The Paper Boat By Josh Kratovil I was crouched among the crushed limestone and goose muck lining the I&M’s shore when the blood-orange beams of the rising sun crept over my sneakers. A soft breeze rustled the wildflowers on either side of me, stirring the canal to life. Gnats and dragonflies played along the water's surface, casting furtive ripples in every direction while robins flitted between the tree tops. And for a second—just long enough for my breath to hitch in my throat — I let myself believe all the kooky town legends about the canal’s magic. Kelsey had been missing for months by then, and I was willing to believe in anything that might put things back to normal - even if it meant switching places. You see, my sister was the quintessential good twin: the pop quiz-acer, the early bird, the Catechism-quoter. I was the defective twin, bumming cigarettes off senior boys and ditching class to drink lukewarm beer with Marcy at the quarry shore. Even Kelsey’s rich copper hair outshined my dull, red-brick locks. And though my parents never said it, I knew their biggest question wasn’t “Where’s Kelsey?” but “Why not Irma?” Why couldn’t the defective daughter have been the one to vanish after the Turnabout dance? I could see it in the dead-eyed bear hugs Dad insisted on giving me whenever I came home and in my mother’s endless, furtive glances at Kelsey’s chair each night at dinner. So, yeah. I would have been fine switching places, even if that meant finding myself in a shallow grave just off Bluff Road. At least then, everyone else would be able to move on. I whispered my wish and put the little boat into the babbling waters. After a gentle nudge from my shaking hands, the lazy current took hold of the craft, turning it so Kelsey gazed at me from the picture I'd paperclipped to the boat's center. I stared back until the boat became a distant dot, indiscernible from the water’s surface, as my sister left my life a second time. Disgust over my wish wrestled with a black, twisted glee. With no small effort, I pushed the intrusive thoughts aside and turned for home. By then, the sun was no longer a creeping pinprick of light but a shimmering disc looming over the canal. Heat bugs buzzed their droning call from unseen branches overhead, and the wildflowers brushed against my bare arms as a warm summer breeze teased them into motion. The flowers bent toward a gnarled tree on the path ahead. Beneath its broken shade waited a mangy kitten. There were almost certainly fleas or ticks hiding in its matted fur, and there was a wicked scar across one eye. But when I approached, it did not cower: it stepped cautiously toward me. As it entered the sunlight, I realized its mud-caked fur, once cleaned, would shine with a rich copper hue and allowed myself to believe in the canal’s magic once more.
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