INKredible Issue 18 | Summer/Fall 2017

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Issue 18

Palm Reading 8 12

The Demise of Margaret Wilson,

Old Eyes

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The InterDimensional Cycle

The Girl with The One Black Eye

Rainy Afternoon

Reflection

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1/4

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“Age” is the acceptance of a term of years.

But maturity is the glory of years.

- Martha Graham

Alzheimer’s Disease and Diabetes 30

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The Midnight Lady 35

Robot

Gallery

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5

There is the building.

Beside it stands a column that cures restlessness.

They say you must lick the column until your tongue bleeds.

And beside the molding stands a man, unshod, grazing the grass as a sheep would, clothed in white where he is clothed. And beyond all of this you are gazing as if at a crumbly globe, a black ocean.

It curls and spits.

The few buildings fold themselves close to earth like thimbles. The streets clogged with whores undressed, telling fortunes: “You will never lose your curiosity for the varieties of grief.” How they bless strangers with their cunning hands! It is not like home, where water reflects whatever watches; instead, you see heads folding sheets, as if they conjured sadness with their very touch.

Now the cracked cup of daylight spills its heart out, the dust kissing the thinnest of skins of their arms, and names.

Old Eyes Poem by Alex Xu ’19 Photo by Pete Assakul ’18

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6 Faint blue veins on awakening eyelids Show signs of pale but undeniable life Taking the left hand these signs become more palpable Raised colored lines follow the slopes of each proceeding knuckle It moves, nay, twitches!

The hand which once laid with the palm facing the fabric of the white sheets Now displays the exterior ridged lines of the skin which some believe can tell a life’s story “This life was kind,” said one “This life was good,” said another “This life had love,” showed a third But the life line was shorter and much fainter than all the others

Poem by Kyra Matus ’18 Photo by Pete Assakul ’18

Palm Reading

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The Inter-Dimensional Cycle “

You’re the best,” I said. I knew he knew that universal truth it was universal. With the fattest cheeks, he stared at me from far away; around the distance of a hamburger. My distance from him though was not a hamburger but a plate of ravioli. I thought, why ravioli and not a delicious lasagna?

Then came to me a voice, from a football field away, “You need to be precise in the distance you keep! It’s not an easy world out the-” Cut the crap, I said. Football field distances indicated untrustworthiness. You don’t get to talk, I said. You’re not the best here.

I looked back at the champion of the observable universe; he had gotten first place in the field of being in the inter-galactic Olympics. I told you I was right. Though I blame myself for thinking he would not get first place in the inter-dimensional Olympics.

“Come on, he is the best” and “His fat cheeks might help him in the dimension part” are certain but I still don’t see him holding that huge silver prize in the tenth dimension, bursting out a shy smile with a prideful finish, embracing, with his two big arms, that huge, Ununoctically, calm space. It’s not going to happen.

These times when I say arrogant things like “No, it’s not going to happen” make me feel the best and the worst. You know when you judge the best, you become the best and he be-

comes the second best. But how can you let those hamburger cheeks be second best? I like being the best though, since I’m not the best. That’s obviously universal. Sometimes, I start thinking how ravioli can be much better than hamburgers. These are bad, secret thoughts; so I am not letting them out of my throat. He keeps some things inside, too. That’s the best for both of us; his protection. But to keep my bad thoughts satisfacted, I’m planning to come to his room and finally relieve myself by speaking, of course, in a very calm and reserved manner, “Please take extra caution while keeping those hamburgers in your cheek.” He will think it’s so serious because he thinks he eats those hamburgers. He doesn’t, though: they’re the ones eating him. And I’m laughing because I told a funny half-lie.

This way, he’ll still think I’m inferior, so I’ll officially be inferior. But in my mind, ravioli will be much better. I’ll become unofficially the best, and I’ll laugh and snicker and laugh. But I’ll sometimes laugh for hours and days and very many months until there’s not a single drop of superiority remaining and he’ll make me feel ashamed of having acted snobbishly and I’ll apologize to him again.

I feel like he puts me in a balloon that’s traveling to his level up in the sky, but how can he keep this balloon so high up in the sky? He says I

Story by Cicek Yavuz ’18 Photo by Hugo Godwin ’20

don’t do nothing, your balloon just flies high up in the sky. I ask, “How do you make it all so slippery. I trip and trip and can’t stand straight” and he says that’s not my fault, and then I feel the best and the worst again because I think “Nope, it is your fault” and I can feel the extra spicy taste of the ravioli in my cheeks. I keep on going, “It’s universal. It’s your fault.” If you’re going to be the best, you have to be the best at everything, I say.

But then he goes all magical, making the black part of his eyes go all around his eyes in the calmest, most arrogant manner. His black void eyes are madly close to the tenth dimension. I want to say he doesn’t stand a chance, but ravioli are getting mushy in my mouth. Now it’s so miserable inside. He can make them all so mushy and sticky and bad and awkward, but how can he still keep his calm. If you’re this calm, I yell, how can you keep this hot warm balloon so high up in the sky.

