August 21 st 2020: The Present He pulled out the heavy suitcase from beneath the old coffee table in the attic, immediately covering his nose as he felt the tingles of a sneeze in the making. The room was dusty, as was expected, as his parents had not ventured up there for years. It was a big day. In more ways than one. For the first time since he was admitted, Mason was going to visit his father at the nursing home. The timing too was fitting as the day marked nine years since his sister's passing. A few tugs and some unfastened clasps later, he pulled out the bag that lay folded neatly atop the contents of the moth-eaten luggage. The costume was intact, its blue and red fabric glistening beneath the tattered plastic covering, the shiny silver goblets - the eyes of the mask -reflecting the pensive expression on his face. It would be totally out of character for Mason to show up at the Wings of Care Nursing Home, dressed as a superhero, but it was much more than his character that was at stake. As if on cue, a spider scuttled hurriedly across the web-tangled floorboard in front of him and Marley's laughter echoed reminiscently in his ears. He felt her presence then, cheering him on in the silence of the empty house, convinced that what he was about to do was good and right. ***** Marley I’m Marley Cadence Elliott and I’m the baby that Geoffrey and Lisa Elliott had planned for. They were high-school sweethearts that stayed in love even after attending college in separate states in the US. They tied the knot a year after they graduated and began trying for a baby in their fourth year of marriage. Geoffrey’s a musician who loves Reggae and Rhythm and Blues. He attended Juliards on a scholarship, going on to manage a chain of radio stations called Citadel Group and founded a small recording studio in Miami. Lisa Elliott is the daughter of the prestigious dentist Albert Atkins, fondly known as "Dr. Tatskins". He gained the nickname after running a marketing ad for his practice, featuring a teenage girl on anesthetics getting her tongue twisted saying " Stanks Dr. Tatskins. Sthat didn't hurth a bith ". Lisa was a brilliant academic, an aspiring dental surgeon like her father, but midway through college, she discovered a greater love for animals instead. Graduating with honours from veterinary school, she became employed at a licensed Vet clinic as the lead Dentist and Oral Surgeon after three years in residency. I was supposed to be their bouncing baby boy. Geoffrey coveted the name Marley, after the famous titled reggae singer Bob, because during the early stages of their pregnancy, I responded with kicks and thumps whenever they played me songs by the popular band The Wailers. As they claim, the sequence of my movements seemed to be rhythmic and purposeful, like a cadence. Hence my unusual middle name. It wasn't until the third trimester that I turned in the womb, the gynecologist noting no sign of testicles on the ultrasound image, indicating that a little girl was on the way. My parents were mentally unprepared for a daughter, far less one that was diagnosed with PKU. Phenylketonuria (PKU) is an inborn error of protein metabolism, a condition which has no known cure. The rare disease occurs in children, usually from birth, commonly inherited from their parents. It prevents the body from properly breaking down proteins, specifically phenylanine . When the body is unable to break these down, phenylanine builds up in the blood causing problems throughout the body which commonly result in seizures, developmental delays, memory lapses, irritability, behavioural issues and intellectual disability. My parents were devastated when a simple breakout of eczema and the pediatrician's shrewd observation of my delayed growth at my three-month checkup led to the diagnosis. No one in either of their families had the condition and it was unfamiliar territory for them both. Oddly enough, I grew steadily throughout infancy and toddlerhood and I’d even dare say that I’m a smashingly successful thirteen-year-old-girl with ailments. I’m smart and observant, respond well to my treatment and strict diets, despite my occasional episodes of mood swings, seizures and anorexia nervosa. My parents were so busy working around me - my treatment, special education, diet and routines - that the morning sickness, fatigue and general inertia experienced by my Mom went unnoticed until she stepped on the bathroom scale one morning and recognized that she had gained six pounds! That was nine years ago. The time that I learned that I was going to be a big sister. This time the baby was not one in the planning but they were extremely fidgety, always doing checkups, nervous and anxious, and - the part they would not say out loud but I knew to be true - praying that the baby would not be like me. I prayed hard for that too. And for me to have a healthy baby brother. ***** Mason It’s difficult being the second child in a family where your older sibling isn’t the same sex and also has special needs. That's mostly how I feel whenever I’m alone in my room and my parents are busy fussing over Marley. It helps that my older sister is not a fan of the attention but chooses to rise above her disabilities, lavishing me, her younger brother, with all the love and attention that our parents unconsciously withhold; taking on the world one day at a time, with the energy of an all-male football squad (it’s her and my favourite sport). I’m the baby of the family and the “normal” kid. Everyone expected me to be like my Mom: fierce and determined, especially when she gets her hands on a drill (it’s part of her profession as a “doggy dentist”). That’s why they named me Mason. Mason Albert Elliott. But the only drills I’m good at are the ones where my family stops in the middle of dinner and a movie to rush to Marley’s aid in her episode of a seizure. Or my enrollment in football summer camp that would be cancelled as they have to use funds to go out-of-state with Marley for treatment. Or the bi-monthly sibling support therapy sessions I’m forced to attend with other kids with special-needs siblings. I’m nine-going-on-ten and overly acquainted with these drills that have become an integral part of my life. Marley had been doing really well for the past eighteen months until she suddenly lost seven pounds in under two weeks. She started having tantrums, forgetting things and being really crabby with everyone, including me. Her doctor referred her to a specialist at the Children’s Hospital in Boston, which is out of state. Dad had a huge contract signing for an album recording with a local artist who’s getting really popular and Mom has rolled-over vacation (whatever that means) so she booked the trip with Marley. They’ve been gone for over a week. Dad just got off the phone with Mom and it sounds like Marley isn’t doing so great, but the good news is that they’re coming home. He doesn’t bother to tell me what’s happening in detail, just the tidbits that he assumes my little nine-year-old brain can absorb. Maybe it’s because I’m shy and timid, mostly reserved and quietly observant. Except when Marley and I are together. And she’s having one of her good days. I’m happy she’s coming back but also confused as to why I’m sad to give up the attention I’ve been receiving while it’s just been Dad and me. At least we’re half-way through summer and football camp doesn't end for three weeks, so I just might get a