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The yoga class ran long. On a bench outside the studio, the Kuykendalls sat waiting with phones in hands and their breath billowing before them, Ethan thumbing through emails—there was, among the usual obscene glut of notes from his editor and producers, one brief but particularly concerning email that he had now reread several times since its arrival minutes earlier, his mood darkening each time—as his wife, beaming brightly beside him, read aloud the latest in a string of recent text messages. “‘Eight pounds even, big blue eyes like his mom’s, totally bald but with the other kids’ coloring so probably a future blond.’ Still no picture attached,” reported Kristin, skimming at her screen with the conductor pad at the tip of her gloved index finger. “The suspense! Like we’ve never seen a newborn before. I immediately sent pictures of all our babies, coneheads and all.” After a pause: “Ugh, what do you think is taking so long? Shouldn’t Skylar be done by now?” At a peek behind Kristin’s head and through the studio’s frosted-glass windows, Ethan could faintly see his half-sister, Skylar, a lithe dark silhouette leading her dozen-odd students in what did not appear to be the asses-up pose that marked the class’s near-end. His throat clenched involuntarily. Dropping his gaze back into his lap, he read the concerning email again: Kuykendall, old man—I will be in our nation’s fair capital on the dates indicated in the subject line. Professional commitments mainly, but I’ve been in extra time to see friends, most especially you, my treasured East Coast counterpart, at long last after all this. Alicia will join, and of course I look forward to meeting your better half. Where do good-looking middle-aged people go in DC for gin cocktails? Take us there and let’s bore our wives senseless lamenting the plight of the male advice columnist till dawn. Yours always, Wells. Kistin’s phone chirped again; she scrolled to the newest update. “He came last night around eleven, after four—only four!—hours of labor. They’ll be ready for visitors next weekend, supposedly. Immediate family first, and, ooh, how soon can we come? Ooh, they want us to come! Wow!” Kristin squealed, vibrating violently beside him, shoving the phone against his face by way of corroboration. “Wow!” echoed Ethan, peeling his eyes from his own screen. It occurred to him that the concerning email was of the sort to be reopened and considered thoroughly in privacy; and not panicked over here, in public, in the cold, and in opposition to the excitement of a new nephew. In an hour or less his wife and half-sister would be delivered to their respective destinations—Kristin to the Symphony Valley Luxury Mall to make a dent in the Christmas shopping, Skylar to her efficiency at the Symphony Valley Apartment Plaza a bit farther up the highway—and he’d be alone at his desk, the rest of the schoolday hours his to spend banking columns; or, deadlines be damned, to figure out what to do about Wells. He darkened his phone with a click and dropped the whole thing, concerning email and all, into the wide-mouthed pocket of his windbreaker. With the phone out of sight, the concern attached to the email receded somewhat. “Congratulations, babe. You’re an aunt again,” he said, wrapping his arms around Kristin’s broad shoulders. Beyond their golden reflections, faintly through the glass, he watched as Skylar dropped her hands to the ground and lifted her shapely behind into the air; several less graceful asses rose obediently skyward. “I think we should go this weekend,” Kristin said, this being one of a generously small number of things Ethan had hoped she would not say. “Could we do that, with the kids? Could you get away for a couple of days?” Ethan stiffened and considered her at arm’s length. “Kris, it’ll cost us two thousand dollars to fly to Montana on three days’ notice. You seriously want to spend that kind of money to visit a newborn?” Kristin’s lip twitched, her sapphire eyes glittering in the cold. “Well, but newborns change so quickly.” “From interchangeable to slightly less so.” This was meant to make her laugh, and it did; but the laugh was dry and cold, like the wind that curled lazily around them as she gripped his hands in hers. “You’re being mean. I want to see my sister, and her baby, before the baby gets too big, or before Astrid beats us to it and Elin goes sour on the whole idea of having family visit. I strongly desire that.” Another of the things Ethan had hoped she would not say. He sighed and replied mechanically: “My desire to not spend two thousand dollars traveling to Montana to see your sister and her baby is slight.” The studio door banged open, loudly, spilling forth chattering amateur yogis in leggings and jackets. Craning his neck, Ethan could see Skylar in the studio, alone now, gathering left-behind mats and tennis balls into her toned arms, never bending her knees as she reached repeatedly for the ground. “Great!” huffed Kristin, lifting her volume to be heard over the crowd. “Well, I think that’s it, then, right? My strong desire wins out over your slight one.” At this second, this exact second, to Ethan’s extreme chagrin, one of Skylar’s just-released students emerged from the studio wrapped tightly in heavy scarves and sweaters, overheard Kristin’s final sentence, and dropped her topmost scarf in a theatrical double-take. “Holy fuck,” said the girl, a dark haired twentysomething, planting her hands on Ethan’s shoulders. He could see that she was younger, even, than his half-sister, no makeup on her ruddy face, a piercing excitement in her eyes that he had begun to recognize—unpleasantly—as evidence of his mounting celebrity status among people this age. “Are you Ethan Koo-y-kendall?” “It’s actually pronounced Kuykendall,” said Kristin. “That’s me,” said Ethan. “Okay,” said the dark-haired girl. “So, seriously, I’ve been reading you since I was a kid”—here the Kuykendalls exchanged glances—“and I LOVE you. Which is all I really want to say. I wouldn’t have even guessed that was you, but I heard her say the thing—the strong versus slight thing—and then I remembered your face from when you spoke on a media panel at my college, and I thought, that’s where I know that guy from. That is totally Ethan Koo-y-kendall’s face.” As she chattered on, he considered it in the glass, his face that felt only familiar and therefore mediocre, and definitely worsening by the day; but that he knew objectively was the right sort of face to have. The thumbnail photograph that appeared online before each of his syndicated columns presented his face as downright Adonis-like, all powerful sharp lines, wavy blond hair slicked away from his high golden forehead, his chin firm and square beneath a radiant frontal smile (the Post had sent its most persuasive photographer to insist against Ethan’s preference for turning slightly away from the camera in these posed photos, as it implied a slyness that now ran counter to his brand). Kristin adored the picture, confirming that it did, indeed, give him the look of empathy and insight that was needed here; that his predominantly female readership would both fall in love with him and want desperately to lay its endless in-law problems at his feet. Skylar, on the other hand, had howled at the picture, saying he looked like he’d been dipped in honey. “Why would I want advice from some kind of male supermodel?” she had wondered, reasonably. “I seriously love you,” the girl said again. “Your advice is always so genius. You must be a millionaire.” “Ha!” said Kristin. “Always nice to hear,” said Ethan. “I’ve got this weird issue with my ex-boyfriend,” the girl continued. Kristin gave Ethan’s leg a squeeze and rose to her feet, towering over the girl by several inches. “We’re running late,” she chirped brightly. “We’re just here to pick someone up and it looks like she’ll be out in a moment.” Ethan stood as well, and wrapped a grateful arm around Kristin’s shoulders. “At the bottom of every column is a link to my inbox,” he said. “Lay it on me—write it out as soon as you get home. I’d love to be able to help, if I can.” “Okay, but do you promise you’ll print it? Because I’ve actually already written this question to that guy Cary Wells, you know, at the San Francisco Chronicle? I don’t know if you know him, but his column is almost just like yours, but—I don’t know—like, less serious or something. More funny.” Despite the powerful clenching of his throat, Ethan managed a smile, with teeth. “Absolutely, I know Dr. Wells. He’s a friend. The fact is, and this is true of both of us, as much as I’d like to answer every single letter that hits my inbox, I just get way, way too many to be able to