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It was the first really cold morning of the season, the sun was bright, the air crisp. When it was time to leave the cocoon of her cozy, varnished kitchen, Elena smelled the new weather and grabbed a wool coat and some gloves before heading to her car. She paused, almost imperceptibly, before opening the driver’s side door and getting in. The full tumbler of coffee she’d brought stayed in the cupholder, untouched, until she pulled into her assigned parking spot at the university. There, after the car was in park and the engine was off, Elena took her first sip. Lukewarm, but still good. Wednesdays were her busy day, four classes almost back to back, with only a forty-five minute break for a late lunch. Then, a long weekend of working from home. The lectures passed uneventfully, Elena holding her sighs back when she noticed a student asleep in the last row. She told her second class they’d have their grades back on their most recent assignment early next week. One girl, a student Elena knew and liked from previous years’ seminars, waited for her attention after class to ask for a letter of recommendation for a job application. Checking her watch, Elena decided to forgo a stop at her office and head straight to the café for lunch. Suzie chose a damp-looking quinoa and avocado salad with Asian slaw from the refrigerated case near the till, Elena a turkey, brie and arugula sandwich on ciabatta. It was Suzie’s turn to pay, and the cashier plucked the twenty dollar bill from her hand while shouting their coffee orders over his shoulder. He was a student, Elena recognized him from one of her foundational literature classes, but couldn’t remember his name and just smiled politely when he said “Have a nice day Professor Hobbes!” The women took their meals to a table tucked away in the back, near a floor-length window and away from socializing students. There were a few solitary diners, laptops and books open, earbuds in, studying over stale cookies and cooling lattes. “And of course next year I have my sabbatical, and I still haven’t submitted my initial research proposal because I can’t narrow down where to go,” Suzie said, before finishing the last of her coffee. “Does it all have to be for the one project or can you mix and match?” Elena asked thoughtfully. She’d never been on sabbatical. Though she loved teaching, the relentless boredom in some students’ faces year after year certainly made her itch. “That’s the beauty of it, I can see what happens. I mean I know the majority of it will have to be spent in London at the British Library, but I’m hoping to do a few smaller trips. I’ve got the entire semester, and it’s a big project of course. Going to Dublin will be easy enough for research, but I’d like to check out some smaller towns, and there’s a poet based at the university in Cork that I’ve been meaning to interview for an article.” Elena nodded and finished her coffee, placing the mug heavily on the table in front of her. A muscle in her shoulder seized and she rolled her neck subtly, frontwards, backwards, frontwards, backwards. She started to gather her things, phone, bag, keys, stacking dishes and wiping the table, waiting for Suzie to get the hint. “Have you been to Ireland?” “Yes,” Elena said, nodding tightly. She calmly plucked her gloves from the right-side pocket of her coat. “Where did you go? Dublin?” “Mm,” Elena said. Her fingers slowly slid into place against worn suede. “And to the west a bit, Galway. You know, the cliffs and everything. No I didn’t kiss the Blarney Stone,” She laughed a little too loudly and stood up hurriedly. “Spent a night or two in Donegal. Now I’m sorry to rush off but I have to speak to a student before my next seminar, I’ll talk to you later?” “Of course, good luck, and have a nice weekend.” The women hugged and Suzie settled back down into her chair. Elena left the café and turned sharply back towards the main academic building. She looked down at her feet as she walked, and tried to ignore the prick of sweat at the back of her neck. At dinner that evening, Elena’s husband Robert told her about a meeting he’d had with his business partner and the director of a film for which they’d put up a fair amount of money. “And this guy, he’s green, and we’re trying to explain to him that he needs to be more organized and he’s just totally ignoring us, he thinks this artiste cliché will get him everywhere he wants to go.” Elena nodded and sipped from a glass of chilled wine. The starter hadn’t even arrived, but by the way he gulped his drink and scoffed at his own story, she could tell Robert was growing irritable. She slid her hand across the linen tablecloth and put it on top of his. She listened as he finished his story, then lightly squeezed the fleshy part between his thumb and forefinger, wishing she could kiss him. It was hard for Robert, once a successful actor, now relegated to producing and silent partnerships. A rising star in his twenties and looking like he’d be set for parts for life in his early thirties, his career—and confidence—had crashed to a halt quite suddenly. He still occasionally acted, in quiet, intelligent plays or in small parts of films directed by old friends. But, he wasn’t happy when he talked about work, and she wished he’d just retire altogether. They didn’t need the money, he’d been smart with his finances when he was successful. Plus her modest income from the university, and they owned their house outright. But suggesting this to Robert would only get him thinking about his previous success, and they’d have the same old arguments they always had, round and round on a carousel of resentment. By the time dessert was served, Elena was tipsy and Robert was, in fact, irritable. He’d spent the majority of their meal talking about his own work, and now awkwardly transitioned to talking about hers. He must have realized how self-centered he was being, Elena could give him that. Robert was always aware of his flaws, which Elena appreciated. “And how is this semester going?” He asked. “Any shining star students?” Elena sighed and picked up her espresso. “I doubt it, they just don’t seem interested this year.” “Or maybe you’re the one who’s bored?” Robert lifted his eyebrows knowingly and smirked. “You may be right.” She set the cup down in its saucer a little too hard and sighed again. “What I really wish I could do is a research trip. Suzie’s going on sabbatical, and I must admit I’m extremely jealous. A whole semester to just learn something new for a change, have something fresh to share with students. And something different to write about, publish. Not just the same old opinions under new titles.” Her dessert spoon rattled on a small plate as she tapped her fingers on the table. Robert nodded and sipped his own coffee. Elena waited for him to ask. “Where’s Suzie going?” “She’s going to Ireland.” An awkward pause grew into an anxious silence, but Elena felt calm while the waiter cleared their table. “I’m jealous, really,” Elena said. Robert opened his mouth, but didn’t say anything. He looked at his hands. Maybe it was the wine, but the customary pricks of sweat didn’t bother her, and she calmly laid her credit card down in the folder and waited for it to be collected. When they arrived at home, Robert went straight to his office, and shut the door quietly. Elena turned the shower on and let the bathroom fill with steam before she undressed. She stepped into the shower and scrubbed her chest and arms until they were red and clean. Before applying face cream, she inhaled sharply and rubbed a circle clear in the mirror. Her face looked tired, she thought, her eyes only halfway open. She could glimpse just for a moment a version of herself, twenty-five years younger. This was the face she pictured as her own, but wasn’t sure if it existed anymore, or the woman she’d been then, existed anymore. That night she fell asleep quickly and deeply, but woke up when Robert dropped into bed beside her. She tapped her phone on the nightstand, 04:27 lit up the room and bounced off the eggshell ceiling. Robert curled up on the edge of the mattress, his back to her. She knew he was drunk from the slight snore that escaped from his huddled body. Elena woke again before the sun rose, and softly ran her fingers down Robert’s back, he hadn’t moved and his pajama top stretched tight across his shoulder blades, before getting out of bed. In the kitchen, she brewed coffee and put two pieces of crusty sourdough into the toaster. The sun started to rise, she saw wisps of orange and pink cloud through the window over the sink. A long rectangle of light slowly made its way across the wooden countertop as Elena drank her coffee, ate her toast and remembered another quiet morning, twenty-five years ago. It was instant coffee in a paper cup then, and a plain croissant she’d picked at over the course of five hours as she sat in a cold, gray room. People came and went, asked her questions, sometimes she was with Robert, sometimes alone. Mostly alone. A woman with a very tight, sleek bun and a scratchy-looking blue Garda uniform told her the other woman and child had passed away in the hospital. An investigation was underway. Photos had been taken, broken glass splashed across wet tarmac, sparkling under a floodlight. Elena had closed her eyes then. Just before noon, Elena heard Robert walking down the stairs. The last one creaked, and then he joined her in the kitchen. She was sitting at the table, grading papers with more coffee. He poured himself a mug and stood with his back to the window. Elena reached her hand out and Robert grabbed it, hard. His face was desperate, and Elena kissed his palm, then flipped it over. She knew this hand so well, after so many decades, but she was still shocked by the sight of graying hair and a light brown age spot on his second knuckle. The day passed sedately. Robert went out for a long walk in the afternoon, said he was going to the grocery store. He still wouldn’t drive. While he was out, Elena peeked into his office. Splayed on the desk were papers they’d been given, copies of forms they’d had to sign, in that cold, gray room. Underneath them was a newspaper, curled and browning with age, Robert’s youthful, closed-eyed face on the cover under a headline in bold and a foreign city’s weather report. It was funny, to see a prediction for something so far behind them. When he returned it was dark. Elena was making a salad and boiling water for pasta. The front door shut and Robert paused in front of her on his way upstairs. “I think I’ll retire,” he said. “Now, I think I will.” Isabel Crabtree is a writer from Rhode Island, currently living in the UK. Her work has been published in Esquire, Level and Honest Ulsterman.

The Witches swoop around the downstage lip of the stage. One leans close enough to smell the sweet tea on her breath. My wife bought us front-row tickets to opening night of Drunk Shakespeare. The cast sit like benched athletes at a “bar” stage right, tossing back plastic shot glasses of water poured from falsely filled liquor bottles, each gently rocking, primed to spring into multiple roles. To their credit, the Witches slur and stammer, crack up. I’ve worked with drunk actors. Up there, they’re dead sober. It’s my birthday, and tonight’s a surprise gift from my wife, bless her. In the lobby, she gobbled glasses of rose to survive. I told her she didn’t have to come. Her existence orbits Marvel movies, romance novels, and a high-pressure job. Normal people stuff. Leaning over, I murmur along the opening lines, trying to impress her, I guess. She ignores me, listening. The show goes on. It's cute. Actors are late on cues. Toss in bits, adlib. Lady Macbeth drains a flask, offers the messengers, the doomed king Duncan, even a girl in the front row who I suspect is planted or a friend. More and more of this. It’s not exactly funny, but they’re having a good time. It’s infectious, warm. Clever, really: horror enhances comedy. Directors forget this. Finally, we arrive at the big number, the speech everybody knows. Lady Macbeth is dead, dragged downstage by a grinning Seyton, and presented to her distraught king. The audience goes quiet. The “dead” queen takes a final drink and winks at my wife who sniffs a laugh. Macbeth eats the solemnity, vamping like a professional wrestler before his provocative monologue. He knows we came for this. My wife sees I’m excited, smiles, pats my hand. But a knee goes unsteady under Macbeth, and I see them now–slick eyes. From somewhere, not those crumpled shots of water, he’s sneaking it, swimming. Drunk. Here’s the “uh oh” look–is the rest of the audience seeing this? I did a performance in summer rep once where our Prospero, shit-faced on Wild Turkey, blanked and simply sat down. Just plopped on his ass like a tantruming toddler. They curtained and offered the patrons refunds. For a queasy moment, I think that's it, but his jaws chew into motor memory. Arms, legs, and body follow and he’s tomorrow and tomorrow-ing smoothly on cruise control. The critic in my head switches off, resigned to enjoy the language.  Macbeth kneels to linger over his fallen Lady, which is right. I hate soliloquizing loftily to the heavens, or aghast clawing into the void of profundity. Direct your words; speak to something. Bending like that, over the lain out corpse of his cold queen, it’s misting us, his syrupy bourbon breath, which the others expect. It’s Drunk Shakespeare, right? Ball lighting kindles his eyes, and the verse ignites: he’s actually crying–thin, popping tears. The words wretch out in ugly, desperate sobs with no music, rhythm, or drift. I taste notes of a thumping heartbeat, a drum, realize it’s my own open-mouthed breathing. I’ve been sucked toward the stage. He sees me and our eyes meet for a moment, then he’s looking up, out, and saying, “It is a tale told by–I’m the idiot, Leah.” A mutter ripples back, unsure whether to laugh. “Wait, what'd he say?” “It was an accident. I don’t even remember.” He’s sunk to his knees and is talking to us, to everyone, direct address. “I remember her saying ‘you're so quiet.’ I’m sure I was thinking about you, babe. I don’t even know what we did, Leah. It’s a blur. I didn’t want to–” Stage right, actors are standing and looking at each other like, “What should I do?” Macbeth’s scanning eyes find what they’re after, a tall lady in the middle of the house. I can’t help but swivel and bear down on her. Most of us are. Hundreds of eyes. She clutches a bouquet of red roses. “I’ll quit all this. Stay home. Leah, nothing matters,” he says and scoots forward gracelessly to the edge of the stage nearly sliding Lady Macbeth overboard. His legs dangle. The tall lady sits, frozen. The roses crush against her denim jacket. One of the actors, Banquo, puts hands on Macbeth but gets shrugged away. Lady Macbeth, trapped by his leaning hip is desperate to be dead, feigning death like her life depends on it, like, Oh my God, get me out of here. They dim the lights, but he keeps going. “I’m sorry,” he says. “It only happened once. If it happened.” He’s all over the place. You can’t follow–pauses, sobs, hiccups. “Let’s start over. She’s gone. Please.” He apologizes like someone who apologizes for breakfast, but his face isn’t lying. People are standing in growing groups. The show’s over. It’s murderous how awful this man looks, how the tall lady, Leah, is nailed to her seat, crinkling her bouquet, speechless, looking too stunned to cry, though her cheek twitches, the mechanisms in her face attempting to remind her. “I love you. You want this, right?” Macbeth is saying. Banquo and the stage manager drag him up, freeing Lady Macbeth to scurry away, cursing. Macbeth doesn’t need to shout, the room’s still quiet, despite the lines of patrons filing outward. He’s laughing gently, amazed. “Don’t come to my show. Don’t do that; come to dinner. Let's have a date night?” It’s only Leah and Macbeth here from the look on their faces. My wife is pulling me up and out of my seat.  I’m the last one transfixed; everyone crowds the doors. Out in the cold toward the car, I take my wife’s hand. It’s limp meat, but I grip. We ride silently for six miles, save the bossy GPS. Her hand is warmer now, squeezes back. I turn to her, smile. “That was the best acting I’ve ever seen.” She nods at the road, says, “I hate Shakespeare,” and switches the radio on. Travis Flatt (he/him) is a teacher and actor living in Cookeville, Tennessee. His stories appear or are forthcoming in Bending Genres, Flash Frog, Roi Faineant, JMWW, and elsewhere. He enjoys theater, fluffy dogs, and theatrically fluffy dogs.

