Ablaze - digital journal of writing from LCCC

Manuel

Cycle of

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Ablaze:

Track Marks and Mug Shots

Krista Day

The graffiti on the cement walls that surround me pay homage to my fellow social deviants . My accommodations are minimal and I know their blueprints like the back of my hand . Concrete and steel; hard and unforgiving . Metal doors and ra zor wire fences offer society protection from the misguided and misunderstood . The air is stale and rancid. Thick with the derelict aroma of sweat and tears, blood and fears . The chemically addicted years seeping through their pores . What the socially obedient find deplorable and disgusting, I find a distorted sense of comfortability in . I glance at my arms to assess my self-inflicted damage. Bruised and bloody my arms are a crime scene . A testament to the reoccurring theme in my life . Track marks and mug shots . My veins hide my secrets, my pain. The me I’ll nev er let you see . Mug shots mark my time . The proof of my existence since I stopped living a long time ago . My thoughts drift to

my mom and the dreaded phone call that awaits. How many times has she held her breath and believed that I was done? How many times has she prayed to God to give her back her daughter? Barely coherent I hear my name being called. Echoing off the walls of my tomb it’s a slithery whisper in my ear. With what little strength I have I follow the voice that has summoned me . I instinctively know what comes next. Criminal ly addictive rites of passage . My passively suicidal love affair with heroin consumed 15 years of my life . Being a professional junkie wasn’t a part of my plans .

If a picture can tell a thousand words my mug shot only says one: JUNKIE. The girl staring back at me is vaguely familiar. A shadow of the me I re member . Circles under my eyes almost as dark as the bruises on my arms . My face a ghostly white. The angles and shadows created by my protruding cheek bones give my face and eerie “living dead girl” appearance. When was the last time I ate, I ask myself as I run my fingers along my collarbone, then down my ribs counting as I go? And a shower? Judging by the chaotic state of my hair, the vile smell of sweat, dirty streets and back alley’s covering me it’s been a few days. Maybe a week. Time

had become irrelevant . Degradation and dereliction had become my normal . I had lost the capacity to be human . I survived on an animalistic level. Always on the hunt . Blind to any dangers that surround ed me. The need is what drives you. Con sumes you. And there’s always the need. You obsess the need. It’s in every part of your sacrilegious pilgrimage where you’ll sell your body and trade your soul just to not be you for a few hours. The craving for your fix is like a fire beneath your skin. There’s a seductive gravitational pull you in feel in every inch of your body and you can think of nothing else but the task at hand: scoring heroin regardless of the physical toll that will be reaped upon your body. It’s merely an occupational hazard of the desperately destitute and the wicked ly addicted. You’re at the mercy of a drug more powerful of your valiantly pathetic attempts at self-preservation . Heroin has you hitting your knees for all the wrong reasons . Degraded and demoralized, your body has become your deal ticket paying for your next high. You’re a slave to the needle . Addicted to the ritual as much as the score . Your mind screaming, “NO”, your body craving more . Your dreams have been shattered . All your “Nevers” have come true . Welcome to the chaotical ly sadistic world of addiction.

For 15 years this was my tortured and twisted reality. I’ve been beaten and broken and shattered. I’ve been victimized and demoralized. I’ve been homeless and hopeless. My tomorrow’s a perpetual question mark . I used to believe that the lucky ones died. God knows I tried. I didn’t

know how to live, but I couldn’t seem to die either. But that’s where I find my pur pose. If for 15 years, I wasn’t able to kill myself successfully I have to believe that I stand a chance at living successfully . Maya Angelou once said, “I can be changed by what has happened to me, but I refuse to be reduced by it.” I’ve come to believe that what we do isn’t who we are. I no longer define myself by the mistakes I’ve made. I’m stronger for having been broken. Strength, for me, comes from the courage to grow stronger in all those broken plac es within me. I’m learning to embrace the beautifully broken pieces that make me who I am. Today I am enough.

Poetry

Robert J. Heemstra, Jr.

Poetry is much more than a simple rhyme it is a written masterpiece of art it catches the imagination full time to write poetry is an easy start the love of poetry hit me in class Creative Writing was the class I took and the love of it would be everlast sometimes a poem takes more than a look

writing to me is no longer a task I believe it has helped me in many ways and it removed my shy and fearful mask now I read my poems without delays no matter your genre keep writing on for the written word never will be gone

A Dream Within a Dream - Edgar Allan Poe

Take this kiss upon the brow!And, in parting from you now, Thus much let me avowYou are not wrong, who deemThat my days have been a dream; Yet if hope has flown awayIn a night, or in a day, In a vision, or in none, Is it therefore the less gone?All that we see or seemIs but a dream within a dream.

I stand amid the roar

Of a surf-tormented shore,And I hold within my hand

Grains of the golden sand-How few! yet how they creep Through my fingers to the deep,While I weep- while I weep!

O God! can I not grasp Them with a tighter clasp?

O God! can I not save One from the pitiless wave? Is all that we see or seem But a dream within a dream?

We walked beside the giver’s trees

My arms not bundled full

The sunflowers that were waiting for me Yellow petals shooting up and jumping when time came for my call

Jobs ending, and the wind was flowing through the green meadows

A few miles to travel that far, horses galloping in the distance My blue pants were not stained with any grass and dirt, but of soot The smell of the unground work, that sprinted to the sun

Mother nature wafting the yellow curtain over the sky Pink hues to simmer like warm tingly sweet soup

That I once had when I was young That led me to watch the moon and discuss why he never showed on his weekends

They let me pick them from the Earth, love inside their brown and black seeds And carry them up through the hills, no such thing as the lonely woods Rabbits clapped their tiny claws, and laid beside the clover piles Who sat tall and whispered hello to my sunflowers

We passed by the tucked under orange blanket hay piles And passed the old gent’s garden of peppers Over water troughs, the water tickled But all my flowers did was smile and wave

As we walked through and from, past the goats and sheep that bahhed Chickens jogging to their eggs, tucking and laying a pillow to them They turned their heads upon me, and let me go my way The flowers never drooped, but perked up each time that I turned

Sunflowers

Some snoozing in my arms, green smooth stems upon my elbow Some dancing with the rays the sun dazzled to them

Bestowing a ball of light and gust of wind to make us feel warm Like everything she could give, her children walking far from their newly discovered homes

Their strong green leaves pushing up, and wooing Mother nature on As we climbed past the wooden fencing, the white streaked door stood big and tall

Little raindrops to cower and swirl from painted rain clouds

A fresh breeze to breath, felt like standing by my place by the rivers when I was a teen

The warm air grasped my hair, the red locks being combed The flowers nodded their heads, when I made way A wicker basket sat beside the white buttered door

And off I set them gently, so sad to say goodbye

They only peeked upon me, a bit of a surprise

Leaving my smoky, freckled arms And silently swayed to say good day, a small smile upon the petals And returned to a spring’s nap again

And as I walked back to the city, The rain showered upon me and scrubbed me down Mother nature standing by the door, snapping her fingers to do just so Some petals jumped on all points, and flew in the wind in circles

Squinting an eye upon the rain drops, Being poured heavy like a bucket down a drain The petals stuck to my face, and the basket stirred like a cradle The sunflowers gazed at me, and waved their tiny leaves

Sticking their tongues out at me, like a funny childlike game And enjoying the bath of rain, I was out till the sun went to sleep The little petals chased me, as I picked the soppy soft petals off my face They tangled themselves in my hair, and wanted me to stay

The moon finally made his greeting

And the rain began to stop

And the peaceful silence, a coin could be dropped I looked upon the stars, like fresh gold buttons laid

And suddenly I was back to my city home Sitting beside my machinery, a sooty coughing night Bare light to show me anything, not even a friend in need Making the green, but green was cash here

But the shimmer of a late wanderer walked far outside with a candle And I knew it when I saw it, a tucked away venture point of yellow Ignore the metal and grinding gears from my fellow workers

And my feet are planted firm upon the fresh greener grass

Suddenly I can see them, picture them standing there Walking alongside the wooden fences, some hazy yellow skipping in twos Peering up at me, gazing like newborn children Saying “where have you been?!” and Mother nature taking me back in

And the wind swinging through the leaves, to comb my neat hair

To something wild, a bit extreme, or perhaps a game of tag Giving me all the dreams, I left back in that spring A traveler’s shoes to arrive when the clock goes ding!

A Ghost Among the Ocean

A wild life I wanted, a wild life I claimed

For my youth went by, and I despised every single day

For boring was the nature of what surrounded me

Though the only place I could call home was the open ocean sea

It hummed a song and each day, it was calling me by name Like no one did; it was calling me by name

I found myself beside the aqua ocean tides in evening

As I sat beside and thought about the years that gone by My heart it sunk, when I realized time was going by quickly

And so I gazed out to the waves, a mischievous demeanor met my eyes

My decision was made that day, to steal a boat and run to ride the coursing waves

This was my scheme, as I decided to ride the coursing waves

It was my time, the night time

When eyes blinked shut, and drifted in slumber

I packed my bags and began to wonder

My mind was twisted, saying yes and no when I stole the boat

But my mind was made, when I heard the ocean calling me by name Oh! What a beautiful sound it made, was the ocean calling me by name

I cast out upon the homely heaven, Drifting through the navy waves, and its emotions flipped like a switch

And all I heard was the ocean’s screams, and the wind almost ripping my sail

As I felt the pouring rain, which ran down my spine, as my hair stuck to my face The currents rocked the boat like a cradle, as the ocean was calling me by name Its voice like a thunderous crack, as the ocean was calling me by name

Gripping the ropes, I grunted as I slid Feet firm in this ocean’s test The tides turned to ruckus

As it tried to make me go overboard

I fell in the swirls of the blue mountain currents And my sight went black, as everything flashed in seconds

Everything seemed to start up again, as I felt myself awake I found myself upon a beach, as I saw my ship in ruins Floating in pieces down the way, As I heard the ocean growl back at me I felt myself go bitter, as I sat upon the sand This ocean turned away from me, and left me here to despair

My ears were then filled with laughter

Menacing like someone’s final hour, shortly turning to a growl I felt myself go rigid, as I gripped my hands together It was breaking through the palm trees, just far over to the left I felt my stomach twist, as I stood up quickly upon the sand, And I saw a man, only nightmares could stand, waiting by the trees

With dark black eyes, he looked at me

Like I was his supper

It was only then I realized the clear see-through of blue That made up his figure

He was a ghost, a ghost right in my view

I felt my throat close tight, as his noises rumbled the waves

My nose was filled with a dying breeze, and the ocean blue turned black

Still it was growling, as this man started to walk towards me

As I felt myself trying to find a place to go, alas there was none I backed up a few steps, and the palm trees shook And then I saw more of them appear, the ghostly men themselves Forty men lined up in the trees, with see-through bodies as well

They stood there waiting like a shark for its meal But my attention focused back on the man, whose feet hastened through the sand He finally came up to me, as my mind turned in knots And he stared me in the eyes, as I felt fright bite my nerves

And I wondered what he was going to do As he didn’t seem to blink

And then what seemed like minutes

His growling came to a halt, as he unexpectedly offered me a position And out came the question in a gruff tone of his, “Join my crew, would ye?” he said More or less, I shook my head, “No way.” I said

And in that moment, with nothing to spare He got all frizzled, as his growls shook the bay He hollered to his crew, and I had no option then I screamed, but to no avail, I found myself surrounded But my screams that I had let go, were taken over by a blood piercing whistle

And in that moment, my voice seemed to vanish

He commanded everyone, which included me to go near the shore

As the whistle seemed to be calling something, as the skies were opening up

The ocean started to tremble, as the ground began to shake

And then a ghoulish ship it was, came floating towards our way

The ship did creak, as it threw down its ropes Almost near the shore, it came to a halt

Forced aboard, I was led to the bow

And the man or captain now, demanded to know my title

But before I could, the ocean now was calling me by name, Its voice was loud and booming, almost rocking the ship

And looking down upon it, it kept calling me by name The captain shook his head, and said nothing more, only letting out a whistle

The wind picked up, as the waves turned gentle

And the ship then moved, squeaking as it turned And just like that, he turned to his men And shouted very gruffly, orders for them and me The ship was now floating away, upon the water’s bend

And from that day, I left my past behind, and sailed on that vessel

It was a wild life I wanted, and a wild life I claimed I had spent the next forty years riding upon the sea

Over years ago, I acquired to my knowledge

I had lost my soul that fateful day, to this fickle sea And now I ride the coursing waves, upon the very sense

As I, had set this course into action, by setting sail that day

All the Pretty People Are Blue

Jc Fairchild

I sit upon the cloudy roads, covered up with a big light coat, as the wind rippled and blew, the colors of deep navy passed in the crowd and above in the hard sky. A storm was brewing for so long to uncover something inside, and there was me trying to hide. I watched the men and women, and everyone else walk so freely down the boulevard like a lion walking out of his cage. Stepping so fiercely and feeling the breeze against their skin. So lively with smiles, and under my coat, I sigh, sneaking a gaze down at the rainbows. All the colors of the universe trickled in when I slept, kissed on my crown when my mother brought me here. When did I start feeling so ashamed? Was it when I was eleven, and I saw it winding through the stars, the starry night from where I came. Every constellation shimmered in the shaggy separation of our yard of sand and grass, and there was Orion shooting his ar row to say I was special. Our hearts were lined in glass cases in our chest because of the planet’s damage, and inside were our hearts, that were kept safe like it was a special jewel. However, we could open the door with a small silver hinge. I heard other people when they fell in love, the heart case gained a lock and key. I only saw that with my mother. But looking back, everyone in my house, which was 5 other peo ple, had ripples of blues that matched the ocean, while oth ers had a glimmer of yellow matching the stars or a summer sunset so perfectly. Blue, I learned was where people lined up and, in my family, the prettiest were blue. Blue was pride that was shared between my brothers, and I would watch in awe as they talked about the shades and tones of blue. Yel low was the same, but it shared a different energy like they broke a ray off from the sun and comforted me after certain problems or shot me off into the sky with bold questions, tone of voice, or for some, their presence .

It was when we came back from the nights by the ocean many years ago, that my chest curled into itself and burst out like a shotgun shell. We were just on the bottom floor when it happened, and everything was so peaceful. Panting, and clutching my chest, I sprinted up the old oak steps, slamming shut the giant white bathroom door with a small crack in the middle . Leo and Rem, both of my brothers, jumped out of their skin. I could still hear them below me, as the world took me in its hands and swirled me in pain.

“Mom! It’s happening!” Rem shouted, cackling, and smacking his large hands together .

They had been placing bets for a while then, wondering when it would happen. I remember hearing them whispering in the back of the old jeep, telling me to butt out of it. He knew he had won, for he knew me better than anyone seeing as he was older. He might have been foolish when it came to many things, but he saw my ways, and age was striking that trait out of the park. It always did, I know it did, especially if one looked at my uncle also .

“What shade do you think he’ll be? He won’t be navy for sure!” Leo bellowed, pushing his finger towards his chest, smirking.

I was 5 when Leo’s chest started baking, crys talizing into a deep navy that one thought they were looking at a sky. Like someone had thrown in a pinch of mystery, a loud mouth, and a wild head of blonde hair, and you had my brother . His coming was non-destructive, it bloomed like a flower in spring. Slowly spreading one day like coffee across a page. Rem’s, I don’t remember. It was the last thing I saw before running. Both of their excitement and looks of shock filled their eyes before it hit their faces because they knew, as well as I did.

“Maybe he’ll be light blue, match the peaceful tides, you know?” I could hear Rem below me, and pictured him at the table cocking his head with messy floppy, raven hair.

And hearing the heavy steps below with silent breath creaking, and could picture my mother by his side for a minute. I always knew it was her, the way the floor pressed down and the house did not scare her. The sweat beaded down my forehead, and the glass case fogged as it pumped profusely. The beading sweat slid down the side of my face to add to the outing we were just at playing games. Glancing around the room and feeling the voices wrap around my brain and squeeze, I saw a little raven fly

over in my eyes, circling around their voices . Looking at the field photos on the left corner, I recalled that my mom called Rem a little raven since he was born. He was always finding things either in writings, books, or in people. Later on, he knew the respect of and acceptance of people keeping a secret .

And then the deep rumbly muffled voice of my uncle echoed in my ears, and my chest lurched forward. My eyes swirled and I fell to my knees, clutching the corner of the chipped white coun tertop . But as my knees shook, the rumble pushed me back and it was 2007. I was on the edge of the beach watching my sister, Stephanie, swim and laugh, paddling over and under the sea in stride like a dolphin . My brothers were further back submerging themselves deeper into the giant tides laughing, calling out to me .

“Peter, come on!” Rem shouted, heaving Leo’s wet mane that he grew out that year under the cold plume of saltwater.

Lunging up, gasping for air like a panting dog, Leo’s sharp blue eyes found me quick. They reminded me of a blade because they cut into you deep. Those eyes were either filled with love or hate, but in that moment when we were young, his eyes let him mix both emotions together .

“Yeah loser, come on! You’re missing out!” he screamed, waving his tan hands dripping down with water like a leaky sprinkler.

My legs buckled again, and I threw my head up, and the rumble came again, followed by a deep laugh from under the bathroom floor.

“Look just left!” my uncle’s past voice fell into my ears, and the world was filled with sun.

The way a sunset boiled in summer, and my sis ter’s laughter rung like church bells in my ears. The sweat pooled to my lip, and I remember

the fresh ocean waves when I ran in. The hands over my head, pushing me under until I saw the glimmer of white cascade across the mountain ous waves. Like looking through glass, and I was sitting at my grandmother’s table again eating, seeing the yellow daisies wilting in front of me.

“You have to choose; I can’t make both.”

Her smile, the white apron hung just at her thigh, and flour dust rose into the air, circling around until the clouds filled my head.

“Oh, well, maybe for you...”

The hardwood pressed against my butt as my head smacked against the wall. My heart dove down and crunched together like playing cards, and I felt myself go pale . Sinking further into the clouds, like a soft cushion, until I slammed out of the chair, seeing the black clouds cluster out side in a rapid fury and coming back to reality . The house leaned and groaned, as the heavy clouds strolled over, ringing out water in a wash rag over us, like my tears that rolled down my cheeks

“Argh!” I clutched once more as my heart pounded its fists against the cage.

I glanced up and caught myself in the reflection. Black hair stamped to my forehead, my eyes so bloodshot, and blood dribbled out of the corner of my lip from biting down. Purple lightnings crashed across the sky, and Leo’s boisterous voice protruded through the walls. The low light in the hallway outside the door flickered, until a crunch of glass exploded down from the overhead .

“This is a show!” Leo’s voice came again, and I could picture his polished lion nails curled into his fists on the table.