late enrollment. ***** July 28 th 2011 He wore a Spiderman costume to greet her at the airport as it was her favourite superhero. He didn’t care about the long stares and the wary looks of the masses. His wife and his daughter were coming home after being at a children’s hospital in Boston, where the latter had been undergoing treatment for PKU for the past eleven days. Marley was his pride and joy, his little girl that he admittedly didn’t hope for initially, but the child that strummed all the musical strings of his heart. When she was eight, he had read her the children’s fictional called Charlotte’s Webb and she'd become enthralled with spiders ever since. When Marvel comics launched the modern remake of the blockbuster Spiderman Movie, she was already in her pre-teen phase and she immediately idolized the character. It was her smarts, coupled with her innocence, that caused Geoffrey Elliott to love her fiercely. Her illness never defeated her as she was as resolute and determined as her mother. Marley had the spirit of his wife Lisa which made her a fighter. He would do anything to make his daughter smile and today, smile she would, when she came through those arrival gates. At least that was the plan. He sat patiently with his son Mason as they watched scores of people filter by. The flight had landed on schedule and his wife and daughter should be looking to disembark at any minute. Suddenly, in a fit of nerves, he needed to pee. He had not factored in getting out of the suit to take a leak but couldn’t hold it too long. An elderly lady that sat next to them offered to watch Mason while he slipped off into the nearby washroom. Meanwhile, a guy acting suspiciously was being shadowed by airport authority officers. He slipped out of the washroom hastily as Geoffrey was entering. He noticed the guy mainly because the hem of his white shirt was sticking out of the fly of his dark blue cargo pants. “Hey!” Geoffrey called out, stalling the guy in the process. “Check your fly man” he continued as the stranger slowed his pace, glancing sheepishly down at his trousers. Just then, three officers approached and suddenly the man took off running in a sprint. Everything happened quickly - armed officers encircling, people pulling away in a frenzy, voices echoing through walkie-talkies, sirens and shouts over the PA system. They caught him, sequestered him and grilled him with questions. Geoffrey was making his third attempt to get out of his Spidey suit after the frenzy died when officers entered the washroom, evacuating everyone inside. They found a bomb in one of the stalls. It was chaotic. Flights were delayed, others rerouted. Airport wing had to be evacuated. Marley and her mother, along with other incoming passengers had to be cordoned off at an evacuation point away from the landing strip. He never saw them until many hours later that day. Somehow, a video still-shot of him in his Spiderman suit calling out to the bomber was captured and circulated on the evening news. The running reports tagged him as “The Spider that Caught the Fly”. He was credited as the hero who managed to alert authorities of a man who had somehow managed to plant a bomb at an international airport in broad daylight and without detection. May 12 th 2015 Fame seemed destined to follow her and she had become tired of it. Her father was well-known. Her practice was the most popular in the state. And her husband had made their family a household name when he was tagged four years ago as The Spider that Caught The Fly. Maybe to the world he was a hero, but to Lisa, her husband had failed. Losing a child is difficult for any parent. So when their daughter Marley died three and a half weeks after the airport bomb fiasco, she felt like her world had come crashing down. Sure, she was not the anticipated baby they had hoped for. Marley was supposed to be Mason. Her firstborn should have been a boy as she had wanted and as they had planned. But she loved that little girl with the fire in her eyes and music in her blood. Now, Lisa Elliott couldn’t face the tune of silence in the aftermath of her only-daughter’s being. What made her grief compounded was her husband Geoffrey’s bizarre behaviour that subsequently ensued. He became irrational, uncompromising, an overly-emotional alcoholic, who was apathetic toward her and particularly to their son Mason. The therapist said it was unconscious and unintentional, an unhealthy form of coping with his grief. But the behaviour, and his subsequent medical diagnosis took its downward toll on their marriage, bringing Lisa to a point of no return. As she sat in the courtroom, she registered no disappointment at Geoffrey’s absence for the divorce hearing, his lawyer instead stepping in to act on his behalf. It was almost four years since their daughter died and her marriage had officially reached its point of death in pursuit. Thoughts of her son and a resolve to do better by him are what kept her chin upright as she listened to the lawyer’s recital of her husband’s missive - one in which he resolved to let her take everything (as she was the breadwinner in the marriage) including full custody of young Mason. June 6 th 2013 His name was recognized in his new school and people began to pay attention to him. Many of the boys wanted to be his friend. He loved the attention, craved it actually, and bought into the stories that developed in his head. He was the son of the famous Spiderman that stopped an airport bombing by pulling on the hem of a man’s shirt through his open fly. That was Mason’s polished version of the story as an eye-witness to the event. His embellishments of the facts of that day were grossly exaggerated but for once he was among the cool kids and he felt it necessary to keep up whatever façade was needed to bolster his newfound social status. His parents did everything in their power to show him love but he never felt like he was loved as much as his sister. After Marley’s death, his father started behaving weird, much like his sister would whenever she had relapses, and his parents started fighting frequently. He never showed any physical evidence of his need for their cuddling so they always assumed that he was alright. Marley’s death took a toll on him too. But as usual, they were too preoccupied with themselves and with Marley’s loss to truly notice. It was Career Day at school and they were tasked to dress as the professions they intended to become. His mother fancied him for engineering and design, or anything along the lines of drilling and concrete works (she silently pressured him to consider dentistry like his grandfather and her). His father was neither here nor there, lackluster in his energy or interest in what his only son would become. But Mason saw himself as his father’s son. It was his Dad who had made him famous at his new school, his father who had indirectly won him the attention that he needed. He told his parents over breakfast that morning that he wanted to be an entrepreneur. He dressed in one of his smart suits that his grandfather had bought him to wear to Sunday Mass, but secretly, he stashed the Spiderman costume that his father had never removed from Marley’s bedroom. He was at the front of the class, dressed in the Spidey suit that was too big and too long for his tiny frame, addressing his classmates, teachers and the parents that took time off to be in attendance. As Mason explained that he wanted