Search Results

The old pick-up truck rolled over parched gravel, kicking up blankets of dust that settled over the boxes tied in the back. Jostled together, heavy. Cardboard blanched from the sun. Five hundred miles of dust robbed everything of color. Except the one box, jolted open, and the old antique radio in it gleaming green and white like a corpse. The dial, a wide green eye, stared blank at the sun. A peeling blue house on the corner, that was the place I would stay in for the summer. It wasn't home and never would be, but I felt nothing particular. Past is the past. I can't even call it to mind most days. Don't look at something long enough, it hardly exists. Like a dream, a nightmare leaving nothing behind but the unease of forgotten terror. The roommates were on the porch, lounging like dogs in the panting heat. They looked suspicious as I rumbled the truck into the drive. I got out, starting untying ropes keeping the boxes down. Then they figured I was the one meant to move in. Must be the guy from the ad, I heard them. Looks younger than he said he was. Never mind, he's paying cash up front. Saw them saunter over, beers in hand. Offered names, handshakes and to help unload. Long trip? Not really, drove straight from Blair, Nebraska, no stopping. Boxes got heaved out the rusted truck bed, oof. Carried, shoved through the back door, scraped onto the linoleum. It was sparkling. Not a speck of dust. Somebody took pride in it, keeping things neat. Someone else explained how the air conditioner broke and as I had the attic room, it was hotter than Hell. I could sleep on the sofa til it was fixed, if I didn't mind. I didn't mind. The TV was broke, too. That's all right, I didn't bother with TV. I had my guitar. Just as well, I saw that old TV set in a corner. The butt end of a bottle sticking out the screen. Must've been a rough night for somebody, I said. They laughed. Some of them didn't have all their teeth. They brightened up over the old radio. I'd hoped they wouldn't see it. Damn box wouldn't stay closed. Got rained on last night. Did it work? I hope not, I said. Of course they didn't know I wasn't joking and laughed. They set it on the dining room table, plugged in the old cord. I stood in the kitchen doorway looking in. It popped and whined, the old tubes glowing red in back. Hoped they'd bust in the heat, but no. The round green eye glowed, staring at them. Gathered round, they sucked on sweating beer bottles, stared back. Like primitives beholding the eye of the oldest god in the world. They were dumb, in awe of it. That talking box. Forget Top-40 shit, someone said. I wanna hear the game. Suit yourself, I said. Don't touch that middle dial, or you'll regret it. They didn't hear me. The game squawked on without nobody changing the dial. I heard them marveling at it but walked straight out the room. Hauled my stuff to the attic. Up and down stairs in the heat. Couldn't help listening for what happened in the other room. Nothing, just the game. Their voices, cheering their team, booing the other. Just as normal as could be. ### I stopped in the attic room, heat coming up through the floor. Radiating down from the roof. Old house, no insulation. It cooked like an oven. Sucked my wits out with my sweat. Sweat poured from under my arms, made rivers down my sides. The blue denim of my jeans turned dark, soaking in my skin's tears. I didn’t unpack, stood at the window and stared at the big empty yard. The patch of dirt for a vegetable garden growing nothing. Gravel road beyond. No neighbors. Too far to walk into town. Nobody in the whole town of Winteset had seen me, since I drove in on the back roads. Nobody would know when I left, either. Guitar was all I carried downstairs, and a wad of cash to pay the rent in advance. I stopped on the last step, empty kitchen in front of me. Sparkling linoleum. Round the corner, everyone had gone quiet. The game wasn't on. Instead, just static laced with piano music. Old timey stuff. Every last note twanged out of tune. Sophisticated and childish at the same time. But rhythmic. Building. Those off tune notes clanged and rang. Mesmerizing. Communicating. I peeked in. Roommates were staring, dumb as corpses. Like kids getting foggy before nap time. I wished I'd never bought that damned device. Some things end up in your life like they been stalking you. Can't get rid of them, either. Not without trouble. The dining room was hotter than when I left. All the windows open, fans running constant. Flies swarming in. Floorboards creaked under my feet as I stepped in. Joined them. The radio jumped to static. Roommates came to, saw me. Came back to life like resurrected figures. Might storm later, somebody said. He always says that, said another. Well, that would be a blessed relief, I said. I'd forgotten their names already. Switched off the radio like it was nothing. Got the last few boxes out the truck in case it rained. Heavy ones. Stiff and wooden like bodies. Six of them. My burdens, I called them. Hauled them upstairs, came back down again. A time would come, maybe soon, I wouldn't be able to move them no more. Took a beer from the fridge, ran it over my forehead, neck, bare chest. Put it back unopened. Never touched the stuff. Man's more civilized inventions were not man's at all—but knowledge handed down from the gods. And everything the gods handed down was nothing but an open door for evil. Not the evil in men, but another kind. The kind with purposes all its own. In my rucksack was a jar of honeycomb. I unscrewed the lid, took a couple bites, then hid it away. I had come to know through the years that my habits were unusual. It made living with people difficult sometimes, even when it all went well. Conversation ran dry as the dirt road sprinkled in hot rain. Radio wouldn't play, not when I set both feet in the same room. They couldn't figure it out. Played with the tuning knobs. It was too old to have an antenna. I sat in the corner, strumming the guitar. Music breaks apart the spell, you see. The green eye still glowed, but it wouldn't play. Not even static. Hell, this damn thing! I'll go crazy if it don't play something, somebody said. What about that middle dial? What's it do? They looked at me, remembering what I'd said. Wondering if it mattered. Wondering what regret tasted like. I watched them, cool as a bottle from the fridge. Sometimes people know better. They know better but help themselves. They hunkered down, staring at that middle dial made of ebony and carved with letters. One of them reached out, touched it. My fingers clenched up, guitar strings twanged off tune. Are these channels or something? A, Z, O. They tried each one. Click. Silence of a black hole on channel A. Click, click. Microphone dropped into the ocean on channel O. Click. A human sound on channel Z. Faint, disturbing. We strained to listen. Whispering voices but not loud enough to make it out. The volume got turned all the way up but no difference. A violin played just beneath, one constant note. Off tune. My hands went limp, nearly dropped the guitar. Familiar. Couldn't tell where I had heard it before. Lately my memory had more and more blank spaces. Gaps like vast stretches of ocean. A surface gray and shifting. Like old blankets draped over rooms full of furniture. Couldn't tell what was underneath. Months? Years? Everyone’s eyes turned hollow. Expressions blank. Turn it off! It was barely my voice. A croak. No one moved. Heavy like too much dope. The sluggish feeling of a dream body unable to take another step, get out the way of a speeding truck. The whispering got louder, voices in any language. Couldn’t make it out, but there was snarling underneath. Animal sound. Someone came home from work, found us like that. Ripped the plug out the wall. We blinked at each other. Wary. Animals in a zoo: cautious, measuring each other up. Friend or foe. The hell you guys listening to? Nobody had an answer. Somehow it was dark. Near midnight. Rain blasted down. Thunder brought our wits back. The radio sat dead on the table. Forgotten. We went to our separate rooms, the doors left open for the cool air roaming the house. I took the couch. Guitar on the floor beside me. Didn't think about pillow or blankets. Just sank down into sleep like a tomb. Day hot as ever, house empty. All of them gone to work I guessed. Sprawled in the shade outside, shirt off, propped against a tree, guitar strumming lazy. The notes jangled and jarred, like I’d forgotten what music meant. Fingers moved on their own. Whispering over the strings. Strange whispers. Off tune. I'd catch myself doing it. Willed it to stop Then my thoughts would wander, get caught in the shifting leaves above me. Then I'd hear it again. My fingers working against me. Fed up, I went in. Found myself minutes—hours?—later on my knees beside the kitchen table. Power cord in hand. It was frayed, the plug half ripped off. An easy fix, just copper wires. Thought about getting my tool kit out the truck. Stood up and then I saw it. Strangest thing. Someone put flowers around the radio—not proper in a vase, just strewn all over the top and in front. Marigolds. Hello? I called, thinking one of them came home early. No answer. A floorboard creaked somewhere. A rusty hinge on a door shrieked—cut off. Silence held its breath. Went and stood by the hall that lead to the bedrooms. Listened. Imagined one of them crouched behind a door, listening back. I didn’t go looking. Went outside, sat on the porch swing and rocked, the guitar sitting next to me. If I could play one chord, remember one song, I might snap out of it. Just couldn't trust my hands. The sun set, sky blanketed in red. Crickets started a tune, synchronized from across the yard. Cars came home. Headlights blinded my night-calmed eyes. Dust rose up as one by one they parked in the drive. Footsteps and voices in the house. Normal. Civilized. Laughter. The hiss of beer bottles being opened. Hey, look! The power cord got fixed, somebody said. The radio turned alive. An angry hiss and crackle. Old timey music blared, out of tune. My body protested moving, standing. I pushed myself to go in. Held onto the door frame of the dining room, looking in. It blazed with light. Everyone stood round the table, attentive as disciples. Their faces shone green in the light of that glowing eye. Hungry for them. And they were hungry for it. I wanted to laugh, but couldn’t make my face move. I felt dull and heavy. Started craving that off tune note of the violin. The whispered voices. The animal growl. How long we all stood there, I don't know. Somebody came home late, found us like that. Frozen. I looked at him, pleading. Mute. He didn’t say anything, switched off the radio and cleared away the flowers. There were dangerous eyes on his hands. Large and work-tanned. A mole on his right thumb. A thick, steel chained wrist watch. Spell broken, I shuffled into the living room and collapsed on the couch. The wind outside whipped up dust and gravel. Rattled against windows. Howling. I felt sad like a child robbed of their best toy. Couldn't understand it. Tears ran down my face as I fell asleep without thoughts or dreams. The house was hot and empty. Bright and aching with the white noon day sun. Swung my feet off the couch and knocked over several beer bottles. Days worth. Some had mold in them. Knew they weren't mine. Picked them up in my arms and carried them to the kitchen. The flowers were back on the radio, I saw in passing. A silver platter was in front of it, antique like. A porcelain bowl, paper towel covering something wet and sticky that flies fought over. Kept walking, set bottles on the kitchen counter. Tripped over a knife on the floor all wet and sticky. Tossed it in the sink and opened up the fridge, just for the cool air. A thud from upstairs. I looked at the ceiling, at dust filtering down. The attic room was just above. A rustling sound from up there. Heavy, like boxes tipped over. Climbed up the narrow stairs. My feet crunched on glass. Twigs. Leaves. Inside the room, I saw the window smashed in. A tree beside the house had fallen right through the window. Heavy branches covered the bed. Would have killed me if I'd been sleeping there. I checked the large boxes, secured with cords. One got open. Tree branch tore through it. Cords were cut. I stared at it, knowing that was a bad thing but couldn't say why. Come to think of it, everything was wet. Like rain got in, but no rain last night. How long since there was a storm? The night I arrived. But when was that? Downstairs my guitar was missing. Found it on the porch. Tripped over it when I went outside. The strings thrummed in harmony. My thoughts cleared. I should leave. Up and leave it all. The boxes, the radio. All of it. Get in the truck, peel out. Don't take anything but what's in my pockets. Okay, I decided. But somehow I walked back through the house, instead of just walking through the yard to my truck. I passed the dining room table. Flowers were back. Dull green eye fixed to the top of the old radio. My hand reached for it—like my body had its own plan, nothing to do with my head. Reached over the silver platter. The porcelain bowl. Flies crawling over it thick like a black handkerchief. Hand clasped the smooth green eye. It began to glow, cool and liquid smooth as stone. I pulled at it, trying to rip it off the radio. My other hand went for the ebony carved dial. Neither of them were part of the original radio. They had been added. Somehow doing this disturbed the flies. The paper towel fell to the floor. I saw what was inside the bowl. Blood dried black against work-tanned skin. A mole by the thumb. Severed at the wrist. Thick, steel chained wrist watch still on it. Sick, I doubled over. Vomited on the carpet. Last thing I saw, my face pressed against the carpet, was cords. Severed cords, dragged round a pair of ankles. Bare feet walking towards me. Waxy brown skin. Glass, twigs, leaves. A naked man stood over me. My gaze traced his body, strong as an ox in the sun. Instead of a face or a head, there was just a glowing green dial. He raised his hand. I flinched but he only turned on the radio. Static. Violin. Whispers. Growls. ### Headlights brighten up the room. The back door