Managing Editor’s Note
Welcome to volume four of Edit This!, a peer-reviewed publication created by
students in SUNY-Oneonta’s “Introduction to Editing and Publishing” class.
The journal forms the final group project in a course that also includes
textbook readings on editing, editing exercises, and client projects.
Four steps are involved in the making of Edit This!. First, students submit
academic, creative, or non-fiction works they know will benefit from revision.
Author names are removed and each piece is reviewed by two classmates and
the instructor. The author then receives a packet of anonymous reader reports
and revises the submission to address the issues raised in those reports. This
review process is intended to mimic blinded scholarly peer-review and to
provide aspiring writers with more useful feedback than the typical rejection
letter. Finally, we assemble the revised works into a small magazine.
As usual, the students proposed an organization and table of contents for the
journal, and you will see that this edition of Edit This! contains short fiction,
academic essays, and longer fiction, as well as poems and new material. These
new additions include photographs of our authors and a newsletter for parents
that was originally composed for an education class.
Edit This! would obviously be impossible without the efforts of the students; the
very first round of thanks must go to all the students in the class who
submitted, edited, and revised their writing. I would also like to thank Kim
Theodore and the art team for this year’s cover; Caitlin Weiner and the layout
team for the table of contents; and Sarah Merchant for compiling the revised
submissions into our very first draft. Lauren Hickey and the author team
collected and edited author biographies. Ruth Carr once again provided
assistance with proofreading, as did Amie Doughty. Finally, since editors so
often work behind the scenes, I want to extend a special thank you to those
students who chose not to publish their own writing in the journal but who
worked hard on the editing component. A complete list of students in the class
and a picture taken at the release party can be found on the back cover.
Suzanne Black
Assistant Professor of English
Edit This, Volume IV
Table of Contents
Short Fiction
Karma
Lemon Drops
Light and Dark
The Martyrs
The Night I Fell Asleep at the
Wheel
The Painter
Ragdoll
A Dream Sequence
Yanique Burgos
Lauren Hickey
Zachary Fahrenkopf
Susan Young
AnaMarie Brown
1
5
7
11
12
Danica Bermudez-McLaud
Kim Theodore
Hannah O’Neil
13
16
18
Essays
Instant Messenger, Texting, and Facebook: The Holy
Trinity of a Socially Awkward Generation
Native Women of The Round House: Dangers for
Women on the Reservation
Religion and Politics
Thanksgiving Dinner
Emily Manchester
21
Khrysta Garrison
25
Josh Fitzgibbons
Abigail Casale
31
34
Longer Fiction
Gazebo, Chapter 17: “The
Promised Land”
Go Tell the Devil
The Soldier of Devastating Flames:
A Soldiers of Oblivion series
story
Wait
Andrew Mastorakis
37
Margaret Leslie
Kairee-Anne Cooley
40
46
Amanda Trapanese
54
Poems
Broken
The Dog
Friend-Zoning
The Heart of Life
Loneliness
Love Poem for the Longing: A Spoken Word Poem
The Snapple Poem
When I met you…
News Article: Little Lambs Fall Newsletter
Author Biographies
Venessa Cameron
Zachary Fahrenkopf
Zachary Fahrenkopf
Sarah Merchant
Colleen Moran
Erin Fleischer
Caitlin Weiner
Colleen Moran
68
69
70
71
72
73
75
76
Rita Menhennett
77
79
Short Fiction
Karma
by Yanique Burgos
Jade wrapped her grey cardigan tighter around her waist and rushed out into
the cool December night air. The stars that twinkled like Christmas lights
above her and the flickering fluorescent bulbs that stood guard by the pump
stations were the only things that lit her way in the otherwise dark landscape.
“Just fill your tank so you can get the hell out of here,” she thought to
herself as she approached her fire-truck-red Subaru. Jade hated the darkness.
It brought back excruciating memories from that night, memories she
desperately wanted to erase from her mind.
Visions of the narrow, curving mountain road, the screeching of tires, the
burning of rubber and cries of pure, unadulterated terror plagued her
constantly. They caused Jade to shiver in even the warmest of weather.
No, Jade definitely did not enjoy revisiting the catastrophe that had
taken place five years ago.
She shook off those unsettling thoughts and forced herself to focus on
the task at hand once again. As soon as she filled her tank, Jade could finally
head home to her cozy, one-bedroom apartment, her cat Sadie, and the cool
bottle of wine chilling in her fridge. She could almost taste it on her lips. After a
terribly long shift doing paralegal work, Jade craved alcohol. She had found,
years ago, that it was the perfect way to unwind.
The numbers on the gas pump began to slow. Jade watched as the meter
came to a gradual stop at forty dollars. An unsettling sensation washed over
her suddenly, and Jade began to feel like an ant under a magnifying glass. She
felt someone’s eyes burning holes into her back from afar.
Jade fought off the suspicion as best she could, however, and quickly
shoved the pump back into its spot beside her. She twisted the gas cap closed
and reached into her pocket for the car keys.
Jade sensed that she was not alone. Though the time on her phone read
11:35PM and the frigid night air told her few would be venturing the streets
anyway, Jade sensed another presence in the lot. And the person whose eyes
bore straight through to her soul had malevolent intent. She was sure of that.
1
Quit being paranoid, she chastised herself despite the feeling of dread
that had settled deep in her gut. Jade had never been the nervous type and it
was strange that she felt so uneasy tonight. But she had to get past it. Jade
had to get over whatever was bothering her. She just wanted to be home.
Jade’s nerves caused tremors to shoot through her hands and before she
knew it, the keys to her car slipped from her grasp and crashed to the ground.
The jingling sound that the keys made as they hit pavement sounded like
gunshots in the otherwise silent parking lot.
them.
“Crap,” she growled under her breath and then bent over to retrieve
That’s when she felt it.
A gust of wind whooshed by her from behind, as if someone had sped
past. The feeling caused goose bumps to rise on her back.
Before Jade had time to react, she felt an object as sharp as nails dig
deep into the flesh at the nape of her neck.
Searing pain shot through her. Jade reached back to clasp the offending
area and felt something warm and sticky ooze through her fingers. She brought
her hand back to eye level and realized in horror that fresh blood covered every
inch. The iron smell that penetrated her nostrils only confirmed her
observation.
Jade opened her mouth to scream, but the cry came out as a feeble
whisper. She felt her throat closing in on her. Then she dropped to the ground.
What the hell is going on!? she wondered, fear completely taking over
every fiber of her being. She tried to speak, but her mouth wouldn’t open. She
tried to escape, but her arms and legs wouldn’t move.
Somehow Jade had become paralyzed. She knew there was nothing she
could do.
Jade watched helplessly as an eerie figure appeared from the fog on the
other side of the gas station. At first, she thought the figure belonged to a man.
But the way the creature slid toward her on all fours told her otherwise.
As it approached, her stomach lurched. Jade noticed the creature had
several human-like qualities. A closer look, however, told Jade the abomination
was anything but human.
2
It had slimy, green scales, eyes so small they were practically slits, a
long, hissing tongue that split in two at the end, and a strong tail that thrashed
angrily in every direction.
She knew the reptilian creature had attacked her, and the look in its
yellow colored eyes told Jade that it wouldn’t stop until she went cold.
It took every ounce of strength Jade had to peel her lips apart and
mutter a weak, “why...?”
Jade could tell the creature understood. It opened its mouth and, to
Jade’s complete astonishment, began to speak in plain English. The voice that
left the monster's scaly lips boomed throughout the gas station and oozed with
evilness. “You killed him. I kill you,” its snake-like voice hissed at her.
Suddenly Jade understood. Reluctantly, she allowed her mind to travel
back to that horrific night five years ago.
The night she lost control of her car.
The night she swerved right into an innocent man, killing him on
contact.
The night that turned her into a murderer.
That night, Jade had had a little too much to drink at the bar. It had
been an excruciatingly long day at work, and happy hour was always a good
way for her to unwind. Her friends did everything in their power to try and
prevent Jade from driving home. But she had evaded their efforts and driven off
before they could steal her keys. Jade used to think she was invincible. She
used to believe nothing bad could ever happen to her; that was, until she hit
the man.
Jade didn’t even get out of the car to see if there was anything she could
do. She took off down the road, leaving the man in a heap for somebody else to
find, vowing to never look back. It was only when she checked the news the
next morning and saw the obituaries that she discovered the man had died.
She intended to bring the secret with her to the grave. Nobody will ever know,
she thought to herself.
But someone found out.
Someone, whoever controlled the spine-chilling, bile-inducing monster
standing in front of her, wanted revenge. Pressure built behind Jade’s eyes
from pure terror as she realized tonight they would get it.
3
Jade worked relentlessly in attempts to squeeze her eyes shut. The last
thing she wanted to do was to witness her own murder as it happened. Try as
she might, however, not a muscle in her body would budge.
What kind of fate is this? Jade wondered. Forced to watch helplessly as
something else takes your life away. She realized the way she felt now had to
be the exact way that man felt the night of his death.
She knew she needed a miracle.
A second later the creature leapt into action, and Jade knew all hope had
been lost. She watched as it flew into the air, landing straight on top of her
petite frame.
The creature wasted no time.
It slashed at Jade’s body over and over again, incapable of holding back
its strength. The pain grew more intense with each passing moment, as the
monster cut into her flesh. Jade watched as crimson blood splattered in every
direction. She felt herself grow weaker and weaker with each powerful strike.
Darkness called at the corners of her consciousness and she knew she
couldn’t fight it much longer.
She wished desperately for someone to save her, but knew nobody would
come. Why would they? She deserved every bit of this.
Suddenly, the slashing stopped. The creature stared down at her blood
stained, mangled body for what felt like an eternity. Then Jade watched as her
murderer slithered back into the night and out of sight.
Jade swore she saw the face of the man whose life she cut short standing
over her.
face.
He stared down in her direction, a murderous smile slithering across his
Before she knew if he was real, or simply a hallucination from her
weakness, Jade’s eyes finally closed and everything went black.
4
Lemon Drops
by Lauren Hickey
Mark doesn’t know what’s more frightening, that he’s completely sane or that
no one believes him. He understands, of course, that people think his
childhood trauma is the cause of his apparent irrationality. And generally he
would agree, except that Luke isn’t just a hallucination brought on by grief or
some figment of his imagination. Luke is as real as the lemon drop candies
Mark constantly carries around in his pocket.
The edible yellow ovals are the one thing Mark can take with him
wherever he goes. They’re small, compact, and easy to carry. On most days the
lemon drops taste like any other lemon-flavored candy, sweet and sugary on
the outside, which then gives way to the sharp tang of lemon before dulling
again to a honey-like sweetness. On bad days Mark can’t get the taste of blood
out of his mouth. He knows it’s all mental, that being hit by a drunk driver
while eating the same exact candy is just a memory influencing his taste buds
in the present. It’s an association he can’t shake, no matter what he thinks
about or tries to forget. He eats the lemon drops anyways, even when it tastes
like he’s sucking on warm copper, just because they remind him of Luke.
Mark’s parents don’t think candy is the cause of their son’s hallucinations of
his deceased best friend who was hit by the same drunk driver. But they’re not
entirely sure Mark’s constant candy companion is helpful.
Mark Sterling holds a lemon drop between his thumb and forefinger and
licks off the initial coating of white dust before holding the candy out towards
the gravestone labeled Luke Sinclair. The dates given show a span of less than
six years, the lifespan of someone who was just about to start kindergarten.
Mark closes one eye and tilts his head.
“No, I think you’re still a little darker,” Mark says, “Still not a dirty
blonde, but you’re not quite lemon drop blonde either.”
Luke, from atop the gravestone where he sits with his knees pulled up to
his chest, sighs and shakes his head. Just like Mark, he’s past the early,
awkward teenage stages of life where his limbs seemingly took a turn for the
worst and changed into gangly appendages. Now, at sixteen, he is in the
slightly less awkward and certainly more handsome teenage-to-young-adult
stage. Luke extends a single feathery white wing to accept the lemon drop and
balances the candy on his pinion before snapping the appendage closed. The
lemon drop flies up into the air.
“You’re a showoff,” Mark accuses with a slightly jealous grumble as he
stares at the lemon drop neatly held between Luke’s teeth. “I bet you couldn’t
do that with popcorn.”
5
Luke rests the side of his face on his knees with a smile.
“How are my parents?” he asks softly.
Mark offers a shrug and attempts to toss a lemon drop into the air and
catch it in his mouth in a similar fashion to Luke, minus the wings. “They’re
fine. They still think I’m… you know…” Mark points to his head and twists his
finger. He lets out a whistle and then leans his head back to try and catch a
lemon drop.
“I’m sure they don’t think that,” Luke protests quietly, and he watches a
yellow oval strike Mark between the eyebrows before falling onto the wellmaintained cemetery grass.
“Oh no, they do,” Mark replies as he reaches over to retrieve his lemon
drop and try again. “Them and my parents. But they mean well, they’re just
concerned. Sometimes I still think I’m crazy, too.” Mark stares at the candy in
his hand, adjusting for height and weight and wind resistance, and then he
looks up at Luke. “They still miss you, you know. Every day.”
Luke nods and then lets out a laugh when Mark accidentally flips the
lemon drop against his gravestone.
“You’re lucky more people don’t visit cemeteries during the week,” Luke
says with a grin. “I don’t think eating is the most appropriate thing to do here.
I, and some others, might even call it taboo.”
“As far as I know, I’m the only one who has something other than a
headstone waiting for me,” Mark replies with a smug smile, and Luke reaches
his hand out for the bag of lemon drops.
“Mister Sterling, care for a challenge?” Luke asks, and Mark grabs a
handful of candy before offering the bag to Luke who slips his hand in and
retrieves a fistful. “On three: one, two, three!”
Mark keeps his eyes on Luke as both of them begin popping lemon drops
into their mouths as fast as they can. For a few moments the dusting of sugar
on the outside of the candy keeps the sourness at bay, then the outside coating
is gone. Luke shuts his eyes as his face scrunches up at the taste and both
wings begin to shiver. Mark winces.
“How many did you eat?” Mark asks a few minutes later once the sour
burn inside his mouth has lessened, although his words are badly slurred.
Luke understands nonetheless, and he holds up six fingers. “Me too!”
6
Once the candy has shrunk, Luke begins to crunch while Mark
continues to suck on his lemon drops.
“My parents think I eat these all by myself,” he comments as he holds up
the bag and gives it a little shake; it’s substantially lighter than when he had
entered the cemetery.
“I’m surprised they haven’t stopped buying them for you,” Luke says with
a smirk.
“They know it makes me happy,” Mark replies, and then mirrors Luke’s
position on the ground, his arms wrapped about his drawn up knees. “If all the
raindrops were lemon drops and gumdrops, oh what a rain it would be…”
Luke opens his wings in delight and joins in. “I’d stand outside with my
mouth open wide!”
Both break into laughter when their impromptu singing is done, and
Luke folds his wings.
“Same time tomorrow?” Mark asks, and Luke nods.
“Same time.”
“I’ll bring more candy.”
Light and Dark
by Zachary Fahrenkopf
Sithe floated in the darkness of his mind. He didn’t know where he was; he
didn’t know why he was here. He knew he was somehow in-between worlds,
though. Why did he think that? How can one be in-between worlds? The
answers eluded him, but somehow he knew where he was. He understood that
this was an illusion; he was sleeping, with his brother beside him, so was this
a dream? A strange dream.
7
Sengir, can you hear me?
I’m here, brother.
Where are we?
I don’t know, Sithe. Last thing I knew I was falling asleep, and now here…
In-between worlds, Sengir?
Yes, in-between worlds…
He floated in darkness, unable to see his brother, unable to see anything
but black. He felt his brother; that was the only reason he knew he wasn’t
alone, because he could feel Sengir’s mind, that small, but immense, patch of
emotions and thoughts in the back of his mind. That’s what told him his twin
was still with him, what told him he wasn’t alone, what gave him the fragile
strength he had to carry on. So they floated on in the darkness, knowing that if
anything were to come, they could face it together. And something did come.
It was small, miniscule even. Sithe didn’t think it was real. He could
barely see it, just a flicker of light breaking through the darkness. He thought it
was moving towards him. What was it? No, it wasn’t just moving towards them;
it was growing bigger. The darkness was fleeing from that light, fleeing like a
fox would flee a pack of wolves on the hunt. That bright white light engulfed
more and more until, at last, it stopped, leaving half of the darkness there.
Sithe saw to his left nothing but black, and to his right, pure bright light.
What does it mean? he thought, why did the dark suddenly stop?
The answer to your question, Sithe, lies in thousands of years of history,
history long forgotten by you and your kin, said a voice, directly into their
minds.
“Who are you?” Sengir cried out, “Show your face.”
Which face, youngling? I have many faces, many names. Must you see my
face to listen to my words?
“Who are you? What do you want with us?” asked Sithe.
The first question is hard to answer. I am not anyone. I am happiness,
light, faith. I am freedom, peace. I am hope. I want what you want. I want peace,
the people to be free, for conflict to cease.
8
“Why did you come to us?” asked Sengir.
“How can we trust you?” asked Sithe at the same time.
see.
Take a close look at the light and dark around you, and tell me what you
See? What is there to see? Sithe didn’t understand; all he saw was light
and dark; that was it. What more was there to it?
Look closer; look very closely at the border of the light and dark.
Sithe looked at the area where light ended and dark began. He stared,
straining his eyes, trying to see something, anything. It all seemed the same.
Nothing changed; the light was still light and the dark was still dark. What else
could there be to it? Then Sithe saw it. It was barely noticeable; he couldn’t
look right at it; he had to look away a little before he could see anything. Yet
there it was; it seemed that somehow, the two were fighting, were pushing each
other back and forth, and gaining no ground over the other. They both wanted
to consume the area, both fighting each other unceasingly.
“I don’t see anything,” said Sengir.
“It’s fighting,” said Sithe quietly, “The dark is pushing the light and the
light is pushing back. It’s like they’re both trying to consume the area.”
You’re getting there. Look closer; watch how the two entities move, how
they’re desperately trying to push the other away.
What else was there to see? They were fighting, that was it; the light and
dark were pushing against each other trying to banish the other. There was
nothing else to see, just the light and the dark edges pushing against each
other. No one was winning. Suddenly Sithe saw both the light and dark move,
just a tiny bit. It seemed it was only part of his imagination, just a trick, but it
happened again. This time the dark was pushing the light back. Sithe could
only just see it, but it was there, clear as day. The dark was slowly, but surely,
pushing the light back.