to be a superhero when he grew up, he went into his made-up version of the airport bomber incident with his Dad. Just then, the doors to the classroom flung open and his father came barging in. He was angry and seemed ready to tear Mason to pieces as he spotted him donning the precious costume. But as his father listened to Mason talk about how much he’d loved his sister Marley and how he wanted to be a hero Dad to a little girl in the future, just as his father had been to her, tears fell steadily down his face and he ran up to Mason and embraced him. It was the first time in Mason’s memory that his father had hugged him so passionately and whispered words of love and comfort to him. That was the last time they had shared a tender moment, before his father was diagnosed with FLTD and their family was ripped further apart. August 21 st 2020: The Present Much had happened in my life over the years and I'm thankful for my psychological growth. Life has dealt me so many bad cards that I could become bitter or better as a result. Thoughts of what life would have been like if my sister Marley had not died often flood me, leaving me overwhelmed with regret. But I've learned to be thankful. There's a reason and an explanation for everything that happened. Though I may never get the answers to the “whys”, I find solace in the fact that hope still lives. Frontotemporal lobar degeneration (FTLD) is the cause of my father’s behaviour. Grief and compounded traum are the causes of my mother’s steely countenance and her defensiveness. Significant loss and changes in my early childhood are the reasons for the many mistakes I've made and the difficult journey I endured to becoming my true self. I will salvage the remains of the relationships I've lost with the persons that I love the most. My mother Lisa will be there today too... A sense of peace engulfed Mason as he pictured his father’s expression when he would learn that Spiderman was at Wings of Care and had come to pay him a visit that day. ****


I woke up and said to myself “I am going to get a vacation!” hoping that saying it allowed would help it become true. I excitedly went to work hoping to in the time I don’t have work to do research vacations. Once I got there my coworkers and I exchanged the usual “hellos”, “how are yous”, and “I'm fines” and went about our days. I didn’t have much work to do as I'd already done my work knowing what I planned to do today. I looked for a while and then found a vacation with all paid expenses trip to Hawaii for 1,000 dollars! I didn’t have that money so I knew I’d have to go to suspicious steve. His name isn’t actually suspicious Steve, just Steve, but he is always suspicious. He always has ways of getting what you need and seems rich but still works a 9 to 5 job. I went up to him and said “Steve. You got money?” Steve looked at me with confusion and said “What money?” “Well I was hoping you knew of a way to get 1,000 dollars, but I also wanted to sound cool” Steve rolls his eyes at me, but in a cool way, somehow. He hands me two packages, one labeled “burn”, another labeled “give''. “burn this one, and give this one to a guy a few blocks away. You’ll need to burn all of the one labeled burn to ash. Show me proof you’ve done it and I’ll give you the money. If you ask questions, I’ll have someone else do it. I’ve texted you the address to the location.” he stops for a moment then glares at me “If you mess up, you’ll regret it. “ Hesitantly, I agreed. The rest of the workday was normal so it’s not worth talking about, but what is worth talking about is afterward. Once the workday ended I crept to my backyard, which in hindsight just made me more suspicious, and prepared to burn the one labeled burn. I wanted to look inside and see what it was but I worried if I did he’d have my head or id ask questions and then he’d have my head. Either way, I'd be without a head, which is a thing I prefer to have. I started a recording and threw it in. I waited till it was complete ash which took a while, but before It was all ash I caught a glimpse of a picture of a face, It looked like an ID. I pushed away thoughts of what I just did and how unethical it was and walked over to the place, unable to push away thoughts of what I just did. I worried, did I just abide and aid murder? I kept trying to reassure myself that maybe it was an old ID and they were really precautious, or that someone died in a non-murder-y way and so they burned old items. But considering it was from suspicious steve and it was a person’s face, I would imagine it’s either a murder or a cover-up of someone’s identity. I focused on the fact that this was for a vacation the rest of the way to avoid thoughts of murder and cover-ups. Once I arrived I knocked, a suspicious person opened the door and in a hushed and angry voice said “What?” I tried to match their voice, partially to seem cool, and partially for them to be less likely to want to kill me, and said “I have a delivery from steve.” He quickly takes it and closes the door. If it is what I think it is, then it’s really weird his name is steve. I never thought drug deliverers’ names could be so normal. It’s like being like “I have a drug delivery from billy”, it just sounds normal and too innocent. But I guess not all people who do weird things have weird names like “ax” or “Murder”. I took a recording of me at the door with no more packages and sent them to steve, with no reply I got an online cash deposit of 1,000 dollars. I quickly left and went home. Not sure how to continue, I bought a ticket and waited for my day. Nothing very weird happened well I waited though, except for me. I kept sneaking around places and acting like I did a crime, which I did, I think. One day I crept into working thinking someone would catch me in what I had done and all my coworkers stared at me. Also, all of the “how are yous” turned into “are you oks”, the answers still the same though even if I did commit a crime. Once it was time to go on my vacation I ordered an uber and got all my stuff and put it in, the drive there was pretty calm. We did run into traffic and so I decided to do the only thing I could do which was grab my stuff and start jumping on cars to get by. I’m not kidding, I did actually do that though, I really didn’t want to miss my flight. I did pay the driver first though! So at least I’m not an avoids-paying-for-ubers-car jumper. Also, as a side note, car jumping is really fun! Hard, but fun! I got to the airport and had a relatively normal flight, I think a passenger was trying to flirt with me though, which was sweet but annoying. I sat through the flight and read a magazine since somehow I forgot to bring something to keep me entertained. The flight attendant suddenly said “And now we are flying over Hawaii”, I went up and asked if this was a flight to Hawaii, which is what I thought, she said it wasn’t though. It’s a flight to China. I must have clicked the one below the Hawaii one.... I asked where the parachutes were and as they pointed in a confused manner I grabbed my stuff, the parachute, and jumped off the plane. I heard lots of surprise gasps as I jumped off but it was worth it to finally get to relax in Hawaii. That’s my totally normal story of how I got to Hawaii. “What about yours?” I said to the person next to me. They looked at me and walked away slowly, I guess that was a weird trip in their opinion, oh well, more alone time for me.