bangs to. Lights switch on. The dining room blares into existence. I sit up blinking. Roommates stare at me, laughing. What happened to you? somebody asks. Look at all these beer bottles on this counter. Man, you musicians. Somebody else helps me up. The mess is all gone. The carpet cleaned. Flowers cleared. Silver platter and bowl and all the rest, gone. No trace. Girls, brightened up faces and tight jeans. Cool radio! What is that, an antique? Looks like something from Mars. Yeah those old sci-fi films. Geez, it's hot in here. Air conditioner's busted, somebody says. Yeah let's get outta here, the girls say. You coming? We're going to Des Moines. I get my shirt from the bathroom. Realize I've been wearing the same jeans—for how long? I change those too, join the others outside. We pile into the back of somebody's pick up. Cool breeze on the drive. Clear night sky. Stars. Where you from? Here and there; nowhere. You look kinda exotic for Iowa. Like super tan, black hair, pretty blue eyes. What are you? Human, I guess. They laugh. What are you doing here? Gotta job lined up out of state, don't start for another month. The bar is smoky crowded, lined faces and old bottles. Dusty. Old cowboy prints on the walls, steer horns at attention. What do you drink? Nothing, water. That's weird for a musician. There’s laughter and smoke and money brings beer. I start feeling more alive. Did you ever think you’d end up like this when you were in high school? What's high school? I ask. This brings giggles. Sparkling eyes and glossy smiles. I bet you were like real popular in high school. I bet all the girls were after you. I don't remember, I tell them. When's the last time you got laid? Three thousand years ago. The house, peeling blue, pops out of the dark, caught in the circle of headlights. The girls find the garden hose. Headlights left on, the car stereo plays Simon and Garfunkel. Sprayed water, laughter, cheerful screaming through the yard chasing each other with the hose. Their bodies dance in the headlights and halo of water. I join them. Chase follow drenched. Beautiful faces, full of life. I hope they leave before it's too late, and then wonder why. Can't remember. Morning headache. The girls bustle about, talking, laughing, up early. The kitchen homely with the smell of cooking. Sausages, eggs frying. I can't eat flesh but take a warm plain biscuit. A bite of honeycomb. The radio is on the floor, smashed. The green eye separated from the body. Ebony dial amid the rubble. No one asks how it happened. I haul it outside to the trash can. Inside, a silver platter. A broken porcelain bowl. Wadded up paper towel, stained with red. Ketchup, I see clear as day taking it out. It was nothing, just a dream. But something falls out the paper. Thuds to the ground. A thick steel chained wrist watch. Stained red and black. A fly lands on it. Heart racing, I start to feel sick. Glance up at the attic window. Covered over in thick white plastic. Broken glass still in the frame. Behind it, faint shadow, like an arm. A strong body. Naked, fetal, pushing against the opaque membrane. I mean to kill it, whatever it is lurking up there. Grabbing a thick branch from the woodpile, I run inside. Up the stairs. Slower with each step, like I'm caught in a dream. I frab the old iron door knob and twist it. The door is locked. I crouch down, peer through the old key hole. Blackness. The key stuck in it, from the inside. Everyone’s gone out. I go looking for my guitar. The music from last night still in my head. I need to play it before I forget. Guitar behind the sofa. I take it out, hold it, about the strum a chord—then I see it. The green glowing eye. Atop the busted television. The ebony dial too where the tuning knob should be. Somebody fixed the it up. There's no way it works, I tell myself. My hand reaches out. Fingers stretch, pulling me toward the ebony dial. To turn it on? To rip it off? My head can't tell what my body is planning. The roommates come home. Rustling grocery bags. Footsteps linger in the dining room—confused. Something missing, they can't tell what. Anybody seen Justin? somebody asks. Hasn't paid rent in a while. Did he up and move out? They come in the living room. See me crouched in front of the old antique box. Hey buddy, you fix the TV? Awesome! Somebody flicks the power button on. Tubes groan to life, zap, pop, casting a red glow up the wall. We glance nervously one to the other. Is it gonna explode? Here, have a beer. Just water for me. You look tired, man. A hand reaches out to turn the ebony dial. Click. Channel A glows white. Fleeing black shapes and silence. Click, click. Channel O swirls with melted blue and red like blood in the ocean. Click. I’m laughing far away and saying, ‘Don't do it now. You'll regret—' Green and black static flashes rapidly an image we can’t quite make out. Somebody adjusts the old style antenna. Wait, there it goes! Move it to the right. There! Don't touch it. Stand back. The image comes into focus only for an instant. We kneel, transfixed. A naked man with brown waxy skin. Strong as an ox. Instead of a head, a huge glowing green eye. Faintly at first then louder, the sound of a violin. Off tune. Playing a single note. My heart freezes, craving and dreading to hear a whispered voice, an animal growl. Tired, so tired, my head drops to my chest. Somewhere in the house, a rattling CLACK. The door to the attic room unlocks. It's dark. We sit around the dining table. Cords tied round us, each tied to a chair. The TV plays in the other room. Green flashing light shows our faces to one another. The white of our eyes. Terrified. We listen and wait, dumb as beasts. Two of us are missing. Upstairs, heavy footsteps. Thuds. Boxes being overturned, dragged across the floor. Unpacking. The phone rings loud and terrible. Drowns out the whining violin static noise. My thoughts come back to me like dropped marbles. Can you guys see me? Am I dreaming? somebody whimpers. Somebody else gets an arm free. The phone quits ringing. Static violin sails over us. Our minds go blank. The one with the free arm starts to pull out his hair strand by strand with jerky movements. Another one with wild eyes looks at the open door to the kitchen, opens his mouth in a silent scream. In the doorway, three naked men stare at us. Naked with waxy brown skin. Heads replaced with glowing green dials. More footsteps, descending the stairs slow. There are six of them all together. They communicate to one another in soft beeping. Maybe I don't even see them, and close my eyes. I’m all alone when I wake up. The TV's off, the green eye dull and blind. My arms ache, rope burns on them. The house smells like something burnt. Stuffy, rotten. I open up the windows. Flies get in. There are flowers everywhere, trails of them down the hall. From bedroom to bedroom. Little piles in front of each door. I start to sweep up, but in the piles there are bones. The doors are shut, locked from inside. Sobbing from somewhere far away. Maybe under the floor. The basement? I never did ask about it. Never seen a door going down there. Maybe there's a cellar, outside. Hello? I call out. It gets quiet. I head to the back door but stop at the kitchen. The floor is sticky and black. Smells rotten. I don't go in. Don't go looking to see what's upstairs. The house has gone bad. I stay out on the porch til its gets dark. When I go in, the TV turns on by itself. Bright green flashing light. I try not to look at it. The sound reaches me. My mind starts to go. In the flashing light, I see somebody standing over me. Bare feet, pale legs. He's missing his right hand. His head is his own and he looks at me with hunted eyes. Muffled inside a room somewhere, I hear screaming. Can you stop them? the man asks. There's a crowbar in his hand. If I knew how, I've forgotten. He tries to tell me things. How when he kills one of them, they replace themselves. Hunting down another. So there's always six. They take off the head, replace it with a green dial. It makes the body grow strong. Unstoppable. He's tried everything he knew. Marigolds to appease the gods. Burnt offerings. His own hand. What do they want? He runs before I can answer. To the cellar. Somehow I know, his is the voice I heard sobbing beneath the floor boards. They will find him soon. Or maybe I dreamed it. The phone rings all day. I keep to the porch, day and night now. Still hear it through the open window: the violin, static, growls. Cocooned in nothing, I lay unmoving on the porch swing. Awake without thinking. Somebody else is in the house, I think sometimes. I hear things in the day. At night, the green men look for something. Someone. Morning, the spell breaks. TV cuts out, quiet. Through the window, I see strange marks drawn over the TV. Letters or hieroglyphs. A prayer. Fresh flowers. The silver platter, polished, set before the TV. Sometimes there's a bowl covered in rags. Flies everywhere. At night, the attic door unlocks. Footsteps creep. Green lights flash through the windows. Soft beeping noises move from room to room. I never remember what happens next. A memory hovers out of reach. There's a reason for all this. Twilight, a car pulls up. Girls get out. Familiar looking. They bang on the door. Look in the windows. I lay beneath the porch swing, like somebody placed me there out of sight. Hands crossed on my chest, corpse like. Their heels thud onto the porch. Busy, full of life. Nice, clean hands rattle the door knob. Faces peer in the windows. Oh my God, look at the mess! That's creepy, let's just leave. Should we call the police? Nobody's seen them for weeks. Is it really our problem, Cassie? Maybe they don't answer the phone because they didn't pay the bill. Deadbeats. Or they went camping or something. I don't think so, something's wrong here. The car pulls out. Tears over the gravel. Music blares from the open windows. A familiar harmony. Same music the night we went out. I sit up, cracking my forehead against the swing. The pain, the music. My mind jolts up to speed, like a skipped record. I have to get out of here! Now, before it's too late. My memories are shot, but my instincts are back. Crouched there, I know I can't go inside for my car keys. Not without passing the green eye. If it switches on, I'll be lost in the fog again. My stomach growls. My limbs are shaky, weak. I remember what the girls said about the phone bill. The phone hasn't rang in days. Or weeks? I can only hope the electric will get cut off too. I shuffle around the house, ducking low to keep out of sight of the windows. The garden hose in back. I turn the spigot. Nothing. The water company cut the supply. Any day now, the power company might, too. Then I can get in the house, find my keys without the risk. I camp in the shed. Find my guitar, half buried in the dirt. Wrapped in a garbage bag. Like someone tried to hide it. To save it? I stare out the small, dirt smeared window toward the house. Then I see it. The cellar door hidden in the shade. I wait until dark, scavenge in my truck for a jar of honeycomb. In the moonlight, I see myself reflected in the car window. Skeletal, brown skin stretched over bones. Hair turned white. An old man, nearly mummified. Movement catches my eye. The attic window burns lurid green. Shapes pass in front of it. Hulking men with orbs instead of heads. I crawl in the truck bed and lay down flat. Whisper to myself half remembered lyrics. Hum. Not a full song, but enough. My memory sputters to life. They have been with me a long time. Ages. I cart them from place to place, bound to them. And they to me. Six of them, and me the seventh. The head. They hunt for the smartest. It is a game. Only the smartest can outwit them. Prove himself worthy to serve the old god with the green eye. They will turn him into one of them, fortifying his body. Strong as an ox. Then the chosen one will turn against the weakest of the seven. Sacrificing it. Taking the head for itself. I examine my thin, wasted arms in the moonlight. Soon I will pass beyond hunger and thirst. The last piece to fall in the game. Midnight or so, I venture out. The house is dark. Silent. Even the attic window is dark. I search the truck, find a flashlight. Now or never. Gently I place the guitar inside. Everything else, I will leave behind. My burdens. This game. It ends with me. I walk to the house, careful not to scuff the gravel. Open the door, flick on the beam. Black grease covers every surface. The walls stained and streaked. Fresh blood stains the stairs going to the attic. I stop and listen. No sound but my own breathing. My frail body barely heavy enough to make the floorboards creak. The living room. The TV black with paint, dead and quiet. Dead flowers everywhere. The bowl and silver platter broken and overturned. Tiny black beetles everywhere. The sofa broken, cushions slashed. Bloodied. I search the crevices, find my keys. Okay, then—a noise stops me. Gentle as a mouse. Something brushed up against the floorboards from beneath the house. Quick, I run to my truck. Crawl in the cab. Bang the door shut. Keys. Turn. The engine roars to life. BANG BANG BANG! Fists pound on the driver's side window. I cry out, shine the flashlight at it. A woman's face. Let me in! Oh, let me in, mister! My car won't start. There's somebody in the yard! I yank open the passenger door for her. She scrambles in. I peel out before she even grabs a seat belt. Breathless, panting. She looks back at the house. I went in there looking for my friend Justin. Do you know him? It takes me a moment to recognize Cassie, the gal from the bar crawl in Des Moines. She doesn't recognize me. “Get in, it ain't safe,” I told her. She crawled in the passenger side and barely got on her seatbelt before I peeled out of the drive, sped round the corner and got on the back road going toward the highway. Going so fast the truck was bumping, rolling like it was tearing over corpses piled high over the road. But it was just a road, I told myself. “Guess you're pretty spooked too,” Cassie said. “I saw you go in the house. What was in there?” Her eyes were wide and worried. “Nothing,” I said. “Looks like they cleared out.” “You came running out that door like a shot.” “So did you.” She gave a