Well, maybe it was. The rain slammed down even harder, giving a final jerk to my heart. Growling at my reflection, I punched against the glass door bolted to my chest and against

the silver hinges, causing it to shatter . My heart peeked out, looking at me, his outline was blurry. He matched my shaking like I was com ing in from the cold, as drool fell from my lips . My eyes pooled with tears, and I thought of all things that were blue. My tears, the paint in art class where Miss Pauper yelled at students for not returning brushes, the oceans I swam in, and the color of my grandmother’s shoes. I was submerged in blue. But when my heart nestled back, collapsing into the platform below him and laying back into where he always was, my eyes grew wide. I felt the air leave my system like I suddenly forgot to; the tip of my nose was red like the vacations we took to Iceland. The red drew up my face like tomatoes gaining their color . Sputtering and seeing the green in my eyes escape to another land, air slowly crept back to me. The clouds outside drew away, my head hung low, as I ran a hand over my shaking knees, pleading for them to stop. The air grew tight again as I came back up, my breath grew still, but this time it was different. What was this? My hands touched the growing glass so lightly, like it was a wound. The cracks slowly disappeared and the glass recovered from an auto fix but it looked like fallen snow. Slump ing down, I pressed myself like a critter of the night into the clawfoot tub, and calloused hands covered my whole face. The only way blue came out was through tears then, and it was hours before I left . Roused by my brothers, I pressed my sweater over my head, now shaking and trying to calm my nerves. Sighing, I walked past them, smiling over the red heat in my face .

“Well, what’d you get?!” Leo prodded my chest with a skinny finger, leading me downstairs.

Rem joined his curious gaze in pursuit . The bobbing of blonde waves ushered behind me, but Rem’s black hair led way into the dark ness. One I laid in later, crawling deeper in a creation of a room I made that night and I called it finding.

“That was a storm!” My uncle’s voice boomed

across the kitchen, as he sat in his chair. Swirl ing the cup in his hand as his light-yellow heart jumped in its cage like a dog excited for some one to come home .

He was the only man in my family with chester hair and this weird, patched beard that was already growing silver. His favorite thing to do was fishing, and growing up he led us around like lost boys on a pirate ship But looking at it, it was only a small metal thing, called St. Ally. It didn’t get rid of the excitement though. It meant we could go swimming and reel in some fish wherever he took it. It was mostly by our house, where a rope line separated us from the boats. Besides fishing, Uncle Thomas’s second favorite hobby was drinking.

Shuffling my arms over my shirt, I stood against the wall, now laughing at something Rem had said in a low chuckle as I watched the white rooted line under his locks of hair. The raw feel ing ate at me, and the waves came back again, and suddenly I was walking between the sand as I watched him smirk looking at the floor. At that moment, I knew. They never had to know. The saltwater air rolled in from the sand and the patches of grass in our yard. Suffocating against my face mixed with freshwater I splashed from the sink .

“So, what’d you get?” my uncle Tom asked, departing to a more serious tone, bowing his head and studying me intently . His heart had settled down, as he continued to bite the rim of his coffee cup of Jim.

“Navy . . .” I choked out, before coughing, and re peating in a better tone . A more believable one . It wasn’t a whole lie if I thought about it. I had realized that after hearing Rem knock on the door in his slow knock, seeing only two small splotches of it. I remember watching the cracks in the wooden floor and how they connected together like a forbidden puzzle .

“Well let’s see it then!” my sister grinned at his side .

She must have come in from the rain, her hair looked like wet straw. There she sat a few inches from my uncle, wiping her nose of the smell, but her gaze never left me either . Every eye was on me it seemed. Stephanie was years older than me; her short figure took a few years to grow out of when height finally came to its senses from my dad who died in the war. His small bronze round frame hung silently in the hall, and I could feel his eyes on my back too . Some days, when I would hang my legs from the balcony, my mother would pass it and gaze at it for a few minutes, before closing her eyes and pushing her head up high. With an exhale, she’d then march out into the yard to find children laughing. And then my name would be called to come out into the heat and make the memories we could while it lasted. But if one ever needed to find Stephanie, it was by the ocean waves on her surfboard and when I’d walk down from school, her white pointy teeth and freckles would find me and invite me in to teach me her favorite hobby I shook my head furiously, wiping sweat from my brow.

“It still is jostling; I just want to sleep.” I said very quietly, glancing at my mom’s back as she pressed her elbows deep into dishes. The hiss ing water splashed onto the old lunch plates smeared with tomato sauce.

“Oh, come on, just flash it!” Rem pressed, as Leo jumped over and grabbed the hem of my shirt .

“No!” I yelled, clutching my shirt, letting my el bows smooth the fabric down.

“It’s still all over and absorbing, just...” I started.

“Let him be, boys.” My mother’s voice came through .

The clinking of dishes faded out as my mother

walked towards us. Her black hair fell down in neat knots, forever holding a place of order, each one wrapped so nicely, it seemed perfect. Her eyes finally joined mine, and something clicked inside and looking back, it felt like she knew. But how could she? I scratched and combed my hair away and parted it down the side just like I had seen people on the beach do .

Now, I look up at the passing cars and watch the gray roofs take over the beach trails . A tall pale man with red hair passed holding bags un der his arms, following a few other people who passed by in a blur . Grumbling, he continued to press forward as his heart jumped in blue. I exhale and close my eyes and feel the warm air surrounding me in light . Some nights I can still hear the grumbling . Years had passed and people had left . My uncle got a business started with ships when I was 12. He left one night after yelling filled the house. My mother never yelled, but something frazzled with her that night. I saw a painting hanging in a drug store at 14. A man’s silver face haunted me. White hair like a beach Santa, standing tall with a shovel. The cashier repeated: here’s your change. Saw my look and told me a story . We sat on the counter, drinking Pepsi . He died out at sea but I found out I had a cousin . His eyes bore into mine as if he was always there, and was just waiting for a room to be open on his own journey.

Leo had died some years later. He was always riding the edge, not knowing when to pull back from it. Despite warnings, he kept going and doing whatever he wanted with his friend, Yogi. My mom never liked him, and it said a lot, as she never hated anyone As I got older, the bone started brewing and growing inside of her like thorn bushes in secret in spring . We had our own rooms in her heart, as it watched us attentively in her own glass cage, but others needed to earn a room later on. I always felt like there was a secret hatred from the way Leo spoke to me when he got older. Jealousy leaked into anger of having a secret. Betrayal in a whis key cup, he clinked it at the bar, drinking until

one day he disappeared behind the newsprint with his friends. Sometimes I wish I showed the color then, but maybe I don’t. Rem went for newspaper business at the bay, and we had this respect between each other that grew after that night . He respected my secrets, as I did his . Our brotherhood grew closer together as parts of the boys we once knew in ourselves shoveled out into the sand and never came back We grew apart, but at the same time grew closer. My sister left for another place, writing letters every week with polaroids in between the en velope and letters addressing us all. It was Fall when she wrote a letter to me, giving me this polaroid with a stormy beach and her surfing.

“We should surf again sometime Peter! It’s been a while. Let me know, and I can pick you up sometime!” she had said in black ink scribble . Anytime I walked out to get the mail, I never had to read the whole envelope address. It was the way she crossed and wrote her “T’s” in my name that gave it away, and the envelopes were always bulky.

As I stood by the mailbox and white fence, hold ing the photo close, my eyes bounced around like a ball rolling around. Behind the brewing clouds and her skinny legs, it made me think a little . It made me slide into my bed later that night, and close my eyes, and sink deeper into that room I made of old cardboard boxes filled with black liquid of a starry night sky. Consult ing my heart and letting him hop out of his cage, wrapping his hands around the cord that connected inside to me to keep me living . In those moments, I never was able to explain why some of the boxes were overflowing. They just were. But when the wind slowly crept inside my room from the open window that night, I could hear the familiar past cackle and saw the taller men in the hall Walking high and mighty, blue Their hearts high fiving each other, as I shut my door with a bang from the wind. It was another moment they were waiting for as they glanced at me, waiting until they both clapped my back, laughing as we went down to eat. It was the first

time Leo didn’t hate me. We had gone down the beach that day and I grabbed his metal flask out of a dare, sipping without coughing. It patched up something, maybe he didn’t feel as betrayed.

There were nights after that time in front of the mirror, in a crappy black tank at early hours into the night and before school that the rain bow heart sprayed liquid out against the glass, leaving my chest leaking from the hinges and dribbling down. I wiped it up with toilet paper and stashed them deep into my pockets . The little guy looked at me, banging his fists in anger against the glass. My fingers grazed against it, seeing the barely visible yellow and blue spots hidden underneath the huge splotches of reds, greens, and oranges that reminded me of the changing fall in the east. The small spots were never enough, even if they were there. I sighed and rubbed my eyes, before sliding the light black sweater over my head, feeling his beat. Thump and bump, causing waves to grow in my eyes in the reflection of the door knob han dle, stopping and wondering why. Sniffing and grabbing my collar, I watched myself closely. It followed me deep into sleep where in that little room I had put a chair, and could watch all the stars above me like I did when I was younger in the yard . He yelled at me in frustration, continu ing to beat his fists against the glass. He only wanted the same as I, but he had a mind of his own. He was a few steps ahead, but he wanted me on the same page .

I could hear his voice as I looked at the door . A little voice muffled like it was under water, and I grabbed my shirt collar and peered down.

“Why can’t you, just?!” A tear rolled down the glass, as the bathroom door opened, and I was gone.

Some nights when I would sit awake at night in the room of finding, he would throw his hands out as the glass door was open and walk across. It reminded me of those the landline phone cables. He looked like a rainbow splotch floating

above the candles, where his little eyes bore into me before the shooting stars took over . I’d see my sister and uncle in the yellow flames who were always laughing like bright suns, and the mighty men that my brothers were in blue sections of the sky from the pieces I had of it . But this heart wasn’t solid blue or yellow, it was just small splotches hidden . Other times he grew into silence, following the ways past peo ple did when looking at the same thing. What an interesting thing as I laid down my head, and watched the rain drip across from the glass ceiling. His rainbow flickering in my mind in the off corner, before drawing off into sleep when I got it. My snores joined his growling in the midnight hour. He wanted his freedom, but my mind grabbed his hand, and they stared at the ground. Other nights it was peaceful and he understood why. The mind held onto him like a child’s hand, patching our hurt to the body we had all been a part of. He showed him another room, and they watched together curiously at the little flicker in the back of his glass container and up a few stairs to show where the soul was. It always was putting themselves into things, but never showing an appearance. He reminded me of the light that hid under the door that day my color had come into being, shattering like glass, and he left pieces everywhere. It was when the patience came in, and he saw pieces of what made him here. He saw pieces of me that were inside himself . While they had their party, I watched around the boxes of liquid that were collapsing, and watched the world from afar in the telescope that I made at 11 years old . My hands were tightly grasped, watching the land of the dead, and hearing the messengers at the door to deliver a new message. Or the letters that came through the slot at the first door that could appear at random when I decided to not be in there. But I always was, and the second door started to come whenever it wanted to.

It came a day then, that I grew tired. And when I looked up, the sand blew across the beach in a little tornado and the family with the red-haired man ran across the beach. The kites waved

around, and I sighed as the weight pushed down on my shoulders heavier. Closing my eyes, I felt the hourglass in the room drift, the sand reminding me of those of old, those of the times I had left with the constant feeling of unlocking the lock. The rainbow heart looked at me, smiling, knowing his ticket was close. Some colorful wager of freedom of how old summers felt when one just let go. The clothes hung loose, and just below the collar; the rainbow peeked out . His little hands grabbing to get out, shining and moving around like some kaleido scope. He wanted to know when he could come out, and his little words flew up to my skull, and every night after some began to hurt. There was the world of questions or accusations flowing around and stabbing into the sides of where I lived . I gave up one night as his little voice asked me under the stars,

“When?” .

Like he had been so frustrated, he felt my tired ness too. I traced my finger across the seam of my shoe that night, watching the constellations run and step over planets I could only see if the world existed and the little heart said we wouldn’t know unless. Unless had come unex pectedly. I was suddenly in front of my house, feeling the wind gather around me but in lighter fashion . I opened the door softly and slid in, clicking the lock to the right and the air huffed against my face. My heart fluttered in his own dance. The kitchen floor looked at me, ask ing me what it could do, until Rem’s black hair fluttered upwards before diving deeper into a book he had been writing. And if I looked close enough, in some corner of my mind, the ghost of our father sat near, egging him on to just write something better. Maybe he couldn’t hear him, but he didn’t need to. And if he needed it, I could tell him myself, leave out the father part My mother stood next to him, talking to him. A quiver in her voice of some mail that had come in. He waved his hand dismissively, the ink stain ing his knuckles and side of his hand like he had been working for hours.

“Mom, you worry too much, I have it.” He spoke gently, digging his fountain pen deeper, until both sets of blue eyes snapped up and found me . Their hearts shared the same gaze of curiosity .

Looking back from where I am now, I realized the sun had gotten a little brighter that day . The room of finding gazed back at me in all its glass walls, and I stayed without complaint this time. Lightbulbs grew out of the ceiling and could turn on and off with my command. Keys jingled on lines from the wall like that metal can phone game we used to play. The chair had broken in there, but a softer one took its place . There was a little hour to find myself when I got there whenever I needed, and anxiety didn’t guard the door to let me in. Maybe it was in the sipping with a brother I left behind and the arguments I witnessed with family, or the way people change, as I do too. I slowly pulled the jacket and shirt over my head, letting him breathe. The reflection in the glass of my heart, who had his small fingers interlocked stood still. He beamed at my mother who stood and looked like a waterfall, finally bringing peace. I steadily unlatched the hinge and his little smile grew as he looked at my mother in profound curiosity, but love grew a flame when he heard her voice . He looked at me and sighed content ly, hugging my side and snuggling in like a small cat. The door between us had finally opened, my heart had smiled at me, watching the white drapes flow behind her in the window, until he stepped out onto her open palms. The saltwa ter revolved around us, into my nose and from her face . Rem only smirked at me above the ink stains .

“Peter . . .” he said through a safe lip smile .

The small trickle of my tears inside and out had flown so high, I forgot how to. But in that mo ment, I learned not all pretty people are blue .

A Future Unknown

Jc Fairchild

“I believe in some years’ time, Mars civilians will be ahead of Terrans, and we as Mars will show the other world who runs the universe.” Doctor James Adams said as he clicked his lips into a twisted white smile, as his pale white knuckles came together in a clapping motion before tugging on his brown suit collar in a downward motion.

“Dr. Adams, do you care to make a statement about the line of C-142046? Are the rumors true?” The short yellow haired reporter asked, shoving a mic into his boney face.

Doctor Adams all but closed his mouth, letting out a low laugh that never left the corners of his lips, before leaning into the mic and lowering his gaze into the camera.

“There is nothing to worry about here folks. Mars is what we said it would be. Just. As. Planned.” He spoke into the scratchy mic slowly, before the television screen sizzled to black, leaving his blue cold lake eyes to protrude through the screen.

“Everything just as planned, yeah right . . .,” Sanders grumbled, as he plunged a screw driver into his neck and unhooked the hinge from the flashing blue translator in his torn skin . A patch of skin and the blue chip fell to the floor, before a huge, stained sneaker slammed against it. Yellow sparks flew up wards, before he slid it across the room under a bolted down chair. Blood dribbled down onto his orange gloves, as his pink haired cousin, Parker, cowered in between the blue buckets in the janitor’s closet. Err... A scrappy sound flew by, as Sanders’s death gripped the tool’s red handle, hitching his breath.

“Never getting another one of those .” Sanders scoffed, as he plugged his neck with pieces of decayed sponge that he found on a met al shelf, filled with nothing else but spare screws, nuts, and a dented cardboard box. It held nothing inside except white trash bags.

“Ehh...” His cousin slipped his head below his green jacket and nestled in deeper, until only a strand of pink hung out like a stray piece of cotton candy someone dropped at the fair grounds. Taking in a hard breath, Sanders’s

eyes wandered to the heavy door, before craning his head back to his cousin .

“Be quiet...” He whisper-yelled, his hands curling into his palms .

“How are you fine with this?!” His cousin snapped his blue eyes out from under his coat .

Sanders pushed a stray red finger to his lips. It wasn’t as though fear wasn’t there, oh it was. It was drumming up his spine, knot by knot, and into his core making him bite deep into his cheek. But as he learned growing up, in any situation there needed to be strength .

Err… the strange sound whined again. He quickly plucked his cousin up by his collar, a bloody handprint staining into the fabric .

“We need to move . Grab something .” He said quietly, and before his cousin could interrupt, he dragged him to the door with a military grade bucket and they stood there, each breath matching in the silence right after each other’s.

What seemed like mere seconds and flashes, ten minutes passed before the noise dis appeared again behind the big metal door . Whatever laid behind it route wise was tricky. Layouts weren’t really Sander’s thing, but it had to be. Without hesitation, Sanders flung open the door and the dazzling embers trickled to the ceiling. The dark halls swung and flickered like an old camera effect, as he scanned the vicinity. Broken lights swung above from the second floor, leaving only fuzzy yellow lights, which made their stom ach’s churn. Blue popcorn machines raided the night with small orange flames and black smoke, twisting into his lungs as his back tensed. The black and rainbow carpet ripped at the seams from wheel markings, and his cousin gulped beside him .

“Look, the exit!” His cousin whispered triumphantly into his cousin’s ear. Across the way, red letters spelled out exit, sparking hope from this disaster .

Suddenly on cue, a fast blue object whirled around the corner, and started waving its metal arms into the air, as its glass eyes turned to black numbers . Dialing back from 9, like the click of a half-functioning watch that didn’t work right and unoiled gears, it raced towards them. Immediately, a strong woman’s voice interrupted the screechy wheels and declared into the smoky air- “Welcome to the Dynasty Theater-where all guests have an experience that changes their life”.

The thing was small, but as it swirled and swerved towards them, it picked up speed while knocking over big purple box smart tv’s, leaving black fabric to fly up into the air. The low hum of “Modern Love” echoed through out the halls of the theatre . CRASH! All of a sudden metal bars slammed down onto each door of “Scream 9”, “ Halloween: A Retelling”, and “Ring 6.0”. Parker’s eyes dimmed, as little black cage doors swung open from their tiny hinges, a loud buzzer going off above them. Quickly swarms of blue marched out of the gates, all eyes turning to digits and landing on them .

“Go! Go!” Sanders roared, but Parker was already ahead, as the overhead yellow lights swung and fritzed, leaving his hair to turn red . As their feet pounded against the uneven carpet, bulbs cracked open like lightning as they sprinted under each set of lights- caus ing darkness to slowly consume the building. Sanders squinted his eyes, while zooming through consuming spotted darkness . His left sneaker pulled apart at the strand of the lace that came loose, leaving his mind to hope he didn’t trip. Zipping past the holograms, the volume suddenly skyrocketed, making their ears feel as though they were about to bleed.

“But I try, I try/There’s no sign of life/It’s just the power to charm” The hologram swung in purple squares in swift motions, seeming as though he was levitating. The curve of his smile felt insulting to Sanders as the volume shook the walls.

“I’m lying in the rain/But I never wave… bye… bye” The last bits of the chorus bounded off the walls, glitching as his mouth popped to the side .