I probably wouldn’t have noticed it if it weren’t for the neon-yellow slip flapping against the wind. The sky was booming, and my hands were beginning to cramp from the bags of groceries I was carrying. I had to get my groceries in before the clouds began to weep. Still, I dropped one hand’s worth of groceries on the ground and picked up the note, which was slipped onto the split ring of a penguin keychain. The keychain was sitting in front of a rather worn-out looking house. Before I could examine any longer, a gust of wind threw my hair ablaze. As it howled an ominous warning of the storm to come, I chucked the keychain into one of my grocery bags, then hurried the rest of the way home. *** Luckily, I didn’t get too wet. The rain was now in full session, pattering softly against my window. After shuffling away my groceries, I made myself comfortable on the couch with a bowl of popcorn and the TV remote. I was about to play a movie when, out of the corner of my eye, I noticed the bright yellow note and keychain sitting on my kitchen counter. I tried to ignore it- I was feeling so cozy on the sofa- but something kept tugging my attention towards it. “Ugh!” I groaned as I picked myself up and grabbed the keychain, then sat back down. The keychain featured a crocheted stuffed penguin, about half the size of my palm with beady little eyes and gray and white yarn for fur. It seemed to be in fairly good condition. Why would someone give this away? “You’re quite cute...I wonder if you have a name,” I pondered aloud. “Mister Penguin.” I froze. I know that did not come out of my mouth, because it came from a deeper voice. Was I hallucinating- “A kind woman gave me that name. She-AGHHHHH!” When the voice spoke again, I yelped and tossed the keychain into the air by reflex. As the scream traveled in the direction the keychain was falling, I realized that this unfamiliar voice was coming from the crocheted penguin. “What is wrong with you, lady? Are you crazy?” The stuffed penguin squawked. As if that wasn’t already terrifying enough, it started to helplessly wiggle, trying to get into an upright position. I screamed. It screamed. I screamed again. *** After hushing it (it had somehow managed to scream louder than me) in fear of alarming my neighbors, we both agreed not to scream at each other anymore (or toss anyone into the air again, for that matter). “Okay, so let me get this straight: you’re a talking stuffed penguin on a keychain.” “Yes.” I opened my mouth, but no words came out. “You’re only going to make yourself crazy trying to make sense of it. Why bother?” For the sake of my sanity, I decided to no longer bother. “So you said your name was Mister Penguin?” I asked, remembering what it had said right before it sent me into a plight of terror. “Yes. That’s the name she gave me.” “Who’s ‘she’?” “My human. The one who took care of me. I have to find her,” Mister Penguin said. Even though his eyes were made of beads, I felt as though I could see a glint of determination in them. I was hesitant about what to say. I wasn’t sure if I should mention that, just before he came to life, he was left swinging on a stair rail outside someone’s house. “Um...were you always able to talk?” “I was always watching. It felt like she always knew I had a presence, without me having to utter a single word to her.” “So why speak now?” “Because it appears that I’ve gotten lost! One day, I was feeling quite sleepy and took a nap. Next thing you know, I’m in your stuffy apartment!” “Hey! Not everyone can afford a house, you know? I’m barely making enough to cover my rent,” I quipped back. “Alright- forget your tiny apartment,” Mister Penguin gave a dismissive flap of his wing. My mouth gaped. The audacity- “I have to find my human. She needs me.” “What do you mean she needs you?” “She kept me in good condition. I’m a bit like her support stuffed animal, you see. And I need you to help me. Please.” Somehow, this stuffed penguin managed to evoke sympathy from my heart. His eyes looked anything but lifeless, as they filled with expressions of worry, concern, and a deep sense of care. “Okay, fine. I’ll help you. But before that, there’s something you should know.” “What’s that?” “When I found you, you were left outside someone’s home, with a note attached to you saying ‘free, please take.’ That’s the only reason why I brought you back to my place.” “What?” Mister Penguin let out a chirping chuckle. “No no, that can’t be. The last I remember, I was still on her key ring, the one she keeps closest to her. She wears it on a lanyard...” I slowly shook my head. Mister Penguin’s eyes widened. “There’s no way...” his eyes casted downwards, glancing back and forth in confusion. “Maybe- maybe there’s an explanation for it,” I reasoned. “But something must have happened.” “Very well. I’ll tell you my story.” “Oh. Well in that case, let me grab the popcorn-” “It started a crisp sunny morning...” “Okay, you don’t have to be so dramatic...” “ What’s this?” She picked up the keychain laid outstretched in his palm. “Oh my god, it’s so cute!” she gasped. She gazed at the little stuffed penguin, appearing to have been hand-crocheted, sitting in her hands. “Where did you get this?” “At the fair they were having last week. Someone was selling their hand-made keychains.” “I see,” she replied. “Why a