September 2016 • Issue 4
September 2016 • Issue 4
Edited By:
Kristi Rathbun-Nimmo • Lexy Alemao • Betty Darnall
Jackie Havens • David Jensen
Chantwood Magazine
September 2016 • Issue 4
Copyright © 2016 by Chantwood Magazine.
Cover art copyright © 2016 by
Aleksandra Wolska
All stories and poems are copyrighted to their respective authors,
and are used here with their express permission. No portion of this
work may be reproduced without first obtaining the permission of
the copyright holder.
Kristi Rathbun-Nimmo: Publisher/Editor-in-Chief
Lexy Alemao: Editor • Betty Darnall: Editor •Jackie Havens:
Editor • David Jensen: Editor
Chantwood Magazine • Issue 04 • September 2016
©Chantwood Magazine, 2016
www.chantwoodmagazine.com
Table of Contents
Letter from the Editor • 6
Julia Hunsaker • Grass: A Remember Smell • 7
New January • 8
Josh Penzone • The Scratch • 9
Joshua Aaron Crook • Buzz • 27
Oscar Rodriguez • Choosing My Reader • 33
Alannah Taylor • The Sonnet of the Chicken • 34
Columbkill Noonan • Secrets of the Fells Inn • 35
Brooke Flory • Do You Still Speak to Him? • 51
CLS Ferguson • So is Time: An Elegy • 52
Caleb Warner• Sun Shine • 53
Monica Nawrocki • The Little Pirate • 69
William Doreski • Digitally Enhanced • 74
Chad W. Lutz • Rainbows in December • 76
David Jensen • Miracles and Conundrums of the Secondary
Planets: A Review • 79
About the Authors • 81
“There was a song and story: an aged Scylding, widely learned, told of the old
days; at times the fighter struck the harp to joy, sung
against chant-wood, or made a lay both true and sorrowful; the greathearted
king fittingly told a marvelous tale…”
Unknown, Beowulf
Letter from the Editor
Kristi Rathbun-Nimmo
How is it possible that it is September already? Not only that, but it is the
end of September! Time really flies, doesn’t it? And with time comes change and
new and exciting things.
As I mentioned in my letter last month, the editing staff and I are excited
to present our first review of a short story collection. You can find David’s
review of Jacob M. Appel’s Miracles and Conundrums of the Secondary Planets
on page 79. We have another review in the works, so look for that before
the year’s end (it’s going to be a good one!). If you are interested in having
your work reviewed by our editing staff, you can get in touch with us via our
submissions email or through our website.
There are a few more exciting changes coming ‘round the bend, so hold
tight! We can’t wait to share the news with you when the time is right. For
now, we hope you enjoy this incredible assortment of poems and stories from
some very talentd writers.
As always, thank you for your support and for all of your wonderful work!
Chantwood couldn’t exist without all of you. Until next time,
Best wishes,
Kristi
6
Julia Hunsaker
Grass: A Remember Smell
Walking in the springtime morning,
I smell a memory:
Buffalo, New York. Six years old, and—
Daddy!
I hustle down the concrete stairs, around the eye-sore peach house,
Towards the sound that told me he was home:
Growly monster mower.
My light-up sneakers flash pink and yellow
past flower beds of waving tulips
and maple trees with huge wing-leaves,
covering me from the sun like hen’s wings.
And ahead I see my protector, iron clad
in an old, white hospital fundraiser t-shirt with green writing
and faded khaki shorts frayed from lawn battles.
His shabby black sneakers streaked with green grass guts
that smell so good. Deep breath.
I scream at the top of my lungs,
Hi, Dad! and wait
just beyond the chomping monster mower’s reach
while he wrestles it to do his will.
I hop up and down when I spy his ear plugs,
my pony tail waving too,
hoping he’ll see me through his
dark visor-glasses and scalp-shielding green cap.
He turns the mower one-eighty degrees to
trim our side-yard carpet, and then—
Scooter! I hear his voice above the monster mower
and I am carried higher than the maple trees,
My wide, laughing smile—his, my favorite thing.
7
Julia Hunsaker
New January
Ice pearls tipped the
long lengths of willow
hanging above me,
a bower of fairy January.
Pulling close, I saw the
world turned upsidedown through
frozen globes clasped
fierce to tree.
New January bade me
melt fingerfuls of
winter tears,
freeing the tree tips
to bare flower
and fruit,
the sun glinting
off his ring I wore,
warm.
8
The Scratch
Josh Penzone
His wife rubbed her pregnant stomach as she walked into the fourth
bedroom. He moved to the window and looked at the woods beyond the
neighborhood. “It could be an office,” she said. “Maybe you’ll start writing
again.” The realtor reminded her that there was an office on the first floor, but
that room could also become a sitting room, because with this much space, the
options seemed endless.
After the realtor left to give them privacy to talk, she twirled in the
kitchen, arms out, letting go of her five-month baby bump. “It’s a steal,” she
said, pointing to the gourmet double ovens. “How can we say no?” Her smile
beckoned Sean to hug her, so he did. She placed her head on his chest and
whispered how it could all be better, how it could be a fresh start. She ran her
hand through her straight black hair and pointed out how the dark, coffee
floorboards complimented the java cabinets. “It’s even got a granite island. I
could do food prepping here. Hang some pots and pans above it. It’ll look like
we’re hosting a cooking show! Oh, think of what we could create in here!”
Lance Reynolds, their realtor, paced the front porch, talking into his
Bluetooth. All Sean knew about Lance Reynolds was that he was pleasant,
recently engaged and good at his job; yet, he felt something wicked seemed to
lie beneath his affability. But Ellen liked him and shushed Sean anytime he
tried to talk about the mystery of Lance Reynolds.
“So, what do you think?” Lance asked, opening his arms wide. “Pretty
wonderful, right?” He smiled. Ellen nodded, but Sean didn’t reply. “As you
know, I live right there,” Lance pointed to the house at the middle of the culde-sac. “I only bring clients here that I can one day see as my neighbors,” he
paused, and then added, “my friends.” He strolled over to Sean and Ellen and
whispered like he was sharing an insider stock tip. “Howard Havenshaw, the
guy who used to live here, just one day disappeared. He moved somewhere else.
Don’t know where. West maybe. Weeks later he hired people to pack up his
things. We never saw him again. He contacted me some time after and told me
9
The Scratch
to sell the house, but only to good, honest people. He said he was willing to lose
money on the house, as long as the people moving in were high caliber. Truth
be known, I’ve only shown this to two other couples. And well, after vetting
them, they didn’t make Howard’s cut.”
“This all seems a bit odd,” Sean said.
“I find it fascinating,” Ellen said. “Very unusual for us to be involved
in something so secretive and interesting. Sean, we could use a little change in
our lives.”
Sean shrugged and kicked the large stone front of the house like he was
checking tires on a car.
“Sean, I get your apprehension. I do. Mr. Havenshaw was an Army
man. Served two or three tours in Vietnam. I don’t think he’s eccentric so much
as someone who is all about honor. ‘Be all you can be.’ ‘The right stuff.’ That
type of mentality.” Lance had played up the tone to let them know that he also
thought it was weird. “Between you and me, the neighbors are getting restless.
An empty house at the front of the street for too long can give the wrong
impression. Makes us look unwelcoming.”
They walked down the front steps. There was a naked flagpole in the
front yard. He turned and looked over the front of the house. It was Hardie
Plank. The rest of the houses were stucco. Sean asked if there had been mold
in the stucco. Before he got an answer he went on about mold and its dangers
until Ellen cut him off.
Lance assured him there was not a mold issue as he pointed at the
other houses. “We all wondered why Howard changed it too. Suddenly, one day
people were here working on his home.” Lance smiled, showing those veneers
that looked so good on his business card. “Howard was a calculated man.
Hardie Plank is the best product out there. Maybe he just wanted to protect the
new owners. Keep them safe.”
The skepticism in Sean’s tone was evident as he questioned the sanity
of someone remodeling a home that didn’t need it, especially when the home
isn’t occupied.
“Listen: I’ll have the inspector come out ASAP. If he finds something
wrong with it, then we’ll move on and look in Worthington like you had
suggested.” Lance smiled wide. That smile had probably gotten him a lot of
things over the years that people didn’t want to give him.
“Still seems odd to be—as you put it—‘vetted’ to buy a home.” Sean
10
Josh Penzone
said.
“Don’t take it personally. Besides, if Howard Havenshaw gives you
guys a Google search what is he going to find? That you both give back to the
community by teaching high school? High school teachers are more honest than
the Pope these days.”
The first hit on Google wasn’t about them being teachers. Sean knew
that for sure.
He mumbled something no one understood and wandered to the side of
the house. He pressed his hand against the Hardie Plank and snorted.
“Sean, let’s not overthink it. Okay?” Ellen was now sitting on the front
steps. She slouched and fanned herself with her hand.
Try not to overthink it.
Their couples’ counselor introduced this phrase to them four months
ago and Ellen had slowly begun using it as her go-to platitude.
“Here’s an idea,” Lance Reynolds said. “Colleen Kellerman, who lives
next door there, throws these wonderful cul-de-sac parties. She calls them
Peephole Parties.”
“Why?” Ellen asked.
“She saw our street once flying back from Chicago and she said it
looked just like a peephole.”
“That’s adorable.”
“I think so too, Ellen. I think so too.” Lance Reynolds held his smile
for a few seconds, making Ellen smile too. Sean leaned against the side of the
house, listening. “Colleen’s having a Memorial bash this Saturday. You guys
will be done with the school year by then, right? It’s a perfect time to cut loose
and blow off some steam. We place cones at the front of the cul-de-sac and we
roll our grills out to the street. Why not stop on by? Meet the neighbors. Get a
feel for the street.”
Sean felt like he was rushing a fraternity. A plane flew overhead.
After it passed, he could hear Ellen breathing. It was steady and rhythmic.
Like when she practiced her Lamaze before she realized it didn’t work and she
needed drugs.
“You really should come this weekend.” Lance pointed to Ellen’s
pregnant belly. “It’s a perfect place for kids.” He pointed across the street. “Zak
and Celia Turner just announced that they’re expecting. They live next to me
on the right. I believe they are due early November.”
11
The Scratch
“That is so close to our date!” Ellen said, nudging Sean.
“Sounds like that future whippersnapper of yours has a built-in crew of
best friends at the ready.” Lance tilted his head and smiled to look at Sean who
had come back around from the side of this house. His teeth were so perfect
that Sean momentarily forgot the purpose of the conversation.
#
Their first child’s name had been Danforth. Howard Havenshaw would
learn this from his Google search.
Danforth was a family name on Ellen’s side. While pregnant she had
an image of this beautiful boy, with blonde-white curls in profusion, with the
most beautiful blue eyes she’d ever seen, like a sapphire. Then, when looking at
old pictures at her mother’s, she found this imagined child to be some distant
relative. Danforth, Age 2 was written on the back. “We’ll name him Danforth,
and call him Danny,” she said. “Maybe the name will give him those eyes.” And
Danny did have those bright blue eyes. They looked like some rare gemstone
that had been cut from the sky.
Seven months after Danny was born, when the anxiety about Sudden
Infant Death Syndrome had finally passed, Danny went to sleep one winter
night and never woke-up. While Ellen screamed in hysterics, Sean peeled back
his son’s cold eyelid, to see a little sliver of blue circling his dilated pupil. And
now, their home, the one Ellen had labeled a dream home, seemed unlivable.
They couldn’t walk by the room at the top of the stairs without thinking about
his little still body looking like a doll, as if he’d never been real.
At least once a day Sean wondered if they would have tried to get
pregnant again. But Ellen was already pregnant when Danny died. When
she had told him that Danny would be a big brother, Sean laughed. “But
you’re still breastfeeding,” he had said, laughing nervously. Sean had been
terrified when Ellen was pregnant with Danny. He was even more terrified
after Danny was born, scared he might accidentally hurt him. When Sean fed
Danny those rare bottles in the early morning darkness—when Ellen was too
tired to breastfeed—he felt like bursting because he didn’t know he could love
something that much; yet, he still wondered where his life would have led
him if he’d never become a father. This unknown life had vexed him so much,
that when Danny didn’t wake up, he felt responsible, as if any minute the
authorities would barge into the room and arrest him for considering a life he
could no longer live.
12
Josh Penzone
#
The scratching sound woke Sean before the sun was up. The fog of a
future hangover rolled in as he squinted at the ceiling. Had he really drank
that much last night? He didn’t think so. His wife was on her side, snoring
loudly. He nudged her.
“What?” she said.
“Listen!”
“It’s still dark out. What time is it? It’s exam week. We can sleep in.”
“Shh,” he said. “Just listen.”
Scratch. Scratch. Scratch.
Sean asked her if she could hear it and she said she could. He stood on
the bed and reached up. Their ceilings were only eight feet high. He knocked
on the ceiling and the scratching grew louder. He jumped off the bed and the
scratching followed him. When he stopped. It stopped. Like a sound shadow.
“Are you seeing this?”
“Yes,” she sighed angrily. “It means we have a mouse problem. Or
worse!” She sat up, suddenly alert. “We need to call someone today! If the
Havenshaw place passes inspection, it won’t mean anything if our house
doesn’t.”
Sean folded his arms. How could she think the scratch was an animal?
It was following him, like it was communicating. As he went to the bathroom,
he couldn’t help but notice a sliver of sound right over top of him. Then, as he
walked back to bed, something in the ceiling scraped more clearly in gentle
rhythms, mirroring his movement.
Ellen held out her arms. “Cuddle me until we have to absolutely get
up,” she said. He lay down and she turned into him, putting her head on his
shoulder. He stroked her hair. She liked it. Even after his arm grew tired, he
kept doing it, because he wanted to make her happy.
“I really like that house, Sean. It’s a good school district, better than the
one we teach in. I know the thing with the owner is weird, but so what? I can’t
be in this house when this baby is born. We only have the one other bedroom
upstairs. We can’t put the baby in there, we just can’t.”
Her voice got soft. She was fighting off tears. Their therapist had talked
about the tears as a trigger of guilt and how people wallowed in that guilt to
feel self-pity. To Sean their tears were for the sadness of losing a child. He
would cry how and when he pleased and feel what he wanted to feel. But Ellen,
13
The Scratch
she wanted to think that their therapist had some magic in his words so she
followed them the best she could and choked back the tears.
“I’ll admit. It’s a pretty perfect place,” Sean said, thinking nothing
would ever be perfect again.
“Exactly. It’s perfect. Forget the weirdness attached to it. Try not to
overthink it.” She nestled her head into his shoulder but couldn’t get situated.
He sat up and motioned for her to turn around. She obliged, smiling, and
he began to rub her shoulders. After three minutes on the shoulders, the
scratching came back.
“Ellen?”
“I hear it too. Must be a nest of something up there. I don’t care if we
have two mortgages. My parents will help out. We are moving out of here with
or without a buyer.”
They never really talked about why they had yet to officially put their
house on the market. Perhaps they had hoped Danny’s death was all just a
dream and one morning they would walk by his room and hear him cooing or
laughing. But this would never happen, and each time Sean walked by his son’s
closed door, he felt further from Ellen, further from everything, especially any
memory of Danny.
The scratching grew louder. Ellen asked him to call an exterminator
and to set up an appointment for after work.
“But what if it’s not a critter?” Sean asked, suddenly filled with a hope
he didn’t quite understand.
“What else could it be, Sean? Something is up there right now chewing
through our wires. It’ll probably burn this place down.”
If it were a rodent, it could create a fire hazard by gnawing on the
wiring. Sean had a buddy who was a fireman in Cincinnati. He used him as
a source for research for his unpublished novel. Fires started for all kinds of
reason, a mouse in the ceiling was as good as any. But still, Sean couldn’t shake
the sense that the scratching was important and he couldn’t ignore the thought
that he no longer wanted to sell the house.
#
The exterminator hadn’t seen any sign of a critter in the house. “I’d
hate to cut a hole in your house for nothing. I’ve searched all over and there’s
no entry point that I can find that shows me where an animal circumvented
the drywall and there’s nothing in the basement to believe a critter is living in
14
Josh Penzone
your house. It’s most likely something loose in the house. Maybe some nail that
popped and is now rolling around in the vents.”
“But the sound follows me,” Sean said. “When I stop, it stops. Have
you ever heard of such a thing, or at least an animal doing that?” Sean looked
at Ellen, trying to make her understand that this sound could be something
important.
“No. Not when you put it like that I haven’t.” The exterminator
tipped the bill of his cap as he looked at the ceiling. “If I heard the noise, I’d
have a better understanding of what it was. And believe me. If you did have
some animal in there, I’ve been here long enough provoking it, so I’d-a-heard
something by now. Only thing I’d seen is the old woman next door waving at
me from the window.”