)))wind unravels fingers— tones pores which gasp as sudden cold sneaks up on you like an icicle down your back, between your breasts stamps a crescent moon on your forehead as wrinkles huddle in its gusts skin dances, its electricity pungent in the snap of so much air fingers search for you your furred belly announcing its softness into my waiting hands Now You See It, Now You Don’t There is a pool where everyone can drink, liquid sliding down throats like cool tea on a hot porch-- eyes glisten in half-light as pinks and oranges give up the battle against darkening sky— It can ease the whocha and whatcha of life— at least for a while, but stay too long and the pool shrouds you in the woven hair of others whose time has come and gone-- crumpled into dust on some bench under stars that were once too hot. We lie in the grass above— the hills tendering their forgiveness one star at a time as we lose our names among falling petals— pinks and purples clinging to their scent— until the pressure of our hands releases it and thirsty skin drinks. A Man Stops The Clocks My time at Barnhouse & Timble stopped one afternoon when spring’s bright light leapt off marble columns in a tilt-a-whirl --- time fell away— a crazy man with a gun, a judge, two attorneys, and a soon-to-be ex-wife –the gunman looking to make her an ex-wife, lickety-split— Stood next to her, is all I did— that and calling a spade a spade – maybe he was drunk that day, but that is granting an awful lot of benefit-of-the-doubt. More likely, it was a grinding hate that unwinds clocks, turns a man inside out. Either way, a gun is a gun, especially when loaded and handled by a man wearing his innards as a suit. The sun glinting off that gun pointed in my general direction— the slowing tick of the clock, tears rolling down his face— tears as he pulled the trigger—and the breath that whooshed out so fast I didn’t feel it—not at first. Watched red cover white marble, slowly pooling, an ambulance on its way, turning inside out right there on the floor. They got divorced alright—later that year. Same judge, but no more appearances from the husband. They put a straitjacket on him to keep his innards contained. He’s jacketed still. On quiet days, I still hear that whoosh— so loud, it drowns out everything else, takes my pen away and stoppers up all the words inside— just me and him, and his tears as I struggle for air. Audrey Howitt lives and writes poetry in the San Francisco Bay Area.  When not writing, she sings classical music and teaches voice. She is a licensed attorney and psychotherapist. Ms. Howitt has been published in Purely Lit: Poetry Anthology, Washington Square Review, Panoply, Muddy River Poetry Review, Academy of the Heart and Mind, Total Eclipse Poetry and Prose, Chiaroscuro-Darkness and Light, dVerse Poets Anthology, With Painted Words, Algebra of Owls and Lost Towers Publications among others.

It’s the early aughts. I’m no older than eight, stuck at a Hannaford grocery outlet. While my father was elsewhere gathering items for weekly survival, I found myself browsing the magazine aisle, skimming Sonic the Hedgehog comics while attempting to sneak peeks at the softcore pornography on display. It’s no wonder I blossomed into the mustachioed dirtbag I am today. As I perused various publications, my eyes often wandered toward passing shoppers who struck me as odd. Many walked hunched over, shuffling across the grimy floors in misery as harsh LED lights emphasized their struggle. Where had these people gone wrong, and what had they done to warrant such debilitating discomfort? I didn’t have answers, but I wasn't too concerned. Then and there, I convinced myself I'd never succumb to such significant chronic pain. Smash cut to fall 2023. Now thirty, I lay sprawled on my bedroom floor, clenching my lower back in distress. For the second time that year, I was battling sciatica, and unlike the previous tango, I was losing this match in a big way. Cushioned surfaces had become my number one enemy. Lower surfaces, like toilets, were impossible to use without emitting tears. Standing perfectly still felt okay, but bending the body in any capacity felt torturous. The activities that once brought me joy were impossible to execute. Exercise? Please. When I walked, it looked like I was doing an impression of my grandfather in hospice care. Writing? Unlikely, as sitting for more than five seconds felt impossible. Masturbation? Doable, but at what cost? Getting there was a challenge, and climaxing felt like someone was dragging a garden rake across my spine. Bottom line: I couldn’t sit, stand, or move without experiencing violent pain. This suffering was all I knew for three months. The origin of my chronic pain isn’t hard to pinpoint. Despite enforcing daily exercise habits since my teenage years, I neglected stretching, which resulted in my muscles becoming tight balls of fragile, useless tissue. On top of tightness, I was the victim of a silly sledding accident in December 2022. A word of advice: two inches of snow is not enough powder to warrant the construction of a makeshift ramp. The result of these Jackass shenanigans proved to be severe. My tailbone collided with the frozen earth multiple times, and in a matter of days, the right side of my lower body began to retaliate. Armed with an internet connection, I slipped into the role of armchair doctor and diagnosed my symptoms. To my horror, it appeared I was suffering from sciatica. Sciatica usually occurs when a herniated disk or bone spur in the spine pushes on the sciatic nerve, which travels down one or both legs from the lower back. In my case, the damaged nerve originated in my right glute. At its worst, the pain would slither down my right leg and across my lower back, sending me into a crippling state of uselessness. After enduring several weeks of unbearable bed rest, I decided it was finally time to see a doctor. Under their supervision, we developed a stretching routine that targeted tightness and alleviated the sciatic nerve. Several weeks later, I noticed progress. I continued to stretch daily, with the naive assumption that I had overcome my chronic pain. A feeling of agitation began to develop in my lower back towards the end of September 2023. Simple tasks like bending over started to feel incredibly risky. I continued to stretch, hoping my issue was the result of tightness caused by fatigue and not necessarily my chronic pain coming back to haunt me. One day, while squatting down to pick up a lightweight object, I felt a shockwave permeating the right side of my lower body. The sciatica was back with a vengeance. Reunited with my ninety-year-old mobility, I shuffled to my room and collapsed on the floor. This spell of sciatica felt much more severe than anything I had previously faced. After mustering up the strength to send my doctor an email, I returned to the hardwood floors of my room. I found their firmness to be much more tolerable on my spine when compared to the cloudlike structure of my once beloved mattress. While slipping back into armchair doctor mode, I discovered a community of online sciatica dwellers who praised the benefits of hard surface sleeping. Though intrigued, I was skeptical. I decided if I was going to rest on the ground, I needed to invest in some comfort. Rummaging through my closet, I discovered a thick wool rug, a yoga mat, a sherpa comforter, and extra pillows. I used the wool rug as a base layer. Next, I wrapped my yoga mat inside my sherpa comforter and placed both atop the wool rug. Finally, I set up pillows for my neck and lower body to achieve maximum posture support. By the end of October, I was COMMITTED to hard surface sleeping. Despite this pledge, the pain continued to linger. It was only a matter of time until drugs entered the picture. Desperate for solace, I began to smoke grass each night before bed. The pain receptors of my sciatic nerve suffered heavy delays when inhaling THC. I would be on the ground, trying to enter my zen palace, when suddenly, I’d feel the delayed ramifications of a slight shift in posture I made thirty seconds ago. Marijuana tends to magnify feelings of euphoria and dread simultaneously. The discomfort was gut-wrenching enough when sober, but when stoned, the effects became elongated to a hilarious degree. Throughout the night, it felt like I was being shot to pieces by the antagonists of The Matrix, all while performing a botched slow-motion bullet dodge. Keanu Reeves, I am not. Upon learning of my situation, my doctor prescribed me prednisone, a steroid used to treat inflammation. My doctor provided me with enough medication for seven days. On the first day, relief was present, albeit fleeting. But by the third day, I noticed a significant change. I was no longer calculating each step in an attempt to reduce irritation. Moving felt fantastic! And the more I moved, the better I felt! By the fifth day, I realized I was Superman. I was faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive, able to leap tall buildings in a single bound. Look up in the sky! It’s a bird! It’s a plane! No friends, it’s me on steroids. There were downsides. On top of irregular bowel movements, my personality had taken a chaotic turn. I had two speeds on prednisone: mind-numbing optimism and stubborn impatience. Had it not been public knowledge that I was taking medication for an injury, those closest to me might’ve assumed a cocaine addiction. I can’t say that I blame them. Despite these grievances, the drug proved to be effective for the seven-day window. But what would happen after those seven days? Would I lose my newfound mobility? Would the pain slowly creep back with each passing day? I notified my doctor of these concerns, who suggested I take a month-long physical therapy course at the local hospital. At physical therapy, I wouldn’t shut up about getting an MRI. In my mind, an MRI would provide concrete answers. I had already acquired an X-ray earlier that year to check for bone damage after my sledding incident. The results were negative, but I didn’t get any information on the status of my nerves. An MRI could provide those details. My fellow physical therapy mentors quickly pointed out that my lackluster insurance would barely cover the steep price of an MRI. Sensing my disappointment, they reiterated that I was on the right path to recovery. “Just stick to your stretching routine and incorporate hip, core, and stability exercises. If you do those things, you should be okay.” Should. I hate that pesky word. This incident marked the second time in a year that sciatica had thrown a giant curveball into my life. It was hard enough for me to be happy without chronic pain getting in the way. I was by no means a successful person. The strenuous labor I relied on hardly paid the bills. I aspired to work in a creative field, but those dreams had yet to materialize. To make matters worse, I was now suffering from a condition that made activity and inactivity equally challenging and painful. If I couldn’t beat this thing now, what would become of my future? The act of embracing uncertainty was not a concept I willfully enforced on the regular. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve always believed a little fear is good for the soul. But in a world filled with no guarantees, how could I be excited at the prospect of change, especially if I wasn’t one hundred percent over my sciatica? I think back to when I was a snot-nosed child at Hannaford, observing shoppers with chronic pain out of the corner of my eye. The world is a cruel, unforgiving place, especially if you’re suffering from a permanent injury. What consequences would beset me if I couldn’t prove to everyone that I was pain-free? When engulfed in darkness, we tend to find light via community. During my three-month struggle with relapsed sciatica, I met several people suffering from similar conditions of chronic pain. These allies provided hours of reassurance and positive vibes. They patiently listened to my unrelenting rants as I riffled off all my fears. Most importantly, they stressed that my life was far from over. That being said, adjustments were needed. Activities that were once constants were no longer accessible. Embracing change wasn’t a mere suggestion anymore; it was an order. Failure to comply would result in another heartbreaking setback. But how did they do it? When faced with uncertainty, how did my newfound colleagues embrace significant change? Simply put, they didn’t have a choice. As terrifying as a sink-or-swim scenario sounds, for many, it’s the only way forward if we wish to grow. The path to rebirth won’t be easy. Some will question our ability to function. Others will unfavorably compare us to our non-chronic pain colleagues. But for every apathetic asshole we’ll encounter on our journey, we’ll also cross paths with those who find our voyage inspirational and relatable. And if we can inspire others to free their minds from the unrelenting grip of chronic pain, perhaps they can also embrace uncertainty and evolve. So, where does this leave me today? I’m in the process of embracing change. My updated exercise routine is serving me well. I notified my labor clients of my condition and canceled all future projects. I also sought advice from several graphic designer pals who helped give my shabby resume a sleek makeover. I started writing again for the first time in three months! And every thirty minutes, I remind myself to get up and stretch my muscles. While jobless, I’m taking on small occupations that don’t require back-breaking physicality, such as house and pet-sitting gigs. I’m also in the early stages of developing an OnlyFans account titled Softcore Smut on a Shoestring Budget, which is totally not a desperate ploy for cash driven by financial anxieties. The point is I’m trying, dammit! For the first time in years, I’m optimistic about my future. Had I known chronic pain was the secret ingredient to embracing positive change and diving head first into uncertainty, I would’ve fucked up my lower back a long time ago. If you wish to take that as an endorsement to injure yourselves, by all means, go wild. I only ask that you refrain from using my name and referencing this piece when authority figures question your actions. Good luck, my friends. We’ve got this. Torrey Kurtzner is an out-of-work writer and master of self-deprecation. Against the better judgment of his peers, he’s determined to pursue a career within the creative arts, even if it kills him.

