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If I could be anything, i’d be the dying star you whisper wishes to before bed in my wildest fantasies i am your divinity akin to akemi i warp the world for your safety christ calls this is my blood i scream here is my heart! wrapped in cellophane to preserve, i only ask you peel that plastic and consume all piece by piece until we are one ode to my former eyebrow piercing to the divine hole the pristine pit of my countenance, you are comely and alluring to the lightning bug underneath my skin the sorcerer’s sword which embodies self-expression you are masculinity incarnate a childhood dream meets an adulthood reality we transcend expectations in ways such as this Theodore James is a 22 year old transsexual male who writes so that he may breathe. Words and language have been his passion for as long as he can remember. He spends his free time reading, writing, overthinking, and eating delicious vegan meals. He specializes in angst, but also lives for a little bit of humor. His favorite poet is Danez Smith, his favorite color is burnt orange, and he loves the smell of the sky after a nice long rain.

Pedestrian Living Brown house finch, God’s beauty borne aerial with heart and murmur and beat of wing all enumerate in feathers sweet, small-beaked, simple drive of wearied poet and old man’s swing— crushed dead on a one-way. Missing Person’s Report Eating day old pierogi, the line between nourishment and punishment, nearly absent now. I drink my milk, but, you know, height isn’t everything. Marta was telling me how the whole thing was a corporate lie anyway, and I made idiotic jokes about how Big Milk was coming to get us. The hashbrowns were fully sizzling, golden wads of chaos on cheapskate Waffle House oil, that last big supper I ate. Homer put it second best when he claimed, “Everything is beautiful because we are doomed.” First place, of course, goes to the eggshell, glistening in barren fullness, the best articulation of physical desire mixed with perdition. I am too young to be getting smaller, I’m told, but that won’t stop me from shrinking. When the milk cartel comes to execute me for slander, I will disown this and all other poems, having finally accomplished something genuine. Abilene Rhapsody Alive again in the American Southwest with friends and a campfire and a park full of needles, we share songs that wrap ‘round the prickly pears, Thinning over their shapes like clouds or the denim on my knees, worn pews. Oh big sky, they say the tension’s between ever-moving blood and the dry bones resisting it. Oh, worn pews. Oh, big sky. Softer Living Thinking of the mallard’s wings serrating the sky, gray thread rippers on a cloudy cotton hanging. My shoulders hurt pretty bad because I can’t lift a boat properly, I really miss Victoria right now. She’s got this coat so soft it feels something close to feathers, adjacent to the kind of kindness I’d imagine ducklings have before they’re grown up or shot or mauled by bears or whatever. Soft as the wiry margin between eggshells and Peking specials, basically. This is a poem about how I went boating on a Monday, and felt generally pretty good, duck mortality aside, but right now I’m thumbing my left earring, which got put in all slanty. It’s nearly funny that 30,000 Americans die in car crashes each year and I’m mad today because my left earring is crooked from when an armed teenager shot it askew. Victoria was there. Ask her about it if you see her. Lake of Fire Opening and closing the door with some force like the gasping gills of an upturned fish; put gently, it’s hot as balls in here. Came down last night from the mountains in blue-gray fog. Gunsmoke of possible car-crashes, the headlight trajectories of running down the slope, taillights swallowed in mist, ein flammenwerfer extinguished. Like a soldier then, running as artillery rock outcrops briefly explode into vision, heading back to find some shelter, a beautiful trout longing for the river, thrown back toward aqueous mercy to find my fucking AC broke. Too Much Fun Beneath the lemon drop sun, behind the bar for tips, I wish I could just swim in Absolut Citron. The young patrons With snide Hawaiian shirts stumble and dance between uninterested parties while I hand out shots: my knees will ache for theirs to give. Augustus C. Grohmann is an interdisciplinary writer and MFA candidate at Hollins University in Roanoke, Virginia. Email them at ggrohmann@hotmail.com.

she did not stretch 60 feet tall like that day on the Clearwater building in Florida when the city had to install sidewalks and portable restrooms for thousands of pilgrims nor did she appear on a griddle at a restaurant on the California-Mexican border. She remembered that Jesus had a thing for showing up on fish sticks or bacon on a banana peel or as a ruffled dark spot on a potato chip by all accounts Mother Teressa was partial to cinnamon buns. Our Lady of confided all of this to a guy seated at a pew scrolling absently through his phone Damon Hubbs is the author of two chapbooks: "The Day Sharks Walk on Land"(Alien Buddha Press, 2023) and "Charm of Difference" (Back Room Poetry, forthcoming in 2024). His most recent poems can be found in Does It Have Pockets, Apocalypse Confidential, South Broadway Press, Yellow Mama, Lothlorien Poetry Journal, D.O.R, and Fixator Press. He lives in New England. Twitter @damon_hubbs

One Million Years Ago Yesterday A big girl now she recalls the first dress purchased with money of babies sat perfect for endless summers with boys bare feet on sands so hot she cried. Always willing arms protected her when rains fell heavy onto the shore lightning struck wild waves on the horizon she begged for another day to come so bright. Little stars crowd her memories as they fall innumerable from distant worlds she cannot assemble the fragments of moments lost in a shapeless cosmos. The large mirror tells a precious tale as she stands in earnest by a jealous star so little seems different for the aging child woman of centuries and universal truths. Weakness I give you the weakness of my skin so you can press your finger upon my soul leave traces of your prints on my thoughts. I submit to you the tenderness of my heart so you may handle it with your care its beats at the mercy of your will. I surrender all that might be strength in your palms so you may weigh its authentic measure and smile when you understand its truth. It is my gift to you in earnest so you will embrace this offering and hold it into your breast forevermore. Poussin is a professor of French and. His work in poetry and photography has appeared in Kestrel, Symposium, The Chimes, and hundreds of other publications worldwide. Most recently, his collections In Absentia, and If I Had a Gun, were published in 2021 and 2022 by Silver Bow Publishing.