Now do you see it? Ever since the beginning of time, the beginning of
creation even, the forces of light and dark have always been fighting each other
in constant warfare. Each side is destined to battle for all eternity, until one side
is finally destroyed. Yet both sides are ignorant of the fact that without the other,
they too would perish. The dark is getting stronger; it is preparing to engulf the
9
light and destroy our world. It’s always been like this; although they cannot live
without the other, they still fight.
“If they can’t survive without the other, why are they fighting?” asked
Sengir
Why? That is like asking why a bird flies; it just does. That is your
answer; they just fight. Throughout history there have been times where the dark
has come close to annihilating the light, yet it hasn’t happened because people
have not let it. Someone has always risen to the task of resetting the balance,
even when they were ignorant of what they were doing. Most were just trying to
protect their family, or bring about peace to a warring land. Very few knew that
their actions had indeed saved the universe.
The time is coming, when the world will once again need someone to fight
back the dark. Will you join in this war?
Sengir said yes immediately, but Sithe held back. There were too many
questions, too many which needed answers. Why them? Out of everyone this
world holds, why tell them, why ask for their help? They were only children,
what could they do? If the world was to perish, why were they the ones who
were to save it? He could see Sengir becoming a hero, but himself, he was a
coward. There was no way Sithe could bring himself to face those fears, he
knew it.
“Why us?” asked Sithe, “Why us?”
You will learn in due time; now return to your world, and think over what
you have learned. Before long the choice will be before you…
10
The Martyrs
by Susan Young
Every day I fear for my life. I can’t help but wonder, is today going to be the
day? I have already lost a number of my friends: Mark Sharpie, Heidi Lighter,
Bick Ballpoint, and Elmir Gloo. It’s only going to be a matter of time before it’s
my turn. I have seen so many of my kind perish before me, having bites taken
out of them, getting lost, never to be found again, and being broken right in
half. I have even seen many pencils’ bodies being ground so much that they
vanished into thin air.
To have your body be shaved down has to be the absolute most painful
thing ever to happen to you. I would rather be snapped in half, than have my
body be scraped away until my graphite spine is exposed. At least being
snapped in half is quick and said to be painless. I have only had my body
ground twice in my life so far. I have managed to get out of being ground a
couple of times when Bick Ballpoint was around. He did not mind being used,
but having to watch his very life being sucked out of him with every movement
that our owner made was difficult to watch. Bick died a martyr. He had tried
his best to always be there not only for me, but for other Pencils too. He was
not prejudiced towards pencils like the other pens were; he saw us as equals
and not just cheap writing tools.
I wish that I could be as strong as Bick was; he had always told me not
to be afraid of dying. He told me to think of what it would be like to finally meet
my mother; she had given her life so I would be able to live. I have never seen
my mother before. Bick told me that he had heard Dictionary say that she had
been a “Cider Tree.” If I get chosen today, I guess that I can try to channel my
mother’s fighting spirit, or at least pretend that she had one.
The word around the Backpack is that there is a big test later today and
our owner is going to need a pencil to get the four essays done. Mom, I hope
that you are looking down on me because I am going to see you soon.
11
The Night I Fell Asleep at the Wheel
by AnaMarie Brown
Note: This story was inspired by the Barenaked Ladies song “Tonight is the
Night I Fell Asleep at the Wheel.”
I glanced at my watch, remembering that I promised you I’d be home by 8. 8:15
—almost on time. My lateness would still bother you, but I didn’t care. I was
feeling a giddy high that felt unreal.
I cracked a smile in spite of myself, feeling on top of the world.
The window to my left was completely open, blowing the night wind onto
my unshaven and weary face. I saw the bright lights of the city straight ahead,
a sight that most would call beautiful.
Being a native and growing up hating it, I used a mocking tone to
describe its “beauty.” But even on a night like tonight, the lights and faded
sounds of crime and poverty didn’t lessen the bubbly high I was feeling.
To be perfectly honest, I wasn’t thinking of you at all.
In fact, I wasn’t even sure what it was about that night. I just couldn’t be
brought down—figuratively, anyway.
I was actually laughing (me, laughing!) when I lost control of the car and
swerved off the road. Maybe I was tired. Hell, I might’ve even been asleep.
Before it happened to me, I always figured a car crash to be like a roller
coaster ride. You know—where the feeling in your stomach is the worst part,
tightening in on your body as you helplessly gasp for air and spin wildly. That’s
not true. When it actually happens, it’s the sound that gets you—crushing
metal (maybe bones).
Now, I was upside-down in the car, my head thrown back against my
black leather seat, my coffee cup on the ceiling dripping little drops on my
nose. I smiled again.
This couldn’t be real. Could it?
My eyes were opened, but my vision was blurry as I watched and
listened.
12
People had seen me. Had seen the car. I could see the red hat and yellow
coat of a fireman, who was gaping at me in horror while someone was reenacting what he’d seen in slow motion.
“Is someone inside?”
Isn’t that a stupid question to ask? Of course someone’s inside. I am. Me.
I tried to talk, but nothing came out—the pain was too intense. I barely
heard them say they were going to use the jaws of life. Well, they were going to
try. And they did try.
Unsuccessfully.
I put my hands weakly on my stomach, neck, face. It was going to be
over soon. It had to be. I’d never bled so much in my entire life. I could taste
the blood; it and sweat, a tangy and coppery aftertaste to my weak swallows.
But that didn’t bother me at all. Because, really, I wasn’t in the car. I was
floating higher, looking in on myself, hearing a mix of the car radio blasting
“My Sharona” and the screaming yells of confused firefighters and medics who
were out of options.
And you? You were the very last thing on my mind.
The Painter
by Danica Bermudez-McLaud
He always seemed to be pacing. This moment was no exception. His children
sat at the dining room table staring at him blankly—barely paying attention to
his ramblings anymore. He knew that they had grown tired of visiting him
every weekend; they were older now and not as easily amused. He was fully
aware that soon their visits would stop entirely as they moved onto “bigger and
better” things, yet for some reason, he couldn’t make himself shut up.
What was he even saying right now? At this point, he didn’t know. His
ranting had become a habit. To him. To everyone. It was a habit that everyone
else managed to ignore, but it remained important to him. He had no idea why.
He was only pushing away the few people he had left in his life.
13
He was rambling on about his college years at this exact moment, while
his daughter successfully tuned him out with her iPod. His son, the patient
one, appeared to be feigning interest in him and his rant, looking down at his
phone only occasionally so that he could text a friend or girlfriend. He didn’t
even know if his son and that girl were still together. He probably should have
asked his son about her, or tried to meet her, but honestly, he didn’t care. They
were teenagers; how long could their relationship possibly last? There would be
other girlfriends in the future and he resolved himself to make an effort with
those girls.
As he paced, his greying, shoulder-length hair bounced. His hair had
been his pride and glory when he was younger; in the late 1970’s, the jet black
ringlets that fell all the way down his back made him mysterious and full of sex
appeal. That was also when getting high and spewing philosophical bullshit
was considered cool. Now, past middle-aged and stuck, he still had a great
head of hair, which he would not cut shorter than shoulder length even though
he looked ridiculous. Despite his great hair, he had lost the sex appeal and his
air of confidence. He was worn down, unhappy, and alone. Now, the only thing
he enjoyed was spewing the same old bullshit to anyone that would listen. And
nowadays, it seemed the only people listening were his children.
He observed his daughter bopping her head to whatever type of music
she was listening to (he had no idea—it was probably that Top 40 crap on the
radio), while he ranted on and on. At some point, he would tire of talking and
decide to cook dinner for them. Did he even have anything substantial to make
in his apartment? He definitely had pasta. He always had pasta. That’s all he
ever had. He wondered if his children got mad at him for making only pasta,
but then decided it didn’t matter. They just saw him once a week anyway.
This was what his life had become. Two divorces, two kids from the
second marriage, and one day a week to share with them. He was making no
money in a dead-end retail job, living in a small, shitty apartment, stuck in a
country that wasn’t his own. And there was pacing. Lots of pacing and ranting.
He had come to America with a positive mindset. After serving in the
Mexican military and divorcing his first wife, an American woman named
Diane, at the age of twenty-four, he enrolled himself in SUNY Albany’s
undergraduate program. He was exotic, seemingly intellectual, and a talented
painter, which made him friends immediately. It also didn’t hurt that he was
very handsome. He was tall, slender, and had chiseled features. His Mexican
heritage was hidden; many often had to guess his ethnicity because of his
ambiguous features.
He was well-known within the college community, which was why Jeanie
was interested in getting to know him as soon as he was hired as a waiter at
14
the restaurant where she worked. From the first moment they met, they each
felt a spark. She was twenty years old, blond, blue-eyed and gorgeous. Their
attraction for one another was strong and a romantic relationship quickly
budded between them. Within no time, he had knocked her up.
The first pregnancy was too large of a surprise for either of them to
comprehend, which led them to the hasty decision to terminate it. It was a
mutually agreed upon course of action—one which Jeanie regretted
immediately after it was completed. She entered a downward spiral of
depression and he had no way of helping her out of it. This was about the time
that he began beating her.
The second pregnancy came one year later and Jeanie refused to have
another abortion. They were married in the town hall and nine months later,
his son was born. They moved in with Jeanie’s parents and both picked up jobs
at the local mall. There were no other jobs available for them, considering that
neither of them had finished their degrees. Throughout this time, his anger
over what his life had become worsened and so did Jeanie’s beatings.
The third pregnancy followed one year after his son’s birth. Another
child, he knew, would move his dreams and ambitions farther away. During
the second trimester of Jeanie’s pregnancy with their daughter, he gave her the
most severe beating that he ever had. Her father kicked him out of their house
and Jeanie finally smartened up. She would go on to complete her degree,
become a successful single mother, and then finally remarry a decent man.
When his daughter was born three months later, he wasn’t even allowed in the
hospital to see her.
Over the years, he had been granted permission to see his children on
the weekends. When they were younger, they were always excited to see him
and he was determined to be the best possible father to them. In his mind, this
meant never saying no to their requests. He felt no need to discipline them or
act as a positive role model to them. He gave them ice cream and bought them
toys and never yelled at them. As they grew, though, they began to see through
this style of parenting and they began to see through him, realizing that he was
a washed-up, pathetic failure.
Now, standing before his two teenage children whom he knew nothing
about, he realized that in two years, his son would go off to college and his
daughter would never come visit him again. As he thought this over, watching
them eat their pasta, he became numb.
He should have been formulating a plan to win back their affection or
become a better father, but instead, he could think only of his paintings. He
had his own art work strewn about his shitty apartment—beautiful paintings
15
that he had completed when he was full of optimism, some paintings that he
had started and then given up on with no hope, and blank canvases. In a way,
they represented his life since he had come to America. He saw his artwork as
a way of fixing his life, of regaining his children’s respect. He believed that if he
could create beautiful paintings again, everything else would fall into place.
And so he walked away from his children, into the next room, and picked
up a paint brush.
Ragdoll
by Kim Theodore
I have a list. Sometimes I wish groceries could be on it, but that’s not my job
anymore; it’s not the job of any of my kind.
We are the chosen ones, the ones sent to do the bidding; we are the
reaper of souls.
This list rarely has young beings on it; it’s something we rarely see.
That’s why I remember her so clearly. It was a still, but beautiful, night in the
middle of August. The flowers had just put their petals down for the night and I
was waking up to do my rounds.
There was this girl. She had silver hair, an hourglass shape, crystals for
eyes, tinted in dark blue, and perfect teeth inside pouty lips.
I praised her for her features. She was a creation of perfect genetic makeup, but mascara runs the same on all lashes.
It was deep into the night when her name etched itself onto my list. I
followed her scent into the town, stalking her first to make sure I had the right
girl. She was wearing a short white dress. It was simple, complementing her
silver hair. Alone she walked the streets, clenching her bare arms, protecting
herself from the night. Her face, her cheeks, were stained with black. Where
was she coming from? Neither a smile on her face, nor a frown, she walked
barefoot down the rough streets.
Her eyes were lifeless, like a doll. The closer I got, the more terrifying this
beautiful creature looked. She had scratches on her legs, bruises, too. Her
silver hair, that beautiful hair, was roughed into tangles and knots. This girl
was disheveled.
16
She made her way to the bridge in her city. It wasn’t too far from where I
had found her. I wished I knew where she was coming from or what she was
doing. She walked to the middle of the bridge and watched the water for at
least an hour.
Should I do this? I pondered this as she stared into the rushing river.
Sometimes a name can disappear off the list, and I was praying that it would.
Is this girl ready?
I waited for a sign from her.
She lifted herself with ease on top of the railing. Was this my cue?
The job had to be done, whether she waited for me—or did it herself. I
came up beside her, and I waited.
Slowly, she whispered to herself, “Why me?”
This girl, this beautiful girl, she wanted this. She was troubled, maybe
even her whole life. It’s my job; I shouldn’t have waited so long. She closed her
eyes and mumbled to herself. I closed my eyes too, reached out a hand, and
gave her a small push.
Just like that, her name crossed itself off my list.
###
I can’t remember what that man looked like. He was dancing with me the whole
night, but I can’t even remember his name. Did he do this to me? I can’t
remember. God, why can’t I remember?
My dress is torn. There’s blood on me. My feet, they hurt, too. Everything
hurts. My head, it’s fuzzy.
Home, home is across the bridge. I’ll just go home. My friends, they’re
not here. Maybe they’re at home.
I cannot walk any longer on this bridge. My feet, they ache. I want to go
home. I’m going to rest here. My feet, my poor feet.
This water, it’s so calming. I love the summer air. Why am I here? My
feet, they still hurt.
17
The waves are crashing into each other tonight. I feel like if I look long
enough I’ll see some of the water-life in there. That man, his face, it’s coming
back to me. I can see him in the rolling water. Is it him? Did he do this to me? I
need a closer look.
I’m holding onto the railing next to me. I’m standing on the bridge. I’ve
never done this before. It’s calm up here.
Did that man hurt me? I wish I could remember.
Why me?
I keep whispering to myself. Remember! You have to remember! His face,
his face is right there in the water. I just need to get closer to the water. I
wonder how I can get closer. I don’t want to fall. I just want to get closer. How
close can I get?
A Dream Sequence
by Hannah O’Neil
Chapter 1
I awoke face-up, staring at the ceiling. It was 4:30 in the morning and I knew I
was not going back to sleep anytime soon. Not that I wanted to anyway. Closing
my eyes was always accompanied by nightmares, that horrific flash of light,
and then blackness.
At this point I was used to not sleeping. It had been this way for the past
couple months now, and lack of sleep no longer bothered me. However, this
particular morning was different from the rest. By 7am I would be back in
school.
It was the first day for everyone. But while everyone else was excited to
show off their new school outfits and to take on a new year filled with football
games, school trips, new loves, old loves, and endless weekends of parties, I
was dreading it all.
I used to love all of that stuff. I had been the president of my class since
freshman year, head of the planning committee, and would have been captain
of my soccer team during this last season of high school. None of it interested
me anymore, though. I couldn’t enjoy any of it knowing I no longer had my best
friend at my side.
18
It was now 5:15 and I knew I was not falling back asleep. I finally got up
at 5:30, jumped in the shower, and then went down for breakfast. I could
already smell the eggs, blueberry pancakes, and cinnamon-sugar bacon being
cooked.
I walked into the kitchen where my mom was sitting at the kitchen table,
reading the paper and sipping her coffee. My dad was manning the stove, as
usual, in his plaid pajama pants and t-shirt. He flipped the pancakes,
scrambled the eggs, and cut the fruit as if it were one motion. He was a chef at
a high-end restaurant in the city and he was very good at what he did.
As I walked in, my mom said “Good morning, Logan” and then got up
and gave me a kiss and a hug. My dad came over swiftly and gave me a quick
kiss and a squeeze, then returned to the stove to flip the next batch of
pancakes. I poured myself some coffee and sat down at the table next to my
mother.
Dad came over with four plates of food in one hand and a pitcher of
freshly squeezed orange juice in the other. He set everything down and said,
“Bon Appetit” in his mock French voice. Mom and I looked at each other and
smiled. We could always count on him to lighten the mood. He grabbed the
silverware and plates and then sat down across from my mom. We each filled
our dishes with all the food that could fit, in complete silence; only the sound
of serving spoons clanking made noise. I looked down at my plate and realized I
didn’t have much of an appetite anymore. I looked up at my parents and
realized they didn’t either. Then, in sync, we all looked up at the empty chair
that sat across from us.
That was when it really hit me. He would never again sit across from me
in the little old chair. I began to get choked up and then looked down at my
plate of food again. Breakfast had always been our favorite meal. With my dad
working in the city almost every night, and me and my brother in sports, we
weren’t able to do family dinners that often. Breakfast had always been our
bonding time for the day. It just didn’t feel complete anymore. Nothing felt
complete anymore.
My mom cleared her throat finally—I could tell we were all thinking the
same exact thing—and asked, “Did you sleep okay last night, honey?”
I shrugged, still looking down at my plate and said, “Not really, just the
average night’s sleep for me.” I couldn’t dare look up at their faces. I knew I
would lose it if I did.
19
“They gave me an extra hour before I have to be into work, so I can drive
you to school today,” said my mom. I could tell she was getting choked up
again.
“Uhh, yeah, that’d be great.” My voice broke.
My dad hadn’t said anything. I looked over and he was pushing his eggs
around with his fork. Most of our meals were like this. The silence, the pain,
the sadness all seemed to hit hardest when we sat down for a meal together.
The empty chair was always the reminder that our family would always have a
hole in it.
After breakfast, I went upstairs to finish getting ready, grabbed my bag
and then went back into the kitchen. My dad looked lost as he put the leftovers
from our uneaten breakfast into Tupperware.
dad.”
I walked over to him and wrapped my arms around his waist. “I love you,
He stopped what he was doing. When he turned around, I could tell he
had been crying. My dad hated when I, or anyone, saw him cry. He took my
head in his hands and looked right into my eyes. “I couldn’t imagine what I
would do if both of you were killed that day.”
He pulled me closer and hugged me so tightly. We were both sobbing at
this point. Mom walked in and saw us and instantly started crying as well. She
came over to us and we all stood in the kitchen in our little huddle and just
cried for a good 5 minutes. Finally, we let go of each other, grabbed some
napkins, and wiped away the tears. We all looked at each other and gave a
crooked smile.
