allowed us to see of the world within the woods. Until we popped out and all the moonlight, all the stars hit us. We swam in the lake, water tickling our lips, smooth as melted butter in the summer. “I never want to leave,” you said, and I thought that meant you would stay, but tomorrow broke down night into tiny fragments of nothing and forever died and I put the world back together into broken pieces of cheese and crackers.

Divorce JULIA PERKINS

You’re in Taylor’s basement, sitting on the couch covered in cat hair when the shouting carries down the stairs and she looks down at her fingers, picks at the fabric of the couch and softly says in a shaking, even voice, “Yeah, that happens all the time,” and you think you are going to burst like a water balloon because you had nearly forgotten: five years old, sitting in the corner of your bedroom on the itchy rug playing Barbies, with Sophia, when the shouts carried through the hallway to your bedroom. The Barbie fumbles in her hand and she looks at you, like a scared fawn, so, face hot, you look down at your beaming Barbie, softly say in a shaking even voice, “Yeah, that happens all the time.” Again you see how the golden dark shapes of the trees looked from your half-closed eyelids as you lean against the scratchy cushion of the backseat at ten years old, on a late-night ride home after another broken vacation, remembered 39

JULIA PERKINS

POETRY

only because of the argument over the windows they wanted to put in the bedroom you share with your little sister. Kim’s asleep, but the bickering keeps you from falling into your dreams.

Putting together that night when you were eleven is like trying to fit puzzle pieces with worn and chewed edges together. You can’t tell the difference between the stories and the blurry memories, but you and Kim were watching your favorite Sunday night show Extreme Makeover Home Edition when the shouts carried through into the room with the fireplace and round green rug. You don’t know if someone turned the TV off, but you think you were there when he growled, ripped off part of their bedroom door and you think you cried, but you’re not sure if someone drugged your mind with poisoned memories because you don’t remember what he looked like when he splintered the frame or what happened for the next few… days? Weeks? You just know December 1 was the day he left and it was as

JULIA PERKINS

if you were taking your first breath out of water because you would never have to tell your friends, “Yeah that happens all the time.” But you have never watched Extreme Makeover Home Edition again and the wood on the side of your mother’s door frame is still frayed and the windows they fought over installing in your bedroom now have chipped paint, mold grows on the edges, and when you put your finger against the side of the glass you can feel the faintest breeze brush your skin. They say there are no sides, that you shouldn’t choose between mom and dad, that they both love you, that they don’t want you stuck in the middle, but they don’t see they are chasing each other around a pool of water, which keeps spinning, spinning, spinning you into the center of everything and you’re screaming “I’m dizzy!” but they can’t hear you because they’re shouting louder than you, so you drown deeper, deeper, underwater.

Mr. Darcy Has Abnormal Biology - A Found Poem KIRA SMELSER

POETRY

Hannah’s devotion to Elizabeth is reported as a precursor to cephalopod eyes. The muscles of all animals brush back the curls from his schizoid personality, where he gathered his considerable dignity. The unusual speech patterns of an organism that is offspring cannot bear to hear him labeled a philanderer either. How does the legal concept of love refer to competitive interactions between the fact that “I am stunted and cannot accommodate you!” Surprised and disconcerted, a grand rubescence graced her cheeks, evolved in competition. Obesity is not formally considered an eating disorder, but stern judgment. There are far more people on waiting lists who, like him, dropped her hair pins one by one to the floor—uncaring.

Helen

JOE VIRGILLITO

He never thought he’d have a problem seeing another person’s face, or that there might be one he’d like to see so often. It made no sense. He started to question her every little hinting detail, as if she didn’t exist on the same plane of reality. But he knew the reality of the situation. It was becoming a problem. His eyes were poring over every detail on her Facebook page, staring at her face in the upper left-hand corner. He wanted to ask her questions, maybe about how often she liked to smoke, if often at all. But in reality every hypothetical question he posed was too idealistic. That would be a problem if they ever talked face-to-face, that the silly details of his mind wouldn’t match the details of hers. Maybe he could ask what television show she watched most often, and he wondered what type of face he’d make if she mentioned some dumb reality show. He knew he wouldn’t have a problem with anything she said anyway, whether she was answering his questions

JOE VIRGILLITO

or asking some questions of her own. And as they talked, maybe the details would start to slip through the cracks, and his only problem then would be nodding just often enough to forget that unrealistic thought of bringing his face to hers. Maybe if he could just face it like a man and greet her with a smile he’d stop questioning himself and see that she could be his reality. He could see almost every single detail. He often could when he started thinking too much about his problems,

POETRY

but this really didn’t seem like a problem at all. Maybe in her face, somewhere among all that beautiful detail, he’d find an answer to those questions he asked himself so often.

POETRY

VISUAL

Spiderman VISUAL

OSAAMA AWAN

Wolverine OSAAMA AWAN

VISUAL 50

Catalina Sails JACLYNN CLAY

Young Love JACLYNN CLAY

Rosy Roses VISUAL

KIRA DIAZ

Fall Photography JEFF FABER

VISUAL 54

Foggy Baseball Fields at Night DEVAN KINGSTON

Abandoned Train Tracks DEVAN KINGSTON

VISUAL 56

Power of Time TESS PELLICANO

Lighthouse

KRISTEN RIELLO

VISUAL 58

Untitled 83 JOSHUA VICTOR

Untitled JESSICA WHARTON

VISUAL

PROSE

Letters to IHOP KIM FEARS

I lied to the waitress today. She asked me what my name was and I said Felicity. My name is not Felicity but I wanted to know what it would be like to change my identity. But then I realized that even though she called me by a different name, I was still me. I could have drawn a beard on my face, and shaved my head, and she still would have known some facet of who I was. That comes through no matter what. It sucks. 9/30/12 I go to IHOP because I can’t flip pancakes. I can’t do a lot of things, like cry during sad movies, but flipping pancakes is a bigger issue. I spent twenty years of my life waking up on Sunday mornings and fucking up my stove with pancake batter. I didn’t think it was going to be that hard, but it really is. My plate would look like I’d vomited partially cooked batter onto it, and then I wouldn’t be hungry anymore. At IHOP, they know how to flip pancakes. 12/25/12 I can’t believe this place is open on Christmas. Oh wait, it isn’t. I’m just sitting out here alone because I still can’t flip my own damn pancakes. If I could, I would have a beautiful Christmas

PROSE

breakfast right now. But I can’t, so I’m here, hoping somebody

will help me out. It’s kind of cold out. If you come in tomorrow and see a snowman in front of the door, I made it. Let it serve as a reminder of the great opportunity you missed.

KIM FEARS

2/16/13 Why do you guys have to stuff your French toast? What is the allure of that? I like French toast, and I like all of the toppings you offer, but the creamy filling is just overkill. It feels like we can’t leave well enough alone. It’s like saying, “Well I know you like your house, and you like your cat. BUT here’s a thousand bunny rabbits, just to make it even more fun!” I don’t want bunny rabbits. I just like the house and the cats. 4/22/13 You shouldn’t give kids pancakes with smiley faces on them. It’s weird and it might freak them out. It freaks me out. I don’t want something smiling at me when I’m trying to eat it. If a turkey smiled at you before you chopped its head off, would you still eat it? And who would want to eat a face? Wait. Don’t answer that question. 4/23/13 I ordered the chicken and waffles this morning. I had been eyeing it for a few weeks now, but every time I saw it, I couldn’t decide if it was going to be gross or delicious. I would always tell myself, “Next time. Next time,” And make an invisible circle around the picture with my finger. Well next time finally arrived this morning, and here I am, confused as fuck and feeling very Southern. The waitress didn’t seem surprised about my order, though. 63

KIM FEARS

6/6/13 How do I like my eggs? How do I like my eggs? Well, scrambled, obviously. That’s the only way to ensure that the little birdies inside are dead, and that no weird shit’s gonna come popping out of my stomach like in Alien. Also, I don’t like runny food. I want food that stays put. And sometimes you have to scramble something up to get it to stay put. So HELL yea I like my eggs scrambled. 7/2/13 I’m decidedly unimpressed by the syrup choices here. Some people are, though. I see them pouring each flavor onto a spoon and tasting to see which will go best with whatever pancake flavor they have chosen. This is all old news for me. Any wise customer would immediately taste the syrups, before even LOOKING at the menu. You all seem very proud of having offered such an array of syrups, but I see no apple flavor, no marshmallow, NO CHOCOLATE, and no option to drizzle it all over the hot busboy’s body. 9/15/13 I have trust issues. Give me all the bacon you have. 10/6/13 PROSE

Sometimes I just wish the waiter would trip, and toss all of his shit into the air. It happens all the time in movies. Everything

slows down and the shit flies everywhere. I feel like IHOP is the

KIM FEARS

place for that to happen. Scrambled eggs would splatter the old man who’d been talking smack to his grandkids, coffee would get all over some blonde chick’s blouse, and a pancake would land perfectly on my plate. Then I would look up and say a punch line. Fade to black and signal the slogan: “IHOP. The International House of Pain.”