do that. I have a few awesome producers who pick out the most representative ones and pass them along to me. I certainly hope I can help with your ex-boyfriend issue.” As pat as this answer felt on this, his thousandth-or-so utterance, it delivered: The girl grinned and nodded, almost certainly beginning a mental draft of the letter she would write. “Here’s your sister,” murmured Kristin as the door swung open for a final time. “I have to get going,” said Ethan. “Thanks again for reading!” The girl clapped her mittened hands, delighted, as if he’d just performed a magic trick. “This was SO cool,” she enthused. “You’re both so tall!” Wells and Kuykendall, Kuykendall and Wells. Wells on the West Coast and Kuykendall on the East, separated the by width of a continent and much more—ideology (Kuykendall was unwavering in his dedication to the institution of marriage, his advice tailored always toward preserving harmony between couples; Wells routinely suggested separation, divorce, polyamory, and sometimes even—always treading the line of journalistic taste and subtlety, saying it without actually saying it—what amounted, plainly, to cheating), relevant credentials (Kuykendall had none, not even J-school, and had lucked into the gig by winning a Washington Post contest in his twenties; Wells was twenty years deep into the successful practice of clinical marriage and family therapy, with a house in tony Potrero Hill and a cluster of important letters behind his name to prove it, his Chronicle-based syndicated column pretty much a well paying hobby), and writing style (Kuykendall’s gentle and empathetic, generally taking even the most offensive letter-writer’s side; Wells’s more hard-nosed, objective even when the questions were not). But in the pantheon of contemporary advice columnists, they were treated as analogues, their names linked in every discussion of the two. Even in the days when Wells was syndicated and Kuykendall wasn’t yet, Kuykendall had been hyperaware of Wells’s work, sometimes crafting his own columns in counterpoints to the other’s, sometimes paying it direct tribute. Finding his footing, and without any true expertise except the human-nature education that came from the towering pile of letters in his inbox, he had referenced Wells often with naked self-deprecation. You should probably be asking Dr. Wells, he often wrote. In the early days, he had rarely printed a column without a mention of Wells. Sometimes endorsing Wells’s hypothetical answer, sometimes respectfully rejecting it. Finding himself doing the latter more and more often as his own theories of human behavior took shape, as his began to recognize the patterns and redundancies in readers’ relationship challenges and in-law problems. But no matter what, faithfully reading Wells’s columns, every single one, every Friday, a ritual that spanned decades. First the question, which Kuykendall would then challenge himself to answer twice: once in anticipation of Wells’s answer, and then again in an effort to distinguish his own. Next Wells’s answer, experiencing a little thrill whenever the three answers matched. The more often he was able to guess correctly, and the more often he found himself in agreement with Wells, the less utterly fraudulent he felt. But Wells could do things he, Kuykendall, could not. Wells could open a column with a rich and deeply personal anecdote, sometimes letting it wander without a hint as to how the anecdote addressed the letter-writer’s question till some knockout punchline revealed its incredible relevance. He wrote about his family—a wife, Alicia, and two daughters he affectionately called Problem 1 and Problem 2—so frankly that it embarrassed Kuykendall, whose column never mentioned Kristin or the children by name or otherwise. Where Kuykendal answered only the most objectively answerable questions, and answered them with laser focus, appealing to principles that could not be shot down, Wells printed whatever the hell he wanted, tethered only loosely to the question/advice framework. Once a letter-writer wrote to Wells for advice about an in-law problem and received, instead, a scathing rebuke for her obvious bigotry (seizing on one tiny element of her question that Kuykendall, on first read, had missed entirely). And no in-law advice. Kuykendall was in awe. He could never have managed it; he routinely turned down opportunities to tackle issues too big to get his arms around. He felt himself plodding along for weeks after that, his columns dull and rote. The syndication of Kuykendall’s column had come as the standout shock in the middle of a year full of shocks: an invitation to deliver the commencement speech at his alma mater, the reemergence of his half-sister after their long estrangement (the universe coughed her up, twenty-one and beautiful, on the Metro platform under Union Station, a little bit drunk and thrilled to recognize someone who could show her the way to the Green Line—she was not yet a Washingtonian, but would become one after college, encouraged by their shared father to try to find a job here near her brother), a handful of stalkers, the second of Kristin’s three unplanned pregnancies. Syndication had been, in sum, a good thing, conferring an unexpected degree of celebrity that Kuykendall actually enjoyed for a time. He was actually earning more money in newspaper’s darkest hour, a time when firings and forced retirements were a regular occurrence among his coworkers. He and Kristin were able to buy a house, with a surplus of bedrooms, in a neighborhood not too far from the area’s nicer suburbs; and then, when Kristin wanted to quit her job to be home with the kids, he was able to say yes without much resentment. And then, amid everything else it had conferred, syndication had also brought him Wells. Someone submitted the same question to both Kuykendall and Wells (which happened a lot among syndicated advice columnists, no way to prevent it) and they both answered it, the columns appearing on the exact same day. “Dear Kuykendall,” read the question (and “Dear Dr. Wells,” as it appeared in the Chronicle), “I need help, fast. I’m going to lose my girlfriend if I don’t marry her this year, which for lots of reasons I don’t want to do. How do I hold onto her without proposing? Signed, Happy the Way Things Are.” It was a relatable but bland question, to which Kuykendall had offered a thoughtless, bland answer. “Few things are more meaningful, or more permanent, than marriage,” it began, drearily. Followed by three unimpeachable paragraphs making the case for talking openly to the girlfriend, insisting on patience, not rushing into anything, proposing when he felt ready and not a moment before. This was, notably, the exact opposite of how his own marriage had begun, but it seemed to be clearly the Right Answer. Nearly 200 publications had gleefully printed Wells’s response within physical inches of Kuykendall’s, a juxtaposition that highlighted perfectly that Kuykendall was not Wells, would never be Wells. “Dear Happy,” began Wells’s answer. “Let me tell you about the time I almost lost the love of my life because, like you, I was a self-important idiot. It was the nineties, it was winter, and Alicia and I had been dating for seven years, which, because I was an idiot, I thought was perfectly fine.” Several meaty paragraphs later, Wells had laid bare a story full of his own cruelties and Alicia’s tears, a temporary breakup, and a rocky reunion that had led, somewhat shakily, to the engagement and marriage Alicia wanted. “Twelve years later,” it concluded, “Alicia still allows me to be her husband, and I live and die for every moment with her. If that idea doesn’t appeal to you, then you and I both know what you need to do.” And then a rare postscript: “Confidential to the future Mrs. Happy: Give him a year. Do not give him seven. Best of luck to you both.” A day later, Kuykendall had found, in his inbox, an email from Wells, the first of many: Kuykendall, my fellow agony uncle—I hope this note finds you well. Sorry for the duplicative hiccup. Happens regularly in this business, and always this way, with contradictory advice. I once told a young man to quit law school and move to Morocco for love. A few days later, Hax told him to do the exact opposite. In this case as in that one, my advice was surely the less sensible. Although I do think I’m right about this particular jackass. (Don’t you wish it were OK to use “jackass” where appropriate? “Idiot” is so inadequate.) I appreciate your column, which I’ve only just started reading but will never miss henceforth, and more importantly I appreciate another male voice savvy enough to not be outshouted in this henhouse. A word to the wise: Banish the word “hormones” from your writerly vocabulary, forever. Sincerely, Dr. Cary Wells (SF Chronicle). It was the year’s final shock, and by far the biggest. Resisting the urge to write back right away, Kuykendall had instead busied himself with several hours of obsessively rereading columns from his own archives, his face burning with vanity. Wells read his column! When he finally did write back, transferring the conversation from the column-affiliated email address to a private one (this marked the last time he would check his own professional email, the task thereafter left to a string of newly minted Northwestern graduates), he kept his answer restrained: Dr. Well—I am humbled. Your column has inspired me, as a writer and as a man, for years now. Your response here was perfect, as always. Ethan Kuykendall. “Thanks again for the ride,” said Skylar. “Walking from the Metro is bullshit when it’s this cold. But I’m setting up a carpool with one of the Pilates teachers, so I shouldn’t need to ask again.” “Don’t mention it,” said Ethan. “You and Kris are headed in the same direction; this works out perfectly.” “Do they pay you extra when class runs long?” asked Kristin, slowly. She always spoke more slowly when Skylar was present, a fact Ethan had noticed during the grim year in which Skylar had lived, rent-free, in their basement. In the back of the Sedona, Skylar had loosed her hair from its tight bun and was massaging her scalp with both hands, dark curls spilling over both shoulders and down her back. In the rearview mirror Ethan saw her frown slightly, her hands freezing in place. “Nope,” she said. “Class is supposed to go exactly ninety minutes, every time.” “Oh,” said Kristin. “So then today…?” “Today we started ten minutes late because I lost a pair of earrings before class. I wore them in, I left them at the front desk before my students came in, and then when I stopped at the desk in between classes, they were gone. I looked all over the place—didn’t find them. I guess somebody probably took them. So then in lieu of the fact that we started ten minutes late, we also had to finish ten minutes late.” “Goodness! Well, did you call the police?” Skylar uttered a little husk of a laugh. “Uh, I didn’t say I lost a pair of Harry Winstons before class. Calling the police wasn’t necessary.” Ethan had never heard of a Harry Winston, but gathered anyway from Skylar’s tone, and from the way Kristin stiffened beside him, that some small aggression had been committed here. He increased his foot’s pressure on the accelerator. “Kristin’s sister had her baby,” he announced, catching Skylar’s eye in the rearview mirror. “Which sister?” asked Skylar, holding Ethan’s gaze. “Elin,” said Kristin. “She’s the one in the middle. This is baby number three for her, another boy.” At the word Elin, Skylar crossed her eyes and screwed her face into a grotesque expression, releasing it an instant later. Ethan choked back a laugh; Kristin shot him a quizzical look. “Fabulous,” said Skylar. “Give Elin my regards.” “Turn here,” said Kristin, pointing. “I want to start at Nordstrom.” “The other sister,” said Skylar. “What was her name?” “Astrid,” said Kristin. Ethan sensed that Skylar’s face changed behind him, but he willed himself not to look. “Right, Astrid. Any babies for her yet?” “No, not yet. (Right here, Ethan—this door is fine.) Astrid is like you, Skylar. Still kind of in 30 is the new 20 mode, or whatever. She drives me and Elin crazy. By the way: In light of, not in lieu of.” “What?” “In lieu of means instead of. You meant in light of, which means given that this other fact is true.” Skylar was silent; Ethan could hear her uncomfortable shifts, the soft burps of leather beneath her. “Right, Ethan?” Kristin watched him, her hand hovering at the door handle. “Uh—” “Right.” Rolling her eyes skyward, Kristin gave the door a resolute push and climbed out of the car. “Don’t ask him—he’s only a nationally published newspaper columnist. Bye, guys!” This last she tossed over her shoulder with a wry smile before shutting the door. She fluttered her fingers slightly in the direction of the Sedona as she walked toward Nordstrom, the wind lifting her pale straight hair around her ears. For years, emails between Kuykendall and Wells were frequent but light, mostly shop talk. Then somewhat less frequent but more intense, a volley of meditations on everything from the plight of modern journalism to their hatred of all things Kardashian. They returned often to an ongoing discussion of how difficult it could be to seem universally relatable despite their shared status as toothy blond WASPs, Wells repeating often that he preferred to just face that fact head-on, to apologize for it where needed, and to never let it shake his seemingly unshakeable confidence. He seemed to read every single one of Kuykendall’s thrice-weekly columns (even Kristin read only half or so), and offered up criticism as regularly as he gushed praise. Kuykendall, old man, we’ve got to talk about this ‘strong/slight’ paradigm of yours, he wrote, following a column in which Kuykendall advised, as always, that one spouse’s strong desire toward one choice should override the other spouse’s slight desire toward the alternative. It had had become a cliche around his column, but one that his regular readers seemed to appreciate. Self-referential is fine, is encouraged, is how a community of readers is built. But don’t keep referencing yourself when the thing you said originally was asinine. Does strong/ slight work in your own marriage? I can tell you that it is obliterated, frequently, in mine, and that I advise against it to couples on my couch. Ashamed, Kuykendall had dashed off some light reply: You caught me! Still on the hunt for my catchphrase; just trying to do a bit of light branding. And then changed the subject, ignoring Wells’s direct question. At this point, in fact, though Wells regularly emailed about his home life in lush detail (the screaming match he’d had with Alicia over dinner plans, the vast improvement to their sex life now that they used separate bathrooms, the horror of discovering Problem 1 had started her period, his top-secret worry that Problem 2 would bloom into an uncontrollable slut the moment she grew breasts), divulging even more than he did in his column, Kuykendall now found himself withholding the same—even, sometimes, committing glaring omissions, or worse. For example, though Kristin had not held a job since her second pregnancy, he let it be implied that she still worked in the English department at the local high school. (Even as he made a regular column practice of extolling the virtues of stay-at-home parents, who seemed to constitute about half of his readership.) For example, he had not mentioned the birth of a third child, though there was one. Instead, he let it be implied that his was still a tidy family of four, amalgamating his second and third children into a single, fictitious boy who behaved better than any of the children did actually. (Even as he counseled letter-writers nervous about parenthood that the joys of additional children outweighed the difficulties.) For example, he omitted Skylar entirely, though for one hellacious year between jobs and roommates she had lived in their basement, babysitting on command instead of paying rent. Leaving her long, coiled hairs everywhere. Clashing on an almost hourly basis with Kristin, who did not like the foreign smells of her lotions and hair products or the fact that she coached the children to call her Awnt Skylar. This was a full-bodied in-law problem the likes of which Wells was famous for tackling, and yet Kuykendall could not bring himself to present it. He had written her out of every story or else cast her, vaguely, as some sort of nanny, a nameless pair of helping hands that had helped smooth out the family vacation. (Even as he brought every column back to the same themes of the importance of family, of making everyone feel heard and wanted within a family.) He had kept his activity on social media minimal for what were mostly Wells-related reasons. Occasional posts publicizing his column itself. No pictures of Kristin, of the children, of himself with either. And then: Six months ago, spring turning to summer, Wells had written in a most excellent mood, bearing the good news that Problem 1 had made her final decision and would be headed to Stanford in the fall. One down (almost), one to go! he had written, the text of the email seeming to sing his elation. As you know, Stanford is Alicia’s alma mater. I know this is uncharted territory for us, Kuykendall, but I attach here a photo of the Wells women, of whom I have never been prouder. Kuykendall, writing at his desk at Post headquarters, had