Start the tape. and Richard says: Okay, dena. Are you ready to talk? Do you want to answer some questions? dena says: Umm. Stares at the ceiling and: Umm. Richard: Are you ready to -- dena: Sure. I'll talk to you. You and only you. Darling. And you'll remember your promise? The dust-wind autumn day we came here together, dry leaves -- Richard: I remember. dena. with a small 'd'. dena: Yes. She laughs. Yes: with a small 'd'. I want to see it printed that way in the transcriptions. Richard: If I promise, will you tell me everything? dena: Yes. Richard: Will you tell me the truth? dena: Oh yes. She looks at Richard, her smile cracked glass, a peek into deep-fathom space where cold, oiled machines hum. I will tell you the truth. And you will not scream. You will not run. Only because you are Richard. Richard: Because I understand you. dena laughs, the scratch of a stylus across the grooves of an old vinyl record. she says: I will watch your eyes while we talk ... No one can ever get dena to talk. Except Richard. So: tell me about the first night. Tell me about the rose. dena: why start there? Why not last week the week before the season before? The ancient seasons? Richard: I want to know why you chose him. dena: It was just the shine young shine coming out of his skin -- Richard: Tell. dena: I didn't know him, knew I'd never see him again his boyfriend waiting in the car outside the flower shop, old Nashville Road bluemetal Volvo, peeling flakes, bright orange primer vanity license plate: GUNS-R-US the boyfriend yelling at him and he talking, crying eyes red and wet face pale red wet but not so pale as later ... Richard: And the rose? dena: Bought it inside and gave it to him -- Richard: Why? dena: The depth there, in his sadness. Didn't know he shined, but knew exactly why he cried. Most of them cry in confusion, but he -- dena pauses, sips water. Richard waits. then: I said 'you are someone who needs' he smiled through silent tears and I made sure Richard: You made sure dena: Yes my blood was on the briar to mark him for later. His eyes so sweet -- Richard: You said you would tell me all of it. You said you would tell me the truth. dena: and the truth is that his eyes were sweet and his tongue bitter, and I drank a cup of ice water after. dena smiles. Depths slide through the smile, depths that are always trying to move out beyond the edge of the world. The black smile wants to live in the bright sunlight world of happy things. The tape is rolling. dena: How much do you want to know? Would you like to know why the sun sings? Would you like to know what crickets dream? Richard: The truth. Only the truth. He looks at his watch. He's late. Half hour. dena: Truth. Richard: Without poetry. dena giggles: There is no truth without poetry. She laughs, breathing frost, shifts in her chair. The room is cold growing colder. Cold growing colder ... Richard: Who was next? dena: That night, or after? Richard: That night. dena: That night I heard the moon scream and I flew with owls across a stained sky and when I looked, I saw everything. I saw the fever at the edge of the world all of the big world and two boys, running like kites with cut strings Pinocchio-boys paroled from sleep singing and kicking leaves and howling out too late on a school night pillow-ghosts propped up scarecrows of bedclothes in empty beds to fool foolish parents. Richard, smiling: I remember doing that. dena: Yes. The magic. The boy magic: I took them fed pushed darkness into their veins and when I stopped they weren't little boys anymore. When I stopped They weren't anymore. She grins. Her teeth are jagged slates, eyes crystal pomegranites. If she wants, she can be beautiful. She has that choice though Kafka called her Gregor Samsa ... Richard: Is there anything left? dena: Sometimes. Of little boys, no. Little boys have soft bones with warm, sweet, taffy centers -- Richard: I will never see this. dena: You asked me. Richard: Only the truth. dena: Don't you believe? She smiles again, the smile of living things, fluid crescent against the alien darkness of her rippling face. Now she is beautiful again, moonlight on flawless white skin. dena: Driving here, through sweet scents of jasmine and potpourri pine and country homes, dirt roads, I saw her drugged and beautiful, thumb cocked dripping deliciously from light yellow summer clothes I took her to that winter farm where you used to rehearse the band, remember? There in soft straw and gauze of cobweb she kissed me thought to shock me when I took her into my arms she cried out; and no one heard but spiders ... Her mind filled with sketchbook fantasies, never realized I read her hunger as I read her mind and made sure she came before she died. Richard: How many? How many years? dena: You want centuries. Richard: The truth. I want the truth. How many? dena: Lost count long before volcanoes cooled; great beasts roamed the earth and I; in another shape. I'm older than stars, didn't I tell you? Older than light. Richard: No. You never told me when you were born. dena: Before God. Light bends around me, when I feed Rainbow Halo dreambubble, silent and beautiful, I think. Richard: I will never see this. I will never. dena: You exist in second's space, casual eyeblink -- see time from my side and your mind slides sideways. You are privileged to know; only because you know me. You hear me. You are tranced by Mayhem. You hear the song. You are kin. Richard: dena: All God's children are red dreams of violence; God's children hear voices singing of meat. Second's space lures them away; parents teach them away from it, the true nature. We are Hunters all: Killers. dena: before seasons of bright time took you over painted you pastel colors you were red, too. Richard: dena: Say something. Richard: Teach me. dena: you already know. Look -- your hands stretch skin into blood shape Now you sing feast-ballads hymns to tearing flesh. She smiles. Moves to him. Kisses and kisses and unlocks him. dena: Come with me. Richard: Um. Richard: Richard: The moon is waning silver the moon doesn't matter. Beasts drink water Beasts cross the river Singing of murder. dena: Richard: The tape is rolling -- The tape is rolling. Dave Duggins is a writer, artist, and musician. He’s written four books--three novels and a short fiction collection--and a bunch of music, with a couple of blues rock albums on Spotify. He currently releases all his creative work through Silvern Studios, his little multimedia company. You can find out more about what he does at daveduggins.com, but the site's pretty static. He’s more lively on Twitter. His new novel, Romae Futurum: Invaders, is now available in the Kindle Store: https://tinyurl.com/yck8qpow

The Dry Spell It hasn't been raining since it had. I sound vague? You haven't stared at the spearhead of a midday road. You haven't tried to track rain and heard the summer roar. Everything set for the rain - that cup of tea, those books and music, social media posts, bad mood, sudden sex, uprooted sadness that breathes on and perishes at the same time - all hold a bowl. No noise, tune, ting - the bowl remains an arch of aching. It waits. Nothing is nothingness; even a dry spell gets wet with our sweating. Halo- rainbow around my sins (To Robert Frede Kenter) A halo-rainbow surrounds my sins, its glow almost motherly callous and concerned as if she stands in our longevous balcony and see us playing soccer in the street without watching us, and hence we can be the truants from good behaviour, moral language. I blink. I cannot remember a rainbow in my life let alone a halo around the sun. I murmur, "Forgive me for leading a monochrome life." Cold breeze feels for my pulses, touches my neck. "Am I alive?" I desire to ask and decide not to. The grass smells of a memory falling from a great height, from the parapet of Eden. The air thronged with the particles reminds me of how the crows circle and scream when one of them falls. Light has fallen. It is sundown soon. I can call you Rob and say, "Slainté Mhaith." or hear the sobbing water of a lake nearby. An author, journalist, and father, Kushal Poddar, editor of 'Words Surfacing’, authored eight books, the latest being 'Postmarked Quarantine'. His works have been translated into eleven languages. amazon.com/author/kushalpoddar_thepoet Twitter- https://twitter.com/Kushalpoe

She always loved airports. Her dad, robbed of having a son among his three children, used to take her to the parking area at the end of the runway to watch the planes take off. Her sisters were uninterested but she loved it. For a long time she thought he did it only for her. Really he was doing it for him. When her marriage failed and she was still only in her twenties, she took to spending time at the airport even when she wasn’t going on a trip. She liked to sit in the main terminal and watch the travelers check in, pulling their wheeled luggage along and gazing at the panel of ETAs and ETDs. She’d read or listen to string quartets through her earbuds, and then, after a couple of hours, she’d go home feeling revived. In search of a bathroom one time she wandered into a long hallway that didn’t seem to lead anywhere. It had a firehose in the wall behind a glass case. It had a struggling ficus backed into a niche where it didn’t get any light. High windows threw some sunlight beside the niche, so she dragged the ficus there and watered it with her Evian. Every time she went to the airport, she’d go there to check on the ficus and discover that someone had moved it back to the niche. She’d set it out again in the the sun patch and water it, and it started doing better and better. She saw a man look at his watch after checking in and thought he had too much time to kill before his flight. This was all on impulse and later she was surprised at herself, but she went up to him and asked if he wanted to see something special. He was nice looking, a little older than her, and had sweet eyes. She took him to the hallway with the ficus and showed him how she had nursed it back to health. Then she took his hand and led him into the niche, and she unbuttoned her blouse and said he could have her if he wanted her. When they were done and he had to catch his plane, he asked her name. “You can call me Bluebird,” she said and went skipping away. Her father used to call her Bluebird. For a while she did this regularly, finding just the right man, showing him her ficus, and offering herself to him. These men were always grateful, then bewildered when she told them her name and skipped away. It was better than her marriage. But then she chose a man quite a bit older, and he wept when they were finished, and that made her wonder what he was thinking. His eyes were something other than bewildered when she said her name. They were full of sorrow. Kevin Brennan is the author of eight novels, as well as stories and poetry that have appeared in many online and print journals. A Best Microfiction nominee, he's also editor of The Disappointed Housewife, a literary magazine for writers of offbeat and idiosyncratic fiction, poetry, and essays. Kevin lives in California's Sierra foothills, where he cavorts among the pines and writes anomalous indie songs for his wife.