WILDER FICTION PRIZE WINNER

The Sandpiper KARA FORTIER

Donald Duck is dying. Cancer, the doctor says. I can’t remember what kind. Marlene has cancer, too. It’s sad, yet strangely fitting that they have cancer together. Neither of them could have faced it alone. Donald Duck’s real name is Don Snyder. He met me before I was born, but I didn’t know him very well back then. I was three when I awarded him his nickname. He thought it was the funniest thing in the world. “What’s my name?” he’d crow. “What’s my name?” “Donald Duck,” I’d say, and he’d laugh like the sun was going out. Donald Duck’s laugh wasn’t a light cackle; it was a deep chuckle that came from the very bottom of his being, slowly at first, as if he had to think about what he was going to say. “Ha, ha, ha,” every syllable pronounced separately and given equal weight and importance. It lasted forever and made you feel like you were the only person in the world worth laughing over, the only person worth listening to. When Donald Duck laughed, time stood still and rushed forward, squeezing decades into breaths. I’d listen to him and think I knew how to spell laughter. PROSE

Donald Duck was taller than Dad—six-three or six-four,

inhumanly tall to a toddler. That is what I first learned of Donald Duck: his height and his kindness. And, of course, his voice.

KARA FORTIER

Donald Duck had the best voice in the world. It was as tall as he was. You could listen to it all day and never get bored, never once be tempted to interrupt it. It sounded like honey and sunshine, and a little bit like the inside of a Crunchie bar, all crackly and sweet. It was what I imagined the sailors from my books sounded like. Donald Duck’s voice told the best stories, and I always listened as if my life depended on them. Sometimes it did. Other times I just liked to hear that voice. The only thing I loved more than Donald Duck’s voice was Donald Duck’s boat. The Sandpiper. The best bird on the shore, and the best boat in the sea. You could get everywhere that mattered in a boat, and the Sandpiper took us there. The whole of history happened on its bow, in a series of spirited reenactments that transpired while our parents were diving. We were privateers attacking a Spanish galleon; we were sixteenth-century merchants seeking riches in India; we were frozen sailors searching in vain for the Northwest Passage. The Sandpiper was a whaler and a schooner and a nuclear submarine all at once, and Donald Duck was always its captain. When our parents came back, we would race to the stern and stand on the dive platform, toes gripping the edge, to throw the guts from Dad’s latest filet to the seagulls. When the fish guts ran out, we raked the water for comb jellies to appease the ravenous birds. Dad said I used to think fish guts were gross, but I don’t remember ever being such a sissy. Probably my mother had thought they were gross, so I thought women were supposed to believe that. But fish guts were never gross, and they never stank. They

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looked like flat rocks washed with the blood of necessity and they smelled of childhood. After the diving and the bird feeding we would head in to the dock, more slowly than we had left it. Don and Marlene liked to eat at the Galley, where you had to have socks and they had the best desserts in the world. Only people from the Navy were allowed, and a big sign above the door read, “No Shower Shoes.” Donald Duck was in the Navy once, but he doesn’t talk about it anymore. I wanted to be in the Navy someday, too. I didn’t wear shoes in the shower, but I guessed that old people like Don and Marlene must. We never showered after diving. Instead, we dragged the sea in with us, picking off the worst of the seaweed at the door and flaking dried salt into our meals. I don’t know why they worried about our socks. Sometimes their friends would meet us there at the Galley, and they would talk about their farms and their children, and I always liked them. Donald Duck’s friends were always fun. Kendra’s father killed a heifer and Julia-Anne had watched. I wanted to watch the next one, too, which would be on a Sunday, but Dad said no, it was too far a drive and you didn’t invite yourself over other people’s houses to watch their heifers get killed. Every Fourth of July we spent with them, sitting for hours in a little square—Don’s and Marlene’s square, where they were allowed to bring as many people as they could fit. It was always PROSE

crowded in the square, because Don and Marlene knew everybody

there was to know, and the light shows on the water were better than fireworks. When I was twelve, I finally became an adult. My certification

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came in the mail, a flimsy little card with dolphins on the front, and it seemed impossible the wonder that it held. My entire life I had waited for this card. On the back was all the information I’d ever need: my date of birth, my worldly status (Junior Open Water Diver), and my picture, in case I forgot. Dad called Donald Duck and told him the great news. The Professional Association of Diving Instructors had approved my certification, and my name would appear on a list somewhere in the Maldives. That way, if I died, they would know who I was. Donald Duck offered to take the Sandpiper out that weekend to celebrate. I liked that he would be there for my first dive. Marlene waited topside that day, possibly doing reenactments of old Navy battles on her own to pass the time. She had been told by the doctor that she was too old to dive anymore, so she tricked him into letting her do only the most dangerous dives instead. Everyone knew that when Don and Marlene stopped diving, they would die. Sometimes Don and Marlene danced on the Sandpiper. There was no music but the wind whistling over the water and the gentle slap of waves on the hull. Don would sweep her up, his big hands closed around hers so gently you might mistake him for an angel if you weren’t careful. The rocking boat would have tumbled anyone more land-footed, but Don and Marlene were the king and queen of the Ocean State. That was all the dance floor they needed, and all the music, too. The only other thing they required was each other. For me, Don’s and Marlene’s relationship was like the ocean. I could never really understand romance—children are so often

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cocooned in a different kind of love—but it looked to me like theirs was the deepest kind, the kind no one else can ever quite fathom. Like when you’re swimming at the surface without a mask, and all you can see below you is darkness. You know the place—you could locate every underwater boulder there, and the hideouts for all the best fluke and spider crabs—but just for a moment you don’t, because it feels so good to be lost. The remarkable thing about the sea is that you don’t have to know where you’re going to recognize the beauty around you. That was Don’s and Marlene’s love, and I treasured it more deeply than I understood it. It was evening when we went to see them last. I have known Don and Marlene all my life, and I had never been to their house. We went in winter, after they got sick, to visit them just for the sake of visiting. Or so we thought. We should have known that there is no visiting without diving, even if it is only in the stories. Dad and Donald Duck told stories to the rest of us for hours. It was kind of funny, because they had done most of their diving together, and they kept interrupting each other with “Oh, was that the time you tried to pet the bristle worm?” or “You can’t get narced at eighty feet!” The stories always happened in the wrong order, with the punch line coming before the first person was done PROSE

telling the story.

Then Donald Duck got out his new BC, the stupid kind where you risk drowning yourself if your buddy runs out of air, according to Dad. The arguing got so loud that I forgot we weren’t

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on a boat, but they were never truly angry. The only person my father never got mad at was Donald Duck. I realized then that, even though he was trying to sell us a piece of equipment that would probably kill us if we ever tried to use it, Dad trusted him with our lives more than he trusted himself. He always had. Donald Duck is dying, but he isn’t scared. It’s only cancer, he says, and you can dive with cancer. He’d like to die at the bottom of the sea, but he isn’t sure he’s going to get to. So he’s decided that’s where he’ll go afterward. It’s up to us to do it. He’ll stand on the lovely, trusty Sandpiper, parked in Heaven’s Jamestown, and wait for Marlene. Then, when she’s on board, he’ll set out one final time to sea. I know they have boats in Heaven. If they didn’t, what would be the point? I want to go to Jamestown when I die.