“We need to stick together because that is the only way we will get
through this,” said my mom. She was right. We couldn’t let the hole in our
family grow any bigger. Moments like this made me thankful to have such
strong, supportive parents. They always seemed to know what to say.
“We would be devastated if both of you were taken from us that night. We
are so lucky to still have you in our lives,” said my dad, and my mom nodded
in agreement.
I understood that, but what I didn’t understand was why him and not
me? I was the one who insisted we go out that night, even though our parents
said not to. I just had to go to the “party of the year.” Made him drive just so I
could get drunk. And now I was being punished. Having to live with the death
of my brother for the rest of my life was punishment for that one night.
20
Essays
Instant Messenger, Texting, and Facebook:
The Holy Trinity of a Socially Awkward Generation
by Emily Manchester
Hey.
Hey, whts up?
Nm, u?
Nm. just chillin
Thts cool
Yea
How many people can say they’ve had a conversation similar to this on their
computer or on their cell phone? This quick, shallow exchange of words could
be a standard conversation between members of a generation accustomed to
electronic communication such as instant messaging, texting, or Facebook
messaging. Whether this conversation is to go anywhere or stop at “Yea” is up
to the participants, but either way, this form of communication has contributed
to creating a socially awkward generation.
These days, the quickest, easiest way of communicating is through texting:
When will you be home? I have to be somewhere in 30 min.
I’m on my way, give me 10 min or so.
Texting makes it easier to meet up:
Hey, wanna go for a run?
Yeah, sure! I’ll meet you at Elm St. in 10 min.
Cell phones are a technology that have made communication more convenient
through text messaging. In the long run, however, have these digitalized
conversations changed communication for the better? For my generation, these
changes began at a young age.
When I was in fourth grade or so, I began to gain some independence. The days
of play-dates arranged by parents were long gone. Kids were beginning to take
it upon themselves to get together (with their parents’ permission, of course),
but to do this, we had to go beyond communicating in the school yard. Talking
on the landline was the only other way my friends and I knew to communicate.
I had no idea cell phones existed yet.
21
When I entered middle school, it seemed that everyone owned a cell phone. I
begged for one, but my parents refused to give in and didn’t get me one until I
was thirteen. Until then, I was an avid user of AIM, or AOL instant messenger.
This was where communication began to take a different shape for me.
Roz Chast, a cartoonist for The New Yorker, notices a drastic change in
communication in her 2002 cartoon featuring a text-savvy Romeo and Juliet
(see Figure 1):
Juliet: romeo u there
Romeo: yo wassup
Juliet: nothin, u?
Romeo: scool sucked 2day
Juliet: heard wylander got mad
at u
Romeo: what a jerk i usedd
purpl ink on the sci test. he
g5ot pissed he lookjs like
jimminy crickt
Juliet: lol
Romeo: going to nicks party
Juliet: cant im grounded
Romeo: y
Juliet: cardoza called home,
sez im failig spanish btw both
my rents hate you
Romeo: mine hate U 2
Juliet: my dads coming gtg
Romeo: k bye
Juliet: xoxoxo bye see u tmw
Romeo: xoxoxoxoxo bye
Juliet: xoxoxoxoxoxxxoooxxx
gtg
Romeo: K
Figure 1: “The IMs of Romeo and Juliet”
(Chast).
Besides the humor, the most evident features of this conversation are its
atrocious spelling and choppy flow. Less evident, perhaps, is the extreme
shallowness of the exchange between the two star-crossed lovers. Chast was
brilliant to use Romeo and Juliet as the subjects for her cartoon because the
reader can’t help but picture the classic scene where Romeo stood below
22
Juliet’s balcony proclaiming his love to her. It is sad that something so intimate
and vulnerable as Romeo’s epiphany outside Juliet’s balcony has been
transformed into a robotic, impersonal conversation in front of a computer. The
Romeo and Juliet of this decade aren’t much better. They continue to have the
same blank-stare, finger-tapping sort of conversation they had in 2002. Only,
they do it on cell phones, and I was soon to join them.
For three years I had waited, and finally, the day had come; when I opened my
new pink Motorola Razr on Christmas morning, I was elated. I was another
consumer captivated by the novelty of the cell phone. Soon after, IMing became
a thing of the past. Technically there isn’t a significant difference between
Instant Messaging and texting, except that texting can happen anywhere,
anytime, while IMing takes place in front of a computer when both people are
online. And so my transition from AIM to texting took place.
After a year with my cell phone, I began to realize that life would be practically
impossible without it—seriously! Without my cell phone, I would never be able
to let my parents know where I was, when I needed a ride, whether there was
an emergency, or essentially anything. Hanging out with friends was only one
text message away. How could anyone get by without a cell phone? As pathetic
as it sounds, it literally became a necessity in everyday life by the time I
entered high school.
In high school, communication changed once again. My freshman year, I got
Facebook. The concept of IMing was reintroduced with Facebook messaging.
However, there was so much more to Facebook than Facebook messenger.
Facebook is a social networking website designed to keep people connected
through photos, status updates, and personal information. My obsession with
social networking grew until I found myself logging on to Facebook at least two
or three times a day. Slowly, I calmed down, and even deleted all the people
who I no longer talked to in real life from my friends list. I was beginning to
understand the harmful effects of going on Facebook so often, depression and
the inability to “measure-up” to my peers being the main ones.
In fact, my opinion of Facebook changed drastically upon watching TV one
night, when Rock Center came on. My thumb hovered over the channelchanging button on the remote, but then Matt Lauer appeared, interviewing a
father and daughter with a story that perked my interest. Tommy Jordan,
father of fifteen-year-old Hannah Marie, shot his daughter’s laptop after she
posted an outrageous status on Facebook that cried out against her parents.
Jordan then posted the video of his furious response on YouTube where it soon
went viral. The Facebook post by Hannah began as such: “To my parents: I’m
not your damn slave. It’s not my responsibility to clean up your shit. We have a
cleaning lady for a reason. Her name is Linda, not Hannah.” It’s easy to see
why Hannah’s father got upset. Instead of turning to friends or even lashing
23
out at her parents, this 15-year-old girl chose to type out her feelings on a
public website. Yelling and arguing are not pleasant activities, but they are
healthy, normal occurrences for any relationship, especially one involving a
teenage girl and her parents. Facebook has changed communication in that it
makes it okay to avoid confrontation in the real world. Not only that, but
Facebook serves as an electronic diary—a very public diary. Too many people
would choose to interact electronically rather than in-person when any level of
discomfort is involved; people are emotionally distancing themselves. Fiftyseven likes and thirty-two comments will never feel as comforting as an
understanding smile from a friend followed by a hug. When one participates in
shallow communication, one receives shallow forms of satisfaction, and these
shallow forms of communication, instant messaging, texting, and Facebook,
have created a socially awkward generation.
For example, I get nervous whenever I have to talk to someone on the phone.
Calling someone to order pizza, make an appointment, or even talk to a friend
freaks me out. I used to think this was because I was born socially awkward,
but now I understand that growing up the way I have has contributed heavily
to make me this way. IMing, texting, and Facebook have made conversations so
fake in that we have time to think about our responses. When one talks with
someone on the phone, or in person, responses come right away, and so the
conversation is more natural. Before I make a phone call, I find myself
planning and practicing exactly what I’m going to say. As pathetic as this may
sound, my reaction to more personal communication is standard for my
generation. I have friends who won’t talk on the phone at all unless it’s family,
or they flat out refuse. It gets worse; there are people who fight or break up
through texting. Just like young Hannah, these people don’t know how to
argue effectively, which is a very important communication skill. The loss of
communication skills is what makes people socially awkward.
I am socially awkward, but I’m not alone. A generation that has grown up with
IMing, texting, and Facebook is now finding itself short on communication
skills. While everyone continually stares at their cellphones, they walk right by
each other without stopping to have a real conversation.
The worst part about all this is that it doesn’t stop with my generation. Every
day more and more fourth graders appear on Facebook. Children’s first cell
phones are acquired as early as the second grade. In a Sprint/Iphone 4S
commercial from 2011, a little kid is shown playing a game on his phone. There
are even apps, or applications, targeted at young kids. If I have a hard time
talking to people, where will these young kids be in fifteen years? Technology
and social media have completely taken over the world of communication. As a
result, we are facing a socially awkward future. Gud luk 2 us all.
24
Works Cited
Chast, Roz. “The I.M.s of Romeo and Juliet” They Say, I Say. Eds. Graff,
Gerald, Cathy Birkenstein, and Russel Durst. New York: W.W. Norton &
Company, 2012. 347. Print.
Graff, Gerald, Cathy Birkenstein, and Russel Durst, eds. They Say, I Say. New
York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2012. Print.
Jordan, Tommy, and Hannah Marie Jordan. Interview. Rock Center. MSN. NBC,
New York, 7 March 2012. Television.
Sprint/iPhone 4S. Commercial advertisement. 14 Oct. 2011. Television.
Native Women of The Round House: Dangers for Women on the
Reservation
by Khrysta Garrison
Native American women are significant figures in their cultures; however, many
experience trauma from being victims of rape and violence on the reservation.
Louise Erdrich wrote the novel The Round House (2012) to raise awareness and
display the legal issue of sexual violence against Native American women on
reservations, which is an ongoing problem in America. Looking at this novel,
one should recognize that there are only four major women characters, all
confessing sorrowful stories that reflect the pain many Native American women
endure; three endure domestic violence or rape on the reservation. What do
these stories reveal about life on a reservation for Native women? It undermines
the notion that Native American women are the foundation of their cultures,
bringing women who are seen as strong down to a position of vulnerability and
weakness. Geraldine, a victim in The Round House, faces a situation that
highlights the flawed legal system that fails to bring justice for these crimes,
and the white man’s success in raping Native women represents a continuation
of colonization over the Native people. At the same time, the novel highlights
the psychological effects of sexual violence on Native women, portraying the
human story behind their experience of trauma.
25
When comparing statistics of rape on reservations to Geraldine’s
situation, it appears that she directly represents, or confirms, the statistics
regarding rape on the reservation. The Atlantic and The New York Times have
recently published articles highlighting crime, specifically rape and sexual
violence, on the reservation, and the articles point to the U.S. Justice
Department’s report that “one in three Native women is raped during their
lifetimes.” There are three major Native American women characters in The
Round House, Geraldine being one of three, statistically speaking, who is a
victim of rape on the reservation. These articles also mention the statistic
“more than 80 percent of sex crimes on the reservation are committed by nonIndian men, who are immune from prosecution by tribal courts.” It is
important to recognize that after both the Tribal Law and Order Act (TLOA)
signed in July of 2010 and the Violence Against Women Reauthorization Act
(VAWA) signed in March of 2013, tribal courts now have jurisdiction to
prosecute non-Native perpetrators, while The Round House was written prior to
these acts in 2012. This new addition of jurisdictional power to the tribal
courts is recent; therefore, it has not yet led to outstanding improvements in
the case of sexual violence on reservations. In fact, recent articles still highlight
sexual violence as an ongoing problem. A recent article in The New York Times
by Timothy Williams states that Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. announced
“a surge of violence on many Indian reservations and complaints that federal
law officials, who are responsible for investigating and prosecuting most major
crimes in Indian country, have done too little to address the problem.” This
claim was made in November of 2013, only months after the previously
mentioned documents were signed into law, proving that albeit the tribal courts
acquired jurisdiction to prosecute non-Native perpetrators, matters imperative
to ensure protection of Native communities are still being disregarded. While
there is potential for change, as this is an important turning point that brings
hope to Native American women and their communities as a whole, it does not
change the previous damage along with the pain and trauma felt by women
who reaped the disadvantages that come along with under-recognition in law,
such as the VAWA of 1994 that failed to bring justice to their cause.
Why is it that the U.S. legal system places Native Americans at a
disadvantage, honoring location of crime over nature of crime? A U.S Supreme
Court decision in 1978 made it so that tribal courts on reservations were not
granted the same level of jurisdiction as courts outside of reservation land.
They lacked the jurisdiction to prosecute a non-Native perpetrator; therefore,
tribal courts could not tackle certain cases that were required for courts
outside of the reservation to handle. Although outside courts were responsible
for taking up these cases, because they were the only courts with jurisdiction
to do so, they generally did not get around to resolving the reservation cases in
need of legal attention. This injustice is seen in Erdrich’s The Round House
when Geraldine’s perpetrator, Linden Lark, a white man who resides off of the
reservation, uses the reservation land to get away with crimes that he would be
26
unable to commit freely on non-reservation lands. Lark’s crime in raping
Geraldine is not prosecuted for two reasons: he is a white man committing a
crime “less” than murder, and the crime is committed on Indian land.
This clear disadvantage in the tribal court is suppressing the Native people and
it seems to be an act of manipulation used in order to keep the Native people
under the white man’s control. This sounds a lot like our history in the U.S.—
colonization of the Native people by the white man. Not only are white men
essentially asserting dominance over the Native culture through limitations on
jurisdiction rights, but some men also sexually and violently violate Native
women—the heart of their culture. Louise Erdrich captures the media with her
captivating yet devastating message embedded within The Round House,
landing recognition in international publications. This novel brings visibility to
her cause by raising awareness to protect Native American women from sexual
violence on the reservation. In an op-ed article in The New York Times, Erdrich
mentions the Cheyenne proverb “a nation is not conquered until the hearts of
its women are on the ground”—that is exactly what the white man gets away
with, completing the conquest that was never fully accomplished in their eyes
by bringing down the women of Native American cultures. Dian Million’s article
“Intense Dreaming: Theories, Narratives, and Our Search for Home” argues
that Native people “dance in a politically electrified field most of [their] lives”
and “were never meant to survive” (316). It seems as if white people did not
account for the Native nations, equally, in their legal system not only because
they did not anticipate the survival of Native people, but because the
structured inequality created by apparent dominant societal “norms” has
taught them to be prejudiced towards people of differing descent. Therefore, it
appears that white people might still be attempting to push Native
communities and tribes into extinction by neglecting to acknowledge and
punish the harm their people are causing these communities through violence.
This desire for the white man to finish what was never completed in
conquering America leads white men to demoralize and violate Native women
on their territory, knowing they will be free from prosecution. Andrea Smith’s
article “Not an Indian Tradition: The Sexual Colonization of Indian Peoples,”
draws on Ines Hernandez-Avila’s point that since Native women bring life to
further generations of Indian people, they serve as a threat to the colonizer and
“while the bodies of both Indian men and women have been marked by sexual
violence…it is the bodies of Native women [who] have been particularly targeted
for abuse because of their capacity to give birth” (78). In Erdrich’s The Round
House, Linden Lark, the white perpetrator, victimizes two Native women on the
reservation—he rapes Geraldine for helping Mayla, a woman of Lark’s love
interest with a baby from another man, who was murdered by Lark. Lark
endangers and brings trauma to Geraldine’s life, hindering her ability to
function in both her family and community. Geraldine is an important figure of
her community, and recognizing her role as the arbiter of tribal enrollment on
the reservation is important because an assault on her is essentially an attack
27
on the continuation of tribal enrollment. To directly damage the source of tribal
enrollment, potentially putting a stop to it, is a start towards ending tribal
enrollment altogether, which is an example of colonization over Native
American people.
In this case, we have a white man attacking, diminishing, and attempting
to eliminate the Native community through the heart of their culture—their
women. White men who attack and traumatize Native women through these
means, on Indian land, do it because they know they can get away with it. In
The Atlantic article, Young Bird states that “perpetrators think they can’t be
touched…They’re invincible,” which is seen in Lark’s attitude that he is aware
of Indian law and therefore can and will use it to his advantage. This is made
clear in Geraldine’s recollection of the encounter when Linden states, “I won’t
get caught…I’ve been boning up on law,” (ch. 8) in order to threaten and
ultimately terrify her. These men know that the women they target will not gain
justice for the crimes committed against them, no matter the nature of the
crime so long as it takes place on reservation land. Erdrich makes this flaw in
the legal system clear in her novel through the actions and attitude of Linden
Lark, the perpetrator. Lark traps both Mayla and Geraldine at the site of the
round house, which is on the reservation, and abuses them, even attempting to
kill them on site. Linden contemplates “what to do with the evidence,” arriving
at the decision to burn them because “you know, they’re just evidence” (ch. 8).
That is, he disregards them as human beings, choosing to see them as
evidence that must be destroyed. Lark even goes to the extent of blaming Mayla
for his violent actions and saying that “we [Native women] have no standing
under the law for a good reason and yet have continued to diminish the white
man and take his honor” (ch. 8). Linden is stating that the Native women are
deteriorating the image and reputation of the white man when in reality, as
seen through the scenario at play, it is the white man who is degrading Native
women. In this novel, Lark does not victimize Native men, only Native women,
which displays the colonizer’s attempt to wipe out the source of Native birth—
the potential for generations of Native communities to continue and survive.
Sexual violence is not only a form of colonization over the Native people,
but also a breach of women’s rights. Native women do not feel safe on their own
lands due to the ease with which male perpetrators can victimize them at no
cost. These men intimidate and taunt women, making them physically and
psychologically vulnerable to the dangers both feared and experienced through
sexually violent acts against them. Geraldine most clearly represents the
devastating impact that sexual violence against women on Indian land has on
Native women, reflecting an ongoing, yet largely unrecognized, problem in
America. The statistics surrounding Native American women and rape on the
reservation show that Native women are typically “too demoralized to report
rape,” which is seen in Geraldine’s case when she shuts down emotionally due
to the psychological damage Lark’s attack does to her.
28
Geraldine isolates herself. Unwilling and unable to discuss what has
happened, she claims to have forgotten details that could potentially bring
justice to her case. In chapter five, Geraldine’s son Joe comments that “it had
now been over a week since she had walked up those stairs,” further noting
that “she kept the shades pulled” in order to keep out any sunlight. Not only
does Geraldine seclude herself from the community, while attempting to hide
from even her family, she also purposely places herself in a dark room.