penguin?” “When I was a kid, my dream was to sail the world and study sea animals- specifically, penguins.” She laughed. “They’re adorable,” she said, studying the small gray plush. “I always thought they were fascinating,” he noted. “For giving up what their wings could’ve been to live a life at sea.” “Interesting,” I mused. “So how do you feel? For giving up what could’ve been a grand life flying across the world to live at bay?” “It’s a sacrifice- the kind that you make when you know, with utmost faith, that it’s worth it.” I had a feeling that Mister Penguin wasn’t talking about penguins. “You’re fairly poetic for a talking stuffed penguin.” I paused. “I think.” I could’ve sworn I saw Mister Penguin roll his beady little eyes. He continued- “She took me everywhere she went. She also loved him as much as she loved me.” I felt like it was the other way around, but chose not to say anything. “They stayed together for a good two years, but between his shop and her classes, it seemed they needed different things at different times.” Mister Penguin shook his head in pity. “After she finished her classes, she decided to support his business full time. But that didn’t seem to make him happy.” “I don’t think you should work here anymore,” he said, a tone of frustration in his voice. “You’re not happy-” “You don’t get to tell me what makes me happy!” she shouted. “I-I want to be here. I want to help you. And once we get your shop off the ground, we can-” “There’s no ‘we’ in this plan. There’s only me. I know what your dreams are, and I know it’s not this!” he let out a heavy sigh. “But with where my business is going, I don’t think there will be space for your dreams to grow.” “But-” “This is a huge life decision. You need to know what you want, and you need to try. Right now, you haven’t even bothered trying because of my store.” Silence filled the gap. Her eyes tear as the realization dawned upon her. “So...what are you saying?” “I’m saying-” he stopped himself as he brought a hand to his mouth. His eyes lingered on the ceiling for a moment, his expression unchanging. “I’m saying,” he took his hand away, “that you should pursue your dreams, and I ought to keep going with mine.” She didn’t know what to say. “I still love you. And I always will. And maybe, one day, our paths will cross again.” Not a single tear was shed. “But right now, I think we need to go our separate ways.” “After they left each other for the last time, she went home and cried for months on end. Eventually, the crying lessened over time. She still took good care of me, but she was never the same after that. It was like...a light died in her eyes.” “She sounds...heartbroken,” I said in thought. The unfortunate reality of circumstances. “Which is precisely why I need to find her again. Without me, who else will be there to comfort her?” I let out a breath. “Fine. We’ll head back to the house tomorrow morning.” *** The next morning, we stopped by a local cafe to grab a cup of coffee on the way. While I was waiting in line, I heard a voice coming from my bag: “Psst! Hey! That’s him. The guy who broke her heart!” “Stop shouting! People can hear you!” I whisper-yelled to Mister Penguin, with a hand cupped over my mouth. Mister Penguin, who was chained around my purse handle, looked up at me. “No need to worry about that. No one can hear me but you. That’s the fun in magic, eh?” “...Great.” In other words, I look absolutely crazy to the public. Good to know. “Who did you say you spotted?” “The ex-lover. Black hair, gray sweater. He’s sitting by the window- wait...” I leaned over to get a better look. “There’s someone else sitting at his table,” I observed. “Do you know the woman he’s with?” “It’s definitely not my human...hold your fishes, I think I’ve seen her before.” “Who is it?” I exclaimed in a low voice. “That’s...that’s one of his good friends. They’ve known each other for a while. I saw her at his shop!” “What?” “I asked what you would like to order, ma’am.” I whipped my head around, not realizing we had made it to the front of the counter. A lady stood before me, with a sharpie and cup in hand. “Oh I’m- I’m so sorry! Um, I’ll take a medium caramel latte...” *** “I can’t believe you didn’t warn me,” I groaned as I stepped out of the coffee shop, latte in hand. “That was so embarrassing. She probably saw me spying and thought I was talking to myself.” “For all that she and everyone else knows, you were talking to yourself,” Mister Penguin retorted. I rolled my eyes. “Whatever.” I turned my attention back to the cafe. “Those two in the coffee shop...they seemed to be quite friendly, huh?” “I can’t believe him,” Mister Penguin shook his head. “I mean, they could have just been catching up over coffee, as friends do,” I explained. “She had her hair and makeup done, he was dressed up...they looked like they were having fun. She kept touching his arm throughout their conversation, and would lean into him whenever she laughed...oh gosh. I think they’re-” “Dating! Unbelievable- with that woman, of all people. How could he do this to her?” he uttered in disbelief. “I’m sorry, Mister Penguin. But-” I didn’t have the heart to tell him that this was bound to happen, sooner or later. “Maybe she’s doing better now, so this won’t really bother her?” Mister Penguin didn’t say anything. We walked the rest of