With striped lawns and fences and barking dogs and lost cat posters on lampposts. I’ve spent weekends pulling weeds and evenings walking, some years pushing a stroller. Cordial hellos. You get the idea, but I’m not finished. Here where they pretend concrete is art—cul-de-sacs and speed bumps, medians and roundabouts. Someone paints their door bright then someone else follows suit but in another hue. There are kitschy flags about holidays and seasons or sometimes wine, advertising alcoholism as a worthwhile pursuit. There are wreaths on doors, welcome in curly fonts, all screaming personality! The sound of rolling trash bins is music every Thursday morning, or at least an alarm clock, everything is pulsing in that methodical way. We don’t know how much money the neighbors pull in, it’s in the same ballpark probably but some winters it’s a class war between snowblowers and shovels, sometimes we’d leave our driveway uncleared hoping for some benevolence. Once I tried to move my kids into the city proper, where we could walk somewhere beyond a park, a gas station. I want the trees, the forest, but that will have to come after the kids are grown. My ex said downtown was too far, he didn’t want to drive them to me there. He might have said more but I didn’t bother to make it out above the endless drone of a weed whacker. Holly Pelesky writes essays, fiction and poetry. She received her MFA from the University of Nebraska. Her prose can be found in The Normal School, Okay Donkey, and Jellyfish Review, among other places. Her collection of letters to her daughter, Cleave, was recently released by Autofocus Books. She works as a librarian while raising boys in Omaha.

Show tits. Be Black. Laugh too loudly. Order veal. Have the kind of queer relationship that Netflix hasn’t figured out how to monetize. Rent. Walk down the street thinking they don’t know your headphones are blasting that one pop-punk hit you felt guilty about listening to even back in high school. Slouch. Pick your teeth. Do the drugs they don’t write breathless travelogues about. Run back and forth across the Brooklyn Bridge at 4 a.m. with someone you just met because you feel that ugly beautiful energy when you look at them and it has to come out, come OUT, COME OUT, before you can go somewhere as prosaic as bed. Appreciate silence. Age appropriately. Imagine a better life is possible. Call an ex from 10 years ago who occasionally stalks your Insta stories and tell them you don’t miss them, not really, but sometimes you wake up with the memory of the taste of their ass on your tongue, anyway hope they’re well. Know sorrow. Learn nothing. Turn right on red. Chas Carey is a public servant and member of the interdisciplinary performing arts collective Wolf 359. This piece sprung up after someone told him about a colleague who charged $800 for a masterclass on how to get accepted by the New York Times' "Modern Love" column.

Bad Donna calls me, as she does each year, to sing-song her signature ditty, “hey, hey, it’s the first of May! Outdoor fucking begins today!” She asks whether my husband knows how to “put a spinner on it.” After a couple dirty jokes, she moves on to cancer. Lung cancer, she tells me. Both lungs, but a different kind of cancer in each lung. “The doctors say they’ve only seen a few cases like this before,” Donna says. “I really am terminally unique.” “Terminally unique” is AA-speak for people—usually newcomers—who are garden-variety drunks like everybody else, yet insist they face special challenges the rest of us can’t understand. If they’re lucky, time disabuses them of that notion. Bad Donna’s always quick with the jokes. Bad Donna’s twelve years older than I am, old enough to have been my babysitter, but not so old I’ve ever given a thought to losing her. The two of us became fast friends at an AA club in Delaware decades ago. Since we share a first name, Donna decided she’d be “Bad Donna” while I—by default not merit—would be “Good Donna.” Bad Donna displays her “badness” on the surface for everyone to see. I’ve never known why she is so sex-obsessed. I asked her once and she said, “go figure, maybe I’m just honest.” We used to see each other every day at the 7 AM Early Bird meeting, speaking by phone more often during the craziness of early sobriety. Now we talk four or five times a year. I always call her on her birthday in early December. She laments the lovely skin and slender waist of her youth and complains she looks like an evil stepmother. I listen, and tell her she is beautiful—and I mean it. So, a day off work to drive down to South Carolina where Bad Donna and her husband live now. We are so busy at the office; it’s a terrible time for me to be away, but fuck it. I wouldn’t have made it through those first years of sobriety without my friend attaching “Good” to my name and convincing me I could live up to it. Bad Donna taught me the crushing shame I had carried didn’t have to be my permanent condition. My GPS directs me to Donna’s door. Ken says he’s glad I’ve come. “How bad is it?” I ask. “Hospice comes tomorrow. She’ll start IV pain meds.” Ken says he’s going upstairs to take a nap. Bad Donna is propped up on pillows in her bed, a cloth turban on her head. Her eyes seem too big and there isn’t much left of her under the covers. I lean over to kiss her cheek and her breath smells funky. Her hands push against my shoulders. “Get off me, Good Donna, or I’m gonna whip your candy ass!” she hollers. I’m so relieved she’s still got spunk I could cry. “I brought you ice cream, Bad Donna.” “I can’t eat that shit. I’ll get fat like you!” “Suit yourself.” I take a minute to study her and the room. The bedside table holds a bunch of prescription vials and inhalers. Along with a copy of Emmanuelle. “Did I tell you the one about Snow White at Disney World?” Donna asks. “No, honey, I don’t think so,” although we both know she did. “They had to kick her out of the place. They kept finding her sitting on Pinocchio’s face, saying, lie to me, Pinocchio, lie to me!” We laugh. “I can’t believe it’s been two years since I’ve seen you.” “And I can’t believe how tired you look.” Then she launches into more jokes. I try to listen, to laugh when she wants me to, to bring my old friend comfort, but my monkey mind goes through a litany of my own worries. Problems at the office, mostly, and things aren’t great with my teenaged daughter. I’ve been feeling pushed and pulled and pissed off. I never miss my AA meeting, but I’m missing one today. “Oh,” I say, when I notice that Bad Donna has stopped talking and is watching me. “I’m so sorry, my mind drifted for a second.” “I’m dying here. Why did you even come? Shit.” “Do you remember Sheila?” “Of course, I remember her. Came to meetings off and on for years and never even put together thirty days. Finally took a header off her balcony, didn’t she?” “Yep, that was Sheila, very pretty, too. Do you remember her funeral? How a couple of guys got into a fistfight at the cemetery, arguing about which one of them she loved?” Bad Donna hoots. “I’d forgotten that! What a circus!” “That could have been me, there in that cold ground while a couple of drunken fools slugged it out and turned my funeral into some big cosmic joke. That probably would’ve been me if I hadn’t met you, Bad Donna.” We are quiet for a minute. I am determined not to cry. “I haven’t forgotten how you helped us with our bankruptcy. Thank you,” Bad Donna says. “Donna. Oh, I wish you weren’t so sick.” Bad Donna eyes the tub of Rocky Road melting in my lap. “You better get us a couple bowls, Good Donna,” she says. “God, I hate funerals.” Sarah Holloway lives in Savannah, GA, with her husband and lots of books. Her work has been published or is forthcoming in Flash Fiction Magazine, 50-Word Stories and SugarSugarSalt Magazine.