Geraldine’s willingness to create and reside in this environment represents how
she is mentally in a dark, lonely place, which she feels incapable of escaping—
or rather, does not want to escape due to post-traumatic fear. Deep down
Geraldine knows that telling the truth about the event that haunts her will not
bring her justice given the tribal courts’ lack of jurisdiction due to the location
of the crime. The pain Geraldine endures can be seen through her physical
appearance when Joe points out that “she’d become weightless, all jutting
bones,” (ch. 5) because she barely eats a morsel of food. It becomes evident
that not only is she mentally weak, but physically deteriorating as well. At one
point Joe asks his mom, “can’t you…come back to life?” to which she swiftly
replies “No” (ch. 5). Her son wants her to be there for him as a parent should,
yet he is placed in the position of caring for and defending Geraldine because
she refuses to take any steps towards recovering from trauma. In a way, due to
Geraldine’s state of physical and mental exhaustion, she seems content sulking
in her lonely, dark room because it provides a hiding spot away from societal
contact, further harm, and having to speak up about her attacker.
As a woman previously victimized by a non-Native sex offender on the
reservation where she resides, with high rates of crime and sexual violence in
particular, it is understandable why Geraldine would not want to face the world
after an experience that infests her every thought. Geraldine is so distraught
over the experience since, as she recalls, when she was held hostage at the
Round House with Mayla and the baby, Lark threatened her, demanding, “…If
you move an inch I will kill Mayla. You are going to die but if you say one word
even one word up in heaven after you are dead I will kill them both” (ch. 8).
This memory triggers post-traumatic fear for Geraldine because, while she was
able to escape the dangers of Linden Lark, she seems convinced that her
survival has been at the cost of Mayla’s life along with the baby’s. Also,
Geraldine lives in fear that, if she tells anyone who her attacker was, her
inability to keep her mouth shut will lead to their death—as she is unaware of
either Mayla or the baby’s status at this time. When a perpetrator threatens his
victim, he makes the victim feel that he will inflict further pain on another
victim as a tactic to keep everyone quiet. Essentially it does not matter whether
the perpetrator plans to follow through with his threat or not, because if a
victim believes staying quiet about the situation will save them, and others, the
perpetrator’s threat is effective regardless whether he follows through with it or
not. Therefore, Lark is successful in his decision to threaten Geraldine, even
29
though she does not obey his orders to stay where she was when he made the
threat. However, Geraldine refuses to reveal Lark’s identity as her attacker,
claiming that she was unable to identify him in the midst of the attack;
meanwhile, she has full knowledge.
In Louise Erdrich’s The Round House, the victim knows she can only gain
justice through lying, and the perpetrator knows that he will get away with his
crime since it was committed on Indian land. Both perpetrator and victim are
aware of the flawed legal system that works to one’s advantage and the other’s
disadvantage. Under the jurisdiction of this time, the only crime against women
on reservation land that could be prosecuted in tribal courts was murder, when
the woman cannot reap the benefits of justice. While other women would have
gained justice in being safe from his threat as a sex offender, it would have
been at the cost of another woman’s life. Even though Geraldine and other
possible victims of Lark did gain justice in the end, it is important to realize
that any justice gained was not by means of law, but rather through a legally
unjust, morally just crime committed in order to protect Native American
women from future attacks by the perpetrator. Under the legal circumstances
given in the novel, Lark has successfully taken over Geraldine’s body, her
psychological state of mind, and her ability to reason her way free of her
predicament because she knows that there is essentially no way out. Lark has
successfully displayed the ease of colonizing the Native community through
their important woman figures, outlets into Native communities as a whole,
through sexual violence and manipulation of the legal system.
Works Cited
Crane-Murdoch, Sierra. “On Indian Land, Criminals Can Get Away With
Almost Anything.” The Atlantic 22 Feb. 2013.
Erdrich, Louise. “Rape on the Reservation.” The New York Times 26 Feb. 2013.
---. The Round House. Epub Edition: HarperCollins e-books, 2012. Kindle AZW
file.
Million, Dian. “Intense Dreaming: Theories, Narratives, and Our Search For
Home.” American Indian Quarterly 35.3 (2011): 313-333. Project MUSE.
Web. 11 Nov. 2013.
Smith, Andrea. “Not an Indian Tradition: The Sexual Colonization of Native
Peoples.” Hypatia 18.2 (2003): 70-85. Project MUSE. Web 12 Nov. 2013.
Williams, Timothy. “Task Force to Study Crime on Indian Reservations.” The
New York Times 14 November 2013.
30
Religion and Politics
by Josh Fitzgibbons
The United States has no official religion. The Constitution does not explicitly
endorse any particular faith; however, Christian culture is evident within our
nation’s history. References to God are present in the Constitution, the
Declaration of Independence, and the Pledge of Allegiance. This divine guidance
can have a positive role in shaping the United States’ moral path, particularly
in terms of equality and justice for all, but religious values should not
dominate political action.
Religion plays a key role in helping guide political thought within the
United States. Both political leaders and the electorate are influenced by their
religious beliefs. Politicians, and therefore those who elect them, should
arguably be guided by a moral code for the betterment of society. On a certain
level, this active presence of religion is positive, ensuring that the United States
remains a “moral” country. Legislation should be drafted and passed under the
guise of separating “right” from “wrong” and ensuring that society follows what
is right. The Civil Rights movement of the 1960s, for example, brought new
laws to protect African Americans who had previously been suppressed by
racial attitudes and actions.
Religion also helps politics in that it forges national identities and
encourages community building. Societal relationships can stem from religious
practice, especially because many religious practices and services foster social
interaction. At this point in American politics, local communities are pivotal to
the success of the nation as a whole. Religion is a device around which people
can gather to solve societal issues locally. However, this culmination of social
thought can cause problems if the so-called solution exploits or marginalizes a
group that does not necessarily agree with the religion.
While there is definitely a place for religion within the contemporary
political system, the practice can also harm politics. If political stances are
influenced solely by religious beliefs, it can lead to the imposition of personal
attitudes on others. The religious-right faction of the Republican Party, for
example, usually supports legislation banning abortion, same-sex marriage,
and drug use. This point of view becomes extremely problematic for several
reasons. One could argue that the imposition of beliefs on others is in direct
opposition to the doctrines on which the United States was founded, but on the
other hand religious doctrine often states that a particular faith should be
spread.
The problem arises when what should be considered a religious or moral
question becomes a legal or political issue. Same-sex marriage, for instance, is
31
often opposed by Christian conservatives on the basis of preserving the sanctity
of marriage as expressed in the Bible. If marriage were strictly a religious issue,
then anyone opposed to same-sex marriage could simply avoid it and
encourage their neighbors to do the same. However, gay marriage is not a
religious question, but is rather considered a legal issue. It becomes difficult to
make a case for a ban on same-sex marriage because such a prohibition would
naturally infringe on the rights of others. Similarly, drug use is another area
that is hotly debated. Religiously, it is acceptable to argue against the use of
drugs or dangerous substances, but is it right to legally deny someone the right
to make decisions concerning their own body? Medical and recreational
marijuana is gradually becoming legalized within the United States, indicating
a positive change in terms of separation of church and state.
In the same way that religion can affect politics, politics can influence
religion. A move towards secularization can have positive implications within
the government, but the same process can harm society as a whole. Religion is
vital to the success of society on an individual level. Many people act in
accordance with their moral code, which likely exists even if someone does not
practice a particular religion. This moral code is separate from that of the
political system. While the government may not see fit to give charitable
donations to those in need, individuals may take the opposite approach
because of their moral upbringing and beliefs. If secularization spills into the
societal aspect of civilization too much then there can be negative
consequences. Charitable organizations or movements with religious
undertones or even directly administered by the Church could disappear,
leaving the underprivileged neglected and forgotten.
The government should act based on its responsibilities, including the
protection of its populace and the preservation of freedom, and because the
United States government has no official religion it does not have the same
responsibilities as the individuals of a particular religious faith. While
Christians usually feel a sense of responsibility to provide for the poor, the
government does not have the same responsibility. Therefore, the importance of
religion in the populace far outweighs its importance in the political system
because it influences the everyday decisions of its followers and their actions
towards others. The purpose of the government is to preserve the rights of the
individual and ensure that others do not infringe upon those rights. Religion
serves a different purpose in that it encourages individuals to think about their
neighbors and make selfless decisions.
Achieving the best possible relationship between politics and religion is
an extremely difficult task, but a case can be made that religion has a very
limited place in the political system. The moral tendencies of differing religions,
particularly between those who practice religion and those who choose not to,
are too divisive for the current American political system. Personal moral
32
stances, while vital to the life of the individual, should not be forced upon
others of differing beliefs. If a decision only affects the individual who makes
the decision, then it should be legally allowed. The counter argument is that
personal decisions such as smoking marijuana affect others because society
becomes unhealthy and stagnant. However, that argument could be made in
opposition to just about anything. One could argue that the fast food chain
McDonald’s should be outlawed because it is unhealthy and therefore
encourages obesity, which causes public health issues.
Although religion should not influence public policy, it admittedly holds
vital importance within the community. In theory, religious activists are not
personally affected by a same-sex couple’s decision to marry. This is where
religion really comes into play because it can influence personal behavior in
spite of public or government policy. Someone who opposes the use of
recreational marijuana, for example, could still choose not to use it even if it
were made legal. This expresses the importance of religion in the personal,
communal sphere rather than in the political sphere.
Arguments for the heavy inclusion of religion in politics are abundant.
The topic is most problematic because of the nature of religion. Religious
beliefs are often crafted in polar objections, or in “black and white.” Usually,
religion takes a stance on an issue that is closed to compromise. Therefore,
people of religious faith view it as their duty to bring about the word of God and
to ensure that society is acting in accordance with the moral teachings of their
religion. This is a somewhat convincing argument because of the sanctity of
religion and the intentions behind practices. However, the political spectrum is
often one of compromise, something that directly clashes with the nature of
religion, so it becomes difficult to incorporate the two.
The relationship between politics and religion is always changing and will
likely never be mastered because of the enormous amount of influence that the
two have on each other. It will be interesting to see what happens in the United
States as the Republican Party continues to be divided between the religious
right and the emerging supporters of Libertarian thought. Still, the importance
of the two spheres in their own respect will always remain a facet of American
life even if religion does become more removed from the political system.
33
Thanksgiving Dinner
by Abigail Casale
All of a sudden, I found myself thinking sociologically when I was at
Thanksgiving dinner with my family. This year’s Thanksgiving dinner was at
my aunt’s house with about fifteen other family members. I never seriously
analyzed my family’s actions until I took an introductory Sociology course.
Because my family is a small social group whose members share
personal and lasting relationships, we are what sociologists consider a primary
group (Macionis, 109). In our instance, we are a primary group by force rather
than choice because we are related by kinship, or a social bond based on
common ancestry, marriage, or adoption (Macionis, 340). At Thanksgiving
dinner, my extended family meets. In other words, my family, composed of
parents and children, as well as other kin, gets together for dinner (Macionis,
341). I feel strong loyalty towards my family because they are my in-group, or
exclusive group of people with a shared interest or identity (Macionis, 112). I
always look forward to seeing them and spending time with them. This year
was an interesting Thanksgiving dinner because I was able to look at my family
through a sociological lens.
In my family, my great aunt is the matriarch of the family—but ironically,
our family does not take her seriously anymore due to her age. This unfairness
against my great aunt is a prime example of ageism, or when someone acts on
a prejudice based on age (OpenStax College, 292-293). Without any empathy
for my great aunt’s series of health issues—from back surgeries to brain
tumors—my family deems her unintelligent and practically useless. For
example, when my great aunt’s husband was cutting the turkey, my great aunt
was standing next to him trying to tell him he was doing it incorrectly and to
let her do it. In frustration (as he has been cutting the turkey every year for the
past forty years), he threw the knife down and yelled at her that “she doesn’t
know anything”; my great aunt started crying and left the room. My family
called my great aunt hysterical because of the turkey-cutting situation. This
“diagnosis” reflects gender discrimination, or sexism. For example, hysteria, or
a wild, emotional state, suggests that being a woman is somehow the same as
being irrational (Macionis, 402). This discrimination is targeted at women
(specifically my great aunt) because the Greek word “hyster” means “uterus.”
My great aunt was written off as “crazy” because of her reaction.
For the first time since my cousin started dating her boyfriend, Evan, he
actually made it on time for dessert this year. Typically, he makes it to every
holiday or family party right before it ends. I believe Evan’s constant lateness is
because the older members of my family dislike him because he is African
American. The elders in my family’s dislike is an example of racism, or the
belief that one racial category is innately superior or inferior to another
34
(Macionis, 280). For instance, any time Evan tries to be a part of a
conversation, my older relatives belittle his contributions or tell me he has no
idea what he is talking about. My great aunt is so racist that she refuses to
even acknowledge Evan’s race. In between bites of pumpkin pie, she said Evan
“just has a dark tan.” My cousin’s father feels Evan is an unfit boyfriend due to
this color of his skin, which is an example of conflict theory simply because my
cousin’s father is oppressing Evan and looking down on him because of his
race. My cousin’s parents are divorced and because of how racist her dad is,
she would not bring Evan to her dad’s after Thanksgiving at her mom’s house.
My cousin is fearful of the racial slurs her father may say about, and to, Evan.
This rude act shows how racism is still prevalent today, whether it is in my
family or society as a whole.
Why do the elders in my family feel so negatively towards African
Americans? The elders in my family hold different values and beliefs than my
brother, my cousins, and I. Their culturally defined standards and guidelines
that are used to determine what is desirable, good, and beautiful are much
more conservative than ours are. Although I do not represent my entire
generation, I am much more progressive and tolerant than my older relatives,
which is an example of how cultural transmission fails in some aspects.
Cultural transmission is the process by which one generation passes culture to
the next (Macionis, 41). My older relatives are not as open-minded as my
brother, my cousins, and I. For example, it is impossible for my great aunt and
me to discuss politics simply because I know she will not listen to my point of
view. In addition, my great aunt judges individuals according to gender, race,
and ethnicity, while I judge a person based on his or her character.
This Thanksgiving was the first Thanksgiving in five years that my great
aunt’s stepson, Tony, was with us. Tony, an ex-police officer, was recently
released from five years in prison. Tony was arrested for his deviant behavior,
one so serious that society recognizes it as a crime. Deviance is the recognized
violation of cultural norms, while a crime is the violation of a society’s formally
enacted criminal law (Macionis, 156). Ironically, Tony used to be a part of the
criminal justice system, or the organizations—police, courts, and prison
officials—that respond to alleged violations of the law (Macionis, 156). Tony was
found guilty and sentenced to five years in prison for the distribution and
possession of child pornography. This deviant behavior, or taboo, is held so
strongly that it results in extreme disgust—which is why society has made it
illegal.
Having Tony at Thanksgiving dinner this year was incredibly
uncomfortable because of his act of deviance. I was nervous and anxious while
I was around him, and my cousins and I even made it a point to make sure we
did not sit near him. Previously, I was used to hearing him talk about his roles
as a police officer, but this year, he did not mention work or even his last five
35
years in prison. Tony’s social status was an achieved status, as his social
position as a police officer was one that he had to do something to receive.
Tony’s position as a police officer was also his master status, or his status that
has special importance for social identity, often shaping a person’s entire life
(Macionis, 89). Polar opposite from a glorified police officer, today Tony’s master
status is that of a felon convicted on counts of child pornography. Tony’s
deviant behavior has greatly shaped the way we look at him, as well as the way
society does.
Sociology is everywhere in everyday life, including the Thanksgiving
dinner table. All one has to do, including myself, is to start analyzing life with a
sociological lens. For example, I learned my family is ageist, sexist, racist, and
even deviant.
Works Cited
Macionis, John. Society: The Basics. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson,
2013. Print.
OpenStax College, Introduction to Sociology. 2012. Print.
36
Longer Fiction
Gazebo, Chapter 17: “The Promised Land”
by Andrew Mastorakis
Ibiza, Spain: the mecca of electronic dance music. At least that’s what Adrian
told me, and I must admit, I was nothing less than intrigued. Thinking back on
the summer, I often find myself contemplating how perfect Ibiza was. If ever
this round-the-world trip had come to an end the way I wanted, it would have
ended there. But thus far into the trip? Thus far, I was telling myself one thing
and one thing only: I was having too much fun and she looked too beautiful. I
wasn’t wondering about life after the summer; that seemed all too irrelevant to
me at the time. Instead, I found myself thinking that I might very well have
been contented never knowing anything other than this life.
Finally, I wasn’t bored. My entire life had been plagued with boredom,
and, sure, you can make the argument that my life lacks as much boredom as
most, but am I wrong to think boredom should be the most absent thing in the
world? Wouldn’t every other person in the world venture to agree with me? I
mean, aren’t they bored too? For all I know, each and every one of the other
seven billion people on this planet around me are more likely to be contented
with consistency than myself. I suppose this more than anything else has been
and will always be my biggest flaw as a human being.
Flaws are a funny thing, aren’t they? Everybody has them; mine just so
happens to be the most anxiety provoking of them all: the strain and stress of
knowing I will never be contented. For the first time in my twenty-three years of
existence, I wasn’t looking for something better. I wasn’t waking up late and
walking around moping as I internally beat myself up, contemplating when the
next spark of volatile excitement would explode before my eyes. As far as I was
concerned, she was all of the volatile eruption I needed. Finally, I was satisfied
and pacified. Contention was finally tangible as a new thing to explore and
comprehend.
And on through the island, we were never more than two feet from one
another. Between the shopping, the sun-bathing, the clubbing, the hotel room
usage, and the candlelit dinners, we were glued together. Being gummed to
someone has never been something I’ve ever wanted. In fact, I’d quite rather
have had the opposite, but that wasn’t exactly the case with her. The last thing
I could have imagined was being able to enjoy this place without her, though it
was exceptionally beautiful.
37
Just as we were about to finish dinner, I smiled while looking into her
eyes as I wiped my mouth.
voice.
“What?” she asked with what I would assume was curiosity in her soft
“I have this surprise for you. This night, this day: it’s all been so perfect.
There’s just one thing that could make it even bet…”
I watched her drop her fork and followed its bouncing around her halfemptied plate, then its rebounding on each corner of the fancy, square piece of
porcelain. Finally it fell off and onto the floor, taking a chunk of the dish with
it.
“You’re not…” She jumped up out of her seat, taking a step away from
the table. “You’re not proposing, are you?”
I burst out laughing, “The fuck? No! Of course not!” I found this all too
humorous; it was uncontrollably funny, but why? I mean what if I were?
“Oh,” she replied as she wiped her hand across one of her eyes. She then
bent over to grab the fork she dropped and sat back down. But really, what if I
was going to propose? For all I know, she was upset because that would have
been a major proposition, ya know? Not just a proposition, but the proposition.