I pointed at that deer in the brush with my finger held out like a gun. It was just standing there after all it’s white-tailed friends hoofed off, and it didn’t even turn to look my way. I bet I could SHOOT you if you’re gonna stand in the clear like that. Three fingers back, pointer finger out, thumb up, I took AIM, squinted my left eye, closed my right, exhaled to steady, steady, steady my GUN like this. The damn deer didn’t move and I was still pointin’ and I started feelin’ bad because I wasn’t even HUNGRY and even though I don’t have a dollar to my name my mom is serving me dinner on a nice plate— as a matter of fact I’m gaining weight. So I told myself to put the gun down and lower my fingers at EASE but right before I made  my move of compassion, that deer turned around lookin’ me straight in the eyes without blinking without shifting without shaking in its hooves and there it stood straight up looking me straight down like the SOB was gonna KILL me now, it’s eyes locked and loaded, piercing through my body and into my SOUL, just like that. And I shit you not, I was SCARED. There were maybe 20 meters between us two, (hold on let me count) - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - it was 31 paces to be exact. I started to think, this DEER is going to DEFEND itself and the others that ran off— rightfully so. I’m an INVASIVE SPECIES in their land pointin’ finger guns for fun with the eyes of a KILLER so it only makes sense it’d come back and RETALIATE, throw its hooves in my face, give me a BLACK EYE, sock me in the GUT, kick me in the HEART, and leave me good and DEAD. A split second of self-reflection and I was SICK with self-disgust. I turned around with my head down and walked the other way sure it would go on its own way… but when I looked back, it was still there still staring at me with all the dignity in the world; and I saw myself from outside and above—IDIOT. which made me SHRINK inside, CRAWLING deep down, up into my guts to hide away from my SHAME. The TRUTH is, I’m no better than the rest and I might’ve always been and always be the countryside’s biggest COWARD and the world’s biggest FOOL. Ash(ley) is a country-girl, romantic scum, pastoral eroticism poet. She's genre fluid; and her style—she got it at ross and stock shows. Her poetry has been published in SWAMP, Bullshit Lit, Tiny Spoon and is self-published on the streets in what appears as trash poems.

Formaldehyde smells just like pickles. After a month of the sour scent, the similarity still surprises Tracy. Sometimes it clings to her when she returns to her room, reminding her of pickled onion crisps until she slips into the warm shower spray. Reminding her of home. The scent drifts out of the laboratory, welcoming Tracy in the doorway with cardigan-covered arms. As usual, she is early and there are only a handful of students sitting at their desks. Normally when Tracy enters it is to people rolling their eyes, or pretending to pick their nose then eating it, before they laugh and turn away. But today the students don’t glance up from their notebooks saturated in looping letters. Diagrams with empty labels. Tracy takes her place behind the middle desk; the one she has gravitated to since the first class. She had been the first to arrive that day, waking when the sun was a running yolk through her curtains. Unsure where to sit in a place so foreign, Tracy had opted for the middle. Not too close to look like a try-hard but not too far back to disappear. Tracy was fed up with being forced to the back. Tracy shrugs on her lab coat, the long sleeves brushing her desk. She folds them until they fit, before tying back her split ends. The smell of formaldehyde is strong; it reminds her of grandmother. Tracy’s grandmother is a small woman. The type of old that turns you into a shuffling, sighing bracket. Before Tracy had moved to Hereward University, it was just her and her grandmother in their small home. It might have had peeling wallpaper, a temperamental gas stove, and a leaking shower head, but it was their home. The same place she had recited her fractions, three quarters wobbling on the chipped dining-room table. The wood stank of mildew from where they had wiggled it free from under a wad of rotting wallpaper at the skip. Now her grandmother was alone with the drip, drip, drip. This morning, Tracy’s grandmother would be waddling through the house in her favourite cigarette-burned slippers, her hand digging into a share-bag of pickled onion crisps. Pickles would be thick in the air, an attempt at closing the gap between them both. A pang shoots through Tracy’s heart, a sharpness that always comes whenever she thinks of her grandmother. It had been on a late night over greasy pizza that her grandmother suggested she should apply to Hereward. Tracy had sent the application to make her grandmother happy; she knew that it was only ever going to be a few pixels, the confirmation ending at the sent tick. How much would it even cost to visit Hereward? A number Tracy had never seen before. One she would most likely never see in the future either. The acceptance letter had been crumpled in the letterbox, trapped in a tilting limbo above the muddied doormat. Tracy had fainted. When she woke up, groggy on her childhood bed, she pinched herself until her wrist bled. The birthmark there warped under her nails. Not even her dreams allowed her to step onto Hereward’s stone paths. To people like her it was just a flat brick building shining on glossy paper. The sun catching the window in a way that would forever darkened the halls. The black letters told her that the Hereward science department had a scheme. That they were honoured to accept her. Was she really that gifted? Enough to leap from the muddy grass and into the darkened hall, through the shining glass? There was no point asking her grandmother; if it was up to her, Tracy would be prime minister, the lead scientist in every experiment, the head of Hereward. She would find the cure to everything. Once the heavy feeling had sunk into her stomach, Tracy sobbed her grandmother’s arms. When she looked up, there were silent tears swimming in the wrinkles on her grandmother’s face. Her eyes had a faraway look, as if she was already miles away searching for Tracy in the stars. Today Tracy had woken up before her alarm, the moon an uncracked egg behind her curtains. No more highlighting phrases and writing in blocky coloured letters. Today she would get her hands dirty. The desk digs into the soft flesh just above Tracy’s hipbone, scratching against it like a saw. She shoves her hands in the pockets of her lab coat. Slime slips over her fingers. A stretched latex glove flops out of the pocket, slapping the linoleum floor. In the excitement of the experiment, she had forgotten to wash her hands and slip into clean gloves. Tracy pinches the shed silk skin from the floor, dropping it back into her pocket. Behind her someone giggles. The blonde girl and the one who wears her skirt too short. Tracy can’t make out what they are saying but it is about her. She knows it is about her. The laughter erupts into a shriek and Tracy’s body tenses up. She is fifteen and walking home again, not enough money for the bus that chugs past, and people wearing the same uniform as her are pointing. She is Holey Tracy. Frayed tights and leaking shoes. Ignoring the whispers, Tracy walks to the sink and scrubs her hands red. A light brown splotch stays stubborn on her wrist. Tracy strokes the birthmark with the rough skin of her thumb. In the fresh gloves, the birthmark looks misted like it is on the other side of a steamed window. It looks like a love heart. Tracy’s stomach flips at the thought of telling her grandmother about the experiment tonight. It had crept into their most recent conversation; by the end of the call, Tracy had been unable to talk about anything else. Tracy was always the one to call her grandmother, never the other way around. They would speak weekly so the phone bill wouldn’t stack up too much at home. The first call had been full of questions: are you liking it love, made any friends before shifting to, I’m so proud of you, I miss you, I love you always Tracy. The next conversation had been about the stray cat that sometimes got into their bin bags on rubbish day, the one with chunks of orange fur missing. Her grandmother had found it on the pavement, reaching its paws to their front door, its stomach flattened by a tire track. But last week Tracy’s grandmother had been unusually quiet. The only sound at the end of the line was the rattling breaths of a woman in her eighties. Tracy had asked if the student down the street had botched up her grandmother's monthly cut and dye again. She hadn’t gone yet. So it had been left to Tracy to carry the conversation about the water fountains they had at Hereward University. Big glass containers with slices of lime and cucumber floating inside like shiny fishes. And then, I wonder what the first experiment is. Beside the sink is a line of labelled metal trays. TRACEY is sellotaped to the tray at the end. Tracy keeps her head down as she carries the tray of utensils back to her desk. In her rubber grip, the metal tray shakes. The knives jangle like loose change. Laughter stalks her. Even though she had clawed her way through mock tests and every textbook the library had, she still came from hand-me-down pyjamas and an electricity card. Sometimes when she was laid in her bed, staring up at the clean ceiling she wondered how she had got here, to Hereward. Little, Holey Tracy. Why had they let her, and her squeaking suitcase through their doors? Had she really earned it? The scent of pickles is stronger as if Tracy is back at home, the purple crisp packet held under her nose. An offering. Tracy leans into it with a smile. Rattling metal follows the growing smell and Tracy itches her palms. She wants to crane her neck and watch the trolley, but the girls will laugh even more. It will probably earn her a new nickname; one she can’t shed, like a layer of mould on her skin. One that still lingers after she has returned the graduation robe. In the morning sun, the trolley’s thin legs glint as they turn into the classroom. For a moment Tracy is blinded by whiteness. Her smile grows into a grin. This is what she has been waiting for. Everything she has done, everything she has prayed for, has led her here. The first student in her family, and even better a doctor. At graduation, her grandmother will brush Tracy’s defiant baby hairs off her forehead and give her that necklace she always wears. The one with the small, blue pendant. Tracy will have finally earned it, no more waiting for the something blue of her wedding. Tracy will be a doctor. Thick goggles materialise through the light, then two assistants. From their formless white suits and big boots, it is impossible to tell who they are. Next year that could be Tracy. Only those from the scheme get staff jobs. Tracy would need it; she may be on scholarship but how long would that money last? It was always good to be prepared, save as much as you could. Every day could be a rainy day. Once the assistants have wheeled the trolley in front of the lecturer’s desk, they scurry out with their heads down, silent except for the squeak of their shoes. The class falls quiet. Tracy stretches her back, head popping out of her shoulders like a turtle. A long, white sheet covers the trolley, burying mountains beneath snow. Tracy huffs out a heavy breath. Footfalls clink in the hallway. Dr Owen ducks under the door frame and strides towards the trolley, taking his place before the sheet. He readjusts his glasses and they catch the sun, stealing his eyes. When his eyes appear through the haze, they land on Tracy. A scoff gets trapped in his wet throat. ‘Goggles on,’ he says. Tracy fumbles for the goggles on the desk, slipping them over her face so quickly that she hears the snap of her ginger hair. She imagines the girls are smirking behind their hands. ‘Today is our first practical experiment. A simple one. One I am sure you have done before, but that doesn’t mean it is any less necessary,’ Dr Owen says. His shoes clack throughout the laboratory as he walks into the small gap between his desk and the trolley. After shaking his hands into latex gloves, Dr Owen shifts the sheet on the trolley, revealing that it is actually three thin ones. With a rustle, he slides off the middle sheet and folds it into a small square. Skin is peeled back from the chest cavity, leaving the inside exposed. There is no bleached ribcage. From her desk, Tracy can only make out the red wall of the body’s side. She can’t help the smile that trembles her hands. ‘A simple organ dissection,’ he says. ‘You will each come up and take an organ from this body, return to your station, and wait until I give further instruction.’ At secondary school, Tracy had only performed dissections on animals. A cow’s lungs between a group of five. Students crowded around a splayed open frog on the teacher’s desk. From the outline under this sheet, it isn’t a cow or a frog. It is a human. A fully grown, once alive, human. At that moment she knows. It is a sense. Just like the prickle of eyes on the back of her neck. She knows this is a woman. They have scooped the body out, but it is still a woman. A knot forms in Tracy’s throat. She looks out the window at the thick tree trunks so close to them all. Just like how she can’t see the leaves, Tracy can’t see this body’s face, so it is just a body. A body of organs to be investigated. What would she choose? The lungs? No, they were too boring, she’d already touched a pair. For a second, she wanted the gallbladder but the idea of carving through its tissue was too much, too real. There was no way she could pretend it wasn’t once part of a human. A functioning part. She wants the kidneys. The organ that shrivelled and yellowed under abuse. Who had this person been? A drinker? A mother? Tracy gulps. Sweat begins to slick her palms. The latex sticks to her skin. ‘First, Elizabeth.’ The blonde girl glides past Tracy. Roses suffocate the scent of pickles for a moment before the vinegar is wetting Tracy’s tongue again. Elizabeth keeps her back straight as she ponders over which to take. The class is silent, air thick with body heat and thumping hearts. When Elizabeth turns around, her face is blank, and she holds something long and pink in her hands. The pancreas. The organ is flat, stretching over both her palms. She walks back to her desk and this time it is only pickles that float past Tracy. Next is the boy in front of Tracy. He chooses the liver. Yellow and small in his large hands. Tracy imagines what her liver looks like. Maybe it would have hints of yellow and brown from the Bucks Fizz she has on Christmas and birthdays. The energy drinks she used to chug every day. When she got accepted to Hereward, she shared a bottle of red wine with her grandmother. It had been the first time she had drank wine. Even though the bottle was only seven pounds, Tracy had never felt so elegant in her life. Next is the spleen, then the stomach, the kidneys. Tracy chews the inside of her bottom lip, her nostrils flaring. Everyone has had the same idea as her: take the interesting and rarer organs. She wonders what they dissected at their schools. Human brains? The girl who wears her skirt too short chooses the gallbladder. As she spins around to walk back to her desk, Tracy spots a glimpse of pink knickers. Tracy’s skirt brushes her knees. She can’t afford a glimpse of pink, or nail varnish, or even lip-gloss. They would throw her out without a chance to pack. She can’t leave Hereward unless it is with a first-class degree and her tassel switched. She has worked so hard, sacrificed everything. She has nothing else. Seeing the gallbladder has reminded Tracy of her grandmother again. Of the pain she has endured over the past few years. The nights that leaked into dawn as she grunted, hunched over at the waist in her favourite chair or halfway up the stairs. The tears that burned Tracy’s throat as she watched. All Tracy could offer was a hand, a shoulder, and a half-empty hot-water bottle, the exposed red rubber carved like gills. The waitlist for gallbladder removal surgery was excruciatingly long. Her grandmother would have to suffer from gallstones for much, much longer. Tracy’s heart aches at the thought of her grandmother trapped in her chair, alone. She wishes she had chosen the gallbladder now. That it was beneath her knife and critical eye. Cradled in the next student’s arms are the deflated lungs. Thank God she didn’t get those. ‘Heavy smoker huh,’ someone whispers behind Tracy. Heavy smoker is an understatement. The lungs have been consumed by smoke and ash. Maybe whoever had the stomach would peel the tissue back and find the last cigarette, eaten after being smoked to a nub. Tracy had never smoked, the bitter tang that coated her tongue whenever she stood in the kitchen was enough to turn her off. So did her grandmother’s thin, yellow nails. She can still hear the scratch of them against thin skin. If it was possible to itch off a birthmark, her grandmother would have done it by now. There are only a few organs left. Tracy hasn’t figured out what she wants. From here, she can’t see anything inside the hollowed-out torso. What is left over? A skinny boy walks past her desk, a uterus in his large hands. She had forgotten about it. The organ is shrivelled, the tubes thick and drooping over his fingers like slugs. An itch forms in her abdomen. That is inside her. Tracy cringes. The uterus slaps down on the desk behind her, or at least she imagines it does. ‘Tracy,’ Dr Owen says. Tracy rubs her sweaty palms on the sides of her lab coat, and they slide around inside their second latex skin. She glimpses at the red lumps splattered on the other students’ desks. The air is cold and sharp in her lungs. The last chosen, and for once it isn’t because of her grasshopper arms or nervous laugh. She knows exactly what it is. The same reason girls would never let her sleep over, or play, or even borrow a pen. It is because she is wearing the same socks she has worn since she was ten. Striped, with a hole stretched around her big toe. Holey Tracy. Would she ever escape it? Even when she had that degree, would she just go back to that small house with its pickles and smoke, sit on that dusty chair until she too was paralysed with gallstones? The pang returns. How dare she think of her grandmother like that, as if she hadn’t given Tracy everything she could. Done everything she could. People like Tracy, like her grandmother, gave and gave until all they had left was their failing bodies. Every identifying aspect of the body is covered, leaving only its cleaned innards exposed. The face is an outline, a tent pitched by its nose, the feet ski slopes. How did they die? When? How did they get here? The goggles are steamed from Tracy’s breath; she wants to reach inside and rub them clean like a windshield wiper, but everyone would laugh at her. Here, the pickles are smothering. Two sheets soaked in juice. Or is it her? Have the pickled onion crisps lingered on Tracy? Crumbs that have burrowed into the skin bending her elbow, the wrinkles when she smiles, a stain on her wrist that she is unable to hide beneath knock-off rose perfume. Holding her breath, Tracy peers into the body. Into the unnatural spaces and shadows. This is all we are in the end. Empty and gaping. Alone. No designer shoes and heavy, diamond necklaces. Tracy’s fingers float at her throat, the latex dry like a powdery kiss. No blue pendant waits for her there. Only the heart is left inside the cavity. Thick and heavy in the centre. Boring. No wonder everyone had bent around it, their hands dodging and searching for something softer, something more interesting. But this is all that is left, all Tracy can afford. Beneath her touch, the heart is freezing, and she presses the tough tissue. Who had this belonged to? Who had it breathed for, lived for, hugged against? Tracy gulps; she shouldn’t think of it like that. This body as a person. It is just a body. With the heart in her hands, Tracy begins to turn. Her shaking hands knock the sheet, and it tumbles over the body’s arm, revealing saggy skin. Brown age marks and freckles dot the faded flesh, but it is the birthmark that catches Tracy’s attention. She freezes and leans in closer. Pickles clog her throat, forcing her to pant with her mouth open. Just above the inner crease of the elbow is a birthmark. A pale brown splotch. But if she looks closer, tilts her head, the splotch curves and smooths into a love heart. Just like the one on Tracy’s wrist. The one she inherited from her grandmother. Oliviah Lawrence is a horror and speculative writer from the North East of England. In 2023 she completed an MA in Creative Writing with distinction. Lawrence is inspired by horror video games and the uncanny. Her writing explores the female experience, body horror, and obsession. You can find her @oliviahlawrence on Twitter.

“You could have spread a newspaper,” she says. Mother, the dogs leave their fur everywhere in the house, how can father’s white beard falling in the yard disturb you? Also when you groom yourself you drop talcum powder on the floor. No one says “You could have spread a newspaper.” Father, you are lazy when you spread a newspaper on Sundays but a hero when you spread a newspaper to cut open the jackfruit, her favourite. Today while mowing your cheeks and chin, I see fear in your eyes—first time. There was a time your wife feared you. “History changes like newspaper,” grandpa jokes. I see she aggravates your Parkinson’s and my compliment about your perfect stubble angers you. If you had teeth, they would grate. You smile only when the electric shaver tickles your ear. Next week, as promised, I will shave your white hair and we are going to spread a newspaper, the day’s newspaper, to remind her that she is a drop, not any wave. I think I’m a good son who doesn’t spread the newspaper about that other woman. You’ve been a good father, giving us a bit of everything. Mother is giving us arrogance nowadays; it sticks to her like jackfruit glue. It worries me that no newspaper reports such news. The past has been unfair to her, agree. The present is unfair to you, Father, agree. The past and present have been unfair to me, and so will the future, but how can this disturb you both?