Intruders JUSTIN GOLDSMITH

Sometimes the dogs bark really late at night. I pull down one of the shades over my window with my finger and look through it, at the house across the street and to the left. During the day, I can see the dogs at the corner of the black metal fence. They usually bark at me or another passerby, but at night I can never tell what they’re barking at. It’s always too dark to see past the pine trees on the side yard and none of the streetlights work anymore. The mother is the only one that lives in the house now. I never see any cars other than hers in the driveway. Her coppercolored van barely seems to move, and it’s the same with her. Sometimes she walks the dogs, two big Labradors, and other times I see her walking with another woman in the neighborhood.

When I was younger, there was only one dog at the house.

It was the same kind of dog, but it was much tamer. We barely ever heard it barking. I would sometimes see the neighbor’s kids out in the backyard with it, playing fetch or wrestling with it and laughing. When we first moved to the house, they had a block party and we were invited. I don’t remember much of it, but I remember they had a big gated pen that they kept the dog in. The neighbor kids locked me in it, and I remember feeling so small inside of the cold metal. My mother, or one of my brothers, told me that the old golden Labrador was hit by a car not long after we moved to PROSE

the neighborhood. Soon after that they got a second dog, a brown

one. The second dog started the barking, a low, elongated echoing sound. When it’s really quiet, you can hear the bark bouncing off of all of the houses. I don’t remember when they got the third dog,

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a black one, but that one eventually joined in with the barking and that’s all that comes from the house anymore.

Her name is Stacy. Her kids were older than me, but about

the same age as my older brothers. The father was a psychologist in the high school. Everyone knew the family. I remember my mother once said that she saw the son smoking a cigarette behind the green electrical box to the side of their house. I must have been nine years old, but something about the instance frightened me. I didn’t like the thought of an older kid leaving his house at night to do something bad without his family knowing. I looked at that electrical box as a sort of crime scene, picturing the neighbor kid indulging himself. Every time I went outside and saw that spot, the big green chunk of metal, I could imagine him in the dark, squatting, and smoke hissing out from between his lips. I wanted to be friends with him, Josh, the neighbor’s son. He was probably about six years older than me and in the same school year as my oldest brother. One of the other neighbor kids would come over and ask me if I wanted to play basketball with him and Josh. He was good, a star on the high school team, or that’s how it was in my head. We would play in their driveway, and Josh would have us play two against one. He would always win and I would never mind. I would go home and tell my oldest brother about it and talk about how good Josh was. I would ask my brother if he would play with us next time, trying to make some kind of friendship between two older kids. My brother would always refuse and ask me why I talked about Josh so much.

The daughter, Lauren, was younger than Josh by about

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two years. She used to walk home from the bus stop with my other brother. I remember when me and some of the neighborhood kids were playing tag in the street, the daughter yelled down to me from her window about the girls I was with. She asked me which one I was interested in and I got embarrassed and went home.

One night recently I came home and parked on the street.

I looked across the road and noticed the light of their living room through the bay window. There was only one lamp on, a standing lamp with an off-white shade. The room looked very calm and there was nothing moving within it. I turned my car engine off and stared into the room. I wondered if Stacy was even inside the house, if she had gone to bed and had forgotten to shut that light off. I looked at the dark green couch, the blackness of the inactive television set, and I could almost feel the room’s stale air. For a while I sat in my car and looked at the house. All of the houses on the street look the same aside from their color, but Stacy’s house looked different that night, frightening, almost. I thought about what it would be like to be inside, sitting in that dim lit room in the quietness. I don’t know what I would have been doing there, if I would have been alone or if Stacy was sleeping, but I felt like I wanted to be there. The longer I stared into the room, the more like an intruder I felt. I didn’t think about doing anything bad, stealing or anything like that, I just thought about somehow getting inside, disturbing the idleness. I felt like the house was owed something PROSE

that I could give it with my presence. After a while I heard the dogs

barking. I looked towards the black gate fence and could see the silhouettes of the two dogs facing me. Even when I went inside my house and got into my bed they kept barking.

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Before I made it into high school Josh got sick. My family didn’t tell me much about it, but from the little I heard from my mother I knew it was bad. He stopped playing basketball, and after a while he was pulled out of school. Some other kids in the neighborhood said he was home schooled and some said he wasn’t doing anything at all. I would doubt the stories, but sometimes I would see Josh bringing out the garbage or getting the mail and he didn’t look well. I would wave to him, but I think he usually didn’t see me.

Around the same time that Josh got sick I heard bad

things about his father, Dr. Stern, the school psychologist. Kids were saying that Dr. Stern was caught doing something with one of his patients in his office, a girl in the high school. When I asked my mother about it she didn’t deny it, but I could tell she didn’t want to talk about it with me. An affair, she called it, that’s all she would say. I started seeing Dr. Stern much more than usual. I saw him going in and out of the house in his scratchy looking turtlenecks and thick-rimmed glasses. Around then, the house was always full of people, going in and out and the dogs were always barking. Even at night, I could hear car doors shutting and engines starting. One night, I heard yelling coming from their house. I crawled over to my window and tried to listen, but I couldn’t make out any words over the barking of the dogs. I saw Dr. Stern come out and slam the front door and then it got very quiet. The dogs stopped barking and stared at him and he stared back at them. I didn’t want to move away from the window because I felt like if I moved at all he would notice, so I just stayed very still and watched them. The lights in the house started to go out and soon I could

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only see Dr. Stern’s dark outline. After a few more minutes, he moved towards the door and the dogs started barking again. He walked over to his car, got in it, and drove away slowly. That was the last time I ever saw him. The house was much quieter after Dr. Stern left; I could never tell if it was more or less pleasant without the violent noise. The quietness disturbed me; it made me feel unwelcome, especially at night. As the years went by, the stillness of the neighbor’s house made me forget them. I didn’t hear much of Josh’s sickness and the dogs barked much less at night. When I was in high school Lauren crashed her car into a tree at the corner of our street. I wasn’t around to hear it or see it, but my family told me it was because she was driving drunk. I walked outside and down the road and saw the tree. It wasn’t as bad as I had pictured it, but there were some deep gashes in the wood. For some reason, I thought they looked like they belonged there; like they had always been there and I had never paid attention to them. The next day everyone talked about it in school. All of the kids were saying that after the accident she got arrested, but other kids said she went to the hospital because of her injuries. I didn’t see Lauren much at all, but after the accident I saw her leaving the house with Stacy a lot. That same year I was drunk with my friends walking around the neighborhood. We were ringing doorbells and running PROSE

and hiding and laughing. We made it onto my street and one of

my friends was ready to ring Stacy’s doorbell. At first I thought nothing of it until I thought about Josh. I could picture Josh and Stacy sleeping, in a moment of peace from all of the bad things

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that had been happening. I pictured the loud ringing pulling them awake, scaring them, and Stacy rushing to the door expecting someone but seeing nobody. I felt a bad feeling in my stomach and I tried to convince my friends to move on, to not disturb this house. After some arguing, my friends stepped onto Stacy’s yard anyway. When they did, the dogs started barking and we ran. I remember feeling so relieved that something got in our way; that something stopped us from disturbing them after I had failed. When I was driving with my mother in the summer after high school we passed Stacy and Josh walking together in the neighborhood. Josh was wearing sweatpants and a sweatshirt with a winter cap. He didn’t look well, and neither did Stacy, but they looked happy. I remember my mother had said something about it being nice to see. I pictured my mother and I walking together the same way, but it didn’t seem as happy, as needed.