Bertrand ignored the wailing sirens as he hustled along the street, dodging parking meters and stepping over sidewalk cracks. He hated the sound of sirens; besides being harbingers of bad news, he could feel his teeth vibrate as the pitch changed with their Doppler Effect. Instead, he thought about the shifting autumn light as the evening approached. The sun turned the sky pink and orange as the city lights flickered on. Despite his mood, the coming night felt pleasant. The air reminded him more of late summer than mid-fall. For November, the temperature felt unseasonably warm. Bertrand liked it, liked the smell of the warm air this late in the calendar. He focused on the warmth to shake off his irritability. Some optimism should change his mood. Maybe he’d enjoy the poetry reading after all, even if it made him cringe. He’d order a beer when he arrived at Mulvaney’s. Besides, Cindi would pick up on his sour attitude in one second flat if he didn’t change his mood before he arrived. Cindi Ventalli, his junior-college crush. They’d met in a freshman poetry class he hadn’t intended to take. His ex-girlfriend, Macy, got him to enroll in the class before she split a month later. Macy had met a trucker who wanted to “show her the world.” Bertrand took the news well because by then he’d started to develop a new attraction—Cindi Ventalli. It was fate, he told himself, when the instructor asked the students to “pair up” and Bertrand and Cindi turned to face each other. Since then, they’d only ever been friends, but Bertrand still showed up at her readings, sifted through her emailed verses and sonnets looking for patterns and imagery, or whatever else that long-voweled teacher had asked the students to look for and then deliver in their offered feedback. Cindi loved the class; she gobbled it up, even when the instructor played a recording of William Shatner—yes, Captain Kirk—reading a particularly terrible poem about a space cowboy. Cindi looked directly at Bertrand and declared that in 50 years everyone would consider Shatner’s work unparalleled genius. Bertrand was still waiting. He chuckled to himself recalling those early days of their friendship. Cindi had that effect on him; she could change his mood. True, too, she was keen to his mood. If he showed up in his present state—bitter and resentful—she’d have hurt feelings. And hurt feelings would change her reading, maybe even change the material she’d read, perhaps even change her words. He’d once seen her come unhinged at a reading, in the middle of a sestina, and start editing her main six words, the very spine of her sestina unraveling before a stupefied audience. No, he’d need to change his mood and do it fast. He didn’t want to attend the poetry reading in the first place, but Cindi didn’t deserve his defiance. By the time he reached the crosswalk at 8th and Coburg, the sound of the siren had faded to a low hum. He could see Mulvaney’s from there, a seedy, university bar that attracted discerning intellectuals as well as growler collectors and loggers. The house’s usual entertainment drew eclectic crowds. Mulvaney’s had a side room with a stage and fairly decent audio system. Small-time, touring bands frequented the bar. Not fancy enough for a wedding, but the room did well enough to host a weekday Quinceañera, in addition to the annual ska band revival festival. And it was the perfect place for a dimly lit, retrospective literary reading. Such readings took place there a few times a month. Plus, they sold a bitter ale Bertrand craved when he thought of it. The reading that night, The Eugene Navel Gazers, had become a monthly event at Mulvaney’s, and people went nuts for it. At one time it was a reading for all genres. The name ‘Navel Gazers’ was meant as a joke, but the memoirists hated it and stopped attending. The poets never minded the jeer, though, so they took over the reading and made it theirs. And so the series became exclusive for poets. Over the years Navel Gazers hosted some pretty big names in local and state-wide poetry talent from Paulann Petersen to Tom Swearingen, folks Bertrand had never heard of but Cindi assured him were the real deal. Over the years, Cindi had been asked to read there several times—she had something of a following herself and had seen a little publishing success, too. But her day job found her schlepping books at the big box bookstore and waxing lyrical the plain-type words of children’s picture books for story hour. While Cindi’s English degree had landed her the bookseller job, Bertrand’s environmental science degree had landed him a construction job. He wasn’t too invested in the environment even when he was a student. He’d only picked the degree because it lacked the foreign language requirement he’d need with a B.A.. But his job wasn’t too far off from what he liked about the degree; he did get to work outdoors and he occasionally got to stand in for the boss when inspectors came around. He’d boast about methods they used to prevent spills and accidents—sort of the truth—and so, naturally each job site was made “environmentally safe” by his holding the degree. His boss, Josiah Tanner, often gave him cash bonuses—under the table, of course—for a job well done. That same day Josiah had jammed a wad of bills into Bertrand’s hand as he left the job site. Earlier that day, Don Davies, the company’s superintendent, had come around asking about some fiberglass insulation trimmings that needed to be disposed of properly. Bertrand had been hauling these off each day and ditching them out by the train tracks in Glenwood, but he’d made up something convincing on the spot about donating these to a local re-use center which was all too happy to have them. For his quick thinking, Josiah gave Bertrand three-hundred dollars in cash—a bonus. Bertrand had intended to head over to the casino on the coast with his buddies after work but then Cindi texted him just as he was leaving to remind him of the Navel Gazers reading. What’s more, she would be reading that night. She needed him there. And so, to his chagrin, he found himself walking through downtown headed toward Mulvaney’s, with a scowl, an attitude, and three hundred dollars cash in his wallet. At least the night was warm. The ‘walk’ sign flashed and Bertrand stepped off the curb. As he crossed the intersection, he took in the scene in the lot across Coburg Road. A shanty town had sprung up there; make-shift structures of cardboard and tarps hung over strung ropes and chain-link fencing. Bertrand could see the outlines of people arranged in various poses, huddled together in their dejection. Some had faces he could see through the dimming light, scruffy and tired. Others were only silhouettes slumped this way or that. The sight of them made Bertrand sick. Couldn’t they find some other place to set up camp? Couldn’t he walk down the street in his own city without being bothered by their filth? Their lewd presence? As he neared them, the features of their faces became clearer, and he could see that many of these people, men and women alike, diverted their eyes, bowed their heads, or adjusted themselves as Bertrand walked by. Bertrand snorted a sound of contempt. Serves them right, he thought, out here in the street. Surely they each deserved their fate. After all, even he had landed a job. Sure, he didn’t love it, but it gave a decent paycheck. And the three hundred dollars in his pocket felt right, even if he was on his way to a god-damned poetry reading. This was the American way, he reasoned. Well, maybe not the poetry reading. But a person could make something of himself even if he didn’t love his job or if he came home each day to an empty apartment—at least the apartment was his, month-to-month, anyway. Why did it seem so many people were afraid of a little hard work? Just then, he caught eyes with a man about his age, early thirties, in a faded Dodgers-blue jacket, the LA logo grayed with grime. The man had a stubbly, dirty face and a hard set jaw which he squared up to Bertrand as their eyes locked. The man seemed to look into Bertrand’s soul. He seemed to read Bertrand’s mind. He seemed to say, I didn’t choose this, daring Bertrand to challenge him. “Gotta’ dollar, man?” his gruff voice said. “I just need to eat something. Chula’s said they’d give me a burrito for one dollar. How ‘bout it?” A black hole marred the man’s smile where his left canine should have been. “Get a job, bum,” Bertrand sneered. He shook his head, cocked his shoulders back as he passed the man, trained his gaze on Mulvaney’s up ahead. Its neon sign glowed red against the dimming sky. Bertrand’s own words echoed in his mind as he walked. He reassured himself he’d been right to tell the man to get a job. He figured nobody had ever said something like that and perhaps he would make a positive impression on the man, a little tough love could go further than any dollar ever would. Sure, that was it. Bertrand had truly been a good Samaritan, he figured, a goddamned saint. As he approached Mulvaney’s, he noticed another homeless man pushing a bike with a Burley trailer attached to