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“I heard she ran off with that boyfriend of hers,” I overheard from Ms. Avery as I tried to
get lost in the crowd. “You bet,” she said in response to some mumbling from Mrs. Jorge, “heard it from Jim Francois’ dad.” “Poor Jim,” Mrs. Jorge shook her head. “That boy is good for this town; too good to be have been pining over a girl like that.” “Now that she’s left maybe he’ll get his priorities straight.” I lost the conversation as others filled in the growing space between us; their words overtaken by the hundred others speaking around me. From above, the crowd must have looked like a flock of starlings. There were groups of people talking among themselves, but no group lasted more than ten or fifteen minutes before merging and morphing with a new group and eventually splitting into new circles of gossip. The movement was sustained by the need for everyone to make sure that everyone else knew they were there; lots of big waves across the crowd and “Oh, I just knew I’d find you here!” I finally found Cheryl; a stationary point amid the ever-flowing crowd. She was wearing an old pair of ripped jeans; they could have started blue or black but only she would ever know. Now, they were grey-white and nearing shapelessness. Despite the heat, she had on a thick black hoodie. There was a hole in the shoulder where she had ripped off whatever branding the sweater had. She stood out from the others in the crowd, if not for her clothes, then for her porcelain skin. Everyone else was varying shades of orange or brown, brought on by the dry August sun. I walked up to her without saying a word and gave her a reassuring squeeze on her forearm. She responded by nudging her shoulder into my chest. Mother orders a martini. It’s her third, but the flight attendant doesn’t know that. Before we
boarded the plane, she downed two in the gaudy airport bar. She crushes the olive between her teeth, which she never does because she hates olives. So, because she’s eating it, I know what that means. I tap the back of her free hand. “Rome wasn’t built in a day.” She’s dabbing the corners of her mouth with a napkin. “I’m sure those builders needed a drink every now and again.” Around us, everyone is settled in. The engines’ constant low humming is the only sound. I have the aisle seat, so I can see the bored, empty faces of the other passengers; some read, some type away on laptop keyboards, and some have headphones in while a film plays on the screens fixed into the back of the seats. A few just enjoy the view out the window. It bothers me how Mother always wants the window seat, but never looks out of it. What a waste. I crane my neck to see over her clumsy hands—the thin layer of clouds veiling some rural part of southern Ireland, the sun hanging above us like an ornament, the horizon slicing through the haze. While I’m focused on the view outside, Mother orders another martini. “Less ice this time,” she tells the flight attendant, who obliges with a curt nod. I give Mother a look. She returns it, and for a moment we’re just staring at each other. “Oh, my god, Millie. I’m not getting sloshed. Just a couple drinks. Why are you always on my back?” Jason ambled up the trail with his brother Marc. While Marc led the way, Jason lagged behind.
With each step, his boots squeaked on the damp spring grass. Windflowers and sprouting ferns encircled him with trees that had begun to bud, casting dappled morning sunlight through the forest canopy. The air was cool and crisp. A slight breeze ruffled his hair, carrying the freshness of blooming flowers. It whispered tranquility to his soul. Jason closed his eyes and took a deep breath, savoring the freshness that filled his lungs. I can’t believe it’s been so long, Jason thought as his childhood memory of walking on this trail with his siblings struck him. “Come on! We don’t have all day!” Marc hollered, looking back at him. “Would you cut me some slack? I’m doing my best,” Jason said. Marc chuckled as he watched Jason struggling to keep up. “Looks like you gotta stay a few more days to let the country air detox your body.” “Even if I wanted to, I couldn’t.” Jason huffed. “There’s a couple dozen clients waiting for me back in the city, and I’m the only one who can—” “Please, don’t start with your banker stuff again. Can’t you take just one week off… for old time’s sake?” My sister’s hair, honeyed from the hair salon, fell between us. The tips of it brushed the