I got to college and forgot about the Sterns again until my

mother told me over dinner that Josh had passed away. It almost bothered me that she was crying when she told me. I had missed it. I imagined the ambulance in front of the house, parked in front of the green electrical box. I imagined Stacy speaking to one of the paramedics, crossing her arms and raising her shoulders like she was cold. I imagined her face, stern and unchanging as she answered the paramedic’s questions while her son was quiet and still in the house with strangers’ hands all over his body.

I felt sad, but I felt uncomfortable about how his death

had caused my family to stir. While I didn’t want to feel it, I did. No one close to me had ever died, and Josh and I were far from close, but when I thought about him dying it made me feel uneasy.

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He was just a kid in the neighborhood but I knew him from when I was very young, had memories about him, and now that was all I would have. My mother talked about how bad she felt for Stacy; for all that she’s been through. She talked about how she thought Stacy should move; how she should get out of a house that’s full of bad memories. Stacy never did move. Lauren did, at some point, and left her mother alone in the house with the two dogs. She started walking the dogs much more during the day, and I see her deeper in the neighborhood, much farther away from her house than I had ever seen any of the Sterns. I wonder if she means to go that far; if being far away from the house makes her feel anything. When the dogs bark at night I always look out to the neighbor’s house. The living room light stays on, and I look into the house sometimes expecting to see Stacy moving around. I’ll stare into the bay window and wait, but she never passes in front of it. The couch and the things around the living room never budge; nothing new is ever inside. I look at her car, sitting still in the driveway on the other end of the house. Every night when I

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hear the dogs barking I look for some change.

Dad’s Song BRETT KASELOUSKAS

I had practiced the song over and over and over again, yet I was still afraid I would forget the words. Standing alone in the dark wings of the stage, my sweaty hands gripping the microphone, I repeatedly sang the first line in my head, “He said I was in my early forties, with a lot of life before me, when a moment came that stopped me on a dime.” I couldn’t let him down. Sudden applause snapped me out of my lyrical fog and I knew it was time. “Next we have Brett Kaselouskas singing ‘Live Like You Were Dying.’” Those words rang loudly through the middle school auditorium, eliminating any chance I had of changing my mind. I slowly walked toward the center of the stage. Looking into the crowd, the beaming spotlight hurt my eyes, but I could still see him. I saw his head, bald from the chemo, and it reminded me why I had to sing this song. It was his favorite. As far back as I could remember he played country music, in the car, around the house, even in his headphones while he mowed the lawn. For years I didn’t even know that another genre existed. Standing in the checkout line at Walmart, I held his copy of Tim McGraw’s new album. It didn’t occur to me at the time that the reason Dad liked it so much was because Tim was singing about him. “I spent most of the next days, looking at the x-rays, talkin’ ‘bout’ the options, and talkin’ bout’ sweet time.” That song was his song. The applause quieted just as the piano began to play. I looked down to turn the microphone on, watched its small light switch from red to green, and swallowed my nerves. My voice

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shook as I sang the first verse. I tried to disconnect myself from the lyrics so that my eyes wouldn’t fill with tears. It didn’t work. Instead the lyrics ignited memories. “And all of a sudden goin’ fishin’ wasn’t such an imposition, and I went three times that year I lost my dad.” I saw pictures of him and me in my mind, pictures of us wearing matching hats at my first Red Sox game and of him deep sea fishing, holding up my fish because I was too afraid. Dad was diagnosed with Lymphoma on a day I should have been at school, but I just couldn’t go. I stayed with my grandparents while he was in surgery, and held my breath each time the phone rang, waiting to hear what the doctor had said. “It was just the neighbor,” Grammy would say. “Why don’t you watch a movie?” I was watching Finding Nemo when the call finally came. He had cancer. Grammy tried to tell me in the gentlest way possible, but there’s no gentle way to say that word. I hate that word. Weeks earlier, Mrs. Noonan had looked confused during my audition. It may have been because I wanted to sing a country song, or because she didn’t know seventh graders listened to Tim McGraw. But mostly I think she was confused as to why a twelveyear-old boy chose to sing a song about a forty-something man with cancer. “Why did you pick that song?” she asked. I chose not to tell her. I wasn’t ready. “I just like Tim McGraw,” I said. It seemed like reason enough to me. PROSE

On stage that night I became more comfortable as the

song continued, and soon didn’t feel nervous at all. Instead, I felt proud to be singing a song for my dad, even if no one else knew it was for him. “I was finally the husband, that most of the time I

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wasn’t, and I became a friend a friend would like to have.” Even through treatment, he was still a husband, a friend, and a father – a great one. Sitting at the kitchen table covered in bits of eraser, I was doing math homework when Dad rushed through the door. He tried reaching the bathroom before getting sick. Treatment made him so sick. “How was your day?” he would ask as soon as he felt better. I knew he had more important things to think about than my day, but he knew how important it was that he asked. He was still Dad. The cancer made him weak, but in my eyes he was stronger than ever. Singing Tim’s words was my chance to tell the world just how strong he was. I looked at him sitting in the second row as I sang the last line. “And he said someday I hope you get the chance, to live like you were dying.” He smiled back at me, and Mrs. Noonan finally understood why I had really chosen that song. I was barely off the stage when she tearfully approached me. “That was beautiful, I’m sure he loved it,” she said. I knew he did. Backstage I walked past rooms full of other students waiting to perform. Some holding objects to juggle with, others making sure their dance shoes were tied just right. All I could think about was getting to hug my dad. For me, the talent show wasn’t about showing off my talents; it was about showing off his. His talent of remaining strong, of turning his disease into his motivation. He never let his diagnosis stop him. He was going to beat this thing, and in the meantime, he lived like he was dying. Only a few steps from the car, I felt someone touch my shoulder. I turned around to find an older woman I had never met before. She had a bandana where her hair should have been.

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“I couldn’t let you leave without telling you this,” she began. “I am fighting cancer myself and struggle to keep a positive attitude. Your performance inspired me to start living my life again. So thank you.” I was speechless. My dad’s song was her song too. Standing in an empty parking space, the woman hugged me tightly as the line of traffic continued moving past us. “Thank you,” she whispered in my ear. “No, thank you,” I said back. Without even giving her name, that woman taught me just how powerful a song

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can be.

In Context KYLE LIANG

Since the Japanese imperial takeover of Tainan, the southern capital of the once Taiwan Republic, the island of Taiwan has struggled for independence. For nearly 50 years, the Japanese presence was crossly prevalent. Then in World War II, Taiwan, as well as the rest of China, found themselves in a tug of war between Communist China, led by Mao Tse-tung, and Nationalist China, led by Chiang Kai-Shek. As a result, in 1943 the Allied Powers held the Cairo Conference in which they decided Taiwan’s fate. The Powers agreed with Chiang Kai-Shek’s request that Taiwan be “returned to China” and thus the island came under the ownership of Nationalist China. After World War II ended in 1945, the Allied Powers agreed to have Chiang’s troops “temporarily occupy Taiwan, on behalf of the Allied forces.” However, the stay was far from temporary, and with the passing of one evil—the Japanese—there came another. Tensions between Taiwan and the Chinese Nationalist Party were at the utmost; conflict was on the verge of erupting. On February 28, 1947, an era known as the “White Terror” began in Taiwan. Roughly 2,000 Taiwanese men and women gathered in front of the Bureau of Monopoly in Taipei on this day in order to protest the unjustifiable, brutal beating of a woman cigarette peddler and the unwarranted killing of a bystander by police earlier that day. Chinese governor Chen Yi responded to the protest with machine guns, immediately killing several civilians. As uprisings continued to erupt, Chiang Kai-Shek sent troops to the island, leading to the death of over 30,000 Taiwanese men and women, followed by a period of arrests and sudden disappearances for decades…

KYLE LIANG

It is 1964 and the Taiwan Republic of China is in a state of fear. For 21 years, every Taiwanese man has had to serve in the military following their high school graduation. The people of Taiwan are anticipating an attack or invasion on their small island off the southeastern coast of the mainland. That year a child is born. Ming is the first son and only child of his generation. Ming’s mother and father are home much of the time, allowing them to provide Ming with the attention and affection a son would demand from his parents. His parents make sure his bed is in their bedroom during infancy so they can tend to him throughout the night. Ming’s father works for a successful trading company, which allows him to own multiple pieces of land, a car, fine clothes for his family, and to send Ming to prestigious schools in the capital of Taipei. March 1st, that same year, a mother is lying on a hospital bed in Kaoshiung, dripping with sweat. She has just given birth to a silent baby. The doctor assisting in the delivery wraps his hands around the dark, new-born baby’s ankles, raises its feet into the air, letting the head hang in front of the mother’s bed and begins striking the child’s bottom with the palm-side of his open hand for what seems like hours until the hospital room hears the first cries PROSE

of life.