shrug. Shivered. “Something about that place. I can't—can't ever quite remember what it is. Like as soon as I'm not there, I forget. Hey, if you take the next left, we'll circle back round to town. You can drop me off at my folks.” I could tell it occurred to her she was in a car in the middle of the night, speeding over back roads, with a strange man. I had no intention of going back. “I ain't stopping till we get to Grinnell,” I said. “Lots of people around. Bright lights. I just—can't be in the dark no more.” “I got friends in Grinnell, at the college. Say, if you need a place to stay...” She looked me up and down, figuring I was too old to be introduced to her friends. Too old to surf a sofa. I don't blame her. It was my own scent, a kind of outdoorsy funk from sleeping on the porch several nights—how many nights? Too polite to say anything, she rolled down her window to let the cool night air in. I rolled down mine and opened up the hatch in the back window. The house has gone bad. I stay out on the porch til its gets dark. When I go in, the TV turns on by itself. Bright green flashing light. I try not to look at it. The sound reaches me. My mind starts to go. In the flashing light, I see somebody standing over me. Bare feet, pale legs. He's missing his right hand. His head is his own and he looks at me with hunted eyes. Muffled inside a room somewhere, I hear screaming. Can you stop them? the man asks. There's a crowbar in his hand. If I knew how, I've forgotten. He tries to tell me things. How when he kills one of them, they replace themselves. Hunting down another. So there's always six. They take off the head, replace it with a green dial. It makes the body grow strong. Unstoppable. He's tried everything he knew. Marigolds to appease the gods. Burnt offerings. His own hand. What do they want? He runs before I can answer. To the cellar. Somehow I know, his is the voice I heard sobbing beneath the floor boards. They will find him soon. Or maybe I dreamed it. The phone rings all day. I keep to the porch, day and night now. Still hear it through the open window: the violin, static, growls. Cocooned in nothing, I lay unmoving on the porch swing. Awake without thinking. Somebody else is in the house, I think sometimes. I hear things in the day. At night, the green men look for something. Someone. Morning, the spell breaks. TV cuts out, quiet. Through the window, I see strange marks drawn over the TV. Letters or hieroglyphs. A prayer. Fresh flowers. The silver platter, polished, set before the TV. Sometimes there's a bowl covered in rags. Flies everywhere. At night, the attic door unlocks. Footsteps creep. Green lights flash through the windows. Soft beeping noises move from room to room. I never remember what happens next. A memory hovers out of reach. There's a reason for all this. Twilight, a car pulls up. Girls get out. Familiar looking. They bang on the door. Look in the windows. I lay beneath the porch swing, like somebody placed me there out of sight. Hands crossed on my chest, corpse like. Their heels thud onto the porch. Busy, full of life. Nice, clean hands rattle the door knob. Faces peer in the windows. Oh my God, look at the mess! That's creepy, let's just leave. Should we call the police? Nobody's seen them for weeks. Is it really our problem, Cassie? Maybe they don't answer the phone because they didn't pay the bill. Deadbeats. Or they went camping or something. I don't think so, something's wrong here. The car pulls out. Tears over the gravel. Music blares from the open windows. A familiar harmony. Same music the night we went out. I sit up, cracking my forehead against the swing. The pain, the music. My mind jolts up to speed, like a skipped record. I have to get out of here! Now, before it's too late. My memories are shot, but my instincts are back. Crouched there, I know I can't go inside for my car keys. Not without passing the green eye. If it switches on, I'll be lost in the fog again. My stomach growls. My limbs are shaky, weak. I remember what the girls said about the phone bill. The phone hasn't rang in days. Or weeks? I can only hope the electric will get cut off too. I shuffle around the house, ducking low to keep out of sight of the windows. The garden hose in back. I turn the spigot. Nothing. The water company cut the supply. Any day now, the power company might, too. Then I can get in the house, find my keys without the risk. I camp in the shed. Find my guitar, half buried in the dirt. Wrapped in a garbage bag. Like someone tried to hide it. To save it? I stare out the small, dirt smeared window toward the house. Then I see it. The cellar door hidden in the shade. I wait until dark, scavenge in my truck for a jar of honeycomb. In the moonlight, I see myself reflected in the car window. Skeletal, brown skin stretched over bones. Hair turned white. An old man, nearly mummified. Movement catches my eye. The attic window burns lurid green. Shapes pass in front of it. Hulking men with orbs instead of heads. I crawl in the truck bed and lay down flat. Whisper to myself half remembered lyrics. Hum. Not a full song, but enough. My memory sputters to life. They have been with me a long time. Ages. I cart them from place to place, bound to them. And they to me. Six of them, and me the seventh. The head. They hunt for the smartest. It is a game. Only the smartest can outwit them. Prove himself worthy to serve the old god with the green eye. They will turn him into one of them, fortifying his body. Strong as an ox. Then the chosen one will turn against the weakest of the seven. Sacrificing it. Taking the head for itself. I examine my thin, wasted arms in the moonlight. Soon I will pass beyond hunger and thirst. The last piece to fall in the game. Midnight or so, I venture out. The house is dark. Silent. Even the attic window is dark. I search the truck, find a flashlight. Now or never. Gently I place the guitar inside. Everything else, I will leave behind. My burdens. This game. It ends with me. I walk to the house, careful not to scuff the gravel. Open the door, flick on the beam. Black grease covers every surface. The walls stained and streaked. Fresh blood stains the stairs going to the attic. I stop and listen. No sound but my own breathing. My frail body barely heavy enough to make the floorboards creak. The living room. The TV black with paint, dead and quiet. Dead flowers everywhere. The bowl and silver platter broken and overturned. Tiny black beetles everywhere. The sofa broken, cushions slashed. Bloodied. I search the crevices, find my keys. Okay, then—a noise stops me. Gentle as a mouse. Something brushed up against the floorboards from beneath the house. Quick, I run to my truck. Crawl in the cab. Bang the door shut. Keys. Turn. The engine roars to life. BANG BANG BANG! Fists pound on the driver's side window. I cry out, shine the flashlight at it. A woman's face. Let me in! Oh, let me in, mister! My car won't start. There's somebody in the yard! I yank open the passenger door for her. She scrambles in. I peel out before she even grabs a seat belt. Breathless, panting. She looks back at the house. I went in there looking for my friend Justin. Do you know him? It takes me a moment to recognize Cassie, the gal from the bar crawl in Des Moines. She doesn't recognize me. “Get in, it ain't safe,” I told her. She crawled in the passenger side and barely got on her seatbelt before I peeled out of the drive, sped round the corner and got on the back road going toward the highway. Going so fast the truck was bumping, rolling like it was tearing over corpses piled high over the road. But it was just a road, I told myself. “Guess you're pretty spooked too,” Cassie said. “I saw you go in the house. What was in there?” Her eyes were wide and worried. “Nothing,” I said. “Looks like they cleared out.” “You came running out that door like a shot.” “So did you.” She gave a shrug. Shivered. “Something about that place. I can't—can't ever quite remember what it is. Like as soon as I'm not there, I forget. Hey, if you take the next left, we'll circle back round to town. You can drop me off at my folks.” I could tell it occurred to her she was in a car in the middle of the night, speeding over back roads, with a strange man. I had no intention of going back. “I ain't stopping till we get to Grinnell,” I said. “Lots of people around. Bright lights. I just—can't be in the dark no more.” “I got friends in Grinnell, at the college. Say, if you need a place to stay...” She looked me up and down, figuring I was too old to be introduced to her friends. Too old to surf a sofa. I don't blame her. It was my own scent, a kind of outdoorsy funk from sleeping on the porch several nights—how many nights? Too polite to say anything, she rolled down her window to let the cool night air in. I rolled down mine and opened up the hatch in the back window. “Suppose I could use a shower,” I said by way of apology. “Get me a nice motel room, after I get you to your friend's house.” “I appreciate that,” she said, prim as a secretary. “But don't apologize. My dad's a farmer. When he hoses down out back, a century of dirt comes off him. Are you related to that musician guy? The one at the house, with the guitar. He the prettiest blue eyes.” “We're acquainted,” I said, gripping tight the steering wheel because what if she realized that he and I were one and the same? Over the gravel roar of the tires, I could hear the high corn rushing past with a hissing kind of hush. Whispering. A shiver crawled down my spine. Instinctively I reached out to turn on the radio—hesitated—then turned the dial. Buddy Holly sang out, filling the night with joy, living on in spite of his fate. Like myself. The young lady kept talking about all her friends in Grinnell. Probably just nervous. Wanting me to know how many people would miss her if anything happened. I wasn't listening. Memories flipping past my eyes like an old movie. The bar in Des Moines. How long since you got laid? A thousand years. Laughter. The heavy boxes tied with cord. Six of them. Always six of them. The green orb, all seeing eye. Three thousand years ago it had sat in a pharaoh's tomb. “Oh god,” I murmured, remembering the moment the ancient priests set it there. Beside my coffin. Giving me the tour before my eternal journey. Explaining the procedures of mummification. Honey. Needle and thread. Gold. “What's wrong?” Cassie asked. “Immortality,” I said. “There's always a price.” She didn't know what I meant, why would she? Sat there in silence as I rambled half-remembered things. When the god Osiris was killed, his body was torn into seven pieces. His wife, the goddess Isis, put him back together again. In Ancient Egypt, the pharaohs expected that by imitating the mummification of Osiris they too would gain immortality. They buried themselves in tombs with seven servants and the eye of Ra. The priests were meant to do the ritual of resurrection. Except priests were often corrupt. They took money and didn't do the ritual, or they didn't get it right. Every mummified pharaoh ever found is proof that the priests failed. You see, the ones that succeeded didn't stay in the tombs. They walked—and they still do. You see, the life force was divided among the seven strong, healthy servants. One became the resurrected pharaoh, and received the pharaoh's head. The other six waited in a kind of suspended animation until the seventh began to grow old. Meantime, he was meant to care for them—to keep them hidden and well fed. Then, when it was time, the six awoke and searched for another to join them—someone surprisingly strong and resilient. With survival instincts, intelligence—worthy of wearing the crown someday. That's what happened at the house, to all the others. My servants had woken and set the game in motion. The strongest, the one who had survived them up till the very end—he was one of them now. Most likely he was the one who would hunt me down. It had been going on for three thousand years. My head, worn by countless bodies. My memory fractured. Each of my servants was my burden to bear. Mouths to feed. And once my body began to wither, and my memories knit together the soiled tapestry of my life, that was the sign of the end—and the beginning. Cassie retreated to the far corner of her seat away from me. Her hand clenched the door handle. I realized what she was planning. “Don't do anything stupid to hurt yourself,” I said, slowing down as we came to a T-intersection. She didn't wait for the truck to stop before she jumped. Sprawled on the gravel with a scream. Scraped up arms and legs. Then she was running, down into the ditch, up into the high corn, swallowed by the night. “Cassie, wait!” I yelled after her. “It ain't safe! They're coming!” I opened the door to go after her. Just then I glanced in the rear view mirror. That's when I saw it. In the truck bed. The old television. The glowing green eye fixed on top of it. Been there the whole time. Beside it, a single heavy box, the cords cut, the lid askew. Opened. How did it even get there? Quick, I shut the door. Reached across to close the passenger door that Cassie left open. Hands grabbed me through the open hatch of the cabin. Strong hands. Violent. They pulled at my head—pulled and pulled. I screamed, with all my life. Not again. There wasn't a curse in any language that could stop it. Another thousand years, another and another—because they would never left me die. “Come on, you sunnofabitch,” a voice growled in my ear. “This ends now!” And in the rear view mirror, I saw Cassie's face— Hanna Nielson is an Irish-American writer-editor based in Belfast, Northern Ireland. Her novel The Burning Child of Bantry is due to be published with Wild Hunt Books. She has published art, short stories, and blogs. Currently she is editor at Variant Literature. Cool note from Author: I wrote the first draft of this age 14 while staying up late one summer after my radio started playing the strangest sounds, both beautiful but inhuman. Inspired both by The Tell Tale Heart and the song Channel Z by The B-52s, the resulting story title got me accepted into every MFA program I applied for since then. Recently, I redrafted and expanded it, going deeper into the mythology and creepiness.