All three of them looked at the ceiling. Nothing. They hadn’t heard the
scratching since the morning.
“What do you we owe you for the visit?” Ellen asked.
The exterminator smiled and told them it was a free visit, just an
evaluation. No harm done. Sean had gotten the exterminator’s number from a
neighbor. He knew the neighbor had told the guy what had happened to Danny.
Don’t overthink it.
Sean shook the exterminator’s hand and told him that he’d videotape
the sound and send him the clip. The exterminator didn’t seem to think that
would help matters, but he didn’t tell Sean not to send the video.
After the exterminator left, Ellen began boxing up the house, starting
with the nursery. He handed her children’s books from the shelves and other
knickknacks as she carefully placed them in boxes. With each handoff Sean
eyed the ceiling.
“Is this packing premature? I mean we haven’t even gone to that
Memorial Day party. We could hate the people,” Sean said.
“Lance told us to stage the house so he can get pictures for the Internet.
That’s what we’re doing. Packing while we do it is like two birds.”
“Don’t you want to know what happened to the previous owner? Why
did he disappear in the middle of the night?”
“Don’t know. Don’t care. That’s his business. Do you think I’m going to
tell everyone at the party why we’re moving?”
“But we have a reason. Yes, it’s personal, but it’s not a secret. So, there
must be a story behind this Howard guy leaving. You aren’t curious? What if
15
The Scratch
this disappearance is a metaphor for the street and everyone has something to
hide?”
Try not to overthink it.
“Then, you’ll drive yourself crazy with your insistence to over analyze—
ooh!” Ellen grabbed Sean’s hand and made him feel the baby’s movement. He
smiled to mimic her smile, which was really just an expression of relief for him.
The baby was still alive in there.
They never really had a chance to grieve, or reflect, or act irrationally,
or fall apart so they could learn as they put themselves back together. The
second pregnancy didn’t allow that necessary deconstruction. Ellen made him
attend all of the baby classes again. “Maybe we missed something,” she said.
“Maybe we’ll catch it this time.” Her denial made him angry, but he had no
place to put his anger. He needed to be positive, for the baby, for his marriage.
He found himself drinking more than usual these days to combat his feelings of
anger and cynicism. Drinking didn’t make him forget; it just made him dwell,
which he seemed to like. Sometimes he’d tell Ellen he was going to visit his
brother, but instead he’d go to a bar and sit alone and drink Seven and Sevens.
“He’s moving a lot today,” Ellen said.
“Now you think it’s a ‘he,’ do you?”
She shrugged and went back to boxing up the room. He stared at the
blank wall. He couldn’t remember what used to be there. He looked at Ellen
and wondered if they would have divorced after Danny died if she wasn’t
pregnant. Would they have blamed the other and used that unfair resentment
to push the other one away?
To try not to overthink it.
He stared at the ceiling, praying the scratch would come back, and then
it did. It seemed to fall in rhythm with Ellen’s packing. But Ellen never looked
up.
#
American flags had been spiked into each yard, yet the flagpole in
the Havenshaw house remained naked. Sean and Ellen were told to park in
the Havenshaw garage, to make them feel a part of the street. Lance had left
them two baskets on the granite island in the kitchen. One had aged cheeses, a
pepperoni stick, and a bottle of red and a bottle of white. The other had bottled
water with peanut butter and pretzel rods, which is what Ellen had said was
her only pregnancy craving.
16
Josh Penzone
“None of this seems strange to you,” Sean said, peering out the front
window. Several grills were being rolled to the ends of driveways. “It’s like we
are being courted.”
“Less odd than a noise that follows you around?” Ellen said.
On the way over Sean had tried to broach the subject of what it could
be. Ellen didn’t want to hear it. The conversation lasted ten seconds, and it
ended with her face intimating that Sean had no business delegating their son’s
presence to only one location.
The doorbell rang. It was Lance. He looked like a man in his late
thirties hosting a rush party at a fraternity in his white polo shirt and salmon
shorts. His arm was draped around the waist of a pretty redhead. She looked
to be at least a decade younger than him, but it worked because Sean couldn’t
imagine Lance with a woman his own age.
“Good afternoon,” Lance said, extending his hand. Sean shook it and
told him thanks for the baskets. “How was it pulling into the driveway? Did it
feel like home?”
“It did. It really did.” Ellen said. “And who is this?”
“This is my beautiful fiancée, Audrey Pittman. I need to introduce her
by her first and last name to remind me she isn’t taking my last name when
we get married this fall.” Sean was expecting a smart-ass remark from Lance,
but then he said proudly, “She’s going to be a plastic surgeon. She actually just
spent a few months in Africa helping children with cleft palates. If anything
I should take her name.” He kissed her cheek. Audrey kissed him back, then
waved a friendly hello to the Thatchers. A grape sized diamond flashed in the
sun.
“I’m going to go set-up Cajun grilling camp at the base of my driveway.
I just wanted to welcome you. Take your time. Look around the house again.
We’ll see you outside.” Lance winked, Audrey waved goodbye, and they headed
down the front walk.
Ellen walked back to the kitchen. Sean followed her. “That was some
ring,” she said. “Lance must deal with millionaires or something.”
“Or he is a criminal. Guys like that always get in over their heads. He’ll
probably end up dead.”
She held up one of the bottles of wine. “Should we just take these with
us? And the beer? What do you think?”
“All kidding aside, Lance couldn’t afford that ring. Not if it’s real. It had
17
The Scratch
to be twenty thousand dollars. He’s hiding something.”
“Sean,” she said exasperated. “Please.” Her eyes were big, pleading with
him not to do that thing where he second-guesses everyone’s intentions.
Try not to overthink it.
“Oh my!” She grabbed Sean’s hand and placed it on the left side of her
stomach. “She’s feisty today. Maybe she’s excited for her new home.”
“Now it’s a she?”
“Better than being an it.”
Sean wanted to tell her that they should leave and go home. To listen
for the scratch. To unpack. To actually talk about Danny. So when the baby
was born they wouldn’t just forget Danny had been their baby once too.
Ellen said she suddenly felt exhausted and needed a quick nap before
“meeting the gang.” She lay on the carpet in the family room and used Sean’s
jacket as a pillow. Sean drank his first beer quickly. It tasted so good, the
second beer went down just as easily. As he opened his third beer it occurred
to him that the school year had been over for twenty-four hours. No more
grading papers. No more lesson plans. No more documenting what he does on
a daily basis to justify to the state that he actually teaches. No more students
grubbing for points. No more begging students to turn something in so
they’d passed. This was always a happy time. The beginning of summer. The
beginning of reading for pleasure and sleeping in and having cocktails in midafternoon. Then as he twisted the cap off his third beer, it also meant no more
distractions, no more reasons to leave the house to make copies or to rewrite
a test or to just sit in his classroom and stare at the clichéd posters explaining
what teamwork and perseverance were. He felt very alone. He sipped his third
beer and watched Ellen sleep peacefully.
#
By the time they reached the end of the driveway, Sean was done with
his fourth beer and welcomed the buzz that came with it. “I feel like we live
on the set of a television show, Sean. This is so nice. Isn’t this so nice?” Ellen
waved to a woman across the street. She waved back. Sean thought the woman
looked mean. Aggressive. Or maybe he was just drunk.
“I think she’s the woman who’s pregnant. I’m going to go say hi.” And
just like that, Ellen left Sean alone to fend for himself.
“Hello, future neighbor,” a woman said. Sean turned to see a tall,
slender blonde dressed like the American Flag: blue skirt, white tank top, red
18
Josh Penzone
heels. She said she lived next door. Sean turned to look at her house. It had
a brick front with gray stucco. “Old Havenshaw really messed up the unity of
the street with the Hardie Plank.” She begrudgingly admitted that the Hardie
Plank looked good, so good in fact that everyone else on the street should get
it. Sean felt she was the type that was hired by big businesses to give seminars
to motivate employees to believe in what the company was trying to achieve.
She was simultaneously likable and unlikable, and the more he felt compelled
to judge her, the more he wanted to be her friend. There was something about
her face that made him block out her words. Trapped beyond her natural bitchy
appearance was sadness, something that Sean could now see in other people as
if he had a super power.
“My son will be a senior in high school next year,” she said, after Sean
asked if she had kids. “Got a 33 on his ACTs. He wants to be a writer.”
“I teach high school English,” Sean said, pleased with himself about
his ability to make small talk. “I once fancied myself as a writer, but I realized
I’m much better at helping those that have actual talent.” Sean grinned
dumbly, still lamenting all those rejection letters for his literary novel about
firefighters. Ellen had loved his novel. Every word. She even said his saturation
of metaphor was what made it so brilliant. How each sentence mattered and if
he’d deleted just one phrase, the book would have lost its meaning. It was like
a 300 page poem. Thinking of Ellen’s support made him wave to her. She was
talking to the pregnant woman. The man next to her moved his hand in small
circles on her ass.
“An English teacher. Isn’t this just serendipitous,” the woman said.
“Maybe my son could show you some of his work. He’s obsessed with the
transcendentalists. Everything he writes now sounds so self-important. But
don’t tell him I said that. He doesn’t know I read his stuff. I have to hack into
his computer to do so.”
“The transcendentalists, huh. He to wants to ‘suck the marrow out of
life,’ does he?”
“Don’t we all,” she said, showing her perfect teeth as she laughed. Her
teeth looked just like Lance’s. She looked past Sean towards the middle of the
cul-de-sac where people were starting to gather around Lance’s grill.
“So, how do you like Lance Reynolds?” she asked, the confidence gone
in her voice, the sadness blossoming in her eyes. “Never mind. It’s none of my
business,” she said quickly afterwards. “Enjoy the party.” Her heels tapped
19
The Scratch
the sidewalk as she headed to her front door and disappeared. What was her
connection to Lance?
Try not to overthink it.
A squirrel jumped around in the tree above him. Sean looked up but he
couldn’t locate it as the maple’s leaves rustled. He brought the beer bottle to
his lips, but it was gone already. Sean never considered himself a big drinker,
but he supposed over the last six months he had become one. He’d go ahead and
order an extra few at dinner knowing Ellen would drive him home. Then, after
she went to sleep, he’d have a few more. Sometimes he’d wake up thinking of
the sweetness of Jack Daniels mixed with ginger ale. Although he had never
had a drink in the morning, he was beginning to understand why people did.
Ellen walked over, a half-eaten plate of food in her hand. “Could you
take care of this,” she said, handing him the plate. “I need to use the bathroom.
She’s punching my bladder.”
“Ellen,” Sean said, stopping her. “I think the woman who lives next
door to Howard had an affair with Lance.”
Above, the squirrel clawed at something.
“Don’t you do that!” she said.
“What?”
“Overthink it. You’re trying to make this into some sort of novel or
allegory or something. Like everything means something. These are just people.
Same as you and me. Sean…this is life. Not fiction. It’s not to be analyzed.
Just enjoy the nice weather and the fact that you don’t have to pee every ten
minutes, okay?”
The squirrel had stopped.
Sean apologized and asked Ellen if she’d bring him a beer. She stared
at him, probably trying to gauge how many he’d already had, but instead of
asking him she said, “Just have a good time for a change, will ya?”
As Ellen hurried away, Sean walked towards Lance Reynolds’ house.
Ellen would come outside and see him mingling and she’d be so happy. Yes, he
could have a good time too. Wouldn’t that make her happy?
Try not to overthink it.
“Hey, you,” an older woman called out. “Yeah, you,” she said as Sean
pointed at himself. “Come here, would ya?” She was sitting in the mulch bed in
front of her porch. She had on a large, red sun hat and her hands were black
from the mulch. “Could you hand me that drink? I’m too old anymore to get up
20
Josh Penzone
and down. I’d rather just stay where I am.”
Sean grabbed the blue drink in the middle of her front steps and
walked to the left side of the house where she was sitting. He could smell
the alcohol from the glass. He was pretty sure it was vodka mixed with blue
curacao—all alcohol. She took a big gulp.
“Easier to drink after the ice melts.”
“Hi, I’m Sean Thatcher. My wife and I are looking at the Havenshaw
place.”
“I know who you are. No secrets on this street. If it’s out in the open,
then it’s out in the open to all.” She took another drink. “Blue drinks sure are
fun. Life needs to have more fun. Everyone is too damn serious most of the
time, I tell you what.”
Sean immediately liked this woman. She was sad, too, but it was a
different sadness than the American flag woman. She had more awareness of
her sadness. She seemed to embrace it.
“If you don’t mind me asking, why are you doing yard work in the
middle of the party?” Sean said. Underneath the porch was a nest of cigarette
butts. She tossed some mulch to cover them up.
“Which answer do you want?” she said.
“What do you mean?”
“I can give you the real answer or I can give you the real answer with a
protective coating so you won’t judge the street.”
Ellen was walking towards him with a beer. After Sean didn’t say
anything, the woman continued to spread mulch.
“I see you’re making friends,” Ellen said, handing Sean the beer. Sean
took an immediate sip. “Hi, I’m Ellen Thatcher.” Ellen took back her plate from
Sean and ate a watermelon ball.
The woman held up her mulch-covered hands to show Ellen why she
wouldn’t shake hands. “Why don’t you two go and join the revelry.”
Ellen said okay and hooked her arm under Sean, but then stopped after
she got a closer look at the house. “Oh my, what happened?”
“Damn vermin worked its way into my basement through the wood.
Raccoon the size of Rottweiler. Kept hearing something at night, but ignored
it. However my dog wouldn’t. Thank goodness for Samson.” The moment she
said his name, a German Shepherd-mix came running from the back yard and
nestled next to the woman. “My husband usually dealt with those matters. Now
21
The Scratch
it’s all up to me and Samson. That raccoon won the first few rounds, but last I
saw of it, the critter he was hissing in a cage, off to be incinerated, so I guess I
won the war.”
She smiled, proudly.
“You kids go on and enjoy the party. Just trying to cover up this damn
hole before it can get fixed so it doesn’t ruin the aesthetics of the day. You’ll
understand what that means soon enough.”
The woman gulped down the rest of the blue liquid and began humming
as she decorated a mound of mulch to camouflage the hole.
#
As night approached the drop in temperature felt nice. Too many
beers in a hot sun had left Sean drunk. Ellen spent a lot of her day with the
pregnant woman. Sean instinctively kept a distance from them, afraid he’d
mention Danny. Sean found a man who hated small talk as much as he did, the
pregnant woman’s husband, so the both of them just stood next to one another
drinking in silence. Ellen looked over at them with a pleased look. She probably
thought that Sean was making a new best friend. He didn’t want her to think
differently so he’d smile back and then ask the man a question, usually where
the closest beer was. Then they’d take turns going to get it. Once the man said
he was calling it a night, Sean realized they had never even exchanged names.
He asked him quickly, knowing Ellen would want to know what it was. The
man told him and then staggered into his home.
Sean yawned as he stood next to Lance, who was playing corn hole with
one of the husbands on the street. Lance made a joke about Sean’s drunkenness
and welcomed him to the Peephole. Lance was likable—too likable. He was the
kind of guy who people complained about behind his back as he brought out
an insecurity you didn’t want to face about yourself, but at social gatherings,
you wanted to be around a guy like Lance. Lance’s fiancée had left a few hours
back. She had been on call and left for Riverside, the hospital where Danny was
born.
The man playing Lance in corn hole asked Sean if he wanted to take
over. Sean shook his head and walked towards a red cooler at the end of the
driveway a few houses down—across from the Havenshaw house.
He snapped the tab on the beer and took a sip. It was warm, but he
didn’t care.
“You the guy buying Howard Havenshaw’s old place?”
22
Josh Penzone
A girl about seventeen sat under a sycamore tree. She looked familiar,
probably because he’d seen a variation of her year after year at his job.
Somehow the rebellious fad never seemed to find its end. Her blonde hair had
streaks of green and pink. She wore combat boots and a short black skirt.
The band name on her t-shirt was also familiar to Sean. He’d seen it on other
t-shirts in the school halls, but he didn’t actually know any of their music.
“Thinking about it, yeah,” Sean said, smiling. He’d always had good
rapport with his students, and oddly enough, talking to a teenager was the
most comfortable he’d felt all night.
“Be careful, man. This street is fucking cursed. If I were you, I’d look
elsewhere.”
Her body language screamed “the world is an armpit” which was
why Sean walked towards her. After his failed writing career, he’d asked to
stop teaching the AP classes. He didn’t want to be surrounded by the likes
of Faulkner and Joyce and Shakespeare and Kafka. He didn’t want to be
reminded of what he didn’t become so he began teaching the at-risk kids, the
ones who hated high school and everyone associated with it. He had never had
found so much joy with his job. Yes, he’d seen this girl a hundred times.
“Why is this street cursed? I’m Mr. Thatcher by the way. Or Sean. You
can call me Sean.”