the back. The man was headed toward him. At his current pace the two would meet right at the front door of Mulvaney’s. Bertrand studied the man’s appearance. He was older, maybe in his late 50s. A worn trench coat hung from his frame like a soggy cape. He appeared to have socks on his hands as gloves, wrapped around the grips of the bike’s handlebars. What were once colorful streamers hung from the handles like sad birthday decorations, faded and forgotten. The bike itself was an amalgamation of cycle parts, things welded here and there in a chaotic representation of a bicycle. It hosted two bells on the crossbar and a broken headlamp hung there too. Rust and stickers lined the frame. The seat was a wide, shabby saddle. But it was the Burley trailer attached to the back which gave Bertrand pause. The thing was pristine, beautiful even, as if it had just rolled out of REI. It probably had, Bertrand decided. The man had probably stolen the trailer. But what was in it? A trailer like that was meant for children to ride along on bike trips. Even babies could safely scuttle behind mom or dad as their parent pedaled to the grocers or daycare. Bertrand decided he would look closer at the trailer as the man passed—see if there might be a baby in there, report the man to the police for endangering a child by living on the streets—but he never got the chance. Before the man came within ten feet of the door to Mulvaney’s, he stopped short and propped the bike against the wall of the pub. He bent down to the bike’s chain and appeared to tug at something there. Bertrand kept his eyes on the man until he was safely through the door of Mulvaney’s and the world transformed to a safer, warmer place. Inside the bar, a soft Wes Montgomery tune burbled. The lighting glowed about the place illuminating a few people arranged in clusters sharing ale and laughter. The smell of old wood and stale beer filled Bertrand’s senses. He spotted Cindi right away, her familiar petite shoulders, auburn hair. She stood next to the bar chatting with a college-aged kid, an empty stool between them. When Cindi spotted Bertrand, relief washed over her face and she waved him over. “Hi,” she said too loudly and leaned in for a one-armed hug. “This is Phil.” She gestured to the kid. “He’s a math student at UO. Wants to teach. Has a cool project he’s working on.” Bertrand stuck out his hand and the kid pawed it into a quick shake. “Bertrand is also a poet,” Cindi told Phil, which was a lie, but the lie was not Cindi’s lie. Bertrand did write his thoughts down, and he wrote them in column-form, but the poems never had any rhyme or reason. He’d done the same thing in that poetry class many years earlier just trying to eke out a passing grade. A few people, including Cindi, found his work full of imagination and emotion. So, Bertrand had kept on with his writing ruse, occasionally offering Cindi a page or two of his random thoughts and she would “critique.” At one point, he explained the lie to her when he’d had too much to drink, confessing his ruse. But Cindi had only laughed and assured him his writing read more true than many of the hacks who had taken the stage at Navel Gazers. Phil asked, “Are you reading tonight?” “Oh, reading’s not for me.” “We’ve been trying to get him to read for years but he’s far too modest,” Cindi beamed then lifted peace fingers at the bartender for another round. “You drinking tonight?” “I’ll have one, I think.” “My treat,” Cindi said. “Thanks for coming.” “Wouldn’t miss it.” Two bottles arrived on the bar and Cindi picked them up, handing one to Bertrand. They clinked necks then sipped. The cool bitter ale tasted refreshing to Bertrand and he took a second pull before looking around the bar again. The sizzle of carbonation described his esophagus with a simmer as the ale slid into his gut. He warmed. “Are you waiting for someone?” Phil asked, leaning toward him. “No, just seeing who’s here tonight.” Bertrand said. “So, math, huh?” “Yep. How ‘bout you.” “I’m in construction, but I do a little environmental work for my company, too.” Phil nodded like Bertrand’s words had made some kind of sense to him. “I gotta go do the mic check. It’s almost time,” Cindi said, clinking bottles with Bertrand once more before moving off. “Thanks for the brew,” he called after her. “Sure thing.” Bertrand excused himself from Phil saying something about wanting to get a good seat. In reality, he wanted his seat, the seat in the back corner, to be precise. He felt safe there, tucked away. Plus, he didn’t want Cindi to see his face if his attention waned. Bertrand moved through the opening to the side room and found his way to the back corner near a large, wooden door. At one time the side room had served as a storefront and the big heavy, wooden door led out to the sidewalk and street beyond. Years since then, though, the door had been permanently bolted shut. A sign affixed across the door read, “This is not a door,” which always made Bertrand laugh. He touched the sign as he sat then sipped his ale again. Cindi was on the stage with one of the Mulvaney’s crew checking the sound and dimming the lights. Bertrand watched her and admired her shapely figure, the line of her skirt, the soft edges of her sweater. She’d left her hair down and it hung to her shoulders, swishing as she moved about the stage. Most readings, she tied it back in a stunted ponytail, a cute look, but Bertrand preferred her hair down. He tipped his bottle to his mouth and drained the last of his ale, thought about ordering another but did not want to give up his seat. Instead, he settled into the warm feeling in his stomach. Wes Montgomery faded from the speakers. Before long, people started trickling into the side room filling seats. To Bertrand’s surprise, Phil stood at the mic first. He tapped the bulb and the audience quieted. “Thanks for coming out tonight to, uh, Navel Gazers.” Phil’s body moved in a gyrating motion but his head remained fixed at the mic. “Cindi said I could make a quick announcement if I also agreed to play emcee. You know, introduce the readers. So here we are.” A murmur of laughter moved through the room. “So, my name’s Phil Messier. I’m a grad student in the math department at the University and we have started our own reading series. It’s a math series, though, so not like your typical literary reading. You know, it’s more like poetry in patterns.” He made scare quotes in the air when he said ‘poetry.’ “If you want more information, get with me after the reading tonight. I also have a stack of flyers ..” He looked over the heads of the audience. “There,” he said, pointing to a table in the opposite corner from where Bertrand sat. “Anyway, first up is none other than the legend herself, Cindi Ventalli. Give it up for Cindi.” Applause filled the space and Phil stepped off stage as Cindi stepped on. She nodded at him and said something, though her words came before she’d reached the mic so Bertrand didn’t hear her. True to fashion, before Cindi spoke, she paused for a long moment with her eyes shut. Then, she opened the yellow folder—always yellow—and set it on the lectern. “Narcissus,” she started. “I notice you alone / Near the water’s edge / Your head tilts toward the reflection...” Her modulation rose on the last word and she paused. Bertrand hated it when she read like that, like performing her piece rather than just sharing the words. He hadn’t learned much in that poetry class but he knew the importance of allowing people to have their own interpretation. Just read it, he thought as she continued. “The expression on your face / Reminds me of something / I heard once in a child’s song / About a cow and a moon / And a dish and fiddle.” Good lord, Bertrand thought, pulling the bottle to his mouth before remembering he’d finished the ale. He set the bottle on the ground with a soft clank and redoubled his efforts to pay attention. He knew Cindi would ask about the reading when it was over so he’d need to have some recall of her words. That’s when the crying started. Through the bolted door, Bertrand heard what sounded like whimpering coming from outside: the distinct sounds of a fussy baby. Was there a baby on the street outside? Surely it was dark by then. Who would have a baby around this part of town at night? The sound grew louder, taking on an urgent cadence. Bertrand thought of the man with the bike trailer, that brand-new Burley. The image of the man with his bike propped by the pub wall came back to Bertrand: older, disheveled hair, new baby trailer. The man had seemed too old to be a father; a grandfather? Maybe. But why would he have a baby out at night? Babies should be at home nestled in their cribs. By then, Bertrand realized he’d missed the last stanza of Cindi’s poem and he tried to tune out the sound of the baby crying outside. “You smile. / The clouds hold up the entire sky / Above you.” Cindi nearly sang the word ‘you’ and Bertrand almost groaned. Focus, he told himself, pick a phrase or two to recall later. But the baby’s lament grew louder. Bertrand was certain others in the seats near him could also hear