the way in silence until we reached the front of her house, the place where I found Mister Penguin just the day before. “Well, we’re finally here. Are you ready?” “Hey, let’s just head back.” The hesitancy in Mister Penguin’s voice caught me off guard. “Why? What’s wrong?” “Well, I did some thinking while you were walking. I think she left-” Before Mister Penguin could finish his sentence, the front door swung open and a young woman stepped out with a trash bag in hand. She looked to be about in her twenties, with chestnut brown hair held in a messy updo by a hairclip. We made eye contact, and she stopped in her tracks. “Um...can I help you?” She asked, eyeing me curiously. “Oh! I’m so sorry. I wasn’t trying to, uh, be creepy or anything. I just- I wanted to give you something...” I slip the keychain off my bag and show it to her. Her eyes widened in recognition; but before she could say anything, a voice called out from the door, grabbing May’s attention. “May! Are you there?” May turned back to me. “I’m so sorry, I need to attend to my grandmother first. Um, would you like to come in?” *** “I’m so sorry for the mess, I didn’t know May was inviting someone over today. Make yourselves at home!” With that, May’s grandmother left. The room we entered wasn’t all that bad- it was a cozy little space with perhaps a bit of clutter, although it looked to be mostly family photos and little trinkets. A table stood next to the window, displaying a sewing machine. Several pieces of fabric were draped around the room’s furniture. May quickly picked up a couple pieces of cloth and dropped them on the chair by the sewing machine, then motioned for me to sit down. “Sorry about my grandmother,” she sighed. “Oh, that’s alright. I’m sorry for intruding.” May shook her head. “Don’t be. If anything, she’s probably excited that I’m actually talking to another human being right now that isn’t her.” We both shared a small laugh over that sentiment. “So,” May began, “you said you had something for me?” “Oh! Yes,” I reach into my coat pocket and pull out the keychain. “I believe...this belongs to you?” May stared at the penguin for a couple of seconds before gently taking it into her own hands. While she didn't say anything, I watched a flurry of emotions and memories flash across her eyes as she gazed at the stuffed penguin. “Yes, it used to be mine. But I gave it away. I left it outside this house, with a note saying it was free to take.” “Yeah, I saw. I took it home.” She blinked at me. “Then why did you bring it back here?” I wasn’t sure how to explain that part. “Uh...I just had a feeling that it missed you?” To my surprise, May let out a small smile. “I bet he does,” she replied, feeling the yarn over with her thumb. “Someone special to me gave me this keychain.” “I see,” I said, pretending as though I didn’t hear the whole story from the penguin himself. “Even after that person...left, I still kept the keychain. It reminded me of many sad memories, but also many happy ones. Most importantly though, it was the only place left where hope still lived.” May casted her eyes down to the stuffed penguin in her palm, a look of sorrow etched across her face. “But,” she continued, “one thing led to another, which led me to realize that as much as I loved this little penguin, I had to give it away. I loved it too much to throw it out, so I decided to leave it outside in hopes that someone would see it and take care of it. And it seems like Mister Penguin has found a new home.” That was when it struck me. May already knew. “Oh- Mister Penguin was the name I gave it. I know it’s silly, so you can change it if you want-” “No, that’s okay. I like that name. It’s very fitting.” May breathed a sigh of relief. “Well,” she handed the keychain back to me, “I believe this is yours now.” I wanted to ask her one last time, just for good measure, if she was sure she didn’t want to keep it; but when I looked into her eyes, the question died in my throat. She had love- a lot of love, but she was ready. Soon after, I picked myself up to leave. As May walked me to the door, a piece of clothing hung over the table caught my eye. “That skirt is really cute,” I noted. “Hm?” May turned to where I was looking. “Oh. Thank you. I actually sewed that,” she replied. I gave May a look of shock, to which she laughed. “Sewing has always been a passion of mine. My dream is to become a fashion designer.” We head over to the entrance. Before I stepped out, May spoke. “It was really nice meeting you, um...what was your name?” “Oh, oops. I never introduced myself. My name’s Lilliana. You can just call me Lily.” “Lily. It was nice meeting you, Lily.” As I made my way to the bottom of the steps, I paused in my tracks. Before May shut the door, I turned around. “Hey, May?” I called out. May stopped and creaked the door back open, tilting her head at me. “Yes?” “I’ll take good care of Mister Penguin.” May gave me a heavy smile. I thought I saw her eyes glimmer against the sun. “Thank you,” she said. As I made my way to my next destination, I glanced down at the gray stuffed penguin, just as quiet and still as it was when I found it. While it no longer carried the life it had just this morning, I could still feel its vitality, thriving with all the love, hope, and ardor that May left it with. What a magical penguin it was.