menu we shared. We sat side by side since the booths were comically huge, like everything else at The Cheesecake Factory in Pasadena. I almost tucked her hair behind her ear, my older-sister instincts rearing up even though we weren’t kids anymore and hadn’t been close for years. Her lunch invitation hadn’t been unexpected. It was the summer of 2007. I’d traveled from Florida where I was in graduate school to our home state of California to be the maid of honor in her wedding. The event was three days away and there was so much left to do. Tanning bed appointments, mani-pedis, a champagne brunch, bridesmaid dramas I’d been tasked with diffusing via flip phone, eyebrows to be waxed into thin perfect lines. After we ordered our salads, I thought we would talk about those things. Instead, she stared straight ahead out a picture window that faced onto Colorado Boulevard and roped me into helping her reconstruct the plot of One Magic Christmas. It was her favorite holiday movie as a kid. A father shot to death on Christmas Eve. His children driven off a bridge into an icy river. A mother grieves. The angel Gideon appears. “I need to tell you something,” she said after the waiter left our salads. I perked up, wondering if it had something to do with her fiancée. His favorite things were green smoothies and making fun of ugly people and he always pointed out when my sister had seconds. I put down my fork, hoping for a called-off wedding. She was a quietly intelligent nursing student. A hot girl who had been getting into Jesus. She was only twenty-two. Women keep secrets all the time. It was my mom who taught me to keep my secrets. She believed we
women were meant to swallow our pain, our questions, our discomfort for men, for anyone really. When I would ask her why she would answer, “That’s just the way things are.” She felt pride about how well she could keep her secrets of unhappiness. But the truth was, it was no secret. It was written all over her face, in her tone, in her living. The only ones oblivious are ourselves. I have secrets of how I lost my virginity. There was coaxing, manipulation, and the giving of Xanax to help keep me quiet. Most of my sexual relationships have been pills to swallow, both literally and metaphorically. Lies, abuse, and manipulation from boys led to the constant stream of pill-taking, to normalize all the things I had to keep secret. Friends would talk about their first times, and I would make up some story so as not to get asked, “Are you okay?” I had no idea if I was okay, which is what the pills and all the drinking were for. I didn’t want the question in the room, so I made up a normal story, a story anyone could believe. Shame comes with secrets, and eventually, shame eats us all whole. You start to feel disgusting that you have things to hide. Not because you did anything wrong, but because they happened and you regret them, hoping they would go away forever. –––– The room was tiny. $975 a month, and yet my suitcase just barely fit into the open patch of floor
between the bed and the desk. Jumbles of my clothing covered every available surface, half sorted into piles. It was small, but it was home. Or rather, it was going to be. Despite the muggy heat of the Toronto summer, the first thing I had done upon entering the room was rush to the window. Cracking it open, I was accosted by the clamor of the city. Car horns honked, and street cars rattled. People in expensive suits scuttled below me, eyes scanning their phones, hands clutching their lattes. The skyscrapers across the street appraised me from beneath scrunched eyebrows, their roofs stretching up to touch the cerulean sky. Climate-controlled air rushed out and in crept the smell of grease from the corner hotdog stand, woven together with the nauseating stench of the subway. It was all so overwhelming. So loud. So foreign. What an adventure I told myself, pausing to look in the closet mirror and bare my teeth like a used car salesman. Liberty emerged from the ocean, flicked the deliciously salty sea off her eyes and thought: don’t