“Welcome to Dynasty Theater! Where all guests have an experience that changes their life!” A blue haired man in a yellow suit smiled dandy, before his blue eyebrows rested down into purple squares and a part of his face glitched. It looked as though his jaw dislocated and fell off, leaving him to be half of what he was originally as an announcer. Glass streamed down from the ceiling, black ness teared at the walls, as pictures of past customers fell down and shattered. In the on growing darkness, a new light flashed out of nowhere, leaving Sanders to swing an arm around Parker and shoved him in the oppo site direction, through the old tape roomsboth now bounding towards the red grooved ladder on the wall that was too high for both of them. Colorful shapes and lines in the walls of old retro patterns cracked through blue screens like old chalk. Pentax 9946’s stood on their tall silver legs, more photos laid shattered, and past celebrities danced on a screen, moving around like they were stuck

in time. Sanders could have sworn he saw snakes slither out from a man’s black coat, black streaming down the screen like paint speckles . Another letterman jacket, a mob of yellow leather, and pencil sketching ap peared on the now-shaking screen. The men continued to sing in a chorus of confused gibberish, leaving their faces to turn to black paint streaks .

“You go first... hurry!” Sanders exclaimed, before bending down and cupping his padded hands together to heave him up . His green hair fell down over his eyes, as he stared at the plugs on the floor.

“Welcome to the Dynasty Theater-where all guests have an experience that changes their life .” Hundreds of humanoid voices soared through the music . His hands laid empty. “What are you waiting for?!” Sanders screamed, throwing his head up to look at him, as his mop of green hair came up with him.

Parker’s blue eyes looked down at him keenly and in the brief second of what mess it was, the past fear that was there morphed into something different. It was like something came out of hiding for so long, and decid ed it was time to say hello. The bubble gum haired boy stamped his foot in between his hands and swung onto the ladder and leaned his veiny hand down for Sanders and pulled him up with this forgotten strength. In what seemed like someone took a broken flashlight and smashed their lights into four different directions, their vision was filled of blue squares with glassy cracked now glowing eyes. Num bered but each bot came decorated in cos tumes and swam into the room like a swarm of bees. One was covered in black stripes, while another looked like a robotic animal.

The cold bars came swiftly to both of them as they fled upstairs. Sanders quietly cursed himself out, as blood trickled from his neck . His chest ached and the movie images that they had seen previously flashed throughout

his head of the silent killer . It just had to be a technology movie. The second floor grew narrow as they passed by white railing bars, scanning for some place to go . Some sort of escape . The metal bots bobbled under them swiftly, too quick now to even see the whole thing as they extended their wheels upwards and tried to fling up to the next floor. Swim ming over the edge like ravenous animals, it looked like a swimming pool of technology.

“Welcome to the Dynasty Theater-where all guests have an experience that changes their life .” The voice shot up behind Sanders . Without a second to spare, a flash of pink ran in front of Sanders, and a blue painted box bolted back into the crowd. Peering over again as he ran, a wave of glaring white eyes now looked down at the ground as one blue metal body laid neglected on the floor, with its chest compartment dented, with bucket fragments embedded inside .

“Look!” Parker shouted, sharply pointing his index finger at an open door before another bot came over the railing side .

Swiftly, Sanders plunged his screwdriver into its chest, causing it to fall back to the ground like the one before . BAM! Both teens slammed into each other suddenly, collapsing and rolling down a scratchy slope before a loud WHOOSH! took over their ears . Pok ing his head up, Sanders saw the outline of the door, the room giving some light from keypads . The outer hall banged like a gun shot, letting the dark know it would win from where it came. Multiple black numbers on white like power balls pierced through the doorway like deer eyes and CLICK! Their eyes blinked and decreased to 8 . Rushing to their feet, Parker punched his fist into the number pad, leaving it to crack down the middle. Iron arms banged against the walls outside, as Sanders glanced at the glass . “ADO1 Certified”. Sanders felt himself laugh a little. ADO1 Certified never broke, no matter heat or smashing .

“What is this place?” Both of them wondered while glancing at each other, without saying anything . TV screens and computer moni tors were everywhere. Every shelf had a grey screen. If it didn’t, there were black boxes that were screwed into the walls. Both teens walked in silence with red faces down the yel low taped stairs to an open black circle grated floor, before FLOOSH! Another door flew shut behind them . A large screen took over half of the one wall, but other than that, there was nothing else to exist in that room. That is, until…

“Do you find them evil yet?” a garbled voice pushed out from the circular ground beneath .

“I don’t...?” Parker replied, while pushing his heart back up from his stomach in between breaths, as the metal grate whined below him.

Below Sander’s white Adidas sneakers, speck led with black dust, popcorn butter, and shards of blue metal, flashed another set of white glossy eyes with another message in mind. But as Sanders looked closer, it was bigger. Much bigger. Wiggling its metal finger through the gray slots like a huge bug towards something, he jumped . Stale air began to close in around them as both teens kicked up their feet and leaped across the room, leaning up against the grey walls. Peering down, their eyes spotted a fraying black belt strung across a latch on the grate in some lame attempt to keep whatever it was in, but not for long. Both boys looked at each other, one shrugging in frustration as the room lacked everything and anything else to try and use .

“We’re all nothing but a number, yes?” A different voice asked again- only this time

it sounded like an old news reporter. The cracked white glossy eyes made of little grids and metal rounded teeth creaked in an up and down slow motion as it stared at them. The grate wiggled up and down, wailing against age, the belt tugging and budging from all directions. Suddenly the metal fingers stopped, and the air grew still.

“I said, we’re all nothing but a number, yes?” The first voice asked, staring at them with regular black circles for eyes, now filled with something different. Neither could put a finger on it.

“I wouldn’t say?” Sanders gritted his teeth.

“Why are we answering questions from something that tried to kill us, look out from where we just came.” Parker cocked his head towards the closed door, his eyes looking like a draining lake. The air grew stiffer, and the thing below now said nothing. Minutes passed before the deep voice cut through the room .

“Will you remember this?” It asked, pushing against the grate again, each metal finger pok ing the grate again, but this time it was one at a time with fascination.

Both boys looked at each other in shock .

“Well yeah!” Parker yelled, the tips of his hair standing on edge .

“Congratulations boys... You played well…like I said. just. as. planned” a new and now familiar voice pierced from the slots below them, until SNAP, the leather of the frayed belt cut in two and the vision of a day out cut short and drew to blankness .

Among the Cardboard Towers

Jeff Schultz

Prefab crispbread towers totter, rusty rebar exposed, holed by furious exertions of distant bellicosity shattered windows cannot hide family photos from snow, mildew, and mold. Cars smashed like discarded toys of a malevolent giant, parcels abandoned pell-mell in the frantic flight from threats unseen. Yet the magpie chitters unperturbed.

The Anti-Irredentist

Jeff Schultz

Grimy visage scans the near distance hidden beneath debris, flapping ochre curtain and shabby beard growth. Heedless bipedal occupiers clad in grubby camo pace nervously below lacking awareness, oblivious to the rising threat. High up in the rebar-lined Swiss cheese of smashed prefab apartments he lies on a stained mattress in a once lovely flat, now forced hovel, feeling the crisp breeze yet resolutely steeled to his pending task. A child’s colorful drawing hangs limply from a spindly wall fragment. Inspired and likewise scalded by his wife’s tragic recent passing, he hears her even now from her nearby hasty burial, pleading to him. She would not have agreed with his truculent idea, not this way – no! She was a better person, able to control the monster that he could not. The same monster he met years before in the sandy wastes, when as a lad he fought an unyielding enemy for what now seems so trivial, such empty goals. She was his only real medicine to fight the monster, her touch the salve for his unseen malaise. He shook out of his stupor, coughed and spat, rations running low. The urban resistance nest he carved out hid him from the drones that buzzed overhead, just enough cracked ceiling remained to keep them unaware until it would be too late.

St. Javelin Ann O’Nymus

Hail, Mary, full of Grace with Holy nimbus round thy face Hear o hear our cries and pleas as here we pray upon our knees Among the rubble, ruin, and dead Filled with hunger, hurt, and dread;

We had fled to their protection begging for some intercession but they refused any assistance in the name of political expedience: alas! we are besieged by the east, ignored by the west our poor plight puts our faith to the test!

So to thee cry we, wretched children of the borderlands To thee we send up our sighs we weep and we mourn on these outskirts with no other help in sight;

Turn, then, Virgin Advocate Turn thy merciful eyes toward us And send us means to defend ourselves From this flagrant and unprovoked injustice;

O Mother Mary, with grace and charms and holy weapons in thy arms send us an FGM-148 hurry, please, before it’s too late.

© Slava Ukraini, Saint Javelin Image used with permission.

Involuntary Troglodytes

Jeff Schultz

Under battered dwellings dank basements sat ignored. Home to unwanted boxes brimming with obsolete ephemera, no longer needed. ‘Til the dire wolf prowled and shelter took priority. Feeble, fearful figures clustered together for warmth, praying to St. Javelin for deliverance.

Zic-Zak Brigade

Jeff Schultz

Grozny’s feared fighters descend to spread mayhem, rough in appearance and bewhiskered. Steely-eyed miscreants eager for the hunt, honing their blades while helpless civilians shudder. Alas!

Their unsavory deeds must, of course, persist and what better hive of skullduggery than the insatiable Interweb where myopic servers nourish puffed egos of charlatans allowing buffoonery to masquerade as truth.

Harvester of Fortune

Jeff Schultz

What the past proletariat labored to fabricate in the workmen’s paradise and painted a proud shade of tortoise, now sits forlornly in a random ditch, Goliath’s rejected paperweight moldering in the haze. Then an amiable agrarian ambled along, and took notice of the unexpected scaly war-madillo. He recalled an apex predator, perfect for the sacred task, and dashed away. Hastily he assembled his agriculturalist amigos and harvested the sullen tracked bounty behind a brood of thick-wheeled tractors. Let not the dirty hands of the farmer be cursed, for he is out…standing!

Leviathan Jeff Schultz

Beneath the brooding waves, a dark menace lurks. Sliding at low speed with nary a sound, the steel shark stalks. Waiting, waiting, the interminable delay. Slowly the crimson-handed chronometer creeps until a grim bearded face nods dour approval. Like a biblical leviathan, the massive beast rises leveling off at the predetermined depth while dark-hued overall-clad forms sit in red-tinted squalor. Reeking of oil, sweat, stale breath and tinged with ozone, the moment hangs heavy and bitter. Sudden broach of foaming surface, flash of light and brimstone, blasting heat as the nightmare takes flight.

A Good Reason

Emily Kaufman

At 11:15 on a seemingly uneventful April morning, I just finished cleaning all the rooms on my list for the day, except one. I noticed the only car in the parking lot was the silver SUV parked in front of room 11 where they were probably sleeping off a night of God-knows-what.

“If you want to stay, you have to pay.” I sing to myself as I make my way to my last room; though, no one was outside to hear me . That little jingle had become my mantra at work, helping me have the patience for the excuses I’m certain I’m about to hear. It’s always, “I’m going to the office to pay for another night .” (Then they leave an hour later instead) or “I’m waiting for my ride.” or “I’m waiting for someone to bring money .” or any reason I should let them stay in the room until long after check-out time at 11AM . I should compile a menu of the excuses I’ve heard and let the customer choose which one they’d like to use. I’m just dying of anticipation as to what the special will be for today as to why this guy is still here after check-out time. I sigh to myself as I approach the rust-colored door. Three hard knocks leave my knuckles aching .

“Housekeeping!” I say loudly, in hopes that all this noise will wake them from a deep slumber. I know the drill; it usually works.

I wait. No answer. Here we go again. I knock even louder this time. My knuckles throb. I don’t want to have to open the door in case people aren’t decent. I give it another go.

“HOUSEKEEPING! IT’S PAST CHECK OUT TIME!” I yell. Still nothing.

This time, I pound on the door with the side of my fist, to give my poor knuckles a rest. BANG . BANG . BANG . I brought my left ear closer to the door to listen for movement or talking . Dead silence, inside and out. I had no choice but to open the door now. I took my master key, placed it into the lock, and daringly started to turn it . I heard the door pin click . The door cracked open . I pushed slowly and peered in through the slight opening. My eyes adjusted to the room, which was dimly lit from a small lamp on the far wall. The room smelled of cigarettes and an odd, stale scent I couldn’t quite put my finger on. Five feet from the door, I could make out shoes lying on the floor, but they have feet in them. I opened the door a little further. I saw legs. Further. Thankfully he was clothed. I saw khaki shorts and the back of his navy-blue tee shirt; his chest was facing down. Further. The door was most of the way open now and daylight poured in. His head lay right in front of me, turned toward the door as if to greet me. I saw his face. I wish I hadn’t.

My eyes widened in sheer terror. I gasped, momentarily forgetting how to breathe as my mouth fell open. A wave of intense heat and panic simultaneously flooded my inner core, trickling through my body to the surface of my probably pale skin . The pounding heart in my chest echoed through my ears. My palms and forehead were suddenly sweaty. Weakening knees were barely enough to hold me up. All I could do was stand there, motionless.

Liquid wept from his nose, forming the stagnant, dark red pool that oozed beyond the measure of his head. His shaggy, brown hair draped just past his brow; the tips rested in the congealed puddle. The sunken eyes that were once alive and blue lay open with no wonder behind them; only a screen of gray overcast, as if spiders had woven their webs over the windows to his soul. His left cheek, smushed against the floor, was puffy and purplish. The contents that were once in his stomach spilled from his mouth and settled in a puddle just beneath his colorless lips . White foam lay dispersed overtop of it all. I had never seen anything so graphic in my life. They don’t make it like this on the TV shows.

Yet, somehow, the innocence in my then-18-year-old self said, “Maybe he’s just unconscious. He can’t be dead.” I half-expected him to grab my leg. I looked at his right arm which lay down at his side, closest to where I stood. The back half of his arm, facing the ceiling, was the whitest of white. Closer along the floor, the front half of his arm was a bluish red. That’s when it hit me. Lividity set in. He was long gone. No amount of resuscitative efforts that I or any trained professional could provide would bring this guy back. Water stained my cheeks as I dialed the phone.

I stood outside room 11 when the ambulance arrived; my eyes were still wet.

“Did you know him?” the paramedic asked, condescension spewing from his lips.

“No,” I said with a hint of anger, “I just didn’t sign up for this.” I was confused and perturbed as to why he was so cold toward my emotion.

“I didn’t realize this was spilled milk,” I said sarcastically under my breath as an attempt at my own personal comic relief .

A few police officers showed up after another ten minutes, and the coroner shortly after that.

“You were the one who found him?” the officer asked kindly. I nodded.

“I knocked several times, yelled, and pounded on the door but he didn’t answer. I guess he had a good reason,” I said, trying again to comfort myself with humor. He gave a quick laugh.

Behind the officer, the rest of the party was bringing the stretcher with the occupied body bag out of the room and loading the coroner’s van. I looked at the door to room 11. It was closed. As they all got in their respective vehicles and drove away, another tear rolled down my cheek. The shackles of shock kept me from pinpointing exactly what I was feeling at that moment or why I was so emotional about a kid overdosing whom I didn’t even know.

That’s when it hit me. This kid was two years older than I was. His life was cut short, but it was be cause of his own decisions to associate with addicts and follow suit. I asked myself where that left me. Here I am, working and living at a motel, surrounded daily by a smorgasbord of different drugs virtually at my fingertips. Why haven’t I copied my surroundings? Why haven’t I followed the influenc es I see around me every single day? I decided there simply wasn’t any good reason why I should.

Looking back on that day, and his face, I vowed to always have good reasoning behind my decisions before I make them. I make it a point to learn from not only my mistakes, but others’ as well. I learned that the wrong move could put me in the grave plot next to this kid. Life is fragile and should be treated as such. You don’t always get a second chance, no matter how young you are. The decisions you make in your earlier years can tremendously affect your later years… That is, if you are granted that many .

LOSS

The Empty Chair

Jeff Schultz

The table sat sullenly

The meager meal served

No small talk, nothing to discuss Save the empty chair .

Inconvenience to Death Sentence

Emily Nast

Heart beating rapidly, as she senses something is wrong. Piercing cries encompass the walls of where she is supposed to feel safe .

Trapped .

She feels something slide across her skin .

Her heart beats even faster, as she knows her home is being invaded .

She freezes in fear .

Her muscles grow tense, as she feels pressure on her arm . The pressure is growing.

Her arms pushing against the walls and feet kicking trying to find a way out. Still trying to find an escape, when suddenly she can’t move her arm, something is grabbing her .

Trying to fight the monster who is attacking her, when the pressure becomes too strong .

Her arm tears from her body . The next one is quicker. Still fighting for her life, the intruder returns .

This time he grabs her leg .

She kicks, but he is too strong .

Her leg, twisting and turning in all directions. One final twist and her leg tears from her body

He repeats the same thing on her other leg .

Her limbs, forcibly amputated .

Fighting, she thinks the pain is over .

Then comes a sensation she does not recognize .

It’s sharp.

It punctures her belly .

She is being cut into pieces .

Her belly and chest are no longer attached, instead being cut into several bits .

Her head, the only part of her left .

Suctioned through a tube .

Gone .

Murdered in her home . Not because she did anything wrong.

But because she was an inconvenience, she was sentenced to death .

Departed Sorrow

The day that you left it was over for me That this pain is slowly drowning me I’m trying to swim out, but I can’t breathe. No, I can’t break free and all these people around me . Do they think that I’m fine? I’m not okay

Burning Passion

Your love, your love is all I need Need to make me really happy, and because of that I believe That my love for you is so real Understand how I feel How much I miss you

Because

When, we’re apart It hurts my heart I feel alone

I’m not at home, cause you’re my home So please stay by my side Please be my bride

Because

Your love, your love is all I need Need to make me really happy, and because of that I believe That my love for you is so real Understand how I feel How much I miss you

Because

I don’t like it when you say you’re not adorable,

and I wonder, why?

Stephen Plaza

Why can’t they all see me going insane

That I’m going to die? Now I wonder, why, Why is life so unfair?

Dang, the truth is really hard to bare .

Now, I’m all alone slowly suffering My happiness stopped, yes, it’s buffering.

Stephen Plaza

because you’re so insanely sweet

All the time

I hope in the future, I’m reliable

I’ll be there when you need me, anytime Because You’re the one

The only one I need

The one that makes me so happy, and because of that I believe That my love for you is so real So, understand how I feel How much I love you

So please

Promise me, It will always be, just you and me

For eternity, because all of you Is what I need You really are the only one perfect for me

I mean all of this, truthfully

I really love you, with all of me

Conflicting Anguish

Stephen Plaza

Darkness, this cloud of darkness surrounds me every second of the day . Always keeping people away. Darkness, fueled by self-hatred, dissatisfaction, disbe lief, sorrow, sadness. Darkness, the evil shadow which had carved an infinite void within me. A void as vast and wide as the sea itself. Darkness, whispering thoughts which reverberate throughout my whole body. Worthless, trash, insignificant, idiotic, insane, I hate myself, and WHY? All echoing and growing louder as time lingers on. Darkness, this field which incases me in a forever box that doesn’t want to let me free. Spark, not many things can fill this dark empty void, but it helps me heal. Light, a bright ray of sunshine had entered my sad, cloudy life . Light, bringing greatness and meaning to my life. Light, clearing away the darkness surrounding me and overflowing the infinite void with its bright light. Light, great when around, but sad when not. Light, showing the heart an amazing feeling, emotion, what it was missing out on. Despair, O’ how the heart shouts in agony when the bright sunshine isn’t around, longing the feelings of joy, happiness, excitement... love. Despair, stuck in a weird cycle of joy and sadness, surprisingly fitting for someone like I. If defeat was a game then I’m the absolute best, a champion.