the cries. He looked to his fellow poetry patrons, but none seemed moved from the poet at the mic, Cindi, pulling her stanza’s ends up like questions. And then, the crying shifted to high-pitch shrieking as if sudden pain inflicted the infant. The sound assaulted Bertrand’s senses and he felt the need to rise from his chair and move to the other side of the room to escape the din. But there was another part of him that also wanted to go outside, to find the baby, to alleviate its discomfort or stress, whatever the source of its hurt might be, to find it and fix the cause of its anguish. Again, others near him seemed to not notice the crying. But now the sound vibrated his being. The hair on his arms grew stiff as the crying morphed into an urgent bleating. The cadence of its noise became cyclical, like each breath of the infant issued the same distress and terror or pain over and over again into the night like a siren warning of unimaginable trouble. And Bertrand was certain the sounds came from an infant. Such screeches could only belong to the very young, that specific octave only new vocal chords could reach, a squall of panic and agony from things not yet understood. But Bertrand understood the pain in that wailing. Somewhere out on the street a baby was in pain. Again, Bertrand looked around the room—at those closest to him—with more scrutiny. Either they did not hear the baby or else they ignored it, all of their attention taken up with Cindi who droned over the din, “When you laugh / The sound comes like a series / Of bubbles spilling and popping / Gurgling and bursting to life.” That sound? Bubbling and popping? Bertrand gaped. What about the sound of a baby in the night howling with such misery that the very issuance of its complaints had begun to cause Bertrand physical harm? His ears rang with the infant’s bellowing. His skin tingled with each keening sob. The yowling and agony that roared from such an aching, its torture-filled squawks made the ale in Bertrand’s gut churn with regret. Bile rose to his throat. He thought to hold his hands to his ears, stand and rush out of the place, flee those echoes that filled him with such guilt and fear—guilt for his inaction and fear for the life of the child. He imagined the man parking the bike along the wall of the bar, his attention to the child forgotten, some opioid transaction luring him away from his grandchild, so small and fragile in this broken night of vagrants and disease. Then, just as Bertrand shifted forward in his seat, no longer concerned with what Cindi would think if he walked out in the middle of her reading to find the child—as suddenly as if a glass had fallen from the bar causing everyone to hush, to turn and look—just like that, the crying ceased. The silence that issued forth from beyond the bolted door came in a most terrible emptiness that permeated the old wood and bolts all the way to the very bones of Bertrand. The silence—more abysmal than the wailing had been once the wailing had gone—gripped Bertrand’s throat with a maddening fear. His thoughts sifted through the nothing he heard, searching for a bleat, a whimper, a hyperventilating wheeze that might inform him of the baby’s wellbeing. He sharpened his senses so as to detect the sounds of an infant soothed, cooing or clucking from an adult nearby, or else the sound of a restless babe still convulsing with trauma. But only silence came; silence and the droning of Cindi at the mic, “Your slope consumes me / Your energy compels me / Your amusement amuses me. Don’t go. Don’t you ever go.” Had he imagined the crying? Those near him, their rapt attention on Cindi, seemed to confirm the sounds were not real. Still, for the rest of the reading, Bertrand remained stunned in a state of hyper-awareness. He continued to listen for the baby outside, imagined the man had pedaled away, and that the motion of the Burley trailer had lulled the child to sleep. He imagined the man had scooped the baby and swaddled it to comfort, suckled it to a warm bottle. He also imagined terrible things, things that scratched into his consciousness without prompting, things he did not know he could imagine, but he shook these thoughts away. He grabbed words and phrases offered by Cindi and the other poets who read, clung to their meanings for distraction and tonic. Phrases like, “Pine trees wet from the rain of a mighty storm,” and “The smell of the pages fresh like linen and ink, oil paints on new canvas, linseed uncapped.” After the reading, he dared not go outside. Instead, he ordered another ale and drank it down. Cindi found him at the bar, third beer in hand. “Whoa partner, slow down,” she said, parking atop the stool next to him. “Want one?” Bertrand raised his hand to the bartender who came over wiping her tattooed hands on a white dish towel. “No thanks,” Cindi said to the bartender and not to Bertrand. “Good reading,” Bertrand lied. “Yeah?” “But what was up with that baby crying?” “Ted’s poem about his dad?” Cindi laughed. “What? No. There was an actual baby crying outside during your read.” He studied Cindi’s face. She stared back blankly. She raised an eyebrow. “If you weren’t able to pay attention tonight, I get it. Long day, all that.” “No, Cindi, I’m serious. There was a baby crying outside. Loud. You didn’t hear it?” “Who would bring a baby to a bar?” She laughed again. “No, outside! Jesus, Cindi, a fucking baby.” “Are you mad at me? I was at the mic. I heard nothing. It’s pretty consuming to be up there, you know.” Just then Phil walked up to the bar to hand a stack of flyers to the bartender. “Phil,” Bertrand called out. “Phil, did you hear a baby?” “Ted’s poem?” Phil asked. “What? No.” Bertrand had no recollection of Ted’s poem. He had no recollection of most of their poems—all he could think about was that baby. “Uh, no,” Phil said. “Why would someone bring a baby to a bar?” “You know what, forget it,” Bertrand said and he stood to leave. “Aw now,” Cindi said. “See you later, Cindi. Nice to meet you Phil.” He stood up and slapped a ten on the bar. “Hey, wait a minute,” Cindi said but it was too late. Bertrand had moved across the room and out into the cool night before she could change his mind. Once outside he looked to the other side of the bolted, wooden door. To his disappointment nothing slumped there. The sidewalk remained vacant; even the street in both directions appeared empty of loitering. He scolded himself for hoping he’d find something there, some evidence that he had heard a baby crying. He thought about the place where he sat in the side room, how maybe a trick of a heater vent had issued the wailing sound. Maybe he’d only imagined such a noise, had given it human origins. He thought for a second he should go back inside and tell Cindi he’d just been joking with her. He decided to go home instead. As he hurried along 8th Avenue, he watched for the man with the bike and Burley trailer, but he also feared he might actually see him. As he passed by the shanty town, he noticed that the Dodger’s jacket bum was gone, maybe by then enjoying a burrito at Chula’s, or so Bertrand found himself hoping. He thought of the money in his pocket, the bills folded together, and how he would buy the man dinner if he saw him on the street—but would he? Bertrand figured he might only tell himself we would buy the man dinner; make himself feel better. Other shapes of people moved in the shadows, human beings with souls and feelings and history. He felt ashamed at his judgment of them, embarrassed at himself for not leaving the reading to seek out the crying baby. Then he shook his head and pursed his lips. Bertrand jammed his hands into his jeans pockets as he walked. The air had chilled and the smell of rain permeated his senses. He couldn’t see the storm clouds that had stacked above the city but he felt their weight. The wind picked up and whipped his hair around his face as he walked. Three more blocks and he would be home. The caterwaul of an alley cat startled him and he quickened his pace. He tried to calm himself. “It’s only a cat,” he said out loud to nobody. He imagined the curly golden hair of a baby in the bottom of a dumpster and he coughed to keep from crying out. He started to run. By the time he reached the last block from his house, Bertrand was in a full sprint. As he ran up the steps and unlocked his front door, he felt a sour paste rise in his throat. He made it to the bathroom just in time before losing his ale into the sink. The splattering sound that came with his purge caused him to heave harder. He ran the water clutching the faucet handle. Then he dry-heaved and wretched with a convulsive ache. Sobs snuck out of him between throwing up and catching his breath. Finally, he calmed. He comforted himself with the thought that he’d only imagined the baby crying. No one else had heard it. Perhaps Bertrand had a stomach bug having eaten something that had made him sick. A hallucination, that was all. In his own reflection, he saw red in the whites of his eyes; burst blood vessels—likely from his heaving—formed a crimson halo behind his irises. Sweat beaded