It is 1980 and Ming is attending high school in the capital. Ming enjoys attending school each day and studying. Ming’s

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teachers tell his father that Ming is a well-behaved, intelligent young man. They say he has a promising future ahead of him. Ming often thanks his father for the opportunities given to him. During his second year of high school, Ming meets a girl and quickly falls in love. It has been three years since Ta’s parents left for America with all of his siblings; Ta is now sixteen years old. With no one to cook for him, Ta eats noodles every night. It is not long before he grows to hate the taste. Ta works furiously every day in school to make up for his lack of company at home. Ta’s younger brother had not begun high school before leaving Taiwan and could therefore pursue an American education. Ta’s older brother stopped growing early in his adolescence and so was considered unfit to serve. Ta is the only family member left in Taiwan and he is counting down the days. It is 1982 and Ming is preparing to attend college the following year with his girlfriend of two years. Word is spreading around the island of an opportunity overseas known as the American Dream. Hundreds of families have already gone on ships to North America in search of this opportunity. Ming’s mother and father begin asking everyone in town about the American Dream. It is June 1984 and Ta is leaving the home where he has spent the past 20 years of his life in order to begin his service in the Taiwanese military.

KYLE LIANG

In Taipei, Ming is gripping the sleeve of his girlfriendâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s dress, crying. Mingâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s parents left Taiwan on a ship to find the American dream, leaving Ming in Taiwan. Men over the age of sixteen cannot leave the island and are required to serve in the military. Without his parents, Ming cannot afford to attend college anymore. It is 1985 and Ta has not had a single visitor since he started his mandated service. He sits in his bed some nights watching men, one after the other, walk out the doors of the barracks to greet family members on the other side and return to their bed with a smile on their face. Ta wishes for nothing more than a visitor. Ming is on Base 629 in the mountains of Taiwan and has lost fifteen pounds since his entry into the service. Meals are given to everyone to share on one large plate. Ming was never a fast eater and the other men did not like to share. Every day the men are required to walk for hours from town to town in stiff, rigid, boots. There is not a day Ming does not have blisters on his feet. The men are allowed five-minute showers. The water is cold and the five minutes includes undressing and dressing. At night, there are men in his barracks lying in bed asleep, thrashing at their sheets, PROSE

screaming.

It is 1986 and an old man carries his belongings onto Base 629 and into the barracks. All the other men know why he is here.

KYLE LIANG

Every year that he has been mandated to serve, he has attempted to escape. Every year he attempts to escape, he is caught. He is then thrown into prison and forced to begin his three years service again when he is released. Later that month, there is a fire in the woods neighboring the base. All the men grab their tin toiletry bowls and run up to the fire. As they try to fan out the fire, one of the men steps onto a trap set in place by a hunter. The trap closes onto his leg and after that day the man never returns to serve on Base 629. Each night, two men are required to walk around base for one hour carrying a gun. This is the only time the men carry guns. Tonight is Ta’s turn. Before the hour begins, Ta and his partner walk over to the bathrooms. On one side of the small restroom house are small, wooden stalls with doors in front of each and directly across from the stall doors is a long urinal meant for the use of many men. Ta’s partner walks into one the stalls on his left while Ta heads towards the urinal and turns to urinate with his back facing the doors. Several seconds later, there is a tremendous bang sound behind Ta. A stall door falls open and Ta’s partner pours onto the floor, head smashing into the ground next to Ta’s heels. Ta begins to scream. He cannot stop screaming. His face turns and he rips his zipper up. Blood is pouring out of his partner’s head and consuming the area of the ground by his feet. A man runs into the house, throws open the door, stops short, standing opposite the pool of blood bursts out, “What happened!” Ta’s face is contorted with fear and shock. He yells over the dead body through strained words, “Ming is dead.”

KYLE LIANG

It is 2011 in Norwich, CT. I am at the side of the table, leaning against the backrest of my chair with a half-eaten plate of rice sitting slightly to my right. My father is at the head of the table, sitting back in his chair, hands folded, legs extended out, one crossed over the other, with an empty plate slightly to his left, and he is telling me the story of how one of the men he served with in the army killed himself in the bathroom of Base 629. I can hear my dad screaming as he tells me how the man’s head fell flat against the floor next to his boots and I can see the alarm on his face. In this moment I realize my ignorance, my previous inability to accept the profoundness of this world’s experiences that I have yet to, and perhaps never will, experience. My ignorance prevented my fifteen-year-old mind from grasping the idea of an experience so psychologically anguishing that it could fire a bullet through a man’s skull. It was not until after I recognized the shroud of ignorance I produced between my life and another’s— my father’s—that I could attempt to understand their lens: the way in which they view, perceive, interpret, and understand the world around them. Rather than concede to my ignorance, I must resist it in order to reach a genuine understanding. Once I revealed my ignorance to myself, I could attempt to understand and appreciate other people’s pasts and authors’ works in the contexts of their

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lives.

Avalon DANIEL MORO

The seawind swept stars and things up past your window. Someone watched you down by the tall grass as you walked up from the docks, then back again. Something hums past the crypts and sunken meadows, further past the stone fountain. Can you hear it? I find myself in love at half-night between cloud and mountain, but only in dreams. A strange man lowers himself into the creek beside the lilybank. This petaled water he has made his home and he will sleep there. The midday sun punished the valleys, high and low, shimmering and nearly ablaze. Songs of solitude and praise echoed from a small brown home to which no path led and near no creature strode. Do not knock at the door. They are the tender ones, the ones inside. Larks passed by the cottage at sunset, which one other woman and I noticed. She drew her hands off the collar of her shirt and started home. The wind howled through the pines that night and even the owls slept. A shadow passed by one of the windows downstairs, then paced back and forth once more. I would later find out that figures were spotted in the woods that night. A cat between my legs, a mess of my heart at my feet. The dandelion sun shone once more. â&#x20AC;&#x153;Every moment is a chance to start anew,â&#x20AC;? you thought, as you bled out in the bathtub.

Why Space Jam Won the ’90s JOE ROMANO

With all things considered, 1996 was a monumental year in United States history. Bill Clinton was re-elected into office, the Dallas Cowboys were cementing themselves as “America’s Team,” and Will Smith commenced his tenure as Earth’s premier guardian in regards to extraterrestrial invasion. Although Independence Day was the year’s top-grossing film, it certainly wasn’t the most important film of 1996. That designation belongs to Warner Brothers’ epic apologue depicting Michael Jordan’s initial return to the NBA. To this day, I refuse to believe that Jordan’s recrudescence to basketball prominence was influenced by anything outside of Looney Tune Land. When Michael Jordan shook Mister Swackhammer’s hand and potentially subjected himself to an eternity of humiliation on Moron Mountain, there wasn’t a single individual in either galaxy who spoke. Time stood still and Jordan’s legacy, for the first time since he was cut from his Varsity basketball team, became susceptible to derogation.

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The stipulations were confirmed and the venue that would

ultimately showcase the greatest demonstration of competitive engagement was set. The only aspect left unsettled was the outcome. With that said, here’s why Space Jam ultimately won the ’90s.