Every single time it catches me by surprise and anticipation. “You’re the best,” he says, as the burgers in his mouth slowly roll down to my mouth. Do you want the ravioli, then? “No,” he says. Now he has replaced his mouth with a black empty void that no being can mess with. I suspect it’s the tenth dimension, but he’s not saying anything about that. I bring a simply intelligent argument: who’s the best if he’s the best in honesty? You can’t have two bests, I say. I stand there hungrily, waiting for him to project his best of kindness, best of sincerity, his best of affection. He, embracing the whole calmness of the void inside him, says, maybe not. I can do nothing but smell the stale ravioli-burgers and his instant victory.

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“Feel the flow of the kana.”

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s I slowly break free from the comfort of sleep, the polymerization of hot, musty air and the blinding rays of the sun reminded me daily that I was right in the middle of the summer season. I groggily rise from the tatami and carefully peel back the century old wooden slide to gather in the acres of rice fields.

Only the second day of my short visit to my grandparents’ house, I still have to remind myself am 517 kilometers from Tokyo. Gone are the neon lights of Shibuya, the elegant streets of Roponggi, and the swarm of tourists in Ginza. Instead, I am entertained by the peace and tranquility that existed right in the middle of a small village in Fukui, with only the cicadas in the distance keeping me company with their endless screeches.

After I wash up, my grandfather motions to me to follow him into the smaller, wooden cottage near two Japanese maples outside the main house. As I enter, I find myself in the familiar calligraphy classroom I once enter daily twelve years ago. nothing had changed: the neatly piled stacks of white mulberry paper smeared with ink, tens of brushes hang orderly on the faded walls, and the light crackling of the wooden floor whenever I take a step.

As I lower myself on the same seat I sat so long ago, my grandfather hands me the tools I need. On the desk, I place a piece of washi on top of a shitajiki, and then a metallic bunchin to hold the paper in place. I apply six drops of water onto the inkstone and began the mundane process of grinding an inkstick on the surface to produce the ink that breathes life into the washi; sumi. I pick up the bamboo handle of one of the countless fude, gently dip the

Essay by Noa Kimura ’18 Art by Willa Neubauer ’18

tip into the dark, and begin tainting the white.

The piece I am writing is one of one hundred Japanese waka, a classical anthropology compiled by Fujiwara no Teika during the Heian Period. Contrary to the pieces I had written before using kanji, the waka was mainly written in kana, demanding a completely different artistic style of shodo and mastering of the kofude, a smaller brush than the standard fude I am used to. I feel eager to try something out of the ordinary, and my ignorance in the art of kana was painfully exposed as I fail miserably in my first attempt.

Not only did I force too much strength onto the small brush, causing the fragile tip to smudge terribly, but also have no idea how to replicate the miniscule, intricate brushes that Fujiwara so masterfully drew. Appalled at my abysmal squiggles of lines that by no means resembled the beautiful, elegant, rhythmic strokes of Fujiwara, I let out a silent scream that if voiced, would have make a banshee proud.

I sigh as I dab my kofude onto the sumi for the 26th time. Things are looking rather bleak. My 25th attempt is almost no better than the first, and my energy is waning. This is more challenging than I expected. I glance sideways towards my grandfather, whose mouth tightens when overlooking the wakas I half-heartedly finished.

This is embarrassing really. I am a disappointment to my grandfather, who every month submitted his works of calligraphy to the prestigious Japan Fine Arts Exhibition. I gently massage my temple, gathering my thoughts, breathing in deeply, and desperately trying to retain my sanity.

“Feel the flow of the kana”, my grandfather advises, adjusting his glasses while peering over my shoulder. I nod, wipe the sweat off my neck, and resume the minor but drastic movements with the fude. I finish one character and pause, scrutinizing the faded ink of the original waka. After careful observation, I finally understand what my grandfather spoke of. I realize that the whole waka was flowing in a coherent manner, beginning definitively and ending gracefully. I was making a mistake, pausing after writing each character. It was a novice mistake, and thus a grave one. Painstakingly, I resist the urge to observe the original waka and attempt to let my hand flow by itself.

After hours, I finally finish a waka. Although far from perfect, my waka embodies the refined, balletic motion of the ancient language.

I place my work on the shelf to let it dry. My grandfather looks over it. A nod. I smile. I pick up the kofude, wet the tip with sumi and repeat the process. I don’t want to let the flow end.

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The Demise of Margaret Wilson, The Girl With The One Black Eye Story by Sage Molasky ’18 Art by Tina Guo ’19

“I was right to be afraid, to be ashamed.”