Nothing? Something?

A worry it has brung, Its haunting chant will be sung. Fast and swift like a bullet to the brain, Almost as sudden as a collision with a train. No mercy, just and fairness it will rain, And natheless it brings not a single ounce of pain .

Direct like traffic on a one-way lane, But even so,

it’s as cloudy as the clouds of a rainy day. Is it straightforward, like a stop sign? or is it subjective, Like the briefcase of Mr . Wallace . Is there something or is there nothing, A thought, a question be that as it may, It leaves our minds forever stained, So an unsolved mystery shall it remain .

Lonnie O’Boyle

Thunderous Evening in the Deep Woodland

Stephen Plaza

“What’s going on? what’s going on?” is all poor Amaya could say. Earlier it was a cold and rainy night deep in the pine tree forest, which didn’t bother Amaya be cause her tent was secure. Suddenly she could hear some strange noises from the distance . “Strange,” she murmured . What could that noise be?” Amaya left the safety of her net to investigate. Carrying her flashlight, she ventured toward the sound with all the bravery she could muster up. “Who’s there?” shouted Ama ya as she pointed her flashlight in the direction of the mysterious noise. When Amaya looked at the source of the noise, she turned pale like a ghost, leaving her speechless when she saw it. While frozen by fear, all Amaya could see was a tall, dark creature with long, lengthy arms. “Almost human-like but definitely not,” she thought quickly. Then she slowly looked up, and all she could see were glowing purple eyes and no mouth . Once that happened all hell broke loose . The crea ture started to make the strange noise, but even louder, and in a hostile way. She screamed and made a run for it, and in a panic, she dropped her flashlight. While running away from the creature, she thought, “Damn, Why did I have to lose my flashlight at a time like this?” After some time of running, the noise would slow ly fade away and gave Amaya some hope. “Thank goodness”, she said, all out of breath. Suddenly, the screeching noise was close again as if right behind her. She fell on the ground near some tree roots . Trying to get up, she sat there, just looking up, when she saw the silent creature right above her. Her heart was racing, yet all she could feel was an empty void in her chest the more the creature got closer. It slowly extended a hand towards her head. Amaya could feel heaviness all over her body, especially her head. When contact was made the creature was screeching louder than thunder. Amaya could feel pain rush to her head. “What’s going on? what’s going on?” is all poor Amaya could say.

Five Minutes in a Lawyer’s Office

Angela Munley

It was a familiar feeling to her. That pain in your hand. You know? The one where it feels like your heart is going to burst and the pressure spreads to your hand . More like an aching tooth, than sharp pain Rubbing it didn’t help.

(Maybe you don’t know what that feels like. In truth, I hope you don’t.)

It was embarrassment. The kind she felt when she had holes in her bottoms of her shoes and the cold snow was seeping in and melting. She always wondered if the other kids noticed. The rest of her life her feet would always feel cold. Looking back, she wondered if this is psychosomatic, or real?

Pieces of her felt like a failure. Not at life but at fixing her marriage. Why didn’t he love her? Was it him? Was it her? It was him, but she didn’t know that at this point. She had always loved him, but he didn’t even know what love was nor did he respect her enough to be honest about how he really felt.

It hurt. She felt like she was going to burst open from rage. She wondered what would happen if her soul were unleashed right now. It felt like it would expand out across the Earth and leave it as just a burnt-out shell .

No one understood. How could they? She didn’t tell anyone what was happening. She just endured it. She would attempt to say she needed help but people told her, “You can handle it.” Then change the subject. It was true but should she have to, alone? Maybe she wasn’t there for anyone else before so why should she expect it of others? Moving forward she would make it a life intention to be kind especially when she didn’t know why someone was mad or upset. It’s not personal, until it’s personal. To listen more and be there if someone is going through this kind of nonsense. But only if it was healthy for her.

She looked at her palm and rubbed it. It still ached. She didn’t want to eat or talk or live anymore. It would pass quickly. She had concluded she wasn’t suicidal, probably more homicidal at this point. Her love for her children was all that really kept her from ending this shitty person.

He lied. She sat avoiding eye contact at that large table in the lawyer’s conference room. Emotionless outside, still in her raging hurricane of anger and disappointment . She let him lie, because she knew that once he signed that paper she was free. Free of any strings or complications other than communication about their children. He apparently always had been lying to her. But this was it.

Ownership of Exotic Animals

Luis Gonzalez-Lopez

“There are around 15,000 privately owned “pet” primates in the U.S. and an estimated 75,000 monkeys used in animal experimentation, plus countless more in zoos and used in other forms of entertainment” (Bornfreeusa .org, “Sanctuaries Are not the Solution to the Captive Primate Crisis,” par. 1). Just like these monkeys, there are thousands of other exotic animals of different species in the U.S. being used for experimentation on products we use, used for entertainment in places like zoos, and privately owned by people. This causes an issue because many of these animals are born in captivity and can’t be set free into the wild because they will die. These animals are also taken out of their habitats, and trafficked in the U.S. or around the world. This issue also poses a threat to society as many of these exotic animals are extremely dangerous and can escape from their owners. Many of these animals suffer from illness and some of them die while being trafficked. Many people believe it is okay to own exotic animals because it pro vides people with jobs, and adds to the economy, while providing people with new life opportu nities, but others believe that ownership of exotic animals in the United States exposes innocent animals to danger, illegal trafficking, and many of the animals are illegally bred.

Ownership of exotic animals should be legal for many reasons, for example the generation of niche jobs. “The exotic pet trade develops job opportunities, strengthens the economy, and shapes lives . It should be accommodated and appreciated just like any other hobby involving the natural world” (Smith 5). Ownership of exotic animals should be legal because it creates new job opportunities for people. The creation of new jobs helps strengthen the economy by bringing in new ways of making money. Exotic pet trades and ownership should be legalized because of the opportunities it provides and the benefits it has in society mainly in jobs, as many veterinarians and vet techs specialize in exotic animals.

Exotic animals such as wolves, tigers, bears, and primates belong in their natural habitats as they pose extreme danger to themselves and people around them. “By their very nature, these animals are wild and potentially dangerous and, as such, do not adjust well to a captive environ ment” (Bornfreeusa.org, “The Dangers of Keeping Exotic Pets,” par. 1). As seen here animals like the ones mentioned are aggressive by nature . They do not adjust to captive environments like zoos or other places outside their natural habitats; therefore, the people owning or taking care of these animals face a very high risk of being injured or even killed by them . Chimps, rare birds, large lizards, and so on are not domesticated animals. It is very difficult to predict how they will respond to certain stimuli . “Even a seemingly gentle and loving animal can attack if provoked by a loud noise or unusual experience” (LaMarca 1). Even animals that are not known mostly for their aggressive nature, like the ones men tioned before, can be aggressive if

provoked. Being owned also poses a threat to the animal as it will be harmed to be tranquil ized or even killed .

Animals face the danger of falling ill or dying because of animal trafficking for purposes like bringing them to zoos, among oth ers. “Animals are exported from countries for four primary reasons. The first involves taking them to zoos. The next involves selling them as pets . Animals also may be sent to restau rants or used to create clothing” (McIntyre, par . 1) . Animals are taken out of their natural habitats and exported elsewhere to be used as entertainment in zoos, sold to collectors or the highest bidder, eaten at restaurants, and even converted into clothes for fashion . This shows how innocent animals are killed or used for many unnecessary activities . “In one year, the figure was over 10 million. That peak year was 2018. One conclusion from the study was that in total, around 200 million live animal trades have taken place since 1975 and the trade is largely dominated by a few influential countries” (McIntyre, par. 2). These statistics show that through the years animal trafficking has only increased, with 2018 being the peak year many of these animals ended up being sources of entertainment or becoming pets . This exportation often causes illness or even death for many of these animals. Every day animals are trafficked around the world facing the dangers of getting sick and possibly losing their lives, with exportation only increasing across the years.

Exotic animals are bred in zoos under the false claim that it is for replenishment of endangered species. “Zoos aren’t breeding animals with the intent of replenishing threatened populations: Babies bring visitors through the gates, and captive breeding gives the public a false sense of security about a species’ survival” (PETA, par. 1). Zoos breed animals because it brings people to the place . They breed the animals under the false claim that it is to “preserve” the species when it is to keep people coming in. This causes more animals to be unable to be released into their natural habitats because of their lack of experience, and instead living their lives in cages. “Most animals confined in zoos are not endangered, nor are they being prepared for release into natural habitats . In fact, it is nearly impossible to release captive-bred animals, including threatened species like elephants, polar bears, gorillas, tigers and chimpanzees into the wild” (PETA, par. 1). This shows how many species of animals are often bred in zoos just to be kept there because they would not be able to survive in the wild. Most of them are not endangered and are just bred for profit and entertainment purposes.

Exotic animals around the world face many dangers with people wanting to own them, among those threats are danger to their safety, illegal trafficking, and illegal breeding. Exotic animals are being highly trafficked around the world for many reasons, but mainly for entertainment purposes like to be displayed in zoos. This has caused the rate of trafficking to increase throughout the years . These animals are often bred under the lie that it is to conserve the species when oftentimes the species are not endangered. This is done mainly by zoos to keep businesses active. Exotic animals are not supposed to receive domestic care mainly for the

reason that they have very unpredictable behavior and many of them are extremely dangerous when threatened or provoked, this can cause these animals to be killed simply because they were defending themselves. The number of certain species in the wild will decrease because of the constant exportation, causing many species to become endangered. What would you do if you could save these innocent animals? Everyday these animals are taken from their homes to be used as clothing, food, pets, and to be a source of entertainment living in cages for the rest of their lives. They are trafficked, illegally bred, and in constant danger of getting killed for trying to save themselves . Change is needed to stop the mistreatment of these animals, and it starts with you.

Works Cited

Bornfreeusa.org, “Sanctuaries Are not the Solution to the Captive Primate Crisis.” Bornfreeusa.org, n.d., https://www.bornfreeusa.org/campaigns/animals-in-captivity/sanctuaries-are-not-the-solution-to-the-captive-primate-crisis/ . Accessed 23 Apr. 2022. Bornfreeusa.org, “The Dangers of Keeping Exotic Pets .” Bornfree.usa.org, n.d., https://www.bornfreeusa.org/campaigns/animals-in-captivity/the-dangers-of-keeping-exotic-pets/ . Accessed 23 Apr. 2022. McIntyre, Douglas A. “These Are the Most Exported Animals in the World.” 247wallst.com, 8 Nov. 2021, https://247wallst.com/business/2021/11/08/iguanas-are-the-most-exported-animals-in-the-world/. Accessed 23 Apr. 2022.

PETA. “Don’t Zoos Help to Preserve Endangered Species?” PETA.org, 2022, https://www.peta.org/aboutpeta/faq/dont-zoos-help-to-preserve-endangered-species/. Accessed 23 Apr. 2022.

Smith, Melissa A. “10 Reasons Why Exotic Pets Should Be Legal.” pethelpful.com, 2 May 2022, https://pethelpful.com/pet-ownership/10-Fast-Reasons-Why-Exotic-Pets-Should-Be-Legal . Accessed 23 Apr. 2022.

Ling-Lang vs. Santa

Stephen Plaza

There was a sound on the roof

It was a loud bang

Footsteps could be heard over me

My name is Ling Lang

Someone struggles down the chimney

He reaches the bottom

I could see the red jolly fat man

I hid behind the column

He crawled out the chimney

He walked, walked towards the tree Santa didn’t have his sack

Good thing he didn’t see me Santa saw the cookies

The audacity I witnessed He stalked them like a hawk

He said, “Ho-Ho-Ho I’m in business”

The jolly fat man grabbed the plate

Oh boy what did I see

He ate all the cookies whole; eerie it was And anyone would agree I was enthralled with anger

I hated Santa

I started to feel thirsty

I wanted a Fanta

Now I was filled with rage I yelled “Curse you, fat man!”

I ran straight at him Now the chaos began Now I RKO’d him

Now he fell down with a bang I started to strangle him Who defeated Santa Claus? Me, Ling-Lang!

Spring Struggle

Kelly McAndre

The days are growing longer

At last, Spring is the season

The sun is becoming stronger

As I’m left inside sneezin’.

I watch from the window, tissue in hand

As loved ones go along for a stroll

Rebirth of nature across the land

But this pollen is taking a toll .

Sitting on sun rays as they pour in

I am like an indoor cat

Wanting to feel it’s warmth on my skin

I cannot go outside and go through all that .

Itchy nose and a scratchy throat

I wait inside, while my allergies attack

Sniffling and sneezing, the time I devote

This shall pass, oh, but they will be back.

The Perfect Potential Employee

A cold-hearted old man may not be the first pick for a new hire, but as a surprise, maybe he should be at the top of the list . Mr . Ebenezer Scrooge may not be the most attractive employee; however, he will offer your company benefits no other man could . Mr . Scrooge would be a great employee for your company because of his stub bornness, his cheap ness, and his strong work ethic.

The first reason you should hire Mr . Scrooge is for his stubbornness . Even though being stub born can be per ceived as a negative trait that brings rudeness along with it, it will bring a lot of positive things to your work environment. One way Mr. Scrooge’s stubbornness will positively affect your business is the perfection of his work. Mr. Scrooge I stubborn and will not give up on his work until it is a hundred percent perfect. For example, he will stay at the office and count all the money out to the correct amount. He does not care how long it will take, or how long others need

Bailey Hayes

to stay to achieve

the highest level of perfection . He only cares about having everything his way. This ensures that you as a company will never have a prob lem with trusting him. He will always be on his game when it comes to his job . The second reason his stubbornness will come in handy is that you are ensured that he will never change. Now, unfortunately, you will always have a rude touch here and there, but he will always keep up to date . Mr . Scrooge will never slack off, become lazy, or not care about his work.

For example, Mr. Scrooge is extremely adamant in his ways.

Throughout his entire life many citizens in his city have tried to change him . They have tried to push him to have more pos itivity in his life, and he never budged . As an older man, he still has the same qual ities of an extremely good worker. With that being said, his standards of perfection will never go away; his standards are truly apart of him . Stubbornness is a great quality of Mr. Scrooge being that it is ex tremely easy to trust him .

The second reason you should hire Mr . Scrooge is because of his cheapness . Cheapness is something that took Mr . Scrooge years to accomplish . He is the master of saving money for himself and for others. The first way Mr. Scrooge being cheap is a positive quality is be cause when it comes to money, he will not make mistakes. For example, Mr. Scrooge is not willing to pay a cent more for an object, even if it is necessary . Therefore, he will ensure that no extra money will be given out to others. That is because he does not like to give others any more than he knows they deserve, or what he thinks they deserve. The next reason the quality of cheapness will improve your company is because you will never have to worry about spending extra money. For example, Mr. Scrooge is used to working in some of the harshest conditions. His entire life he worked in extreme cold, and he would only add a piece of coal to the fireplace early in the morning . He also barely uses candles for light unless he cannot see his work. Both of these habits are done to ensure no extra money is put to waste. I can assure you that these qualities will come along with him like a package deal, and you will save so much money by hiring him as your new employee. Cheapness is one strong quality of Mr . Scrooge that will ensure nothing will go wrong within your company .

The last reason you should hire Mr . Scrooge is because of his strong work ethic . This quality of Mr . Scrooge is argu ably the most important quality he will bring to your company. Hard-working employees are not something that you can come by easily in today’s time, but this is what Mr. Scrooge is all about. One

reason that his hard work ethic will come in handy is that he will never take off. Taking off is never a part of his daily work routine. For example, working for money is always a top priority to Mr. Scrooge. He is very materialistic and loves to make a good income, and because of that, he will never call off from work, which ensures that he is making money. He will always go through his daily routine of waking up, getting dressed, eating breakfast, and showing up at the office earlier than expected to get a good day of work in. Another reason that his strong work ethic will be proven to be significantly beneficial is because he is not afraid to do one thing that most workers are. That would be, he is not afraid to work through any holiday. As many love to spend quality time with their families throughout the holidays, Scrooge could not care less. For example, out of all the holidays in the year, Christ mas is the holiday he hates the most . Christmas is also the number one holi day most workers would like to have off. Therefore, he would be able to bring more business to the office, and he will make sure that all of his work is up to date by working a few extra days. You as a com pany will never have to shake with fear to ask him to work a holiday because he al ready planned his outfit out to come into work that day. Mr. Scrooge has a strong work ethic that will bring many benefits to your business .

Mr . Scrooge should be heavily considered as your next employee for his perfect qualities . Mr . Scrooge is not like any other employee you can hire. He is extremely stubborn, he is cheap, and he has a strong work ethic. These qualities are mothing but beneficial and will bring nothing but improvement to your work environment.

The White TigerA Critical Response Essay

Kelly Hopkins

The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga is a 2008 award-winning novel which chronicles protagonist Balram Halwai’s ascent through India’s caste system from a pre-destined life in the “Darkness” (India’s lowest social class) as a poor, uneducated baker to a wealthy and successful entrepreneur in the “Lightness” (India’s upper class). Adiga presents a firstperson narration through a series of letters written by Balram to a Chinese premier. India’s fast-growing economy and successful business landscape has Premier Wen Jiabao visiting India to acquire business advice and guidance from India’s leadership and business elites. Balram feels certain that Jiabao will have much more to gain by gazing at entrepreneurship through his “half-baked” societal scope of India – through the intelligence, experience, and prowess of a “White Tiger.”

Adiga portrays Balram’s hometown of Laxmangahr as deeply immersed in the “Darkness.” Families are close-knit but live in a state of destitution . Access to healthcare and education is virtually nonexistent and jobs are scarce and consist of tedious backbreaking work such as rickshaw pulling and farm labor where “the story of a poor man’s life is written on his body in a sharp pen” (Adiga 22) . The only sense of identity a person has in India is the caste they are born into. The Halwai family is rooted deep in caste darkness with Balram’s parents not even giving him a name when he is born—during childhood, he is simply known as “Munna” (Boy). Balram’s father does however see something special in his son, and he shouts at Grandma Kusum, “How many times have I told you: Munna must read and write!” when she offers a sug gestion that Balram quit school and earn money working in the tea shop; this also poses a clue of how “the ‘coop’ is guarded from the inside” (Adiga 23, 166).