Harris Caldwell—retired public defender; amateur woodworker; frequent apple juice drinker; thrice-a-day tooth brusher—died just now in his sleep at seventy-two years, three months, and nine days old in HumanTime. He missed the fervent bird chirping by sixteen minutes and ten seconds, and he missed the sunrise and creamsicle sky by twelve minutes and thirty-six seconds. That was Caldwell’s favorite part of the day, that sunrise. He would have loved this one. The death was sudden, and Caldwell did not feel a thing. That is what the coroner will say to comfort the family. The coroner will also say that it was a massive heart attack. He will also joke that neither man nor water buffalo could have survived it. It’s true. It would have killed a water buffalo had a water buffalo suffered the same massive heart attack as Harris Caldwell. Caldwell was tucked in bed with his wife Joyce when he died. She awoke forty-six minutes and eight seconds after Caldwell’s death, and she mistakenly assumed her husband was under the weather. She brought him an additional quilt. She kissed his forehead. It will be another one hour and three minutes before Joyce discovers that her husband has died. Was dead. Would no longer be alive. Had experienced the end of his story. ***** Harris Caldwell—former alive human; current dead entity; eight hours, forty-four minutes, and two seconds old in AfterlifeTime—wondered just now when Joyce would join him. He sat in a blank waiting room, alone, except for the man with wings who sat behind the sturdy front desk. The man with wings wore a golden halo-like crown, and he shined like melting ice. “Are you an angel?” Caldwell finally asked. “Good one,” the man with wings answered. At the end of the room was a heavy-set door with a pull handle the length of a broadsword. Beyond that heavy-set door were one-hundred and six billion individuals—all dead, deceased, departed—all wandering an infinite grassy plain. Among the fields of tall grass were the following: a perfect breeze, a perfect softness, and nothing hurt. Most searched for family. Some chose to make new friends. They certainly had the time to do so. Harris Caldwell had a maximum of thirty days to decide whether or not he would be passing through the door, if he would be joining the rest in wandering the infinite grassy plain. If not, he would be reused. Sent back. Reincarnated. Given a new story. “You must be an angel,” Caldwell said. “Try again,” the man with wings said. Caldwell crossed his arms and sat in the blank waiting room for three weeks, two days, seven hours, and eighteen minutes. In all that time, he had no urge to use the restroom. Up here, there is no urge to use the restroom. “When will Joyce be joining me?” Caldwell asked. “Pardon?” the man with wings asked. “My wife. Joyce. She should have died by now.” The man with wings lifted the page on his clipboard, then another, and then another. “Is that so?” “She should have died by now. That’s how it works. One spouse dies, then the other. Of a broken heart, is how they call it.” The man with wings lifted the page on his clipboard, then another, and then another. “She’s still alive, according to this.” “That’s not like her,” Caldwell said. He shifted in his seat. “Let me see. Let me see what she’s been up to.” The man with wings clicked his pen, and within that click, Caldwell perceived the events of the last three weeks, two days, seven hours, and eighteen minutes. ***** Joyce had not cried when she found him still, stiff. Not immediately, no. The suddenness of it all had confused her. When did it happen? When did he go? Why was there no shout? How much of the night had he still been with her? An hour? Three? Did he hear the early birds chirp? Or had he been long gone? Why? Why did he go? It wasn’t time yet. There was still so much to do. There was still plenty of time. Why, Harris Caldwell, why did you leave Joyce behind? Why The children took over the arrangements. They made the decisions. Box color. Box ornaments. Box type, steel or friendly to the environment. Joyce only nodded, only wanted to choose the wardrobe, only hoped to find Harris Caldwell’s wedding day cufflinks so he could wear them in his box. The viewing was brief. The people had said their words, had shed their tears. A priest spoke. It wasn’t memorable. Joyce cried too, had cried the most that day. Had cried when Harris was revealed in his box. Had cried when she couldn’t recognize his face. Had cried at his neutral expression. Had cried because he wasn’t wearing his cufflinks. Had cried because she had two days, five hours, and twenty minutes to find his wedding day cufflinks. Had cried because they were at home, somewhere. Had cried because she ran out of time. On the day after the burial, Joyce carried an additional eight pounds, three ounces on her heart. She strained to shift. She was mindful of the weight and feared tipping over. That night, she slept next to zero pounds, zero ounces. The people called daily, had said more words. Joyce carried an additional seven pounds, ten ounces on her heart. She attended a brunch with closer people, the kind that say pretty, gentler words. Words with meaning. Joyce went home carrying an additional seven pounds, one ounce on her heart. Joyce continued to search the basement for the cufflinks. Her children joined. They’d realized the preciousness of close proximity, the value of word to ear over word to receiver to ear. They spoke of Caldwell, had focused on the good because all that mattered now was the good. Joyce carried an additional five pounds, five ounces on her heart. At night, she spoke to Caldwell. She knew he was there, was ever presently listening to her speak, would have answered had he been able to. But Joyce was mistaken. Harris Caldwell was in the blank waiting room, waiting for her, waiting for her to join. Joyce carried an additional three pounds, twelve ounces on her heart. The children had left, had returned to the day-to-day, while Joyce searched for the cufflinks. As she rummaged through shoeboxes and dressers, she spoke to Harris, felt comfort knowing he was still with her, that they had endured a lengthy story together, that she would live her days with Harris still there. Joyce carried an additional one pound, eight ounces on her heart. This is where it steadied. This is where it would stay. Joyce would not have to strain to shift, would not fear tipping over, not with Harris Caldwell by her side. ***** There was a gingerly knock-knock at the only window to the waiting room, and the man with wings fluttered to the window and welcomed a breeze from the infinite grassy plain. “I was told to come here,” said a voice. “Yes, shortly. Mr. Caldwell has yet to decide, so I ask you to please be patient,” said the man with wings. “I understand. I’ll wait. And by any chance, is there a restroom nearby?” “Remember, there is no urge to use one up here.” “Oh, goodness. You’re right.” The man with wings closed the window and fluttered back to his desk. He checked the time and flipped through his clipboard. “Mr. Caldwell, I’ll remind you that you still have a choice to make.” “I’m not going until Joyce joins me.” “You’ve made that clear.” “Because she’ll never find me,” Caldwell said, pointing to the heavy-set door. “It’s too crowded out there. She’ll get lost. I’ll never see her again, and I can’t let that happen.” “I understand your concerns, but—” “How many have found each other?” The man with wings sighed. “It’s rare, but not impossible. Most are just happy to be here.” “I don’t believe you.” Caldwell crossed his arms and pouted. “She’ll never find me. We’ll have to go together, and I see no other option.” The man with wings lifted the page on his clipboard. “She’s not scheduled anytime soon.” “And why not?” Caldwell asked. Without realizing, he rubbed his wedding ring. “Hmm? Joyce loves me, and I love her too. Her heart should have broken by now, and it doesn't make a crock of sense why it hasn’t. You should know all about this. One spouse dies, and the other follows. I’ve been with Joyce forty-nine years and some change.” “We know.” “Best forty-nine years and some change a man could ask for, but I don’t want it ending at forty-nine years and some change because I want her by my side till the end, whatever the end is.” Caldwell shifted in his seat, found no comfort, and stood to pace the room. “Before this, the longest we’d been separated was eight days on account of a fishing trip on the other end of the country. I caught three trout. It’s torture up here.” “Incorrect. This is the most peaceful place in existence.” “Not for me it isn’t!” Caldwell gripped the back of a chair and huffed. “I thought I knew her, but I never expected this. To be so happy so soon? It’s unlike her.” The man with wings flipped the page on his clipboard. “According to this, you’re mistaken and you know it.” “And so what if I am? Will you send me down there for it?” “There is no down there, just an up here.” Caldwell squeezed the back of the chair and shook his head. “I couldn’t have held on that long. If Joyce had gone first, I’d be trailing right behind her. Within the half-hour, is my guess.” Caldwell glanced over his shoulder, hoping she’d be there. “She’s strong, that woman. Stronger than I ever was. Ever could be. When I was a boy, my father told me it wasn’t about a pretty smile or promised wealth or Yes, honey’s. He told me to find a woman who’d worry. Who’d worry about your health, your happiness, your dreams, and as long as you worried right back, the two of you would live a prosperous life. Joyce worried, all right. I worried in return, but I could never catch up to her. I should have tried harder. All that time, and I never tried worrying more than her… “Look at me,” Caldwell told the man with wings. “I departed first. I couldn’t even be there for her till her end. How selfish of me.” A phone rang, and the man with wings picked up a receiver from under the desk and listened to the sounds. “Yes, I understand.” He returned the receiver and fluttered around the desk. “Mr. Caldwell, your allotted time is running out. We ask that you make a decision. Pass through the door, or opt to be reused.” “If I’m reused, will I remember her?” “No. You will be a blank slate.” “Then it’s not even worth it.” Caldwell sighed, strained to straighten up, and approached the heavy-set door. “Angel?” “Not an angel.” “Can I see her again? Right now, as she is. Can I see her again?” “Will you exit if I show her? I have others waiting to use this room.” “Yes. I’ll see her, and then I’ll go.” The man with wings clicked his pen, and Harris Caldwell saw Joyce, as she was, currently, digging through a box of mementos on the front porch. ***** Caldwell stood near Joyce, though he was not there. He yearned to hold her hand, but he reached and could not reach far enough. It was not allowed. “Oh, Joyce,” Caldwell said. “I hope somehow you heard what me and Angel were saying. I’ll miss you, Joy. I wish I’d saved the big one for a later time,” Caldwell said, tapping his heart. “Goodness, you’re beautiful.” Joyce admired a photograph of the Caldwells taken forty-nine years, two months, thirteen days, and four hours ago. Her eyes welled up at this reminder of their youthful looks. “Don’t cry,” Caldwell told Joyce. “You know when you cry, I cry.” He felt the oncoming tears. “Ah, there they go. Never had a good grip on them.” Caldwell rubbed his jaw and sighed. “Goodbye, Joyce. I’ll cherish us, hun, and maybe that’s what’ll keep me going up there.” Joyce put the photograph down and curiously reached for the bump in the corner of the shoebox. She lifted the cardboard flap, and there they were, that bronze pair. Caldwell leaned in and looked close. She had found them. Joyce Caldwell had found her husband’s wedding day cufflinks. Joyce looked up and smiled at the clouds above. “Here they are, Harry.” “That’s all I needed to see,” Caldwell said. He blew her a kiss, and returned to the waiting room. “Thank you, Angel.” “You’re very welcome, Mr. Caldwell,” said the man with wings. “Now off you go.” Harris Caldwell pulled the heavy-set door, appreciated the breeze, and joined the others in the infinite grassy plain. He would find a clear spot in the tall grass and sit. He would ask individuals not to crowd around him. He would wait. Michael Lenart is a writer from Chicago, and has forthcoming work in The Bookends Review.