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Michael Jordan Was Perfect There are only a handful of athletes in the history of professional sports who could’ve made a movie like this work. Scratch that, actually. There is only one athlete in the history of professional sports who could’ve made a movie like this work and Warner Brothers nailed it on the head. Michael Jordan is the epitome of professionalism and arguably the most iconic individual to ever don a jersey. In a nutshell, Space Jam wouldn’t have been as successful if it starred anyone besides Air Jordan and that sentence cannot be argued as anything short of factual. Recently, LeBron James announced via a Q&A on Twitter that he has given thought to potentially undertaking a Space Jam sequel. Given the enormity of such a contention, paired with the ongoing, media-fueled “Greatest player of all-time” debate, obviously James’ statements created a whirlwind of rumors and dialogue regarding a potential sequel. There’s no question that LeBron James will go down as one of the all-time greats, if not the greatest of all-time. That being said, there’s a reason Michelangelo’s David remains the only one of its kind. Masterpieces don’t need continuations, but if you must try your hand at recreation, you best be able to deliver. 91

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The Supporting Cast Was FIRE Although Michael Jordan absolutely played himself to a T, it was the supporting cast that put Space Jam over the top. The script was absolutely brilliant, but without the precise personnel, Space Jam could’ve fallen into a trap that a lot of high-budget children’s films ultimately fall into when attempting to reach a broad audience. Wayne Knight (Newman from “Seinfield”) was an absolute wrecking ball for the 12 minutes of screen time he had as Jordan’s personal ball washer, and I don’t think there’s another individual on this planet who could’ve voice acted a four-foot, cigar-smoking criminal alien boss more accurately than Danny DeVito. Furthermore, when it’s all said and done, I think Bill Murray might go down as the single greatest human being of all-time. I wholeheartedly don’t think that man has done anything wrong in 60+ years of existence. The best line in the entire film occurs during an exchange he has with Jordan and Larry Bird on the golf course. Wearing an umbrella hat, Murray questions whether or not Jordan’s skepticism regarding his ability to compete in the NBA PROSE

has anything to do with his skin color. When Jordan refutes this

notion by indicating that Larry’s white, Murray epically corrects Jordan by contending, “Larry’s not white; Larry’s clear.”

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The Soundtrack Was Loaded One of the most undervalued aspects of Space Jam was the fact that the film’s soundtrack was absolutely RIDICULOUS. From start to finish, you’d be hard pressed to find a more impressive compilation of symphonic dominance than what Atlantic Records put out in October of 1996. For starters, the movie opened up with the melodic stylings of R. Kelly, who convinced all of us that we were capable of flight. In fact, his effort was so inspiring that it launched his career to unrivaled heights and ultimately earned him a Grammy. Although “I Believe I Can Fly” was the most criticallyacclaimed work on the musical accompaniment, other notable hits included the Space Jam theme, which was performed by the Quad City Dj’s, and “Hit ’Em High,” which featured Busta Rhymes, LL Cool J, Coolio, and you guessed it, Method Man. If that wasn’t enough to solidify the Space Jam soundtrack as one of the greatest soundtracks of all time, Bugs Bunny even tears up a 4-minute track entitled “Buggin,” which was written by none other than Brooklyn native, Shawn Carter (Jay Z).

The Controversy Was Unmatched No movie, or rivalry for that matter, is complete without 93

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controversy. In Space Jam, the level of controversy regarding the heavily anticipated showdown between the “Tune Squad” and the “Monstars” was unparalleled. Even before the game was played, skepticism ran rampant throughout the galaxy. Media and fans alike voiced their concerns regarding the Monstars’ training regimen, as well as their talent level and extraordinary size, which seemingly appeared out of nowhere. It was later revealed that the Monstars had actually stolen the basketball talent from Patrick Ewing, Charles Barkley, Larry Johnson, and for some reason, Shawn Bradley and Muggsy Bogues. Though this was never verified, the skepticism still exists and evidence hints that these alleged false practices were, in fact, implemented by the expansion team prior to tip-off. As for the actual game, things became even more complicated. The “Tune Squad” got buried in the first half and a lot of it had to do with terrible officiating. The Monstars implemented an incredibly physical style of play and Marvin the Martian didn’t reach for the whistle once. There was one point in the first half where Foghorn Leghorn was literally burnt to a crisp at mid-court

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and the refs completely missed it.

Although most of the disputation regarding the game was aimed in the direction of the Monstars, a lot of people questioned the Toon-Squad’s half-time adjustments, and more specifically, a

JOE ROMANO

liquid that has been most commonly referred to as “Special Stuff.” Critics of Jordan’s team allude that Bugs had tainted team water bottles with deer antler spray, but when it’s all said and done, we all know that his actions were of inventive gamesmanship.

The Game Was Incredible The one aspect of Space Jam that gets lost beneath its controversy and star-studded cast was the fact that the actual meeting between the Tune Squad and the Monstars was incredible from a sports’ perspective. Tune Stadium had a colosseum-type atmosphere that night and the sheer grit and determination of both teams were on full display from the opening tip. In 2011, a student-run organization at Harvard University known as the Harvard Sports Analysis Collective actually went through the trouble to produce a statistical breakdown of the game and the results are nothing short of staggering. Some notable things to consider when examining the box score of the game is the contrast between the first and second half performances by both teams. Although the “Tune Squad” went into the locker-room at halftime trailing 18-66, they heroically managed to dominate the second half and pull off a 78-77 victory on the back of Michael Jordan, who managed to throw down a full-extension half-court dunk as time expired to seal it.

JOE ROMANO

Lola Bunny Was the Ultimate SMOKE With regards to the sexiest cartoon characters of all-time, a fair majority of the population tends to bring up names like Jessica Rabbit and Betty Boop. Obviously those are admirable candidates, but with all due respect, people who think that Lola Bunny isn’t the sexiest cartoon character of all-time are just flat-out lost and in dire need of a childhood reevaluation. I guess you can make an argument for other characters, but when it’s all said and done, a vote for anyone other than Bugs’ female counterpart is a vote in the wrong direction because Lola Bunny changed the game regarding the sexual potential of preCGI animation. Although characters like Betty Rubble, Sailor Moon, and Daphnee from Scooby Doo paved the way for future sex symbols in the realm of frame-by-frame animation, Lola Bunny redefined the genre. She was attractive, athletic, smart, tough, and most importantly, dripped sex from her initial appearance. I always hated on Bugs for grinding out that post-game kiss at the end of

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the film but I guess he deserved it.

Problems KIRA SMELSER

I drive down the winding road, smoke from my cigarette clawing its way out of my cracked driver’s side window and into the freezing air. The sound of the engine hums through the car as I lean my head on my hand, my arm resting on the door—the vibrations running up and down my arm. My peach air freshener dangles from the rear-view mirror and swings back and forth as the car crunches over the loose gravel of the road. I look over at the newspaper-wrapped gift sitting in the passenger seat along with the case of Bud Light. I push both of them back in the seat, not wanting them to fall onto the floor. I look up into the rear-view mirror and run my hand through my shaggy black hair, the few usual strands falling in my eyes. My hand wipes at my eyes to get any hung over crusts out of the corners, and I scratch at my dark stubble, regretting not getting up sooner to shave. I pull into the driveway at the end of the road and park on the grass near the mailbox that I painted two years ago. The red paint is fading and chipping off, revealing the green paint that hides underneath. I frown at it as I get out of my car and pick at the paint, causing another piece of red paint to fall off. I hold the piece in my hand as I take one last long drag of my cigarette and then toss both to the ground, grinding my cigarette into the frozen grass with my boot. “Todd, I really wish you wouldn’t do that.” I look at the porch where Lauren stands, having just come out of the house, her arms wrapped around herself against the