A few rays of light glisten and burst through the dark cloud hanging over Balram’s corrupt school with a surprise inspection by a man in a blue safari suit. Balram reads, writes, and

He begins to demonstrate his social entre preneurial savviness by utilizing tenacity and a sleek salesmanship aptitude to be come a driver for a rich coal mining family in the “Light” of Bangalore and New Delhi. Balram gradually becomes an entrepreneur – “Darkness-style . ”

As driver/servant for Mr . Ashok, Balram becomes woven into the daily lives of his wealthy master and his family, consisting of wife Pinky, his brother, The Mongoose, and his father, The Stork . Balram quickly learns by observing and listening that greed, selfishness, and a zero tolerance policy for good ethics are the only behaviors and attitudes that ensure a spot at the top of the food chain in “jungle law.” Although Balram respects and looks up to Ashok as a person he would like to emulate, he is also keenly observing Ashok for any weak ness in his character, which Balram will later exploit in the story for financial gain—a smart move for Balram? He is, after all, an “entrepreneur . ”

Adiga casts a shadow of darkness over the “Light” India by illustrating an upper class so ciety rife with corruption, bribery, extortion, racketeering, and moral decadence throughout India’s judicial system, law enforcement, and government (Sarkar 3). The exchanging of cash-filled “red bags” between the elites in the “Light” is customary as they scratch each other’s backs. In spite of corruption, there is a team-like cooperation among India’s “Light” ensuring all of India’s wealth remains at the top one percent. “There are just two castes: Men with Big Bellies, and Men with Small Bellies. And only two destinies: eat – or get eaten up” (Adiga 54) .

Religion is a source of societal manipulation and generates a smokescreen thicker than the choking smog hanging over the traffic-heavy roads of Delhi. The “Light” secretly want the “Dark” to have a sense of false hope and to believe that Hindu’s “36,000,000” gods are the saviors that will guide them out of their sewage-lined streets

and fix the defunct hospitals, electricity poles, and water taps. In glaring contrast, Ashok exclaims to The Mongoose while riding inside the Honda City vehicle, “We’re driving past Gandhi, after just having given a bribe to a minister. It’s a freaking joke, isn’t it” (Adiga 115) . Balram is not genuinely interested in religion but rather uses religion as a means to appease and entertain his master Ashok, who shows a shallow interest in the lives of the common folk . Balram parallels gods to masters who need servants to appease them (Haitham 28) .

Manipulation of the notion of “family” is also common in India . The “Light” placate servants by referring to them as “family,” yet they will throw servants under the bus in a heartbeat. A cover-up is put in place when Pinky is driv ing drunk and runs over and kills a child –Balram takes the fall – “My life had been written away. I was to go to jail for a killing I had not done” (Adiga 151) . Disobedience from a servant towards his master (or mas ter’s family) results in the servant’s family members being severely beaten and/or killed . Furthermore, the “Dark” set up marriages with the wedding dowries in mind (for a very short-lived big belly of financial relief). Grandma Kusum pushes her family members to marry when they are not ready without any consideration for the long-term conse quences . She also plays a part in the framing of Balram for the Pinky incident, throws nu merous money and marriage guilt-trips at Balram, and even tricks him into becoming the guardian for his cousin Dharam . Family is one of the primary reasons why the “Rooster Coop” is one of the most profitable enterpris es in India .

The Rooster Coop is the life blood of Indi an society; the ‘Coop’ is where the low caste works menial jobs day-in and day-out serving the upper caste . A combination of fear, internal fighting, and undermining keep the “Dark” trapped inside the Coop . Only a rare breed of society can escape the Coop—a White Tiger. Balram declares, “I’m a

man of action and change” (Adiga 3) . Martin and Osberg acknowledge, “The entrepreneur is inspired to alter the unpleas ant equilibrium . Sometimes entrepreneurs are so gripped by the opportunity to change things that they possess a burning desire to demolish the status quo . The entrepreneur thinks creatively and develops a new solution that dramatically breaks with the existing one” (7).

As The White Tiger progresses, the pieces of Balram’s numerous chandeliers begin to crystalize together, so to speak, and the only way a person of India’s “Darkness” can escape the oppression of the Coop is to prioritize wealth and power over morals. In addition, Balram’s Darkness-style entre preneurism is much more than crime and corruption – it exemplifies murder. Although Balram strongly believes in his abilities as a businessman, it is unrealistic for people of the “Darkness” to show up at a bank in the “Light” and expect the bank to loan them the rupees needed for business start-up funding . Ashok’s time is drawing near—a dark and twisted (and criminal) means to an end—or in Balram’s case, a new beginning.

A scene early in the story at the school’s classroom portrays a young Balram as pet rified from a lizard on the loose; however, when his father tries to kill the lizard, Balram shouts, “Don’t kill it Daddy – please!” (Adiga 25) . The father did not listen and “[p]ounded it with a pot of toddy until the pot broke. He smashed its neck with his f ist . He stamped on its head” (Adiga 26) . This is foreshadowing of Ashok’s death as Balram eventually overcomes his fears within the Coop by pounding and slitting Ashok’s head and neck with a broken bottle of scotch in order to steal his red bag filled with money.

Works Cited

Game over for Ashok. The welcome mat rolls out for Balram in the “Light” as he starts a very successful and lucrative taxi company.

Balram’s father asserts, “My whole life, I have been treated like a donkey. All I want is that one son of mine – at least one – should live like a man” (Adiga 26) . Balram does not quite understand what his father means in that moment, but it connects subtly for him later during one of his mall escapades with Ashok when he notices a nearby construc tion site with families of donkeys “saddled with metal troughs of rubble” (Adiga 164). At the end of the novel, Balram feels that he is a success by “not taking the lashes his father took” but also expresses some shreds of sor row for murdering Ashok, “it has darkened my soul” (Adiga 273) . Ultimately, Balram de picts no regret– “all I wanted was the chance to be a man – and for that, one murder was enough” (Adiga 274) .

Demonstrating that a “university” education is not a necessary ingredient in the recipe of life and that a “half-baked” (School of Hard Knocks) experience can be sufficient enough in the world of entrepreneurism, Balram knows that he is worth much more than a low-skill servant life and deserves more. Bal ram exhibits the indispensable traits of the veritable Indian entrepreneur—confidence, competitiveness, vision, determination, self-motivation, people skills, motivation, and resourcefulness—along with the requisites of crime, corruption, a lack of morals and ethics, and murder—a winning combination in Adiga’s India. Breaking out of the Coop and traversing the border separating “Dark” and “Light” requires a person who is willing to risk it all and choose money, power, and individual freedom over family—only a rare species in the world can survive and thrive in this jungle—The White Tiger.

Adiga, Aravind. The White Tiger. Free Press, 2008. Haitham, Hind, “Discourse of Entrepreneurship in The White Tiger.” Thesis and Dissertations. Lehigh Preserve, 2013, https://preserve.lib. lehigh.edu/islandora/object/preserve%3Abp-7256358. Accessed 10 Oct. 2018.

Martin, Roger L, and Sally Osberg. “Social Entrepreneurship: The Case for Definition.” Stanford Social Innovation Review, 2007, pp. 1–13., ssir.org/articles/entry/ social_entrepreneurship_the_case_for_definition. Accessed 10 Oct. 2018. Sarkar, Sushil. “The Theme of Corruption and Moral Decadence in Arvind Adiga’s The White Tiger.” The Criterion: An International Journal in English, vol. 3. no.4, 2012, pp. 3, https://core.ac.uk/ download/pdf/229681057.pdf. Accessed 10 Oct. 2018.

The Wildwoods: Then and Now

Joseph Popovich

Growing up, I was always under the impression that I could stay young forever, that time is no is sue and that things will always stay the same. Now that I am getting older, I’m starting to realize that time is flying by, and the world is always changing. When I was a kid, I remember going to Atlantic City with my parents, not for the casinos, but to spend all day on the beach and all night walking down the boardwalk. Every young child was wearing a neon-colored bathing suit, baggy muscle shirt, and a pair of LA Gear sneakers or Reeboks with the pump on the tongue. As we can see from the photographs, a lot has changed. Everything about the photographs is different, from the way they dress to the number of people on the beach, to the very sand they sit upon; It’s different.

Image 1. was taken in the summer of 1944, on the beach in Wildwood NJ. The couple in the photo are Edna (left) Fred Long. I know this because they are my great-grandparents. As World War Two was finally coming to an end, our country was starting to see some relief and families started feeling better about getting on with their lives. For this couple, that means going to the beach. By the 1940s, the flash of an arm or a leg was no more an outrageous sight. As the hem lines started inching up, the spaghetti-strap-like styles started emerging and women became more comfortable with their midriff showing as evident from the two-piece suits that started doing the rounds. This new boldness and independence can also be attributed to the period of the Second World War when women were left to be the heads of the house and managers of businesses in many cases. We see the huge leap that women’s fashion took after the war (“The Indian Express From the 1800s to the 90s”) .

It’s not hard to see that this couple is at the beach, they are together, and they are happy to be that way. What they are wearing is just a bonus to accent the photo. The woman seen in Image 1. is wearing a vintage bathing suit, sun cap and is generously covered in what I would assume to be dark colors considering it is a black and white photo. Sim ilar qualities are found in Fred’s beach attire. He is most likely wearing a suit with little to no design and a dark-

Image 1. Edna and Fred Long. The Wildwoods, NJ 1944 (unknown)

colored tank top with no print; he shows his wisdom with the thinning of his hair and lack of body definition. A strong glare on the lens of the camera has left discol oration on the photo changing the black of the woman’s dress from grey to purple to blue . That same glare also streaking across the faces of the couple almost seems to be the reason for her squint and crooked smile . Cap tured perfectly, the boardwalk sits at the top left-hand side of the picture . I also notice a child sitting in the sand and someone running in the distance. It’s almost as if the photographer made sure to get everything in the shot to capture every possible aspect of being on the shore . Just short of having a seagull flying overhead, this photo accu rately represents a perfect day at the beach in the 40s .

From what I understand, Image 2. was taken on the same beach on the same day at around the same time as Image 1. I can’t be certain about that, for it’s just an educated guess . There also seems to be a lot more history in this photo as far as some of the hotel’s architecture and the boardwalk. “The Wildwoods began developing as a resort in the last decade of the 19th century . A building boom began in the 1950s, due partially to the construction and completion of the Garden State Parkway in 1955” (Lange). This is also right around the time of the “doo-wop” era and Atlantic City making a reputation for itself in the music industry .

In Image 2, Edna is seen wearing the same vintage bathing suit. She stands with her hands on her hips with the same smile that we see in Image 1. She is a small and skinny woman with little to no curves despite her size; she seems to stand confidently as if she was trying to mimic or compete with the large building seen over her left shoulder. The young man in this photo prob ably has no idea that he’s getting his picture taken, yet he will be captured at that moment for ever. I am going to imagine him as being someone’s grandfather by now. The yellowing of the photograph is almost like a mark of authenticity representing the time in which it was taken.

If these images were taken today, I don’t believe it would be as easy as sitting down in the sand and asking someone passing by to snap a photo . Beaches are overpopulated and depending on what time of the year it is, it could be hard to find a spot to lay a towel down. Everyone just takes “selfies” and filters are being applied to change their appearance. Women wear bikinis now and they are not afraid to show off their bodies. The men are almost always shirtless and bathing suits are colorful and designed to fit any body type. So much has changed, from our ability to take photographs whenever we’d like, to how we dress on the beach and even the sand under our feet. It’s just going to keep on changing. There is no stopping time. All we can do is evolve and try to keep up .

Work Cited

“From the 1800s to the ‘90s: How bathing suits have evolved over time.” Indian Express [New Delhi, India], 31 May 2018. Gale OneFile: News, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A541024792/ GPS?u=nant9483&sid=bookmark-GPS&xid=42bb9083. Accessed 31 Mar. 2022.

Image 1. 1944 Edna (left), Fred Long. “The Wildwoods.”

Lange, Linda via Scripps Howard News Service. “Wildwoods Preserve Family Fun of the 1950s.” Reading Eagle, 5 Oct 2005, https://www.readingeagle.com/article.aspx?id=108529. Accessed 11 Apr. 2022.

Long, Fred. Image 2. 1944 Edna Long. “The Wildwoods.”

Wikipedia Contributors. “Wildwood, New Jersey.” Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, 22 Feb. 2022, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wildwood,_New_Jersey. Accessed 11 Apr. 2022.

Image 2. Edna Long. The Wildwoods, NJ (Fred Long)

Saint Manuel Bueno, Absurd Man

Ryan Wasser

Composing syllabi for the academic milieu always feels like a daunting task. As a professor, deciding what material to cover, and how to supplement that material with evocative readings is challenging If one has any sense, one strikes a balance between typically acknowl edged “great works,” and lesser-known works that are no less profound despite their relatively subjacent position in the canon. This year was no different: unsure of myself in my inaugural role as “adjunct professor,” I decided to rely on the strength of my experience with philosoph ical texts by including Miguel de Unamuno’s “Saint Manuel Bueno, Martyr” as a key reading for the upcoming semester . Often overlooked in favor of philosophers like Kierkegaard, Ni etzsche and Sartre, Unamuno’s work is notable for its integration of asystematic existential elements into an otherwise easily digestible, prosaic form .

In that regard, “Saint Manuel Bueno, Martyr” is a unique literary feature on the landscape of existential philosophy. One is tempted, upon first, second, and subsequent readings to be lieve that Unamuno’s story of a priest intimately at odds with his own faith and his effect on the surrounding village of Valverde de Lucina is about the interrelatedness of comportment and faith—in other words, the understanding that what we do is more telling of what we believe than what we say we believe. This perspective is all but codified in the closing ruminations of one Angela Carballino—the eyes through which the story is told—ergo I have no intention on debat ing its viability, chiefly because, speaking per sonally, I hold “it” to be a fact of the human condition Having said that, equally as pressing are the connections between Unamuno’s story and other existential thinkers such as Camus, espe cially if the more intuitive moments of the story are taken at face value. One begins to wonder whether Don Manuel is the incidental man of God Angela makes him out to be, or if he was an absurd man akin to albeit wildly different from the characters analyzed in Camus’ The Myth of Sisyphus . A more pressing concern might be

whether there are any appreciable differences between the two archetypes at all.

For readers unfamiliar with Unamuno’s work, a brief summarization is in order . As noted, the story of Don Manuel is given to us by Angela, a woman who, after returning to her village after attending a covenant school for girls, becomes close to the priest, first after a number of con fessional encounters where she articulates various concerns to the man, and later, after her brother, Lazaro, returns from the United States, complete with modern, atheistic sensibilities in tow. While various smaller events constitute the bulk of the story, it is the paradoxical rela tionship between Lazaro and Don Manuel that forms the crux of Angela’s reminiscence. The relationship is paradoxical because it is clear that Lazaro is not keen about the priestly order especially as they relate to the feudalistic “idio cy” of the Spanish countryside (Unamuno, “Saint Manuel Bueno” 271) . But for Lazaro, Don Manu el “is not like the rest of them,” not the manipu lative womanizer Lazaro perceives other priests to be, but “is, in fact, a saint” (272), and it is this growing respect for the priest that leads Lazaro to embark on a faux-conversion to Christianity for the sake of the town’s spiritual welfare.

The most compelling aspect of Lazaro’s conver sion from atheist to undercover apostate is that it speaks directly to the situation the Don Man uel has known all his life, that Manuel himself does not believe in Heaven or God; that his role as “poor country priest,” while necessary for the prosperity of his parish, is ultimately founded on what he perceives as justifiably benevolent deception. The extent of his disbelief comes to us in pieces: first, through discrete indicators in his manner of speech while discussing the existence of Hell with Angela, next through his revelation to Lazaro about his lifelong, seem ingly hereditary struggle with suicidal thoughts, then in his scathing remarks about the syndi cation of the Church, and finally when he con fesses as much in no uncertain terms to Lazaro communion of the last Easter week communion prior to his death (Unamuno, “Saint Manuel Bueno” 283) .

The interactions between Angela, Lazaro, and Don Manuel establish important ethical ques

tions—more so than other points, the futility of obsessing over the “Social Question” and the questionability of religious “syndication” stand out (283)—that are critical, not just to the characters, but to readers alike . The questions raised solely by Don Manuel, however, are far more impressive, if not illuminating, as they pertain to the human condition, namely, “what is the nature of belief,” and “how should we act in the face of unbearable truths?” The answers to these questions can be found immediately in the actions of priest himself: belief, something attributed in the story to belief and tradition, is the opiate of the masses, and something Don Manuel insists on continuing to be the source of in spite of his own stated lack of belief so that the people of Valverde de Lucina might “live as happily as possible in the illusion that all this has a purpose” (282) . As to the issue of unbear able truths, Don Manuel advocates, both for himself and Lazaro, a kind of continual suicide by passion, working despite the weariness-in ducing impermanence of life so that their peo ple— people less cosmopolitan than those of contemporary society—might “be allowed to live with their illusion,” to continue dreaming their lives so to speak (288) .

But should Don Manuel’s actions be consid ered those of an absurd man? In The Myth of Sisyphus, Albert Camus describes the absurd as “that divorce between the mind that desires and the world that disappoints life, my nostal gia for unity, this fragmented universe and the contradiction that binds them together” (50)— it is the inescapable realization of the world’s incommensurability with our expectations of it, and the limits such a realization places on our ability to know or understand the world-as-such in anything that might be considered unitary in fashion . An absurd man, therefore, is a person who lives without appeal (53), who fully accepts the limits of his or her particular fate, and carries on in spite of the absurd as opposed to reconciling the absurd through redemptive nos talgia or suicide . In the company of absurd men is Don Juan as well as all great actors, and great conquerors—”[they are,] as much through [their] passions as through [their] torture,” and it is precisely this dualistic persistence in the behavior and reflections of Don Manuel that would seem to justify our characterizing him as

“absurd” (Camus 120) . But is this characteriza tion fair? Does it do Don Manuel justice?

As self-evident as the answer might appear to be from such a perspective, in the opinion of this author, one cannot be so sure . Don Manu el checks all the appropriate boxes for Camus’ description of an absurd man, but even with all of that, our efforts fail to characterize the priest of Valverde de Lucina as absurd because “the absurd has meaning only in so far as it is not agreed to, “ which is to say that the absurd is a matter of particularity, a matter of faith (Camus 31). If we assume faith to be the paradox “that the single individual as the particular stands in absolute relation to the Absolute” (Kierkegaard 54)—a reasonable assumption given Unamu no’s bespoke reverence for what he calls Ki erkegaard’s contra-rational position toward religiosity (The Tragic Sense of Life 198)—then one might further argue that the absurd and God, despite being syzygistic opposites, are technically one in the same, that God both is and isn’t simultaneously, as is our relationship with it. The human experience proves to be paradoxical at every turn, least of all in its relation to the metaphysical or transcendent .