hesitated long before opening the attachment on his phone, knowing that to see the face of Wells’s wife and children would somehow alter their years-long compact. But then there they appeared on the screen of his phone, the four of them, including Wells himself, posed in black t-shirts and crisp blue jeans, in a living room that appeared to be their own. Wells and Alicia seated on a plush olive-colored sofa with interlaced fingers, the Problems standing at playful angles behind them. Kuykendall felt as though he’d been punched in the stomach. That Alicia was Asian, and lovely, surprised him, but not nearly as much as the realization that in decades’ worth of columns, and years’ worth of increasingly intimate emails, Wells had mentioned neither. Not even when this fact might have done wonders for his almighty credibility with the diverse audience. Not even in response to the letter writers who accused him of myopic white-male privilege, accusations he printed every few months, each time apologizing gamely, promising anew that he was doing the best he could to understand and connect with his audience. Kuykendall knew, without a doubt, that he himself would have mentioned the Asian wife within his first handful of columns. And the girls, whom Wells had painted for years as sticky, awkward, walking disasters, never breaking from the use of their demeaning nicknames—gorgeous, ridiculously so, with laughing dark eyes, their skin tanned like models’. At home that evening, Kristin and the kids out getting ice cream, Kuykendall had made himself a heavy-handed gimlet and considered the email again on his desktop computer. Writing his reply quickly, while he had the gumption: Wells—congratulations on the Stanford news, and on the preternatural beauty of your tribe of women. Smart of you to keep Problems 1 and 2 a secret from the East Coast. And then, after a few deep, ginny swallows of his gimlet: By way of reciprocity, here is my lovely wife on Memorial Day (she asks that I not publicly share pictures of the kids, who are still too young to waive anonymity). He had attached a photo not of Kristin, but of Skylar in a blue and white sundress with her wild hair everywhere, laughing at something one of the children had done just out of frame, and clicked send. The shame that assailed him as soon as he did so was overwhelming, a physical weight that pressed on the top of his skull and threatened to crush him like an anvil on top of a tin can. It was a shame beyond the usual shame. He had experienced shame at this level exactly once before: at ten, the first and last time he’d ever played hooky from school, sneaking home with his newly acquired latchkey to find the house unexpectedly not empty. Finding, despite the midday hour, his father stretched out on the velvet loveseat with a woman who was definitively not his mother. Who would, some years later, be Skylar’s. Pulling away from the Nordstrom entrance, Ethan sighed and found Skylar in the rearview mirror again, frowning darkly. “Well, then,” he said. “Ready, Miss Daisy?” Her face relaxed a bit; in a single movement, she climbed over the center console and lowered herself gracefully into the passenger seat. Even in her heavy coat, her hair big and wild around her, she looked tiny in the space Kristin had vacated. Her butterscotch skin still glowed from the exertions of teaching back-to-back yoga classes. “Home, please,” she said. “I need to take a thousand naps and then reflect on my life and how it’s wasted because I don’t have three babies yet.” “Please,” said Ethan. “Or study a dictionary or something.” “Ha. She was right about that part, for the record. But you’re in good company. I get twenty letters a week that make that exact mistake.” Out of the Symphony Valley Luxury Mall’s expansive parking lot he drove, back onto one of the side streets that fed into the highway. The traffic was noonday light, the highway almost empty, but he drove slowly anyway, beneath the speed limit. Beside him, Skylar slipped her feet out of her combat boots and rested them on the dashboard. Each of her toenails was painted a different shade of blue, from the palest powder blue on her left pinky toe to a deep blackish-blue on her right. “So I guess that means you’ll go to Montana for Christmas,” she said. “Not sure. Kristin wants to see the baby sooner, like, this weekend. Negotiations are in the works as we speak.” “Okay. Well, I’m not teaching this weekend, so I could babysit if you wanted. As a thank you for this ride.” “Thanks, Sky. I think we’d take the kids with us. But, again, negotiations are in the works.” The gray brick rooftop of Skylar’s apartment building crested the bare trees rolling past the highway. “Next exit,” she said, pointing. “Then two fast rights.” “I remember,” said Ethan. “Before I forget—one of your yoga students recognized me this morning.” “How famous you’ve become.” “I hate when that happens,” confessed Ethan. “It feels like an encroachment. I need to stop saying yes to speaking engagements near the District if I don’t want that to happen more and more.” “You’re a god among the fucked-up masses. Embrace it. You bring honor to Kuykendalls everywhere.” “Seriously. She asked if I was a millionaire, and I thought, ha. Millionaires drive minivans, right?” “Did you tell her you were my brother?” “I thought it might come up, but it didn’t.” “Ah, right. Well, they don’t put our last names on the studio calendars, because first names are friendlier. And I guess most people’s first thought, when they see some tall white guy hanging around the studio, isn’t I wonder if he’s related to Skylar.” “About Christmas,” said Ethan, slowing the Sedona to a stop before the front door of the apartment complex. “Obviously, if we stay in town, we’d love to have you come over to be with us.” “I already promised Christmas morning and an early dinner to Mom and Dad. I guess it’s out of the question that you’d come to that with me, right?” “Uh—” “Right, no problem,” said Skylar, slipping her feet back into her shoes. “Thanks again for the ride.” Exhausted suddenly, worn down by even the first tiny sliver of the day, Ethan stopped at a Starbucks between Symphony Valley and home. At the mercy of a sole slow barista, he stood helplessly at the counter, and felt himself sinking beneath the anvil weight as he stared into the screen of his phone. I will be in our nation’s fair capital on the dates indicated in the subject line, read the email, just as it had initially. The dates indicated in the subject line were three weeks in the future. He began a draft of his reply. Meeting in person is long overdue, he typed slowly, one letter at a time, little novas of panic bursting behind his eyes. But of course, before plans can be made, I have to check with the management, though I’m sure she’s as eager to finally meet you as I am. "Excuse me,” said a voice beside him. His gaze snapped to the left and rested on a woman, fortysomething and bundled in a sweater and thick coat, grinning broadly at him. “Are you Ethan Ky kendall?” “Well, yes.” She gripped his hand in hers; and he could feel, from the warmth her fingers conveyed, that his own were icy. “So great to meet you,” she said. “I’ve read you for years. You answered my question back in, I think, 2011. It was about my mother-in-law. You had the best advice. You always do.” She pumped his hand vigorously and then retreated, covering her smile with both hands. He watched, speechless, as she found her seat. He looked down at his phone and exited the draft he’d begun, opening instead a new draft to his wife, Kristin. Idea, he wrote, in light of your “strong desire” to see your nephew. Less than a minute later, before the barista handed over Ethan’s drink, Kristin wrote back: Better not be a counterproposal. I want to see the baby. I’ll buy tickets for all of us this weekend, wrote Ethan. And also for three weekends from now, so we don’t miss any scintillating changes. She replied, twice. First a smiley face; and then, a few seconds later: But wait. Kids? Too much flying for them. He climbed into the driver’s seat of the Sedona and took a long swig of coffee, unbothered by the heat on his tongue. As he sank into the deep leather of the driver’s seat, he felt the anvil weight lifting. Skylar, he wrote back. She’ll babysit whenever we go. She’d love to. Shannon Sanders is a Black attorney and writer near Washington, DC. Her debut short story collection, COMPANY, is forthcoming from Graywolf Press in October 2023; her short fiction has won the PEN/Dau Short Story Prize for Emerging Writers and can be found in One Story, Electric Literature, Joyland, TriQuarterly, and elsewhere. Find her at ShannonSandersWrites.com or on Twitter at Twitter.com/ShandersWrites.