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hen we were kids, Margaret was always up to something. A brother three years her senior, I should have been in charge, I should have been the one who felt invincible, but there I was, always lagging behind her fierceness, trying to keep in step with her sturdy gait. She was exponentially taller than I was, smarter than I was and, to my chagrin, stupendously courageous. You could say I was frightened by her, and you’d be right, but every other kid in town was too. She wasn’t mean, but she also wasn’t scared. Oh God, she

wasn’t scared of anything at all. Weird, she was. Crimson hair and orange freckles and one caramel eye with blue flecks whose best friend was a pitch black eye across her speckled nose. She was born like that, blind in one eye, an eye so dark that her iris swam indistinguishable in blackness. All warm colors and bony angles, she stretched towards the sun as if her life depended on its warmth; I always imagined it was the sun’s rays that burned away her baby fat and kept her looking so old and beautiful. And yes, although she spoke to fairies and whispered magic spells alone on the asphalt playground, no one teased; no one dared. She was venerated, idolized, resting on an untouchable pedestal, and everyone followed her, our God, our savior, Margaret Wilson, the girl with the one black eye.

One day, when Margaret was nine and I was twelve, late in our spring semester, when the weather was too hot and wet to bear the thought of school on Monday, Margaret decided to have an adventure. My nose was in a book, as it always was, when she grabbed me by the wrist and out our front door. The tire swing drooped under the damp sycamore tree, stretching its great arms over our porch. She gained speed as we wound through the culde-sac, Maggie’s great, scratchy voice booming through the neighborhood. More and more kids came running out of their houses, making their way towards the growing throng of children, sprinting their short, stubby legs to keep up with her grown up sized bravado. Still clutching my forearm, Margaret dragged me onwards, past the shining gates of our little suburbia, through the small forest that seemed to be erected in her mighty honor, up Kneebone Hill, until finally, Margaret stopped and stood upon a dilapidated bench, wood slivers sticking out, menacing, taunting us to a splintery embrace. Her disciples fell silent as she raised her bony hand towards the sky. Yellow glittered off her painted fingernails, and at that moment, I felt her godliness expand within me as well.

“Hear ye! Hear ye! We have gathered here today so that I, Margaret Wilson, may name my second in command.”

God, she was so cocky. But you had to love her.

“I have hidden a red ribbon somewhere in town.

The first worthy soldier to find it, wins!

Begin at once!”

Her voice fell down over our puny lives. Suddenly, a cacophony of little voices rang out, and children struggled past each other, running every which way to reach the bottom of the hill and search the town.

We sought the scarlet token for what seemed like hours.

I stayed closer to the hillside so that I could glance up at Margaret. Her flaming curls rebounded the sun’s rays as she paced back and forth on her throne. Desire pulsed within me to find the ribbon, but my fascination with Margaret’s reign was stronger.

Most of the children on the hunt were far younger than I was; I

was sure I’d find the ribbon before they did. Something inside me knew Margaret had hidden the ribbon somewhere only I could reach, only I could find. See, all the other fourth graders went to the movie theater or played sports at the YMCA on weekends, but every Sunday I piously tucked myself into the folds of our couch and read, hoping that Margaret would bring me along on an adventure. And she always did. She always cared. In some unspoken way, I was already her second in command. In some unspoken way I knew that, what with my being the oldest disciple searching for the ribbon, I would find it first, just as Margaret planned, and we would be bound together by law, an irreconcilable force. As I watched her atop the hill, I loved her more than I had ever loved her. Gratitude, that’s what I felt, although I didn’t understand at the time. At that moment, I realized she was my savior, my sister, Margaret Wilson, the girl with the one black eye.

After a while, fatigued by the soggy air and my existential epiphany, I stopped into Tom’s Diner for a coca cola, and that’s when I saw it. Margaret’s favorite cherry hair ribbon, dangling from the fan. I stood atop a chair, strangled the material loose, and set off for the hill where Maggie awaited. Pride swelled in my heart, and although I was twelve, much too old for this sort of make believe, I wanted her approval anyway. I wanted to be like Margaret: courageous and free. Screaming at the top of my lungs, I boasted of my prize as I zipped past the scavengers. By the time I reached the wooden bench, the crowd had returned, breathless for my inauguration.

But Margaret was not ready to crown her second-hand man; instead, she sat alone under a shaded tree, and smiled at the grass. With a closer look, I saw a fat, grey, lump of moist flesh squirming at her feet. The largest worm I’d ever seen. All us kids wondered why Margaret’s face bore such a look of fascination. I guess I’ll never know. But what I am certain of, is that the worm changed her life forever.

“Boris! Boris the worm!” she cried,

“He shall be my best friend from this day forth. My confidant, my

second in command!”

And with that, she strode off, back towards our house, without even a second glance. I lowered the ribbon in my hand and let it drop at my feet.

Beads of sweat dripped down my cheeks. I couldn’t look at any of the other faces in the murmuring crowd. Tears welled in my eyes, and I sank slowly into the grass. What was wrong with me? Jealous of a worm? I reassured myself that Maggie would grow tired of the grimy thing and find more

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worth in me, but I was wrong.