be scared. Two more days only. She turned to the beach. On the golden sand, the umbrellas looked like smarties on cookie dough, baked by the shining sun. I am not going to get stuck on this island, she reassured herself: I am not. I am going back home. The sea water, cool and transparent like liquid aquamarine, glazed her temples. She shivered. Nothing good came out of that island. It was a cruel island. You could not stay on that island. There was no work, no money, no legacy, on that island, where one struggled, died and was forgotten. That was the destiny of all the people she had ever met until the day she had left for the Mainland. It had been her mother’s destiny too. Why she had returned for the first time in ten years for that weekend, after she had denied her roots for a decade, she didn’t know. To show her native land how well she had escaped Her? How she had succeeded outside her domain and got her college degrees, life experiences, friends; her new house, her office in a skyscraper, her husband to be? She smiled, admiring the diamond on her ring finger. The plane tickets had been mysteriously cheap. The idea of going back to her hometown had made her feel uneasy, but she had convinced herself: three days only. Three days of sun, tasty food and relaxation: the only good things that land could offer a human being. If she wasn’t there to show off her new life to the island that had imprisoned her for almost two decades, she realized, then she was there for the short vacation she needed after all the hard work she had put in her job that year. A fresh breeze hit her face, awaking her from her stream of thoughts, and cooled the water around her. Liberty frowned. The mistral had left the island the night before: it never returned so quickly. She shivered again. She set her eyes on the sunbaked shore and pushed forward. Content Warning: This short story includes scenes of bullying, violence, and slight gore
The stone hit Ava in the back of the head. She stumbled and fell, spilling her schoolbooks out of her arms and onto the dirt road in front of her. Gravel dug into her palms as she threw out her hands to break her fall. Her knees skidded painfully across the ground. “Have a nice trip!” a boy’s voice called out from behind her, to a chorus of laughter. “See you next fall!” Ava brushed her long, black hair out of her face. She was hollow-boned and delicate, looking far younger than her 11 years. Her dark eyes welled with tears. She quickly wiped them away with the frayed cuff of her sweater. A chilly autumn wind blew across the Kansas field, causing the corn stalks lining the road to whisper in the breeze. Somewhere in the distance, faint and far away, a gas-powered tractor growled. It was probably from Mr. Conklin’s farm – he was the only farmer in the area who was wealthy enough to own a tractor – but it didn’t matter. He wasn’t close enough to help her. Nobody was. She was on her own. A group of kids about her age, two girls and a boy, ran past her. One of the girls stuck out her tongue. The other laughed. Their shoes kicked up clouds of dust into Ava’s face as they passed. The girls were sisters, Sarah and Beth Winters. They were pretty and clean, with crisp red bows tied in their flaxen hair. They were the kinds of girls who had everything they needed and got everything they wanted; they never had to ask for anything twice. They wore matching blue dresses with warm red sweaters that looked like they were bought from a department store. Not handmade, like Ava’s shapeless brown smock. They weren’t twins – Sarah was two years older than Beth – but they were inseparable. Even now, they held hands as they skipped away into the distance. Ava hated them both, equally. Trigger Warning: Eating Disorder
Summer stared at the plate of food in front of her, attempting to swallow with her mind before swallowing with her body. No big deal, just eat the food. Just do whatever your body needs you to do to survive, it shouldn't be hard. She gulped down the pieces of steamed broccoli and chicken with an orange on the side. She felt guilty. All of the fitness coaches around her said fruit had “too much sugar” and she would eventually get diabetes. The doctors said that’s not true however. Whatever, no matter. Yes it’s hard to eat and not compulsively exercise after but it’s not the end of the world. I’m fine. Everybody is so dramatic. She thought constantly to herself. She tugged at her sleeves, showing her discomfort. Her mom looked at her in fear, knowing what would happen if she had to go to the clinic again. “You okay honey? How are you feeling with the chicken?” She said as she touched her daughter’s hand, attempting to reassure her. “The chicken’s fine mom, thanks.” Her mom looked at her pick around her plate and began to see visions of her past self. The girl that would wolf down any plate she put in front of her, and would become so lively and animated while talking about volleyball or choir. Now she just sees a ghost, and what exactly do you do with a ghost of someone who’s still around? Rapunzel had been waiting years for this moment.