But what if she was just upset because I might have denied any chance of that
having been my surprise for her?
Anyway, after the dinner incident, I had to remind myself that I still had
this plan. I had set this all up just to see that smile. No other reason could ever
be worth it. You see, I’ve shown throughout my life that I’m really not all that
outgoing. These are the reasons why I don’t do dangerous things really, with
the exception of drinking, partying, fucking, and of course everything that I’ve
been doing all along last summer. The catalyst for that last part was Kirstin of
course; as if it could have been anything or anyone else. She was changing me,
wasn’t she? She was changing me for the better. She was taking me out of my
world of fiction and bringing a fantastical story of serendipity right to my door.
And she just kept on knocking until either someone answered or that knob fell
clear off.
We walked through the woods where she had never been and I only once
before. Just two or so miles hiking, and we had reached the island’s north
shore. There, waves crashed, exploding upon the pebbled beach.
She smiled, “you know, we could ‘a just driven to the beach.”
38
With a smirk, I simply told her to “just wait”. We walked another mile
down the beach until she pointed into the sea.
“What’s that?” she asked, pointing out, way into the sea.
“That’s where I’m taking you,” I told her as I laughed. I grabbed her
hand, interlacing each of our fingers, and continued to the destination. Just
over the horizon was a jetty of rocks, all in a line: thousands of these masses of
Earth stone lay toward a gazebo. This beautifully crafted gazebo stood a half
mile into the ocean.
I jumped up onto the first rock, nearly losing my footing. Reaching out, I
gave her my hand. Together, we scaled the ocean, stone by stone. If she slipped
on a rock, I’d be there to catch her. And if she slipped from my hands, I would
have gone right in after her. Before she knew it, we arrived. Reaching the
ending point, I guided her hand with mine, fingers still interwoven. The bond
between us grew exponentially stronger with each tug of the hand towards the
gazebo. “Come on!” I shouted. As she took her final step into the wooden
crafted hut, a massive wave crashed, colliding with the front of the gazebo.
With that one great force of nature, the water had finally tempered evenly;
nothing but small ripples of the nocturnal fish as they were getting in their last
meals before sunrise. The calm in the ocean was the very calm I felt with her; a
sort of calm that could only be found in the depths of a wondrously fantastic
dream. And that’s what I had been living all summer long: it was all a dream
with a heartbeat and a persistent pulse. It was all a dream unrolling itself
before my eyes.
With one hand, she traced the meticulously carved wooden beams. She
traced the same spot over and over again. Once, twice, three times: she drew
her fingers up and down an immaculate rose, thorns and all. She put her hand
gently on my chest and sharply drew in a breath. She quietly, but fervently
exhaled, “this is amazing.” I knew right then and there that I had done
something right. I rolled out a blanket where we would lie ever so still, gazing
towards the water. Just lying beside her, being near her, it all kept me smiling
this hard-earned smile. We had lain still for so long saying absolutely nothing,
a comfortable silence. Never before had sheer silence been so amazing. With
every second gone by, with every word not spoken, each second became the
best of all that I could recall up to that point in my life.
I sat up and looked over to her. I then propped myself up more
comfortably, pulling my right leg up, foot flat on the floor, my other leg straight
out in front of my body. I reclined back, holding myself up with my hands
behind me. She, in response, rolled over onto her stomach, supporting her
head with one hand, resting her other arm over my knee, and her legs waving
39
back and forth in the air. I looked at her and she smiled. Just to see that smile
of hers made me smile the type of smile I had never made before.
“What?” she questioned.
I stopped smiling, looked down to her lips, then up to her eyes. Never in
my life had I seen the sun reflect against such beautiful eyes before. I didn’t
know what to say. What was I thinking about? What wasn’t I thinking about
would have been a better question. My head was flooded with thoughts, ideas,
plans, wants, desires. What could I have said? What I wanted to let out wasn’t
all that simple to just verbalize as if it were something I say to everyone.
They’re words that I had never said, only written. They’re words I had never
believed in before that very moment. If I were to say anything, they would have
had to be the most meaningful words ever spoken. Soon enough, I somehow
found the words. I found what it was that I had spent that entire day thinking
about. I found what it was that I had spent all summer thinking about. But the
sheer act of saying what I was thinking was holding me back. The real question
there was whether or not I could get the words out of my mouth.
I looked into her eyes, and I saw the future. I saw my future, and I saw
her in it. The future was bright and it burned persistently and perpetually. The
future, it burned like the sun and shined like the stars in the August night sky
over the Mediterranean Sea. With her and only with her, thoughts of the future
illuminated my psyche. With her and only with her, the space between my ears,
through my eyes and past the inner-most part of my skull gleamed bright with
glitter and gold. With her and only with her in the cars we drove and the planes
we rode, the gas light would never go on and we’d never run on E.
Go Tell the Devil
by Margaret Leslie
Part I
Derek and I would sometimes ride by on our bikes, seeing rusted equipment
still in the fields. Maybe it was once a respectable farm, but now it was a wild
junk yard. It was probably because she couldn't do it anymore, too old to tend
to the chores, too old to manage the cows and workers. One day she must have
decided to shut it all down and let it all go to shit. She was a frail old woman,
ninety years, very weak, completely alone. The house looked deserted amongst
miles of barren farm land. Boarded windows, the pillars replaced with
makeshift supports, tree limbs, anything that was lying around. The structure
itself seemed to be slanted and haphazardly covered with a patchwork of sheet
40
metal and plastic. Sometimes we’d see her out front, sitting still in a rocking
chair as we passed, never turning her head.
“Do you think she’s dead? I bet she’s dead,” Derek challenged.
“No, she’s not dead.”
“What do you think she’s got in there? Drugs, money...guns?”
“She doesn’t have any money. Look at that place, prob’ly just security
checks.”
“Well, there’s gotta be something worth something in there. I mean look
at all that scrap...There’s only one way to find out.”
Derek is what I’d like to call a catalyst. Everyone else refers to him as an
idiot. Sure, he may not be the best student, or the most high-minded
individual, but he possesses the very fiber I lack. Plenty of people have balls,
but have they been convicted of grand theft auto at the age of fourteen? Well,
would have been convicted if he’d been old enough. Derek’s a real “bad-ass”
and I wanted in the club. I knew Derek’s plan would be a risky venture, but
sitting around hoping for something to happen seemed unappealing. Hope can
kill in a town like this, so quaint, so comfortable, so nauseating.
The plan was to be executed early in the morning because that’s when
Derek could steal his older brother’s beat up pickup truck. Also, the old woman
would probably still be sleeping. We planned to park in the woods behind the
house. Next we would climb the ladder that was already conveniently set up in
front of what we assumed was the attic window. I don’t know what we planned
to take exactly, whatever seemed valuable or profitable. I had a feeling Derek
was most interested in her medicine cabinet. I was just curious to see what
was in the house. This scheme was like a rite of passage to me. To prove to
everyone, to prove to myself that I got valor. What’s even to fear? She’s just a
small old woman that could potentially have us incarcerated.
Part II
5:00 AM
On the morning of my corruption, the day of my rebirth, I woke to crows
arguing outside my window. The moon still hung in the grey sky like a cold dull
rock, yielding just enough light. I didn’t have much of an appetite and was
already dressed. I’d slept in my clothes so I would be ready on time. I opened
my screeching door just enough to squeeze through, trying not to disturb my
sleeping parents.
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A rusted Ford with a horse head emblem attached to the hood sat in the
driveway exhaling heavy exhaust. Derek was in the driver’s seat, a bent
cigarette hanging off his lip. I felt paranoia set in as I entered the cab. He
whipped out of the driveway and charged down the road, veering to the right to
run over a small woodchuck. There was a clunk and Derek let out a little
chuckle, exposing his crooked teeth.
Derek often searched for ways to disturb people; he seemed to thrive on
such behavior. There was no denying his need for attention, or his impulsive
tendencies. Since I choose to spend my time with such an individual, you
might assume that I’d be the same way, but I’m not. Our town is very small.
Our senior class has 65 students. Because I was home schooled for the
majority of my high school career, there wasn’t much of a chance for building
substantial friendships. I usually kept to myself. I first noticed Derek as the kid
who was always involved in some sort of trouble. Sometimes I’d see him
humping inanimate objects to amuse girls; yes, he was quite the charmer. He
was also three years older and in my grade. I was asked to tutor him once; this
being our first interaction, he felt obliged to get me high for the first time. I was
the one that received the lesson that day. Derek would continue to teach me a
handful of what he presumed to be valuable life lessons. Lessons like:
“Never trust women, they only want your drugs and conversation.”
“Sailors never wear a raincoat in the shower.”
“Only pussies wear argyle.”
You know, things like that. I relied on Derek for pure amusement and
exposure to what every teenage boy must experience. What Derek relied on me
for remains unclear. Maybe he needed someone to throw down on drugs,
maybe he needed answers to chemistry, or maybe he could sense my
admiration and wanted to feel tough. Whatever the reasons, we both were
using each other for some superficial benefit, much like most relationships.
“So, what do you plan to do when we get there?”
“Jesus, will you just calm down? Don’t you know I make it up as I go?”
“Yes, I guess I should know that by now.”
“What I plan to do now is take one of these and think about it.”
Derek opened his bony fist. Five blue pills nested in his palm.
“How about it, Mr. McKinney?”
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“I’m not sure we should do that if we’re breaking into a house.”
“Fucking unbelievable, five o’clock in the morning and you’re still
thinkin’ like an individual.”
I took the blue pill and Derek’s pale eyes lit up. I didn’t bother to ask
what they were. Derek didn’t like questions and I had something to prove. He
then crunched his up in the bottom of aerosol can and inhaled with a pen cap,
all while driving. I was impressed.
We arrived at the farm and pulled up behind the house, next to a rickety
shack that was literally stuffed with junk. An apple tree grew beside the shack.
I hopped out of the truck, feeling lighter than I did before. I looked down at the
dirty and disfigured apples, blood-red and bruised, misshapen and scattered
amongst the mud. Derek was already headed towards the ladder as I looked
up. I followed, noticing two crows hopping around a rusted car which was now
one with nature. A small tree grew out of the front seat, branches stretching
outside the passenger window.
5:30AM
We approached the ladder, Derek turned around to remind me to “Shut the
fuck up when we get in there.”
We entered through a small square opening into a cramped and stuffy
attic space. I immediately noticed an overwhelmingly putrid smell. I saw piles
of deer antlers scattered about a long and narrow room that extended about 30
feet to another small opening.
We made our way through a jungle of bones and crates filled with boxes
wrapped with brown paper. The floor sank with every step. Passing through the
opposite end, I noticed fear had yet to set in. I felt no worry. I felt pretty fucking
good.
The next room had more furniture laminated with dust. There was an
organ and broken chairs lining the wall. Spider webs covered the ceiling
completely. The walls were crumbling and partly covered with dirty wallpaper.
The air became thicker. I looked to Derek who traveled into a dark room. I
followed and found him standing motionless in the doorway. His back faced
toward me.
I looked over his shoulder and saw a bare room with boarded windows. A
striped mattress lay on the floor. On it were several rifles lined up as if being
taken for inventory. He began to analyze each one, picking out his favorite,
43
because I’m sure he wouldn’t leave without one, or two. I left the room to
wander elsewhere.
Besides the vast array of rotting antiquities and skeletons of dead
critters, there wasn’t much upstairs. I looked out a foggy window to see a
murder of crows attacking one of their own, bouncing up and down and
ramming their beaks into the wet ground. I began to make my way down the
narrow staircase adjacent to the room where Derek was scheming. I noticed a
flash of light from a crack in the first step. I crouched to peer through and I
saw movement. I knelt closer, trying not to fall flat on my face. Starveling pale
hands, knuckles that looked as if they might come unhinged, held a pencil that
was scribbling on yellow paper. I tried to get a closer look, to see whose hands
these were. I changed angles and could see that it was the old woman.
6:00AM
Strands of gray hair protruded from her flaky head. The rest was pulled back
into a tiny bun. The color, completely different from the roots, looked somewhat
violet. Cats-eye glasses were shoved on her long nose and two buck teeth poked
out of her mouth. She was bird-like, or rat-like. She looked over ninety years
old. I needed to get a closer look. Trying my best to avoid creaking floorboards,
I made it down the stairs. It brought me to a room full of holy emblems.
Statues of saints, their palms pressed together, looked sorrowful. Rosaries and
charms hung on the walls.
I needed to find the woman before she found me. There were three doors
in this room, but no windows. One had a padlock, and the second was slightly
open, showing the corner of a bed with rustled sheets. The last was slightly
cracked and I could identify nothing. I moved along with my back to the wall; I
could feel it crumbling as I inched along. I was seconds from storming the keep
when the door swung open and the old woman appeared.
She did not turn to look, or even notice me at all. I held my breath as she
limped by me to a dining table covered with papers and medication bottles. She
was wearing mud boots and a nightgown, with a yellow robe wrapped around
her small crooked frame. She took a seat and picked up a magnifying glass to
look at the note pad she was writing on before. It was then that I realized she
must be almost blind.
6:30AM
I was horrified standing before the woman who Derek and I planned to rob. I
felt like a head mounted on the wall. I could do nothing. How was I supposed to
find Derek now? I needed to find him so we could leave, before she noticed we
were here. I backed up towards the entry to the stairs, keeping my eyes on her.
Suddenly there was a loud thump from upstairs. She looked up.
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“Is it you? The crows said you would come.”
I wanted to laugh at such a strange remark, but I held it in. She rose to a
wobbly stance and started to walk toward the locked door. Beside me was a
large Jesus statue that came up to my knee. The paint on his face was peeling
and it looked quite heavy. I wasn’t sure what came over me, but I kicked the
statue over and it made a loud thump, making the room and everything in it
shake. The woman shrieked as a hanging cross fell from the wall. She pulled a
long key from her robe and unlocked the door all in a panic, slamming it
behind her. Suddenly Derek appeared, holding a rifle, ready to fire. His glassy
eyes were foggy mirrors, pupils like pin points. There were spider webs in his
hair, and he had the face of a psychotic goon.
“Derek, it’s all right. She locked herself in that room.”
“Did you make that sound?”
“I broke Jesus.” I pointed to the shattered figure.
“You did. I’m gonna tell the devil.”
Derek went to the table and started sorting through the medications.
“I’ve never even heard of these before.”
“I think we should leave. She might come out.”
“You worry too much.”
He leaned the rifle against the table. I looked down and noticed the note
pad she’d been holding was on the floor. She must have dropped it. I picked it
up and looked at the pages. Each was filled with drawings of crows and
scribbles I couldn’t decipher.
“All I need now is to find some bullets. Then we can leave.”
All of a sudden the door she had slammed exploded. Splinters flew
everywhere. Derek and I crouched to dodge the debris. The old woman stood in
the doorway as the dust cleared. She was holding a shotgun. Her mouth was
open, exposing her rat teeth. We could hear crows cawing in the distance. The
woman pointed her shotgun in Derek’s direction. Derek fumbled for his rifle.
There was a click. A misfire. Without thinking, it must have been my valor, I
ran at the woman and pushed her with all my strength. She fell backwards into
the room she had been hiding in. I looked around the room, which was covered
with deer heads. Their glass eyes stared past me. I looked down at the old
woman. She wasn’t moving. It looked like she wasn’t breathing either.
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I looked at Derek who was under the dining table in the fetal position.
We said nothing and could still hear the crows outside. Derek and I left with
nothing. We didn’t bother to check the old woman. We had enough.
Time Passes
A week passed from the day. Flashing police cars and an ambulance were
parked outside the house when I passed on my bike. I wondered what would
happen to the junkyard now. I hadn’t seen Derek for a few days. I wonder if he
knows.
The Soldier of Devastating Flames
(A “Soldiers of Oblivion” short story)
by Kairee-Anne Cooley
Spectra: a world filled with mystery, darkness and curiosity for the undead. A
realm filled with three sectors that represent Heaven, Purgatory, and Hell to
keep the souls of misfortune at bay. When I wander around these hollow
grounds, my mind sometimes returns to the times back on Earth, where my
soul grew from pure to empty like all of the souls here. Just like my two best
friends, who I now consider to be my brother and sister, Atticus and Masi. We
are soldiers; we are souls that failed in the life we were given in the past. We
are guardians of this questioning world of Spectra.
Now, before I get ahead of myself, allow me to tell you my tale as a
human born with the ability to control fire. Let me tell you the story of
devastation within the darkest flames.
I barely remember where I was born, but whenever I was taken to several
locations by my mother, she would tell me about the country. She would
describe it to be cold with snow covering the hills and ground around the
capital city of the country. And the lights of the city were making the night-lit
sky nothing but a blur to the human eye. By the time we moved into the United
States when I was three years old, my father already had taken off and my
mother became the sole provider for both of us. Normally, this would be
considered acceptable; however, even my family had secrets. Like my mother, I
was born to control flames and create them with a simple flick of the wrists.
People would consider us to be witches, poison for the good of mankind.
Ever since I could remember, my mother and I would have to move constantly
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in order to hide my growing powers. By the time I grew to be thirteen, things
changed.
The streets themselves started to grow angry; people began to charge at
one another to slaughter each other at gun point or to slit each other’s throats.
At this time, I could only remember two things: hiding and striking. Using my
powers, I would step in and attack anyone who would go against my mother.
She too, would strike with anything her little paws could grab. In the end, she
became a victim, shot in the middle of the chest.
I watched her falling back into my arms, my face covered in her blood.
Tears streamed down from my eyes, and I shook her body as she stared at me
dimming, her breathing coming in and out in gasps. I screamed for help,
watching everyone else go off towards their selfish ways. I couldn’t bear it any
longer. The fire I was born with raged through my veins and out of my heart. I
looked up, noticing the sky clearing to reveal sparkles of stars that scattered
across the massive sky. I glanced down at my mother’s cold face, her life taken
away from her eyes. After placing her body down gently, I stood up to glare at
the fighters.
I growled and flicked my hands so the flames would appear on the palm
of both hands. I shot a glare at the man nearest to my mother’s corpse. I yelled
and threw one of the fire balls at him. He screamed in terror as it engulfed his
entire body. People around him began to panic, instantly dropping their
weapons and running away from the terror I bestowed upon the idiotic fool. My
head snapped to the other victims and I started hitting them with the fire balls
at well. Their screams echoed, smoke was forming to touch the sky above, and
I slowly moved onward, watching the soon-to-be corpses dance around in
circles, crying and screaming for the pain to stop by having their hands
reaching out to each other. I smiled as my heart was beating heavily in my
chest. This was sweet revenge.