With that we return to our overarching ques tion: what separates a man of faith from an absurd man? As it turns out, very little; a semantic line drawn in the sand that we mod erns utilize to assuage our own discomfort with the paradox of human existence. Not only do questions like these make it so that we cannot see metaphorical the forest for the trees, they give us a convenient excuse for failing to do so. Maybe it doesn’t matter if there is a difference between a person who lives without appeal, and a person whose appeal is so foreign to “the universal” that it transcends comprehensibility . Perhaps, in certain instances

such as these, fine details and idiosyncrasies ought to play second fiddle to the larger prin ciples embedded in the actions of those we observe. Perhaps there are moments when we should leave the suspicions we have become so accustomed to entertaining unrequited . There is no better evidence of this than the “conversion” of Lazaro—each of us has the capacity to act as though we are better people than we actually are, and in doing so becoming the better person we have feigned being in the interest of promoting a greater, more harmoni ous existence for all. And as for our saint, I find Angela’s final rumination to be most profound, if only slightly incorrect, “that Don Manuel the Good . . . died thinking [he] did not believe, but that, without believing in [his] belief, [he] actually believed, in active, resigned desolation” (Unamuno, “Saint Manuel Bueno” 291) . Desola tion, I fear, is too strong a word: the good saint may have been resigned, but only to the par adox of human being, the reality that heaven and hell, whatever those words mean to you, are places we make in this existence.

B

Works Cited Camus, Albert. The Myth of Sisyphus. Translated by Justin O’Brien, Vintage Books, 1983. De Unamuno, Miguel. “Saint Manuel Bueno, Martyr.” Basic Writings of Existentialism. Edited by Gordon Marino, The Modern Library, 2004, pp. 257-294.

---. The Tragic Sense of Life. Translated by J.E. Crawford Flitch. E-book, Dover Books, 1954. Kierkegaard, Søren. Fear and Trembling. Edited by C. Stephen Evans and Sylvia Walsh, translated by Sylvia Walsh. Cambridge UP, 2006.

1It is important here to acknowledge a good friend of mine and talented philosopher in his own right, Shane Warren of West Chester University, who first introduced me to the work of Unamuno. 2Emphasis added.

The Cycle of Coffee Mistakes

Coffee

Dates, evenings, mornings Coffee

Hot, iced, cream, sugar or plain? Coffee Runs

Coffee gives me the Runs America on Dunkin Runs

Like a thief in the night it creeps

My soul crushed by the burden and weeps Perhaps it is denial or fate Or maybe a misguidance

A rapture of good sense Did fall upon me when I ordered

No

It will not happen this time No

I will fight through it No Oh no

I smell it, I feel it Oh no

Groaning, moaning Rumbling, tumbling Chair-gripping, whisper of sulfur Clenching, wheezing Deep breath breathing Praying, bargaining Can god hear my cries?

Bathroom!

I don’t think I’ll make it, where is the nearest Bathroom?

Hold

Just a little longer, hold tight Holding…

Victorya Lenz

Running, screaming

Panicking, pleading

Pounding on doors

Buckets, windows

Bushes, floors

Where oh where could porcelain nirvana be?

Oh

Oh god no, I can feel it Oh…

Never-mind

On the bathroom break Never mind

I’m fine, leave me alone Never-mind

Desecration, degradation

Of demeanor and stature

None other than Hamlet

Could depict the agonies I endured

The malicious attempt on my vanity Was a “murder most foul”

Go away!

Let me wait here in shame Go away!!

The barista is to blame! Go away!!!

Weak

Body, weighted by exhaustion Weak

Mind from racing, grip is Weak .

Silence, relaxation, tranquility. Perhaps more than

Weak?

Graceful, risen to the heavens

A cloud of virtuous bliss

Such as a kiss from an angel

Perhaps that is the cycle

The never-ending understanding between Panic, hysteria, alarm - versus Elation, exhilaration, and ethereal pleasure.

The Greatest Mystery to Grace a Middle School

Victorya Lenz

To preface, I am a mostly unbiased passerby to an event that shook the very core of my middle school in 2011. This is based off a completely true story, save for narrator bias. I vowed to myself I would never speak of this to another soul, but after 10 years of silence, it still haunts me. Oh god, does it haunt me. I can no longer walk the hallways of the school without thinking of the rumors that arose from the ashes of this affair.

It was a chilly winter afternoon shortly before Christmas break in the middle school corridors when I first heard the loudspeaker announcement. The faceless voice ordered everyone to their home rooms. Students grabbed for the comforting hands of their friends, shuffling in single file line as quickly as the teachers allowed. Under a cloud of hushed silence and feverish whispering, children theorized about what could be waiting outside of our classroom doors. The lockdown felt like it went on for hours, but our teachers busied us with games and puzzles, handing out candy canes and mini chocolates left over from previous holidays .

While we huddled up our classrooms, blissfully unaware of the carnage that had been unleashed in our very school, our teacher stood up and cleared her throat. Her sullen expression bore itself into our hearts, and the bags from exhaustion looked deeper than ever, almost as if her heart had gained another 10 pounds of angst. She drew a dramatic breath, rattling her lungs, and she fumbled at the pack of cigarettes tucked underneath the folds of her jacket like she was reaching for assurance.

When she laid the news on us, we all sat back in our seats, stunned. A class clown offered a gesture of humor but was quickly shot down by the burden of despair that was bestowed upon our minus cule minds. That’s when the real rumors began. At first the most unpopular kids were blamed. Every one assumed that this could have been brought on only by some semblance of evil . Friend turned against friend, foes joined together to shield against the attacks of blame and fear You, dear reader, may be wondering how long this went on, and if I can be transparent, it never really ended. After a few months the bathroom was opened back up, as leaky bladders and angry parents demanded there to be more rest areas throughout the corridors, but the sentiment of danger never left . There was still a monster roaming among us.

It all happened in the bathroom, and again I can’t stress enough how disassociated I must be now to talk about it. But nevertheless, it was the men’s bathroom. No one knows exactly when it happened, as no one reported the initial act which led to the speculation this was done by a single offender. In the days that followed, we were all in a collective haze. I’d like to say this brought us, as a collec tive, together, but in fact it did the opposite . Distrust ruled the streets, suspicions rose, rumors ran

deep throughout the veins of our hometown middle school .

All that was clear was that at some point some one sneaked into the bathroom, more than likely without a hall pass, crept into the men’s bathroom, and committed the crime . Hours later, the horrific smell attracted some teenage boys that investigated and quickly left the scene to report what they saw. Soon they taped off the bathroom and shuffled all of us into our respective rooms while the higher ups investi gated the evidence .

The most we could gather is that the culprit went in early to classes, or perhaps swiped a hall pass, but when the teachers regrouped, they realized no students had used a hall pass during first period. Which lead to a bigger ques tion: Was this a conspiracy? Had it been a group of students? I had turned into an amateur sleuth, puzzling about this for the weeks and months that followed.

I suppose after all, I should explain in short what happened, as it may be relevant to the timeline of events. There is no eloquent way of muddying the waters of this wretched deed, so I will be blunt. During sometime between arriv al and midway through second period, some one took a monster dump in the men’s urinal.

Before you, who I’m sure is a seasoned and prudent reader, have a haughty laugh and throw this into the trash, I implore you to put yourself into the 2011 small town middle school and feel the intensity of this offense. Someone, either through a crime of passion or premedi tated malice, went unseen into the men’s bathroom and pooped, large and strong, right into a urinal . What can be gathered from eye witness testimony is that they made no attempt to clean it up or conceal this misdeed . There was no smear of waffle stomping or a frantic moving of evidence, it was a clean job through and through .

Over the months and years that followed, there were several theories, and this is another rea son why I am divulging this atrocity. For purely selfish satisfaction, I need to catch the offend er. At least for my own peace of mind, and I

hope, to settle a shaken community after all they went through. For privacy’s sake, all names have been changed to conceal the identity of the suspects, but due to the lack of security cameras in the corridors, there’s no evidence save a possible DNA test on any residual evi dence. God knows, the criminal may have worn gloves then we’d still be at the theorizing state.

I’m going off track, so let’s get to the basics, there are three possible suspects

First, we have Jeremy S. Jeremy was a small statured blonde athletic kid. Jeremy was easy enough to get along with, fit into almost any clique, and was a nice enough guy. He was the perfect child, played every sport, got perfect grades, never really had an issue with anyone, broke running records, and came from the idyllic nuclear white picket fence family. How ever, Jeremy had strange outbursts of energy, and everyone knew his dad was difficult to put it lightly, as both his mom and dad were all-star athletes and expected nothing less. In addition, his mother was on the PTA and a teacher’s as sistant, giving Jeremy no alibi for prior to school starting, and allowing him almost full access to the bathrooms, as everyone knew him and wouldn’t question his hall pass status if they saw him lurking about on his own.

If I can interject, I was the primary speculator of Jeremy . He just seemed too clean cut, and no one ever questioned his walks about the school. Jeremy would also stay behind school due to his mom, knowing the layout and getaway routes easily, also he had a penchant for being a bit mischievous in nature . Plus, this would be the perfect act of rebellion. No one would ever suspect him, nor would he ever get into trouble if caught. Second, we have Marshall; someone who was very small, nimble, with dark hair and a crooked smile. Marshall was the new kid, but he came with a history. All anyone knew was that he got kicked out of his old school and hung with a particularly rough crowd. The group in question would mill about in the bathrooms and write obscenities, hand in homework late, and punch lockers. All pre cursors to some real rule-breaking behavior . Marshall didn’t care about hall passes, and in an attempt to fit in, most of the grade feared

he’d do the worst hazing imaginable to fit in. As for alibi, Marshall didn’t need it, he’d do as he pleased. Which, for a small town such as mine, was about the most dastardly thing a kid could do .

I personally never liked Marshall for the crime . Maybe one of his cohorts, sure, but god knows they would have taken credit for a hit this big. That is the most chilling thing about this inci dent, that no one ever came forward. Whoever it was kept quiet all throughout high school, and there were only ever whispers of ideas. Most people assumed it was Marshall, but I just know that if he had been walking through the hallways without a pass he would have been hauled straight to the principal’s office, as that happened frequently .

The third option was more rumor and unfound ed, but as a diligent reporter, I am obligated to say all the facts. It was possible the misdeed was committed by faculty. It’s not completely off base, as there had been major budget cuts and layoffs, and disgruntled teachers were a dime a dozen . A teacher could have slipped out unseen, they would have had prior knowledge of who would be out and about and could make a quick getaway. A teacher would also explain why no one ever took credit. However, a teach er would have more of a risk, the risk of being caught and fired. It would have had to be a crime of revenge, which in theory makes sense, but logically it doesn’t seem like the most direct statement to make, especially if it results in the potential loss of a job . At that point, it seems more prudent to vandalize a little harder, or send a strongly worded letter of disgruntlement or something along those lines .

As you, my friends in decoding, have probably picked up on by now, I’m not a fan of this the ory. I guess it makes sense out of context, but not in conjunction with the mysteriousness of the event. Why did no one ever claim it? How did everyone just forget?

Now, before I leave you, my dear reader, off to investigate, I must confess There is a fourth suspect, someone who has remained enam

ored with the story, someone who has been silently stalking the series of events leading up to the dastardly deed . That person is me .

In truth, I went to the bathroom that morn ing, the teacher dismissed me without a hall pass as it was only two doors down. I took a very long time curling up in the stall reading the last chapter of my book before I had to return to my own personal geography class hell. The women’s bathroom was right next to the entrance of the men’s, and I will admit, when the other was closed, I would go into the men’s. I saw a group of boys run out of the bathroom with their noses plugged one whole period before official discovery. I have become obsessed with this crime, as I view it as the perfect rebellion, silent but deadly . As much as I want answers, getting this story off my chest is enough to make me accept the possibility no one might ever solve the unlawful act. Of course, that is a great attitude for the offender to have, making me a very possible culprit

Perhaps, in a moment of pure psychosis, I left the bathroom . Seizing my opportunity, I might have crept into the men’s bathroom, pooped in the urinal, washed my hands, then hid in a stall when I heard someone coming. As the group of boys entered, it is possible that I waited until they entered into their respective stalls and made a run for it into the women’s bathroom to have an alibi . What if I sulked in there and moved the bookmark in my book for the sake of authenticity, then waited until I saw another person come into the women’s bathroom for a witness? Then I could have left, walking slow enough for the boys from before to see me and confirm my whereabouts, and slipped back into the classroom .

Perhaps, it was none of us. Maybe it was an other unnamed source . Perhaps no one did it and it was a collective hallucination that haunt ed a school. Most likely, no one will ever be prosecuted for the transgression. But now, I am not alone in my query .

Ravelment

Hearts Like Ours

Beck Lalko

Every seven years when the sky is so blue and bright it hurts to look at and the fields that are marshy in the spring are so dry that the yellow grass turns to dust as soon as you set foot on it, the carnival comes to town. It comes to town quietly; one day there’s nothing, just an empty field, and then there are tents and lights and rides and a host of people waiting to welcome you.

It’s been that way as long as anyone can remember.

This is the year it returns, and I’ve spent all summer waiting: Every blisteringly hot, sticky humid day bringing me closer to the day I’d wake up to see the posters announcing the impending arrival.

The last time it was in town, I was ten years old. It was in town for four days, and I spent the first three begging my daddy to take me. By the time he relented, it was the last night of festivities and most of the prizes were picked through. That didn’t matter, though. The memories are still full color, even now at seventeen.

Mostly, I remember the rides. They’re rickety old things: the kiddie coaster that sends everything near it rattling as it passes, the Ferris wheel that can’t make a complete revolution without stuttering enough that the cars swing, the Tunnel of Love that everybody’s mama forbids them from being seen on, and the huge old merry-go-round with its wonderful music and flaking gold paint. Unlike the yearly county fair where everything is either from some church basement or on loan from a company that makes sure everything is state-certified, everything at the carnival is extravagant and brilliant and a little bit dangerous.

The only thing I didn’t see was the freak show, and that was ‘cause my daddy didn’t think that was the kind of thing you take a little girl to see. As if it wasn’t going to be a tent full of people in costumes with skin conditions or bad prosthetics .

The kind of begging it took to convince my parents that I should go this time could go into some history book, but I’m not about to dwell on the promises I’ll have to keep. The only thing that matters is that I’m going. I have on my favorite pair of jean shorts and a striped green button-up and my beat-up hiking boots, and now all I have to do is lace the boots and wait for Louisa to pick me up.

I stretch my legs down the creaky wooden stairs of my front porch and pull the laces tight through the hooks of the boots . Though the day’s nearly over, the sun still beats down hot on my bare forearms and all I can think about is getting some shaved ice .

I hear Louisa before I see her on account of the ancient Pontiac she drives . Enbarr comes into view, sleek and shockingly yellow as always. I can’t look at it without thinking it looks like it’s got two huge nostrils, but I know better than to mention it to Louisa again . The streets out here aren’t paved, so she’s got a miasma of dust surrounding her like the moment’s being played back on grainy film from 1970 when the car was brand new.

She eases it up the gravel driveway and I call through the screen door to let my parents know I’m leaving. This is met with a twoperson chorus of goodbyes and demands that I come back at a reasonable time .

Enbarr coasts to a stop, the cloud of dust settling through the roar of the engine doesn’t fade. The name is from a story, and it doesn’t disappoint.

The driver’s side window rolls down slowly, and Louisa hangs her head out to grin at me . She takes a moment to slide a tiny pair of red sunglasses up into her strawberry blonde

hair before she turns the radio down. Like Louisa herself, the sunglasses are a little too stylish for this town; she got them when she was visiting her dad in Charleston.

“Come on!” She has to shout to be heard over the grumbling of the idling engine. Even with out the noise of the car, I couldn’t blame her for yelling . Her grandma forbids her to go to the carnival . Seven years ago, I got to go, and she had to wait until the next day at recess for me to tell her about it .

I jump down from the porch, landing solid in the gravel . She rolls her eyes at this and watches me jog over to the passenger side with interest. As always, I marvel at how heavy the door is, and both the door and I groan as I pull it open . The inside of the car is dark vinyl, only just starting to crack with age. I have to knock the cache of soda cans and fast-food wrappers from the passenger seat before I can sit .

Inside, it smells like gasoline and Louisa’s jasmine perfume and that faint musty odor old cars get no matter how much you try to keep it at bay .

“I thought you loved this car,” I say, gesturing to the trash .

She pats the console with the fondness of someone encouraging a horse . “She doesn’t mind.”

With that, she throws the car into reverse and swings out of my driveway with all the finesse of a getaway driver. She operates on the belief that Enbarr can outrun anything. She’ll tell anyone who will listen about the time she outran a cop to avoid a ticket, though she usually leaves out the part where the cop had been sitting in a speed trap in his station wagon.

I reach for the radio . My choices of music are between the four static-filled AM stations the car manages to pull or cassette . The Best of Johnny Cash has been stuck in the player

since Louisa’s uncle put it in back in ‘94. Luckily the player reads in both directions or we’d be listening to the same forty-five minutes of music instead of the same ninety.

Louisa rolls the windows down as “Ring of Fire” starts, trum pets flaring out into the late summer afternoon. Countryside passes by in a green and yellow blur. The sky overhead is blue and completely cloudless, the sun a gold, unblinking eye in the west. It’s too early for any of the heat of the day to have dissipated, but the old AC does a decent job of keeping us cool, even if the cold air doesn’t smell all that great.

“Gramma should know where we’re going,” Louisa says, laughing. She’s got a laugh like wind chimes, all cheerful and musical .

“I don’t see what her problem is.”

Louisa takes a turn like she wants the car to flip. “She says back when she was young, people went missing at the carnival . ”

“Did she say ‘back in my day?’”

“No, but I could tell she wanted to. Anyway, she’s convinced that if I go to the carnival, I’m going to get taken away.”

“Are you?”

“Not a chance. I’ve got you with me.”

“Oh, sure . ”

“Yeah,” she says, serious . Then she shrugs . “So what’ll we do first?”

“Whatever we want.”

Less Ordinary

There’s no parking lot—just a field of crackling yellow grass and the distant sound of the highway that isn’t visible through the trees. The carnival’s always set up here, as long as anyone can remember . Years before anyone ever thought they’d pour a highway through this part of the state. The first townsfolk to come see the show probably rode in on horses .

There are no horses now. Just glittering rows of dusty cars, the roofs of em glittering like beetle shells under the enamel

blue sky . Enbarr joins the ranks, the bright yellow nearly hard to look at in the glare of the sun .

Louisa sighs dreamily the moment we’re out of the car . “Do you smell that?”

I tilt my head back and take a huge draw of humid air . I sigh and close my eyes, just imagining the foods I’m smelling. Kettle corn and hot dogs, funnel cake and fries—sugar and salt in the air like perfume .

From the field, I can hear the carnival: the music swinging merrily along at 3/4 time, the whoosh and rattle of the old rides, the ringing of bells that mean someone’s won a prize, and the laughter and shouts of the folk in attendance. I’d run to it, but Louisa has a routine to go through .