She let the information slip casually, playing it off as a mistake, but knowing that Mother Gothel would be furious with her for allowing anyone else into the tower — especially a prince. Therefore, she was expecting a punishment. So, when Mother Gothel pulled a pair of shears from her cloak, Rapunzel acted quickly. She seized the witch’s wrist, twisting it as hard as she could. Mother Gothel let out a cry of rage, not only at Rapunzel’s defiance, but also at her unexpected strength. But Rapunzel did not falter; after a moment longer of struggle, she was able to tear the shears from Gothel’s grip and pierce them straight through her heart. Rapunzel pulled the shears out of Gothel’s chest — allowing the body to collapse on the floor with a thud — and stood up, pushing her hair back over her shoulders as she admired her work, chest heaving with her heavy breaths. Of course, there was the matter of getting rid of the body and cleaning up the copious amount of blood before the prince arrived for their nightly meeting; she couldn’t have him suspecting anything was wrong — not with what she had planned for him. It was exceedingly difficult, but Rapunzel managed to get the job done before nightfall. She dragged Gothel’s body to the closet that held her cleaning supplies — including the mop that she needed to clean the blood that was now smeared across the dark hardwood floors of the tower. Beatrice McCoy had lived next to a volcano for all eighty-two years of her life, and she was almost certain it was never going to erupt.
Mt. Ursula had been dormant long before Beatrice was born, and she expected it to remain that way long after her bones were laid to rest under the dirt and moss that made up her home. When she was a little girl, she’d stay up, staring out her window where she could see the volcano’s peak in the distance. She used to worry about it waking suddenly, destroying her beloved town with ash and smoke. When she expressed her concerns to her mother, she’d smooth down her hair and assure her Ursula was fast asleep. “Everything is just fine, bumble Bea,” she’d tell her. “You’re safe.” Despite her skepticism in her earlier years, Beatrice had formed a bond with the sleeping volcano. She no longer saw Mt. Ursula as a threat, but as a friend watching over them, a reassuring presence. So when the TV flashed the evacuation warning that morning, Beatrice went about her usual routine without so much as a pursing of her lips or a creased brow. She walked into the kitchen, spooned her coffee grounds into the filter, and reveled in the sound of it brewing. The slow drip turned to a steady stream as it filled her favorite mug—though it was chipped now, she could never bring herself to use another. Lenny had gotten it for her for their 10th anniversary. On the furthest edge of the coldest corner of the steppe, a herder lived in a yurt with his three
children. The herder’s wife had died years before, so it was just the four of them who huddled around the great stove in the tent’s centre, faces blackened by soot. They were bored and achy, for when the winter bit like this no-one could go outside. For days and days they had had only each other for company and tempers, which had started out thick and mellow as yak milk, were running thin. “I wish I could check on the sheep,” fretted the youngest son, who loved the outdoors and all that breathed there. “I wish I could visit my friends,” sighed the oldest son, who enjoyed the village and all who danced there. “I wish I could trade for coffee,” grumbled the herder, who as a father thrice-over was reliant on the stuff. “What good is a fire if you’ve nothing to brew on it?” The daughter of the yurt, who was also the eldest child, opened her mouth to speak - but before she could, a great flurry of snow blew down the narrow chimney and snuffed the fire right out.! By a stroke of bad luck the father’s words had been whipped up by the north wind and carried to the Fire Maiden, a goddess much revered in those wintery parts. The herder’s thoughtless words badly offended her. Trigger warning: mentions of assault
The first time my mother cried, I told her about the madwoman in the attic, The inherent darkness enveloping her entire existence as she got engulfed in the banality of her life. The woman who contemplated through a man’s voice, the woman whose voice screamed out the rasp crisp reality of her essence, which revolved around the madness of her simplicity, the yearning for her ‘wild’ nature. I explained how she etched the routine of her everyday life on a piece of paper, a delicate, white, thin symbol of rebelliousness that she permitted herself in secrecy. The paper which, when written upon, held the power to liberate her thoughts from the husband she was coerced into, the children she had endured the pain for. A paper, which, if discovered, would shroud her behind the attic’s darkness forever because it was forbidden to imagine she possessed a sense of self, a consciousness that didn’t stem from her husband. Yet, she wrote and as she wrote, she wept for the sons she had given birth to– the ones who would never be her own though she tore herself apart for them. She wept for the daughters, stashing away some papers behind her pillow, for she knew, one day her daughters would be where she was, confined in the attic, forbidden to cry. Mother, if it made her isolated and blue, why did she cry? 1.