AGAIN, I SEE THE DAWN of my childhood when women stood lonely in Edward Hopper windows, still in their full slips, or already in flowered housecoats. They took in these moments after their husbands left for work and before their children woke up clamoring for those tiny boxes of cereal, perforated for easy opening, the milk poured right into the boxes’ wax paper lining, a miracle— only a spoon to wash. Soon the laundryman would deliver the wet wash and each side window opened, rusted pullies creaking as clothes were clothespinned to ropes that spanned alleyways in arcs. The women shopped wearing one of their three weekday dresses, stockings rolled over rubber bands just below the knees. Tasks, tasks, tasks, then dusk when front windows opened again and women leaned out, shouting down to their children Get upstairs in Italian, in Greek, in Yiddish, in German, in brogues, in dialects. But at dawn, all spoke silence. VICTORIANA How imprisoned she is by the high neck of her Gibson Girl blouse, the edge of lace beneath the chin, the yoke, the puffed sleeves that taper to wrist flounces. She can’t wait to take off the swan-bill corset that forces her torso into an S-shape. She hasn’t patience to put her dark hair up in a perfect pompadour nor does she sport even one strategic waterfall curl. I wish you could hear her belt out in her thick Cockney, Lottie Collins, she ’ad no sense. She bought a fiddle for eighteen pence. She was no suffragette, but she bought and ran a millinery shop, a candy store, owned four large rental houses and birthed three kids. My daughter, before you empty my house someday and decide you don’t want a sepia framed photo of a woman you never met, before this photo lands in an antique shop and a customer tries to get a few bucks knocked off because the white nicks in the frame reveal that it’s a faux mahogany finish painted over plaster, I want to introduce you to your great-grandmother. Meet Ada Bloom. WAYS OF ENTERING A DREAM You can waltz into a wobbling raindrop, become its iridescence, its sheen. You can be a figurine in a Fabergé egg spirited out of a tsar’s palace and into a glass case at the Met, yet you’re free to gallop into the ocean, that cradle of all raindrops. You can bumble into the basement of bugaboos, a spider you only know is there by the web that breaks on your face and you don’t know if the spider is still in it or dangling somewhere. It’s so Miss Muffet to be scared of spiders. You can fly into a dream, feel your spread-eagled self lift off your mattress, the whoosh of wind, the squeeze in your stomach and your limbs as you fly over the roofs of your childhood. Last night I entered my grandfather’s parlor in his torn-down house on East Raynor Avenue. There he sat, plump and pale, his hair dandelion fluff. He told me his mixed-up story of the Gardener and the Three Bears, and laughed his rumbling unfiltered Camels laugh. His cheeks bloomed with a shot of schnapps. Rochelle Jewel Shapiro has published in the New York Times (Lives). Nominated for a Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net, her short stories and poetry have been published widely. Her poetry collection, Death, Please Wait (Turtle Box Press). She teaches writing at UCLA Extension. http://rochellejshapiro.com @rjshapiro

BINGO I find her in back, mid-game around the table, playing two cards at once. O-9, N-17, G-46… Mini packets of Cracker Jack are today’s prize. She has won three already. Her sweet tooth, suppressed for decades, now thrives on jelly beans and ice cream. She doesn’t remember it’s junk we don’t eat in this house. As cards are called… B-29. I-43. N-17… she full-on concentrates. Not long ago, when invited to play, she had sneered, For losers. It was awful when, between reading the Times, completing the Sunday crossword and discussing politics, she could still track her memory loss, could still reflect on her own mind. Now, like the child she never allowed herself to be, she thrills over a complete row of plastic coins. It should break my heart. But it’s so much easier to love her this way. MANSION Fifty-two years later, I still dream of the house where I grew up, its pitched roof, mock-Tudor gables, and wainscoted walls. Thick spring-green shag suffocated fine oak floors; heavy yellow brocade humiliated the view of Lake Michigan with her tormented moods. Given life and left to figure it out, we well-off, at-risk children fostered avoidance; we seized what space we could for ourselves, which, despite its size, was never enough. Deprived of protection, we stashed secrets in walk-in closets and yawning attic annexes, hid hopes inside the drafty shafts of disabled dumbwaiters. Unschooled in the ways of rage, brothers became autodidacts of abuse. Pleas and protests echoed off leaded stained-glass and high-beamed ceilings. Foreboding closed my throat like the swinging door between kitchen and formal dining room where I hid to cry. Bedrooms were no barrier to the threat of absence. Bruises barely hinted at the depth of harm. My older sister modeled love in the updated kitchen where orange-and-yellow daisy wallpaper lied about the dangers lurking upstairs. I watched her feed our Great Danes ground beef, cooked hot and sizzling, mixed into kibble with her bare hands, distributing pink juice evenly, marbled linoleum floor slick with drool. (continued) (Cohen, Mansion, page 2, new stanza) Where she learned to nurture, I cannot say. She became a mother whose grown children still break her heart in big and small ways every day. I remain childless by choice, unpartnered by preference, a student of my upbringing. But so was she. Maybe our education doesn’t explain her grief-laden choices any more than my own. My black Lab and I are the same age in dog years, her perfect love guaranteed to leave me before I am ready. Every day, she teaches me that the space that is mine to fill is small indeed, and this is good news, though I have yet to claim it. THE RED LINE Since you left, I have spent days gazing through glass at the blazing Japanese maple, at the sparrows in the beech, at the squirrels in the feeder foraging for nuts. Come sundown, the rat ambles up, fat and slow; doesn’t flinch when I knock to scare him off. He lives under the deck. I’ve tried baffles and traps, ammonia spray and high-pitched ultrasonic waves. He always returns, like the song I loathe and can’t stop hearing— the one about the serial killer, the one I asked you to stop playing. You’d make grotesque gestures instead of dance, mouth words instead of sing. I teased you about your sublimated rage and your fetish for violent death. We never fought, but used compromise like a weapon. You shaved your beard. I dyed my gray hair. You quit inside smoking. I cut drinking to weekends. Recently, you said I was foolish to think that there was only one rat, that if I was serious, I should put out poison. But first I would have to stop feeding the birds. It came as a surprise to us both when I told you that was the one thing I was unwilling to do. THERE IS YET TIME We stand together in great darkness, some distance apart on the beach, to wait for sunrise. First a hint of not-quite-night, a mirage perhaps, whisper of color, blue maybe, maybe. A pastel hush of lavender in a skyward streak that a moment ago was not there. The sand is hard as a sidewalk. My toes and fingers sting in the eye-watering wind. Laced ice kisses the shore. An apricot-orange stripe appears as a reward. Being human, we want more: to cheer, applaud. Instead, slate-gray clouds blur the horizon. Those who’d come for evidence that, forget yesterday, today is another, return, disappointed, to their cars. I get it. And I’m also relieved when they leave like guests after the party is over. The beach belongs to me and my dog, who wants her stick thrown again. Fetch, return, the point of life being whatever is happening now—a botched sunrise on Lake Michigan as a winter storm rolls in. It’s the peril and cringe of exposure, the balm and dread of being alone. It’s the squirm and scrape and ache of making selfish choices. I cannot be the only one with a voice inside that says, “I don’t have to,” after I’ve already said I would. I think I believe there is not enough of me to share. What if I’m wrong? Maybe that is why I am restive as a cloud churning hot and cold, braced for lightning. Lynn Cohen has been published in Amelia, Amethyst Magazine, Brushfire Literature and Arts Journal, Burmingham Arts Journal, Cantos, The Chained Muse, El Portal, Evening Street Review, Flights, Front Range Review, Grand Journal, The Midwest Quarterly, Oberon Poetry Magazine, OPEN:Journal of Arts & Letters, Peregrine, The Phoenix, SLAB, Spotlong Review, St. Katherine’s Review, Swamp Ape Review, Thin Air Magazine, and Trampoline. Her novel, A Terrible Case of Beauty, was published by Trebol Press in 2013. She received a Best of the Net nomination from Apricity Magazine in 2023. Lynn has attended various writing conferences, including the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference and the Columbia University Summer Writers’ Workshop. After a brief tenure in the Jerusalem Symphony Radio Orchestra, Lynn received a Bachelors in Music from the New England Conservatory of Music, concentrating in double bass performance. She received a Masters of Social Work from Simmons College in Boston and practiced as a clinical social worker for several years in Boston and Baltimore. She then moved to Vermont and received her MFA in Creative Writing from Emerson College in Boston. She has worked as a massage therapist and Certified Advanced Rolfer™ in Los Angeles and Milwaukee. Lynn plays the cello and is quick with stir-fries and pasta.

Still stung, still staggering streets at night, sometimes with feet, most times with mind, where smoke from chimneys twists and turns, throws silhouettes of lips unlearned and someone from the ether smiles till somewhere more important burns. I wander squares and lanes and groves past modest mice, conceited crows; primeval ploys, pursuits of friends who weave me down the deepest ends to wither, shadow, curse, decry, apologize (would make amends). A further figure shimmers, waves, predestinies of primrose glades mistakable for few things else, though either by deceit or stealth, I'm left to stagger streets at night, sometimes with feet, all times by self. Lawrence Moore writes from a loft study overlooking the coastal city of Portsmouth where he lives with his husband Matt and nine mostly well behaved cats. He has poetry published at, among others, Sarasvati, Fevers of the Mind, Fahmidan Journal and The Madrigal. His debut chapbook, Aerial Sweetshop, was released by Alien Buddha Press in January 2022. His Twitter handle is @LawrenceMooreUK

Poem where I mention Michigan because Bob Hicok is from Michigan and I am doing a reading with Bob Hicok, who is from Michigan, so it makes sense to read a poem where I mention Michigan, so Bob Hicok can hear it and feel something sway in the breeze above his nose In Michigan, there’s a dispensary that doesn’t accept credit cards, but the employees wear name tags. I buy the left side of the dispensary because I want to go an hour without imagining my daughter ducking under a desk while the second amendment yawns. Who cares about sound when a lover touches you with an octopus’ second heart. I never look out the window mid poem and see a bird doing bird things, but I’ve watched poets gnaw their fingers off and mail them to literary journals. I pledge allegiance to the bottle rocket lodged my temporal lobe. My doctor’s started writing prescriptions for my prescriptions after I learned that your lips can get chapped from kissing for too long, and that even after a decade you’re sometimes still too pretty to touch in the daytime. Anyway, since we’re on the subject of pages of braille dipped in holy water and hung on a clothesline on a dairy farm in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, when you’re awake but not, I like to softy run the tip of my finger along your lips and answer questions you never asked: Yes, It is easy to love in the morning. Yes, I’ve forgotten the early haunts, or how the problem with life is that it is life. Yes, you still touch like a hymnal. I’m sorry, I don’t know what you should wear when every mirror calls you a ghost. Not really, I haven’t worried much about my penultimate orgasm in weeks but thank you so much for asking. Yes, maybe God made the dinosaurs or maybe the dinosaurs made God, but no, I did not know your thighs could set off the smoke alarm. Sutures Is a Pretty Word to Hum; Or a Living Room Is; Or Every Held Breath Is a Missile Shot at the Moon Wake up on the living room couch with your heart pried open, blood dripping down a hole in your chest. Your husband is standing in the doorway, staring at you like you’re a rollercoaster at an amusement park he’s too short to ride. Look your husband in the eyes and say, I’m sorry you found me this way. The problem is you’ve forgotten how to be a person. You try, though. You are always trying. Tell him, Don’t worry, I can still pour a rum and Coke, and sometimes I even remember to add the Coke. Smile like you’re the amusement park attendant who lets him ride the rollercoaster anyway. Tell him, Don’t worry, when I close my eyes, you are still every Talking Heads’ lyric. Tell him, Don’t worry, we are good even when we sometimes aren’t. Tell him, Sometimes I accidentally put butter instead of cream cheese on my bagel, but it still tastes okay. Staring, your husband is still staring. Pretend to hold your breath as you wait for him to say something. Imagine every held breath its own missile shot at the moon. Your husband doesn’t say anything. Be relieved that you are only pretending to hold your breath. Wonder if your husband has ever said anything in his entire life. Wonder if people like trees because they grow up so slow. Wonder if you were always supposed to be this way, waking up on a living room couch, your heart pried open, blood dripping down a hole in your chest, as your husband stands in the doorway, his mouth stitched shut. Watch your husband grow a ghost in his lungs before floating through the living room and down the hall. Moments later he comes back with the first aid kit the two of you bought when you moved into the house. It hasn’t been touched in five years. Your husband sets the first aid kit next to you on the couch. Last night, the weather was the moon, and the moon was swollen, he says. His voice is softer than you remember, though maybe that’s not true. Maybe it’s louder. Maybe it’s brand new. Maybe you’re dreaming. I was outside, he says, dancing. He opens the first aid kit and removes a bottle of peroxide and package of gauze. And then there were wings sprouting out of my shoulder blades, and then I was just there, still outside, dancing in the middle of the street with wings. Think, A living room is a weird name to call a room that holds a couch. Say, Wings, and then nod. Say, Oh, there are wings. Imagine your husband lightly brushing his feathers over lips, down your neck, over the hole in your chest and then, finally, between your thighs. Someone must water the flowers on the moon, your husband tells you. He says it like it was always a thing, that thing, the simplest thing—just a few drops of water and a light scent of bees. He leans over and kisses your forehead. He promises you this won’t hurt right before dipping the tips of his wings in peroxide and using them to wipe the blood dripping down your chest. Leigh Chadwick is the author of numerous poetry collections, including Your Favorite Poet (Malarkey Books, 2022) and Sophomore Slump (Malarkey Books, 2024). Her poetry has appeared in The Massachusetts Review, Salamander, Identity Theory, Passages North, and ONLY POEMS, among others. She is currently at work on a YA romance novel set around the Donner Party.