“It just is, Sean. Got any weed?”
“You shouldn’t smoke pot.”
“Why. Cause it’s bad for you?”
“No, because it’s expensive.”
That joke always made the kids laugh, but it didn’t make her laugh.
She stared at him like she was trying to figure out if he was cool or just some
lame-o trying too hard.
“What’s your name?”
She shrugged. “Nikki.”
“Have I met your parents tonight?”
“How the fuck am I supposed to know?”
“Good point. How the fuck are you supposed to know?” Sean had
learned to respond with profanity when his students used it. It took away their
power of shock, creating an even level of discourse. She turned from him and
her arm moved in rhythm with a scratching noise. Sean sipped his beer and
watched as she took out a small pocketknife to carve FUCK THE PEEPHOLE
23
The Scratch
in the trunk of the sycamore.
“You see that woman over there, standing on the porch?” Nikki said.
Sean looked and nodded. The woman had been there all night. “She’s crazy.
Like seriously, clinically crazy. Her son died in Afghanistan this year, but
she was crazy long before that.” She underlined her words in the stump.
“Sometimes I think that crazy bitch is the only sane one on this street.”
“What about you?” Sean asked. “You crazy?”
“I’m the craziest of them all.” Then she smiled for the first time as she
stood. She walked into the ray of the floodlight. Sean couldn’t find any sadness
in her eyes; it was something else. She walked past him and towards the
darkened woods behind her house. Her phone glowed in the night as she sent a
text. Two houses down Lance took his phone out of his salmon shorts.
Try not to overthink it.
People began saying their goodnights. Sean made his way towards his
wife. He could hear her laughing in the darkness two houses away. A thin,
good-looking man, the one playing Lance in cornhole, was cleaning his grill in
the driveway across the street. Sean hadn’t talked to him yet. The man called
Sean over to introduce himself. They shook hands. There was a brief silence,
really the first one of the night. It was calm and peaceful and Sean began to
think how nice it would be to live in a place that had such a loud, calming
silence.
“What do you think of our little street?” the man said, spraying his grill
with cleaner.
“It’s nice.”
“It’s safe. And if that’s what you’re looking for, then, look no further.”
For some reason Sean thought of Danny when he was five weeks old
and how he had carefully wiped goop out of Danny’s left eye because of a
blocked tear duct. While he did so, there had been a storm outside and the wind
moved a tree branch against the bedroom window. Danny turned to the soft
sound of the branch scraping and smiled. It had been his first genuine smile.
The man finished cleaning the utensils. He eased the grill backwards
on its wheels. “Heard your wife is expecting. My wife is two months pregnant.
We’ve obeyed that superstition of not telling anyone before three months, but
I’m telling you.”
“Why?” Sean asked
The man shrugged. The whites of his eyes shone in the darkness.
24
Josh Penzone
“Because I’m fucking thrilled and I can’t keep it a secret anymore. If I
tell any of them,” he nodded towards the remaining partygoers, “then everyone
knows. If I tell you, then, maybe it’ll be just between the two of us.”
The woman dressed like a flag was gathering all of the little flags that
lined the yards. Lance Reynolds was shouting goodnights from the front porch.
“Thatchers! We’ll talk business tomorrow. Havenshaw said he’d keep making
payments on his house until your house sold. This deal is as good as done.
Welcome to the Peephole, Thatchers.” Lance checked his phone and walked
inside. His porch light flashed once. Was it a signal?
Try not to overthink it.
The good-looking man rolled his grill up his driveway. A pretty woman
was waiting for him in the lit garage. That made two pregnant women on the
street.
Ellen hugged the pregnant women she’d befriended and walked slowly
towards Sean. She was holding her back and moving like she had ten blisters
on each foot. “I’m beat. You need to drive home,” she said.
“I can’t,” he said, gulping down the last bit of his can. He thought she
was going to frown or give that disappointed look, the one she had perfected
over the years when he had done something wrong, but all she did was smile
and said she was happy he had a good time.
Sean and Ellen walked back to the Havenshaw place. The woman
dressed as the American Flag waved at them as she gathered the last of the
little flags. They entered Havenshaw’s front door—as if they lived there—and
walked to the kitchen. The lack of any furniture didn’t seem to register with
Ellen as she opened the refrigerator and grabbed a bottle of water that had
been in the basket.
“Wow! I am so tired.”
“Did you have a good time?” Sean asked.
She nodded as she yawned. “Celia and I saw you getting along with…”
“Zak.”
“Yes. Zak. Celia and Zak. And they don’t want to know what they are
having either. A surprise, just like us.”
Ellen buried her head in Sean’s chest, making a soft, pleasant moan.
“I really can’t drive,” she said. “This little guy inside me has just zapped
me. I need a nap. Then we’ll go.” She smiled and went back to the spot she had
slept earlier. “Come here and keep me warm,” she said.
25
The Scratch
On the way in, Sean had gotten a blanket from the trunk of the car. He
spread it out on the floor. He took a bag of hotdog buns and set them down as a
pillow. She put her head on it. Then he inserted a package of hamburger buns
between her knees as she lay on her side.
“This is nice. Thank you. Just a quick nap,” Ellen said. “Just a quick
nap and then we can go.” She curled the other side of the blanket over her
and almost instantly began her usual soft snore that had become something
of a hypnotic calm to Sean over the years to help him sleep. And even though
he was sure it had been there recently, he couldn’t remember the last time he
heard it.
His phone, which he had forgotten on the counter, beeped. Voicemail
form earlier. It was the inspector. The Havenshaw house was to code.
He lay next to Ellen. He looked at the recessed lighting in the great
room and wondered how he’d replace the bulbs when they burned out. They
seemed so high. He smelled fresh air. The window was open, but the night
was so quiet he hadn’t noticed. Not even the bugs were interested in noise. He
spooned Ellen. The berry scent was gone from her hair, replaced with summer.
He angled his right arm to support his head as his left draped over her. He
cupped the bottom of her pregnant belly. No movement. The baby must be
asleep, like his mother. He looked up as one of the bulbs flickered. He closed his
eyes and listened.
26
Buzz
Joshua Aaron Crook
Jayden watched his grandfather jab a finger against the cellphone screen
like the thing was guilty of something. He grinned as his grandfather’s eyes
squinted and went wide or as the screen was brought closer or farther away. In
the end, his grandfather shrugged. Jayden fell back into the pillow on his bed
and his grandfather crossed his legs on a chair a short distance away.
You know, there was a time when we didn’t have the internet at all, his
grandfather said. We just had to know things. Where things were and how
things were done.
Didn’t have the internet?
Nope. Can you imagine?
Jayden shook his head and said, How did you Google?
We didn’t. We had an Encyclopedia Britannica, the grandfather said.
The boy’s eyes went wide like the name was a sacred recollection of some
old holy book, unheard of and foreign.
It had about everything you could imagine in it.
Like the internet?
I suppose so. Maybe not as much as the internet.
How did you play games?
We played them outside. We would kick cans or make sailboats to float on
the creek. We’d play football, though the ball was always deflated ‘cause it had
a hole in it. Sometimes we wouldn’t do anything at all but sit there and watch
things.
That doesn’t sound like a lot of fun, Jayden said.
Fun meant something different before. You’d have to use your
imagination.
What?
Your imagination. You know, when you just think things up in your head.
Jayden laughed. It wasn’t that he’d never done it, but it sounded funny
coming from his grandpa.
27
Buzz
Where’s grandma?
Where is she ever?
Jayden grinned again. What did you imagine? he said.
We imagined all kinds of things. We used to imagine we were old enough
to drive when I was your age, so that we could go out on the circuit and pick up
girls.
Girls?
Girls were different back then, too.
I don’t like girls.
We didn’t either, but we pretended we did.
I guess I like grandma.
You guess?
Yeah.
His grandfather grinned and whispered, I guess I do too.
What else? Jayden said.
Well, you ever heard of Buzz Aldrin?
Jayden shook his head. I heard of Buzz Lightyear.
Same thing I guess, his grandfather said. We used to dream of space. Of
going to outer space and seeing things and walking on things that no one ever
set foot on. We spent the majority of our days walking around town trying to
find something no one had ever done, and I don’t think we did. There was one
time Harry McKinsey drank old rainwater out of a rusted trough, and I don’t
think that’d been done before. But space was all something no one ever did, and
that sounded nice to us.
What’s a trough?
Something that doesn’t matter anymore.
Jayden nodded.
Can I imagine?
Sure you can, his grandfather said. You already do when you play with
your toys and whatnot.
About space, Jayden said.
I don’t see why not.
What should I imagine about?
His grandfather shrugged and said, With space you can imagine just
about anything you want, I think, because there’s no tellin.
Okay, Jayden said. He closed his eyes and his body became tense beneath
28
Joshua Aaron Crook
the blankets. His hands were curled near his chest where the blanket crested
and his eyelids fluttered.
Don’t imagine too hard, or you might break something.
Jayden relaxed some.
What do you see? his grandfather asked.
Stars. A bajillion of them.
That’s an awful lot a stars.
So many, Jayden said.
What else?
Jayden looked at his grandfather with anxiety through his helmet. There
was sweat on his forehead and the red light of the GO button was blinking and
reflecting in the clear glass. He nodded once and his grandfather in the seat
next to him nodded back and Jayden slammed his whole fist down onto the
button and it turned green.
Commencing launch sequence, a voice said from somewhere, and it
sounded like a woman robot. Everything started to shake. Jayden gripped the
arms of his chair and stared forward through the glass of the hull and watched
the stars buzzing around in distant space like light bugs all lost. They all at
one time became long white streaks coming toward the two of them like a run
through a dark canopy and just as Jayden became frightened with the shaking
force his grandfather put a hand over one of his own and they shot through the
stars together.
They passed every type of thing. There were planets made out of Jell-O
and aliens with hands for heads and eyes for belly buttons. They waved,
and Jayden and his grandfather waved back. Huge spaceships flew by and
they were made of building blocks of all kinds of colors. They went splashing
through a huge stream of white and Jayden flinched and looked at his
grandfather.
The Milky Way, his grandfather said.
Oh. Where are the cows?
His grandfather pointed to the hull glass, and Jayden looked and there
they were. Cows that were white and black and brown and they were mooing
and spinning around hopelessly in space but none of them seemed to mind it
much. Jayden laughed. There were planets that were entirely cities and some
that were entirely trees. One planet had arms out to its sides and it waved
them in a weird unison like someone trying to swim that didn’t know how.
29
Buzz
We have to go higher, Jayden said.
His grandfather nodded and Jayden went for the controls and hit UP
and held it there. They floated higher into space and Jayden knew it because
he started going through clouds. His grandfather looked at the clouds and
smirked.
I didn’t know there were clouds in space, his grandfather said.
If you go high enough there is.
I see.
Grandpa, what did you want to do in space?
Well, I wanted to walk on the moon. So that’s what we would do.
Walk on the moon?
Yep. We’d pick up rocks and bring them home to your great grandma and
grandpa and they were from the moon.
Did they keep the rocks?
They kept an awful lot of rocks, if I remember right.
Jayden smiled and kept holding the UP button. The clouds were far below
them now and his grandfather tried to lean forward to see what was above
them.
How high do you intend to go after all? his grandfather said.
Just a little higher.
Did you know that there are a billion trillion stars in our universe?
Jayden shook his head. How many times is that on my hands?
Well.
Like fifty billion?
That seems close enough.
That’s a lot, Jayden said.
The air in the cabin became richer. A light poured into the cabin that
was immense and Jayden’s grandfather put a gloved hand over the glass of
his helmet to protect his eyes. The light came in chromatic waves of color, like
rainbows through a waterfall, and eventually his grandfather brought his
hand down and just watched the whole thing in awe of it. The beeping and
rattling sounds of the hull went low and suddenly they felt like they were both
floating, but they were seated still. Jayden looked at his grandfather and his
grandfather looked back.
What’s happening?
I think we’re there, Jayden said.
30
Joshua Aaron Crook
Where, Jayden?
Heaven.
Heaven?
It’s above space.
His grandfather looked out again and they went through a thick shelf of
clouds and erupted over them and sitting atop them all was a city made of a
shining white stone and there was gold running through it like a long thread of
embroidery. People with wings were walking around in each direction with the
clouds at their feet and they looked back and pointed at the ship but none of
them were frightened by it.
Jayden.
Jayden leaned forward and released the UP button and watched the
people crowd below, their flapping wings and their smiling faces. They were
cheering and waving from below. Then, beyond the growing crowd of angels
was a gate that opened with a blast of golden light and it struck the hull like
the exhaust of a rocket and Jayden’s grandfather looked away and shielded his
eyes but beneath the veil of that which hid him he saw his grandson and he
was smiling and standing up from his seat and his hands were flat against the
protective hull of the ship and he whispered something indeterminable. He was
bathed in gold and he seemed happy there with whatever he saw.
Sometimes there’s only one of something and there isn’t anything else like
it, Jayden said, and his voice was a reverberating echo, an internal dissonance
within the light like the sound waves were shocked by it, but his grandfather
heard and nodded and all at once the light went out and his grandfather closed
his eyes and when he opened them, Jayden was asleep in his bed and he was
smiling. His grandfather sat cross legged on the chair a short distance away.
He stood up from the chair and glanced at the picture of Jayden and his
mother on the dresser and he went to it. He lifted it up and brushed a hand
across the picture and put it back down. He went downstairs, and his wife was
there, making coffee and cutting up an apple.
You been up there for a while now, she said.
There was an awful lot going on.
I made coffee. You want any? I know it’s late.
I’ll take a cup.
She made him a cup, and she poured in the cream and the sugar the way
he’d wanted it for the previous twenty five years. This time, he stopped her at
31
Buzz
the second spoonful of sugar by putting his hand on her shoulder.
I love you, he said to her. I know I ain’t always been the best man and
things ain’t always been right, no matter how hard I tried to make them, but I
love you, and that’s all, really.
She laughed at him and blushed and said, You alright?
I’m alright. Never been alrighter.
She smirked and put the next spoonful of sugar into the cup and handed it
to him and said, I love you too, you crazy old man. Now get your head out of the
clouds and come over here and sit with me.
He did and he went and he sat.
32
Oscar Rodriguez
Choosing My Reader
First, he would be wearing a long black coat
Taking refuge from a cloudburst
Under the awning of a bookstore,
Contemplating the rhyming of a thousand
Little sounds.
Tiny pools mirror the pearl sky.
Leaves float on water as if ants
Carried them on their backs.
Burying his chin inside his chest,
He will enter the store.
A shiny copy of my poetry sitting
On small a table will pull him in
Like a golden watch.
He’ll open it to a random page
And skim the lines.
The rhyming stopped.
He’ll put the book inside his coat
and pull it out later
to use as an umbrella.
33
Alannah Taylor
The Sonnet of the Chicken
Look how the outside of an egg is cold
Yet here inside a brand new life is dawning
With soft small body and feathers of gold
Soon to wake you early every morning.
Let me compare love to this simple bird
Which clearly was not born to run or fly
As love alone can’t speak a single word
But nobody can help but hear its cry
Shall I compare thee to a chicken’s feather?
Each one soft, secure and warm to touch?
Like you and I, they’re side by side, together,
The chicken without these would not be much.
So let love not be airy summer’s day
But little chicken sleeping in the hay.
34
Secrets of the Fells Inn
Columbkill Noonan
Marya Kozlowski had no recollection of her Grandpa Gomulka, and her
memories of Grandma Gomulka were quite dim. All that she could recollect of
Grandma (her mother’s mother) was a stern, hostile presence that emanated
such a degree of constant and severe disapproval that Marya and her brother
Teodor had done their best to stay out of the old woman’s way.
Teodor, who was Marya’s elder by three years, remembered Grandpa
Gomulka (who had died while Marya was still just a baby) had been much the
same as Grandma. Teodor told her that Grandpa was as mean and nasty an
old man as could be, and was liable to strike out with the back of his hand or a
whip of his belt for the smallest of transgressions. Teodor said that Marya was
lucky that Grandpa had died before Marya had grown old enough to annoy him.
Marya also remembered that Grandma had hated Marya’s father. Even
though Marya had only been five when the old woman died two years ago, her
grandmother’s hatred of Karol Kozlowski had been so obvious, so pervasive,
that even a child could feel it like a cloud of toxic air.
Grandma had refused to speak to her son-in-law, except for when
absolutely necessary, and when she did speak to him she used a clipped,
cold tone that was even worse than that which she used to address everyone
else. Whenever Karol happened to be in the same room with the old woman,
Grandma would pinch her lips together and glare icy daggers at him, so that
everyone felt very uncomfortable.
Teodor said that it had been much the same with Grandpa Gomulka.