For weeks, she kept Boris in a mason jar, filled with leaves and twigs.

She took him for walks, slept by his side, fed him dirt and other nasty things and jabbered on and on, filling his indifferent ear with words she thought he wanted to hear. But I was the one who wanted to listen, I was the one who cared.

Boris came to school with Margaret, sat on her lap at lunch and in front of her plate at dinner. One night, we were eating spaghetti and meatballs, my favorite dish, but focusing on the stringy pasta and Mom’s secret sauce was impossible because Margaret droned on and on, whispering to Boris and translating to us what he said in reply. I was disgusted, hoping Mom and Dad would put an end to her insanity, but much to my dismay, Boris attracted even the grown-ups’ attentions. Our parents found her affinity with this monster amusing.

“How innovative, Margaret!”

“How caring!”

“Our little conservationist,” they said.

Conservationist? My sister was off her rocker, friends with a lump of grey mass, not saving the planet. That night, I went to bed with a hole in my stomach where the spaghetti and chocolate ice cream should have been and dreamed fitful dreams. Giant worms and magic spells and torrential downpours: all these things flittered across my mind, but all I could think of was my sister. She was lost and I was endlessly searching, running from nothing and seeking something

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wholly unattainable. Chasing my Margaret and her innocence and our childhood, a history shrinking endlessly into the horizon, consumed by Boris and Maggie’s madness.

I woke up to my mother’s voice in my ear,

“Time to wake up, guy! School awaits.”

It was awful. This dream I had: the prophecy for what was to come.

I awoke with the realization that I would never know my sister again. She would die with this worm, nestled under the bony grooves of her arms, and I would be lost without Margaret Wilson, without her guidance, her bravery. Sans Margaret, I was just a boy: average height, average intelligence, the book worm who wasn’t all that bookish, the brother who had no sister to call his own. I was nothing. For two days, I lived in utter despair. Those 48 hours were the darkest of my little life, and it seemed as if my days would run together into one stretch of sadness, into one moment of infantile agony. But then I heard the stories at school.

Kids began to laugh, to tease, to taunt. How could Margaret Wilson, despite her oddities, stoop so low as to have a worm for a friend?

Imaginary acquaintances are all well and good, but a worm? How outrageous!

My sadness disappeared into gossip and a new purpose engulfed me. My anger at the worm built up in my stomach like the sun, until I was nothing but a boy scorned, burned from head to toe. I steamed in my room like a kettle on the stove, whistling with rage and piercing the air with my obstinate hate. Margaret was not allowed in my room, nor was she graced by my adoration. She spent her time out in the garden with Boris, playing games I wished I was playing, although I couldn’t admit that at the time.

All the while I sat on my bed, watching and waiting, staring at Margaret’s ingenuity, her belief in a higher power, her belief in the goodness of a worm.

But I knew better. I had been shown the travesties of life, the pain of love lost; Margaret knew nothing of these things. I had found the power in myself to grow up and to leave these daydreams in the backyard where they

belonged. I was a big kid now, no longer leading a life of quiet desperation, in need of Maggie’s warmth.

And I had decided my course of action: Revenge.

I told everyone at school that I had mutiny on my mind, a sort of coup d’état, if you will. I spread the news and it caught like wildfire. Everyone was sworn in secrecy, everyone was in on the plan.

Everyone except my little sister who suspected nothing, consumed in her fantasy world of worms and dragons and princesses who can only save themselves.

On the day of the attack, Margaret, hot under the midday sun, left Boris in his jar on a table when she went to take a sip of water. I seized my chance. Followed by the entire elementary school, all buzzing with the prospect of overthrowing Margaret's madness, I snatched Boris up and dumped him on the ground. Maggie came running, her eyes burning into my soul.

But I did not look away. I was drunk on the power, like a Ben and Jerry’s sugar high when your parents aren’t home. I pulled out a knife I stole from the cafeteria. It glistened into her one good eye. She squinted but

did not drop her gaze, and neither did I. I knew what I had to do to break Margaret Wilson. With one fluid motion, I dropped to my knees, and sliced Boris into five neat pieces, staring at my sister all the while.

She didn’t cry or scream or fall to the ground in agony. She just laughed. She laughed like a mad man I saw on the television once before my mom could change the channel. Her ferocity clawed its way through her slender frame, and all at once my fear came rushing back to me. Her flaming red hair seemed aglow against freckles blemishing her face, carrying all the wrath of the universe. Like she was covered in little supernovas, exploding across her pale skin. The intoxication of sovereignty was gone; I was just Margaret’s sad older brother once again: all her faith in me, all her trust seemed to wither underneath the muggy heat. And I was right to be afraid, to be ashamed; I had been the first person to ever, and would ever, challenge the power of Margaret Wilson, the girl with the one black eye.