Jess’s house was like a private hospital, clinically white and antiseptic; germfree and sanitised beyond sanity. Kate felt like a dung beetle intruding upon a basket of fresh linen. She hadn’t blitzed her own pad in nearly a month, whereas Jess cleaned her place top to bottom twice a day, religiously. Kate had instructions to leave her shoes in the porch; the first of many house rules. But at least she wasn’t obliged to remove all articles and don a hazmat suit. She proceeded into the foyer of Jess’s pearly white Persimmon home. Shimmering mirrors reflected her bedraggled presence (it’d rained on the way over), and dust-free ornaments shone with a silvery lustre. Images of relatives consecrated Jess’s magnolia walls. Everywhere she turned, yet another face grinned at her. It felt like she was being watched. “In here, Kate,” a voice called from the dining room. Jess’s husband, Chris. “We’re just plating up.” Trigger warning: character death, mild profanity, child neglect
She’s much younger than me, and that cherubic innocence clings to her plump cheeks, and I know when she giggles she does not know I hate her. The shirt she wears, whose pink leopard print pattern is joined by old spaghetti sauce stains, used to belong to me, but I feel no connection to that age. Maybe someday she’ll be 17 too and washing dishes while a sister that’s eleven years her junior sits cross-legged in front of the TV, and she’ll remember bitching about the days-old broccoli Mom told me to cook up and feel bad. Right now she’s remorseless, getting cookie crumbs all over the couch and bobbing her head to the Law and Order theme music. I’ll have to remember to change the channel to cartoons before Mom gets home. It’s anyone’s guess when Mom will roll in. She gets off work at the diner at nine, but usually stays out to do fuck all while I have to scrub broccoli bits from Lydia’s teeth and tell my friends yet again I can’t hang out tonight, I have work to do and someone has to watch Lydia, but next weekend maybe I’ll be free. Usually she comes back smelling of alcohol, or someone’s car, half the time wearing different clothes than she left in. It’s better than when she doesn’t come home alone, and I have to contend with another shifty-eyed jerk who can’t quite decide how to behave around me. I don’t have much of an income, outside of pocketing a percentage of the money Mom gives me for the necessities she can’t be bothered to buy herself, but I bought a lock for my bedroom door. Would’ve gotten one for Lydia’s too, but she always has to get up in the middle of the night to pee, and she’s not smart enough to operate machinery yet. I even have to rescue her from her own bedroom when her chunky fingers can’t get the door open. In any case, I could wake up at the quietest creak of a floorboard. That is, before I simply stopped sleeping altogether. It just so happens that my name is Marvin. I don’t use it much, only for legal and medical purposes.
When I got to high school I started calling myself “Jim” and have ever since. Only the IRS and my doctor call me Marvin now. Actually, my doctor doesn’t. She calls me Jim, and I call her Katy because she’s so much younger than I am that I feel a little silly calling someone the age of my children by their honorific. I always know when one of her nurses is writing a message on her behalf because they call me Marvin. Then I message her back as Dr. Katy so it doesn’t seem like we’re too familiar or anything. That wouldn’t be appropriate, being familiar with my doctor, even though I am. The question of names comes up because I’m thinking of changing mine. I never did before because my mother gave me the name Marvin and I kept it because I rather liked my mother. If my father had given it to me I’d have changed it a long time ago, probably to something like Luke or Max, a name more appropriate to my personality. Do I sound like a Marvin to you? I kept my father’s name even though it’s unpronounceable and unspellable in English. They tell me it’s okay in Danish, but they also tell me I’m unable to pronounce it correctly. So I guess it’s a wash. We both win, or lose, depending on how you look at it. Anyway, I kept it because my grandfather insisted that the clerk at Whitehall spell it right when he immigrated. If not for that my family would be called something sensible like Rasmussen since his first name was Rasmus. Beyond the dense cloud of smoke and fire, above the wreckage of modern construction,