To kill or be killed, that was the question of this world. And with the
flames, I reigned on to dominance.
Over the next few years, people continued to scream for me to stop; their
corpses danced around near my bare feet. I smirked, adjusting my glasses to
see their last dances clearly. At times like this, I would stare at the moon with
open arms, fingers curling with the small bits of flame forming in my
possession. A smile would form, my gaze growing darker in the moon’s
beautiful yet dangerous glow that beamed throughout the clouded horizon.
I would laugh, not giving a damn about who was at my mercy. However,
like all the killers before me, one idiotic psychopath grew to become a better
one than the rest of us. When I first met him, his hair was wild yet somehow
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fluid with his swift movements. His left obsidian eye glared at his falling victims
while the other one was covered in an eye patch, and his arms were wrapped in
bandages that covered themselves in blood—old and new. His lower body was
inside a pair of midnight colored pants; the rest of him was covered in an open
lab coat, revealing his bare chest and stomach, which were covered in multiple
scars. The only thing that was hidden at the time was his face, which was
covered by his wild hair.
Curiously, I approached him once I had gotten rid of the flames from my
fingertips.
“Hey! Just who the hell do you think you are?!” I yelled bitterly, glaring at
the man as I grew closer to him, “They were my kills!” Moments passed. The
older man never spoke a word or even looked at me for that matter. Instead he
raised his damaged hand and motioned his two fingers to tell me to inch closer
to him as if he was expecting me to attack.
I rolled my eyes, snapping my fingers to create the fire once more in the
palm of my hand, forming it into a ball.
“Seriously, who the hell are you?” I asked loudly, “Don’t make me kill you
too.” I threw the small fire ball at his feet. The older man looked down and
started to walk right through it with no difficulty. My eyes widened as I took a
step back. I kept firing more fire balls at him; he dodged again with ease. His
one eye stared into my face; a small smirk emerged from the edge of his lips.
“Excellent form, nice use of the elemental ability. Very nice,” he replied,
his voice melting through my eardrums like honey despite the thick Irish
accent. I dropped my hands, tilting my head in confusion.
“What are you babbling about, old man?” I asked again. The old man
shrugged his shoulders and approached me where we were now face to face.
His hand reached out for me as the wind began to pick up. The edges of his lab
coat swayed from behind his legs.
“I have work for you, Josiah. I have been watching you from the moment
I stepped into the city four years ago. You’re very well known for the fire and
the many corpses that suffer from your abilities. Tell me something, are you a
psychic? A witch? Or are you a monster like I?”
I smacked his hand down and jabbed him in the cheek. He was pushed
back, his head turned away from my fist.
“How the hell do you know me!?” I yelled, “I’m growing tired of your
stupid-ass games!” The old man began to laugh as his lone eye focused its gaze
48
on the full moon right above us. His arms spread out to embrace the moon’s
everlasting glow.
“You’re the one playing games here, Josiah; I’m simply offering you a job
is all,” he answered as he lowered his head to focus on me.
“What kind of job?”
“A job.”
“Asshole,” I growled. I took in a breath and glared at him with a sly smirk
forming on my lips. “Just tell me what the job is and perhaps I will take it.”
The old man dropped his arms and lowered his head to look at the
ground.
“I cannot do that until you are ready.”
“Ready for what?” I began to approach him while forming another fire
ball. However, I took slow and steady steps to observe him as he too
approached me with a large, open grin on his face. The old man grabbed the
hand that held my fire ball and maneuvered my hand to toss the fire ball away
from us. I struggled to get free from his grip; however, he started to pull me
down to the ground.
I was on my knees, growling at him once I found my knees slamming into
the pavement. He placed his hand on my right shoulder. I looked at him. His
gaze grew cold, and his grin became a bitter frown.
“To die.” He snapped his fingers and pressed his hand on my shoulder.
The sound of his snap echoed throughout the empty area we stood on; his
voice was fading away. I felt the weight of my body getting heavier, my eye lids
closing in an instant—I could’ve sworn my body was on the edge of a cliff,
falling to its fate with fire consuming my body.
###
When I came to again, I began to see blobs of unknown people. One of them
had a hand reaching out to me. Once my vision became clear, I saw one boy
and one girl. Both of them looked very similar to each other with darkened
skin, chocolate brown eyes, and black hair that reminded me of the old man’s
lone eye. They seemed to be around the same age as I was, but then again, I
barely remembered my age now. When I focused on the girl, she smiled at me
with flashing perfect teeth.
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“Are you okay?” she asked in a sweet voice. She pulled me up and held
me in place till I was able to get my balance in check. I shook my head.
“Where the hell are we?” I asked while I gazed around the unknown area.
It was utter darkness with just the girl, the boy—who I assumed was her
brother—, and me. I looked at the girl who was shorter than both her brother
and I. Her face was clear of any markings, yet her pupils contained the form of
a cat with a line down the middle. She wore a dark violet dress; pieces of the
dress had rips that scattered in smaller areas. Around her neck was a cat iris
necklace that resembled her eye structure, expect for the amethyst jewel that
was placed in the center.
I then looked down and noticed my clothes were also ripped in several
places. However, unlike the girl, my hands were covered in burns that almost
destroyed my hands completely, and yet I didn’t feel the pain I was supposed
to. Perhaps I was used to it.
I glanced at the girl’s brother. His face was blank of emotion, but he
stood in seriousness like a silent soldier. He had his arms crossed on top of the
black dress shirt he wore over his tall body structure; his face was filled with
lined scars that went from both cheeks to the tips of his ears like he was the
joker from the Batman series. His eyes were hollow much like mine once were.
He licked his lips and uncrossed his arms.
“It would appear that we are in an abyss created by the old man,” he
answered, his voice deeper than a bass drum. I rolled my eyes out of
annoyance and put my damaged hands on my hips.
“You guys ran into him too? Bah! How the hell did we end up here?” The
siblings shrugged their shoulders.
“All we remember was standing in the middle of the road near our home
and he touched us in the middle of a fight and snapped his fingers,” the girl
answered as she played with the fringes of her dress. I walked past them,
extending my hands to create two fire balls.
“Old man!” I began to yell, throwing many of the fire balls that appeared
quickly from my palms, “Where are you!? Explain yourself!” The girl’s brother
behind me placed his hand on my shoulder.
“Calm yourself, brother; we need to conserve our energy for when the old
man does show up again.” He spoke softly, and I felt my hands lowering
themselves. I hissed and looked away.
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“All right, all right,” my voice trailed off, thinking of the word “brother.” I
couldn’t help but wonder, why did his voice relax me the way it did? I shook
the thought away and stared at him. “I’m Josiah. Who are you?”
“I am Atticus, and this is my little sister, Masi,” Atticus replied, waving a
gentle hand towards his sister. “What brings you here?”
I looked down at my feet, feeling my body shaking without thought.
“I don’t remember. I would assume that the old man was the one that
brought me here, but it doesn’t really explain you two. I mean, if the same
thing happened to you guys, then why did he put us together?”
“Maybe we somehow met in the past?” Masi inquired.
“It still doesn’t explain why we wouldn’t remember the events that
occurred before we woke up. I can remember everything in life, but at this
moment—I keep drawing a blank whenever I try to think about it,” I replied.
“Close your eyes, and maybe your memories will come back to you,
Josiah.” Atticus suggested.
“But how will that work? I don’t understand, you fool.” I answered.
“Just give it a try, brother. The mind can achieve much more when you
attempt to open the doors to it with your heart and soul.”
I exhaled a sharp breath and nodded.
that.”
“All right, I’ll try it. Just stop calling me ‘brother’; it’s sort of odd to hear
“Fair enough. My apologies.”
Masi came up to me and the three of us sat in a circle. I closed my eyes,
breathing in and out deeply to relax myself. I blocked any thoughts, any
sounds Masi and Atticus created next to me. Suddenly, I felt my heart pound
heavily, my head aching until I felt tears pouring on my cheeks. My hands
quickly touched the sides of my head.
I screamed. The images in my head were coming and going so fast I
couldn’t even keep up with them. The images of the fire, meeting Masi and
Atticus, meeting the old man, my mother’s murder, and fire. Fire circled
around me, forcing my body to move away from Masi and Atticus. I felt the
51
burns on my hands reaching a boiling point of pain, peeling my flesh over and
over again.
I screamed again. The fire around me consumed me until I felt my eyes
open. My hands went down to the ground, and more tears poured down from
my weary eyes. I found myself seeing the city again, where rain was slamming
down on the pavement. I stood up and watched the old man facing Atticus and
Masi, who were in fighting stances. Another version of me appeared and
attacked from the background with my fire. The old man snickered and
attacked the three of us with two daggers in each hand.
I watched in horror as the old man murdered Masi with a single stab to
the heart. Then the old man reflected the fire ball and forced it against Atticus,
who went down on his knees and screamed with blood spitting out of his
mouth.
“Masi! Atticus!” I screamed, closing my eyes to block off the tears before
reopening them to watch my other self getting killed. Finally, the old man
approached me, throwing the dagger into my chest like a dart. The other me
went down; blood was taking over his shirt. He threw a final sprint of fire at the
old man, who dropped his spare knife and caught the ball of fire with ease. He
grinned coldly and laughed as he tossed it directly at me. The fire soon flared
upward to hit my past self’s body.
I looked up at the sky one last time, hearing my blood-curdling screams
echoing within the dead city I had once taken over with my two best friends,
my brother and sister.
My head went down, and I cried loudly as I felt both Atticus and Masi
placing a hand on my shoulders. I raised my head and smiled weakly at them
once I realized I was back in the dark abyss.
It was all coming back to me—my past, my present, my future were gone
forever. Masi and Atticus had died alongside me just like they said a few years
ago. On a rainy day we had met shortly after the murder of my mother. They
were here as my friends and fellow warriors who once left me in the city alone
before now. They were my damnation, just like the fire. The three of them
destroyed me.
I was dead.
How? I was just in the empty city alone without them, breathing and
destroying the things I hated in life.
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I watched the old man appear out of nowhere, tilting his head in a
curious matter. I slowly stood up with the help of my best friends. I wiped the
tears away and looked at the old man.
“Are you ready now?” the old man asked impatiently. I wanted to speak,
but my voice was too raspy from screaming. Atticus spoke in my place.
“Ready for what?” he asked. The old man rolled his eye and motioned
with his two fingers for us to follow him.
“For the job. You all died for a reason. I need you.”
“But we were killed by you! Why would you need us if we’re dead
anyway!?” Masi hissed.
“It doesn’t matter! No more questions!” the old man yelled. “I grow tired
of your annoyance. Now follow me, you bloody mongrels.” Nervously, Atticus
and Masi began to walk towards him, but I stood my ground and threw a fire
ball at him.
“I refuse to move from this spot unless you tell me what the fuck is going
on!” My voice was rising louder than it normally would. Atticus stopped
walking and nodded his head in agreement with me, but the old man turned
his head and shrugged his shoulders. His glare caused me to shiver in my
place.
“I want you three to be guardians of my world, Spectra. I govern the
realm of the undead, and I need soldiers to be protectors of the three sectors
that lie dominant in my world. Mind you, you three are getting a second
chance, considering you fucked up your last one in the human world. If you
wish to join me in Spectra, then let’s get a move on. If not, suffer in this hollow
abyss with no more chances of ever leaving again,” the old man replied. His
words ran within our eardrums. My body shook violently; the rapid thoughts
began to form in my head.
Should we do it or not?
I pictured the flames in my head, hoping for them to give me a sign once
more. The flickering flame floated around the old man. I realized from that
point on, the world was giving this frail soldier of hell another chance: to be
with my blurred memories of the living and the friends I made that helped me
get over my mother’s death.
Things were difficult; however, I breathed in the cold air in a large gasp. I
looked straight ahead into the old man’s eye and nodded.
53
“I’m ready,” I answered, seeing Atticus and Masi nodding their heads
slowly in acceptance. The old man smiled widely and began his way through a
ripple he made with a gesture of his hand.
“Wonderful! By the way, my name is Laurent,” he answered smoothly, as
we entered the ripple, and a blinding light soon consumed our visions.
“Welcome to Spectra.”
###
So now you know the truth.
I was once a son, a friend, a murderer, and a terror to everyone else.
Now, I sit here in the sector of nothing but suffering and the fiery flames
of hell. I am now the guardian of hell in the mysterious world of Spectra.
Hopefully one day, Atticus, Masi, and I will return to the human world to raise
some more hell for the guardians after us. After all, you can never escape fire’s
grip on you.
Wait
by Amanda Trapanese
The pain burned its way down from my skull, lingering for a moment in my
neck, and then resumed its way down between my shoulder blades, diffusing
throughout the rest of my broken body. With an exhausted effort, I lifted my
shaky arms up toward my head.
More pain. I could feel my bones scraping against each other at my
shoulders. If I were alive, I’d have probably passed out from how excruciating—
never mind, words truly couldn’t justify such a feeling. My hands groped
through my blood-saturated hair, until they finally met the windshield. Placing
my hands flat against the cool glass, I pushed against it while trying to pry my
forehead out of the hole that it had created upon impact. I clenched my jaw.
The pressure required in order to make any progress, the grinding of my
cracked and jagged bones, the protruding vertebra at my neck and in between
my shoulder blades—I could only push harder; just get it over with.
A metallic taste coated my tongue as I proceeded with the pressure. My
fingers ached and burned as the webbed glass of the windshield caught my
skin. It was hopeless; I was going to be stuck here for the rest of my afterlife.
54
My frustration overwhelmed me and I decided to give one last push against the
glass.
Like a loose tooth, I popped right out. I swung back against the
cushioned driver’s seat with a gasp. A vague, empty feeling filled my inner core
as if I were missing something. I felt cold, like you usually do after someone
rips the blankets off of you. It only took me an extra moment to realize my body
was still hunched over the steering wheel with half of my skull protruding
through the windshield.
“Oh! Ew!” I scrambled out of the driver’s seat, pulling the rest of my soul
out of my body and into the passenger’s seat. I wasn’t grossed out by my being
dead or anything, more that I was all mangled up in the most ungraceful way
possible. My blood, my life more like it, was oozing down the glass in front of
me, and my neck had some very unnatural protrusions where my bones had
squished into one another.
Freaked out, I got out of my totaled white Cavalier and stepped away. My
car had hydroplaned at sixty miles per hour to a dead stop, wrapped around a
merciless telephone pole. It wasn’t like your typical “wrap” though. The front of
my car had greeted the pole, whereupon the pole then decided to try and split
my car down the middle. And there was the top of my forehead, peeking out, all
gory and mutilated.
What a shame it was to have died this way. There’s just no dignity in a
car wreck like this. They’ll assume I had a drink or two due to the fact that my
boyfriend just dumped my ass via an engagement to another woman. What
good was that? Mom will cry; Dad will try and defend my honor; my sister will
probably write some angry and depressing letter; Nikolai will probably just go
on and marry Farra or whatever her name is, and then everyone will get over it
and settle for the conclusion that I was a basket-case or something. Tragic, but
simple. That was my life.
I’m dead. I’m dead. Some sort of excitement replaced my emptiness.
“I’m dead!” I yelled to no one. A large smile spread across my face as I
thought of all the possibilities ahead of me.
###
Nikolai walked into the kitchen, his work shoes clicking slightly as they met the
dark hardwood floors. I sat quietly at the kitchen table, watching him prod
through the refrigerator. Taking out one of the many plastic containers I had
filled with leftovers, he carried it over to the granite countertop and then
reached up to turn on the small T.V mounted on the wall in-between the
55
cabinet and the counter. News of my car accident was plastered all over the
screen. Nikolai’s face dropped, his jaw hanging ajar and the container in his
hand falling onto the counter.
“Fuck,” he grabbed the edge of the counter to balance himself.
“Bastard, like you really give a rat’s ass.” In the three years that I was
together with Nikolai, he was also dating Farra; he was basically sticking with
both of us to see which one he liked better.
Nikolai reached for his face, covering his open mouth. He couldn’t pry his
dark eyes away from the screen. The news crew got up close to the disturbing
scene, zooming in on where my head had met the windshield. Only I noticed
the open door on the passenger’s side of the car—the onlookers and police
officers probably assumed it flung open upon impact, but I knew that it was I
who had opened the door to get out. A pleased smile threatened my lips, but I
bit down on it, more interested to see Nikolai’s reaction. He was digging into his
pocket now, fishing out his cell phone and dialing. Maybe he was calling my
sister or my mother. I leaned my chin in the palm of my hand to watch.
“Fay, did you see the news?” Nikolai exclaimed into the phone. Fay? So
that was her name. Anger began to boil in my spirit.
“She’s dead, dead on impact!” Nikolai’s nerves echoed through his voice
and I watched as “the shakes” vibrated through his entire body. Nikolai’s face
contorted, as if he were struggling to decide which emotion to show first, before
finally a weird, almost manic smile twitched the corners of his lips. I felt sick—
what had I done for him to hate me so badly? Had he wanted me dead? In the
years we were together, did he ever love me at all? Why even bother with me for
all that time, then, anyway?
“We don’t have anything to worry about anymore; it’s just you and me,
baby,” Nikolai said into the phone, squeezing his eyes closed and biting down
on his quivering bottom lip. I couldn’t stand it anymore. I stood up from my
chair, not caring that it fell back onto the floor, alerting him of my presence.
My rage and disgust was so evident that it made the lights flicker above me on
the little chandelier. Nikolai was staring right at me, as if he could see me
though I knew he couldn’t—no matter how many ghost and spirit movies or
psychics that he had been to, I knew Nikolai couldn’t see me.
“Fay, I’ll call you back.” He shut the phone and placed it on the counter
next to the food container.
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“Nathaly? Are you here?” What an ass. I walked right up to him; my head
reached just under his chin. Tucking my dark red hair behind my ears, I let
out a sigh.
“Nat?” Nikolai’s voice sounded as if someone were squeezing in between
his legs. I couldn’t suppress a chuckle at that. Nikolai shut his eyes tightly, his
bottom lip quivering.