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Essay by Gregoria Serretta-Fiorentino’19 Art by Lauren Lam ’18

T

hey told you the world would become yours, as if instead of a ball in your hand you had one of those big colorful globes, as if with a throw to a hoopscore of a basket you could steal the universe from under the eyes of its billion inhabitants. They told you to just go and get it, so you grabbed the ball, you ran, you elbowed, you dribbled, you drove, and you aimed. They told you to aim the ball to the ring; little did you know the steroids had already aimed at your heart.

Get him up to the CT. Dad, please pick up the phone, I am tied up with a bunch of tubes, I feel so alone, my heart monitor is wavering, I know you want me to be a man but how can I be one if I can’t even feel my own body?

Insert the nasogastric tube.

It’s the rubber soles against rubber ground, the idolatryzealous eyes of the crowd, the glistening zeros of the scoreboard – but your eyes glisten brighter. You smile. You grip your ball firmly, you adjust your pinuniform, and you lunge into position. Coach nods. Dribble!

Send his sample to the tox screen.

Dad, I don’t know what to do, it’s my heart, I can hear it barely beating, I want to get out, I need to get out, the lights burn my eyes, this is a mistake, who is this coward tied to this chair?

Assess his LOC.

The other players, their arms start surrounding you and their feet get in the way but you just keep staring at the hoop, running, moving. Grinning. Because you’re never afraid, you never flinch. The ball bounces on the ground, one bounce to the left, the other bounce to the right. They’re tripping, and you’re running. It’s all yours, it always is. The crowd roars. Pivot!

Start the V-fib.

But Dad, I don’t understand, I believed in you, you had my back, you gave them to me, you said they would help me become better, you promised they would make me the best, but where is my trophy now?

Prepare the electrocardiograph.

They’re watching you, listening, expecting, dreading – but you’re always looking in front of you. but you’re always ahead of them. You laugh. Dribble to the three-point line, they try to stop you, you divert them, they quiver, you stay firm..

They panic, you keep it cool. Now just a few feet from the hoop. The court explodes. Aim! Where?

Place your hand on his sternum, compress the chest and count to two Seconds left to score The big dream Dad it’s all gone, forever But you’re running, and the crowd’s cheering, and they’re compressing Dad, you need to get me out of, here Is your moment, aim and shoot because that’s who you, are Unable to get the chest to rise So you run faster, and they cheer louder, and they compress harde-

Do you dribble, do they pivot, or do I aim?

They told me the world would become mine; little did they know I was already the world’s.

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Rainy Afternoon Poem by Kyra Matus ’18 Photo by Pete Assakul ’18

Though gray the sky It lightens my load Though only just blooming The flowers grow The petrichor fills my nose With the scent of wood chips and dirt roads As I sit and think in the wet soft grass What a beautiful place - how long will it last?

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his is the way the dark feels when the night is almost blue. It holds onto your big feet swinging from the edge of the bed, remembering June and the way lilacs shrivel before July. If the warmth teaches you anything it’s to take off your socks before bed and sleep under thin sheets, or to buy clip-on fans. Clip-on fans attach anywhere and are especially nice for bedposts near where naked feet lie in the dark. The noises are meaningless but thinking, in drawls and bedtime murmurs, is not. It’s the thinking that pops you upright in bed, feeling the dark through open eyes, searching for yellow through black. The night reminds you of June which reminds you of childhood, thinking of the way the kitchen smells in heat. Thinking of the way warm concrete feels, thinking of big hands sifting through dirt, the last time he walked near the crabapple, the baby bird you buried in rocky ground. The nostalgia and heat drive your feet off the bed and onto the floor. They’re flat and cool and awake. It’s a type of insomnia, you wonder, suddenly sad, watching the night stand still.

Essay by Willa Neubauer ’18 Photo by Edward Guo ’19

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Reflection Reflection Reflection

Story by Sage Molasky ’18 Art by Olivia Gee ’18

I

hear something. Maybe a whisper. Maybe a song. Honeysuckle and sugar maple sweetness drips out from the tongue of this place. The grass whistles and whooshes and whines. The trees, melancholy, dance alone, apart, together, and crack under the weight of wind. Lips parted, perched atop a mossy hillside, they coo and hum the rhythm of the gods. The rhythm of something good. Of something lost. In a poppy field, I drift in and out of this world, but here, I am almost within, I am almost good again, I am almost awake.

A little self I left long ago waits for me back home. She lies to keep them guessing where I went. And she’s good at lying. She’s good at being whole. She waits for me on a redwood swing in the place where the magic is hidden. She still gobbles up flapjacks on Sunday mornings and eats watermelon with a spoon. She’s a rebel because she eats the black seeds, no spitting them out. Spitting is for the kids without courage, the kids who tease, the kids who don’t want to be witches. She wouldn’t mind growing a tree in her stomach, at least she’d get free fruit. Perhaps the watermelon seed would turn into an apple tree, and then she’d never have to go to the doctor’s, she’d never go hungry. And she dreams that maybe if she were a tree, she would travel and give her apples to someone else.