I think we were always competitive until the day when we weren’t anymore. It was always chalked up to two cousins seeing who could get the best of the other, but in reality, we never were that close or particularly fond of each other. The times when we did do things together it was because of something our parents arranged or seeing each other at those family functions that no child wants to go to when they could be at home doing anything else. But eventually we all grow up, and we realized that if we focused our competitive nature together on a mutual task rather than trying to one up another, we could accomplish things that no one in our family had ever done before, reach levels no had ever dreamed of ascending to before. We complimented each other perfectly, he was Heavy Metal and uber aggressive, where I was more laid back and liked to let life come to me as it saw fit. I came from a semi-strong parental background, where his mom, my Aunt, wanted nothing to do with him and had him on his own since he had started fourth grade. But I needed that to counter what I had, and he is the perfect counter. Argumentative days and minor fist fights gave way to teens running the streets, we were and are both street punks, dropping off packages for the drug dealers for twenty dollars a pop, hustling pool in places where we were the youngest ones by at least twenty years, cruising up and down the streets as the music bumped solidly and the cool air of the night ricocheted off the black top roads that just hours earlier had blistered heat and launched an aroma that only someone familiar with street life could understand. Sticking our heads out the window to take in the night air and let the wind blow relief over our sweat encrusted faces, life seemed so open even though we were on a fast track to the only destinations being jail or death, the world still seemed open with our ignorance guiding us throughout. We knew the dealers, the bangers, the prostitutes, we knew it all, and for that two mile stretch we were the kings of nothing, but at least we were kings. It was probably about ten years later and the world changed with the internet taking over. All of a sudden, every dream and every impossibility seemed within our reach and very, very possible. All you had to do was go online and read the numerous stories of people who were hustling and succeeding. Jay-Z became our inspiration for someone who come up from the hustle and made it big, while also making everyone around them successful. With our diametrically opposed personalities, we knew we could represent something that had never been seen before, and it truly felt like the beginning of a brand new gold rush. We wanted it. We wanted happiness. We wanted money. We wanted the new life money could buy. We had heard all the sayings before on how money couldn’t buy happiness, but have you ever been miserable when there’s no food and you can’t afford any? When the winter drops the temperatures below zero and you can’t afford heat or electricity and all you can think about is how there’s absolutely no hope? Now, have you ever been depressed when there’s a refrigerator full of food, or sad when the winter has the outside world below zero, but inside you are walking around in a house that’s in the mid-seventies with so much electricity every room is a shining beacon unto itself? People who say money can’t buy happiness are correct, but it can put you in a lifestyle that allows you to be happy. We had always found that people who say this never knew what it was like to be alone for days on in as a nine year old kid when no parent comes home. How at that time you have to find whatever it is you can find to eat because your parent has long since stopped caring, and now they’ve just stopped remembering. The hopelessness as you eat toothpaste, or on the rare occasion it was there, dog food. The utter panic that a nine year old has during these times, but not having the mental experience to know what these new feelings that utterly decimate your soul are. The days when you have to go the hospital to see your parent having their stomach pumped due to overdoses or suicide attempts. How in the fifth grade you don’t how to buy deodorant but know exactly how to pump your parents stomach with a charcoal milkshake? The absolute suffocation of despair as it seems every breath, every step, every moment of hope is just something that allows for a greater depression to wrap its claws around your neck and further squeeze out what little hope you have for life left? Very few people understand how before you even make high school the only air you can breathe is the air that makes you realize nothing will ever get better, better times are for people with watches, you have death or suicide, when the only hope is that maybe the next life will get it right. We knew this, we experienced this, and once we understood we were both here, we knew we could do it. If someone’s Hard Knock Life could lead to a Yellow Brick Road, then ours could as well. The streets prophet even waxed poetic on the Rose That Grew from Concrete. And with the internet, we could make money with the kids in the neighborhood who were C++ straight and moving on, we would finance them and ride the success. One of the women we knew, a stripper who was using her money to become C++ and go into business for herself, was looking for backers, not fuckers, but backers, and we told her we could spot twenty grand. She agreed, we panicked. Twenty grand only existed in a state of verbiage for us, that was a reality for preps, not street punks. But we had two months until she needed it, so we fell back on our only steady in our life, the streets and the hustle. My cousin and his girlfriend would come up with ten, me with ten. During the days I would run whatever packages I could for the hustlers, at night I would run guns for the dealers. Deuce-deuces and deuce-fives, sixty for unloaded, eighty for loaded. That was my hustle. I never slept during that time, not only because I was on the clock for twenty-four-seven, but this wasn’t me and my stomach and nerves reminded me of this at every moments peace. My dreams were nightmares worse than the nightmares of my reality, but we had to do it. We only wanted the little biggest slice of the pie, and this was our break. The two months came and I had ‘made mines’ about a week prior. I went to see the stripper on the day we agreed, my cousin and his girlfriend made theirs, but as she danced away and I sat, my cousin never showed. I told her he had it, just to give it another week. During the days I searched everywhere I could for him, but no where was the only answer I could get. On the third night of me waiting in the strip club, his girlfriend showed up. He had left. She came home one day and he was gone, took everything. And just like that, I was dead in the water. All the memories I had of us, coming up, times spent running the streets, laughing, fighting, discovering life only the way you can with a family member, all gone. Now when I drove the streets, the air seemed colder and the smell of the piss painted black tops never seemed to leave. It was all over, as was my faith in humankind. That year closed in utter depression. It was about a year later a frantic knock on my door woke me up. I could see one of my cousins at the door, pounding on it. I opened it up to the panicked tone of someone who was in shock. He was in his backyard is what I was told. I didn’t have any clue as to what my cousin was talking about, so I told him to calm down and tell me again. THE cousin. He was in his backyard. A bullet in the chest and buried alive. I was shocked. I asked what happened. I was told what would’ve been about two days before we were supposed to meet with the stripper, his girlfriend came home tweeking, and he told her she had to go the rehab or get out of his house, so she shot him in his sleep. He wasn’t dead, it was a chest gunshot wound, but then she buried him alive, where he died. For a year he stayed buried while she lived there. When I met up with her and we drove all around the city looking for him, she had already shot and buried him. After she was arrested, my cousin was added to a national database for Domestic Violence Fatalities. It turns out being born of a dad who left, a mom who didn’t want him unless it was to put down or verbally abuse him, had left him to find a partner just like that. Abusive. He wanted out not only because of the streets, but because he just wanted to escape all the abuse. My cousin and I. We who fought many, surrounded by machismo bullshit all our lives, and he was going home to an abusive partner. He never would’ve told me his girlfriend was abusing him. And now his last words were whatever was being said as the dirt piled onto him, his final stop in this world, an unwanted son buried alive with a bullet in his chest.