“I’m sorry for everything, Nat,” he began. “You deserve a lot better than
me; I know I outwardly wasted your time, three years of deceit. I stayed with
you hoping you would change. I was rooting for you, not Fay.” He made me
sick. I couldn’t listen anymore. Why was this the first thing I did as a newly
dead person? Annoyed and disgusted, I shoved Nikolai. I was pleased when he
actually fell back, whimpering and cowering down to the floor.
Well, it’s never too late to change, even in death I suppose. Though I
couldn’t mask my disappointment with myself, I felt sorry for Nikolai. He had a
warped way of thinking, believing that there was nothing wrong with him, and
everything wrong with me.
Movement in the window above the sink caught my attention. A shadowy
figure had passed, glancing at me briefly, but briskly continuing onward. I
didn’t waste any more time on Nikolai; he was a lost cause.
Outside the air was harsh, cutting into my skin as the wind picked up.
Chicago wasn’t kind in the fall or winter. I hustled through the snow after the
figure, and watched as it began to take the clearer shape of a man. Was this a
fellow dead person? I quickened my pace.
“Hey! Hey, wait up!” I called after him. “Please!” I watched him dissipate
into black, smoky wisps and then almost instantly he reappeared right before
me. I skidded to a halt, gasping. He had moved so fast.
“Jeez, you’re like a professional ghost or something,” I said, a little
winded from trying to keep up with him. The man looked down at me with
conflicted, cloudy, gray eyes. His hair was so dark that my eyes got lost in its
endless waves, as the wind carried it about his face. He stared at me as I stared
at him—was he taking me in like I was doing to him? Was he measuring up my
appearance as I measured up his perfectly sculpted jawline and his parted, full
lips? His shoulders were broad and muscular, unable to be fully concealed
under his red scarf and leather jacket.
“Stop it.” His voice was definitely ghostly—raspy, as if he hadn’t spoken
in a while, and deep. He shocked me.
57
“Stop what?” I demanded, folding my arms over my chest and leaning my
weight on my left leg.
“Sizing me up like I’m something to eat,” he continued, smirking. “It’s
rude.” I felt my jaw drop.
“What’s your deal? Why were you creeping around that house?” I shifted
the direction of the conversation instead of snapping at him.
“I was watching you.” Oh, okay, way to be blunt.
“Awesome; might I inquire as to why you were watching me?”
The man tucked his hands into the pockets of his jacket now. “I was
making sure you didn’t do anything you would regret.” He didn’t remove his
eyes from me, watching me intently as he spoke.
“Like what? What are you, my guardian angel?” Tousled hair, leather
jacket, dark jeans, and black, Dr. Marten boots—he didn’t look like anyone’s
guardian angel; he looked like a regular guy.
The man was shaking his head slowly, looking downward now. “No, but
something like that,” he replied.
“What would I regret? Why would it even matter? I’m dead and I can’t
change that, so what would it matter if I do something I would ‘regret’?”
“It’s not as simple as that, Nathaly.”
“And you know my name—well, what’s yours?”
“Jamison.”
“Well, Jamison, tell me why it’s not that simple.” He shook his head
slightly and then disappeared into wispy, black snowflakes. My frustration was
immense; why did he have to be so damned mysterious? Crossing my arms
over my chest, I looked around my old neighborhood—none of these people
actually gave half a shit that I was alive… why would they care if I’m dead?
My heart ached and I ducked my head. My fingertips tingled, longing for
the warm hand of a partner. My boots crunched in the snow as I stepped closer
to an oncoming living person with my hand out. The man hustled along,
holding his tan jacket closed tightly at his throat, passing through my hand as
if it never were.
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Instead of feeling like I didn’t exist in reality, anymore, I literally didn’t
exist. So why did it feel so different—so much more hurtful, now?
###
Gentle flurries drifted down toward the white-blanketed ground. In the very
near distance, smoke escaped through the top of a chimney that peeked
through the treetops, filling my nose with the cozy smell of winter. Snow boots
crunched along the frozen ground and came toward where I was leaning—
against a closed, shiny black coffin decorated with lavender flowers and white
lilies. My mother stared off at nothing, her eyes red and tired. My father stood
beside her holding her limp hand with a stern look on his aged face. His
caramel eyes were focused on the coffin—I knew he was analyzing every detail,
as was his habit, to make sure everything was perfect the way he planned. Dad
rarely ever expressed emotion outwardly, but today was the only day in my
existence that this feature of his actually stood out to me. Why couldn’t today
be the day that he showed me he cared? Really showed me, not just in
organizing my deathbed ceremony.
Winona finally arrived, trudging up to our parents and greeting them by
falling into their warm, alive arms to sob. She showed enough emotion for the
entire damned family—as she has always done. We weren’t necessarily the
closest, warmest family…
Smoothing down the same long-sleeved black shirt that I had been
wearing since I died, I stood up straight from leaning on my coffin and began to
make my way over to my little family when I was stopped short by the familiar
cough of Nikolai. My heart made its way up to my throat as I turned to see him.
Nikolai looked perfect. His black pea-coat was buttoned up enough to
just show the knot of his blue silk scarf—which I had bought him for
Christmas last year. Nikolai granted my family a small, tragic smile, lowering
his dreamy, brown eyes to the snow as he stopped before them.
“Nikolai?” My mother suddenly came alive, wiping at her dry eyes and
patting down the top of her hair.
“Hello,” Nikolai met her eyes now—why did he have to be so lovely? It
made him very difficult to hate—at least for my mother. His chiseled cheeks
were wind-blown, as was the tip of his nose. His fair skin nearly blended in
with the snow if not for the Clark Kent curl that escaped from his slicked back
hair. I felt the snow beneath my feet melting with my rage and stomped over to
the small group.
59
“Go away! Get away from my burial! It’s called rest in peace for a reason!”
I yelled at Nikolai.
“Who is that?” Winona pointed her hazel eyes at me, her nose scrunching
up as if she smelled something rotten.
“I’m sorry if I smell, I’ve been dead for a week—”
“Hi, my name is Fay Choll.” My heart went straight from my throat to my
ass and I whirled around. Tall— well taller than me—with blonde hair that
flowed for days and blue eyes you could swim in, Fay stood right behind me
with a red painted smile.
“How could you…” My words were hardly even audible as I spoke them to
Nikolai. My chest fluttered for a moment and then I felt as though someone
were trying to carve through me. My nails raked through my skin as I tried to
pull myself away from such a feeling.
“Fay Choll? How do you know Nat and Nikolai?” My father spoke
authoritatively. With such a tone he was very hard to lie to, and I eagerly
examined the evil couple’s faces. Nikolai’s eyes moved over toward my coffin
and I watched him struggle to suppress a shudder. I watched the bump in his
neck rise and fall with a gulp and then moved my attention over to Fay—how
could she be okay with Nikolai if she knew about me?
“I actually worked with…Natalie—I’m her boss,” Fay lied right to my
father’s face without even flinching.
What kind of person is this woman? How can she be this way? How can
she show up to her shitty boyfriend’s ex-girlfriend’s funeral and just lie to her
family? I couldn’t stomach this any longer; I couldn’t just stand here and watch
Fay shake hands with my family as they put me in the damned ground. So
much was happening at once within me. My blood boiled in my blue veins, my
jaw clenched, and the skin tightened around my knuckles until they were as
white as the fresh snow that had begun to layer over my coffin. I felt a strange
power brewing within me, like I was getting stronger off of my rage.
“Jamison?” My jaw dropped only slightly as I noticed him standing a little
ways behind my family, tucked quietly behind the trunk of a dead tree. Any
normal person would be creeped out at suddenly seeing a ghost lurking in the
woods around a cemetery, but I guess that “creeped out” feeling dies with the
body.
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Just like the last time I saw him, Jamison dissipated into dark, gray
wisps of smoke and reappeared again behind me, his hands grabbing my
shoulders and pulling me away from my family.
“Jamison—Jamison, okay, you can stop now!” I exclaimed, stumbling
backward until there was no ground beneath my feet anymore. I fell for a few
seconds and then hit the cold, frozen ground with an exaggerated thud.
“Jamison, that was all sorts of uncool.” I muttered, bringing myself into a
sitting position. The dirt walls around me towered over me, intimidating me,
trapping me.
“Jamison!” I called, trying to ignore the panic that was starting to choke
me. I stood up, my fingers grazing the dirt, like powder, that clung to my
clothes and skin. A few snowflakes that had snuck around my coffin flurried
down and met my face. I closed my eyes, digging my fingernails into the wall
and gritting my teeth.
“You do not want to do something that you will regret.” I heard Jamison’s
voice as if it were part of my own thoughts. The dirt wall was damp and
freezing as it met my forehead. Strands of my red hair fell like a curtain around
my face and my arms hung limp.
There was a groan, soft at first, then more urgent—like hinges that
hadn’t been greased in years. My head jerked up to greet the oncoming coffin.
“Oh no, no! I’m not ready!” I screamed, as hot tears spilled out of my eyes
and down my cheeks. “I’m not ready,” I cried, repeating it to myself over and
over again as the coffin drew closer.
Lying on the fresh ground tracing spirals in the dirt with my fingertip, I
watched as my coffin descended. The voices above were muffled by my
deathbed, but they crept their way to my ears, slithering down the six foot, dirt
walls that would house me for the remainder of eternity.
“She wasn’t the most exciting character, but she was my youngest
daughter. Though we didn’t get to know each other very well the past few years,
you met a wonderful man, developed a wonderful life with him… I feel cheated
out of knowing you better, baby girl.” My dad’s voice cracked and instantly he
became quiet. You feel cheated, Dad? A wicked little smile dared to tilt the
corners of my lips upward. I suppose it was only natural for Nikolai not to
mention to my parents at my funeral that he dumped me on the day I died.
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“I’m going to miss you, Sissy,” Winona practically choked on her sobs,
wiping the smile right off of my face. It was growing darker in the hole now, and
the coffin was only a few feet away.
“Nat, I’m sorry all of this had to happen,” Nikolai’s voice was like poison
to my ears and I cringed, squeezing my eyes shut. “I don’t really know what I
can say to you that you don’t already know. I hope, wherever you are, that
you’re happy.”
“You sicken me,” I whispered to no one. Black, vaporous smoke crept
into my vision and I turned my head to be greeted by Jamison lying beside me.
“Hello,” I said, my voice practically a groan. I turned my gaze back to the
coffin that hung just a foot above us. “You don’t have to be here, Jamison.”
Jamison reached over, offering me his hand. All I could do was stare at
the gesture; why did he want to be here for this? This wasn’t his death—he
didn’t even know me. The coffin was inches from us now and my heart sunk,
depression weighing on me at the physical embodiment of my deathbed.
“Take it.” Jamison urged, but I simply shut my eyes. Jamison reached for
my shoulder now, grabbing it, and then suddenly we were sucked out of
Chicago, Illinois and spit back out into somewhere I didn’t recognize as part of
the human world.
Just like that, Jamison had ripped me from my real-world travesty and
shoved me into an otherworldly realm. The sky was purple in this world,
making the green trees and grass look vibrant. There was a large tree in the
middle of the field before us, and Jamison was walking toward it.
“Wait, don’t leave me here!” I bolted after him until I was at his side
again. We were coming up closer to the tree, and I was able now to grasp just
how large it was. It resembled a willow tree, though its long, drooping branches
were covered with beautiful, light pink petals that occasionally drifted
gracefully to the ground. There was no wind here, not an ounce of a breeze,
and yet this magnificent swaying tree continued to, well, sway.
Jamison parted some of the branches as one would do a curtain and
motioned for me to go forward. I stepped carefully through the grass, unsure of
this place though driven by my curiosity. Jamison let the branches fall and
followed behind me. I felt his eyes watching me, as if he were expecting a
certain reaction.
62
“What place is this? Where have you taken me?” I looked up at the
canopy of branches in awe. The tree was as wide as five people standing side by
side, and it reached about six stories into the eggplant sky.
“How do the branches keep moving like that when there’s no wind?”
Excited by this otherworldly place, I reached out to one of the long, pinkpetaled arms and watched as it grazed slightly against my fingertips.
“Do you have an open mind?” Jamison finally spoke, his husky voice
nearly shocking me. My eyes turned to him, now. He was leaning against the
vast trunk, his hands tucked back into his jacket pockets. He was watching me
with immense curiosity, his brow furrowed, darkening his gray eyes and his
lips slightly pursed.
“I like to think so, try me.” I gave him my full attention, dropping my
hand from the lovely tree and taking a step closer to him. I tried, with much
ambivalence, to peel back my layer of hostility and find my inner calm.
“Tell me everything that was wrong with your life.” Jamison spoke evenly,
as if this weren’t some huge invasive question to ask a total stranger. Ghost or
not, I still valued my privacy.
“Nothing’s a secret when you don’t have a body to house all of your
emotions.” Jamison lowered his gaze now, perhaps carried away in thought, for
his expression converted into one of affliction.
“Twenty-four years alive and I don’t think I can walk away from it all
saying I was happy; that would be a lie.” I amazed myself at my blatant honesty
toward a total stranger. Jamison’s eyes returned to me again, clouded with
sadness.
“Why?” he said. I pried my own eyes away from him, searching for some
sort of refuge in this enchanting place. Goosebumps raised the tiny hairs on
my arms and at the back of my neck as I tried to remember an instance where
I was truly happy.
“You want to know what causes these branches to move the way they
do?” Jamison stood up at his full height now. He was built similar to Nikolai,
though there was a certain darkness about him that led me to believe he had
far more substance than my ex-boyfriend.
“I’m intrigued.” Jamison stepped closer to me, leaning his head back and
letting his long hair fall away from his face as he breathed in the movement of
the tree. His eyes were closed now, his lips slightly parted and I felt a shift
within me. I no longer viewed him as “something to eat,” but appreciated him
63
more. He was raw, honest. He wasn’t ashamed to express his emotions like the
people in my family. He was real.
“This tree is a special place,” Jamison began, sighing. “Many souls
revolve around it. This tree is in a vacancy, an empty pocket with nothing
around it to disturb the peace.” Jamison swallowed, and I watched as his
Adam’s apple moved beneath his fair skin. He lowered his chin now, looking at
me through a curtain of thick eyelashes.
“This is the place where lost souls come to reside, moving around this
tree for the rest of their eternities. They are what make these branches bloom
and sway. They are what carry the petals through the air and down to the
grass.” Jamison’s words were heavy on my heart, as I understood exactly what
this place really was.
“Why did you take me here?” I demanded. My eyes stung and my throat
tightened. I clenched my jaw, balling my fists to keep my body from shaking.
Jamison looked just as depressed as I was sure I’d become.
“To save you.” His voice was hushed and he looked at me gravely.
“Save me? I’m already dead; it can’t get any worse than that!”
“But it can.” Jamison waved his hand before my eyes and the air between
us began to ripple, warping into an entirely new image.
Darkness engulfed me, but then a red glimmer appeared. The glimmer
was faint, gradually edging closer and closer. As it neared, I felt comfort in the
promise of its warmth. A smile began to spread on my lips as the red and
orange light was almost upon me. I saw figures within the light, moving as
though they were dancing. I was instantly reminded of the flame of a candle,
flickering and moving with such fluidity that it might as well have been water.
Out of the blurry movement, the figures took shape.
Nikolai?
He was almost naked, dripping with dark, red fluid that poured down his
face, over his shoulders, and slid down his chest toward his abdomen. It didn’t
take me very long to realize it was blood. It took me much longer, though, to
notice it was my blood. Nikolai was smiling, licking my blood off of his lips,
before turning to kiss Fay—her golden hair tainted with my blood as well. I saw
myself behind them; my mangled body from the car accident was sprawled out
on our kitchen table. I was dead and they were dancing in my blood.
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“It was I who wished you to die,” Nikolai sang as he began dancing
around the table with Fay. The red light began to dim, blurring their blooddrenched bodies in my vision.
Jamison’s face interrupted the horrifying, fading scene. I returned, under
the comforting canopy of this swaying tree, feeling left with an utter emptiness.
My shoulders sagged with all the hopelessness of my entire life.
“Why are you here, Nathaly?” Jamison knew exactly what he had shown
me, and he watched me with the same expectant expression as earlier.
“Because I died, and you dragged me here!” I exclaimed. It was
challenging for me to contain my temper after being so visually disturbed just
seconds ago. I watched as anger flared within Jamison’s distraught eyes.
“Think! People don’t just end up here and stay, Nathaly; they come here
to move on. It can take seconds or it can take centuries—sometimes souls are
here for so long they forget what they came here for.” Jamison’s eyes travelled
upward, watching as a cluster of petals began to descend toward us, dispersing
and floating with so much grace it made me hold my breath so not to disturb
them.
“Well why are you here, then?” I asked. Jamison lowered his gaze at the
sound of my voice. “Why are you here?” I urged him.
“To save you,” Jamison repeated, quietly.
“How long have you been here?” I watched a collection of emotions pass
over Jamison’s fair face before he finally settled on one of hope.
“Over a century I have been waiting for you to be conceived, for you to
live, and for you to pass on.” Jamison stepped closer to me, leaving only a foot
between us.
“Why are you here?” he asked me again.
“For you?”
Jamison shook his head, the hint of a grin on his full lips. “Try again.”
The tears threatened at the corners of my eyes but I couldn’t look away from
him—I couldn’t bring myself to just brush him off like I would anybody else.
“All right,” I began, swallowing my salty tears.
“Come on, tell me.”
65
“Fine! I’m here because I’ve lied to myself my whole fucking life. I’m here
for my blatant ignorance of such an awful situation with a shitty person. I’m
here because I didn’t appreciate life when I had it—and I had only a taste of it.
I’m here because I thought I deserved to die.”
“So why are you here?” Jamison looked flustered, if not a little sad. My
own frustration began to overwhelm me.
me?”
“You’re just rattling off the same question! How is this helping you save
“Yet we’ve made progress.” Groaning and rolling my eyes, I sunk down to
the grass and let the soft blades embrace me.
“Progress, please.” I shut my eyes, closing away Jamison’s pleading face,
closing away my reality. All I could see were Nikolai and Fay holding each other
as they smiled down at my brutalized body. “Fuuuuuck!” I gritted my teeth,
hating myself for being such an ass while I was alive.
“I can’t tell you why you’re here, Nathaly; you must figure it out on your
own.” Jamison’s voice was a delicate whisper in my ear. I peeled back the
darkness that covered my eyes and turned my head over to face him. There he
was lying beside me once again, in the grass though, just inches away with his
sad, hopeful grays staring deeply into my soul.