Someone who really needed them. And maybe she’d take polaroids of the places she went and hang them on her branches or package them up and send them in postcards back home.

I’ve eaten my fair share of black watermelon seeds, but I’m not a tree. I’m just a girl, romanticizing the idea of confession. And I don’t have any apples to give to you.

I once read a book that talked a lot about blackberries. Now, I’m an expert on the little buggers, or at least what Tom Robbins told me about them. Blackberries are an invasive species in Oregon. In springtime, they grow like wild with no regard for the sanity of gardeners or farmers or fathers who stay at home. Uncouth and blunt, they grow under the rainy Portland sky, over brambles and under big brick buildings with words cut out of the signs. But what if Oregon took those blackberries and put them in cities? What if they grew over skyscrapers, made archways of gooey fruit and reached their straggly vines towards God? What if the metallic brilliance of the city was covered in blackberries? No one would go hungry. The people of the city would munch on blackberries and

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“I’ve eaten my fair share of black watermelon seeds, but I’m not a tree.”

live in a state of drunken euphoria, of sweet satisfaction. Bellies full, what could we do? The answer: anything.

But here I am, trying to suck as much of the honey out of this place as I can. Today, the bees are sleeping. The cold freezes up raindrops mid air, so we can lick them, like lollipops. The land still whispers. The loons still sing in their long trek north and maybe somewhere a bluebird whistles. I try to sing back, even though my throat is sore with empty words. I try to hum a tune back to them. It’s the least I can do. To thank them.

To thank you. For making me myself again. Not wholly within, not wholly without. To thank you.

For making me remember. Feeding me blue chrysanthemums and espresso and warmth on windy days. For reminding me to eat my breakfast.

My hands stop moving and my lips are pinkish blue, but that’s okay - because of you, I am almost whole, I am almost good again, I am almost awake.

When I return, they pick dandelions out of my hair and maple leaves off my shirt, damp with dew and dreaming. They laugh because I’m the witch who killed the mockingbird. But the bird died because of something crueler, their incessant searching.

They eat me with their eyes, devouring every succulent morsel, every hearty piece of flesh. I spill forth the secrets of distant lands and magic and fairy tales, so they suck the honey right out of me.

They don’t know that I am eating honey too, right from the belly of the beast.

Dresses made from fallen petals, rose thorns cinched tight

around my waist, budding under midnight showers. My peals of laughter shake the room like millions of crickets writing love letters across the lake. I wait for something else to laugh with me. For something else to love. And they know I’m waiting. They call me mother earth, monsoon, halfhanged mary among other things.

Think I scoop their hearts out with a spoon? You’re wrong. I fill them up with sugar and salamanders and hope. They think they see me but really, they see themselves.

Who do you want to be?

They never have the answer. But I keep feeding them watermelon seeds so they go and share their apples with someone else who needs them. I surely don’t. So in some way, I am the girl I used to be, the girl I wanted to become. I kiss their foreheads and tell them not to want. Don’t envy me. Because what they’re seeing is something else, something fearsome and unattainable and not real. Something within each of them. They see what they want to see. But that’s okay.

Because I am what they say I am.

We are one and we are twos and threes and infinities. Our little lives remain intact if only for a short while, intertwined, dripping with the sweat of a life at work, of a life searching. Searching for who we are. For who we could be. For who we might have been. And I am happy. Because in some way, we are all sharing blackberries. Covering a city in our brilliance. We are all capable of anything. And that is what I give to them. I give something back from the taking. So in some way I am almost whole, I am almost good again, I am almost awake.

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aiting in line is boring. Waiting in line on the stairs is tiring.

Waiting in line on the stairs of the American embassy in the middle of the summer is excruciating. While staring at a cluster of hair, hats, and scalps, I swayed back and forth between my two feet. My left hand was either in my pocket to find my phone or already had my phone in its grasp. Across from my right hand, my mother constantly reviewed a plastic file that contained multiple transcripts, an acceptance letter, and my passport. Sometimes, I would look away from 9GAG and ponder the silent movements made by her lips. She was most likely reading every single letter and number to make sure everything was in order. The temptation to tell my mom to relax was great, but I knew it was hopeless to begin with. Everything worried her, and if she starts telling me her worries, I was scared that she would duplicate her concerns within me. Slowly, the distance between me and the wall decreased, but then the U-turn at the end of the staircase happened. The same cluster reappeared in front of me, just in front of a different background.

After six more flights of sloth-like walking, fifteen revisions of my entire middle school life and identity, and countless Bad Luck Brian memes, I saw the end of the line. It was at a green room with six dozen blue leather chairs that all had at least one tear. In the center of the far end was a screen with two big numbers, one for the identification ticket and the other for the location one has to go for the interview. This fifteen minute interaction between visa applicants and the interviewer split two parties with a glass panel. Above each glass panel was a white concrete wall ledge that held a speaker. As I began to put my phone away in my pocket, a surge of electricity transformed into sonic spears.