My sister Cape was only two years older than me except for in the summer months we were one thin year apart. And there it is the first sentence which I write similar versions of, maybe identical, once in a while almost involuntarily and then I leave it, I abandon it, for the story of my sister Catherine, Cape I called her, will not easily be told. But maybe this time will be different, the odds can just fuck off, and they can take with them the old saying about expecting different results being the definition of insanity. Do you think optimism is a crutch? Her body always like that of a dancer she knew how to train your eyes, she cat walked, every time I try to write her story it is in a serif font, italic, elegant ascenders and lasting descenders punctuation need not apply. I wonder if she still cooks wherever she is and if she has children like the pages of a picture-book and how she might serve them as she did me her soft sweet creations, I don’t know if there’s a word for them but clouds, they fell into no category, wonderful little enigmas I can taste now and feel, the way she’d watch my face, her own echoing my joy like a mirror and even when she was sitting right there, across from me, I longed for her, more more more I could never get enough, none of us could. And I think that’s why she left we wanted too much. We tried to hold on to her, my parents hired a psychiatrist to learn how to talk to her, how to get her back home after her first fledgling flights, and I heard through electric walls they even considered moving us back to the sticks. I alone understood Cape, and if the odds have room for another saying they can take with them the one about if you love something set it free, because it’s not finite, there’s no deadline, she’ll be back, Cape, I just know it. Sherry is from the wilds of Ontario. She writes the kind of stories she longs for and can rarely find. feelingfunny.ca

We received a King Cake at the office the other day Part coffee cake, part cinnamon roll Bathed in an icing of yellow, green and purple A Mardi Gras rainbow Inside the cake hides a small plastic baby And depending on your view either marks the arrival of the three wise men or symbolizes luck and prosperity But I have questions as always How does the plastic not melt in the baking process? How lucky can you consider yourself after biting into a plastic baby? She was always losing things. The eraser end of a pencil floated in her nostril, it jiggled when she sneezed, but she could never find it. Her keys were somewhere in that purse that she left in the taxi. And the baby, where was that baby? The Soundtrack to My Life Here comes your debaser man to hang on your cross in the Jesus Christ pose. Don’t save it for later, just hammer another nail in my heart. It’s a wave of mutilation. What a fucking lovely day in a beautiful world. You’re under pressure, Annie Hopparen. get your gun, Remember, distance equals rate times time. Goodbye, Gemini girl, go wild in the country. Stand and deliver a swingin' safari. You are a pixie standing in a garden of sound, drumming to an English beat. Slayer of queens A blazing arrow You are Adam, bowing to the Garden of Eden. In sweet soul limbo dancing with ants, you are you and you are music to my ears. Ken Tomaro is a writer living in Cleveland Ohio whose work reflects everyday life with depression. His poetry has appeared in several online and print journals and explores the common themes we all experience in life. Sometimes blunt, often dark but always grounded in reality. He has 4 full-length collections of poetry, most recently, Potholes and Perogies available on Amazon. Nolcha’s poems have been published in Lothlorien Poetry Journal, Alien Buddha Zine, Medusa’s Kitchen, and others. Her poetry books are available on Amazon. Nominee for 2023 Best of The Net. Editor for Open Arts Forum. Accidental interviewer/reviewer. Faker of fake news. Website: https://bit.ly/3bT9tYu

The Gods of the Riff are inscrutable. They hear neither prayer nor plea. They brook no rebuke. They bestow their favor where they will, and at the time of their own choosing. Their reasons are theirs and theirs alone, they do not share these with mortals. They dwell on an iron mountain; they take their slumber in an anthracite cave wherein no ray of light can find its way. Of the gift of their blessing, I can only say: You’ll know it when you hear it. I: Bruisermania Bruiser had asked Tversky and I to help him move. Spring semester was over, and he was moving back home with his parents for the summer. He didn’t have much stuff, and he’d promised to buy beer. Tversky and I said yes without hesitation. Bruiser was not his given name. He was nicknamed Bruiser because he was all of 5’10’, 135 pounds – maybe. Even at 135 I’d have to say he had heavy bones. There was nothing else to him. The guy was built out of binder twine. He had a mid-70s Chevy pickup he’d nicknamed “Old Betsy” – it was two-tone white and purple. He had a good stereo in Old Betsy and he kept her clean. Tversky was not a nickname, it just rhymes with his actual surname. Tversky rode a ten-speed most places, and liked weed, badminton, and Heavy Metal. At one time he was very serious about starting a metal band. He and some other veteran air-banders had a name picked out, and Tversky was talking about buying leather chaps. He did not play an instrument, so he thought he’d probably have to be the bassist. Bruiser had, at one time, over-consumed at a bar in Great Falls, Montana called Tee-Jay’s. Tee-Jay’s sponsored a lot of slo-pitch tournaments. Our team went often. We’d be in Tee-Jay’s with every other team in the tourney who wasn’t on the field. The place would be packed. They sold beer in 32-ounce plastic cups called “schooners” – you got to keep the cup. Our slo-pitch team – Bruiser included, but not Tversky, who did not play-slo-pitch – made a pyramid of the cups. We impressed ourselves. Bruiser - who did a take-off on wrestler Hulk Hogan’s Hulkamania he called Bruisermania – played pool and flexed around the pool table to the raucous applause of all of us. He’d make a shot, or not, and shout What are you gonna do when Bruisermania runs wild on you? Another slo-pitch team pushed a guy forward. The dude was almost – but not quite – as skinny as Bruiser. The guy leaped on the pool table and ripped his shirt off, challenging Bruiser to a pose-down. Bruiser ripped his shirt off and jumped up there in a non-bodybuilding battle between guys with broomstick bodies and livers under siege. Everyone in the bar was off-their-ass drunk and loud. You could not hear yourself think. About thirty seconds into the pose-down the other guy fell off the pool table and had to be attended to by his friends. Bruiser, claiming victory, repeated his Bruisermania mantra to the crowd, cupped one ear, then the other, hopped off of the pool table, and walked over to the bathroom. He missed the bathroom door and took the exit (the two doors were very close) and then didn’t come back in for fifteen minutes. Someone went out to look for him. He’d passed out sitting on the sidewalk and leaning against the exterior wall of Tee-Jay’s after (evidently) urinating between two parked cars. He was still shirtless. He looked beatific in his slumber. It was just after 4 p.m. I think what I am trying to say is that if Bruiser needs help moving, I am there. II: The Soirée at the Palais The move went easily enough. We had two trucks, Old Betsey and my little black Nissan. Bruiser had, true to his word, bought beverages. We had a six-pack of Molson Canadian Super cans (think Tallboys) and some wine. Cheap wine. I think it was something called Strawberry Angel – but I can’t remember exactly. Unfortunately, there was a map hazard. By map hazard, I mean that my parent’s place was between Bruiser’s old place and his parents. My parents were out of town – Arizona to be specific. In the house I had a bottle of Mescal and a bottle of Peppermint Schnapps. Half-and-half these in a shot glass and you have a shooter called Fire and Ice. The tequila is on top, it goes down like fire, followed by the minty freshness of the schnapps. So, eight kilometers short of Bruiser’s destination I asked if anyone wanted to do some fire and ice shots. No one said they didn’t. A couple of hours in and all of the Schnapps was gone and all of the Mescal save the worm. I cannot explain that. Normally the last shot poured takes the worm, or more likely someone halfway in decides they want it. But there it was. You had to be there. The worm stayed in that bottle for a year until I threw it out. I felt shame. Not enough not to do it, but enough so that I never told anyone about it. I’m older now and don’t give a shit. Drink it or not. my older self would say, no one cares - but back then I felt like I’d failed the test. Tversky said he needed a shower and went to the downstairs bathroom where my parents had installed an over-size shower stall. Bruiser and I sat there at the kitchen table, temporarily paralyzed by the Fire and Ice. Hey, he said to me, after a few minutes. I got an idea. Let’s go get some off-sales. By off-sales, he meant buying beer by the case from a hotel bar. It was Sunday, and no liquor stores would be open. This was Alberta in the mid-1980s – all liquor stores were operated by the government and there was no such thing as a 24/7 liquor store. If you wanted anything outside of the Govt’s very specifically set liquor store hours, you had to go get off-sales. I thought this was a very good idea. I was not ready to throw in the towel just yet. It wasn’t even 4 p.m. We went downstairs to check on Tversky. Tversky had passed out in the shower. He was slumped over and still wearing jeans. The hot water had run out, he was lying there in the cold. His pants were wet down to his knees – by some miracle, no water had escaped the shower stall - but his lower legs and feet were still dry. I turned the water off. We tried to get Tversky up. No go. He mumbled something incoherent. It didn’t sound like get me to the hospital, my stomach needs to be pumped or I will die of alcohol poisoning, so we left him. He looked comfortable, to us. Bruiser and I hopped into Old Betsy – the bed still had all of his bed, boxes, and furnishings, and we headed into town to an old hotel called The Palais. The Palais had the cheapest off-sales in town and was the old reliable for Sunday drinkers. When we got there, I couldn’t get my door open. I had suddenly become too drunk to open the door from the inside of the cab. Go figure. I did, however, manage to get my wallet out. I gave Bruiser ten dollars. He left. I didn’t see him for almost half an hour. I think I rested my eyes a little. I am not sure. I remember looking at the door of the Palais – it was still light out – and waiting for it to open and for Bruiser to come out with our off-sales. The driver’s side door opened. There was Bruiser. He’d crawled across the parking lot – with no off-sales in hand – and hoisted himself into the cab via the handle. What happened, I asked him? Where’s our off-sales? Ah fuck, he said. I forgot to order off-sales. Where’s my ten, I asked? Well shit, he said. I walked in and thought I’d just sit down and have a beer. So, I sat down and ordered one. The server brought me my beer, but then, when I reached for it, I fell out of my chair. I could not get up. These two old fuckers in there were laughing at me. Laughing and laughing. I tried to stand back up but couldn’t. They laughed even louder. Finally, I said fuck it and crawled out of the Palais and across the parking lot to here. I guess I left your ten on the table. Beer plus tip. I was quiet for a bit. Steve, he said. What, I said, maybe a little more sharply than I meant to. Ten dollars is ten dollars – and this was mid-80s dollars. It had buying power like you punk-ass pop-metal fans of today can only imagine. Steve, he said again. My knees hurt from the gravel. I mean, they really hurt. I said nothing. He drove me home. When I got out, I asked him what he wanted to do next weekend. While I was getting out, he rested his head on the steering wheel and had a quick micro-nap. I had to ask him twice. With my second query, he snapped to and took a big breath and held it for a second. We’re going to Motley Crüe, he said. III: Motley Crüe The next weekend we piled into my little Nissan with a flat (24) of beer and a 26-ounce bottle of Jack Daniels to go to Motley Crüe. Tversky surprised us. He said that he did not actually enjoy alcohol and was not going to drink. He was just going to smoke weed. More for us, Bruiser and I said at the same time. They have showers at the hotel, I said. You can drink and lie in there as much as you like. They never run out of hot water. Bruiser and I did not actually smoke pot. Neither of us liked it. I think you have to find your vices or let them find you, and that someone else’s vice may not necessarily be yours. No judgments. I also think Tversky was pleased that he’d not have to share. If Tversky had a character defect it was this: He was very strict about getting his fair share. If you ordered pizza, he’d recut it to make sure everyone chipping in got the exact same amount. He’d samurai that pie and if he’d had a laser, he’d have used it to measure. Do you count the pepperonis, I asked him one time? Yes, he said, do you? He had a look about him. I think he’d been shoehorning the odd-number-out pepperonis his own way and he thought I’d caught him. The ride flew by. Tversky was still talking about forming a metal band. He was very animated about it. He’d decided that for their first album cover, he wanted the art to represent him as a demon of sorts, shirtless and muscular in black leather pants with holes slit in the sides, platform boots, and he’d be holding a trident. No bass, I asked? No, he said. I will play bass, but for the album cover I envision – and he held off a little before saying it again – a trident. Yeah, a trident. The Crüe were touring for their Theatre of Pain album, and a band named Autograph was opening for them. Autograph was good, too. We were pumped. We’d booked a hotel – the venue was two-and-a-half hours away from home. Where we’re from the big bands don’t come, so you have to travel if you want to rock. We hit the hotel around 4 p.m. and checked in. Tversky lit up. He really hit it, smoking joint after joint. He’d get down to the cherry and hold it in his roach clip and purse his lips in a particular way to take those last few hits. Hey Tversky I said, you look like a guy blowing a fly. He stopped and gave me some side eye. Fuck off, he said. Keep going, I said, the fly likes it. Let him finish. Be a pro. Don’t think about us watching you, you fly-cock sucker. We had no pretensions about driving to the arena. Bruiser