He said that he had heard them saying that Karol wasn’t good enough for the
children’s mother, Anka, their daughter. It seemed that Karol’s family had
been too poor, and Karol himself too blue-collar, while they fancied themselves
quite cultured and educated. That neither of them had ever gone to college
didn’t seem to matter to them; what mattered was that Grandpa had had an
inside kind of job, while Karol was the sort of man who worked outside. Neither
Marya nor Teodor could make heads nor tails of this logic, but that was how it
35
Secrets of the Fells Inn
had been, nonetheless.
Also difficult for the children to understand was the nature of what was,
to their grandparents’ minds, Karol’s biggest transgression: the fact that his
mother had been German. What this had to do with Karol, or how such a silly
thing as his mother’s birthplace could be held against him, completely mystified
Marya. What could he possibly do to change it, after all? It wasn’t as if you
could choose your parents, thought Marya. And why on earth would being
German be such a bad thing anyway?
Marya didn’t know much about history yet, having only just started
second grade, but Teodor said that there had been a big war a long time ago,
and that the Germans hadn’t been very nice to the people in Poland, which is
where Grandma and Grandpa Gomulka were from. Still, Marya was pretty
sure that her father had been just a little baby at the time of the war, and so
couldn’t possibly have done anything terrible to the Polish people.
Teodor told her that they had been very angry when Anka became
pregnant with Marya. He had overheard them yelling at Anka, and told
her that she should stop bearing children to ‘that classless German’. They
asked her how many of ‘those horrible German babies’ she expected them to
accept, and they had said that they would be damned (Teodor had delivered
that forbidden word with delighted relish, and Marya had been shocked and
titillated at such a grown-up word coming out of her brother’s mouth) before
they would allow any German to get one ounce of their money.
Marya was also pretty sure that if her father was part-German, then that
meant that both she and Teodor were too, which meant that the two of them
were ‘horrible German babies’. Or, she supposed, they were now grown into
‘horrible German children’, since they weren’t babies anymore. She felt a surge
of anger, because she didn’t know what she could do about being German, and
she wasn’t really sure if it was really a bad thing, or just one of the many other
perfectly good things that Grandma and Grandpa didn’t like. Probably the
latter, she thought, since Grandma and Grandpa seemed to hate everything.
Including, Teodor told, each other. And anyway, weren’t grandparents
supposed to get excited about grandchildren, and not worry so much about
where the other grandparents were from? It all seemed very stupid to Marya.
Whatever her grandparents’ strange reasoning on the matter was,
Marya knew one thing for certain: the house seemed much more peaceful
since Grandma had died. She knew that she was supposed to feel sad, but she
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didn’t. She supposed that made her a wicked little girl, to be glad that her
grandmother was dead, but it was the truth of it and there was nothing that
she could do about that. Just like there was nothing she could do about being
German.
The house where Marya lived with her family was a big brick rowhouse on
Thames Street, right on the waterfront in Fells Point. The bottom floor housed
a bar, called the Fells Inn, which her grandparents had owned since they
immigrated here from Poland just after that big war that Teodor had told her
about. The three floors above the bar were where the family lived.
Sometimes Marya thought that it was a bit strange, living on top of a bar.
There was a pier only a couple of hundred yards away from the place, where
ships bringing their cargo into Baltimore would dock. The dock workers who
unloaded the ships always came to the Fells Inn after work, and sometimes
they grew quite noisy, which could be annoying.
Nobody else she knew lived on top of a bar. Nobody on TV, either. The
Brady Bunch family certainly didn’t have a bar underneath them, with noisy,
dirty dock workers yelling and singing while Marcia and Greg and Peter and
Jan and Bobby and Cindy tried to do their homework. And the Brady Bunch
certainly didn’t have a nasty old Grandma who hated everyone for things that
weren’t even their fault. Which was why it was better now that Grandma had
gone; there were still the drunk dock workers to deal with, but at least there
was no Grandma shooting dirty looks at everyone.
Marya often wondered why Grandma and Grandpa had let them live
there with them, if they hated them all so much. Teodor said that it was
because Grandpa had gotten too old to roll the kegs of beer up the stairs from
the basement to the bar, and so had needed Karol to come in and do the work
for him.
Marya supposed that might be enough reason, but she suspected that
perhaps Grandma and Grandpa actually liked having someone around to
dislike. It had always seemed to her that Grandma had sort of enjoyed being
angry. She wasn’t sure why she thought such a strange thing, but she thought
that she remembered Grandma’s eyes lighting up when she yelled, the way
that Teodor’s did whenever he saw a fire truck, or Anka’s did whenever
Karol brought her a bundle of flowers. Marya couldn’t imagine why someone
might like to be upset; it didn’t make any sense to her whatsoever. But then
again, grown-ups were strange people, and often did things that Marya didn’t
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understand.
That Karol and Anka had inherited the place had apparently been a
stroke of luck. Marya overheard her parents talking and laughing one night,
about how Grandma had been trying to sell the building before she died. She
hadn’t wanted Karol to inherit anything of hers, and was willing to sacrifice her
daughter and grandchildren just for the spite of it. But, her mother had said,
the old bat had died before she could find a buyer, and so the house and the bar
went to Karol and Anka.
Marya was shocked to hear her mother laughing and calling her own
dead mother an old bat (even though Marya agreed with her wholeheartedly
on that matter). She supposed that this made her mother wicked too, since a
person shouldn’t laugh and joke about their dead mother. But strangely, this
made Marya feel better about her own wickedness. She must have got it from
her mother, just like she got her German-ness from her father, and therefore it
couldn’t be helped.
So, the house really was more peaceful without angry grandparents
stomping about and yelling at everyone and giving them dirty looks. But
there was still something about the house, a wrongness, an air of tension that
lingered there. Marya, having known no other home in her short little life,
didn’t realize it, but the things that happened in the house were not normal
things. Nor were they quite natural, or even entirely sane.
Odd things happened sometimes. Doors opened themselves if they were
closed, and shut themselves back up if they were open. Scrabbling sounds came
from behind the walls. Karol said that it was just mice, but Marya couldn’t
imagine a little tiny mouse making a noise so big.
More troublesome were the shadow people, as Marya and Teodor called
them. The shadow people were not really people at all, or even proper figures.
The children knew this, but could come up with no other way to describe
them. The shadow people were like a mass that seemed to absorb all light
(or, perhaps, was a place so dark that the light daren’t go). It was difficult to
look directly at them, because they were constantly moving, and shifting, and
growing larger or smaller by turns. But, to Marya and Teodor, they looked
vaguely person-shaped, and so they called them shadow people.
The shadow people came at all times. They’d move about in broad
daylight, flitting from corner to corner, stealing the sun from open windows,
casting a gloom about the house on cloudless days. But they were most
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frightening at night. At night they seemed larger and more ominous, as though
they fed on moonlight and darkness.
Sometimes, the shadow people woke the children up, and pressed their
dark faces close to theirs. At those times, the children both fancied that they
could almost see terrible angry eyes in the otherwise featureless blackness, and
that they could smell the foul, warm breath of the thing as it stood over them.
Aside from the occasional terror caused by a nocturnal visit from the
shadow people, Marya and Teodor were so accustomed to all of this that they
barely paid it any mind. They learned to ignore the sounds in the walls; they
learned to avert their eyes and not look whenever the shadow figures lurked
nearby. And when they’d wake up in the night, shaken by an unreasoning
terror and a sense that there was a figure looming over them, they knew not to
look up at it, but to instead keep their eyes firmly shut until the feeling passed.
Things went on like this for a couple of years. But then, Anka and Karol
called the children to them one evening, and asked them to sit down at the
kitchen table. Marya and Teodor, worried that they were in trouble, complied
nervously.
But their parents had big smiles on their faces as they sat down at the
table with their children.
“Teodor, Marya,” said Karol. “Your mother has some wonderful news to
tell you.”
“What is it, Mom?” asked Marya excitedly. “Is it the puppy? Are we
getting the puppy?” Marya had been after her parents to get her a puppy for
some time now, but with no luck thus far.
“No, no,” laughed Anka. “It’s even better! We’re having a baby. You’re
going to have a baby brother or sister!”
“Ooh!” said Marya, trying to look pleased. It was clear from the way her
mother looked expectantly back and forth between Marya and Teodor that it
was important that they seem excited. She supposed babies were nice and all,
but puppies were definitely infinitely preferable. Still, she didn’t want to insult
the baby or hurt its feelings by being disappointed, so she put a big smile on
her face.
Teodor, sitting beside her, still hadn’t said anything. Marya looked over at
him, wondering if she would need to goad him into feigning joy along with her.
She lifted her foot, ready to give him a self-righteous kick to the shins, but the
look on his face stopped her cold.
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All of the blood had gone from his face, except for two unnaturally bright
rosy blooms on the apples of his cheeks. His expression was slack, as though he
might pass out.
“Teodor?” asked Anka, her smile fading at her son’s odd reaction to her
news. “Teodor, are you not happy about the baby?”
But Marya had a feeling that this had nothing whatsoever to do with
Teodor’s feelings about babies. She felt this because she, too, now sensed an
awful tension in the room that wasn’t coming from any of the people there. It
felt like the air had gotten very thick and filled with static electricity, so that
it was hard to breath. But more than that, something just felt wrong. Like the
feeling that she had when she woke up and the shadow people were standing
over her bed.
She followed Teodor’s eyes to where he stared so intently. He was looking
at the pot rack that hung over the stove. Frying pans and soup pots hung from
their handles from the sturdy metal ring that was suspended from the ceiling
by three thick metal chains. The thing was very sturdy and incredibly heavy.
It didn’t move when someone pulled a pot down from it, or even when all of the
pots had been taken off from only one side. But Marya saw that it was moving
now, swaying side to side as though it were a tree bough in a gentle breeze.
The tension increased in the room as the children stared, transfixed. At
last it became almost unbearable, as the big heavy thing swung faster and
more wildly on its tether.
“Teodor? Marya?” asked Anka, wondering what was going on with her
children, that they should be staring so fixedly across the room with what
looked like abject fear on their faces.
She glanced nervously towards the stove, but she did not see the swinging
pot rack.
“Come on now, kids,” said Karol at last, with some exasperation. “You’re
mother is having a baby, and this is how you react? How do you think that
makes her feel?”
Teodor at last managed to speak. He raised a shaky finger to point at the
stove, and croaked, “The shadow, Dad. Look. Please look.”
But Karol didn’t get a chance to look. At that moment one of the pots
broke free from the rack, and flew across the room. It struck Karol in the
temple just as he began to turn his head.
Karol cursed and clutched his head as the pot clattered noisily to the floor.
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Anka screamed, startled. The pot rack, though, stopped swaying. Teodor and
Marya, released from the terrible tension, ran from the room together.
When they had gotten upstairs and shut themselves up in the playroom
alone, Marya turned to face her brother.
“What did you see, Teodor?” she demanded. “Was it the shadow people?”
“Yes, well, sort of,” he replied, his face hidden in his upraised hands.
“What do you mean, sort of?” Marya stamped her foot impatiently. “Was it
a shadow person or not? You have to tell me! I didn’t see!”
“Marya,” he said, his eyes wide with terror. “The shadow person doesn’t
want the baby to be born. And the shadow person was Grandma. Marya, I saw
Grandma.”
And so began two months of hellish torment for Marya and Teodor.
Doors were flung open more often, and with more force than before.
Sometimes, a door would catch one or the other of the children as they walked
or ran by. Marya’s front teeth (which were admittedly already loose) were
knocked out in this way.
The scrabbling sounds behind the walls became more insistent, as though
some large creature were trying to claw its way out.
Teodor told Marya that a few years ago someone in the neighborhood had
found the skeletal remains of a monkey hidden in a bricked-off old chimney. It
was assumed that perhaps a pet monkey had escaped from one of the ships a
hundred or more years ago, found its way into the chimney, and been trapped
there. Not knowing of the grisly, rotting prisoner within, the old owners had
closed off the chimney, essentially mummifying the poor chimp for future
renovators to discover. After he told her that, she was certain that the thing
scratching about in the walls must surely be the ghost of that poor dead
monkey, trapped and left to die so long ago. This made her feel very sad, and
she crossed herself in honor of the monkey every time she heard it rustling.
More frightening was what began to happen with Marya’s dolls. She had a
large collection that consisted of baby dolls as well as stuffed animals and hard
wax figurines of horses. She took wonderful care of her dolls, because she loved
them so very much.
But the dolls were never where she put them anymore. This in itself
was not unusual for the house; Marya had long ago gotten used to things
moving themselves so that she couldn’t find them again. Now, however, it was
different. And it was much worse.
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The dolls were not just moved anymore. Now when she found them, they
were changed, damaged, defiled. Baby doll heads were twisted around so that
they faced backwards. A stuffed frog’s head might be placed on a teddy bear’s
body. The legs were broken off of her beloved wax horses and jabbed into the
eye sockets of a stuffed animal.
Each time she found her beloved dolls thusly traumatized, she would
cry sadly as she did her best to fix the damage that had been done. But it was
impossible for her to mask the injuries entirely, and soon most of her dolls bore
obvious seams from where she had stitched their heads back on ( or turned
them back the right way around), great buttons sewn on where once there had
been eyes, or glue dripping down crooked wax legs where she had done her best
to reattach them.
But the most terrifying thing of all was the pictures of Grandma and
Grandpa Gomulka that hung in the attic playroom. The room housed most of
the children’s toys, and was fitted with a set of bunk beds. The children loved
to “camp out”, as they called it, in the playroom, since it felt like a vacation of
sorts.
But, one night, soon after the announcement of Anka’s pregnancy,
something happened in the playroom. Marya and Teodor were staying the
night up there in the attic, and they had had a wonderful time thus far. They
played board games, and Go Fish, and Chinese checkers, and had eaten a great
deal of chocolate chip cookies that Anka had baked just for this occasion.
All in all, it was a good night, and the children went to sleep in the bunk
beds tired and happy. Marya was especially lucky and got the top bunk, as it
was her turn.
Sometime in the night, though, Marya was awakened by voices. She
opened her eyes, confused. It sounded as though the voices were in this very
room. But when she turned over to see what was going on (maybe Teodor was
talking some gibberish or another in his sleep?) she saw something that was
the most terrifying thing of her entire life.
It was scarier than flying pots or slamming doors; worse than
dismembered dollies with their heads askew; worse, even, than dead monkeys
creeping around behind walls. She tried to scream, to wake up Teodor and to
call out for her parents, but terror stole her breath so that the only sound that
came out was a tiny, piteous squeak.
The pictures of Grandma and Grandpa Gomulka had come alive somehow.
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Their heads were extended out of the picture frames, and their necks elongated
and craned unnaturally to the side so that they might look at one another.
It seemed that they were arguing. They spoke in Polish (which Marya
could recognize but not understand). That was why she hadn’t been able to hear
what they were saying, why she had thought that Teodor must be muttering in
his sleep. Though they whispered, their voices were harsh and angry.
Soon, though, they raised their voices, first Grandma, then Grandpa, until
at last they were yelling at each other. Still Teodor slept on. Marya cowered in
fear under her blankets, staring at the impossible heads that stuck out from
the wall, screaming at one another, until at last she could bear it no more.
Terror lent her bravery, and she bolted from her bed. Not bothering
with the steps of the ladder, she simply slid down one of the side poles like a
fireman, and dropped onto the bunk below. She landed directly on Teodor, who
awoke with a start.
“What the…” he mumbled groggily.
“Shh!” she whispered. “Look!”
And look he did. When he saw what was happening, saw the ghostly faces
of their grandparents jutting out from their photographs, he clutched onto
Marya’s arm. They sat there, too frightened to run from the room, praying with
all their might that this might stop soon. They cried, too, as silently as they
could, not wanting to attract the attention of the dreadful spirits.
But even as they cowered there, pressed as far into the shadows in the
corner of the bottom bunk as they could go, Grandpa said something that made
Grandma shut up. Instead, a sly nasty look came over her face, and her eyes
turned sidelong towards the children.
“Be quiet!” whispered Teodor into Marya’s ear. “Don’t make a sound.”
“Yes, that’s right, be quiet,” said Grandma in a strangely sweet voice that
was all the more terrifying because the children knew that was not her real
voice; no, it was not her voice at all but was instead something meant to trick
them, to lull them, so that she could hurt them all the more. It was like the
voice of the witch in the fairy tale, who tried to lure children into her house so
that she could bake them in her oven.
Grandma was looking right at them now, and although they were well
hidden in the darkness, they knew that she could see them nonetheless.
Marya couldn’t help it, the fear was too great for her to bear, and so a
frightened little cry escaped from her. Teodor clamped a hand over her mouth,
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but it was too late.
Grandma Gomulka’s face contorted into a rictus of evil rage.
“Shut up!” she screamed. “Shut up, shut up, shut up, you stupid children!