up along his forehead and his hairline. And there was something else too, he could see just behind him through the reflection of the medicine cabinet’s mirror. There in the bedroom in the dark stood the shape of something odd and out of place. The white spindly rails of a baby crib came into focus behind him. He spun in place and looked into the dark bedroom but there was only his bed and nightstand—no crib. Now he was sure he was sick. How could such a thing be real? How could a crib suddenly appear in his room? And the crying! It must have been the result of a fever hallucination. Besides, if the crying had been so terrible, surely someone else in the bar would have heard it, would have gone to see to about the baby, sought out the reason for that sudden silence. It was the silence, Bertrand remembered, which spooked him the most. He remembered the abruptness, how silence had become a thing he could feel, like he could reach his fingers into that hush and strangle a bit more sound from it, reanimate the baby if only through its sounds. The rain came at once then, loud and torrential, pelting the windows and drowning out all other noise. Bertrand wiped his face and moved off to bed to the floor. He finally slept to the drone of loud rain. Hours later, it must have been, Bertrand was awakened by a clap of thunder. He rose from the floor, checked the clock—3:30 AM—and went into the bathroom. He peed, grabbed a drink of water with his hands, then splashed his face. He avoided looking in the mirror. As he made his way back into the bedroom, his foot kicked something and it skittered across the floor. The thing was small and light and made a clatter as it traveled. Bertrand peered through the darkness at what he thought might have been a beer bottle. He reached his bedside lamp and turned the switch. To his horror and amazement, he discovered there on the carpet a plastic baby bottle with the word, ‘Avent,’ scrawled across its midsection. He reached for it, grasped it in disbelief, and picked it up. Although it was empty, he had the impression of warmth from its plastic sides. The thing was warm. He smelled it. It smelled like sweet milk with sour undertones. What he found truly remarkable, though, was that the smell also seemed warm. He found himself looking around his bedroom for a baby. He felt the expectation that a baby was nearby. He looked under the bed and in the closet. Finally, he sat down and scolded himself for buying into this chicanery. Cindi must have played a joke on him. Bertrand knew he should have taken his key back after she house-sat for him last year. He called out to the apartment, “very funny, Cindi.” A clap of thunder responded. He would not sleep then so he made his way into the kitchen and set the bottle on the countertop. He opened up his laptop and checked his email, convinced that there would be a note from Cindi saying something about how he deserved the prank for not being more mindful during her reading. He found no such email. After glancing through the promotions on Amazon, he closed the laptop and flipped the T.V. on. He thought to stream something banal, maybe The Office, being as he had seen every episode at least a few times so he’d barely need to pay attention. He pulled a blanket over his legs as he settled onto the sofa and stared mindlessly at Michael Scott until his eyelids grew heavy and he drifted off to sleep. When he awoke, the sun was already up. It was 7:30 AM and he would be late to work if he didn’t hustle. He jumped in the shower and threw on a t-shirt and pair of jeans. Rushing through the kitchen, he grabbed a power bar and his jacket, and then stopped dead in his tracks. He looked to the place on the countertop where he had left the prank baby bottle, only no baby bottle sat atop the counter where he was sure he’d left it. He looked all around. He opened the fridge. No bottle. He must have dreamed it. Plus, he had drunk three ales and could have imagined just about anything after that, so he dismissed the baby bottle and headed out the door. Bertrand made it to the job site a few minutes after eight and Josiah was waiting on him, arms folded. “Did you have a rough night at the casino?” Josiah asked with a reprimanding tone. “Nah,” Bertrand said. “Cindi had a poetry reading and I went to that instead.” “Party animal,” his boss said. “Listen, that heavy rain turned up some crazy stuff behind the foundation last night.” “Toxic or …?” “Nothing like that. Probably some kids used to play back here, is all.” “Vandalism?” “Nah. This came up with the rain. Looks like things just bubbled up out of the ground, maybe buried there like a time capsule. Who knows what kids are thinking.” He pointed to where the backyard would be of the house they were constructing. So far, only the foundation and frame had been completed. The rest of the lot was bare except for stacks of building supplies and the few work trucks parked in what would soon be a new driveway. “Came up? Like what?” Bertrand asked. “We need to get the excavators out here again?” “I don’t think so but it is odd. I mean, speaking of excavators, you’d think we would have scraped away anything like this when we leveled the yard.” The two men had begun to walk through the mud to the backside of the house’s foundation. Bertrand grew annoyed at the mud accumulating on the soles of his shoes as they walked. When they reached the backyard, Bertrand took in what appeared to be muddy lumps in a puddle. As they approached, Bertrand could see waterlogged stuffed animals, mostly what used to be pink and yellow, and also fabric; fabric adorned with small animals, maybe ducks or foxes, mixed into the mud. He could clearly see the shape of a baby rattle covered in brown silt. As Bertrand surveyed the mess, his ire grew. Was Josiah in on Cindi’s trick from the night before? “What the hell is this?” Bertrand said with contempt. “I have no idea. Wondered what you might think—” “This isn’t funny, Joe.” “Well I know it ain’t funny. That’s what I’m talking about. Odd.” “Jesus Christ!” Bertrand yelled. “Whoa, settle down.” Josiah said, his hands moving like they were patting the air. “Don’t tell me to settle down. This is messed up! These are baby clothes. You know what they are.” Bertrand shook his head. “You’re in on this too, you asshole!” “Now, wait a minute, Bernie. I got no idea what you’re—” “Screw you, man,” Bertrand waved his arms in the air. “All y’all, screw you!” He turned around in the mud yelling out at the few other guys on the site or whoever else he thought needed to hear. “Get ahold of yourself, son, or I am going to have to send you home.” “I’m already going!” Bertrand yelled back at Josiah before slogging away fighting against the mud on his soles. He slipped but regained his footing before falling. What a messed up prank, he thought. Cindi had gone too far this time. When he got to his truck, Bertrand dialed Cindi. “This is Cindi Ventalli,” he heard the voicemail announce. “Leave a message.” “Cindi, of all the stupid tricks.” He was fuming mad. “I think you’ve taken this a little too far. The bottle in my apartment? The baby clothes at my worksite? I’m not sure what kind of point you’re trying to make, but this is not cool.” He started to drive before he hung up. “Not cool,” he said. Then he ranted about how selfish she had been to ask him to do things she wanted to do, never wanting to do what he wanted. He said some other things that he could not remember before finally clicking off the call. As he drove, he grew angrier. Convinced that Cindi had something to do with all of this and that she had a point to make about him not paying closer attention to her terrible poetry, he pulled up a text dialog box. He held the phone at the top of the steering wheel and typed frantically while he drove. He hadn’t finished the first line of text when he felt the thump of his tire, like he’d hit something large, maybe a dog. The thump jarred him out of his rage and he stopped the car. Good lord, he hoped he hadn’t hit a dog. He got out of the truck, rushed around the front, and saw the pink lace of a little girl’s dress, along with her leg, her tiny fingers. His hand went to his mouth. His heart jumped into his throat. As he came all the way around the front of the truck, he saw what he had hit. It was a doll—a doll and not a child, thank god! He had run over a fancy doll wearing a frilly, pink dress. He’d shattered the head into a million dusty pieces. He knelt down to pick up the doll’s pieces and he started to cry. Bertrand went home and took a sleeping pill. He slept the rest of the day and most of the next morning. When he awoke, he listened to his voicemail. Josiah had called and left a message telling him that he was being let go. “Don Davies found out you were dumping the insulation trimmings by the train tracks in Glendale, Bert.” The crackling voice said over voicemail. “What could I do? The company will pay a stiff environmental fine. I had no choice but to tell Don you were responsible.” There was more, too, something about how he could expect his final paycheck in the mail. Before Josiah