-
·
An Alien Abroad
Cellular Hierarchies, Effie Jia Dear Mom, My year abroad is off to a good start. It’s a bit chilly, but I’m told that’s normal for this time of year. People here only have one sun, so they don’t have alternating heat currents the way we do. I think being among people who lack the sort…
-
·
Maple Leaf
Junglescape, Meagan Dwyer I was 5 years old when I learned how to pronounce my mother’s name. I’d started to learn enough letter sounds in kindergarten to string a few together, though my ‘r’s didn’t stop sounding like ‘w’s for a few years after. The first time I said it I thought it was the…
-
·
Keeping Up Appearances
Light and Dark, Grace Long Harold Orwin was well respected in the anarcho-punk community. And understandably so. He wore black denim jackets with anti-government patches, beaten boots with worn cotton laces, and a DIY flannel bumflap. Each of these pieces of clothing, on their own, would have given Harold some merit in the antiestablishmentarianist world, but…
-
·
Cream Cheese Weight
facetime, Saber Paustian Ever since Cecilia Harrison’s father told her that no one ate cinnamon raisin bagels anymore, she had made it her personal mission to order only cinnamon raisin bagels. She preferred egg. Even so, cinnamon raisin was palatable — even pleasant — lightly toasted and dabbed with full-fat cream cheese. She chose full-fat…
-
·
Rue du Chameau
Golgi, Soren Carlson-Donohue “Don’t slouch, Gazelle, you look like an alley cat.” Sister’s chidings are lost on me now as I sit on our steps. Her steps. My steps now. I am alone. When did Sister become Bride become Mother? When did I, Gazelle, the smallest of the children, become Bride-Waiting? I do not understand…
-
·
Hide and Seek
Moving Forward, Brittany Lenze The day Summer disappeared, you were at home, feverish and ready for the phone to ring. You’d been waiting for that phone call all morning, hovering moth-like around the old-fashioned landline in the kitchen. Your friends liked to tease you whenever you used the ancient thing; the chunky, mustard-yellow receiver tucked under…
-
·
Kaieteur
On the Edge of the Falls, Sarah Moore Some things I’m afraid of: that the burglars have taken the DVD player but not the VCR, climate change, a library book I forgot to return in 2006. I guess it would make more sense to worry that the burglar’s still in the apartment with me. Someone…
-
·
Fading
Hands, Katherine Rogers Shannon wipes her hands down the front of her apron. She has nine rooms left on this floor, and she’s supposed to be off work in two hours. She pushes her cleaning cart out of room 311 and knocks on 312 across the hall. “Housekeeping.” No reply. Shannon sticks her master key through…
-
·
Prairie Rust, Strawberry Lips
The Battle of Antietam in Technicolor, Alexandra Moleski Annie smears pink paint onto the apple of my cheek with her index finger, raising it up to my cheekbone and then dragging it down the side of my face. I try not to laugh at the cold tickling my skin, sitting on the roof of her station…
-
·
Facts and Figures
Element of Speech, Bethany Dudek There are 206 bones in the human body. This is a fact. The first time it heard it, my sister Shauna was mocking, “there is no neck bone, stupid.” There are actually seven bones which make up the neck. C1 through C7, or cervical vertebra. No one bothered to specify…
-
·
Old Dog Can Almost Hear the Worms Sigh
I Believe in Laundry, Julia Tasho When Vera had got litters before she had been in the woods and she had made little canopies out of leaves with her snout to keep the pups safe and hid in the dirt and wet. But she didn’t have any leaves here, just piss rags and towels barbed with…
-
·
Fridge Magnets
The Grass is Never Greener, Vinnie Hagar I start with the IKEA bookshelf I bought to display the volumes of Vonnegut and Fitzgerald and Nabokov that my brother gave me when I graduated. I pull all the books out and throw them into an old grocery bag and then I disassemble the shelf until it is…
-
·
Lament for the Dead
Shadows, Amanda Wisbeck Your son isn’t crying. The crowd shuffles along, their suits and black dresses a stark contrast against the bright blue sky and beaming sun. Your wife walks beside you, her face empty and her fingers clenched around sodden tissues. There are thick circles under her eyes; her lips are in a thin line.…
-
·
Celestial
For Sale, Jess Mezzi In Spanish, the word for “moon” and “sun” are feminine and masculine, respectively. My mother told me it was because the moon represents women and the sun represents men. “Women,” she said, “are supposed to be mysterious. They change. They’re deep and emotional.” And I loved that comparison. At night, I…
-
·
A Liturgy of Hours
Study of Myself, Bella Pozo The bell above the chapel does not ring anymore. Midnight comes and goes with no herald. Sister Mary Monica is used to silence, but she misses the bell. She doesn’t need it to wake her. After fifty-seven years, her body knows its schedule – Matins, then back to…
-
·
The Sierra County Fair
Grandma’s Cupcake Stand, Jessica Ashworth As an adult, Desmond P. Merina will claim that Sunday, October 6, 1991 is the most significant day of his life because it is the day he causes a catastrophic bouncy castle collapse at the Sierra County Fair in Truth or Consequences, New Mexico. He is seven years old, and his…
-
·
Journey to Discovery
ano nakikita Mo?, harana After a few minutes of watching people walk through the cold wind my now ex asked me if I was ready. We were waiting to walk in to the pharmacy to get my first prescription of T, we had been here five times in the last four days. Each…
-
·
Response to a Real Overheard Conversation on the G Train
World’s Finest, Chloe Hiu See Tsang I hope you get stung in the face by a bee while you help your dad tear down the rotting swingset in the backyard, the one next to the barn and the boulders where the snakes whisper about your parents’ crumbling marriage. I hope the wasps swarm and I hope…
-
·
The Pools of Saint Mark’s Square
Two Rivers Meet, Rebecca Turnbull We were driving through the marshes of the Meadowlands on our way to Newark when my mother forgot where she was for the first time. She always had trouble with dates and names and the like. This felt different. She had been staring straight ahead, at the…
-
·
The Elevator
Do You See It, Mommy?, Hannah Elizabeth High PICTURE IT: In the dark parking garage at the Towson mall, bottom floor, standing by the elevator at 10:32 PM, a girl checking her phone. Battery nearly dead. The girl petite, slender, cute blouse and shorts. Pretty, with an air of innocence. Eighteen years old, just submitted her…
-
·
Coleopterist
Tomato Menace and Floral Rabbit, Jury St. Judge Nothing’s a secret once you know about it. The jewel beetles became a regularity in the kitchen. The first was the color of a geode’s guts, translucent purple. It sipped from the lavender-licorice tea you left out. You’d forgotten about your…
-
·
A Sense of August
Untitled, Zachary Vaughn My walk home would be pleasant—would be rather beautiful, really, with the sunset turning the sky all sorts of colors—if it weren’t for the damned bells ringing from the town hall. They only ring for six minutes—from 5:00pm to 5:06pm—but it takes me fifteen minutes to get home from my receptionist job…