dream on dreamer the way Alvin Ailey and Maya Angelou and George Floyd and Breonna Taylor dreamed of southern-baked pilgrims dancing and slow marching their sorrows down the yellow brick roads of second-line members humming from the heels of their dirt-kissed feet: i wanna be ready/to put on my long white robe.... we are survivors we are survivors we are survivors of people who were free and became slaves of people who were slaves and became free we know why the caged bird sings we know what a redemption song brings we them people we the people we are those people who shall never forget our ancestors all up in us as we sleep our grandmother all up in us as we weep because we are native american black irish welsh french german polish italian jewish puerto rican mexican greek russian dominican chinese japanese vietnamese filipino korean arab middle eastern we are biracial and we are multicultural we are bicentennial and we are new millennial we are essential and we are frontline we are everyday people and we are people everyday we are #metoo we are #metoo we are #metoo we are muslim christian hebrew too we are bible torah koran atheist agnostic truer than true we are rabbis and imams and preachers and yoruba priests tap-dancing with buddhists and hindus and rastafarians as the Nicholas Brothers jump and jive and split the earth in half while Chloe and Maud Arnold them syncopated ladies twist and shout and stomp and trump hate again— again— again— yeah still we rise still we surprise like we got Judith Jamison’s crying solo in our eyes every hello ain’t alone every good-bye ain’t gone we are every tongue every nose every skin every color every face mask we are mattered lives paint it black we are mattered lives paint it black we are mattered lives paint it black we are every tattoo every piercing every drop of blood every global flood we are straight queer trans non-gender conforming we are she/he/they we are disabled abled poor rich big people little people in between people we are protesters pepper-sprayed with knees on our necks we are protesters pepper-sprayed with knees on our necks we are protesters pepper-sprayed with knees on our necks we them people we the people we are those people who will survive these times because we done survived those times where pandemics were trail of tears and lynchings and holocausts where pandemics were no hope and no vote and no freedom spoke we them people we the people we are those people while our planet gently weeps we bob and bop like hip-hop across the tender bones of those tear-stained photographs to hand to this generation the next generation those revelations yeah that blues suite yeah that peaceful dance inside a raging tornado we call love Saturday, June 6, 2020 5:37am Kevin Powell is a prolific poet with 16 books released to date. The above poem is featured in his most recent release, THE KEVIN POWELL READER: ESSENTIAL WRITINGS AND CONVERSATIONS. Find out more about Kevin here and follow him on Twitter @kevin_powell

You can taste the starved love Rubbing the sleepy genocide eyes Of tiny children With history pinned inside Their orphaned clothes They scan the puffy gray skies For beet soup and boiled dumplings As if they and their families know To never stop Flashing the blue and yellow Flag as they foot-race soccer balls Into bombed-out schools Tomorrow these un-sheltered people speak once more: We fight For freedom and for peace We fight Against rape and slavery and holocaust Hate May be unguided weapons Lighting our grandmothers’ dresses on fire Hate May be guns and tanks Spraying the oppressor’s blood at our muddy ankles But as long as we have breath From noses made clear by sunflowers As long as we can walk Or crawl Like baptized nightingales swinging bandaged arms And as long as fear is a prison train We must liberate With the muscular African shadow of Mandela We will survive We will win We will survive We will win A note from RF: Kevin Powell is a prolific poet with 16 books out to date. You can find out more about him on his website kevinpowell.net and give him a follow on Twitter @kevin_powell

On September 26th, 1687, a Venetian mortar round fired from the Hill of Philopappos hit the Parthenon in Athens, Greece. This caused the gunpowder stored inside by the Ottoman-Turks to ignite and demolished a majority of the ancient structure. Sylvie wasn’t exactly sure why this perfectly useless information ran through her head as she stared down Ms. Carole Burns. Thick burgundy eyeglasses reflected back at her, showing the white of a glistening iMac screen that separated the blazer-clad editorial assistant from herself. Sylvia was sitting in her own blazer, albeit hers was much cheaper (it was Amazon-bought) than the nicely patterned maroon one that Ms. Burns wore. Carole? No—Sylvie had made it to the second round of interviews, but she didn’t think that meant she was on a first-name basis. Though, Ms. Burns had called her Sylvia. “Hi, Sylvia,” she had said, warmly, shaking her hand moments prior—but it was better safe than sorry. Wait—Carole/Ms. Burns had asked her a question. “So, why are you interested in working for Loom House Publishing?” The Parthenon had been a casualty of the Siege of the Acropolis, an event that occurred during the Morean War. It was also called the Sixth Ottoman-Venetian War, which itself was a part of a wider conflict called the “Great Turkish War,” fought between the Republic of Venice and the Ottoman Empire from 1684 to 1699. Sylvie tried hard not to look like a fish, or a cow, or any animal that wasn’t a very intelligent human person who really wanted to land this job. “I’m familiar with many of Loom House’s publications,” she said, and was relieved that she didn’t stutter this time. “I read The Weeping Sky by E. B. Gardner over the summer, and I really enjoyed it. I want to help publish more books like that.” Ms. Burns nodded absently and typed something up out of Sylvie’s view. Sylvie pressed her lips into a smile—a smile, not a grimace—and waited (im)patiently for the next question. “Oh, I love that book. It’s great to hear you know about our branch in London, and their publications.” Ms. Burns finally flicked her eyes away from the screen, smiling again. Sylvie felt her stomach drop—she hadn’t known The Weeping Sky had been published by their London branch. Did she mess up? Why was Ms. Burns still smiling? “Yes. I’ve never been to London,” Sylvie chuckled politely. “I hope to visit someday.” She was dangerously off topic. She needed Ms. Burns to redirect the conversation back to the job that Sylvie was applying for. Please. Pretty please. After a few more clicks of French-manicured nails on the keyboard, Ms. Burns looked at her again. Sylvie readied herself. “Of course. So, why do you think you’re a good fit for the…” a patient pause as Ms. Burns read something on her iMac, “adult trade editorial intern position?” Otto Wilhelm Königsmarck had led the Venetian forces in besieging the Acropolis of Athens, which had been peacefully occupied by the Ottoman-Turks since the fifteenth century. Sylvie didn’t know who had led the Ottoman party during the defense…but that hadn’t been assigned for her humanities class. Which she had taken three years ago. No—all she could think about was the Parthenon and its white marble pillars, and the gunpowder detonating inside. Had the Venetians been to blame, or the Ottomans? “Well, I interned for the Felicity Harburrow Literary Agency when I was a sophomore at Beverley University,” said Sylvie. She did her best to keep eye-contact with Ms. Burns, but she also remembered to blink. Blink, blink. “I really enjoyed my time there. I learned a lot about how to read through slush piles,” that was a keyword, “and agent-author correspondences.” That earned another smile from Ms. Burns. Sylvie had been playing the Felicity Harburrow card for four years now, as she had continued to use it even after she graduated. She’d been lucky to get it in the first place—her mom’s friend from college worked there and had gotten her the job. It hadn’t been the only publishing company she’d ever interned for, but it was the one that had the biggest name. It was the first entry she listed on her résumé ever since. There was a piece of white modern art above Ms. Burns’s head, framed on either side by cases of books published by Loom House. It was marbled, like real marble, and Sylvie’s thoughts once again turned to the Parthenon. And marble debris. Jesus fucking Christ, this isn’t the time, thought Sylvie. Her face must have twisted, because the smile Ms. Burns’s face quickly faded away, and she silently read something else on her iMac. “That’s great to hear,” Ms. Burns finally said, lacing her hands together on the desk in front of her. “So…what do you think your greatest strengths are?” Prior to