and I walked to a 7-11 across the street from the hotel and got some super big gulps. We went back to the hotel room and drank about a third of the cola and then split the 26 of Jack between us in our Super Big Gulps. Then we walked over to public transit and boarded the train. We were in a good mood. The train was about half people going to the Motley Crüe/Autograph show and half regular citizens who had found themselves in a Twilight Zone episode surrounded by metalheads in black-t-shirts and in various stages of inebriation. I had my best metal tee shirt on. Iron Maiden? No! Motley Crüe? No! Quiet Riot? Good call, but no again. Who then, you ask? I was wearing a Jack Daniels tee shirt. Black with the Jack Daniels label in white. Classic. We loved Jack Daniels. (Well, maybe not Tversky.) All our Metal Gods drank Jack straight from the bottle. David Lee Roth, Nikki Sixx, Kevin DuBrow. DuBrow said he filled his bottle with iced tea. On stage, he said, he was working. Roth said that only punks would do that. We drank ours with coke, and I bought the tee shirt. You can be loyal to a band – and that’s fine. You can be loyal to a genre - and that’s cool. But the bands and the genre are loyal to the deity, and that’s Jack Daniels. Bruiser sloshed his drink to the left and to the right with careless aplomb and was in a general sense, a hazard. Tversky had ceased to speak. I was starting to worry about him. A lady seated across from me looked a little tense. Her lips had compressed into a line so tight she might as well have not had any. I tilted my Super Big Gulp cup towards her, offering her a sip. She looked away, disgusted. I was not offended at all. If I had to guess I’d guess she was around thirty-five years old. I thought she was kind of hot, for an old, angry broad. In another place, at another time, she could have called the cops and had me professionally beaten (this was before the police had tasers) but for now, we were on the Crazy Train, with Mr. Jack Daniels our pilot, and everything was as it should be. Drink up or drink not, my (hot) elderly sister, it’s up to you. This train will roll how it rolls, for now. We got to the arena. It took some coaxing to get Tversky to stand up. He didn’t respond directly to anything we said to him. I think weed was better in those days. It was still illegal, and the stuff that came to our neck of the woods was often cultivated by someone who really cared about it and not a soulless corporation like today. I imagined that Tversky had scored something lovingly grown by some hippie grandmother in British Columbia, where the purest water fell from the sky and the fertilizer was from grass-fed steer manure, manure she’d stolen from some farmer’s pasture by hopping a fence on a moonless night, and that those ingredients, and the pure light of the sun – and her love, too, (yes, her love, don’t say that there isn’t any love in that specific branch of horticulture) – had rendered my boy zonked. We got into the show. I took Tversky to our seats. I actually led him by the hand. At least he was compliant. You know, some people get high and they giggle, others become philosophers. The very worst are seized by some sort of manic anxiety and can be difficult to put up with. Finally, there is the classic stoner. Tversky was of this variety. He was baked and the world was passing by him at light speed and he did not care at all. Whatever it was, it was not his problem. I’m going down to the floor, Bruiser said. He gave me his jacket to hold. I tucked it around Tversky. It was s sheepskin jacket believe it or not. All of us in that arena in denim and leather, with our black t-shirts, and there’s farm-boy Bruiser with his nice sheepskin jacket. The floor is “rush” seating, “rush” meaning there is no assigned seating. It’s folding metal chairs in row after row. Pros: Right in front of that Marshall stack that will elevate your soul and destroy your hearing – and close to any boobies being flashed. Cons, a junkyard of folding metal chairs and rowdies. Rock on Bruiser, I say, and I throw him some horns. He doesn’t hear me, he’s already on his way down. Autograph came on and they were great. Who remembers Turn Up the Radio? I do. Who remembers Blondes in Black Cars? Hell, yes. Nineteen and Nonstop? Yes, yes, yes. My Girlfriend’s Boyfriend Isn’t Me? Autograph felt like autobiography, and Steve Lynch was the best of the underrated guitar gods. Aside: You may have noticed a paucity of female characters in this story. We were for the most part, single. You know how some guys are allergic to cats? Well, some cats are allergic to guys. I think back now and think there was a sort of monastic purity to our lives. Trucks, stereos, metal, and alcohol. There wasn’t room for much else. I think girls understood this instinctively, and generously they made the choice by which we were made single for us. Sue, who I dated irregularly then, I owe you. You had beautiful rock and roll hair when you crimped it and a beautiful speaking voice and I was callow. I was not cool. You deserved better. I hope you found it. Finally: Motley Crüe. Fuck yeah, this is what we came for. Three songs in and Tversky still hasn’t spoken. There is a tug at my arm and there’s a guy in uniform – a St. John’s Ambulance guy. The first aid people. Are you Steve, he says? I am. Your friend Bruiser has been injured. You need to come with me. I look at Tversky. He gives me no sign that he’s heard anything. I followed the St John’s guy who lead me to a little first-aid room. There are multiple St. John’s people in there, in their uniforms with their nice white shirts. There’s Bruiser, hunched over with his arm at an odd angle. I played hockey, I’ve seen this before. I bet it’s a broken collarbone. We think he’s broken his collarbone, says the St, John’s guy. I broke my fucking collarbone, says Bruiser. His eyes are watering. How did this happen, I ask? Some fucking guys pushed me off of a chair, Bruiser says. He says some guys pushed him off of a chair, the St. John Ambulance guy added. Seriously. The St. John’s guy turned to me. You are going to have to take him to emergency. Did you call an ambulance, I asked? Ha! The guy said. We’ll call a cab. Have they played Smoking in the Boy’s Room yet? No, I said, they’ve just started. Good, he says, I want to go out and hear that one when they play it. Then he turned to Bruiser and said, they haven’t played Smoking in the Boy’s Room yet. Bruiser’s eyes were still watering. What, he said? I turned to the St John’s guy. I have to go get our other friend, I said. He’s in a coma. A coma, the St John’s guy asked? I went and got Tversky. I told him what had happened. He looked at me like he was surprised to see me there, at a Motley Crue concert, one that he had driven up to with me, but he got up, handed me Bruiser’s sheepskin coat, and followed me back to the first aid room. With the St. John’s guy’s help, we draped the sheepskin coat over Bruiser’s shaking, bony frame and then followed a different St. John’s guy - The first one was bound and determined to wait for Smoking in the Boy’s Room - down some access corridor into to the bowels of the arena to an exit door. A cab was waiting. The cabbie was an older guy and knew to take us directly to emergency. These metal concerts, he said. They are the worst for this sort of thing. Fights and shit, I asked? No, he said, people getting too drunk and falling down and breaking things. A couple of guys pushed me off of a chair, Bruiser said, between gasps of pain. The cabbie looked at Bruiser via the rear-view mirror and he had the look in his eye you get when you don’t believe a word of what you have just heard. Ah well, the cabbie said. At least it’s not drugs. Overdoses are the worst. Mind you they wouldn’t be calling me for that. For that you get a real ambulance – or a hearse. None of you fellas are high, are you? We’re just drinkers, I said. Bruiser (still gasping) added that we were all just drinkers. Social Drinkers. Heavy social drinkers. Me too, the Cabbie said. Tversky smirked. Hey, he said to the cabbie. What, the cabbie said. Hey, Tversky said again. Hey what, the cabbie said. HEY, Tversky shouted. WHAT, the Cabbie shouted back. Tversky leaned forward, and in a normal inside-speaking voice and with surprising clarity of enunciation (all things considered) asked the cabbie: Have you ever really, really, really had to take a shit and were both scared and excited at the same time? The cabbie laughed. Ah, I thought, Tversky is coming back around. We arrived at emergency. In emergency – which was busy – a doctor came over right away. She was a short, stocky, no-bullshit kind of woman. I could see that right away. When dealing with authority – the police, teachers, doctors, and their kind - I always take a deep breath and remind myself to answer honestly and to remember that whatever it is I am there for, they have seen/heard worse. What happened to you, she asked Bruiser? Basically, some no good fucking cow cunts pushed me off of a chair, Bruiser said. I cringed. She looked directly at me, forcing me to make eye contact even though I tried to avoid it. How much has had to drink tonight, she asked me? A lot, I said. Not that much, Bruiser said. We’re just social drinkers. An aide appeared and Bruiser was put into a wheelchair and wheeled into an examination room. Tversky and I waited. I looked at him – he was still smirking like he had been when the Cabbie brought up drugs and he’d responded with defecation. But whatever he was thinking he wasn’t saying, and he stayed quiet. We sat in silence like an old married couple. It didn’t take too long and Bruiser was pushed back out to us. They’d had to cut his t-shirt off, but they’d set his collarbone and put his arm in a sling and, most thoughtfully, put him in his sheepskin coat. He no longer gasped when he moved and seemed to me to be way better. We called another cab and when it arrived, we piled in and asked to be taken back to our hotel. It wasn’t even 11 p.m. yet. I asked Bruiser how he was feeling and he said great. They’d given him some Percocet for pain and it had kicked in. He said he was ready to party. He told me to look in his coat pocket, he had four more courtesy of the emergency room doctor. Help yourself, he said. I demurred. When we got back to the hotel Tversky finally spoke. I am going to bed, was all that he said. Let’s you and I get a beer, Bruiser said to me. The hotel had a club and we could hear the music thumping. We went to walk in but two bouncers stopped us. Five-foot eight-inch fucksticks in yellow polos with crew cuts and the confidence of law-enforcement students who had been lifting weights for two months and had discovered Dianabol at the same time, but separately, and had not told each other about it, each convinced he was superior to the other. You can’t get in wearing biker regalia, they said to me. I was wearing that Jack Daniels t-shirt. The black shirt with the label in white. That one. It’s a Jack Daniels t-shirt, I said. Sorry, no biker regalia, they said. Can I get in, Bruiser asked? Yep, they said, without hesitation. He doesn’t even have a shirt on, I said. The one bouncer spoke directly to Bruiser. You are welcome but your friend can’t come, he said. Fortunately, the hotel had a lounge and we got in with no problem and sat there and had a beer surrounded by old people and tired travelers. You know, Bruiser, I said, would you recognize the guys that pushed you? I had begun to formulate some plan for vengeance. Not that real vengeance was likely, but it felt good to think about. In the plans for imaginary revenge, we are all ninjas. Nah, said Bruiser, probably not. I never saw who did it. It felt like I was pushed from behind. Did you fall, I asked? I would never fall, he said, offended. I had to have been pushed. We called it a night and went back to the room. The next morning on the way back a much-refreshed Tversky told us about his plans to start his own metal band, and about the album cover he wanted to see where he was a shirtless, leather-pant-covered demon in platform boots holding a trident. Bruiser and I looked at each other. Apparently, Tversky had forgotten about telling us this yesterday, on the ride up. Yeah, Bruiser said. A trident. We all agreed that it would be cool.

THE MALL OF MEN She chooses men the same way you’d pick a detergent bar or a cereal box at a hyperstore Carefully; after looking at the expiry date manufacturing details, ingredients, trademark, et cetera (At best, we are museum exhibits or broken seats of the last matinee) Her aching prurience sways under the glib talk of poetry While she measures our frame on the totem pole of her abstinence Our libido must equal her void Our despair must average her thirst for bestial lunacy Our rough skin must hold the salt of her childhood Our torsos must resemble dim hotel rooms or borrowed flats (Because she has stayed in seven stars with her husband) Our tongues must carry her bittersweet words So, when we sweat above her she can taste herself, more Her trained irises hunger-spot us for signs of buried trauma That way, we could be cold-pressed for character arcs first and then smoothly molten into stories The acid of our triggered abuse could be used for quick exits Someday, We could become poems too So, she can read the in-between of our giving breaths, in festivals far and near, like a lost huntress while tasting our blood, forever unpublished. EXTRA MARITAL We have an extra-marital affair - with time Standing at the door with bags packed ready to move out At the slightest hint of infidelity, ignorance or negligence Time claims everything when it leaves - The past sharing of rooms, kisses and windows pasted with evening skies The earth of our souls and quantum of every journey The stories we kept repeating and the ones we couldn’t tell It takes too much when it leaves you for someone else And worse, for nothing but itself It’s painful to let time depart So, we write and rewrite our lives with the desperation of a thousand atoms Hoping that time understands our honesty waits for some more time a day or two calling it true love Sanket Mhatre has been featured at Kala Ghoda Arts Festival, Jaipur Literature Festival and Glass House Poetry Festival. His first book of cross-translated poems, The Coordinates Of Us won the prestigious Raza Foundation Grant after been shortlisted at IWrite2020 at Jaipur Literature Festival. Sanket’s poems have appeared in multiple anthologies such as Shape Of A Poem, The Well Earned, Home Anthology by Brown Critique, Poetry Conclave Yearbook as well as literary magazines such as Punch, Borderless, Muse India, Madras Courier, The Usawa Literary Review, Men Matters Online, Anthology by Querencia Press and many others.