Chapter 1 Mommy of a hundred names. That's what I call her. Me, I call myself Girl. Mommy has been Carmen and Mary and Rita. My real name is Miranda but Mommy doesn’t call me that anymore. Where we live now, my name is Patty. Last place we lived it was Jeannie. Mrs. Ferraro, our neighbor from across the hall said “oh Jeannie, like wishes!” Jeannie is a pretty name. All the other names I’ve had are pretty but there’s been so many now that it’s easier to be Girl. The place we live now is a too-small space on the rickety side of town. We have lived here and here and there. But never a place we could stay in. I’m only nine and it’s not a good thing when you have lived more places than your age. Mrs. Ferraro used to tell me that we live in a beautiful city. She said that people come from all over the world, that they leave their own homes and jobs and even their kids just to come to see what’s here. I don’t know why. To me, it is nothing but black-smoke trucks and spray-paint boys all the time in the street. At night we can hear the noise of people talking downstairs. In this apartment, there is no room to see how far my bones could go. It’s nothing but one room and peely paint and the wobbly table with one broken leg. Just a tiny taste of bed and wall and door, and me-- I'm hungry. I’m hungry for the place that Mommy and I are going to have one day. Where we can stay and stay as long as we like and no one will make mean faces at us when we see them in the hall. When we finally find this place, I can go to school for one whole time together and not just in little bits like I do now. Mommy promised the place we live now would be different. She said that about the last place and the last place and the place before that. Every night, Mommy dresses up in her flowery skirt and the high heels with the roses on the toes. She tells me she has to go make money for us to live. When she kisses me goodbye she smells like roses. She always says, you just go to sleep and when you wake up, I’ll be right here. But I don’t always go to sleep. Sometimes when she goes out, I put on her clothes so I can see what it feels like to be her. When we lived in the old place, I would go over to see Mrs. Ferraro across the hall and twirl around in Mommy’s dress and Mrs. Ferraro would clap and say that I was a pretty girl like a melody. Mommy says we are lucky for this apartment. It’s okay we only have one bed, some people don’t have any bed, she tells me. She says the same thing about food, like when I scrunch up my face about peanut butter for supper and she tells me that peanut butter is delicious and would I rather be starving like those men in the street? So, okay we are lucky, I guess. But I keep dreaming about a place where we can live forever and I will be Miranda again and we will be so happy. But this is not that place. Chapter 2 We came here last month in the middle of the night. It was the hottest night I ever felt.  Mommy had the windows as open as they would go. It was late and Mommy said I could stay up because it was so hot and who could sleep anyway? She kept going to the refrigerator and taking ice cubes out of the tray and running them against her throat. Then she came over and rubbed one on my neck and throat and arms and Mommy said it felt like a vacation. I never was on a vacation but it had to be the best feeling in the world if it felt like this.  Then she got up and said she had to go out. She would say that every night and every night I hoped she didn’t really mean it, that at the last minute she would see how much fun she could have, the two of us with nothing but ice cubes to make us feel good. Mommy got up and went to the closet and the hangers scraped as she looked for the dress she wanted. She pulled out a black one with no sleeves. It had lots of roses on it. Mommy stood in her slip and high heels. She leaned forward and her hair fell over her head and she brushed and brushed. When she stood up and shook it out, she looked like a lion. Then she picked up one of the perfume bottles and sprayed herself.  The room filled with roses and I breathed in as hard as I could. I forgot how hot it was and all the noise from downstairs and that soon Mommy would go out and I wouldn’t see her till later. Because for now, she was just a rose. Chapter 3 Me, I look nothing like Mommy. She is very tall and thin with soft hands and red fingernails. Mrs. Ferraro said that Mommy looks like Rita Hayworth in her prime. I didn’t say anything because I didn’t know who Rita Hayworth is or what a prime is, either. I have small, fat hands and my hair is too straight and never looks like a lion. Maybe I look like my father, even though I never saw his picture. Even though Mommy never told me his name. When Mommy finished getting dressed, the landlady came to the door. She had big yellow teeth and hair on her chin. She told Mommy the rent is late and no, you can’t talk to my husband, you stay away from my husband and if you don’t have the rent, he ain’t gonna help you no matter what the two of you do like you think I’m blind. Mommy told her okay, okay, give me till tomorrow. As soon as she closed the door, we had to pack. Not much for me, mostly Mommy’s things, her dresses, her shoes. I put my underwear, socks, and two t-shirts in a little plastic bag we got at the drug store when we bought shampoo. Mommy said she’d be back, she had to go to the corner to make a phone call.  I kept thinking that maybe we were going to my dream place, but I knew it was too soon, that a thing like that, a place you would live in as long as you wanted, would take lots and lots of planning - you would have to buy chairs and spoons and things like that and you wouldn’t have to go there in the middle of the night. I thought about Mrs. Ferraro and how I should tell her we were leaving, but I knew I couldn’t. I knew I couldn’t say anything to anybody. I promised myself that as soon as we were all settled in our new place, I would call her. I knew Mommy had Mrs. Ferraros’s phone number for “emergencies.” When Mommy came back, she said we had to hurry, that it was late already. She said she talked to a man, the super and that he had the apartment just waiting for us.  She told me to quick, get ready. “But Mommy, I’m already packed.” I showed her my drug store bag. “Just hurry,” she said. I reached into the bag and pulled out my t-shirt from the time we went to the circus and put it on over my pajama top. I thought about taking one last look around, but I stopped doing that two places ago. When we got to the staircase, we kept looking for the landlady to pop out sudden and scary.  Mommy and I were like two lizards so careful before we took another step. I thought again about Mrs. Ferraro and stopped to blow a kiss up the stairs and to her door.  I promise in my heart, I will call you, I said out loud and Mommy told me shush, don’t talk. Then down and down the rest of the steps and out into the street. Chapter 4 We didn’t say a word till we were a whole block away. It felt like we had stopped breathing. Finally, there was a bus with its headlights coming towards us in the dark like a huge animal. We waved and waved and the bus stopped for us. We got on the bus and Mommy sighed as we plopped into our seats. There were just four other people -- a boy and a girl with headphones who were holding hands, an old woman and a man sprawled out across the whole back seat. That man was one of those people that Mommy was always saying had it worse than us. Mommy told me that we were going to River Street. “The place we are going to will be fine. It will be even better with no landlady always bothering us,” Mommy said.  “The super is my friend. His name is Von.” “Can’t we stay somewhere else?” I said. I remembered where we lived a couple of places ago. Where we had the other room with a curtain for a door and Mommy would have all these men who she said were her friends come over, only we never saw them again. “You haven’t even seen it yet, and you’re complaining,” she said. “You have to learn to give things a chance.” I looked at the old sleeping man in the back. “Don’t stare,” Mommy said “It’s not polite” I pulled my knees up to the seat and put my head down. This is something I made up a week before. What I do is I make myself into an O like a zero. I scrunch up really hard. My chin presses against my chest. Digs in. My arms pull at my legs, pushing them into my stomach.  Smaller and smaller until I’m gone. “Sit up.” Mommy tugged at my shoulder. “We’re almost there.” Not even Mommy can pull me back. She didn’t know how long I could do this. I bet I could do this all night. But then I sat back up because I didn’t want Mommy to know yet about the zero. It was the kind of thing that got her mad. “Listen to me,” Mommy said. “This man thinks my name is Mallee. Say it.  Mallee.” “And I’ll be Girl, okay?” Mommy looked at me, her eyes blue and angry. I knew that look. That don’t-make-me -crazy-because-I’m-not-in-the-mood look she always got when I thought up something new. “We’re going to call you Patty.”  I asked her when I could go back to Miranda. She put her beautiful hand on mine. “Soon,” she said, “I love that name, Miranda. Miranda means wonderful.” But I’m not wonderful, I told myself in my head. I’m a nothing of a zero with no school and no friends so why should I even have a name? Maybe one day someone will feel bad I’m sleeping on a bus. But I didn’t want to start any trouble now, not with Mommy all upset like she was so I said I would let her call me Patty if she wanted. And I said that, but I promised myself in my heart that until I could be Miranda again, my name would just be Girl. Chapter 5 I looked out the window, so many streets going by and I thought about the park across the street from the place we were leaving. I liked going there and sitting under my favorite tree. It was a place only I knew about. I was trying to count how many streets we were passing so that when I could, I could go back to see Mrs. Ferraro and my tree. But the bus was going too fast and it was dark. When we got off, I saw River Street for the first time.  In a way, it looked like a river.  Long and narrow with cars squashed all along the sides. Stores were open late, and there was music like the kind you dance to coming from windows and cars. As we passed, I saw a woman sitting outside in a lawn chair holding a baby in her arms, and groups of men were standing around just talking and smoking. One, a big man with no sleeves and a baseball hat was drinking from a bottle. When we passed, he smiled at Mommy. Mommy pulled at my arm and we started walking faster. It was hard with Mommy carrying her suitcase in one hand and her other hand squeezing mine as tight as she could. I didn’t like this street. So many people and no park nearby. We kept walking and the big man ran up from behind us and wouldn’t let us pass. He smiled at Mommy and held out a bottle to her. She told him to get out of our way. “Why you gotta be such a bitch?” “I told you get out of my way” Mommy said. The man looked at Mommy. He didn’t move. Mommy put down her suitcase, put her hand on her hip and tilted her head to the side. We all stood there like that, like the night froze up. Then the man’s friend came over. “C’mon,” he said, “She got a kid.” They both looked at me. Then the man in front of us breathed hard and moved and went back to his drinking. Mommy threw her lion hair back and we started walking again. He kept yelling from behind us. “You bitches with your stuff all hangin’ out.  Who you think you are?  Miss America?” His friend tried to pull him back “C’mon, let her alone.” “Hey, this ain’t over,” the man still calling behind us. “Next time, you won’t have her with you.” Chapter 6 We finally got to the building and went inside. The hallway smelled like a bad banana. The only light came from a tiny bulb on the ceiling. Mommy knocked on the first door. After a minute a man came out.  