Shut your stupid little mouths, or I’ll shut them for you!”
With that, her face stretched forward closer to Marya and Teodor. They
watched in helpless agony as first one hand, then another, crept up to grasp the
edge of the picture frame. It looked as though she meant to climb entirely out of
the picture. And it looked as though she might succeed.
Surely this wasn’t real, thought Marya. Surely a picture couldn’t yell
at her, couldn’t stick its face out of its frame, couldn’t emerge from the wall
to…what? Kill them? She realized that she had found her voice, and was
screaming, as was Teodor beside her.
Grandma’s picture was grunting as it tried to climb up onto the frame, as
old people tend to do whenever they exert themselves. Still, despite her efforts,
the old woman kept a keen eye on the children, fixing them in place with a
malevolent stare.
Eventually, one bony elbow succeeded in finding the edge of the frame,
and the cruel face of Grandma Gomulka lurched forward as her body found
traction and began to emerge from the photograph.
This last was too much, and the children, in mortal fear for their lives,
leapt up and ran from the room, hand in hand. They shrieked with terror as
they dashed down the stairs, certain with every step that Grandma was behind
them, and would snatch them up by their collars, and devour them. But they
reached their parents’ room safely, and jumped into the bed, still screaming.
Karol and Anka, astonished at being awakened by two screaming,
weeping children, assured them both that it was just a nightmare, that pictures
didn’t come to life and try to hurt people. Still, they had no real explanation for
how both Marya and Teodor had somehow dreamed the same dream, and so the
children didn’t believe them. They knew what had happened. They knew what
they had seen.
They spent far less time in the playroom after that, and would only go in
together, and on bright, sunny days. And they never, ever stayed the night in
there again.
Late one evening, just a few weeks after the incident in the playroom,
Marya came into the kitchen to find her mother eating leftovers. Marya
laughed at the sight of her mother’s gluttony (which was quite remarkable, now
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that she was ‘eating for two’). There on her plate was an exact replica of the
dinner they had all eaten only two hours before: peas, mashed potatoes, and a
chicken breast.
But there was something strange about the plate. It looked as though her
mother had liberally spread strawberry jam all over her food. Marya watched,
wondering if this were some new facet of her mother’s bizarre pregnancy
cravings, as Anka reached for the salt and pepper shakers. Holding one in each
hand, she upended them over her plate to sprinkle a bit more on.
No salt or pepper came out of the shakers. Instead, dreadful globs of
something red came out and plunked on top of Anka’s food. It thumped wetly
onto the food. It was thick and red and looked clotted, almost like blood. Anka
continued to sprinkle, oblivious to the foul stuff she was about to eat. Had
already eaten, from the looks of the plate.
“No, Mom!” shrieked Marya. “Don’t eat that! Can’t you see?” Marya raced
over to her mother and dashed the plate to the ground. The food splattered over
the floor.
“What is wrong with you?” yelled Anka. “Why would you do that?”
“The salt and pepper shakers! They were filled with blood! See?” Marya
pointed to the floor, where the remnants of Anka’s dinner lay spread about.
But when she looked, there was no more blood. She saw the peas, and the
mashed potatoes, and the chicken breast, but the blood was gone. There were
only flecks of black pepper and parsley visible on the surface of the fluffy white
potatoes.
“Oh, Marya,” sighed Anka. “There’s nothing wrong with the salt and
pepper shakers. Oh!” Anka clutched at her stomach, looking confused.
“What’s wrong?” asked Marya, alarmed. “Is the baby ok?”
“Yes, yes, of course,” said Anka. “I just got a cramp, is all…” she broke off
suddenly, and doubled over. She moaned in pain, clutching at her belly. “Call
your father,” she told Marya. “Now! Go!”
Terrified, Marya ran to find her father, screaming his name as she went.
She watched miserably as Karol bundled Anka into the car, and, bidding
Teodor to be in charge of the house, left for the hospital.
Karol told them not to worry; that everything would be fine. But Marya
knew that that was not true. Her father may not know it yet, but Marya did.
The baby was not coming back. Grandma Gomulka had put something in the
salt and pepper shakers. Now, there would be no baby, because Grandma didn’t
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like the baby. So Marya went to her room and cried bitter tears, and yelled
out, “I hate you, Grandma!” She fancied she heard the sound of the old woman
laughing in the distance, but that the only response. And when Karol and Anka
returned home and told the children that the baby had miscarried, Marya was
not surprised.
Everyone grieved the loss of the baby. Karol and Anka never tried again,
heartbroken as they were. They decided that two children were enough, and
that they didn’t want to risk putting everyone through another tragedy like the
one that had happened that night.
Secretly, Marya was glad that they weren’t trying to have another baby,
and Teodor agreed with her. Grandma and Grandpa didn’t want another baby
to be born here. Marya told Teodor about the terrible things in the salt and
pepper shakers, and he agreed: Grandma and Grandpa had done something to
the salt and pepper, and whatever they had done had caused the miscarriage.
They could only hope that Grandma and Grandpa would be satisfied now, and
leave them all alone.
More years went by, and still the family lived in the old brick house above
the bar. Both Marya and Teodor were accustomed to the strangeness of the
house, and after Anka lost the baby, things settled down a bit. Indeed, the place
was almost normal again.
Marya learned once more to ignore the occasional occurrence: the odd
noises in the walls; the objects that fell for no reason or the doors that opened
and closed themselves; the occasional sleepless nights filled with terror,
knowing that Grandma and Grandpa’s spirits were standing over her, wanting
to harm her. But they hadn’t been able to hurt her yet, not really, and Marya
supposed that that meant that they couldn’t, no matter how hard they tried. So
she did her best to ignore them, and, most of the time, she succeeded.
Whether or not their parents were also tormented by the spirits, Marya
didn’t know. Whenever the children screamed in the night, or told their parents
of the strange happenings, they were sternly hushed, and told not to make
up stories. So they learned to keep quiet, and simply endure their feelings of
unease and fear in silence.
Still, Marya fancied that sometimes her father would jump for no reason
at all, or that his eyes would follow the movements of shadows across the room
at night. If he saw what Marya saw, that some of the shadows had form, or that
they moved with sinister purpose, he did not say, and so she never knew.
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Eventually, of course, both Teodor and Marya grew up. They went to
college (he to University of Maryland, she to Loyola nearby). They got jobs,
and had families of their own. Teodor’s family lived in the city, just a mile or so
down Boston Street in Canton, which had grown quite upscale in recent years.
Marya lived with her family in the suburbs, in a nice split level home just like
the one the Brady Bunch had.
Both Teodor and Marya had two children, a boy and a girl apiece.
Sometimes they would bring their children for overnight visits at the old house
in Fells Point. With adulthood had come skepticism, and neither of them gave
credence anymore to their childhood belief that the angry spirits of Grandma
and Grandpa Gomulka lurked about the place. Mere childish fancy, they
thought. Just a silly game that they used to play.
Neither Marya nor Teodor ever told their children much about the strange
things that had happened in the house, not wanting to scare them. But still,
the children sensed that something was not quite right there. They loved their
Grandma Anka and Grandpa Karol, but they never wanted to stay the night
at the house on Thames Street. It was spooky, they said, and they were scared
when they had to sleep there. Marya, being a responsible adult, bade them
hush, and told them not to make up silly stories.
Once, on a Christmas Eve, Marya promised her parents that she and her
husband and children would sleep over, and so have Christmas morning in
the old brick house on the water. Teodor and his family would also be there,
and Anka and Karol were very excited at the prospect of having all of their
grandchildren to wake up to Christmas morning. The city had built up a
nice square just in front of the place, and had put up an enormous, beautiful
Christmas tree. There was a light layer of snow on the ground, and Marya
always loved the sight of the city all decorated for the holidays.
But the children hadn’t wanted to go. They didn’t understand why they
couldn’t just drive over in the morning to collect their presents. There had
been quite a bit of back-and-forth on the matter. The children whined and
complained and pouted. Finally, Marya explained to them that spending this
time together as a family meant a great deal to Anka and Karol, and so at last
the children acquiesced grudgingly. They were good children, after all, and they
liked to make their grandparents happy.
But, on the ride into the city, the mood in the car was tense. The children
were agitated and fidgety. Marya chastised them, and told them to fix their
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attitudes before they got to Grandma and Grandpa’s house.
“Fine,” pouted her eldest, Tom. “Just don’t make us sleep in the attic room
again.”
“Why not?” asked Marya’s husband, Phil. “Too creepy up there for you?”
he teased.
“Yeah,” said her daughter, Katie, who was only five. “The pictures up
there fight all the time.”
Phil laughed, and made spooky ghost sounds, thinking that it was all a
joke, but Marya’s blood froze in her veins. Suddenly she remembered back to
when she was a child herself. She remembered that the pictures had stuck
their heads out from their frames, yelling at each other, yelling at her and
Teodor. And she remembered the feeling of complete and utter terror that both
she and Teodor had felt at the time.
“Marya?” Phil was asking, poking at her leg. He was still laughing from
teasing the children, but a look of concern had begun to cross his face. “You’re
really pale, are you alright?”
She collected herself quickly. “Yes, fine,” she replied. “Just hungry, I
guess.” She forced a smile, and Phil went back to making up silly ghost stories
to scare the children and make them laugh. But, in that moment, Marya
remembered that ghosts weren’t silly at all. Grandma and Grandpa Gomulka
were ghosts, and they were real, and they wanted to hurt people. And here she
was bringing her family straight to them!
At last, though, reason prevailed, and Marya went back to being the sane,
logical adult that she was; the one who didn’t believe in ghosts, and who wasn’t
afraid of her dead grandparents. How deeply embedded childish fears were, she
thought. How easy it was for them to come rushing back to grab a person in the
most visceral of ways. Phil looked over at her once more, quizzically. She smiled
again, and forced herself to join in on his efforts to cheer the children. She was
a mother, after all, and not a very good one if she joined in on her children’s’
superstitious fears along with them.
Phil finally managed to lighten the mood of the children by mentioning
the presents that would be waiting for them at Grandma and Grandpa’s house.
The children began to chatter excitedly with speculation, so that the rest of
the ride seemed to pass very quickly. Soon enough they were pulling onto the
cobblestone street in front of the Fells Inn, and all of her fears were subsumed
in a flurry of commotion. There were presents to be unloaded, dinner to make,
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and beds to be prepared.
Teodor and his family arrived, and the children rushed about the house
with great whoops of delight as they played some game or another. Their
innocent fun elevated Marya’s pensive mood, and soon she forgot all about her
fears.
Even more years passed, and more Christmas Eves were spent in the
house above the Fells Inn, but Marya and Teodor’s children never mentioned
the arguing pictures again. Indeed, they became extraordinarily quiet if anyone
brought up the subject. Indeed, Marya asked them about it once, her curiosity
getting the better of her parental judgment, but the children had immediately
clammed up and refused to speak about it.
Karol and Anka grew older. Eventually, Anka died from heart failure, and
Karol passed away not long after. Upon their deaths, the old house on Thames
Street was bequeathed equally to Marya and Teodor.
That they would sell the place was obvious; there was no need for any
conversation on that point. Neither would have ever considered living there.
Besides, they both had children in college now, and the extra money gained
from its sale would come in handy.
A realtor was called, and at last a prospective buyer was found. The buyer
was a young man, with a pregnant wife, eager to start a wonderful life for his
family. The couple had been shown the house once, by the realtor, and had
loved it so much that they had made quite a generous offer. All that was left
to do was for Marya and Teodor to meet with the couple, and hammer out the
details.
The realtor arranged a meeting at the house, and Marya and Teodor both
arrived early. They were happy at the prospect of a sale, and yet also felt a bit
nostalgic at the thought of never being inside of the place where they had spent
so much of their lives ever again.
The realtor arrived with the buyers, who turned out to be a nicelooking young couple. The wife was heavily pregnant, and she held her belly
protectively as she looked up at the brick edifice. She smiled happily as she
took her husband’s hand. She chattered with excitement while her husband
beamed fondly at her.
Marya and Teodor watched them as they came up to the door, and then
looked at each other with approbation. Here, that look said, was a nice young
couple. These people would take good care of their parents’ house. It would be
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Secrets of the Fells Inn
in good hands.
The realtor opened the door and ushered the couple in. The young man
strode forward, his hand extended. “Hello,” he said, with a thick German
accent. “My name is Gustav Heimrick, and this is my wife, Ina.”
“Hello,” said the wife, in an even thicker German accent than her
husband’s. “So nice to meet you!” She smiled exuberantly, her joy at the
prospect of a new baby and a new home evident on her face.
Marya’s own smile faltered, and she looked again at Teodor. Mirrored in
his eyes, she saw the same thoughts that ran through her own mind.
Her first thought had been, “Grandma and Grandpa Gomulka hate
Germans. They’ll make these poor people miserable. They might even manage
to hurt them, or their baby. I’ve got to warn them!” Then, immediately after
thinking this, she had chided herself as a superstitious fool. What nonsense she
believed! Of course there were no ghosts here. And, of course, she really needed
the money…two kids in college at the same time was a terrible financial strain.
All of these thoughts danced through her mind in a split second, and
stayed there, jockeying for position in the forefront of her brain. At last, calm
reason and financial need won out, and she decided to keep her silly fears to
herself.
Of course, she knew all along that she was lying to herself. She knew that
Grandma and Grandpa Gomulka were there in the house; they were there in
the room right now, seething with that quiet hatred that had been such an
integral part of her childhood. They would indeed torment this young family,
just as they had tormented Marya and Teodor. She could only hope that they
hadn’t grown stronger, that they could only cause fear instead of real harm.
But hadn’t they already caused harm? She thought back to the baby that
her mother had lost, so long ago. She remembered the red globs that came out
of the salt and pepper shakers, bringing death to the unborn child.
But her mother had been very early on in her pregnancy, and this woman
was very far along. Indeed, it looked as though she might give birth at any
moment. Surely, the ghosts of Grandma and Grandpa Gomulka weren’t strong
enough to hurt an actual baby? Surely, even they wouldn’t be so evil. After all,
they had never hurt Marya or Teodor. Not really, anyway.
She blinked a few times rapidly, and made her decision. Smiling brightly,
she shook poor Gustav Heimrick’s hand, and turned towards the realtor. “Do
you have the paperwork now? Where do I sign?”
50
Brooke Flory
Do You Still Speak to Him?
Yes
In every sentence I speak
his shadow lingers behind.
Each letter is coated with his cologne.
My lips long to swallow the spoken words
and utter his name instead of yours.
Every moment,
he threatens to crawl out of my speech bubble
and into our life
and square up with you.
No
I only have eyes for you.
Your body fills up their every corner
and rests like teardrops in my eyelashes.
Every time I blink
your frame is like light burned
in my retinas.
You’re all I see.
Yes
He writes me sweet love notes
and poetry that encapsulates
our entire history together.
Like when we were in high school
and took AP and studied
each other across the divide of desks,
knowing we’d spend the rest of our lives
speaking to one another
if only we could get across the chasm.
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CLS Ferguson
So is Time: An Elegy
Curiosity stopped only by a burn or a cut
Questions unending for no reason other than to know
Playing touch and tackle football in ruffles and bows on the church front lawn
Riding the waves in the Pacific until lips were blue and toes were numb
We threw around the sands on the shore
You escaped through our fingers and toes
Lapping of wildflowers and honeysuckle in nostrils
Warmth of sun shining in hair
Dance of breeze encouraging lovers closer
Path only well enough marked for those who had ventured it before
Romance of youth and nostalgia
Droplets of you moistened our lips for first kisses
New York Minutes filled the calendar
Nominations and awards acceptances called
The dog guarded the window by herself more frequently
Movement transformed from fun to exercise
Food transformed from friend to foe
We used you as a pad between alarm and snooze
The stars are clearer some nights than others
The clearer, the more we rest in the past
The hazy nights keep us in the present
But the ethereal presses us to dream of what might happen tomorrow
As we simultaneously mourn the loss of yesterday
So is time
52
Sun Shine
Caleb Warner
0.
A man, tall and thin, walks down the Historic Highway 40. He carries a black
trunk full of what’s left of his home, dangling it by a hand that looks more like
a claw in the moon’s light. Locomotive, he puffs steam in cadence with each long
stride. Muscles ache. The man stops at a sign just off the road. He breathes into
his hand, and the green sign illuminates in burnt orange.
Welcome to Shamrock, Indiana
Population 2,587
Satisfied, the man continues on, singing to himself an old poem he remembers:
“While we sit boozing strong ale,
And getting drunk and very happy,
We don’t think of the long Scots miles, The marshes, waters, steps and stiles, That lie between us and our home,
Where sits our sulky, sullen dame,
Gathering her brows like a gathering storm, Nursing her wrath, to keep it warm”
1.