its destruction, the Parthenon had been converted into a mosque by the Ottomans, though much of its original sculptures and reliefs had remained. It could be argued that the Ottomans even improved the structure, constructing a tower and removing the Christian imagery that had remained since the sixth century. Sylvie stalled. “Excuse me?” Ms. Burns smiled kindly. Or coldly? Either way, she repeated, slower this time, “What are your greatest strengths?” Oh, that was an easy one. Regardless of whether or not she believed it, Sylvie recited, “I’m very passionate about my interests. I crochet a lot, which taught me to be very organized and to manage my time wisely.” So on and so forth, question after question, and Sylvie did her best to fend off the disruptive thoughts about the Parthenon in 1687. But as each question was asked, and as Sylvie answered, she felt her frustration gaining steadily. Though she thought it was mostly due to herself for her failures, she couldn’t help but feel the monotony of the situation she was in. She’d been here many times before. Ms. Burns’s velvety-colored lip gloss cracked as she smiled this time. “So, do you have any final questions for me?” she asked. “Yes,” said Sylvie, her mind suddenly clear. The question had nagged at her all the way up the office building’s stainless-steel elevator: they hadn’t listed any compensation alongside the job description on Loom House’s website. It might be reckless to ask about it as her first question, but she felt unusually daring right now. Somewhere from within the conglomerate of pressure at the back of Sylvie’s mind, she saw the pale specter of unpaid rent notices sitting on her paint-chipped kitchen table, and the mass of red numbers following a dollar sign at the bottom of a hastily filled spreadsheet. “Is there any compensation for this internship?” she asked. Ms. Burns had been looking at her iMac, but at Sylvie’s query her gaze darted back to her. Sylvie couldn’t help but think that the burgundy glasses made her eyes look wider than they were. “I’m sorry, what did you say? I didn’t catch that.” When the mortar shell fired by the Venetians hit the Parthenon with a “miraculous shot” on September 26th, three hundred people are claimed to have died in the resulting destruction. The roof of the structure was said to have fallen on some, while others died from their wounds, unable to receive medical care due to lack of supplies from the Venetian’s besieging. Sylvie felt shaky—her hands were cold and clammy in her lap. “Will there be any, uh, compensation for the internship?” she repeated. Ms. Burns perked up. “Oh! We do offer college credit, if you’re currently enrolled at an institution. We would just need to see your academic transcript.” Sylvie scrunched up her eyebrows, trying to look pitiful. Something turned over in her gut as she did so. “Unfortunately, I’m not a student right now. Will there be any…um, financial compensation?” Ms. Burns mimicked her expression, scrunching up her own eyebrows and tilting her well-groomed head to the side. If she were outside the situation, Sylvie thought it would be comical, seeing two grown women in a nice corporate office making pouty faces at each other. Like children. “Unfortunately, due to how the industry is right now, we can’t offer a salary or stipends,” cooed Ms. Burns. Sylvie’s hands were white-knuckled as she held them together on her lap. She felt the urge to bite the inside of her cheek, to keep away the pressure that had been steadily pooling at the base of her skull. She took a deep breath. It didn’t help much. “But, after you complete your time with us, we can offer a recommendation letter. Many who have interned with us have said it was a rewarding experience, just on its own.” Prior to that day in 1687, the Parthenon hadn’t been considered a ruin. Sure, it had been sacked by Heruli pirates in 276, made into a Christian church in 484, and had much of its pagan iconography destroyed in the siege of Constantinople in 1204. But it’s that day in 1687, when the roof was blown out, and the front façade collapsed, that many academics point to as “ruinous.” Before she knew what she was doing, Sylvie was standing up, hastily gathering her purse and heather gray jacket from where she’d draped them on the seat behind her. She’d made a mistake, though she only saw the fuzzy outline of it right now. She had to leave. Ms. Burns scooched her chair back in response, but Sylvie’s hand was already on the cool metal of the office door before it occurred to her that she should say something. “I’m sorry, Ms. Burns, thank you for the interview,” she said, opening the door with a rough tug, “But I really—I have to go.” Sylvie mangled her face into a smile, hoping for something. Shock was quickly hidden by vacant pleasantry on Ms. Burns’s face. “Of course! We’ll—um, be in touch,” she offered. Probably not. “Thank you!” And Sylvie was out the door. Her pointed-toe heels clicked on the marble as she walked through the lobby of Loom House’s office building. She made a beeline for the revolving door, not even registering the secretary who threw a polite smile in her direction as she exited. Outside, the air was warm and heavy with exhaust, and in her professional attire Sylvie began to sweat. The street was busy and loud, with taxis rolling up to the curb and expelling people just like herself in suits, blazers, and slacks. Sylvie turned around. In front of her, the façade of Loom House Publishing stood, ruled by a tall, arched door framed by squarish off-white pillars with rolling ionic tops. It came to her slowly—maybe the façade had reminded her of the Parthenon, and that was where all of this started. But she knew, like most things built in New York City at the turn of the century, that the pillars were likely made of concrete, and not marble. Ever the Greeks’ shadow. She tried to imagine how the concrete pillars would collapse, if hit by a Venetian mortar round. If they would fall in complete pieces, or if they would just be obliterated on impact. Either way, the image was comical to her, and with a snort she walked away and down the block. The entrance to the subway was a dark hole rimmed on either side by green metal bars. Sylvie’s heart crept into her throat as she walked down the steps. She knew what awaited her: the unpaid rent notices on her old kitchen table, and the ever-looming debt of living. Note from the author: “Ruins” originates from my feelings after undergoing the interview process for a handful of literary agencies and publishing houses, and is meant to encapsulate the frustrations and anxieties that I know I and my contemporaries have surrounding unpaid internships, debt, and corporations overall. This is paired with some very intriguing information on how the Parthenon in Athens, Greece, became a ruin. Elizabeth Roos is a senior English (creative writing) major at SUNY Geneseo. She is originally from Clifton Park, New York, and volunteers at a birds of prey center in her free time. Though she specializes in fantasy and science fiction, she has been developing her skills writing literary short fiction, and her work has been published in MiNT Magazine, The Lamron, and The Allegheny Review. Her interests can be summarized as, in short, words and birds.

One night while we slept Dreaming of forests And inhabited attics And circuses Impossible spaces Tilting platforms Sad, beautiful strangers A dark meteorite Weary of travel Came crashing Through our roof, A guided missile Steered by God's unwavering hand We slept on Restless in the heat And found it the next morning Set deep in crushed floorboards, Kitsch flowers and vines Blackened on the wall The people came. It seemed routine to them A house with a space rock Lodged in the hallway They brought equipment Paperwork. Finding it could not be lifted They shook their heads, Finally bemused, they left And did not return It became furniture And we awkwardly stepped past it As we went about our days, Sometimes it whispered And crackled in the night Once a faint face formed Briefly On its tarry surface Looking far into the distance. * Years later I wake to find myself Sleepwalking, A pale ghost Haunting our little house And suddenly afraid I call you Hear my thin voice Die in the night air Like a spark Never to be heeded again I know then that I stand before the visitor Suddenly huge, impossibly dark, terrifying The long and secret process of becoming, finally complete Its whisper has become certain and clear "This is the dream", It says, "This is the nightmare" J.S. Doherty is a writer, musician, and technologist from Belfast, Northern Ireland, where he balances a hectic home life with a range of creative projects and regular visits to the ocean. He is currently working on a collection of new poems due to be completed in 2023.