ended the call he added, “Don’t use me for a reference.” The next message came from Cindi who was apparently quite upset by his voicemail accusations and the text message she had received. She said, “What gives? And what the hell does ‘Baby killing me’ and ‘you’re next,’ mean?” He verified that this was what he had sent but figured it was predictive text and not actually what he wrote. He couldn’t recall what he had been trying to type. He called Cindi and got her voicemail. “Hey,” he said. “I’m a little scared. I thought you were playing a trick on me for not paying attention during your poetry reading but . . .” He took a breath. “Listen, I’m sorry. The text was a mistake, too. Can you just call me? …Please,” he added. After he hung up, he sat quietly thinking about what he would do next. From the street outside he could hear the sounds of children playing on the sidewalk. Just above that din, he recognized the soft complaints of a baby crying. Days later, when he had not heard from Cindi, he tried to call her again. This time, he received a message saying the number was not accessible from his current line. Blocked. When he went by the bookstore where she worked, the security guard met him at the door and told him he was not welcome. He tried to remember what he had said on the message he’d left her but he could not remember. He tried to plead with the security guard to let Cindi know he just wanted to talk but a baby started crying and its mother was not able to soothe him. The shrieking unsettled Bertrand and he left. In fact, it seemed everywhere he went he heard babies crying. They cried at the grocery store, in line for unemployment, next to his truck at a red light. He heard them crying when he watched T.V., heard them crying while he showered, saw babies always out of the corner of his eye but when he turned to look directly at them, they vanished into the ether, strollers rolling out of sight around a corner, mothers ducking into doorways with swaddled bundles of cacophonous sounds. He started to think the baby he’d heard that night during the reading had joined him in some way, a haunting of sorts. Could noises haunt a person, he wondered. To assuage his mental health, he decided he should talk to a doctor. “Behavioral Medicine, how can I help you?” The voice on the other end seemed sincere when she offered to help. “I keep hearing babies crying and I think I am losing my mind.” No response. “So … uh, I thought I should talk with someone.” Bertrand took a deep breath. “Sir, are you requesting an appointment with one of our providers?” “Yes, I think so.” “And have you been in to see us before?” “No.” Bertrand had never believed in psychiatry or therapy but he felt desperate. “I am sorry sir. Our providers are only taking new clients on referral. Check with your primary care doctor and see if you can get a referral. After that, their office will contact us and then we will contact you to set up the appointment.” “Oh,” Bertrand sat down. “But what if I need to see someone right away.” “Sir, I cannot make that determination for you. As I said, you’ll have to start with your primary care provider.” “Well what good are you!” Bertrand snapped and he hung up the phone. He sat in silence for a long while thinking about what he might do next. Then he called his doctor’s office. The appointment setter notified him that he no longer had insurance coverage and that he would have to access medical care either through Cobra or the services available through the local clinic, White Bird. Bertrand knew about White Bird. It provided mental health and medical services to homeless people. He didn’t think they could help him because he was not homeless. Instead, he went to the corner bar and drank as much as he could. He even bought a round for the house. The next morning, he found that his $300 cash had been spent and his credit card was missing. After that, his bank account was suspended pending the investigation that he might have been the one to overdraft the balance himself. All transactions occurred within a few miles of his apartment and Bertrand had no proof that the cash withdrawals and purchases were not his own. Bertrand could not find another job. With the little money he had squirreled away, he started drinking heavily to silence the constant wailing he heard, wailing from babies no matter where he went nor the time of day. At the laundromat, a crying baby could be heard over the din of the dryer and tumbling clothes, but no baby was present in the laundromat. In the grocery store, Bertrand heard two babies, twins, shrieking together in agony on the aisle over, but when he went to the next aisle, he found it empty. By Christmas, the finance company had repossessed his truck. Mulvaney’s barred him from coming around after a fight he’d started with a poet who wouldn’t deliver a message to Cindi. His landlord evicted him. On the last day in his apartment, as he packed up what he could carry into a plastic trash bag, not sure where he would go, he finally found that missing baby bottle, the letters spelling ‘Avent’ seemed worn, somehow much older. As he gripped the bottle, he noticed that it felt cold to touch. Not like the warmth he once sensed there. Clutching the bottle in his hand, he made his way out of the apartment and down the street not sure where he would go. The winter chill had settled into the valley by then and the wind felt colder than he remembered from past Novembers. He made his way to the corner church where he’d heard they often hosted a warming center for homeless folks. Bertrand did not count himself homeless; he was just down on his luck. It was temporary, he told himself. Things would turn around soon. Still, he needed a warm place to go. When he entered the church a woman greeted him, wrapped him in a blanket and gave him a cup of hot soup. She told him he was welcome to stay on the bottom floor with the other single men but that the second floor was reserved for families with children. Just then, the familiar sound of a baby crying wafted down the stairwell. The sound steered toward him with such foreboding that Bertrand shook. He knew he could not stay if that sound remained within an earshot. He told the woman as much and he shuffled back through the door muttering, “That baby. That goddamned baby.” Just as he reached the street, Bertrand saw the figure of a man on a bike pulling a Burley trailer. He ran to catch up with him calling out, “Hey! Hey, where’s that baby? What happened to the baby?” Looking back at Bertrand, the woman—not a man at all—redoubled her pedaling and swiftly pulled away from Bertrand’s pursuit. He noticed the look of fear and judgment on her face before she turned away. Dejected, Bertrand made his way up 8th Avenue toward Coburg Road. He found a place between a hedge and fence where he could squeeze himself in to escape the wind. He checked his pockets looking for a few dollars so he might buy something to eat; they were empty. So he hunkered down and wrapped his arms around himself trying with all of his might to ignore the silence but also hoping it would not be replaced by the noises of a crying child. To his relief, a siren called out from a vast distance and he honed in on its sound, finally settling in to sleep. Rhonda Zimlich teaches writing at American University in Washington, DC. She has been published by several literary journals, including Brevity, Past-Ten, American Writer’s Review, and was awarded the 2020 Literary Award in Nonfiction from Dogwood, a Journal of Poetry and Prose at Fairfield University. The same essay earned an honorable mention in Best American Essays. She received the 2021 Fiction Award from Please See Me. Her spookier work has been published by Ink Stain, Icarus Down, and Eat Crow, Pink Panther Magazine, and more. Her writing focuses on history, grief, and intergenerational trauma, with an occasional ghost story that incorporates all of these elements. More at www.rhondazimlich.com

Brian is handsome under moonlight: black shirt, grey jacket and peppered hair. My husband and Brian’s wife have stepped away from the table on a patio where we are dining. The jazz band is taking a break. Fragrant thyme pokes up between the flagstones under our feet; waiters top up our champagne. I love Brian, I always have, we’ve shared so much of the past. Fifteen years ago, he and I were both alone, he recently widowed and I newly divorced. Friends told me to be careful. I didn’t understand. He was my sister’s husband. Hers. Not mine. Yet still, a question I’d wanted to ask so many times over the years hung between us like a tangled web. I blurt it out. “Do you think you and I could have been a couple?” My late sister’s husband stares at me, his magnetic green eyes penetrating mine. He says nothing and, like leaking balloons, my words dissolve into the thyme. I’m none the wiser. Virginia Foley writes in Stratford, Ontario, Canada. Her work has been featured in Dorothy Parker’s Ashes, Read650, Talking Writing, Roi Faineant, 5-minute lit, and Split Rock Review among others. Connect with her on her website: virginiafoley.com