“If I forgive myself, then you go away.” In the time I had known Jamison I
had learned of my infatuation for him. He was so selfless, trying so hard to help
me move on into a peaceful afterlife no matter how crude or how ungrateful I
projected myself toward him.
“Yes, Nathaly, we both go away.” Jamison gave me a small, crooked
smile, his full lips pulling up toward his left cheekbone and then falling back to
their original position. “We move on.”
“But what if we were to stay here? Together?” I watched the darkness
flicker across his face, but it vanished as quickly as it had appeared.
“I cannot spend my eternity in this place.” Jamison’s words were
weighted with an unknown experience that I knew nothing about. He was here
for an entire century, waiting. What sort of torture could that inflict on
someone?
“We would be lost, Nathaly,” he averted his gaze up to the dome of the
canopy, biting on his bottom lip. “We wouldn’t even know each other,
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eventually. This place isn’t meant for establishing an afterlife; it’s meant for
revelation…or for those who are lost, it is meant for dwelling. If you do not
leave this place, if you become lost, you will forget everything but the bad. You
will want, you will desire. And you will be rewarded with emptiness.” He was
lost in his thoughts, briefly, before I finally felt his cold fingertips brush against
my own.
“You don’t understand what it is like to exist with no idea of joy, with no
motivation to live on, yet no ability to die.” His voice was hardly audible, yet I
heard it as if he had screamed into my ear. My other hand groped around the
grass, running my fingers through the blades as if they were locks of hair.
“I do, Jamison,” I began. “It’s my own fault, too. I’m responsible for my
own unhappiness.” My bottom lip quivered and I closed my eyes. “But I can be
responsible for your happiness. And in doing that, I forgive myself.”
The branches groaned, faintly and gracefully, as they swayed. A myriad
of pale, pink petals collected together and rained down toward us. They danced
downward before twisting slightly and carrying on up out of the canopy into the
purple sky. A small, satisfied smile spread my lips and, despite it all, I felt at
peace. I turned my head toward Jamison only to be greeted by thin air, and my
smile spread even wider, encouraging the tears that had threatened at my eyes
to finally spill over my cheeks. I raised my hands up to meet my saturated
cheeks and was surprised at the warmth that I held again. An unavoidable
laugh escaped from my lips, jolting my chest and spreading the warmth
throughout the rest of my body as immaculate peace enveloped me in soft,
pink-petaled branches.
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Poems
BROKEN
by Venessa Cameron
I’m like glass-If touched, I might break and shatter into little pieces of splinters.
It’s like one minute I’m here,
And the next I disappear.
I’m on the floor, fragments-Of me scattered everywhere
It’s like I’m dead, but I’m not
Body
Dead, lying outstretched, torn to pieces.
Usually you would see human flesh and guts
With streams of blood so red,
You would think it was paint.
A scent so high in the air
That it makes you pale.
A scene so horrifying it makes you scream.
But it’s not;
It’s just me,
The fragile me,
The one that’s always complex, sealed off, and secluded.
The one being choked to death-By her own clothes,
Is breaking apart.
Cracked from root to root
Scattered and torn
Caged by the walls and ceiling
Trapped
In fear and darkness
The person that should be dead
With her ribs ripped out,
Is just broken
Like glass.
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The Dog
by Zachary Fahrenkopf
1
He barks
And growls
The Dog
As I tease him
With the rope
2
He grabs at it
Sinking in teeth
Tearing interwoven
Fibers,
Of rope,
Growling and pulling,
An endless
Tug of war,
3
Viciously shaking his head
To win the rope.
Fibers break off
Nearly microscopic
Just like us,
4
A small part of
Something
Unfathomably
Large
5
Together just visible
In one large part
Alone
6
Nothing more
Only microscopic
Are we truly
So little?
7
Are we
Nothing
But specks
In the
Dark?
69
Friend-Zoning
by Zachary Fahrenkopf
I can see through your eyes
See through your mind
An open book, I see the lies
Which you pray I find.
Yet it’s something else which pulls me short:
Your heart it seems expecting hurt
We’re always friends, that’s nothing new
But there’s nothing else I want from you.
I care for you, that’s plain to see;
I know you want all of me.
But what there is I will not give,
For alone, I fear, is how I live.
So my path now takes another turn;
I’ll leave and search for which I yearn.
For the future I cannot be late
‘Cause I feel the push and pull of fate.
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The Heart of Life
by Sarah Merchant
A spirit can live on—
“Far beyond one’s death,
And into eternity,”
Or so we are told.
A spirit most are born with;
Others grow into it over time.
Unfortunately for some,
The death of the spirit,
Comes far before the death of the self.
Although a spirit is not easy
To identify or define,
I hope it is something
that you handle with care—
that you never let die.
A spirit, we are told,
Is the key to an enjoyable life.
But, without happiness,
Without enjoyment,
What is the purpose of life?
A spirit allows more
Than a mere existence.
It brings laughter and heartache;
Recurrent successes, and
A fair serving of failures.
So, if a spirit is the key to happiness,
And happiness is vital to life;
I think we will find it safe to say,
That the spirit is the heart of life.
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Loneliness
by Colleen Moran
Loneliness is his last tender kiss
Lingering on your lips,
And as he pulls away, you know that everything is different
From that point on.
It is the feeling of walking into a crowded room,
And everyone stops talking.
And as you’re standing there looking
At all the familiar faces, you know
That they were just talking about you.
Loneliness is that sensation
As you place your toes into the deep blue water,
And your whole body feels the chill of its coldness.
Loneliness is the time between yesterday and tomorrow.
It is standing all alone like the last leaf
Waiting to fall at the first signs of winter.
Loneliness is a sense of exhaustion that sleep cannot cure.
It is feeling lost, but not wanting to be found.
It’s listening to love songs on the radio
And knowing that you cannot relate to them.
You have a harder time finding things
To make you happy
And an easier time finding reasons
To make you cry.
Loneliness is living in memories
And refusing to await the future,
Refusing to accept that things have changed between you two.
And when you see him with “her,”
That is the essence of loneliness.
And at that point
You realize you are
A l o n e.
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Love Poem for the Longing: A Spoken Word Poem
by Erin Fleischer
I don’t want a fairy tale love.
Stories written on paper are prone to tearing—
And if I had to choose,
I’d rather have promises of your love carved
On the ugliest of concrete.
I want a lay-my-body-in-the-street kind of love,
A kiss-me-so-I-can-taste-the-promises
Entangled on your breath kind of love,
A devotion that is apparent
To any stars that play witness.
The sun rivals the fire you ignite in me
And your passion is the wind that fans it.
I want a love crawling with irony,
And a devotion that’s like a flower:
The breeze may taunt it and it may falter,
But the seed embedded within the earth
Promises perfumed reconciliation.
I want to rip our love apart like the most fragile of daisies,
To let the petals gossip in the air before
Kissing the ground.
I want to note every imperfection
That wallpapers your embrace
And disregard them—
Place them in the farthest corners of my mind
Until they bump elbows with refined memories.
I want our love to look in the eyes and caress our corneas,
To pass the pupil,
And ignite the iris.
You have the power
To make the butterflies in my stomach
Beg for mercy on bended knee
(And repent their sins).
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I want to be the words too sacred to escape your lips,
The air you grasp
When you’re backed against a wall.
I want you to play that old love track
And smile a grin of dog-eared wistfulness
Because you can sense my relevance.
I want you to know that you’re embedded in
Every drop of ink I share with paper,
That every word I write is fueled by
Your laugh,
That every dotted “I”
Is a time you’ve made me smile.
So here I am.
Pouring the precious blood of poetry onto
Forbidden paper
As fair as your skin,
Drinking in false airs of “if-onlys”
And grabbing at straws
Floating in empty glasses,
Because all I want to know is if
You feel the same.
We may never be a fairy tale,
And that’s okay.
I don’t want a fairy tale love.
I just want to know where
The concrete path
Inscribed with our love
Is going to lead us.
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The Snapple Poem
by Caitlin Weiner
Good sir, I work here in the Snapple factory.
Could I interest you, sir, in some Snapple Iced Tea?
Come now, do tell me, what do you think
Of this super-delectable Snapple juice drink?
Do you like this sweet tasting plum-o-granate?
Or how about this great raspberry pomegranate?
What about some lovely raspberry peach,
Which would be oh so thirst-quenching down by the beach?
Or try some wonderfully good lemon tea,
And compare it to some of our strawberry kiwi.
You know what goes well with your everyday lunch?
A nice tall glass of our yummy fruit punch!
Try some delicious white tea lime green
Or possibly you’ll like red tea nectarine.
And what shall you do while you sit in the shade?
Well, why don’t you sip on some pink lemonade?
Frequently overcome with distressing sadness?
Turn that frown upside down with our mango madness!
So tell me, good sir, did you decide?
Is there one flavor that’s stuck in your mind?
He replied, “In all the flavors there is no contest,
I love every flavor as if it were best!”
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“When I met you...”
by Colleen Moran
When I first met you, I loved you the whitest:
a distant friend who made me smile on that first winter night.
When I got to know you, I loved you the pinkest.
Feelings of shyness and embarrassment
surrounded me every time you were near.
When we started dating, I loved you the reddest,
like the little hearts I drew around your name
and the strong sense of passion we had when we were together.
After awhile I loved you the bluest:
the sense of wonder and courage I saw in your eyes.
Our relationship could battle the deep blue waters of the ocean
and still come out a winner.
And after weeks of being apart I loved you the blackest.
I could not see ahead of us and where our relationship was headed.
Even though I still closed my eyes and saw you
I did not know whether you could see me too;
The sharp turns and changing moods took the best of us.
And when you met “her,” I loved you the greenest:
that wide open field that you craved to start over with someone else
and the extreme jealousy I felt whenever I saw you two together,
wishing and hoping it were me.
And right now, I love you the greyest.
I cannot see where both of us are headed
but I know the white and black stages of our relationship
have blended perfectly together.
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Little Lambs
Fall Newsletter
New Discoveries Await
Inside
This newsletter is to inform you
of what Cody has been up to
since I have been observing his
classroom. Children, even at this
young age, discover new things
every day, and I am so happy
that I am able to be there, right
next to Cody, while he makes
these discoveries. I am also
going to talk a little bit about
what is going on in the class:
activities that are being
implemented on a day-to-day
basis and the overall
environment.
I picked a great time slot to sit in with Cody and his classroom. I am able
to watch free play, their morning lesson, and snack time. Right before
snack, the children sit in a circle and sing a few songs together, which
they seem to love. These songs, while entertaining the children, are also
teaching them motor skills such as hand clapping and jumping. After
these songs, the teacher reads them a book. Despite being 18 months old
and the youngest in the class, Cody is able to keep up with his peers by
pointing out colors, animals, and body parts.
I am very impressed with how much he has already learned.
One time on the playground, some
children were playing on the jungle gym
and some on the seesaw, but Cody
explored everything else around him.
He played with the pebbles, played
peek-a-boo with me from across the
playground, and ran back and forth
between each activity with a huge
Follow me to Page
2
November 2013
[Issue] :: [Date]
November, 2013
Lorem Ipsum Dolor
“It is a happy talent to know how to play.”
-Ralph Waldo Emerson
smile on his face. At one point, one of the teachers
found a giant fuzzy caterpillar and let the children
come over and look at it. Cody looked at it for a
few seconds and poked it curiously.
All of these things show that Cody is aware of his
environment and is not afraid to discover new
things. Contrary to some beliefs, play helps
children learn. It allows them to get used to their
environment and opens new, exciting doors to
discovery. Through play, children learn how things
work. This type of play, with young children such
as Cody, leads to more advanced play, such as
make-believe play. Each form of play is necessary
for children in order to learn basic life skills.
A simple game to play with your toddler is peek-aboo. It is fun for parents to watch their toddlers
laugh themselves silly and it is also helping
development. By playing this game, your toddler is
learning object permanence. In other words, just
because you cannot see an object, does not mean it
ceases to exist.
2
As part of my observation practice, it is my job to
get involved in the classroom and implement an
activity of my own. With the weather still being
tolerable, I thought it might be fun for the children
to pick out their favorite leaves from outside and
bring them in to make an art project. We matched
the color of the leaves to the color paper we had,
traced their hands and cut them out, and put the
leaves and paper hands side by side, branching off
a brown rectangle which symbolized a tree trunk.
This activity incorporates play by going outside to
find leaves, autonomy by being allowed to pick any
leaf they want, fine motor skills by helping me
trace their hands, and shape and color
identification by recognizing a rectangle and
matching the color of the leaves with the color of
the paper.
This activity was done with 1-2 children at a time
in order to make sure I focused on each skill with
each child.
Thank you again for allowing me to work with
your child. It has been such a great learning
experience for me.
Author Biographies
Yanique Burgos (“Karma”) is a junior at SUNY Oneonta and is
majoring in Mass Communication. She hopes to move to California
for graduate school upon completion of her bachelor’s degree.
Yanique also has a minor in Creative Writing because film and
writing are two of her truest passions.
Lauren Hickey (“Lemon Drops”) graduated from SUNY Oneonta
with a BS in English and a minor in Creative Writing. When not
doing research for stories or wrestling with her characters, she
spends her time slaving over a 1972 sewing machine making
cosplays with her twin sister.
Zachary Fahrenkopf (“Light and Dark,” “The Dog,” and “Friend-Zoning”) is
studying Adolescence Education: Social Studies at SUNY Oneonta. He is also
minoring in Creative Writing. During his down time he likes to read, write,
sleep, and hang with his dog, Baxter.
Susan Young (“The Martyrs”) is currently a senior at SUNY
Oneonta and has a dual major in English and Adolescence
Education: English. When she graduates, Susan hopes to
become a middle or high school teacher and continue to
be an active member of the theater community.
AnaMarie Brown (“The Night I Fell Asleep at the Wheel”), or
Ana, as everyone but her mom calls her, is majoring in English
with a minor in Professional Writing. She has no idea what she
wants to do when she graduates in May, but hopes it pays
pretty well and is writing related.
Danica Bermudez-McLaud (“The Painter”) is a student at SUNY
Oneonta, who will be graduating this upcoming May. She is
currently studying Communication Arts and English, and has
obtained an entry-level position in the field of Business
Development, which she will begin in June. She enjoys reading,
running, and doing yoga in her spare time.
79
Kim Theodore (“Ragdoll”) is currently a student at SUNY
Oneonta. She is studying English and aspires to be an
author. Outside of class she enjoys reading and playing the
flute.
Hannah O’Neil (“A Dream Sequence”) is currently a sophomore
at SUNY Oneonta and plans to graduate with a degree in Art
and English. Her aspiration is to become a photojournalist, but
she has no set plan for a career yet. She is a member of the
women’s volleyball team and enjoys other activities like hiking
and surfing.
Emily Manchester (“Instant Messenger, Texting, and Facebook: The
Holy Trinity of a Socially Awkward Generation”) is majoring in
Fashion and Textiles and minoring in Professional Writing. She will
be attending the Fashion Institute of Technology next fall with hopes
of becoming a fashion journalist after graduation next May. In her
spare time Emily enjoys spending time with her family and friends,
as well as being outdoors.
Khrysta Garrison (“Native Women of The Round House:
Dangers for Women on the Reservation”) is a graduating
senior at SUNY Oneonta. She is an English major and plans
on attending graduate school in the future.
Josh Fitzgibbons (“Religion and Politics”) is currently a junior at SUNY
Oneonta and will be graduating next spring with a degree in History. He
is considering becoming a teacher, but he hasn’t entirely decided what
he wants to pursue after college.
Abigail Casale (“Thanksgiving Dinner”) is majoring in English
Education and is planning to graduate in 2017. She collects vinyl
records and likes to spend time with her friends and family.
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Andrew Mastorakis (“Gazebo”) is an English major minoring in
Creative Writing at the State University of New York at Oneonta.
More frequently than not, you might catch him daydreaming
titanic-sized dreams of his novelist aspirations.
Margaret Leslie (“Go Tell the Devil”) is an English major and
hopes to pursue a career in writing or teaching. She plans to
further her education by getting her master’s degree in English.
Kairee-Anne Cooley (“Soldier of Devastating Flames”) is
currently a student at SUNY Oneonta majoring in English
and minoring in both Creative and Professional Writing.
When not bickering with her characters, she enjoys
reading, watching Japanese anime, or going on Wattpad
as xRayneWolfx.
Amanda Trapanese (“Wait”) is currently a student at
SUNY Oneonta. Amanda is a dual major in Computer
Art and English with the hope of working for Pixar
Studios when she graduates.
Venessa Cameron (“Broken”) is a student at SUNY Oneonta.
She is studying Computer Art with the hopes of becoming an
animator when she graduates. When she is not studying, she
is reading Japanese comics on her computer or playing
Japanese games on her phone.
Sarah Merchant (“The Heart of Life”) is currently a junior English
Education major. She enjoys being outside, doing yoga, and traveling.
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Colleen Moran (“Loneliness” and “When I Met You”) will be graduating
from SUNY Oneonta in May 2015. She is dual majoring in Education
and has a concentration in English. She is a cheerleader at SUCO and
loves to hang out with her family and friends.
Erin Fleischer (“Love Poem for the Longing”) is a junior studying
Child Development and Family Studies at SUNY Oneonta.
Although her passion in life is working with children, she is also
a grammar nut, a pop culture junkie, and an all-around nerd.
Caitlin Weiner (“The Snapple Poem”) is an English major with a
Professional Writing minor at SUNY Oneonta. She hopes to pursue
a career in publishing or journalism.
Rita Menhennett (“Little Lambs Fall Newsletter”) is
studying Childhood Education at SUNY Oneonta. She
plans to pursue a master’s degree in social work and
eventually become a child welfare or school social worker.
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The Students of LING 215
Spring 2014
Danica Bermudez-McLaud
AnaMarie Brown
Yanique Burgos
Venessa Cameron
Abigail Casale
Kairee-Anne Cooley
Alaina Devens
Zachary Fahrenkopf
Josh Fitzgibbons
Erin Fleischer
Khrysta Garrison
Lauren Hickey
Daniel Keefe
Margaret Leslie
Emily Manchester
Andrew Mastorakis
Rita Menhennett
Sarah Merchant
Colleen Moran
Hannah O’Neil
Kim Theodore
Amanda Trapanese
Caitlin Weiner
Susan Young