Midday in The Brown Jug, the barkeep, Jon Thorne, pulled a raggedy cloth
from his belt loop and cleaned the bar top for the third time in the last hour.
His spindly fingers worked at the wooden surface, moving with a strange
dexterity and grace. Bob Jones, one of the regulars, sat in a corner booth,
huddling around his beer and rubbing at his temples. The old alcoholic had
gotten a late start. Bob grumbled over a half empty beer. Nursing a headache
to be sure. “Get you something stronger there, Bob?” Jon laughed.
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Sun Shine
A bell sounded, and the front door clanged open. Jon stopped cleaning.
Charlie North and his buddy Gary Birdette strolled in. By the look of their
hands—caked red and green in wax—their shift at the Candle Factory just
ended. The dark rings around their eyes told Jon they had both pulled a double.
Old men like Bob Jones never bothered Jon because old men like Bob
made it a point to not be a bother. If they became a bother, then someone might
tell them to sober up. They just wanted to drink in peace and be left alone. But
Charlie and Gary were the belligerent type. The more they drank, the louder
they got, and the louder they got, the thirstier they got. They paid, though, and
that was enough to stay Jon’s frustration.
“Get you boys something?” Jon asked as they sat down. He swiped the
rag off the bar top and tucked it back into its proper place, in the second belt
loop to the right.
“Just a couple of beers,” Gary thrummed a waxy thumb against the bar.
“Got you covered.” Two glass mugs clinked as he brought them out from
under the bar and together under the draft spout. Out of the corner of his eye,
Jon saw Charlie slap his buddy on the shoulder, shaking his head. It was a
gesture of reproach. Not one of jovial drinking buddies.
“You ask him then,” Garry whispered to Charlie. “If it’s so goddamned
important to you.”
Jon brought the beers over. The pair of men went to examining the
palms of their hands. Gary picked at the wax under his fingernails. “You boys
got something on your mind? An itch you wanna scratch?”
Charlie took a drink and cleared his throat. “Well Jon, we’s wondering,
Gary and me, well, we heard . . . well, maybe there was something stronger you
got behind the counter. Maybe you got it upstairs, even.”
Be more specific.”
“Well, Clifton was spinning a thing to us last night about something
special you got stashed away.”
Jon chewed on the side of his mouth. “Clifton has tales from here to
queer. What he tell you now?”
Clifton Carlyle had been hired to give Jon some relief and keep the bar
open longer. Jon plucked him out of Lucky’s park. He’d been living under an old
archway after the power company hung him out to dry. Jon gave him a place
to work, a place to sleep, food. Jon didn’t do this for charity’s sake. He expected
an ex-homeless to be grateful and loyal. A perfect night attendant. Perhaps his
expectations had been too high.
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Caleb Warner
Charlie took another swig, continued. “He’s telling us you have
something that’d make a grown man cry. Burn your insides right out. ‘A real
drink for a real man’ is what he called it. Says it’s got magic in it.” Charlie
smiled. “Maybe a home brew?” Charlie bared a little of his crooked teeth, smile
growing.
“We got money,” Gary said. “We’ll pay you.”
“You set the price,” Charlie said. “Got paid today. Week’s over and it’s
been a shitty one, pallie. We want to set the weekend off with a bang!”
Jon reached under the counter, pulled out a bottle of whiskey, its cap
still sealed in red wax—not unlike the wax on the hands of his two patrons. “I
think this’ll do your trick.”
The pair finished the last of their beer. “We can get that stuff any time.
I’m talking some straight fire stuff. You got it or what? Don’t be stingy,” Charlie
said, and he gave what he must have thought was his most award-winning
smile.
Jon raised a brow. His face hardly changed, but the unease that had
worked its way under his navel tightened, threatening to turn his stomach
inside out. The feeling made him furious. Clifton would be dealt with, and he
would be lucky if he found himself on the street again unharmed.
Jon turned his fury over in his stomach and focused it up his spine and
into his face. It was an old trick that he hadn’t used in a while, but it came back
easily enough. It would end this nonsense and send these two fucks on their
way. Jon let the fury, which he felt as a burning thud that ebbed through his
veins, pool into his eyes. The world turned red and black. He locked eyes with
Charlie, and as he spoke, he pushed—there was no better way to describe it—
his hate through his eyes and into theirs.
“Clifton’s throwing you for a loop, my friends. He—” a muffled noise
from outside the bar cut Jon off. Chanting. A few heads bobbed past the front
windows. He saw signs that read, “The Devil of Shamrock!” and “Repent or
Die!”
“Goddammit.” Jon’s focus shattered. The fury left his eyes and seeped
back into the crevices of his body, waiting for the next time. The Ladies
Auxiliary were back.
A month ago, the local Ladies Auxiliary from St. Patrick’s had called for
the bar’s close when Jon announced that the bar would open for longer hours of
the day. Jon stayed open despite the small—albeit loud—outrage. Prohibition
wasn’t enough to stop people in the 20’s; a Christian boycott, made up of old
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Sun Shine
hens who wouldn’t come in anyway, wouldn’t stop people now. Even if the
whole town turned against him, Jon would always have the alcoholics. His was
the only bar. That being said, it certainly didn’t help Jon’s business to have all
that clucking about.
He would deal with the two spitfucks later. “Sorry, boys.” Jon
reflexively took the rag out of his belt loop and tossed it on the bar. “We’ll have
to continue this in a moment.” Jon pulled out two tumblers and set them next
to the bottle of whiskey. “Here. If you want it. I got to shoo some chickens
away.”
The spitfucks exchanged a glance and a frown, but Jon dismissed it.
“Good luck!” Charlie called as Jon walked out. Jon’s limber hand went
up in a wave over his shoulder, he didn’t give Charlie or Gary another look.
The overhanging door-bell chimed. Jon walked out of his bar onto
the street. The noon day sun peeked out from behind a thick cloud cover,
threatening to warm the fall day, and in a splotch of sunlight on the corner of
Main and Morton Avenue—the corner which The Brown Jug called home—
stood three old hens with their signs.
“Morning, ladies.” Jon walked over to them, hands deep in his pockets.
He would at least try to stay civil. “Ladies, I’m going to have to ask you to take
your signs somewhere else. Find a nice abortion clinic or something.”
They turned to face him. Three hens in a row ready to give him a row
with their squawking. Kathryn Birdette on the left, Rowena Jones on the right,
and Mabel Jefferson in the center. Jon had served alcohol to all of their loved
ones and relatives at one time or another.
“We are exercising our Constitutional rights, imbued to us by GOD,”
Mabel began. The sign she held read: BEWARE! THE DEVIL RESIDES HERE!
Her age alone put her ahead in the pecking order, but it was her voice and
demeanor that made her the speaker of hens, Jon guessed, not her age.
“If you’re going to protest the bar, please do it on the other side of the
street. You’re violating ordinance this close.”
“By the grace of God I am what I am, and what I am is NOT moving,”
Mabel said. The others nodded their agreement.
“Alright. I think I’ll give Allen a call down at the station.” The eyes of
Mabel’s underlings flashed with concern.
Mabel remained unimpressed. “You’re the devil,” she said, pointing a
wrinkled finger at him, “And the people need to know. They need to be warned.”
“You want to come inside and warn them? How about you come back
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Caleb Warner
later tonight when we’re busy and tell the whole town then, hm? People want to
drink and relax.” Jon pointed to the under-hens. “People in your own families.”
He looked back at Mabel, “You’re not protecting anyone. You’re just...stressing
people out. Protest all you want, just do it within ordinance distance. The other
side of the street, please.” Unease, like a wriggling worm, had returned to his
stomach, but it had returned with white-hot fire that burned all the way up to
his throat, scorching the words that came out of his mouth.
“You’re not fooling me,” Mabel said, bringing out the finger again.
These women were looking anywhere but at Mable and Jon. The signs in their
arms sagged. “You’re a tricky devil. Tricked all these people into drinking your
poison. Tricked people into paying you to go to hell.”
Just up Main Street, a couple, walking hand in hand, crossed the street,
but when they saw Mabel and Jon arguing, they turned down the intersection
at Morton Avenue. Potential customers lost, and for the second time, Jon
brought the trick to his eyes again. He had promised himself he wouldn’t use
it, wouldn’t abuse the people of Shamrock like he did in Richmond... like he did
Peabody, but in his anger, Jon couldn’t help it. And it felt good to use it, like
stretching a sore muscle.
Jon leaned in close to Mabel, locked eyes, burrowed his fury into her. “If
I’m the devil,” he said, “then perhaps it would be wise to not tread on my tail.”
“The Lord is my shep—”
Jon burrowed deeper. “Go be quiet somewhere.”
The color drained out of Mabel’s cheeks as she nodded, mouth open.
A fleck of red danced in her grey eyes. Jon looked at the other two women.
“Leave.” They nodded, and like synchronized swimmers, all three turned in
unison and took off down the sidewalk.
When they were gone, Jon shook his head. How much damage had he
just caused? His fury had a way of getting into people, burning up anything
it touched. Mabel may never speak again, fuck, she may never be able to feed
herself again. Jon shook his head harder, trying to erase the ecstasy that the
anger had brought with it. He was better than this. He couldn’t manipulate
the town into destruction like the places before. He liked it here. The festivals
celebrating the archways, the upside-down Christmas tree that Doug
Dougherty put up in his shop every year, the skydiving show down on Airport
Road. No place had been as sweet to Jon Thorne as Shamrock.
2.
57
Sun Shine
Jon walked back inside. The bell tinkled, and when the door shut
behind him the last of his small-town sentiment cut out like bad radio.
Bob Jones lay on the floor in a puddle of beer, a broken mug by his
head. The first thing Jon thought was that he had fallen of his own accord—
passed out drunk again and broken his mug on the way down—but that wasn’t
right. He had only had a few beers.
“Jesus, Robert.” Jon knelt down next to the old drunk.
“Fucking kids,” Bob groaned. At least he wasn’t dead.
“Let me call—” Jon looked up. Charlie and Gary were gone. The
whiskey on the bar top was gone. The rag remained. Did they—no they couldn’t
have—but Clifton knew, and if he knew, the lock may have been compromised.
It had only been something he picked up at the Village Pantry gas station when
he decided to stay. His good lock from home had broken a long time ago.
Jon stood, walked over to the bar, grabbed his rag, and walked back
over to Bob. “Here, keep this on your head. You’re bleeding.” Jon pulled Bob’s
hand up to meet his and grab the rag. Bob’s body obeyed. “What did they do,
Charlie and Gary?” Besides kick your ass, Jon finished in his own head.
All Bob could do was groan, and Jon already knew what they did.
Unease was back, wriggling harder than ever. He should never have left
them alone. Not those two. Maybe they just took the whiskey. Maybe that’s
all. He left Bob on the floor, walked to the back. Both the the door marked
EMPLOYEES ONLY and the door to the back alley were open. Sunlight
streamed into the back hall. “Fuck.” Jon shut the back door and raced upstairs.
His room—one of only two in that thin hallway—hadn’t been
ransacked, but the trunk at the foot of his bed lay open. Jon looked in.
Gone.
He had known it down in the bar. None of the other items were gone.
Not the crystal or geodes. Not his horn handled knife. Just the bottle. Did they
break the lock? Jon inspected it. The padlock was open but unharmed.
Clifton knew. He had told Tweedledee and Tweedledum about it in the
first place. Jon went over to Clifton’s door.
He felt like a pot of boiling water, stewing over on the burner. The
anger came like some burst oil vein, spraying hot, black fury into the world,
powering his body, compelling him to move in ways the more rational part
of his mind would not allow. He stood outside the closed door for a second,
clenching the muscles in his arms, letting the blood and fury pump into them.
Jon’s fingers extended into talons, bones crunched and expanding into their old
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Caleb Warner
shape. Another trick, and this one felt better than the last.
Jon put his boot into the door, just above the door knob. The thin plyboard door gave like tissue, shattering along scraggly grain.
“Whafuck?” Clifton shot upright in his bed. An old army blanket
puddled to his waist, revealing a bony figure and wiry muscle. “Fuck wrong
with you?”
With the speed of a striking snake, Jon lunged forward and slashed at
Clifton’s throat. Jon meant to kill him but he only hit air. Clifton had jerked
backwards, a gesture of pure instinct. He tried to roll off his bed but got tangled
in his blanket.
Jon burrowed a single talon into Clifton’s back, parting flesh like a
sewing needle parts a weave, pinning him to the dirty mattress.
“Been telling stories, Cliff.”
Clifton groaned, tried to reach around and grab at him. Jon put a knee
into the man’s back and twisted his talon.
Clifton screamed.
“They give you drugs or something? I know they couldn’t pay you better
than me.” Jon didn’t need the answers to the questions. What he needed to do
now was pursue Charlie and Gary, but the worm had tunneled deep into his
belly and struck oil. If Jon had any faults, it would be the temper. He could
normally control it, but when a vein burst, it could do nothing but empty itself.
“Don’t know what you mean,” Clifton writhed, “Gah! Take it out!”
“You took it upon yourself to tell Charlie North about the trunk, about
what you’ve seen in the trunk. You’ve repaid my goodwill with treachery.” Jon
hissed the last word like it stung coming out of his mouth.
“Didn’t mean. I didn’t mean to!”
“Do you know what that bottle is? What’s in it? Or how long it takes to
make?” Jon twisted the talon again. Clifton scream cracked. He tried to form
words but they came out unintelligible. There was no way Clifton could know
any of those things.
“Take it out!” Clifton screamed again, finding his coherence. “It burns.
Oh God, it burns!”
Jon’s fury left with the same suddenness in which it arrived. He drew
the talon out. Clifton huffed and panted under him. Jon turned over his hired
help to face him. “You made quite a mess, Cliff. Bled all over your mattress.”
Clifton clutched his wound and stared up at Jon wide-eyed, breathing like he
sprinted a mile.
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Sun Shine
“You’re a demon,” he croaked. “In a person’s skin.” His breathing grew
more rapid and uneven.
Old springs squeaked as Jon sat down on the corner of the mattress. He
eyed the blood on his black hand, watched it disappear, watched his body suck
up the liquid. Jon felt the heat of the blood flow into his hand. The warmth
traveled up his arm, mingled with his own body heat, and finally became
his own. Then, his talons gleamed clean. Jon sighed and, with great effort,
retracted the claws. When the trick ended, his human-flesh gleamed pink like a
baby’s. It would be sensitive. It had just been grown.
“I’m just a small business owner, and I’ve been robbed. Have some
empathy.”
Clifton could hardly speak between his breaths. “What’s...happening?”
“Small town people. Always so nosy,” he mumbled to himself. Jon
patted Clifton on the leg. “Don’t fight it.”
Now to find Charlie and Gary. The bottle—more specifically what
was in the bottle—had a pull. Jon could only explain it as something like a
piece of yarn tied from the bottle to his sternum bone. A drop of his own blood
in the brew—a secret ingredient for an extra kick—was responsible for the
connection.
Jon would follow the pull. It would lead him well enough and his
common sense could take over when he got close. Jon stood and walked to the
door. In the doorway he paused, turned back to look at Clifton who now writhed
and twisted on the bed, grabbing at the wound, digging at himself, drawing
steaming hot blood. The blankets around his body smoked and smoldered.
“You’re fired, Cliff.”
And Jon walked out. Reflexively, his hand went out to shut the door
behind him. Then he remembered there was no door, and he barked a laugh
that sounded closer to a cough. There was no joy in it. Jon took no joy in what
he just did, or in what he was about to do. But nothing else in the mattered now
except that bottle. Jon left Clifton alone up in his room. He left old Bob Jones
on his bar-room floor. He left The Brown Jug to burn. Before long, everything
would be ash, and no one would miss a thing.
3.
After his daughter’s fiancé had been drug up to the house to dry out, Ed
Abernathy went out to fix some of his fence posts. He wouldn’t let the drunken
idiot set him back in his chores. Even if half the day had already been spent
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Caleb Warner
helping his wife clean house. The kid would be fine; he’d sleep it off in the attic,
and Ed would tell his daughter that the boy needed to be straightened out.
Hunter would sigh or laugh, and the days would move along, as they always do.
As they always have.
Ed didn’t know that this would be last day that things moved along for
him. In fact, it was Ed’s last day that he’d be kickin’ dirt of his own accord.
Ed walked up the far end of Shoemaker Lane, where the fence around
his cattle field hooked south. He kicked the broken fencepost out of the way.
Some goon from the high school in a souped-up car had spun out on the gravel
and rammed into Ed’s fence. The car had been totaled thanks to a metal
culvert, but Ed’s heavy, gauged wire fence remained mostly intact, aside from a
few broken posts.