From the diary of Cassandra Austen, sister of Jane Austen I have a choice, one which I fear may attract some consternation and regret. Circumstances dictate that I must make a decision soon, as time pushes me on like an angry mother lamenting filial disobedience. I have in my possession many letters written in your fair hand; my dear, departed sister. They hold within them much that is secret; secret and steeped in venom, the venomous barbs with which only you knew how to pierce. You were private, and you confided in me many things too dreadful to see the light of day. You were not in the habit of withholding your scathing understanding of the very darkest edges of the human condition. And as I walk through the winter of my life, I fear that there will come a day when the world seeks to know what was hidden in the private chambers of your heart. But what right do they have to speak of your heart? What claim can they make upon your laughter and your tears? You and I shared more than your novels, more than your stories and your imaginings. You let me in, utterly, and between us we made a pair, which some struggled to tell apart. I was always there, the useful sister, bidden to a bedchamber of childbirth, chained to the scrubbings of a dirty floor. And I was content to do it, to be the ‘sensible and pleasing Cassandra’, my head always ‘full of joints of mutton and doses of rhubarb’, so that you might be everything that your talent would create. You called me a phoenix once, and I have kept that image close to my heart, even now, after all of these years. I am old, and increasingly of little good to anyone, but I remember what you said, and I sincerely hope that there will be another rising once all is sunk into the ashes. Not for myself, but for you, dear sister. For you and your blessed children; the brilliant works you left behind. It has been my privilege to care for them and help them to their proper place, and now I am tired. I busy myself in my garden and I knit calmly by the fire, but I am lonely. All have left me, and I am burdened with the oppressive hours of a life now spent in painful isolation. I find the hours have leant me great means of reflecting on your words, and I imagine how others may feel and judge without understanding the real nature of who you were. Your tongue and your talent were tied together; one did not exist without the other, though I fear this will not be recognised if your ungenteel utterances are laid bare. I feel honour bound to protect you as I prepare to follow you into the unknown; to follow you as you once followed me to school, because you could not bear to be separated. You have been gone these many years, but I love you still, and I know in my heart what I must do. This will hurt me, but it will hurt you more if I do not act. I have given them pieces, but the masterpiece that was the true Jane Austen shall remain with me. I have shared your work, but I will not share you. I will commit your letters to the flames. I have made my choice. I had truthfully made it before I even took up my quill, and I take this action now, not out of pride, or selfishness, or jealousy. My dearest Jane, forgive me. This is an act of love. Esther Byrne is a writer from Yorkshire, UK. She has had short stories published with fiftywordstories.com, Toasted Cheese and Secret Attic. In 2021, she was runner-up for the Val Wood Yorkshire prize. She lives with chronic illness and is passionate about encouraging people with disabilities to express themselves creatively. You can see more of her work at estherbyrne.com.

She liked doing it to music. It relaxed her, she said, helped her focus. “On what?” I asked. “The situation,” she said. The niche between her fingers looked like it was missing a cigarette. *** “I’m not a performer.” “I can tell.” She reached for her phone. The side of her face changed color as she scrolled. “You don’t feel like you’re onstage? Exposed?” “Isn’t that the point?” She laughed as her eyebrows turned orange. *** “What about an instrumental? No words—just atmosphere.” She turned her phone so I could see. I squinted at the display and shook my head. “I have awful associations with that album. With everything she’s done, actually.” “But she’s just playing piano. You don’t even hear her voice.” “Doesn’t matter. It’s still her.” She crossed her legs and sat up. The side of her shirt rippled over a wedge of skin. *** “Did you know singers save their voices sometimes? Like if you go to a matinee, the leads will be onstage, walking around and doing all the poses and gestures. But someone else sings their part from offstage?” She nodded. “I didn’t know that.” Her eyes traced the crawl of text near her feet. “Of course they try to hide it. When we went for school, the singer was in the pit. You couldn’t see him or his microphone, or the stand he was using to turn pages. But once you know, you know.” She typed something and set the phone down. “I never liked theater after that.” “That’s understandable I guess,” she said. *** The traffic outside bore with it a song that for months had been inescapable. It was playing in the café where we had agreed to meet. I watched her from the table where I sat, early for once. She glanced from booth to booth as her mouth moved around the words of the chorus. *** “I’m sorry,” I said. “It’s just—” Her phone chirped and trembled, then came to rest. Its silver edge formed a perfect parallel with the nightstand’s edge. She ignored the noise and uncrossed her legs. The room around us receded into vague shapes. I could see her eyes roving the wall opposite from behind a scrim of hair. “Your eyes are green,” I said. We both liked doing it in the dark.

We talk a lot about process—not outcome—and trying to consistently take all the best information you can and consistently make good decisions. Sometimes they work and sometimes they don't . . ." --Sam Hinkie, General Manager of the Philadelphia 76ers, 2013 Concession Fighting his way from the concession stand, Josh saw her pass. He stopped, turned, unthinkingly called out: “Liza!”—the woman he still thought of as the future mother of his kids. Boys. Two of them. Sixers faithful all the way. She looked good, and he said so. Could he see her again? Next Saturday? There was this awesome new sports bar in Manayunk. Turned out she was quite busy—would be, in fact, for the foreseeable future. He did his best to insist. “Josh.” She cocked a hip. “No offense, but you are the spitting image of a first-round exit.” He winced as if struck. “It’s splitting.” “What?” “Splitting image.” A lanky teen in an Embiid jersey preened by, saying, “Dude, you couldn’t be more wrong,” before bouncing with friends up the concourse ramp. Liza smirked. Josh looked down to see his Yuengling had already lost its head. “Fair enough,” he said, his words mostly trounced by the announcer’s rousing call for the crowd to stand for the anthem. “I’ll give you—” She rejected his response with a hand. “Whatever you have you can keep.” Someone bumped him from behind, and beer splashed upon his Nikes. Defeated, he tried to take solace in the sight of her walking away. Those crazy thin heels, that flimsy crimson blouse, the tight white leather pants. So hot. The colors, in fact, of the Heat. And still, despite this evening’s outcome, he held out hope that they might someday be a team. Obsession Beads of sweat were leaving streaks in the white paint around his temples. Davey hadn’t anticipated the heat of the Wells Fargo Center lights. And the rage radiating off his wife certainly didn’t help. “Of course I care, honey. I—excuse me,” he said, rising with his fellow die-hards. “What are you doing! Get after it or get gone!” he shouted as the Sixers played catch around the perimeter. “Yeah, get after it!” A nearby dad of two mimicked, winking in Davey’s direction. “See, he understands!” Davey threw arms in the direction of the man so hard that the faux red mullet almost slid off his head. The section cheered in agreement. “Hit me up at the half, man. We’ll get a pic for the gram.” “Hell yeah!” The man gave his eldest an exuberant high-five. Davey sat back down. In tears, his wife asked, “Are you serious?” “I know it’s not easy being married to the Sixers Superfan, but we wouldn’t be able to pay for your hormones without it.” He rubbed her arm. “Let’s make a TikTok. It’ll cheer you up.” She pulled her arm away. “Hardly feels worth it. Not like you’d be around.” Davey watched her watch the clock run down to zero. Already down by sixteen points, catching up for the Sixers would be as difficult as this damn IVF. Or getting back into his wife’s good graces. Regression The sound of his father’s hand hitting his own was so loud that it drew the attention of the fans heading for the stairs for a stretch and snack. “I can’t believe it!” his father shouted. From his seat, Knox could see the slot in his mouth where a missing premolar should be, ejected by an elbow in a pickup game of hoops during the old man’s “glory days.” It reminded Knox of Ricky Sheetz when he got his tooth knocked out during an after-recess scuffle. He rolled his eyes. “It’s not that big a deal, Dad.” “Not a—are you kidding? The OG superfan is a legend, and he wants to take a picture with us? It’s the epitome of cool. Can’t wait to tell the boys.” He stared into his phone, not noticing how his son winced at his embarrassing use of slang. Knox pulled the plate of nachos off of his father’s lap to avoid spillage. Things had been different when his father first brought him and his brother Michael before the pandemic. It was a fun family outing, picturesque in its wholesomeness. After two years of watching reruns of games from afar, however, his father seemed to have forgotten how to behave. “Suck my farts!” his father shouted as the second half began. Knox snapped back to reality in time to see the Heat’s point guard bounce one off the side of the backboard. His father went berserk, fumbling his beer into the aisle after making a particularly rude gesture in mockery of the miss. At this rate, Knox thought, pulling down the brim of his cap, he’d have to drive them home. Suppression Sasha’s stomach dropped through her seat as the ball clunked off the rim. “It’s okay,” she said, clapping politely. “We still have time.” Anton looked at her. “You’re more optimistic than me, baby girl.” “I just think we should give them the benefit of the clock. Miracles do happen.” And she believed that. At least, she wanted to. It felt so good to be back watching sports in real time again. She was already dreading the long, lonely summer. What was she going to do? Watch baseball while eating overstuffed, juice-leaking brats? No way. Basketball season couldn’t be coming to a close already! The Sixers could still turn it around and win it all. They had before, although not in many years. There was Wilt in ’67. Dr. J. and Moses in ’83, over the Showtime Lakers no less. And in 2001, with Iverson—The Answer—well, second place was still a tremendous achievement. “It’s not all about miracles, you know. It’s about hard work…” Sasha didn’t know if Anton was being sarcastic as usual or sincere, so she ignored him. Besides, it’s not like she wasn’t trying. Intimacy was a process. It took time, not unlike confidence in the home team’s ability to get the job done. It could be frustrating, downright discouraging, but that’s what made it all worthwhile in the end. Anton of all people should get that. It’s not like he was sinking emotional baskets left and right. “I know you think I’m crazy,” she said, patting his knee, “but we’re due for a championship. It’s the law of large numbers or statistics or whatever. We’ve been losing for so long, something’s got to give. Right?” “I suppose.” She locked eyes with him. “It’s called believing,” she said, leaning over to kiss him on the temple. Digression He stepped back to the charity stripe, received the bounce pass from the referee. The first attempt had been an air ball. Behind the stanchion, fans turned rabid. Merciless. Online, they’d been going on about his game. His free throw troubles. His three-point percentage. His inept passing. His Swiss cheese D. Someone said something nasty about the Insta babe he’d dated for a week. He dribbled three times, bent his knees, saw a cut out of his face bouncing directly in his line of vision. After all, the stakes were mighty high. If he missed this second shot, the fans would win some shitty fast food. His release was flawed, and the ball grazed the front of the rim. The fans went mad. It was as if they’d won it all. Laughing, he backpedaled down the court. Let them have their victory feast. All that mattered was taking the home team down. Expulsion Even before the Beard jab stepped and shot a brick, it slipped out—effortlessly, as if it had come from his father’s mouth. Cameron winced, knowing what came next. “What did you just say?” His mother towered over him, eyes brighter than the white trim of her Sixers jersey. His father turned, soft pretzel crumbs still in his beard. “Did you hear what your son just said?” Cameron pulled the neck of his sweatshirt over his nose as his mom cupped her hands around her mouth. His father tried to hide his smile. “Oh no,” he said, “whatever shall we do?” “He’s only fourteen.” “He’s becoming a man!” Relief flooded Cameron. Dependable Dad. His mother spat, “That’s it? He just gets a pass? What about next time? What about shit or damn or twat!” “Calm down.” “You did not just tell me to calm down!” she shouted, before letting out a streak of profanity so startling, nearby parents kept their children’s ears covered long after the security guard ushered Cameron and his parents out of the arena. Concussion Their power forward went down. Blow to the head. Time was called, and referees