Lizzie and I were the only two ‘girls’ on the Snake Mountain Hotshots that year, 1997. Our supervisor Bob would only hire two for a twenty-person crew and he even told me once that he hired two so that they could be friends. Fortunately, Lizzie and I were friends, or became friends. I dont think thats always the case w/two women—I talked to other women on other crews—that can set up some kind of dynamic where the women compete w/each other to be accepted by the menfolk. It was both of our first time on a hotshot crew, an elite wildland firefighting crew that travels all over the west—where the big fires were, that/s where we went. She/d done one season on a regular hand crew in Tahoe, I/d been on an engine in Sedona, then helitack for two in the Grand Canyon. I think both of us wanted to test ourselves, prove ourselves. Much to Bob/s annoyance, I was one of the better sawyers that year—meaning I could handle a chainsaw—so I got to be on the third saw team. I was actually relieved when Lizzie asked to be my swamper. I wasnt looking forward to being on a saw team w/some dude—even the safe ones would always mansplain cutting to me. Lizzie wasnt in the best upper body shape, but I wasnt either compared to our lead sawyer Trace, who looked like a grizzly bear. But swamping is more about stamina, moving slash the sawyer cuts away from the fireline. Which is hard work. The hardest job on the whole crew really, especially since saw team members each carried an extra chain and saw kit w/tools and extra parts in our packs. I wasnt quite sure I could handle cutting all day but I wasnt gonna say no and be a pussy when Trace offered. Fortunately third saw is usually for clean up—making sure any ladder fuels in the black are cut and cutting any logs or downed trees into rounds—which takes time but isnt as much arm work—Lizzie did some of that, just so I could get a break and she always took care of gassing and oiling the saw when I emptied a tank, so I could pound some water. One of Lizzies goals was to really learn how to run a chainsaw on her own and if I have one minor claim to fame its that she learned it from me that summer. Lizzie showed up to work the first day in jeans black t-shirt and fire boots—she liked Whites, I liked Nicks—and w/brown dreadlocks pulled back in a big Alien tail. A big wooden cross necklace drooped down so low it kind of hung between her boobs. As far as I know, she always wore it—tucked in on fires or outside when not. Even, you know, during other times. Lizzie wasnt a total conservative—I mean, she was on a hotshot crew for gods sake—she never swore but didnt mind if other people did, like me, or the whole rest of the crew, all the time. She didnt smoke or chew but did drink. I did all three—Skoal Wintergreen was my fave and kept me going on a long day, which gave the guys endless amusement—they/d offer me their chew just to see a girl put a pinch in. They laughed and laughed all summer. But Lizzie was what my mom called a Jesus freak. She/d been homeschooled up by Mt. Shasta (the town) and from what she told me her parents were old school live-off-the-land hippies when most people by the seventies had given that up. I think she went to some summer camp somewhere and discovered Jesus—not like w/a vision or anything, not even as a Jesus=God kind of way, just talked about him as a person or a teacher and loved that and read the Bible on her own. She told me, —My parents didnt understand it, but didnt stop me. They always just wanted me to learn whatever I was curious about. They thought it was a phase. Her dad was a woodworker, made furniture Amish-style or something—no nails, just grooves and glue—and taught her how to work a bandsaw and lathe. And how to whittle. She was carving little wood animals since I was six. The way she described it to me was after her ‘come to Jesus moment’ of how ‘cool’ Jesus was, she whittled a small carving of him and gave it to a girl she liked at camp. —She was so happy that I thought maybe I could make more and make more people happy and, you know, spread Jesus’ message. That could be my purpose in life. I decided I/d do 10,000 carvings in wood. That will just take my life. The process, the whittling, the carving, is also a way for me to return to Jesus, think about him, to focus myself every day. I did the math w/ her one time when we were in fire camp laying on our sleeping bags waiting for the dudes to stop belching and farting and go to sleep. —Lizzie, if you do one carving a day, that/ll be like twenty-six years to do 10,000. If you do one every other day that/ll be fifty-two years! She laughed. —I never even thought about that! —How many have you done? —She didnt hesitate. —Two thousand and seven. She was twenty-two that year. —Lizzie, you/re behind! You/ll have to do two a day sometimes to catch up! She/d been laughing the whole time. —I know! The problem is that sometimes they/re big! Sometimes they take a few days. —You mean they/re not all just little whittles? —Ha! Little whittles. I like that! No but seriously, I just look for wood, I look at wood, and see the Jesus in it. It could be a tree. —You cut down trees to carve Jesus in them?! —No! Of course not! I just carve out his face and prayer hands in a living tree. Like, reveal the features I already see. I did tons of those up at Humbolt around campus and the woods out back. But I do want to do big ones! Have you ever seen the totem poles native tribes do up in Canada? I/d like to do something like that. Except Jesus. So thats how she got her nickname. A lot of us had them on the crew, like Dingo, Snake and Maui. Mine was Vasquez, because of the character in the Aliens movie. Which, I was cool w/. Vasquez rocks. At first Lizzie was Jesus Lizzie, then it just seemed natural to make it Jesus Lizard. Strangely, they never shortened it to Lizard—she was always Jesus Lizard. Even over the radio: —Maui, Chase. Send Jesus Lizard over here. And she was ok w/ the name. If I/d been interviewed for the documentary thats what I wouldve told them about. I know thats what they would have ended up calling it, not Carving Jesus. Lizzie even did one of her tree carvings out back of our barracks. The guys got to be in the brand new barracks buildings, but the two of us were in an old trailer together right on the edge of the compound up against Forest Service land. It/s still there as far as I know, though I wonder if anybody ever found it. Most of her Jesuses (Jesi?) are of a bearded man w/ hands together at his heart, and that one was—she did it in a ponderosa pine, stripping the bark away around eye level, finding knots and cracks and making them the facial features or the hands, using her knife or chisels and ‘gouges’ w/ a mallet. It really did look like the face of Jesus (or a bearded man) was there, like she/d just peeled away the outer surface of the tree and unhidden Jesus. She didnt usually like to make crucifixes, though the one she wore she had made. —I dont know, thats not his main message. He didnt die for our sins. He died because he was healing people for free, offering his knowledge for free. Mostly, at least at that point, on the road, she did smaller whittles. She always had a big lockblade knife on her, and a piece of wood. On down times, if we were in mop-up mode on a fire, she/d get them out and whittle while we talked. Sometimes it was annoying when I/d be trying to take a nap, but if thats the most annoying she ever was I/d say she was doing ok. What the rest of the crew thought of her was mixed. A lot of the guys didnt like ‘girls’ on a crew period. If she had just been a hippie tho, I think she would have gotten a lot more meanness—to the point of harassment—but the Jesus thing threw them—they didnt know what the hell. She made a Jesus carving for each and every one of them, regardless if they were raving assholes or not. Some of them, a few, kept them all summer and would even pull them out of their red bags on the buggy to show her. —Hey Jesus Lizard! I still got your Jesus! She would always smile. Like, really smile. —Right on! I/m glad Jesus is still w/ you. There were of course bets on who could bang one of us. I had my informants, some of the safer guys like Roberto and Joseph who would give me the scoop. And, you know, what girl can resist being around eighteen buff dudes? Lizzie was the cute one, they all wanted her, but the odds were good, even for me. Towards the end of the season, when we/d been gone to Idaho for two three week stints—r+r in Boise and back up to the panhandle for the biggest fire in North America, ever—we came back to northern California, to our station and all headed to the one bar in town, The Timberline. I was playing pool, pacing myself on the alcohol so I could concentrate and beat everyone (my dad had a pool table in our garage in Salem—the one skill he taught me) so I was not blackout drunk like everyone else. I do remember that every time I saw Jesus Lizard she had a shot glass in her hand and I know neither one of us bought a drink all night. I got a little distracted w/Trace putting his hand on my thigh and whispering sweet nothings in my ear like, —I’m gonna destroy that pussy. What girl can resist a line like that? We all got 86ed—or else the bar was just closing, I forget, so a bunch of us piled in Trace and Maui/s pickups and ended up at Lizzie and I/s trailer. Trace didnt really give me time to collect myself—or even ponder the fact that he had a girlfriend—and had me in my room, w/Lizzie and the other guys right on the other side of the door in the living room. My pussy was indeed destroyed, as I think everyone on the compound could hear. Afterwards, or during, Trace said, —I/ve been waiting to do that all summer. I said, —Me too. He passed out. I got up and took a shower, then checked the living room. No one there. But there were definitely voices coming from Lizzie/s room down the hall. Male voices. Multiple male voices. If I/d been any more sober I might have—should have—checked on her. But, instead I went back and put my head on Trace/s chest and fell asleep. In the morning after the awkwardness of Trace leaving w/o much