Rebuilding a fence felt like an exercise in futility to Ed. Some local
farmer’s boy or girl would ram into it with their dad’s tractor, hit it with their
car, cut it to get their quads through. Someone was always messing with a
fence. But, Ed supposed, if people are trying to get through the fence, that
means he was right in building one in the first place. Ed sighed and got to
work.
After setting the new post, Ed looked up, saw Jon Thorne, the
bartender from The Brown Jug, walking down his lane, kicking up a trail of
dust behind. He wore a thin grey overcoat that matched his thinning grey hair.
In the distance, his tall, thin figure looked like just another fence post.
It seemed like no time had passed when Jon Thorne finally loomed
over him. Ed thought he must have let his mind wander again, the way it often
does when he’s doing a chore. The alternative didn’t make enough sense in Ed’s
mind to even register.
“Don’t see you ‘round here too often,” Ed said. Of course, by ‘too often,’
Ed meant not at all. By all accounts, Jon was a Townie. Worked in the bar. No
good reason for him to be out here. Ed couldn’t see Jon’s eyes through the glare
of his glasses.
“I’m looking for Charlie North. He wasn’t at his trailer in town.”
Ed swallowed. Throat dry. “Mmm Charlie don’t come round here too
often, either. Townie, like yourself.”
“Tell me where Charlie is,” Jon said.
“I don’t know where he is.”
“You do. He’s fixing to marry your daughter.”
Ed didn’t much care for barkeeps. Drunks like Bob Jones always told
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Sun Shine
them too much. Barkeeps were witness to any unsightly underbellies that a
small Indiana town had to offer. “Now, Charlie ain’t trouble. Just leave him
alone. He’s a harmless idiot.” Ed leaned against the new post behind him,
knees shaky. “sides, I don’t know where he is all the damned time.”
“If you do know and are lying to me...”
Ed shrugged, made a face. He hid his fear, “I don’t know. Wish I did.”
“Ed.” Jon locked eyes with him. They burrowed into Ed as the barkeep
raised his brows. The eyes went red for half-a-second, hardly enough for Ed to
notice, and he felt his face getting hot and his throat tightening up.
Charlie wasn’t worth that, Ed decided with such clarity that it
surprised him. Ed hardly liked the boy but felt the need to defend him only out
of obligation for his daughter. Whatever Jon would do to him would be tragic,
of course. He’d likely just get a good thrashing. Nothing too bad. Ed would
feign ignorance. As far as Hunter knew, her Daddy liked Charlie. Best to feign
ignorance. Whatever row Charlie planted, he would have to hoe it himself.
“He’s drying out in my attic,” Ed said.
“Your wife in?”
“She’s out.”
“Hunter?”
“With her mom.”
“Much obliged, Ed.” Jon turned away, breaking the gaze between him
and Ed. And just like that, Ed’s face went cold, like putting his face in the
refrigerator after stoking up the woodstove. His throat loosened up.
“Charlie’s just an idiot,” Ed said as Jon turned away, “Whatever he did,
just . . . go easy on him, I guess.” Charlie was just an idiot. Whatever he did to
warrant the anger of the barkeep could be left to that. “Idiots are better pitied
than killed.”
“Send Hunter and her Mom my best,” Jon waved a hand over his
turned back, and he didn’t look back at Ed again.
Now that Jon was done gawking at him, Ed felt his conscience return.
He couldn’t just let this happen. Even if it was just a beating. Jesus, who was
having those thoughts earlier? Ed was a churchgoer, for Christ’s sake. And how
could look Hunter square in the face if something were to happen to Charlie?
He looked down at the tools in his box, lifted a hammer out.
“Damn kid’s gonna be the death of me,” Ed ran a thumb against the
smooth, hickory handle of his hammer.
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Caleb Warner
4.
Lying in the makeshift bedroom in Ed’s attic, Charlie North swore he
could feel every part of his body, inside and out, right down to the cells. Blood
poured through him, and he felt every drop as it traveled from organ to organ,
from muscle to muscle, back to his heart, up to his brain. He could feel the air
touch his lungs, his diaphragm move, his stomach shrink and grow as needed,
but none of those things were altogether unpleasant. What was unpleasant
was the heat. A rose blossom of fire had opened up the second he took a drink
from the barkeep’s bottle, like the best whiskey Charlie ever had, but unlike
whiskey—which always left him wanting more after a minute or two—the heat
had stayed, grown even in the time since he had taken that first drink.
Gary had refused to drink it. After taking the bottle, the lock had been
easy to pick, the pair had run off to the playground in Lucky’s Park. Beneath a
brick archway at the southeast corner, Charlie had popped the cork.
“That stuff smells like straight sin,” Gary had said, all levity gone from
his voice.
Charlie grinned, “Hell of a way to end the weekend. You first or me?”
“You. I ain’t drinking a drop of that stuff. I’ll stick to old faithful.” Gary
lifted the bottle of whiskey.
“Live a little,” Charlie said. Then he took a drink. The rest Charlie
only remembered in snatches, like blurry photos or an incomplete movie. He
remembered trying to climb the arch, climbing a swing set. In fact, Charlie
remembered that all he wanted to do was climb the highest things in the park.
He had wanted to fly. Only a few seconds passed, and he was being dragged
into Hunter’s place, her Pop on one side and Gary on the other.
Now, he listened to the blood rush through his body, feeling like he
could belch fire.
“Whaz in this stuff?” Charlie rolled over in his cot to grab up the bottle.
The room shifted and spun as he moved in the cot. Charlie swallowed back
some acidy vomit. He felt it go all the way back down to his stomach, swirling
there with the heat again. His stomach would bring the topic up again soon, he
was sure. When his vision and stomach settled, he looked at the bottle again.
The glass was a heavy brown, but when held up to the light, it looked
burgundy. It was half full of the liquid that sloshed around thanks to Charlie’s
unsteady hands. No labels, no identifying marks on the glass of any kind. Just
liquid fire in a bottle. He decided to set it back down on the floor next to his cot,
fearing he would drop the cussed thing.
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Sun Shine
Whatever that stuff was...it wasn’t normal whiskey. Charlie had
expected some ‘shine or something else when Clifton had spun him and Gary
on about the barkeep’s bottle. This stuff...Gary was right...this stuff was sin.
Charlie didn’t feel as much drunk or hungover as he felt like he was dying,
being consumed by the fire inside him. And with that thought, for the first time
since he had heard about the bottle, Charlie felt real terror creep up and down
his spine. This stuff would kill him. Burn him up before him and Hunter could
be married.
Hunter, oh god.
And he started crying, tears fantastically cool against his cheeks, but
it didn’t help. The fire inside was only growing, turning from just one flower
of heat into a whole flowering locust tree, full of a thousand hot thorns that
pierced him at every move.
5.
Jon hooked his thumbs under his belt as he stood looking up at the
Abernathy farmhouse. He could faintly hear the cries and mumblings of the
man inside. Jon’s fury had abated, and the worm of unease had grown too tired
to continue tunneling. Jon had resigned himself to whatever would happen
next, detaching himself from this place, this town, in preparation for it. He had
liked this town, too. Jon would be lying to himself if he said that he hadn’t felt
some sort of connection to the place now. It wasn’t the forests and caves he had
grown up in, but it was his home.
Jon shook his head of those thoughts. He would have to move on, find
a new home. After this, no one would let him stay. They wouldn’t understand.
Especially people like Mabel Jefferson, who looked to condemn him at every
move. This would only seal such peoples’ belief that he was the devil, a
demon. He understood. The connection people had with fire to their misguided
mythology’s Big Bad was too ingrained in the collective consciousness. Perhaps
he would travel abroad to an eastern country. They had a better respect,
a healthier mythology, of fire. Jon squeezed his fists, and his musculature
changed again. The claws came out, and Jon couldn’t reign in other changes.
Tendril-like spikes pierced the skin of his back as they extended from his
vertebrae. Talons burst through his boots. The whites of his eyes turned black.
He stopped himself just short of his face changing. He wanted Charlie to see
that at least.
Jon checked the door; unlocked. That’s how it was in the podunk towns.
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Caleb Warner
They kept about every light on outside, their guns loaded and leaned up against
night stands, but their front doors unlocked. Jon walked in.
The house was balmy. Sometimes old farmhouses, the ones that heated
with wood anyway, had a way of getting too hot during the transition months,
but this wasn’t woodstove heat, not dry and crackling from a fire. This heat
dripped with a wet that settled around the bones, so thick you could swim in
it. Jon dabbed the sweat on his face with a sleeve and proceeded through the
mudroom, past the kitchen, and up two sets of stairs.
The attic was worse. The heat poured and moved like boiling water in
the air.
Charlie North gazed up at Jon with wet eyes as Jon stood over the cot.
His breaths were shallow, and his blue cotton work shirt had turned black from
sweat. “What...” Charlie labored a breath, “in bottle?”
“A family recipe,” Jon shed his overcoat, tossed it on a pile of boxes. It
had holes and tears in it now.
Charlie’s eyes darted to Jon’s hands then back up to Jon’s face. It was
hard to tell—thanks to the low light in the attic—but it looked to Jon like the
skin around Charlie’s forehead and neck had started to blister. Maybe it was
just wax from the factory. “Just came back for the bottle ‘fore some other idiot
tries a swig.”
Jon bent to pick up the bottle, but Charlie’s hand went out with a snap
and clamped around his wrist. “Devil,” he wheezed. “Devil!” he said again, a bit
louder. Then, with every last iota of umph, he screamed the word: “DEVIL!”
“Not quite,” Jon felt his composure leaving, felt a similar fire to what
Charlie North was feeling, but it wouldn’t burn Jon up. It just made Jon
furious. A hot wave washing over him, blearing out reason.
Charlie continued to scream, his words garbling themselves into
nonsense. A talon swiped out, cutting the tendons in Charlie’s wrist. Another
scream and he let go. Jon needed to end it quickly, put the poor sop out of his
misery and hit the road. Charlie was a ticking bomb—if ticks were screams.
“I’m not the devil,” he felt the need to tell him, even though telling a
dead man meant little more than nothing. “I’m not like you or anyone else in
this town, but I’m not the devil. See for yourself when you’re burning in hell.
Ask the Big Bad when you’re down there.” Jon lifted his hand up to deal the
final blow.
“H-h-hang it there. Just hang it right there, pallie.”
The farmer Ed Abernathy had a hammer poised up at him. His eyes
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Sun Shine
were wide, and he reeked of fear and uncertainty. A musty smell, like rotten
potatoes or old basements.
“Now, Charlie may be an idiot, but he’s my girl’s idiot, so just hang it
right there.”
Jon didn’t want to kill Abernathy. He could still run. Abernathy seemed
like a homebody, a live-and-let-live sort of guy. He wouldn’t pursue him. Jon
glanced over at Charlie; even in the low light, Jon could clearly see the skin
blistering now. Not just wax was melting, and his cut wrist leaked steaming
blood that separated into plasma in the heat. It was about to happen. Jon did
his best to cram the anger back down his throat, and put his hands in the air.
“Yeah, okay, that’s something.” Ed Abernathy clutched that hammer so
hard his knuckles went white and hands shook. Jon moved into the pale light
coming from a cramped upper window. “Oh my God,” was all Ed Abernathy
could manage to say.
God obsessed family. God obsessed town, really.
“Charlie drank something that he shouldn’t have.” Jon, one clawed
hand still in the air, reached down and picked up the bottle. “That’s all I’m here
for.”
“BURNING!” Charlie cried, clearly, coherently. It would be Charlie
North’s last perfectly coherent thought.
“Ah shit.” Jon tried to move forward; here it came. Hadn’t seen it
happen before, but he had heard stories from others about humans drinking
the fire.
Ed blocked him, gripped his hammer with both hands to stop the
shaking that even Charlie North could have noticed. “Wait a goddamn minute,”
he breathed, “you just tell me what’s going on. Tell me how to fix this, or I’ll
brain ya.”
Jon leapt forward, slicing through the air in front of Ed’s face. Jon
bolted around Ed just as the head of the hammer slid from the handle and fell
to the floor with a dull slap of metal on wood.
“Whaddya—“ Ed said.
“BURN—” Charlie screamed.
They spoke at the same time, both cut off by the explosion.
Jon had made it through the attic hatch before the fire hit. A soft
heat licked at Jon’s back and pushed him forward, down both sets of stairs. A
deafening thuuwuuwuump broke the air above. Jon needed the fire in the bottle
like he needed to breathe. Alcoholism wasn’t a strong enough word. He would
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Caleb Warner
rather die protecting it than save himself and have to live without it.
Jon dove for the front door, dove for fresh air, bottle of fire cradled like
an infant at his breast, but the flames got to him first and knocked him hard to
his knees. Jon curled himself around his bottle and let the heat wash over him.
6.
Hunter Abernathy, riding in the van with her mom and Mable
Jefferson, saw the smoke from the end of Willow Grove Road where it turned
onto Shoemaker. The smoke towered like a titan in the crisp fall sky, and just
for a brief moment before rationality took hold of her, Hunter would have
sworn that the smoke looked like a giant, black snake swirling up into the sky.
“Jesus Christ,” her mom whispered, “whose house is that?”
“That’s our fucking house!” Hunter cried.
“Oh my god,” Mom whispered as they stopped the car at the end of their
round-about.
Black inferno greeted them.
“The devil’s here,” Mabel said. She hadn’t said a word since they picked
her up, head lolling, eyes glassy, stumbling down Morton Avenue towards the
High School. Those three words came out as clear as the sky. Until they came
upon the burning house, Mabel was the center of Hunter’s worry. Now Hunter
couldn’t find a coherent thought besides an image of a drunken Charlie playing
with his lighter. Her mind felt filled with black smoke.
The three women stepped out together, and Hunter wondered if Charlie
started it, but he had been out cold. No way. Hunter stood, wondering the same
thing over and over again, watching the black flames. The whole upper half of
the farmhouse was engulfed in these flames, the blackest flame Hunter had
ever seen. They were highlighted by whites and yellows, but their cores, the
cores of the tongues that licked higher and higher into the sky, were black. The
black smoke emanating off of them—which had looked so dark from the road—
looked grey now in comparison.
“I have to call…somebody,” Mom fumbled with her purse.
The front door burst open. “Jesus, look!” Hunter pointed, body reacting
before mind. Out of the flames and smoke stumbled a shadow of a man.
“The devil,” Mabel said, fidgeting with the little silver cross around her
neck. Her eyes rolled up into her head and drool drained down her chin.
Out of the shadow of smoke and into the clean air walked what
remained of the barkeep from The Brown Jug. Jon Thorne? Hunter didn’t
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Sun Shine
understand. His clothes were burnt off him. His skin was singed black, almost
shiny, even. His face was recognizable enough with its long nose and bald head.
His glasses still rested—though a bit askew—on the bridge of his nose. A brown
bottle swung from one finger of his left hand like how a hilljack might haul his
‘shine. What looked like several (talons?) knives dangled loosely in his other
hand.
He staggered, almost sauntered, up to them. Mom dropped her purse.
Mabel stood her ground, both hands now working at her cross. And Hunter,
only aware of the thudding at her temples and chest, backed herself into the
hood of the van behind her.
Jon Thorne raised the bottle to them with a smirk. “Can I offer you
ladies a drink?”
Hunter stopped breathing.
“No? Shame.” Jon took a swig of the liquid. Hunter heard the hiss
like red-hot metal being plunged into water and wondered if it came from the
burning farmhouse or the barkeep.
Jon wiped his mouth on his bare arm. “I guess I’ll be moving on then.”
He looked right at Mabel. “Got a load of devil shit to do.” And he winked. Mabel
fainted, plopped to the ground like she weighed nothing. Green vomit oozed
from her open mouth. Then, Jon Thorne walked past them, down the middle of
a bean field, bottle still swinging from a finger. Neither Hunter nor her mother
made a move to help Mabel. They were enraptured by the house and by the
disappearing figure of a man. They watched as black burned black and took
their home and their lives, into the sky with the ashes.
Some of the smoke stayed with the barkeep, drifted along behind him, and just
for half-a-second, it looked like Jon Thorne had wings. And then, he was gone.
68
The Little Pirate
Monica Nawrocki
My first pirate encounter occurred on an otherwise normal morning.
I was making last minute revisions to the lessons on the blackboard just
before nine o’clock when a noise took me to the classroom door. I opened it to
find Mary-Louise standing patiently in the cloakroom, tears streaming down
her face.
“Mary-Louise, what’s wrong?” I knelt beside her and began freeing her
from her winter-wear. She sighed piteously and looked into my eyes with her
light blue ones.
“I’m dead,” she whispered.
Feeling less alarmed, I nodded sympathetically and asked, “How did
you die?”
“Stabbed. Pirate attack on the swing.”
“I see. Will you be alive again now that you’re inside?”
She considered my question. “Yes, I’m alive now.” She brightened
instantly. I settled her into the book corner and rang the bell.