He was wearing gym shorts and an undershirt. He had blond hair and a white face that looked too long for his head. He was so tall he almost didn’t fit in his own doorway. And his arms were so big, I figured he couldn’t ever find a shirt to cover them and how did he go anywhere? I thought of the giant I saw in a book one time, picking up little children by their hair and plunking them so delicious into his mouth. I wanted to run the minute I saw him. I tugged at Mommy’s hand. “Be still, Patty.” She smiled at the man. “She’s a little nervous, y’know?” “You didn’t mention her.” His eyes got narrow like little worms. “She’ll be good,” she looked at me, “right Patty?" I said yes, but I promised myself that I won’t let him catch me and plop me whole into his mouth. “She doesn’t like to talk much,” Mommy said, letting go of my hand and holding it out to him. “Why don’t we go inside and you can give me the keys?” The Giant Man kept looking at me. Mommy put her finger up to his mouth. “Come on.” She said leading him inside. “She won’t bother us.” As soon as the door closed, I sat down on the bottom step of the long, thin staircase. The paint was all chipped and I could feel it poking up through my pajamas. I thought about Mommy inside with the Giant Man and how I wished she would come back out soon. I started thinking how hot it was in this hallway and how much I wanted a soda with ice. Mommy had said I could have one as soon as we got here, but that wouldn’t be till later. So, what I did was what I always do when I want something. I put it in a special place in my mind. That’s a place nobody has to know about and only you can go there and you never have to tell anyone. It’s where I will keep Mrs. Ferraro and my secret tree in the park across the street. I can still go there even if we don’t live there anymore. I can go to this special place any time I want and dream about things. I closed my eyes and thought of a nice tall glass all cloudy with cold and ice cubes. And how even before I would take a sip I would roll the glass over my neck just like Mommy does. And I was thinking about that soda so hard, I could practically drink it. I closed my eyes and just kept thinking and I heard the door crash open. I opened my eyes and saw it was the man from the street, and he was waving his bottle around. “Where’s your ma?” he said. Chapter 7 He stood there, looking mean as a storm. His hat was pulled down and his face was in one big shadow under the tiny light bulb on the ceiling. He had a loop earring on one side, and I could see a snake painted on his neck where his t-shirt began. I didn’t know what to do. I was scared but I knew Mommy would be angry if she didn’t get the key. So instead of calling for her, I dropped my head into my lap and held my arms around my knees. Tighter, tighter. There now, I’m nothing and you can’t see me anymore. I’m round and zero and I can stay like this forever if I have to, you just don’t know. I thought it and I thought it and after a minute, he must have heard inside my head because he said I was stupid and a waste of his time and went back out to the street. I never looked up, not even to make sure he was really gone. When Mommy came out after a long, long time, she never even knew what happened, and she maybe thought I was playing the game from the bus and we went up four long flights of stairs, the silver keys dangling from her perfect, long fingers. The Giant Man standing in his doorway, looking after me with his wormy eyes. Chapter 8 Once we moved in, the Giant Man started coming over a lot. At first, he said it was to bring us things. Said we needed a good start. We needed towels and soap and a clock and curtains so no one could see us even if we were four flights up. Then he brought up a bed from the basement that smelled like old wet clothes and a table with a broken leg. He carried them up all by himself. He also brought us things for the kitchen like dishes and pots and a big, long knife he said we could use to slice up bread. Mommy told him the bread she bought was already sliced up, and he said “well maybe I’ll bring you some you have to slice and how about you make me a nice dinner?” Then he spent a whole hour putting two locks on the front door. One was the kind you turn and it makes a big click, and the other was the kind with a chain. Mommy asked him if he does this much for all the tenants and he just smiled. He looked around and said the place was starting to shape up and that he would even get us a rug. Every time he said something like that, he looked at Mommy like he was waiting for her to smile at him. I knew how that felt and I almost began to like him then. I even started to think a little that maybe he would change everything.  Maybe he would marry Mommy, and we could move to the part of the city that people go to see when they come from all over. Maybe I could go to school again even though it wouldn’t start until September. I could get a backpack and have my own seat and I wouldn’t always be the new girl never staying long enough for anyone to know. But we never had the dinner he wanted. Mommy told him she was no cook for any man and wasn’t he going to take her out? So, they started going out. A little at first and then longer. She told me it was all right to keep the door locked, but not with the chain because she had to get in later and I would be asleep. When she did come home, when she woke me up, she would kiss me on my forehead, snuggle in next to me, her beautiful arms around me until I fell back to sleep. Chapter 9 This one night though, the Giant Man came in with her a little earlier than before. I was pretending to be asleep, and she was telling him that maybe it wasn’t such a good idea that they went out together so much. Maybe they should tone it down, she said, because the lady down the hall is giving her funny looks and she already went through that at the old place. I kept my eyes closed and didn’t move. “It’s that guy from the bar, ain’t it?” he said. She told him hush up, my daughter is trying to sleep. “Yeah,” he said, “because you’re mother of the year.” “Look,” she said, “if it’s the rent, I’ll pay you. Things are getting better.” “I can imagine,” he said. “I know how you make things get better.” Then Mommy told him not to come over at all anymore because he was more trouble than he was worth and that she would get him the money for his stupid rent and just go ahead and try to evict us and I squeezed my face into my pillow because I already knew we would be leaving again. But that was a whole week ago and we are here. We haven’t packed up everything and left in the middle of the night, so who knows? Chapter 10 Tonight would have been the last day of school if I had been going, but Mommy never got around to signing me up. Said we got here so close to the end of school and it was just easier to wait until September. I keep thinking about Mrs. Ferraro and how I didn’t call her. We don’t have a phone, but I have her number on a piece of paper that I always keep with me. I think about Mrs. Ferraro’s apartment and how much fun I had there. She had old newspapers and magazines stacked up so high, they could have been furniture. She liked to watch a lot of TV, old movies mostly. She didn’t have any family except for a grown-up daughter who lived in another state and never called her enough. Mrs. Ferraro didn't ask a lot of questions like why Mommy was all the time going out and leaving me by myself. I think she knew not to ask. Mommy once told me never to ask too many questions. People don’t always want to talk about everything. So, I figured that maybe there are things between Mrs. Ferraro and her own faraway daughter she was hoping no one would ask about. Mommy knew that I went there and it was all right with her even though she called Mrs. Ferraro a “character.” She said Mrs. Ferraro was a lonely old lady and I should be nice to her, okay? But Mrs. Ferraro was always smiling at me and I would have been nice to her even without Mommy telling me to. We’d shared cookies and sometimes ice cream and she didn't think I was silly for coming in all dressed up in Mommy's dress and lipstick. Sometimes when I think about those times, I take the paper with Mrs. Ferraro’s number on it and hold it close to my heart. Those times I wish so hard I could call her. But then I think it might be sad for Mrs. Ferraro to have a faraway daughter and now me, a faraway friend. Chapter 11 Mrs. Ferraro’s favorite movie star was Fred Astaire. He became my favorite, too. “Oh, he could dance!” Mrs. Ferraro would say. And he could, all dressed up in his long suit and high hat. Wherever he went, whether it was a park or just to someone’s house to eat supper, he would dance. One night, she said that  no one dances like that anymore because people like to stay home too much and watch TV. “Like us,” I said, and she leaned forward and brushed me on the tip of my nose.  “Yes,” she smiled, “we’re a bunch of homebodies, all right.” “Mommy’s not a homebody” I said. “She goes out a lot.” “You listen to me” Mrs. Ferraro made lines in her forehead and made sure I was looking at her. “Your mama is your mama and she always means the best for you.” I didn’t say anything. “I’m telling you this because I know.” She leaned backed in her chair and looked at a picture on top of her tiny refrigerator. “My daughter, she never thought I knew anything.” The girl in the picture was her daughter, Deena. In the picture, she was maybe in high school or college. Very pretty with long brown hair and smiling, not a big red smile like Mommy, but friendly. Her eyes looked up and away like maybe a beautiful bird just flew by. “She’s about your mama’s age now,” she said. I thought about how in the three months we lived here I never saw anyone come over that was the same age as Mommy. I never saw anyone come over but me. Then I remember that Mrs. Ferraro told me she lived in another state. “C’mon,” she said, “how ‘bout some toot-ee froo-tee?” That’s what she called ice cream even though it was always vanilla. We got out bowls and took the ice cream out of the freezer to get softer so it wouldn’t bend the spoon. “You remember what I told you about your mama.” That night, when Mommy came home and woke me up I hugged her extra hard. Chapter 12 Sometimes now in the new place, on a night like this when Mommy goes out and there’s no one across the hall, I start to hear inside my own head too much. Thoughts are knocking around like cans from the street. I start to think that maybe Mommy is never coming back, like if she got hit by a car or a man with a snake tattoo wouldn’t let her come home. I wish we had a TV to make noise louder than what’s inside my brain. Then I think I shouldn’t even think a thing like that, about Mommy not coming home because I’ll make it come true. I’m standing in the middle of the room in Mommy’s purple dress with the fake diamonds on the front. I am thinking how many hours till I can go to sleep and that will make Mommy come back faster and before I can think anymore, I hear the knock, knock, knock at the door. I wish it was Mrs. Ferraro with her fluffy pink slippers or Mommy with her pretty rose shoes.  But I know it isn’t.  It’s the Giant Man and he’s knocking, yelling for Mommy to come to the door. “I know you’re in there, bitch,” he says. I slip out of Mommy’s shoes so they won’t make noise and quiet as I can, I slide the chain lock into place. The floor creaks underneath my feet. Then I get into the closet and crunch down on the floor. Knock, knock, knock, the banging keeps coming and I pull my knees to my chest and head towards nothing, straight towards zero. The closet is small and I have to brush Mommy’s shoes aside. Above me, her dresses swish quietly on the rack.  And still the knocking. Tighter, tighter, tighter. I am scrunched up so hard when I hear the lock clicking open. My thoughts are coming faster than I can hear them.  Mommy. Giant. Zero. The slam of the door as the Giant Man gets past even the chain lock and I can hear his feet stomping across the floor. Mallee, he is calling.  Mallee!  And before I can even breathe again, he has yanked my head up by the hair till I have to look right at his wormy eyes and his face all made of sweat and skin. “It’s all your fault,” he says. His hands are like giant loaves of bread waving around in the air. “You, you’re just nothin’ but nothin’.” I wonder how he could hear inside my head, and that makes me even more afraid like no matter what I think he’s going to hear it. He reaches to grab around my throat and just as he does, his face goes loose, like all the bones in it just gave up and he crumples to the floor like an old dress. Only to show my mother standing behind him, the bread knife he gave us is in her hand and a scream is in her blue, blue eyes. Chapter 13 One hour later we are sitting at the bus station. We left the apartment with the man crumpled in blood on the floor. Five minutes of suitcase and hurry up and out the open window fire escape. Running, running, running past the stores, down the long open doors on River Street, which is right now the most place I never want to see again. Mommy pulling me with one hand, finally leaving the suitcase behind so we can move quicker. No time to stop, to talk, until there it is, we see it in the distance – bus terminal – lights and buses you could smell from a whole block away. We push through the doors and look around. Mommy buys us some tickets and we sit in the orange, plastic seats. Finally, it’s quiet again. Only the sound of the announcement man telling nobody that buses are coming in. Mommy says our bus leaves in twenty minutes. “I'm sorry, Mommy,” I finally say. I am sorry for what happened.  How if I had been sleeping, how if maybe I tried to talk to the Giant Man. But Mommy keeps looking straight ahead like she doesn’t hear me. “If anyone comes to ask” she says, “we are traveling to see your grandma in Tulsa” “What’s Tulsa?” “My name is Gloria” she stops then and looks around. “And your name is Lynette.” I want to tell her to call me Girl, but now is not the time, so I just say okay. Mommy looks inside her purse. “I wanted to give you some candy,” she says.  “You’re hungry.” I’m okay, Mommy, I tell her, but she just keeps looking. She pulls out lipstick and tissues and a tiny makeup mirror, but there isn’t any candy. “Don’t argue with me,” she says. I know she is thinking about the man and the knife and where will we go now? This is so much worse than rent and landladies and men with snake tattoos. “Is my grandma really in Tulsa? I ask her. Mommy gets very quiet and just says “Maybe.” She stops looking through her purse then and says it to herself again “maybe.” Chapter 14 An old woman with store bags like mine filled with clothes asks Mommy how old I am. She looks like maybe she could have been somebody's grandma once. The old woman is about to sit down next to us. She asks again how old I am. Mommy tells her shush, go away, we're not bothering you. The woman gets upset. “I was just trying to be nice,” she says. “I had a girl like that once.” She says this really loud and she shakes her fists at Mommy and why can't anyone be nice? she wants to know. Why can’t anyone? Then out of nowhere comes a policeman. He walks up behind the old woman and I feel Mommy's fingers tighten around my shoulders. I feel her long red nails dig in and I want to say Mommy, you're going to make me bleed. “Everything all right here?” the policeman looks right at Mommy. “Everything's fine,” Mommy answers, her fingers in so deep now that I flinch. “She all right?” he asks, looking at me. “Holding her kind of tight, aren’t you?” Mommy lets go. “She’s fine.” Mommy is already looking at him like she looked at the Giant Man that first night when he gave her the keys. “I asked her how old the girl was,” the old woman says “but she's too good to talk to me.” “All right, Hazel,” the policeman tells the old woman. “Go sit down over there.” The old woman shakes her head real angry and takes her three shopping bags to the bench across the room. “How old is she?” the policeman asks Mommy. “She's twelve,” Mommy says. “Kind of small for twelve,” he says. “Yes, I know,” Mommy says, “but she'll grow.” Mommy tries to smile her smile at him, but he just keeps talking. He looks around at the floor. “Where are you taking her so late at night?” “Oh, I'm taking her to stay at her grandmother's house in Tulsa. Oklahoma.” “Long way,” he says. “Long way to go with no luggage.” “We're having it shipped” Mommy says. “When you don’t have a man…” But I can tell the policeman doesn't believe her and doesn’t care how beautiful Mommy is and if it hadn't been for the old woman just then standing up and crying, I don't know what would have happened. “Nobody ever listens to me,” the old woman is saying, “Nobody.” The policeman gives Mommy one last warning look and goes over to the old woman. “C'mon, Hazel, I'll take you back to the shelter.” When they leave, Mommy turns me around and looks straight into my eyes. “All right, listen to me. You have to be a big girl now.” And I know what that means.  Big girls stay home so Mommy can go out and get us money to live. Big girls keep secrets. “But Mommy,” I say. “Why can’t we tell the policeman what happened?” “We don’t have time,” Mommy says. “That cop knows something is up, and he’ll be coming back.” “The policeman could help us.” I tell her. “You did it to save me.” “Yes,” Mommy says. “Now look, you forget what happened tonight. You never, ever tell anyone about it.” Mommy keeps looking around to see if the policeman is coming back. “But Mommy…” “Promise me.” She is holding me hard by my shoulders. “Promise me.” “Yes, yes, I promise.” “The police don’t help people like us, like me.” And I know there's no point to talk any more about it. No point in telling Mommy that this man wouldn’t have come in if she had been there, had a regular job in the day while I go to school and people wouldn’t be getting mad at us all the time. And maybe sometime I will tell her all of that.  But for now, I say nothing. Chapter 15 Mommy continues “So, like I said, you have to be a big girl now.” “I know, Mommy” “No,” Mommy says “I mean a real big girl. I’m going to put you on a bus.” “We’re going to Tulsa” I say. “No,” she says.  “There’s a bus over there.  It’ll take you back to Mrs. Ferraro.  I’ll call her to meet you, and I’ll tell the driver where to let you off.” She tells me it’s better and not to make a face but I do anyway.  And then I ask her where she’s going to go without me. “I don’t know,” she says. “But I need to move fast, you understand?” I feel like the suitcase she left behind in the street. “I’m fast, Mommy” I say. “I can be very fast” “I’ll go ahead and find us a place to stay” She says “I’ll find us a nice place with a pretty school you can go to.” She brushes back my hair, “wouldn’t you like that?” I don’t say anything, just smile and she calls me her big girl and hugs me and I breathe in and smell as much of her roses perfume as my head will hold. “You stay there with Mrs. Ferraro,” she says. “That way I’ll know where you are, okay?” She says “and don’t even think about coming to look for me, okay?  You are a little girl and I am your mother and I will always, always come back for you. “ And I think how I’m always being a big girl and a little girl all at the same time. “You promise?” I say “I mean, really promise?” “I promise,” Mommy says. And even though I know she broke promises all the time to the landlady and the lady at the corner store, Mommy always came home every night, even those times I thought she wasn’t going to, so I know she will keep this promise, too. Mommy walks me out onto the streets where all the city buses are lined up.  We get to the one at the end and the driver opens the door. “You stop near the park?” Mommy asks him. He nods and Mommy pulls me up the step. “This is my little girl, Lynette.” The bus driver doesn’t say anything, but Mommy just keeps talking.  “She has to go stay with her grandma.” When the bus driver doesn’t answer, she says “I was wondering if you can help us.  See I was going to take her myself.” Mommy is telling him how her sister is dying and only she can help her and it’s just a matter of time. The policeman from before is coming back from around the corner. The bus starts rumbling underneath us. I try to tug at Mommy’s hand, but she just tells me calm down, Lynette. And then it’s okay because the cop walks right by us, right in front of the bus and walks back into the bus station. “I can’t take her myself,” Mommy says, but the bus driver says it’s against policy to take a un-company minor or something like that. I’m not sure what that means, but Mommy just keeps talking to him and smiling and asks if he has kids, a big handsome man like him, and then she says, here is my phone number. You can call me to let me know she got there safe. Then he is smiling. He is looking all over Mommy’s dress and he finally says that since it’s an emergency, it would probably be all right. We walk up onto the bus and Mommy sits me in the first seat. “You be good” she tells me. You stay at Grandma’s house till I come to get you.” She kisses me hard on the cheek. Hair brushing my face. Roses filling the air. With a swing of her skirt, she turns to leave the bus. She blows me a kiss and disappears back down the street and she is smaller and smaller until she is a dot. And I can’t stop myself from thinking when will be the next time and place I ever see my mother again. Chapter 16 When I get off the bus Mrs. Ferraro is standing there waiting for me. I had never seen her outside before. She is wearing a bathrobe even though she’s in the street. That’s okay, I’m still mostly in my pajamas. The park looks different from how I remember. The trees all stuck together and dark. If I had to right now, I probably couldn’t even find my special tree. “Your mama said it was an emergency,” Mrs. Ferraro says. “She said she’d tell me all about it when she comes to get you.” I feel better then, like I didn’t have to say anything, just like I promised. “You’ll see,” Mrs. Ferraro says, “we will have fun, right Jeannie?” I tell Mrs. Ferraro about Girl. How that’s my new name now. But Jeannie is like in a bottle, remember? You know like with wishes.” “There aren’t any wishes,” I say. “Not ones that come true.” “I wished you would come back to see me again,” Mrs. Ferraro says and then she smiles and takes my hand. We walk up the stairs to Mrs. Ferraro’s apartment. It takes us a long time because she says her legs are not what they used to be and that’s what happens when you get old. One step, one step and Mrs. Ferraro stopping to catch her breath. It takes us awhile and I can’t help it, but I keep hoping the landlady won’t come out and see me. When we get to the apartment. I forget all that and start to think about the nice times we had when I lived across the hall. Then I ask Mrs. Ferraro about the landlady and if she’s still there and I ask who moved into our old apartment and Mrs. Ferraro smiles and says I have a lot to say for one tired little girl and that it is time for bed. She pulls out a pair of little girl's pajamas. “Here,” she says, “you can use these for tonight” Okay, I am thinking, but just for tonight. If I am Jeannie with wishes, I’m gonna wish Mommy back to me by tomorrow. I’m gonna wish the Giant Man off the floor and everything back like it was, only not the bad parts. Just the sometimes hugs and Mommy telling me everything is going to be all right. And I start to think about Mommy and where she went when she left me. The window is open. The last night of June. I think how Mommy told me not to come looking for her. And even though I wouldn’t even know where to look, I wouldn’t do it anyway, because it was a promise. Chapter 17 When I wake up it’s 7 o’clock. Mrs. Ferraro is sitting at the kitchen table holding a picture frame next to her heart. Her eyes are tiny from crying and when she sees me, she acts like she is the happiest person in the world. “You know, Jeannie,” she says showing me the picture, “this is my little girl.” “That’s Deena, right?” I say and Mrs. Ferraro gives me a hug. “That's her nightgown you have on.” She says she will tell me more about Deena and let’s have breakfast. We have big bowls of corn flakes with bananas sliced up. I wish I could tell Mrs. Ferraro what happened last night. We could have a nice talk and she could tell me all about her daughter and I could tell her all about Mommy, but I know that I can’t and I put that thought into the special place in my mind and put on a pair of shorts and a t-shirt that belonged to Deena, too, and I get ready for Mommy to come knocking at the door. Chapter 18 When the whole morning goes by and Mommy hasn’t come back. I keep looking out the window and when I tell Mrs. Ferraro I’m looking for Mommy, she says it might be a little longer than I think and tells me then I should go watch TV. Better, I should go out and play. “It's the first day of summer vacation, isn't it?” she says. I go outside and think how happy I will be to see my tree. Kids are everywhere. Playing on swings or jumping rope. There are mothers with baby carriages and dogs and no one knows what happened last night. I walk over to my tree, my special tree that has heard all my wishes and secrets for the time we lived across the street. I tell my tree about last night. That isn’t breaking my promise and the words spill out of me all in one big breath. And the leaves of the tree start to shake a little even though there’s no breeze, so I think that’s maybe its way of letting me know it heard me. And I want to ask my tree if Mommy is really going to keep her promise about coming back, because it’s starting to look like maybe she won’t. But the leaves keep shaking, like maybe the tree can hear my thoughts, like maybe it’s saying that Mommy promised and she always kept her promise about coming back. So I just have to give it some time. Chapter 19 But days and nights go by and it is a whole week later and I am still at Mrs. Ferraro’s. Still no word from Mommy. Today is Thursday and Mrs. Ferraro tells me that it is her daughter’s birthday and how would I like some cake. I ask if her daughter could come over to eat it with us. That’s when Mrs. Ferraro tells me to sit down. “You know how your Mommy is away, but still you love her?” she says. “Yes,” I say. “Well, that’s how it is with Deena.” She looks at the picture. “Deena lives in Boston. That’s really far from here.” “Like Tulsa?” I ask. “Tulsa?” Mrs. Ferraro tilts her head. “What do you know about Tulsa?” I tell her I heard about it once in a story and always wondered where it was. “Tulsa is in Oklahoma” and she reminds me of the movie we saw with that name. Then she takes a book off of her bookshelf. It’s old and full of maps. Mrs. Ferraro  blows some dust off of it and turns the pages.  “Here,” she points her finger, “here, is Boston and then way down her, that’s Tulsa.” When I see how far it is, I feel a little bit better and I can see why Mommy is taking so long to come back. Then, I ask Mrs. Ferraro if she is going to call her daughter in Boston for her birthday. “She’s very busy.” Mrs. Ferraro says.  “She works in an office.” “We can call her later then,” I say. “We’ll see.” Mrs. Ferraro says, settling back into her chair. “How about you go down and see if anyone loves us.” That’s what she calls getting the mail. I walk down the four flights and open the box. There are a few envelopes and a skinny newspaper with pictures of things on sale at a drugstore. And then there it is--a postcard. On the address side it says, Jeannie, c/o Ferraro. That’s me. My heart is pounding so hard, I think it might jump out of my chest. I turn the card over, but it’s blank.  It doesn’t matter because I know who it’s from. I bring the mail upstairs and give the letters to Mrs. Ferraro. “Hmm” she says “electric bill.  The sun shines all day and it don’t charge us nothing.” “Did you call Deena?”  I ask her. “I don’t have enough around here?” she winks at me “Got all these bills to pay.” “Maybe she is waiting for you to call her,” I say. “All right, all right,” she says. She dials the phone and waits. Then I can hear that somebody is answering, Hello? Hello? I am thinking that Mrs. Ferraro would start singing happy birthday or just start making jokes like she always does, but instead she hangs up. “You know what?” she says. “No answer. She’s probably busy at her office.” But I know that someone answered. I heard it. I want to tell Mrs.  Ferraro that it’s okay she didn’t say anything, because Mommy didn’t have to write anything and I knew it was her.