at the edge of the highest peak of the twin hills, stood a lone figure, covered in soot and sweat. She’d spotted the figure some time ago. Sharon was running, running in all directions, desperately trying to rescue someone, anyone really, from the burning buildings around them, giving up only when the walls caved in and the ceilings tumbled, destroying any chance of survival. She took a deep breath. It was pointless. Everyone had died, and she had known that- of course, she had- the logistics of the situation called for it. They expected it; and it wasn’t as though any of these people were good people. In the end, they were criminals - the worst of the worst, but she’d been tasked with saving someone. And yet, just like always, she’d failed. Sharon wondered if they’d only let her go because they knew she’d fail. Still, it hurt. It hurt that none of the victims would ever experience the breath of fresh air as they ran down the hiking trails, through the patches of forests all the way up to the lake where they’d jump into the cold, yet intoxicatingly calm waters of- Trigger Warning: mental health, suicidal thoughts, self-harm
Anticipation of what was coming was in some ways worse than the panic attack itself. The thundering of her heart pounded in her ears. Vibrating numbness creeped into her fingertips. Clenching her fists, she willed herself to relax. Flames licked the sides of her face. The swirling pressure rising in her chest burst forth. Unable to restrain herself any longer she grasped for anything solid. Her vision fading and consciousness draining away. She could feel herself sinking into a pit. Suffocating flames of black consuming her. Finally, nothingness. I was almost a relief. Her eyebrows raised to aid in the opening of her eyes, she turned her head slowly. The thick fog that obscured her vision slowly cleared. She could feel her soul slowly refilling her deflated body. She always manages to survive what felt like certain death. She tried to reattach her hands to her body. All the connections in her brain seemed severed. Her head churned and oozed. Forming thoughts felt like treading in molasses. Bounding into the room, unaware of their mother’s fragile mental state, the children came. So many arms begging to be held. Request after request buzzed from their mouths. Her quiet recovery was short lived. The reality of motherhood slapped her in the face. There were diapers to be changed. She had to make sure dinner got on the table and soon. No one has any clean clothes, not that anyone had bathed yet this week. Clean clothing wasn’t going to hide the dirt. The small off-white kitchen was so filthy even the rats weren’t interested. The dishes that filled the grim ringed sink would have to be washed before she could even start to make dinner. “You can’t get clean dishes from dirty water.” Emma Flannigan wasn't your average Irish country woman.
In fact, she wasn't even Irish. And yet there she stood, in her home in the small town of Ceallach, getting ready for a day at the market. She finished pinning back her mousy brown hair, exposing her thin, pale face. Although she was only 23 years old, her features were aged with grief. She had, as the towns people often said, "lost her bloom" over the last few months; slowly fading away ever since the death of her husband, Seamus. They had only moved back to his homeland there in the Irish countryside a year before the tragic accident. And now, Emma, a very English woman, had to find her life there, in their Irish home, without him. Looking in the mirror by the door on the way out, she noted her pallid complexion, and, pinching her cheeks in the hopes of color, only seemed to redden them, as if from being too long in the sun. She untied her plain white house apron, hanging it by the door and brushed her hands down her blue cotton dress, smoothing out the bunches from where the apron had been tied. Then off she walked down the road to the market place. Three cardboard boxes were what she could afford. It would have to do. The tired,
whisper of a woman, her yellowed hair tightly pulled back because she knew there would be no time to wash it, put the boxes in the cart. They looked small, so small and the cart so absurdly empty that she took them out and carried them to the front of the store. The cashier greeted her with a $12.00 an hour smile. “Find everything you were looking for?” she asked in a voice that sounded like she’d asked the question ten thousand times already that day. The yellow-haired woman thought about that, wanted to say ‘no, she hadn’t found everything she was looking for; that she had been looking most of her life and hadn’t found it yet; that she was, frankly, god-damned tired of looking.’ “Just the boxes,” she replied simply. “Looks like someone’s moving,” the cashier remarked a little too cheerfully. “Yes, moving,” said the yellow-haired woman and then, vacantly added, “out.” “That’ll be $4.75.” The yellow-haired woman carefully counted out the money, two singles and an assortment of quarters, dimes and nickels. She could feel the people in line behind her staring, knew that they were annoyed at how long this was taking. And she didn’t care because she had stopped caring about what other people thought of her. |