As the rest of the class filed in, the little schoolhouse filled with the
smell of apples and wet mittens; the sounds of laughter, arguments, sniffling
and clanking lunch pails.
And then, the pirate swaggered through the cloakroom.
I was accustomed to my younger charges appearing in interesting outfits
from time to time—surviving the endless prairie winters required occasional
flights of fancy. But this outfit was something special.
A red kerchief was tied tightly over the pirate’s head with a homemade
eye-patch covering the left eye. Bits of white cardboard glinted through
between the black wax crayon strokes. More work needed on fine motor skills, I
noted.
A large, white shirt puffed out beneath a worn blue velvet jacket with
bright brassy buttons and gold thread embroidered in intricate designs up the
sleeves. Baggy, multi-coloured pantaloons with vertical stripes were pulled
tight at the knee with rubber bands over long black stockings. A red satin sash
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The Little Pirate
tied tightly at the waist held a wooden sword in place. My pirate came to a halt
in front of me in a solid stance and placed her small fists on her hips á la Peter
Pan.
“Good morning, Helen,” was all I could manage without smiling. The six
year old pirate was not smiling.
“Good morning, Matey,” she scowled and brushed past me.
“Um, Helen, could you wait here a moment please?”
“My name is not Helen. It’s Blackbeard.”
I willed my eyebrows to be still. “I see. How did you come to be called
Blackbeard? Is there a ‘legend of Blackbeard’?”
Her eyes lit up. “Aye, there is a legend to be told.” She paused,
uncertain. “But I forget. Maybe later.” The pirate began rummaging through
the pockets of her breeches. Her hand emerged holding a wrinkled scrap
of paper. She drew her weapon and made an extravagant but unsuccessful
attempt to harpoon the note with the end of her wooden sword. After picking
it up from the floor a third time, she sighed and handed it to me. I took it and
watched Helen put on her shoes. She looked up and saw me admiring her
ensemble.
She ran her hand lovingly down the arm of her little pirate coat and
asked me, “Do you know WHY this coat is so fancy?”
“No I don’t,” I replied. “Why is it so fancy?”
“Because it’s ill-gotten gains,” she whispered. She gave me a knowing
nod and ran off to pillage the classroom. I read the note as I headed to the front
of the room.
Dear Miss Conklin,
I’m sorry, but Helen saw a pirate picture book this weekend. She is being
right stubborn about being a pirate. I really did try to get her to dress properly
for school but she will not stop. Yesterday she made our cat walk the plank into
the neighbour’s pond. We haven’t seen her since (the cat). I hope she isn’t too
disruptive (Helen). I’m sure it won’t last long.
Erika Jensen
Erika Jensen was incorrect. Helen came to school in full pirate regalia
every day for five weeks. Her accent and aggressive tone came and went but
the costume remained. It got filthy, reappeared clean. It got ripped, reappeared
mended. Eventually, the rest of the class grew accustomed to it and it became
70
Monica Nawrocki
part of the background.
My initial amusement went through brief periods of concern, but there
were never any major changes to Helen’s personality; Helen to Blackbeard
was a smaller jump than one might imagine. And the more time she spent
as Blackbeard, the more virtues I discovered in our resident swashbuckler:
she seemed to associate pirates with the heroes rather than the villains,
fortunately, and so I gained an ally on the playground as she repeatedly came
to the rescue of classmates in distress.
Then one day, Helen returned without a word. She was with us for
about a month and then Blackbeard reappeared. They switched places at
irregular intervals with no apparent pattern or trigger. Perhaps some days you
feel like a pirate and some days you don’t.
In that spring of Helen’s first grade year, a new baby arrived at the
Jensen homestead. Blackbeard re-appeared. For weeks we were regaled with
stories of the new baby’s exploits, riddled with “aaaaars” and “matey’s”.
Apparently, baby Samson could bewitch people and just for the
amusement of watching the ensuing scolding, he would cause Blackbeard
to forget to bring in the firewood. Then the amazing baby began using the
outhouse when no-one was looking and invariably failed to latch the door when
he was finished. “Guess who gets blamed?” scowled Blackbeard.
Baby Samson could also eat biscuits and kept pilfering them from the
cooling rack beside the oven. The class so enjoyed hearing about Samson’s
adventures that they began to ask Blackbeard for updates. She obliged happily
and never failed to come up with something to entertain us all.
Summer break arrived and I returned home to visit my family. On the
long train ride east across the prairies, I suddenly thought of Helen and her
wild Samson tales. I remembered as many as I could, jotting down the basic
plots in a notebook and tucking them away.
When I returned in the fall of ‘39, I found myself disappointed when
it was Helen and not Blackbeard who arrived at school. There was a notable
difference in Helen and she was not the only one. Several men in the district
had enlisted and were off to basic training that fall. A strange mixture of
sadness and excitement permeated my classroom. Arguments erupted more
easily, tears appeared more readily. It was as though each child had been
handed a box filled with brand new emotions and sent off to play on their own.
I did what little I could to satisfy their need for reassurance.
The winter passed slowly. By spring, we had settled into a new
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The Little Pirate
routine of emotional heaviness that we no longer noticed. It was not until the
time came for the men to ship out to Europe that the stupor was broken...by
Blackbeard. She reappeared, in new, slightly larger garb with a little less attention to
detail. But she made up for it in flamboyance. It seemed the pirate had taken
on a new mission and she was determined to share it with the class. When I
finally agreed to end the lessons for the day and give her the floor, she stunned
us all by jumping up on top of my desk and drawing her faithful old sword.
She told her classmates that her father was going to war and that was
scary business. She paused and looked at them all. Really looked at them. The
mood shifted.
She told us that her new mission was to keep him from harm. From
here—from home. She then told us the story of her first mission years ago: the
night she was born and had used her special powers to keep her papa safe in
a terrible blizzard. She kept him safe that night, she said, her big serious eyes
moving slowly from face to face, and she would keep him safe again.
Gone was the playfulness of her earlier tales. A tiny messenger stood
on my desk—a sage storyteller teaching courage, sharing faith. I made time for
Blackbeard every week and the year pulled forward slowly.
We saw less and less of Blackbeard as each man from the community
returned home, one by one. Amazingly, every one of them survived—at least in
body—and when the last uncle had returned, Blackbeard disappeared forever.
I imagined little Helen putting away the costume for good, unable to use it for
play now that it had been used for so much more.
For the next six years, I saved most of the stories she told or wrote. When
my time at the little school finally came to an end, I left the collection of papers
with her as I said my tearful good-byes, placing them like treasure into her
outstretched hands.
I moved on with my life and over the years, eventually lost contact
with my friends and acquaintances from the prairie school. I had all but
forgotten the little pirate, when a package arrived in the mail one day. The
return address named a Helen Jensen-Barlow as the sender. I ripped through
the untidy wrapping to find a children’s book. On the cover was a drawing of a
pirate and a baby wearing a wizard’s cap. The book was called, “Samson and
Blackbeard”. Inside the cover was a handwritten note.
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Monica Nawrocki
Dear Miss Conklin,
Thank you for seeing me as a writer before I was one; for seeing me as a
storyteller, for seeing me as a pirate. As it turned out, I have needed them all.
Helen.
73
William Doreski
Digitally Enhanced
An old blues man digitally
enhanced by slick engineers
laments the art of living black
in the wake of America’s
onrushing superego.
I commend his grief to you
because your expensive cashmere
sulks in mothproof boxes
and your jewelry gleams in a vault.
What can you say when the blues
strums the simplest possible chords
to nail you to your upright posture
with pain so tender you love it
like a romp in your calico sheets?
Your favorite lover comes to call
with a sheaf of leaflets promoting
the most recent incarnation.
His hair stands up like the shock wave
preceding a nuclear blast.
He hears the blues man but fails
to understand a word. The tune,
not being Mozart or Schubert,
also evades him, but something
groans below his belt, something
for which his god has neglected
to prepare him. I recommend
that you offer herbal tea instead
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William Doreski
of his usual dose of whiskey.
And when you take him to bed
turn down the blues music
but let the last dry chord linger
in the dusk, honing your nerve-ends
for the shyness of his touch.
75
Chad W. Lutz
Rainbows in December
Santa’s coming to town in two days,
And I’m running in shorts.
There’s a strong wind blowing warm air
Down the cracked-asphalt roads
Of my neighborhood,
Roads worn from the winters
We won’t be having this year,
The snow that will never fall.
I find it odd to see where my feet land.
Instead of brown slush and ice,
Two rainbows are piled at the end of the street,
Fresh from the storm that just blew in from the west,
Rising like ROYGBIV pillars into the mostly blue sky.
A few clouds that look like Black Angus cows
Graze in blue pastures overhead.
I can almost hear them mooing,
But, in my mind, they’re all booing,
Lost in conversation with you.
I keep trying to erase what we were
Mile by mile, word by word,
But the pages never seem to hold
Enough prose, and my legs never
Carry me far enough, fast enough.
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Chad W. Lutz
I’m exhausted, and I’ve only run two miles.
My legs ache, my mind is traveling
Faster than my feet, and I realize
I’m overdressed for how warm it is.
I think you’ll always be the girl
That tried to hit me with her car;
The one I had to convince myself to
Let touch me every time we had sex.
I turn a corner and run into the fact
You’re the same person who eventually
Told me I was an asshole
Because I didn’t like your friends
Enough to hang out with them
As much as you did.
I begin side-stepping potholes
That take the shape of you
Talking over me,
And then shuffle past,
Ridiculous expectations like
No yelling, no porn, no sadness;
The three-week-old casserole
Collecting flies and breeding
Maggots on what could easily
Have been be our countertops.
I’m flying down streets hoping
I’ll forget we took care of your virginity
At a god damn duck farm in Detroit;
One ego-boosting compliment
After another after another:
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Rainbows in December
“It’s the perfect size.”
“Thank you for being so patient with me.
You were worth all twenty-four years.”
I keep pushing, keep digging.
There you are: jumping up and down
At finish lines at six in the morning,
Not watching me run, but telling others we fuck.
You’re reading my poems and short stories,
Editing them with razor-edged criticisms,
Yet you never once shy away when I get
Upset and need a few days to digest your suggestions.
By now my face is flush
And my knees are beginning
To sweat through
My running tights.
But instead of going faster,
I slow my stride and steady my pace.
I remind my hamstrings and calves
Of the meteorological phenomena in the sky.
78
Miracles and Conundrums of the
Secondary Planets: A Review
by David Jensen
Title: Miracles and Conundrums of the Secondary Planets
Author: Jacob M. Appel
Genre: fiction/short stories
Publisher: Black Lawrence
Brief synopsis: A magician’s parrot recommends against donating a
kidney to his girlfriend. Inside an antique grandfather clock, a dying child
explores Ancient Athens. Rural Virginia is swept by an epidemic of human
resurrections. An alien disguised as a Latvian chef opens unwittingly
his restaurant opposite an abortion clinic. Jacob M. Appel’s Miracles and
Conundrums takes us to a world of hope and desperation, where everything is
possible, but so much seems far beyond reach.
Miracles and Conundrums of the Secondary Planets is not Jacob M.
Appel’s first such collection, and it hopefully won’t be his last. He weaves tales
that are both extraordinary and inherently human. Through eight separate
stories, Appel makes his reader question why people make the decisions they
do, and then, he offers us a simple answer: for love.
Each tale focuses on the relationship of its main characters. What’s
interesting is the variety of said relationships; there are the obvious romantic
ones, the familial, and even those of the pet-owner and teacher-student variety.
No two relationships are presented in identical fashion, and they are resolved
just as uniquely. They make every story feel simultaneously connected in their
focus and separate in their execution.
The most impressive part of these tales—to me, at least—is the realism
of the characters. Each has their own quirks, hopes, dreams, and faults,
detailed within only a handful of pages. They suffer through issues ranging
from the mundane to the life-changing, and their reactions only serve to
79
strengthen their character. Even the person most far removed from realism—
an alien disguising himself as a human to observe our planet’s actions—is a
complex individual that feels as human as anyone else.
Perhaps to the dismay of some readers, each story ends with some
degree of uncertainty. These vary between individuals who find themselves
emotionally lost, unaware of where their lives will take them next, to people in
a changed world, uncertain of the planet’s future as well as their own. No one
person’s story is tied with a bow, a subtle yet effective way of acknowledging
that no one person’s story can be contained within such a short format.
Miracles and Conundrums serves as a good entry point into Appel’s
work and into short stories in general. It’s sure to make devoted fans out of
many readers, as it’s already done to me.
You can find more information about Miracles and Conundrums of the
Secondary Planets and about Jacob Appel at www.jacobmappel.com.
* The writer was given a copy of the book in exchange for his review.
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About the Authors
Julia Hunsaker has been in love with poetry since the fifth grade where she
wrote and illustrated a book of poems. She strives for verisimilitude in her
writing and gets much of her inspiration from nature and emotion. Her newest
loves include her unparalleled husband, darling succulent plants, and Takara
sushi. She hopes to use writing to inspire others, and you can find these pieces
at https://wordsthatmattermost.wordpress.com/.
Josh Penzone earned his Master’s in Creative Writing from Wilkes
University. His work appears in Five on the Fifth, The Critical Pass Review,
Sediments Literary-Arts Journal and FICTION Silicon Valley. His short
story “The Whitings” was published as a single title by ELJ Publications;
it’s available on Amazon. He’s currently at work on a screenplay.
Joshua Aaron Crook is an independent American author from Lubbock,
Texas. He has written and independently published two horror anthologies
and has been featured in various literary publications. His short literary
fiction examines the human condition with Southern Gothic influence. His
inspirations include Carson McCullers, Stephen King, Cormac McCarthy, and
Flannery O’Connor. His writing is dark and introspective with a focus on keen
dialogue.
Oscar Rodriguez is a poet and student at Modesto Junior College.
Alannah Taylor is a young writer from London, currently studying in Bristol.
Columbkill Noonan has an M.S. in Biology, and teaches Anatomy and
Physiology at a university in Maryland. She writes fantasy, science fiction, and
supernatural horror. Her work occasionally bears a comedic edge, and nearly
always has some degree of an historical element. In her spare time, Columbkill
enjoys hiking, aerial yoga, and riding her horse, Mittens. To learn more about
Columbkill, and to hear breaking news about her latest works, please feel
free to visit her at www.facebook.com/ColumbkillNoonan, or on Twitter @
ColumbkillNoon1.
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About the Authors
Brooke Flory is a nineteen year old college student who is pursuing both an
English degree and Communications degree, working her way to becoming a
college professor. However, she dreams of ultimately being both a writer and
speaker, and using her career to positively impact other people’s lives. Brooke
is passionate about Jesus and loves letting His light shine through her. She
enjoys journaling and writing poetry in her free time.
CLS Ferguson, PhD speaks, signs, acts, publishes, sings, performs, writes,
paints, teaches and rarely relaxes. She and her husband, Rich are raising their
daughter and their Bernese Mountain Border Collie Mutt in Alhambra, CA.
The poem occurring here was written as a part of a workshop with Stephanie
Barbe Hammer. You can find more information about CLS Ferguson at http://
clsferguson.wix.com/clsferguson
Caleb Warner’s work has appeared, or is forthcoming, in The Literary
Hatchet, Fickle Muses, and Metaphorosis. He also has an interview with award
winning poet Amy Pickworth published in Tributaries Journal of Creative
Arts. He currently resides in Richmond, Indiana, part of the Whitewater River
Valley basin. Follow him on Twitter: @carner_waleb
Monica Nawrocki lives with her partner and dog on a remote island off the
west coast of Canada. She earns her living as a substitute teacher—often
reading under-construction manuscripts to captive classroom audiences and
happily impersonating someone different every day. She is the author of
two books and her fiction and non-fiction pieces have appeared in various
journals and anthologies in Canada and the U.S. You can visit her at www.
monicanawrocki.com.
William Doreski lives in Peterborough, New Hampshire, with seven cats.
Having retired from teaching, he spends most of his time on foot in New
England’s diminishing natural world. He also reviews poetry for The Harvard
Review and sometimes sneaks into Boston to prostrate himself before the
paintings of Fitz Henry Lane, Gauguin, Van Gogh, and Winslow Homer in the
MFA.
Chad W. Lutz was born in Akron, Ohio, in 1986 and raised in the neighboring
suburb of Stow. A 2008 graduate of Kent State University’s English program,
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Chad is attending Mills College in pursuit of an MFA in Creative Writing
with a concentration in telling lies (Fiction). His writing has been featured in
Diverse Voices Quarterly, Kind of a Hurricane Press, Haunted Waters Press,
and Sheepshead Review. Chad runs competitively and won the Lake Wobegon
Marathon in May 2015, setting the course record by nearly three minutes in a
time of 2:33:59. He aspires to qualify for the Olympic Trials.
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