“Are you kidding me?” said a deep voice with a small grunt.

Even though the spoken words were not screams, they still echoed throughout the room for a second. Nevertheless, I could tell which interviewer was talking, because a woman started to look around the room with hyper-opened eyes and with the edges of her lips touching her jawline. I turned my head down to the ground so that the lady wouldn’t notice that I was looking. My mother began her sixteenth review of my file. Everyone else also stared at the dirty tiles on the ground or their papers or their phone. The interviewer didn’t care about this cultural norm, and now he was ready to scream.

“Do you seriously believe,” he enunciated every word with the force of a nail gun, “that you can go study in the States when you have a F in your classes now?!”

With blubbering English and a face the same color as a splattered cranberry, the woman desperately dug into her bag and took out sheets of paper. I assumed that those would be her acceptance letter and I-20. However, the man behind the glass did not change his expression by any sense. After two minutes, the woman faced the harsh reality that a foreigner’s personality or backstory take a backseat to concrete evidence of success. She left the building while doing her best to inconspicuously cover her face.

I shoved my phone into my pocket, and suddenly found the file in my mother’s hand much more interesting.

The numbers truly mattered.

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Story by Chris Park ’18 Art by Cyprien Gaillard

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Alzheimer’s Disease and Diabetes I

always adored visiting my grandma, Mama. At her house, I loved to jump in the fuzzy blankets in the playroom, hear the ping-pang of my feet on the staircase, listen to my grandmother giggle. Despite her diabetes and old age, I viewed my grandmother as the pinnacle of health. I did not consider her diabetes a hindrance to her health because I did not understand the severity of this disease; when we were celebrating a birthday, my aunt explained it as a barrier to eating cake. As proof of her fortitude, Mama defeated cancer at eightyfive years of age and at ninety could walk around her large house without a cane.

In the bathroom of a restaurant when celebrating her ninetieth birthday, Mama did not recognize me. I dismissed the lack of recognition as a minor side effect of old age. However, she was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease six months later. In the two years since, she seems to have aged two decades. A metal rod had to be implanted to accommodate her

broken leg bone, which shattered as she was walking. Mama now travels around her house in a wheelchair pushed by a caretaker, and a buzzing machine that carries her down the stairs to the lower level. She does not remember anyone from her current life, and she only recognizes the names of her deceased parents and siblings.

Visiting my grandmother now terrifies me. I do not want to see Mama’s bed in the playroom because she cannot overcome the flight of stairs to her bedroom, or hear the buzzing machine as she descends to the kitchen, or know that she lost the muscle memory to write her name, or speak to her caretaker, who manages her every meal and action because she cannot support herself. I do not want to hear Mama screaming in pain as the caretaker injects her daily insulin doses, at which she had not batted an eye for the past forty years. When I look at my grandmother, I try to avoid the thought that I am seeing the state that my father, sisters, or I could be in some day, because Alzheimer’s disease runs in families.

“Alzheimer’s disease runs in families.”

Art by Dear Liu ’19

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A

s the church bells strike the final hour, her pitch-black hair flows in the wind like the crashing waves next to her. She tucks her hair behind her ears, gently puts the blue string in between the pages, and closes the book. She slowly gets up and briefly stares at the black flip-flops in her hand before deciding to walk in the sand without putting them on.

As she walks through miles of endless dunes, she only gets close enough to let the water gently tickle her feet.

Ever so often, she sits back down on the cold sand and pauses to enjoy the swift breeze. She tilts her head up and lets her midnight hair fly back, exposing the beautiful caramel skin on her shoulders. As the crescent moon briefly peaks out from behind the rough, purple clouds and the moonlight hits the water, a fleeting sight of a dolphins jump out from the depths of the unknown waters. For that passing second, her warm, hazel eyes sparkle like the stars would have on a clear, summer night. On the rocks overlooking the beach, the man twirls the rings on his finger and only stops to look at her walking on the beach in his direction. From the church steps, he can hear the crashing waves down below and thunder in the distance. He looks from the rings, to the water, to the midnight lady. He tries not to stare at her, but his eye keeps getting caught on the woman’s delicate white dress, which seems to be the only light in the ominous approaching storm. He lets out a sigh of relief, for he knows that whatever happens today, tomorrow, in ten years or even twenty - he’ll always have this moment.

Essay by Priyanka Kumar ’19 Art by Q Zhang ’18

The Midnight Lady

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Robot Story by Deb Adeyemi ’20 Art by Carolyn Ren ’19

I

sit in Chemistry class, listening attentively to my teacher lecture about Alkali Metals and their properties. I sit there, stiff, with a blank face. The teacher looks in my direction to ask me for the answer, but then his eyes go as wide as saucers. “Oh my God! Christie, is that you?” The rest of the class turns, but when they see me, they all widen their eyes and gasp. I furrow my eyebrows in confusion. “What’s wrong wi-” I stop mid-sentence. I stop because my voice doesn’t sound like me at all. I sound like some kind of talking computer!