I lean my hip to the passenger door and wait. It’s no use to rush her through making sure the car’s as comfortable as possible. She locks it, then gives the handle a firm tug as if anyone’s ever gotten their car stolen in this town, then circles the whole thing so she knows when and where all the dents or scratches are from . Not that there are many; she buffs them out immediately and religiously .

When she’s satisfied, we head towards the sounds. We’re late to the show, so we’re half a dozen rows of cars back from the en trance . That might not seem like much, but it’s ninety degrees out, so I’ve worked u p a good sweat by the time we make it to the gates .

The whole thing is surrounded by movable segments of gray chain link fence, but everything’s draped in great red-and-white striped fabric. It should be gaudy, but it’s not. There are fluttering pennants and strings of perfectly round not-yet-lit lights .

A whole world of wonder lies beyond the conical turrets that rise up on either side of the entrance, letters spelling out CARNIVAL

hanging in the space between. A tall man in a pinstripe vest and tall stovepipe hat stands at the base of the left tower, his whitesleeved arms curled to his arms like a praying mantis. He’s got a pointed goatee and a smile like a cartoon devil .

“Welcome, ladies!” he booms . He unfurls his arms to grab a shiny black cane and gestures around grandly . “To go beyond these gates is to enter another world. You will see sights that will amaze and delight, terrify and enrapture. Once you enter, you will never be the same .”

Louisa laughs, already amazed and delighted .

The man takes off his hat and bows. “To enter, you only need to tell me your name . ”

Before I can even open my mouth, Louisa says, “I’m Lily, and that’s Anne.”

I glance at her, but her eyes are firmly on the greeter .

“Excellent,” he crows, grinning. His face is perfectly white except for his eyes and his lips and his gums .

Despite the heat, I shiver .

He points between the turrets with his cane, still grinning . “Be sure to enjoy yourselves!”

I take Louisa’s hand and we walk past him together .

The whole world blooms in front of me, a riot of color. Rides blur with motion and throngs of familiar people gathered around the games, cheering each other on or com miserating when someone lost. The ground is still the dying grass of the field, but it feels different, less ordinary.

Louisa clings to my hand in silence for a moment, mouth open as she observes the scene around us .

“Wow,” she whispers.

“Much different than the county fair,” I say.

She laughs, tossing her head back a little . “It doesn’t smell like cows here.”

“C’mon,” I say, dragging her in farther. “You promised me some shaved ice . ”

“I did not .”

But she lets me drag her to the stand any way. They have a million different flavors, all the way from simple cherry and blue raspberry to mango and elderberry. A wom an with bright red hair smiles warmly at us.

“What will it be?” she asks.

“Green apple,” Louisa says .

I stare at the list a moment longer. “I’ll try the elderberry .”

With a nod, the worker turns to scoop the glittering ice into red paper cups for us be fore generously pouring syrup . The green apple syrup is predictably pale green . The elderberry is a rich purple, the kind of color that will stay on my teeth and tongue for hours .

Louisa pays and thanks the woman and I grab two little black plastic spoons.

We decide to eat and walk, Louisa carefully accepting the spoon from me . The elder berry flavor is strange and wonderful, sweet and earthy . And cold . Most importantly cold .

“So,” I say as we stand to watch the Ferris wheel, “what was that about with our names?”

A little crease appears between her dark eyebrows when she turns to look at me. “I don’t know,” she says slowly. “Just a bit of superstition, I guess . ”

“Did your gramma tell you that?”

She nods . “Yeah . She said giving people your name gives em power over you. Or something like that. It’s not like we’re going to see the guy again . ”

“Alright,” I relent. There’s no use arguing with advice her grandmother gave her, least of all when it comes to superstition.

She puts the last spoonful of shaved ice into her mouth, her lips closing around the spoon like she’s trying to savor it. She turns her head to me, the crease in between her brows returning . “I should tell you that I promised to meet Andy at seven .”

I stifle a groan.

Golden boy Andy, who is perpetually lead ing the football team to victory, who can’t be bothered to turn in assignments or talk to anyone who isn’t in a letterman jacket or cheerleading skirt, is probably the last per son I’d like to hang out with at the carnival. But he’s Louisa’s boyfriend—at least until they argue again—so it’s not like I have much choice .

“Oh, don’t make that face,” she says, knocking her shoulder into mine. “We’ll have fun. I promise . ”

“Of course,” I say, dredging up my best smile .

She looks at me brightly and says, “Let’s ride some rides . ”

I finish my shaved ice. “We need tickets.”

“Right there,” she says, pointing to a ticket stand .

We throw our cups away and head for the stand . We split the cost of a book of tickets, and she tucks them into her pocket with a grin .

“Let’s hit the swings,” she says.

I want to argue that I’m no good with heights, but if we spend time debating what ride to go on, I’ll miss my time with her before Andy shows up.

A group of people from our school wait in line, and we chat with them while we watch the thing spin. It’s terrifying, especially with all the audible creaking. It’s a couple stories tall, shaped like a mushroom or an umbrella . The whole thing is surrounded by dull fences like a corral for animals .

A bored-looking attendant in an outrageous ly red shirt unclips the gate and motions for the next group to go on in. We put our tickets into a huge red tin bucket with a tiny slot on the top .

The body of the swings is painted with colorful natural scenes. A whole zoo of animals is on display in environments from sweltering jungles with big cats to quiet pastures with grazing sheep . Louisa hauls herself into the basket of one swing in front of a peacock, and I take the seat next to her.

“Fasten the lap bar and don’t swing yourself into your neighbors,” the attendant says from a small booth before he and another worker make their rounds to check the clips.

If I reached out, I could take Louisa’s hand. She grins at me, not noticing my fingers are pressed white to the chain that will hold me a million feet up in the air…

I press my eyes closed as the bell sounds the all clear to move .

The machine in the heart of the tower whirs to life, and I have to lift my legs to keep my boots from dragging. Slowly at first, we circle. Then, we jerk higher and spin faster. Next to me, Louisa is laughing .

I fight the urge to keep my eyes pressed as tight as they’ll go to look out at the world around me. We’re only fifteen feet off the ground, but it feels like miles . I can see the whole of the carnival and the rows of parked cars—and Louisa. I turn my head to look at her, ignoring the scenery. She’s smiling and laughing, her arms spread out like she’s fly ing under her own power, her hair coppery in the evening light .

Soon, they’ll turn the lights on, and this place will be a wonderland.

The swings slow and we begin our descent in choppy intervals . My feet hit the ground softly. Next to me, Louisa already has the clip on the lap bar undone .

She stands and undoes mine for me, raising the bar so I can wriggle out of the seat. If she notices I’m unsteady on my feet, she doesn’t say. I’m grateful.

“Don’t look now,” she whispers, “but that guy over there is checking you out . ”

Before I can argue that he’s probably looking at her, I turn to glance in the direction she indicated to see a tall, dark-haired stranger staring at me. He’s dressed in a dark gray

shirt and blue jeans with black cowboy boots peeking out under the hem . Even though most of the workers are in red shirts, he seems to be one of them, animatedly chatting with the attendant of the swings—or he was, until he caught me returning his gaze.

I stumble into Louisa in a failing effort to appear normal .

Louisa sighs noisily . “I told you not to look . ”

“Well, I didn’t think he was actually looking at me . ”

“Give yourself some credit,” she says, sling ing her arm across my shoulders. “You know what you need?”

“What do I need?”

“To see the freak show.”

“Oh, thanks .”

She rolls her eyes . “Come on .”

The freak show is in a huge tent all the way in the back of the carnival. It’s about two stories tall, with red and white stripes, some of the colors sun-bleached or dusty . Louisa giggles and heads for the dark mouth of the tent .

Huge hand-painted signs promise characters such as Lobster Boy, but also a mermaid and a wolfman and a lady with an extra set of arms .

At the entrance, a lady waits. She’s as tall and thin as the man who took our names, her face just as white. Her eyes are flat black, and she smiles slowly as we approach.

She doesn’t lay it on quite as thick: “Five dollars a person . ”

Louisa pays for both of us and takes my arm . My eyes take a moment to adjust to the dim light . Inside, the tent is divided into rooms,

all angled corridors to direct patrons .

I head to the left, taking Louisa with me.

Supposedly, around the corner will be the world’s oldest man. What he’s doing traveling the United States in a carnival, I have no idea .

The hall gives way to a small room. A man sits back on a recliner; there’s just enough space for spectators to walk past the chair. It’s a tattered recliner, the edges of it fraying. The small, wrinkled man leans back into the chair with ease of practice it seems. He has no hair, and he’s wearing fancy blue pajamas, the buttons done all the way up to his chin. Aside from the rise and fall of his chest as he breathes, he does not move .

“What do you think?” Louisa whispers. “He’s made of rubber, right?”

Before I can answer, he barks a laugh, and the recliner swallows a little more of him. His open eyes are surprisingly bright, nearly scary compared to the sallowness of his skin. He raises a skeletal hand and points at the room’s exit.

Louisa grabs my hand and pulls me after her .

The plaque in the hallway claims he’s nearly two hundred years old. Away from him, it’s hard to feel quite so creeped out . After all, he was probably just someone’s grandfather.

The next room of the tent is set up like a bedroom for the four-handed woman, with a bed and an antique patterned rug . The woman sits at an ornate vanity, brushing her hair and applying makeup with the aid of two extra hands. Her movements are smooth and steady, never faltering like I imagine some thing mechanical would.

She waves with all four hands and then sets about lining her lips with bright red lipstick.

Louisa and I stand in silence for a moment,

before the four-armed woman gestures for us to keep moving .

The corridor is short and dark, and the floor is just gray dust . My heart beats double time in my chest, though I don’t think I’m afraid.

There’s a flap of tent we have to pull aside to see Lobster Boy and the mermaid .

This room is brightly lit, a glass tank full of murky water against the back wall. The tank is about the size of a small car, the water lapping the edges like something is moving around in the darkness .

Lobster Boy sits at a table, sorting through trash. He’s a little older than a boy, with a receding hairline and bright red reading glasses, but he does indeed have pincers. It’s not that his fingers are fused; the skin at his wrists puckers into the smooth, hard shell of a lobster, dark blue speckled with black.

“Hello,” he greets .

“Hello,” I reply, feeling unsteady .

He picks up an empty Pepsi can gently with one claw and holds it up. “Ready?”

We nod .

In one quick movement, he not only crushes the can top to bottom but shears it in half too. He laughs and tosses the two halves of crushed can to the floor to join a pile of other destroyed things .

“Can you do it again?” Louisa asks .

He stares a moment before seeming to realize she’s being serious. “Of course. Here, pick something . ”

Louisa saunters forward to the table and its pile of objects; she picks a length of copper pipe. He accepts it from her with a flourish and then sets about bending it into a sharp cornered square . He returns it to Louisa

and then leans onto the table, head cradled against lobster claws.

“Real mermaid,” he says, jerking his head in the direction of the tank .

I walk up to the glass and peer into it. The last time I saw a mermaid at a carnival, it was just some lady in a bikini top with a rubber fishtail, merrily swimming around in a tank of perfectly clear water.

“Sometimes she’s a little nasty,” Lobster Boy reports, standing . He heads over to a cooler and produces a foul-smelling gray fish about the size of my forearm . Without preamble, he tosses it into the tank .

The fish barely hits the water before the creature appears to snatch it . The mermaid is child-sized, with dull dark green skin and flat black eyes the size of fists.

Its fingers are stubby and connected by translucent webbing, ending in claws that it uses to hold the fish. It bites the head off the fish with a mouth full of rows of jagged white teeth, and it chews, peering out at us without any discernible emotion .

I don’t need to see the tail to know that it’s not made of rubber . The hair on the back of my neck stands up, what sweat had accumulated in the heat of the day suddenly freezing on the back of my neck .

“Is that real?” I ask .

“What is real?” he asks, head cocked . Lobster Boy laughs. “Of course she’s real. Vicious too. I’d advise you to take a few steps back.”

Louisa and I scramble away from the tank and the mermaid’s intent stare.

I turn to look at him, trying not to think about the mermaid’s teeth or his claws. “Where’s she from?”

“Some river in Europe. I didn’t find her,”

he says, sounding bored . Then the grin returns . “There are more things to see through that door . ”

Louisa and I mumble our farewells, and then we’re back in the dim hallway, blinking the light out of our eyes .

Louisa says, her voice strange and taut, “Gramma always believed in things like this.”

I want to point out that her gramma also believed that leaving a bowl of cream on the porch every evening would bring her good luck instead of stray cats and flies, but I don’t.

“Come on,” she says, though she doesn’t sound quite as bold as she had when we first came inside. “We have to see the wolfman.”

The last room. We’ve gone around the edges of the tent; after this, we’ll be back at the entrance .

I hold the flap for Louisa and then go in myself .

This room is dark, the floor piled with rugs.

And, sitting with his back to us, a creature with the body of a man and the head of a wolf. His ears twitch and he turns. There’s no way.

The shaggy fur of his head disappears into the collar of his t-shirt, the rest of him com pletely normal as he wrestles with the Gameboy in his hands. He can’t be much older than us, but there’s no way to tell. He’s got the head of a wolf, his yellow eyes fixed on the game .

Neither Louisa nor I say anything . We don’t exactly run, but we’re at the exit in record time .

A moment later we’re out in the golden eve ning light, grass beneath our feet . We stand there vaguely panting, and part of me wants to laugh. If it weren’t for the dark of the tent,

would it have still seemed so real?

I’m afraid that it would.

Louisa finally shakes herself, but she doesn’t meet my eye. “Let’s go find Andy.”

For once, I don’t have any objection to that.

Don’t Be Stupid

We find Andy at the base of the Ferris wheel, his arms crossed over the front of his DIY sleeveless shirt .

“Louisa!” he crows. Once they’re united, he sweeps her into the kind of kiss I look away from.

“Glad you’re here,” she says, grinning from ear to ear .

“Yeah. This place is awesome.” He gestures around in a grand sweep, his eyes landing on me . To me, he says, “Hey . ”

I raise my hand in a half-hearted wave. “Hey, Andy . ”

He nods, then his attention is back on Louisa . He takes her hands . “Want to ride the Ferris wheel?”

“Sure,” Louisa agrees. “I’d love to.”

I have to tilt my head all the way back to see to the top—an orange car is swinging pre cariously at the summit—and my stomach squeezes. “I’ll sit this one out.”

Andy smirks like I’m doing this to give them alone time, but Louisa turns to me looking disappointed . “You alright?”

“Yeah, I’m fine.” Never mind the things we just saw.

She brightens. “Good. We’ll see you after . Promise .”

Then I watch them disappear into the line. I stand there for a moment, watching the sun sink towards setting.

I scan my surroundings. There are a few game stands; one game is the kind where you shoot water into a clown’s open mouth, another is a game of darts and balloons, and the final one has a wall of colorful plates and a pyramid of baseballs .

Grinning, I head for that one .

There’s a little crowd gathered, watching some guy who I think graduated back in June. The man behind the counter has a red shirt and deeply tan skin and turns his head as I approach. For a second, I could’ve sworn that his eyes had no pupils, but then he’s looking right at me, and I brush aside the notion .

“Three baseballs for a dollar,” he says .

I glance up at the prizes: neat lines of stuffed animals . There are zebras and lions and parrots and piglets and a few things that look like knock-off Pokemon. I slide a crumpled dollar bill from my wallet and straighten it against the counter before handing it over .

I pick up a baseball and test the weight in my hand. A few summers of softball tell me that as long as the plates aren’t glued down, I can probably score one of the stuffed dogs.

The ball hits the shelf, though not harmless ly. The bright green plate I’d been aiming for wobbles. One solid hit to the middle and it will go down.

The second ball I throw hits the plate smack in the center . It breaks apart loudly and the plaster falls to the ground with a muffled thud. There’s a smattering of applause.

“Good job,” the worker says, nodding. “Take your pick . ”

I point to the stuffed dog. Its fur is sage green and fluffy. He unhooks it from its

place and hands it to me. It’s got a clip on it, so I put it on one of the belt loops on my shorts where it smacks my leg as I walk like a holstered weapon.

I turn around and nearly collide with the boy who’d been staring at me before. He reaches out to steady me, his hand on my elbow to keep me from toppling into him . It probably isn’t fair to call him a boy; he’s at least a year or two older than me, his face lean and his shoulders wide.

“My apologies,” he says once I’ve recovered.

“Were you following me?”

He shakes his head . Without a discernible accent, he says, “No. I saw you before, but I’ve been here with the games the whole time. Apologies if I frightened you…”

Before I can think better of it, I finish: “Anne.”

“I’m Owen. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

He shakes my hand lightly and it’s too late to take back the name Louisa made up for me . I decide to change the subject. “You’re not from around here .”

He smiles at this. “What gave it away?”

“The way you dress for one thing. And how you’re talking so fast.”

“I’ll have to remember that for next time I’m in town,” he says with a sly grin. He shifts his weight from one leg to the other and studies my face . “Let me buy you a funnel cake . ”

“Alright. I just have to tell my friend I’m going off on my own.”

He nods and follows me to the base of the Ferris wheel to wait for Louisa. She and Andy exit the ride a moment later, laughing and holding hands. The smile falters when she sees me standing next to Owen.

“Hey,” I say, waving them over. “I’ll rejoin you guys later, alright?”

Andy just gives me a thumbs up, but Louisa narrows her eyes.

“We’ll meet you back here in an hour,” she says .

“Sure,” I say .

She gives me a pointed look and I resist the urge to roll my eyes. Then I’m following Owen away from them and the Ferris wheel.

He doesn’t take me to the funnel cake stand I noticed on the way in. Instead, we head for a stand that also sells fries .

My freshman year history teacher is in line, and she strikes up a conversation about what classes I’ll be taking next year. I tell her the bits of my schedule I remember and try to introduce Owen to her without tripping over my words.

He orders for us, and a few seconds later, he’s being handed the largest funnel cake I’ve ever seen. The edges of it hang over the edge of the red paper plate, the powdered

sugar leaving smears on his fingers. I grab a handful of brown napkins.

We find a bench and sit down. He crosses his long legs in front of him neatly .

“You first,” he offers, holding the funnel cake out for me .

I take hold and pull the thick lace of it apart with my fingers. It’s hot enough that I have to blow on it before I put it in my mouth. The powdered sugar melts sweetly on my tongue. It’s fluffy and perfectly cooked, crispy on the outside and soft on the inside .

“Wow,” I manage.

He grins . “Right?”

I watch as he takes some for himself, watch the way his lips move as he chews. He’s got high cheekbones and long black eyelashes, the kind that girls wish for. His hair is swept back from his face, wispy strands escaping whatever product he’s got in it at his temples .

“So,” I say when the funnel cake is half gone, “where are you from?”

“Everywhere,” he says grandly. When I raise my eyebrows, he laughs. “My folks have been in the carnival circuit forever. I grew up on the road .”

My eyes go wide. “That sounds nice. Really. I’ve been here my whole life.”