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cold. Her face looks thinner and I wonder if she has been eating enough. I shove my hands into my jean pockets and smile. “Where else was I supposed to put it?” “You could quit, then you wouldn’t need a place to put it.” One of her hands comes up to move away the tendrils of dark hair that are blowing into her face from the wind. She stamps her feet on the porch to keep them warm, trying to hurry me along. I grab the case of beer, the present and my phone, and stick my keys in my back pocket along with crumpled dollar bills, my license, and my credit card. Lauren stands watching from the porch and says, “Where is your wallet?” “It started looking shitty a while ago.” I shut the door with my foot and walk up to the porch where I stamp my feet to get rid of anything on the bottom of my boots. She opens the door for me, and I step into the house, Lauren following right behind me. As I walk into the kitchen, I see her mother, and her new boyfriend Jared sitting next to Grace at the table. I place the beer and present on the marble countertop and walk over to the table where her mother stands up to hug me quickly. “How are you, Todd? It’s nice to see you.” I shrug my shoulders. “I’m good.” Jared stands up slowly as I extend my hand to shake his. PROSE

“You made it,” he says. He looks at me for a moment and then

shakes my hand quickly before he sits back down and picks up a tiny spoon that has gross looking orange mushy baby food on it. “It’s okay, I can feed my baby.” I step over to his chair and

KIRA SMELSER

look down at him. He looks up at me, the spoon poised in the air near Grace’s mouth. He stares at me for a few more seconds while I keep my eyes locked on his. His eyes dart quickly over to Lauren who is standing by the counter, and then he nods, letting out a small huff as he drops the spoon back into the jar of baby food and stands up. I sit down on the chair and pick up the spoon, getting a good-sized glob onto it, and lean forward to Grace who is leaning eagerly towards the food. When her tiny mouth clamps over the spoon, Lauren and her mother start talking about Grace’s appetite while Jared goes into the living room to watch television. My shoulders droop slightly as the tension leaves my body. I look at Grace and notice how her dark hair that looks a lot like mine did as a baby is finally covering her head. Her chubby little body is bigger than the last time I saw her, dressed in a bright pink shirt with a kitten on it, tiny jeans and little pink ruffled socks. Her round large eyes peer at me as I feed her, her excited hazel gaze locking on my face in a way that reminds me of Lauren’s eyes when we went on our first date in college. I look over at Lauren leaning into the counter talking to her mother. Her face is scrunched in concern as she listens, her full lips are stretched into a thin line that I imagine running my thumb over to smooth out. Her gray sweatpants hang off of her hips, exposing a little ribbon of skin that her shirt doesn’t quite cover. Grace lets out a frustrated grunt, making me realize that my spoon has stopped in mid air. Lauren looks over at me looking at her, and her eyes squint slightly and turn cold. She tugs at her

KIRA SMELSER

shirt and wraps her arms around herself, turning her body away from me. I look back at Grace, whose tiny hands are reaching for the spoon, and I pop the food into her mouth. Lauren’s mother suddenly claps her hands. “Cake time!” Lauren brings over a small cake with a single candle in it and places it in front of Grace, but far enough away so that Grace can’t reach it. Jared comes in from the living room, and they sing “Happy Birthday” to Grace while I continue to feed her, singing under my breath. Lauren kisses Grace on the cheek and blows out the candle, and then starts cutting the cake. “Want a piece of cake Todd? I’m sure you’re hungry.” Lauren’s mother hands me a piece of cake. Jared looks over at Lauren and smirks, muttering under his breath. Lauren glares at him. Jared wanders over to the counter to get a slice of cake, looks at the beer I brought, and then turns around and says, “Todd, how many beers did you think we would drink? There are only four of us.” “I didn’t know how many everyone would want.” Jared lets out a tiny laugh and takes a bite of cake. “You better eat all that cake. It might help you sober up.” PROSE

“I am not drunk right now.” My voice takes on a slight

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edge. “Judging by the look of you, you were hammered last night and probably were still fucking drunk this morning, so it

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counts.” Lauren’s mother looks over at Jared, silently imploring him to stop. “Lauren, tell your boyfriend not to swear around my daughter. We don’t need her growing up around that.” I look over at Lauren. She looks down at her feet. I go to walk out of the room to go watch television when I hear Jared say to Lauren, “He shouldn’t even be here.” “Shut up Jared,” I mutter under my breath. “You’re telling me to shut up, you shouldn’t even be here. You don’t give two shits about Lauren or Grace!”

I walk back into the kitchen saying, “I don’t give two

shits? I was with Lauren for five years! I was there when she had Grace! I was in the delivery room holding her god damn hand!” “Yeah and even after she had your kid, you still couldn’t stop drinking! You couldn’t stay home and help her with Grace because you had to go out with your friends to a bar every night!” Lauren opens her mouth to say something, but I cut her off. “This is none of your business Jared.” “None of my business? Who was the person that helped her take care of Grace when you left! Who was the one who helped Lauren re-do this whole house that you didn’t take care of when she kicked you out! You need to just get out of here.” “Grace is my baby! I am allowed to see her whenever I want!” Jared looks at me, his fists clenching and unclenching, his anger rising just like mine is.

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KIRA SMELSER

Lauren goes over to pick up Grace who is now whimpering. Lauren starts bouncing Grace and says quietly, “Coming over once every few months doesn’t count as seeing her.” My anger deflates, as she looks at me, sad and withdrawn. “Todd I think you should go.” My head pounds as she comes over to me and stares up at me. She places Grace in my arms, signaling that I need to say goodbye. I look down at the squirming girl and cradle her in my arms, walking over to the kitchen counter where I pick up my present. I walk into the living room and sit on the couch, sitting her on my lap as I rip open the paper. I place the circular chew rings on the couch and hold Grace up to my face so that her little face is directly across from mine. I place a tiny kiss on her dimpled cheek and stare at her. She looks back at me and her eyes start to tear as she starts to get upset from being held still. I sit her back on my lap and place the chew rings into one chubby hand. “This is your toy, don’t let Uncle Jared take it away from you.” Grace looks up at me, the chew rings already in her mouth and glistening with saliva. I press my forehead to hers and stand up, handing her back to Lauren who stares at me, her forehead creasing. I walk over to the counter and grab a beer out of the case, PROSE

open it and take a long drink. “I’ll just take this for the road then.”

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I turn and walk out of the house and down to the driveway where I get into my car and chug the beer. I slam the beer against the steering wheel and yell, the force making my face hurt. I turn

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on the car and start to pull out of the driveway when I change my mind and put the car in park and get out. I stomp over to the mailbox and kick it over with a swift thrust of my leg, letting it crash to the grass and then get back in my car. As I put my car into drive, I look into my rear-view mirror and see Lauren come rushing out of the house with Grace in her arms. She hesitates and then comes down two steps off the porch, and then stops again. I wait a few seconds, my heart pounding in my chest. She ducks her head, turns, and walks slowly up the porch steps. I wait a few more seconds hoping, and then right as she opens the door to go into the house, I slam on the gas. Part of the way down the road, I pull over and put my head onto the steering wheel. Fuck that guy. I try and make things right and all he does is mess it up. I try. I have tried to visit Grace and Lauren as much as possible, but it is too hard to see them. Every time I had to leave, I would always feel more upset and then go drink more. It would always start with one drink, and I would just keep going. I had started drinking in college and it just became a good way to keep my feelings for Lauren out of mind. I had been scared by how much I liked her and drank to keep myself from getting too attached to her. It didnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t work, and I kept drinking after she pushed me away when she had Grace to shut out the thoughts of not being with her. I slam my hand against the steering wheel in frustration. I need to have Lauren, and I need to have Grace. I pull back onto the road and start to drive.

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I feel my phone vibrate in my pocket and I pick it up when I see that it is my friend Mike. “Hello?” “Hey man! I’m about to head out for some drinks. Where are you?” “I just left Lauren’s.” “Again? Hey man, lets go drink!” I take a deep breath and try to shove away the familiar excited pull in my stomach, but it doesn’t work. “Sure man, lets

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go.”