I look down and I want to scream, but my voice won’t respond. It’s not like robots can scream, and that’s exactly what I look like right now! I look down at the rest of my rusty gray body. I can’t even feel the rest of my face.

In fact, I can’t feel anything at all! It takes so much effort to look around, and the ear-piercing creaking sound as I stand up makes everyone hold his or her ears.

I look at my fellow students still staring, but they’re no longer surprised. They’re looking at me with sly grins on their faces. I can read their facial expressions like a book. They want to use me for their advantage. I can only submit to their will. I don’t have any more personal feelings. They all simply see me as their personal

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machine, their robot, and no one cares.

A knock jolts me out of my nightmare. I open my eyes to stare at my ceiling. I sigh in relief. I lay in my own personal bed. I smile to myself, until I hear my mother’s sharp voice cut through my door.

“Christie! Get downstairs and cook breakfast. Now!” I sigh again, instead this time it’s a sigh of annoyance. On a Monday morning, I still have to cook for the five people in my family before I get ready for another day in high school. I swing my legs off the bed, get ready for school, and obediently head downstairs to cook.

After the food is served, I sit to join them. Instead of thanking me for the food, my mom gives me critique on my eggs. “They need more salt,” she says. “Yes, Mother,” I reply apologetically. As I eat, my dad gives me the same lecture he always gives, basically along the lines of, “Remember, grades matter more than anything, alright? Stay focused in school, and bring home some hundreds, alright?” “Yes, Dad,” I say. We finished eating, and went our separate ways. Mom takes my two younger brothers to elementary school, and I head out on my bike while my dad goes to work.

As I ride to school, I think about the project I turned in last Friday, and I hope that my essay was long enough for Ms. Lane. My dad sat hunched over me, watching me type the whole thing and snapping whenever I made any grammar mistake, so hopefully I come out with a perfect score. I pull into the school’s entrance and place my bike on the rack. I walk into the school hallways, everyone ignoring me as usual. People only acknowledge me when they need me for help on their assignments or we have to work in pairs for a project.

“Hey Christie! You finished Mr. Thompson’s lab report right?”

Sandy, one of my former friends, proves my point. We used to be friends at the beginning of the year, but once she realized that I never had anything to talk about and I could never hang with her on the weekends, she dumped me like a sack of potatoes, along with the rest of her posse. I open my mouth to answer her question, but she cuts me off, saying, “Of course you did. Why would I even ask that?

Anyway, how long was your conclusion?” “Four paragraphs,” I answer automatically and keep walking. I know how Mr. Thompson stresses a good conclusion. “Okay, mine was three. Hope it’s long

“It’s always been this way with me.

Everyday was the same.”

enough!” I hear her saying to herself behind me.

I head into English first period and as I sit in my usual seat, I drop my books and hunch over. The back of my eyes fill with pain and I cover them. When the pain subsides, I look up, and realize everything’s all wrong. I feel so stiff. I look around, and the sound of creaking fills my ears. I look down and I want to cry, but robots don’t have emotions, and that’s what I’ve become. The same robot from my nightmare sits in the very chair I’m in right now.

I look up to see Sandy and her posse waltzing in. She stops in her tracks when she sees me. “Christie? No way! This is too good,” she chuckles. “I guess you’re just embracing who you’ve truly been this entire year. A robot. Now you realize how your boring life has really repaid you.” Her other friends and my ex-friends laugh along with her, and all I can do is sit there and think to myself, They’re right.

It’s always been this way with me. Every day was the same. I went to school, keeping to myself, and returned home to meet chores and homework. I didn’t have anyone to come to for personal problems because I didn’t even have any that didn’t involve schoolwork or chores! I’ve been doing the same thing over and over. All my life my parents have made me believe school and home were the way to go. They molded me to be the smartest and the most obedient daughter, but they didn’t realize what I slowly turned into- a robot.

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2 1 Jordan Feast ’18 2 Serena Zhou ’20 3 Rock Zhu ’20

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1 Edward Guo ’19 2 Natalie Yang ’18 3 Dear Liu ’19

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ink.

ISSUE 18 Summer 2017

Writing Director Annabelle Burns ’18 Art Director Pete Assakul ’18 Coordinating Director Chris Park ’18 Club Advisors Brad Faus Elizabeth Buckles Editorial Head Alex Xu ’19 Design Head Edward Guo ’19 Marketing Head Matt Kim ’19 Outreach Manager Dear Liu ’19 Cover by Natalie Yang ’18 Back Inside Cover by Q Zhang ’18

Create.

Share.

Inspire.