conversation, I was sipping tea on the couch (the only thing my stomach could handle) when Jesus Lizard came out. Smiling. —Lizzie, are you ok? She kept smiling. —Yeah. Why? —I just...did you....like... She giggled. —Yeah. Did you? Actually I know you did. I heard you. —Yeah but did you...like...w/ all of them? Her face got red. —I mean, yeah? —Do you remember? —Mostly? —Are you ok w/ that? She shrugged. —Sure. We stared at each other. I said, —Ok. Wow. How many? She looked at the floor. —Um...I dont know. I nodded. —Ok. Wow. After that, for the rest of the season, which was like six more weeks, down into Big Sur and Orange County, the dynamic shifted. Not that they had ever took Jesus Lizard seriously but, before, she had been kind of the crazy little sister. That they all wanted to bang. After the banging, they became more rude to her, ignoring her or yelling extra harsh. Not everybody, not overhead or the safe guys, they treated her the same, mostly. But the assholes were just bigger assholes. Surprise. I think at first she was surprised, then hurt, and she would lose her smile at those points. Thankfully by the time we were in central and southern Cali, we were running four saw teams, cutting all the time through forests of manzanita brush (and poison ok) so she and I just spent most of the time by ourselves. She still carved little Jesus dudes—even gave me a rare crucified Jesus out of manzanita, which I still actually have up on my bedroom wall, the one arms cracked off and I glued it back. I call it ‘Cracked Jesus.’ On the Big Sur Fire we were inland, in the forest, in the redwoods actually, but in mop-up mode holding a line we hadnt cut and there was this ponderosa pine stump, waist high. Normally a sawyer low-stumps all her trees, but this one got left or lost. Lizzie got back her regular energy, crouching down examining it. —Do we have to lowstump it? —Well if we dont someone will. Do you want to do it? —I want to carve it. I can see Jesus in it. Look: these knots are the eyes, this is the nose and prayer hands would be here. And I could see it. —So this Jesus is buried halfway in the ground? She laughed. —Yes! Rising back from Hell! Can I use the saw? Will you make sure I dont kill myself? —Sure. Just watch the kickback, especially if you try to cut w/ the tip. Dont do that. That became her first Chainsaw Jesus: Rough, but definitely him, w/ a long nose and beard and the two hands. Mostly what she did was trim the back side of the stump, carving the wood away from the Jesus. We didnt tell anybody about it but Joseph commented on it in the buggy later after we/d hiked out, that it was a good Jesus. Still maybe out there somewhere in the woods east of Big Sur, if some other crew didnt cut him down later. By the time the season ended, we were all done and we left the morning we got back (hotshot tradition: to leave early on the last day). Lizzie and I exchanged parents’ phone numbers and addresses and hugged, knowing neither of us would be back the next summer. She never fought fires again. I went back to helitack—helirappel actually—up in McCall, Idaho. And now she/s actually done. 10,000. Some people dont believe her, but I do. I had seen some news features on her throughout the years, especially more recently as she was getting closer. The documentary about her is still up on Netflix. She still has the dreadlocks, now silver. And, she wears long flowing skirts, or overalls when she/s working on one of her bigger chainsaw sculptures, which go for tens of thousands of dollars now. She lives in Sisters, Oregon and has a wife and two daughters. When she/s asked in the documentary if she/ll keep carving Jesuses after 10,000 she says, —I dont know what else to do. I still believe in ‘Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.’ That/s still worth reminding people about. Her daughters have whittled their own Jesus carvings, though they seem more excited about the little wooden animals they made. Born in Puerto Rico, John Yohe has worked as a wildland firefighter, wilderness ranger and fire lookout. Best of the Net nominee x2. Notable Essay List for Best American Essays 2022 and 2023. @thejohnyohe www.johnyohe.weebly.

As I heft the suitcase onto the station’s tarmac The rivers of her tears are pooling in the corners of my eyes Grant Shimmin is a South African-born poet of Manx ancestry who has lived in New Zealand for 22 years. A career journalist, he is passionate about human relationships, family, inclusion and the natural world.

not quite It’s not snowing, but it’s not not snowing either. Up by the Georgia border, we’d call anything wet and white “snow,” but out here they have words for not-quite: graupel, sleet, wintry mix. Out here you can hear ice break a tree’s bones. My mother used to call any day the air got below freezing, like a boast, like nobody could believe Floridians had it in them. She’d drive all the way out here but who would watch the dogs for two weeks? When she texts now, there are not-quite words for love: stay warm, stay dry, stay safe. aims But I don’t always want to be this force of nature— your Bay of Fundy high tide, night and day, relentless until I’m rendered moot. Let me creep along the shore as some other creature— your broken clamshell, piece of sea glass, this jellyfish finding your bare foot. dinnertime we sit at the dining room table with a bucket of fresh names, scooped straight from the shore, still briny and wriggling. “how will i know which one is right,” you ask, plucking out all of the mythological swimmers, chucking diana. the pot rumbled behind us. “i think you just know,” i shrugged, “but if i had my way i’d be a victoria.” you sighed, squinting at a hundred half-chewed variations of kayleigh, eyes where their legs ought to be. “hold on: what about these,” i said, holding a few olden sturdy ones. “not mary—" “hold on, marrryy”—i chucked them in the boiling water until their shells turned vamp red. the decades and silent letters sloughed away in the stock. “sometimes it’s just there,” i said before squeezing a lemon wedge and sucking on the largest one’s head. i handed you the supple body, every letter where it ought to be, sudden pink flesh. KJ Shepherd lives in Austin, Texas.

Maybe we’re satellites Sending signals to each other But never touching Ramona Gore is currently a Cinema and History major at Binghamton University, minoring in Asian and Asian American Studies. Since middle school, she has kept a notebook where she stores snippets of her own unique poems. Her work has been published in Duck Duck Mongoose Magazine and Idle Ink.

~Venice, February 2002 Empty-eyed, paper-mache bird heads stare through windows, hang with beaks turned down toward the street. Red, purple, jewels and feathered masks line dark walls. A rainbow of plumage covers holes, nails, and centuries old stains that resist layers of paint. Cat eyes, bird eyes, hollowed out, lined with jewels reflect the single bulb above them. In the street, orange and yellow sunset reaches across gondolas, resting on the sea, tied, waiting for tourists and drivers. They rock against one another, knocking on the concrete wall, count the seconds till darkness.I hold my breath on the Bridge of Sighs, wait to hear the moans of prisoners echo between walls and the sound of waves hitting boats that carry the damned. I only hear heels, sharp and thin, striking brick walkways. The sun has set. Shadows stand tall against street lights. A lone waiter sits and smokes in front of a window filled with streamers. Alone in Plaza de San Marco, I grasp the blessed, blue rosary from the basilica. Four horses, replicas of the stolen Quadriga, hover over the edge above me, only the sound of my breath fills the space. From the corner, a clown, painted white and red with black lines that jut from his eyes. His suit, purple and blue with bells. He skips across the plaza, pirouettes, and covers me with showers of confetti.

Neon t-shirt of Tweety Bird scowling Does it look like I care? because you don’t spare anyone’s feelings. Sheer leopard print blouses because you are feisty, sassy, and wild! Windbreaker of Winnie-the-Pooh, elbow-deep in honey because relatable much? Big girls gotta eat. F.R.I.E.N.D.S. graphic t-shirt because, like Fat Monica, you dance with donuts, too! Pandering sentiment about girl power in glittery cursive font because keep your head up, girly! The future is female. Distressed AC/DC tank top because you don’t mind their objectification of women. Sloppy off-the-shoulder Caution: may contain wine! because alcohol dependency is quirky when it’s you. Garfield thinking I’m up. What more do you want? because you are one lazy piece of shit. Cowl-neck sweaters and chunky knit scarves because your double-chin should really be a secret. The poncho: available in black, brown, and charcoal because the pinnacle of beauty is a repurposed tarp. Justine Defever resides in Michigan and is an Associate Professor of English at Cleary University. Her poetry has been recently featured in Sad Girls Club Literary Blog, Silent Spark Press, You Might Need to Hear This, and Quarter Press. Justine completed a residency in Edinburgh, Scotland while finishing an MFA in Creative Writing at Arcadia University. Read more of her work at justinedefever.com.

There is too much. There is not enough. If there is an in-between, I don't possess the scale to calibrate that balance. I am what I own, and what I own owns me. Not long before she died, my mama said to me, "You are a really nice person." The wonder in her voice, as if recounting a recent revelation, unwomaned me. Still, there's nowhere to be but where you are when you're there. And, let it be known that I was there and fully present. I owned and was owned till the earth scorched beneath my feet. I loved and was loved until my heart left my body and lay in the sick bed next to hers. I was not found wanting. In the end, I was not found wanting. Kelli Simpson is a poet and former teacher based in Norman, Oklahoma. Her work has appeared in Lamplit Underground, Green Ink Poetry, One Art Poetry Journal, The MockingHeart Review, Remington Review, and elsewhere.