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Red

BILLY VESSIO

[please read in one breath] It was a simple idea – I heard them discuss it during lunch. If they could just keep going with the debate, I mean, for the entire hour, Mr. Anderson would have to postpone the midterm, and we’d have to Monday to worry about it. It was genius; he might even cancel it if Sal and Leo did the same and we fell real far behind. Bite by bite I listened to their back and forth, and Dan was pointing right there on his sheet and saying in this thick voice he could definitely keep it going, but now Mikeys looking at him and he clearly has his doubts. I felt a jump – my throat closed – and Mikey said he didn’t have enough to say once they got past that. But Dan assured him it’d be enough if they talked slow, and my hands were to my neck and my breathing failed. They were laughing at their plan and I clutched Dan’s sleeve and gestured to my throat, pounding on the table and making their meals rattle, and Dan tells Mikey he’s got to – listen, got to – keep from laughing during all this, but Mikey was laughing now, and his laughing drowned out the thuds. Doya think Anderson will figure us out? Nah, he doesn’t give a shit. What if he does? Well, then – my vision was fading – I don’t give a shit, what could he do anyway. This was our assignment wasnit? It was. I didn’t have the capacity to stand anymore, or move, I looked to Mikey – desperate – and him with a smile, it was the assignment, he’s right, he’s right. What could he say? Mr. Anderson would even welcome it, they bet, and someone from behind – I don’t know who – with fat hands pressed in hard

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BILLY VESSIO

and the food blew out and Anderson’s old as balls and probably doesn’t want to teach anyway, Mikey said, and Dan’s telling me hurry up, relax, why am I red, I couldn’t remember laughing but Dan told me I was in on the joke on the way to class and by the

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time we got to History it was all a blur.

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CONTRIBUTOR BIOS OSAAMA AWAN is a undergraduate Health Science major who loves to ride his skateboard when it’s warm outside. On his free time he hangs at the radio station WQAQ and draws his friendly neighborhood Spiderman. KELSEY BROWN is a senior psychology and English doublemajor with a concentration in human services from Farmington, Connecticut. She is interested in pursuing a career in clinical mental health counseling and is currently an intern on the child inpatient unit at the Yale Child Study Center. TANNER CELESTIN is a pale girl from California. When she’s not playing volleyball, she’s either sleeping or writing poems on her phone at 2am. Her brother describes her vegetarianism as a “pesticide diet,” and she owes everything to her hilarious, supportive family. RACHEL CORSO is a twenty year old Connecticut local who enjoys the finer things in life such as Ray and Mikes and Toads- just your average Bobcat. All jokes aside, she really is from Connecticut. SHANNON DELAHANTY is a senior English major, Theatre Studies minor. She plans on getting her secondary teaching certification after graduation. She dreams of inspiring others to constantly create art through their writing. This is the first publication of her work. KIRA DIAZ is a second year biology student who loves animals, plants, and photography. When she isn’t taking pictures of landscapes or flowers, she loves to play games or catch up on work. Kira is always ready with a helping hand, a shoulder to cry on, or even just to lend an ear.

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ANTHONY DIMARTINO is a sophomore English major from Northford, Connecticut. He writes for The Quad News and enjoys

reading and travelling. In his spare time, he writes stories. KIMBERLY FEARS is a junior majoring in Film, Video, and Interactive Media. She loves cinema, but writing has always been her first love. She has a deep love for creativity and is always looking to improve her storytelling skills. JUSTIN GOLDSMITH is a senior English major with a concentration in Creative Writing and a minor in Public Relations. He is the current Editor-in-Chief of Montage. BRETT KASELOUSKAS is a senior public relations major from Suffield, Connecticut. He is interested in a career in entertainment public relations after graduation and is currently interning at Entertainment Tonight in New York City. DEVAN KINGSTON is a sophomore health science major and psychology minor. She is a photographer for the Summit Yearbook and a photograph she took of boats in San Francisco is featured on a San Francisco tourist website. KYLE LIANG is a Physician Assistant major and member of the men’s cross country team at Quinnipiac University. Born and raised in a traditional Chinese household in Connecticut, Kyle is constantly pursuing new passions and interests from running and dancing to acting and writing. He feels fortunate for the invaluable opportunities in his life thus far as well as grateful for the loving people who surround him. LAUREN LOCKS is a senior Interactive Digital Design major with a minor in Business. She is the IDD Chair of the Alpha Delta Pi sorority and she loves pizza, House of Cards, and doodling. NICOLE MARESCA is a sophomore here at Quinnipiac. She is an English Major, concentrating in Creative Writing, and hopefully will be admitted in the MAT program for Elementary Education.

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She also is on the Dance Fusion team, and enjoys shaking her ass off as much as writing creative pieces. CLARE MICHALAK is a sophomore English and Interactive Digital Design double major. She has a love-hate relationship with poetry and creative writing and if you see her throw her book out the window, you know what mood she’s in. DANIEL MORO is a senior liberal studies major. He yearns to do something honest, human, and good. TESS PELLICANO is a senior English Major, French and Script Writing double minor at Quinnipiac. She recently studied abroad in Paris and got a taste of the wide world. Her passions are writing and traveling. After graduation Teresa will spend her life seeing the world and all the people in it. JULIA PERKINS is a sophomore Journalism major and Spanish minor from Hamilton, Massachusetts. Her life revolves around the Harry Potter series and she cannot wait to get her Hogwarts letter. This love for Harry Potter and reading has made her want to publish a book one day. On campus, she is the news editor for The Quinnipiac Chronicle. KRISTEN RIELLO is a freshman Interactive Digital Design major with a minor in Visual Arts. In addition to digital design, she also enjoys painting and drawing. JOE ROMANO was plucked out of the mean suburban streets of Hanover, Massachusetts, where normally, the only way out is ‘in a box.’ These days, Joe spends his time spewing garbage on Tha Daily Hangover, playing Super Nintendo, and not being a pedophile. When asked for one word to describe himself, Joe responded with “Love”... And then he reverted back to discretely eating grapes. 110

KIRA SMELSER is a junior English major with a public relations minor and a creative writing concentration. She is an editor for Montage. She likes figure skating and milkshakes. WILLIAM VESSIO When William is not saving orphaned children from burning buildings with one leg broken as he struggles to reconnect with his estranged family and long lost brother who disappeared after the war, he is often seen writing clichĂŠd character backstories for terrible action movies. He is also the co-Editorin-Chief of The Quinnipiac Barnacle and the Programming Manager of WQAQ. JOSHUA VICTOR is currently in his fourth year of a five year Biomedical Sciences M.S. program. He is one of the founding fathers of The Delta Upsilon Quinnipiac Colony, and when he is not hard at work he spends his time hanging out with friends, hiking Sleeping Giant, or reading a good book. Joshâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s favorite types of photography are still life, street, and macro; but occasionally you might find him taking landscapes and narrative photos. JOE VIRGILLITO is a junior Print Journalism major with a minor in History. He is from Leonia, New Jersey and is the Managing Editor of The Quad News and is a current editor of Montage. JESSICA WHARTON is a junior English major with a minor in Psychology. She is an E-Board member for GLASS as well as a member of the University Honors Program.

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS We would like to thank Ken Cormier and Lila Carney for all of their help with the production of this magazine and their guidance with Montage as a student organization. The last two semesters have been long and strenuous, but Ken and Lila have always been available when we needed them. We would also like to give specific recognition to Nick Baldoni, who, through much hard work and design mastery, turned our ideas into reality. Without you, we surely would have crumbled. We would like to thank Montage for its history and existence as a student organization. As you see within this issue, we have attempted to pay tribute to previous editors and editions in order to recognize the great work that has been produced by Montage in the past. The magazine has always been and always will be student run and full of student work. We hope that this tradition continues and that each edition and body of editors has as much fun with the organization as we did. Thank you to Tyco printing for enabling us to give this magazine a physical form. Finally, thank you to all of the people who submitted to the magazine this year. Without your contribution, this magazine would be full of blank pages. Keep on writing.

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PRODUCTION

PRINTER

TYCO Printing

EDITION

850 books