“I can’t imagine that,” he says, “but I can show you the best side of the carnival . ”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah .” He smiles, and I forget that after this weekend, he won’t be in town again for another seven years—if he comes back at all. By that time, I’ll be twenty-four; hopefully, I’ll be far from here, graduated from college or something .

But for tonight, I can pretend that I don’t have another year of high school and I’ll have a date for the prom, and Andy might either turn into a decent guy or break up with Louisa for good.

“Come on,” he says, folding the oil-splotched paper plate in on itself and standing. “Let’s see a show.”

I lick the remaining powdered sugar from my lips and let him help me to my feet. “Let’s.”

Three Kinds

The crowd gives a final raucous cheer for the acrobats, and the girl suspended in the air by nothing but red silk does what she can to bow before letting herself drop to the floor. She catches herself at the last second by some mechanic I can’t begin to fathom.

Owen takes my hand and guides me through the crush of bodies pressing towards the tent’s exit with sure feet. Outside, the sun is in the final stage of setting and the lights come on .

The heat of the day dissipates into twilight, the hot white sun replaced by thousands of twinkling lights. I watch it all with wonder and he stands there watching me.

I’m not the only one in awe; gasps rise throughout the crowd. No matter how bold and colorful things are in the daytime, there’s something charming and mysterious about everything as dusk settles . The calliope seems louder, the sweetness of cotton candy and kettle corn richer in the air .

“After I came here when I was a kid, Louisa and I used to spend hours and hours pretending we were going to run away to join you,” I say, still marveling at the lights as we walk.

He meets my eyes with an amused smirk. “What would you do?”

“We hadn’t thought that far ahead,” I admit. “We just wanted to ride the rides and play the games and eat the food. I’m not sure it would have worked out.”

He laughs, ducking to avoid a man on stilts as he barrels past .

“If you joined today, I’m sure we could find a job for you . You could help set up camp . You could help man a game stand . You could be one of the acrobats. Or you could always tend the carousel horses .”

If Louisa were here, she’d probably crack a joke about how we’d be freaks in the freak show, but I shiver just thinking about that tent. I blink at Owen. “Is that what you do?”

He grins, all teeth. “You’d be surprised how much tending they need . I can introduce you if you’d like.”

“Sure,” I say, intent to play along .

Together, we walk toward the carousel. His feet are sure, and I have the music to follow.

“Does it ever get lonely traveling all the time?” I ask .

He shakes his head . “Not at all . The folk here are my family . ”

“That sounds nice . ”

“It’s the best,” he says, without a hint of irony. He shrugs . “Does it get boring to live in one town all your life?”

“Absolutely. But it’s alright with Louisa. I think I’d go crazy if not for her.”

“It’s good to have friends like that.”

Before I can ask him about his friends— or his parents for that matter—we’re at the carousel .

I would have thought the merry-go-round

was for kids, but standing in front of it, it’s impossible to think of it as anything but beautiful. It’s not like the other rides, which could be from any fair .

It has its own gravity, like a permanent installation, though I’ve seen this field with out it and will see it bare again. The platform is dark wood, scuffed from years of use. The roof has gilded finials, brightly painted flow ers hugging every intricate curve of the wood.

The horses are huge and lovely, their red tongues curling and the whites of their eyes flashing. There’s terror in their eyes, despite all the splendor and loveliness surrounding them. It’s hard to count them as it spins, but there are three horses in each row, all of them different except for the bells on their bridles .

I follow Owen to the line, and he stands with his hands in his pockets, staring at the horses .

“American carousels spin counter-clockwise,” he says . “In England, you mount the horse from the left just as you would a living one.”

“Real horses freak me out,” I admit . “I heard about some lady getting trampled when I was a kid and I haven’t been able to ride one since .”

He looks at me quizzically for a moment, and I realize it’s because I said real while he said living. It only flickers across his face for an in

stant, and then he smiles. “You aren’t in any danger. I can hold your hand if you want.”

I blush before I even process what he’s said. “I think I’ll be alright.”

When we’re let onto the ride, he heads for a specific horse and waits by it until I catch up. It’s gorgeous, its body solid white. The saddle is black and tooled to look like real leather; the saddle blanket beneath it is bright jewel green . It has a gentle face, despite the fact that it’s got a pole through its back.

“This one is for you,” he says, taking my hand just long enough to help me up . Then he mounts the horse to my left, a chestnut horse with gray tack . Its face is just a little more fierce than its neighbors, with narrowed eyes and its teeth on

display. All of its feet are suspended off the floor in a gallop.

“There are three kinds of carousel horses,” he says as the attendant warns us not to dismount while moving. “Jumpers like mine, standing figures like yours, and prancers, with two feet on the ground and two off. We don’t have any of those on this carousel.”

“Thanks for giving me a standing one .”

He laughs musically . “You deserve a horse on the outside row. The side that faces the crowd is the romance side, after all.”

I flush. Nothing witty pops into my head, so I just smile to myself and hold onto the brass pole as the carousel begins to spin .

It’s not as smooth as the carousel at the county fair, but the music is better. It’s got an organ at the heart, pumping out bright music with booming percussion. The bells on the horses chime as we move, adding to the music .

I press my fingers into the grooves of the carved mane, tracing the whorls as it billows solidly. Between the heat of the day and the constant presence of riders, the horse is warm as any living thing beneath the bare skin of my calves . I hug my knees to its sides, wondering for the first time about what it would be like to ride a real horse. Seeing the chipped gold horseshoes on the one raised hoof of the wooden beast beneath me, I for get I’m afraid.

I hazard a glance at Owen. He’s watching me, grinning .

“Is the carousel your favorite?” I ask .

He nods. “It’s the oldest ride we have.”

“And you still let people ride it?” I ask, run ning my fingers along the intricate painting over the pommel of the saddle .

He looks at me quizzically. “That’s what it’s for.”

“Yeah, but if it’s old…”

“That’s not what we believe. It’s a thing to be enjoyed until it falls apart,” he says slowly. Then he shrugs. “You know, after the crowd leaves, we usually have a little party for the folk who work the carnival. I’m sure you could join us .”

“I’ll think about it.”

He smiles, sweet as an angel.

When the ride stops, Owen reverently presses his hand to the neck of his horse before dismounting. We’re swept into the crowd before I can comment.

“We should check in with my friends,” I say as we wander away from the carousel.

“Of course,” he agrees, steering us through the crowd to the Ferris wheel.

Sure enough, under the newly glowing Ferris wheel, Louisa and Andy are waiting for me.

“You’re ten minutes late!” Louisa says.

“I’m sorry,” I reply, jogging the rest of the way over to her. “We saw a show and lost track of time .”

She frowns. “Well. How late do you plan on staying?”

“Uh .”

Owen clears his throat. “I can give you a ride home if you’d like.”

“I have a car,” Louisa snaps . To me, she says, “I just have to know a time.”

“Right,” I agree. “I’m not sure. I’m having a really good time and—”

“The carnival closes at nine,” she reminds me .

“Can I talk to you alone?” I ask .

She presses her lips together and nods, and we leave Andy and Owen to their own devices.

“What is your problem?” I demand as soon as we’re far enough from anyone to be overheard .

She shakes her head. “My problem? I didn’t know if he kidnapped you or something! I didn’t tell you an hour to be cute, you know!”

“Kidnapped! He works with the carnival.”

She rolls her eyes. “I know he’s attractive, but you have to think about this

“Oh my god,” I marvel. “You’re jealous. You have every boy in town on your heels, and I finally get someone to look at me for more than five minutes and you’re jealous.”

“Don’t be nasty,” she says sharply. Then she sighs, raking her hair back from her face. “I’m not jealous. I’m worried . ”

“I’m fine, Louisa. Anyway, I was going to stay for the after party. I’ll just ask him to give me a ride .”

“Is this about Andy being here? You could have just told me you didn’t want to hang out with him.”

“You already planned to meet him . Jesus, Louisa, I’m not going to ask you to give up your boyfriend for me . ”

She frowns. “You don’t have to rely on a stranger for fun . Or to take you home . Come on, D . Please . ”

“I’ll call you later,” I say. “When I get home.”

I turn and walk away, grabbing Owen’s arm as I storm away.

“You alright?” he asks .

“Fine,” I say . “Tell me about the party…?”

All The Pretty Girls Can’t Measure to You

“Are you sure this is alright?” I ask .

Owen meets my eyes and shrugs. “It’s fine.”

We’re watching the crowd filter out. Slowly, the noise of the carnival dies down. Bells cease ringing, people stop shouting, and the rattle and whoosh of the rides cuts out when the last riders exit.

I can’t help but think I should be part of that exiting crowd, no matter what he says . I probably should have gone home with Louisa.

“Anne,” he says levelly, “we’re going to have fun . ”

It takes me a long moment to react; I’d nearly forgotten the name I told him. It’s too late to take it back now, though. God, he’d think I’m a loser, especially if I told him it’s because my best friend’s grandmother is superstitious.

“I sure hope so,” I agree .

He laughs . “Come on . ”

We start heading towards the center of the carnival, where the lights overhead remind me of a huge glittering spider web.

This is where everyone’s gathered. There are the red-shirted ride and the game stand operators, the acrobats in their bright skin-tight costumes, and dozens of others, all of them dressed strangely .

For a moment, I swear I see something dart ing between the stalls, but it’s gone by the time I focus on it .

Everything is bright and lovely: the rainbow assortment of stalls, the red and white pen nants everywhere, the fantastical costumes of some of the performers .

I feel grossly underdressed, but Owen takes my hand and leads me farther in .

The calliope starts up, accompanied by a fiddle played by a man in a patchwork jester costume, the bells on his hat jingling as he saws at the strings.

Around us, the carnival folk pair off and begin dancing, all of them laughing and smiling .

“May I have this dance?” Owen asks, bowing deeply to me .

“I don’t know how.”

He barks a laugh. “I’ll show you.”

“Alright,” I agree hesitantly .

He guides my hand to his shoulder and puts his hand on my waist, strange and formal. Then he pulls me into the dance .

He’s got his hands on my waist and we move one-two-three one-two-three to the music. I’ve never danced like this. Usually, when I dance, it’s without anyone’s hands on me, and I’m just moving to trample grass in a field. This is all deliberate. This is a very Louisa thing to do .

I wonder what she’d think of this—of me dancing with a beautiful boy.

I shake my head to clear it and focus on Owen.

“You’re a fine dancer,” he says, leading me around the clearing without seeming to think about his movements .

I flush. I don’t trust myself to reply. It’s all I can do not to stumble or step on his toes .

He smiles at me as if he knows this.

I glance up at the lights and the night sky above us . The sky is dark blue, not black, and the moon is perfectly round and full, a halo of light around it .

I haven’t been so happy in ages.

After a few revolutions around the central clearing of the carnival, Owen breaks off from the group and moves for a table of food .

There’s a little of everything. There are carnival foods like cotton candy and funnel cake and bowls of shaved ice and roasted nuts, but there are also things that weren’t for sale: farmer’s market fresh fruit and strange fruit I have no name for, platters of huge drumsticks and something dark and sliced . There’s fresh bread and pastries, the smell

of the bread wafting to join the rest of the carnival food .

“Wow,” I say, looking at all the food. Usually, when there’s this much food, it’s all barbe cue .

“Come on and get a plate .”

I pick up one of the unidentified fruits. It’s the size of an apple, though it’s warm to the touch, the skin of it thick and gold. It’s soft like an overripe peach .

I lift it to my mouth and sink my teeth in . The sweet juice fills my mouth immediately. In side, it’s pulpy like citrus, like beads bursting beneath my teeth .

Owen watches me cooly as I lick the juice from my fingers.

“Green used to be an unlucky color,” he says, indicating my shirt, “but it looks beautiful on you . ”

I laugh. “I’m the luckiest girl in the world.”

Is this how Louisa feels whenever boys talk to her? Whenever they want her?

No wonder she wants Andy to hang around all the time. No wonder she’s so sad when he’s being a jerk.

“Might I have another dance?”

I take his hand as soon as he offers and let him spin me out onto the makeshift dance floor.

All the carnival folk are so beautiful . Their skin shines under the amber lights, their clothes light and flowing and perfect for dancing .

This little place has everything I could ever want: music and laughter and good food.

And Owen, with his pink lips and sure feet.

The heat of his hands burns through my un lucky green shirt, and I wish there could be more of this . The thought of him in my high school is so preposterous that I nearly laugh . No, I’d have to join him in his world; he’s sup posed to be looked at under the open sky .

We dance. There’s nothing more to the world. I learn the movements as best I can and lean into his guidance whenever I’m unsure. We spin round and round, the whole colorful world reduced to the pair of us and whatever bit of dry grass we crush next.

After a while, we pull off to an alley between stalls, both of us smiling, me clutching my sides as I catch my breath . My feet are sore in my hiking boots, but not in a way that makes me want to stop.

What I really want is to kiss him. To kiss somebody. To have somebody want nothing more than to kiss me back .

“Anne,” he says, soft and serious, “I wish you could join us . ”

“Why can’t I?”

“What would you do?”

I laugh. “Tend the carousel horses with you, of course .”

His eyes search my face . He looks pleasantly surprised. “That’s a good choice.”

“Let’s get back to dancing,” I declare. If I’m alone with him any longer I’m going to have to kiss him, and I can’t bear the thought of him being disappointed that someone like me could ever be interested in someone like him .

He takes my hand and we’re back to dancing. Happiness has me light on my feet, nearly as graceful and poised as Owen.

This time when we dance, we switch part ners. I dance with the acrobat after Owen,

her tall, willowy body bending to accom modate mine, her impossibly long fingers wrapping nearly all the way around my waist. Then I dance with Lobster Boy, his claws like the shells of crawdads plucked from a creek.

Everyone here is so strange and beautiful . There are people with green or blue or ice white skin, the shapes of them like young swaying trees. There are people as tall as the acrobat, and as short as my knees, all of them dancing together . The oldest man in the world dances an up-tempo jig with the four-handed woman, letting her spin him around .

Some of them have horns and animal heads, square teeth like horses and fangs like wild cats . Some of them have hooves instead of feet or wings curled up to their backs.

I don’t have claws or horns or fangs or fur, but for the first time in my life, I don’t feel so different.

Then—

Then I’m dancing with Lucy. Lily. Something like that. Someone familiar. Someone I’ve thought about kissing before .

Her hands are small and cool on my waist, her wide eyes as brilliant as any of the folk around me. My eyes are drawn to the cross that gleams at the base of her throat .

“I’m so glad you’re here!” I say, spinning her around with me. I’m a fine dancer—Owen said so .

“I’m sorry I left you,” she says.

“Don’t be! You’re here now. We’re going to have so much fun!”

She grabs my shoulders and pushes me like she’s trying to stop the dance—not that it matters .

“Listen to me,” she says, so fast that her

accent blurs the words together, “we have to get out of here . ”

“Don’t say that, Lily.”

She frowns, her brows pinching together.

“You have to stop dancing,” she says, but the words are meaningless. She might as well be demanding I cut out my heart and serve it to her on a platter .

She presses her eyes closed, following my lead entirely .

Then she says, “Delilah, please . ”

My name. The first time I hear it all night. The world snaps into focus around me.

Christ, I’m such a bad dancer. I stumble and step on her toes, but she catches me against her in a crushing hug. I swear she’s going to snap my ribs, but I don’t mind. I bury my face in her shoulder and breathe in the gasoline and jasmine scent of her .

“Thank God,” she murmurs . Before I can say anything else, she stands up on her tiptoes and presses a quick kiss to my mouth, her lips warm and sweet.

When she steps away, I nearly scream. Her hands are on my hips and we’re surrounded by monsters .

“Louisa,” I whisper, unsteady both from the kiss and from the scene around us. “What’s going on?”

“We have to get to the car .”

I don’t argue. My heart jackhammers in my chest, and I’m reeling.

The things around us aren’t human. They’re tall or short but all of them are ugly, twining together and kicking up the dust beneath their feet .

Some of them are staring . Partners break apart . The music falters .

Owen steps forward, moving between the four-armed woman and Lobster Boy. His eyes are dark, but he’s still completely hu man. I’m half tempted to tell him to run, the monsters are surrounding him, but then he grins, proud and peaceful .

My heart crawls up into my throat.

Louisa slips her hand into mine and then we run. I’m hopelessly lost, but she drags me behind her .

A horn sounds and I think: This is a hunt. The monsters roar and bleat and scream, and I can hear the field getting torn up as they give chase . The music begins again, only this time it’s all percussion, all footfalls and heavy breaths .

There’s an impossible noise: hooves. I turn to see half a dozen horses, their coats brown and black, their tack vivid and lovely . The bells on their bridles jingle . I nearly don’t recognize them without the poles anchoring them to the merry-go-round until Owen throws himself into the saddle of the gray-clad horse he’d ridden earlier.

I almost slam into one of the stalls, but Louisa yanks on my arm so I don’t crash.

She steers us to the two towers that mark the entry—the only exit.

Something whizzes past my head, but I just run harder, ignoring the blisters my boots rub into my heels .

Enbarr is waiting for us, doors flung open and headlights on. I’ve never been so grate ful to see that damn car .

“Get in!”

Louisa orders, flinging herself into the driver’s seat.

I hop in shotgun and nearly get thrown into the dash as she guns it out of the field. I’ve never been so grateful for her insane driving .

“Gramma wasn’t kidding,” I manage.

“You’re telling me,” Louisa says, but she’s laughing . White knuckles on the steering wheel as she drives away from the monsters from her grandmother’s stories, and Johnny Cash singing about the Alamo— and she’s laughing. Ugly laughing too, the kind where she’s snorting. The kind she only does around me, no hint of music or wind chimes.

The only light comes from the huge round moon and Enbarr’s yellow headlights. I turn around in my seat to see Owen and a group of riders, illuminated in red by the taillights . Louisa speeds out of the field onto the road, the car growling beneath us.

Come on Enbarr, I pray silently .

Louisa swerves hard to miss a lanky creature that was trying to get on the hood and she says, “I broke up with Andy.”

“What?”

“Louisa—”

“You’ve never smiled at anyone but me like that,” she says. Her fingers are white on the wheel, and for a moment I forget to care about the monsters that are right on our tail. “I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t even care about Gramma’s stories. I just thought he was some stupid guy about to take you away from me. And when I told Andy I thought you were in real danger, he didn’t even care. So I told him we were over, y’know? Then I found my way back into the carnival to see you surrounded by Them and… God, Delilah. I’ve never been so scared .”

“You saved my life . ”

“Yeah,” she says, “well. It’s always been me and you, hasn’t it? I’m just sorry it took nearly losing you for me to see it . ”

I’m about to reply when a thing that looks like a dog catches up to the car and throws itself in front of the car . It probably means for Louisa to swerve into the ditch, but she just grits her teeth and hits it .

The car jerks up and down as we run it over.

I stare at her, at her wild strawberry hair whipping around her shoulders from the wind, the determined set of her mouth. I look down at my dirty boots, so at home on the floor of her passenger side.

She grins at me. “Now all we have to do is outrun em .”

“You were right. About me being jealous.”