gathered at the monitor. Miami’s coach approached, foaming at the mouth. He seemed completely unhinged. Flagrant one? Two? Was one of the game’s brightest stars going to get tossed? Slouched in a seat a friend couldn’t use, Octavius thought of all the blows he’d received in recent months. Elsewhere, striding, head and shoulders bobbing in the distance, was the MVP Octavius, the one who always won when it mattered. The one who would have not only been able to get that Boeing job, but also would have been able to keep it. To rise in the ranks. Players milled around the court, waiting for the verdict. The sad fact was he did not ask to be an Octavius. Normal people made lists, tried to find common ground. They considered current trends. His parents must have been seriously impaired. Drink, drugs, a fetish for ancient Rome. What the hell was with them? My God, if his parents were so keen on having an emperor, why not Julius? As Philly fans, wasn’t that the most obvious choice in the world? How different school would have been. Kids would have taken to calling him The Doctor. Dr. J. He would have cultivated this mystique, this air of grace and cool when the heat was on. He saw himself soaring now, pedaling his feet, extending his arm for a highlight reel dunk. Cameras flashing. The crowd going wild. Quickly—too quickly—he came back down to earth, reality as painful as a high ankle sprain. The truth was, whatever his name, school would still have been a disaster. Because there were winners and losers and although the NBA probably was not fixed, life almost surely was. When alone—when free from all the bullies—he could be man enough to accept this unfortunate truth. Perhaps later, if it was not too late, he’d call his parents and confront them about the name at last. Perhaps it would free him from the him he was right now. Through some miracle or another, he could be if not that MVP self then at least a key player with some useful, specialized skill. He nodded, conjuring an image of himself, feet planted just outside the restricted circle, smiling, stone still, waiting for the blow that would come with the charge. Depression Danny, Matt’s on-again off-again friend since first grade, said, “Grief is a process.” “I’m going to ask you kindly to fuck your motherfucking process.” Danny shrugged. “Hey, it’s not mine. It’s that one psychologist. Keebler something?” “What? The elf?” “Huh?” “You know—the stupid cookie guy.” “No, no, it’s Kubler. That’s right. Kubler…Ross!” At the light, Matt asked, “What the hell were we talking about?” “Sara. Your daughter’s not dead, but losing custody has got to be the next worse thing. There are steps you need to go through in order to heal.” “I’ll buy your beers if you’ll shut the hell up.” “See. That’s one of them—the steps. Bargaining.” “Enough!” “And there’s Anger.” “Does it count if it’s aimed entirely at you?” They pulled into Tom & Jerry’s for their traditional post-game nightcap. Inside, it was loud, Blaze of Glory just starting their second set. Matt drank in silence, brooding over the sad state of affairs. He was embarrassed by how many Bon Jovi lyrics came so readily to his lips. “Don’t worry, bro,” Danny screamed in his ear. “We’ll get ’em next year.” “Yes—of course.” Matt downed his beer, unable to keep from thinking about The Process—the bloated contracts, the piss-poor fits, the top picks who couldn’t shoot to save their lives. “Christ,” he shouted, “they could have done better by drafting out of a hat!” “Now you’re back at anger. Think that means you lose your turn.” On stage, the singer was living on a major off-key prayer. Still, Tommy and Gina were going to make it. “Let’s do shots,” Danny screamed. Shots. Matt had taken a few and missed them all quite badly. Now, all he had to look forward to was a weekend with his daughter twice a month. Decompression At the kitchen table, Josh poured another. Why did his steak look so suddenly sickly in its roll? He took a bite—cheesy, greasy glue. Checked his messages. No Liza. No surprise. Clicked game highlights on the phone: a pretty floater here, a poster dunk there. A role player sealing the win with a parking lot trey, adding insult to injury by making goggles with fingers and thumbs all the way down the court. Josh swiped greasy lips with a sleeve. Life was sad—the loss of Liza was ample proof of that. But, ever the optimist, he was determined to find solace once again. He sat back, breathed in and out, in and out. Closed his eyes, conjured up a celebration: shower of confetti, tears of joy, the foamy spray of champagne. In the end, someone was going to have what it took to win the whole damn thing. To be number one. And that, he allowed, would have to be more than enough. Jillian S. Benedict is a creative writer living in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. In her free time she enjoys yoga, reading, and listening to music while people watching from her stoop. Her work can be found in Feels Blind Literary, Schuylkill Valley Journal, and on instagram @writerwithoutacause. Michael Cocchiarale's work has appeared in online journals such as Fictive Dream, The Journal of Compressed Creative Arts, South Florida Poetry Journal, The Disappointed Housewife, and Roi Fainéant.

Hel is perched in the large bay window of Hemlock Tattoo Removal. Her serpentine tail curls around her, flicking in time with the sound of distant thunder. She cleans her front paw with a sandpaper tongue, lulled by the storm outside. Her owners move about the shop, readying for the day’s appointments. All three beings are unaware of Hel’s impending death. Mimicking her Norse namesake, the fur on Hel’s face is split between creamy orange and obsidian black. Her eyes are similarly mismatched, golden-yellow on one side and piercing blue on the other. Her owners often joke that she’s two cats in one body, either bounding with lively mischief or lounging in subdued repose. Currently, she’s chosen to engage in the latter. Hel stops cleaning her paw and flops onto her side, her back to the window. She stretches in feline satisfaction, readying herself for her morning nap. She’s soothed by the sound of rain pattering the glass. Her eyes drift closed. A BANG reverberates against the window. Hel leaps from the ledge, scurrying behind the reception desk. Her owners jump, their preparations briefly halted. The woman walks to the front of the shop, cautiously peering out the rain-streaked glass. She gasps softly. “It’s a bird...” “Seriously?” Her husband moves to join her at the window. “Yea, look.” She points to the sidewalk. A large black crow lays on its back, wings splayed. “Is it alive?” “I don’t-” The bird twitches, then flutters to its feet. “Huh, must be disoriented from the storm.” The crow looks around, then flaps its wings and flies out of sight. The woman shakes her head. “Weird.” After a moment, they both return to their morning activities. Hel peers out from behind the reception desk, eyeing the window suspiciously. Her ears perk up when she senses movement along the far wall. A needle-like tail flits out from beneath the radiator as a creature darts amongst the shadows. Forgetting her fright, Hel crouches low and slinks slowly around the corner of the desk. A small black mouse with fiery red eyes pokes its head into the light, whiskers twitching. Hel stops just beyond the desk, plotting her approach. Before she can move, the mouse darts beneath the radiator again, disappearing into a hole in the floor. It’s a dissatisfying start to the day, but Hel is undeterred. She leaps to the top of the desk and finds a comfortable position in a basket of papers, where she finally naps. The rest of the morning passes in a blur of soggy people and buzzing machines, all relatively typical for Hel. She’s sleeping on the lobby sofa when one of her humans returns with a paper bag clutched to his chest. He deposits the bag on the reception desk before walking towards the treatment rooms in the back. “Anna!” he calls. “Lunch time!” There’s a sound of a reply, but Hel doesn’t hear it. She’s already trotting silently towards the desk, following the scent of fried chicken. Once at the bag, Hel spots the tip of a golden-brown wing. Without hesitation, she lunges, sinking her teeth into the warm, crispy flesh. She draws back, pulling the wing with her, but it’s bigger than she anticipated. The wing catches, causing the bag and its contents to topple toward her. “Hel, no!” her human calls from the doorway. He starts towards her and Hel leaps from the desk. There’s a loud SQUEAK as his wet shoes slip and he falls backward. Hel’s other human steps out from an adjacent room. “What-” She trips over her prone husband, causing the stack of files she’s carrying to fly forward. Hel drops her prize and scampers away, narrowly avoiding being crushed as the stack crashes down onto the stolen chicken wing. Hel freezes, watching her groaning heap of humans. Her eyes flash to the pile of folders and papers that now harbor her fried loot. As she contemplates her second robbery attempt, the small black mouse with red eyes skitters across the floor in front of her. Hel doesn’t hesitate. The mouse screeches and zigzags between the toppled folders. Hel’s paws slip on the spilled pages, but her eyes remain fixed on the demonic rodent. Hel’s humans are still trying to right themselves when the mouse scurries through a gap in their legs. Hel bounds over the pile of limbs and tears after her prey. “Hel!” the woman calls, but Hel is already gone, chasing the mouse down the corridor. The mouse turns abruptly into a side room and Hel follows without missing a step. Backed into a corner, the mouse tries clambering up the wall. Hel slows, stalking forward on liquid limbs. The mouse turns, eyes and head darting. Hel pauses for an instant then pounces. Instead of running away from her, the mouse leaps with one final screech and latches onto Hel’s leg. There’s a burning sensation and Hel yowls in pain. She crumples into the corner and instinctively bites at the mouse, ripping it from her flesh. She tastes blood. It should be sweet and metallic, but Hel only tastes foul sulfur. She drops her prey, retching in vain as the blood slides down her throat. Hel’s throat is closing. Her little heart races as her lungs starve for air. She collapses, wheezing and twitching until her small body can fight no longer. This is how Hel dies. “Hel?” a woman’s voice calls from the corridor. Hel is dead so she doesn’t hear. “Hel?” a man’s voice this time. Silence echoes in response. “Where’d you get to?” Hel’s eyes flash open, revealing fiery red irises. She shudders and blinks slowly. There is no rise and fall of her small chest, but there’s a hunger deep in her belly. “Hel? Come on out sweetie.” This time Hel hears, and her hunger roars. M. Rose Seaboldt (she/her) obtained her engineering degrees so she could study structures and fire science. She writes so she can explore characters and the trials they endure. Find her on Twitter @boldtsea.

Shoveling Out Dust haloed, scratcheyed, kneedeep in grain, we shovel toward the buried shriek of the auger. Our masks press sharply into our tear ducts as we slowly heave forward, exposing the rough concrete you laid the summer that boy beat up your brother and you got suspended for threatening him on his home answering machine. You spent June helping Grandma fix fence, haul hay, dig, mow, and sweep, walking the pasture out back, becoming patience in the empty, finding a milkweed there, bursting loose, unable to contain its own entropy, and knowing the warning of that. When we slow up, exposing the drill, the grain bin rings with mechanical crows, and, as we snort, scratch, and tumble out, wheat pours from our shoes like old blessings. Cemetery Mower after Ted Kooser The sun rose up at 6:15 today. I’d already primed the mower by then, drank half my coffee, the painted glaze chipped into my mouth as I rolled out of my truck. I spit & cough the night’s bad humors away. The clients don’t seem to mind. They don’t pay me to pull away the bindweed from iron crosses, to wipe bird scat from the gazebo railing. Nope, just to mow, shearing the grass with the loud metal teeth, the petroleum breath and oil sweat rising acrid above the many dead and the one living. Wind sprays the coarse irritant grass on my legs and I hesitate to pinch a dusty snot bubble out from under my nose, afraid I’ll only make my upper lip dirtier. No one is here to judge me, and I try to do the same, but when a stone catches my eye and I notice how small the years are between dates, I wonder why. I always wonder, when the granite reads “Our Angel” or the ceramic photo looks too damn young. A boy’s Senior photo catches me cold and I nearly crash into his grandmother, the mower’s deck grazing her stone like an eager calf nicking fingers held through a fence. This is the only red prairie grass I cut, all of it too close to the names. I course correct and return to my duty, the only one here who can’t yet escape their shame.

yes, i’m the heat of a promise of snow. my friends think i’m a Vegetarian, so i lie and say i am. if only i could have black sunglasses, cross my knees and stare into a horrifying use of contrast (white jackets mean a blizzard for sure). i don’t even drink hot, so what difference will it make? still, i keep putting off roasting some heavy meat, watching air run off—an inverse precipitation. pick me, the slight jostle of a woman getting shit done. my nose is running, but—validation for validation! eating gummies is the closest i can get to ham: touch my neck please. i’m not needy! i’m a Vegetarian; i’ve got something for patience. Aaliyah Anderson (she/her) is a junior majoring in Literary Arts at her high school in Petersburg, VA. She's obsessed with storytelling.