Missiles rained from the sky, hundreds at a time, exploding with mighty bangs and clangs before the villagers of Rena could let out a shocked cry. In seconds, houses, shops, dogs, children and more fell to the ground, engulfed in orange -red flickering flames ,all begging for death to soothe their pain. In an hour, the Iralion soldiers had stormed the Castle grounds, finding and beheading the prime-minister that had hid in the bottom bunker, hands pressed against his ears to block out the deafening wails of the people. In a month, the name Sadar was wiped to oblivion--the tyrant province of the Saran empire, buried in ashes and despair--forgotten by its three sister cities. My mother said it was a good thing. She said it was time the Sadarians were stopped-- whatever that meant. You see at the time, I was too young to comprehend the apparent wickedness of my sister city. Barely eleven, with cardboard for breasts, I couldn't understand just what my people had done, but I smiled nonetheless. Proudly, if I must add. We were saving our empire and I watched it with my own amazed eyes. With the help of our drones that followed our soldiers into the attack, I watched the head of the raid burst into the central castle doors, gunning down the palace guards one at a time as he made his way to the king. It was muted but I could hear the grunts as the men fell in their blood and took their last breath. I remember how silent we all were when my people had found the King's bunker. My mother had ordered the servants to take me to my room but I had been persistent. I hadn't watched this far to not see the ending, because at the time I was watching a movie, not the massacre of a civilization, but a gruesome action packed movie. It was fun. The head of the raid pulled off his mask, the veins on his shaven head visible as he held out his gun. That's when they un-muted it. "Ikular Saran Borayong" For the love of Saran , he said and that was how I watched our emperor die at the hands of my father. It was a befitting ending to my movie. My father came back a hero and our remaining two sister clans made him head--the new emperor. No one returned to Sadar, no one spoke about it , asides the survivors of the raid, who were branded on their necks and transported to my city- Iral. My father said the branding wasn't to torture or isolate our sister but to keep our people safe--trust was something we'd never have with them. A decade wasn't enough to change that. Reduced it ,but didn't change it and we lived like that, with the family members of our victims freely living amongst us, with our culture, our rules, our names and our leadership. 10 years ago I didn't understand it...And I wanted to change that. Hence, my presence at the gates of yooni-market, a sure place to meet any Sadarian. For a reason or two they were never at the central city and it took a great amount of planning, bribery and next level sneaking to escape the castle grounds, but I was finally here. What I would do when I found my target, a complete mystery to me. I adjusted the identity cloaker necklace I borrowed from my father and stepped into the bustling space. My feet strolled the busy market, eyes taking in whatever they caught sight on and hands clasped behind my back. The sky shops hovered over me much like the ones at the capital but their yelling owners contrasted to the calm and collected shop keepers mother and I visited. The street--tiled path, was littered with people in different patterned anshikris and trousers, and some women woret the same, save some that wore the gowns. The street wear resembled the capital also, so did the inch high trees and colorful flowers that decorated every place not occupied with human activities. So far this part of Iral just looked like a busier extended version of the capital and for some reason I liked it. But then, if only I wasn’t so engulfed in my sightseeing, I would have noticed the men following me and would have been prepared when they swiftly dragged and threw me into a narrow corner. I blinked the pain away as I sprung to my feet. My elbow ached and I examined the small bloodless scratch. “Mother wouldn’t like that,” I grumbled to myself. “That’s a pretty cloaker.” I raised my head to see a stout man, probably tanned yellow from the afternoon sun, with the skin around his crinkled eyes a lighter shade. “Wonder if you’re the same under it.” I turned to see the brick wall behind me and my eyes moved to my only exit that was blocked by a huge man looking to the market who’s back faced us. I gulped and lowered my gaze to the stout before me. “I’d really love to give this to you, but I can’t,” I told him. He gave a hoarse snicker as he stepped forward. “I’m not asking, baby girl.” “Well, that’s rude of you. Didn’t your mother teach you any manners?” His smile dropped. “Give me the damned necklace before I hurt you.” “You’re not very intimidating. Try again,” I said and his eyes widened a fraction. He lunged forward and I dodged . I circled my arms around his buff neck and pulled out my knife. Before he could react, I placed the cool metal against his skin, and bent to his height, till my lips were beside his small ears. “Have you seen a poisoned blade before?” I whispered, turning the tip into his cheek “You’re....you’re a witch.” “Aren’t you told too old to believe in witches?” “Kiran!” the man shouted, probably signaling for his road-blocker friend and I hissed. With a slash of my knife, I made a small cut by stout's ear and he fell to the floor. “It’s just a small doze. You’d be up in a few minutes,” I told him as he wiggled on the ground and I stood tall, waiting for road-blocker to attack. “You’re dead ,you bitch,” road blocker growled as he stomped forward. “Trying to sound American, are we?” I giggled to myself while taking cautionary steps back. Knife in hand, I kept my focus on his towering physique, hoping I had enough venom to knock him out. He looked too heavy to go head on with, but I could always run past him. Then again, I didn’t know what weapons he hid under his baggy shirt and I didn’t intend to find out. I filled my lungs with the necessary air, but before I could let out my award winning scream, road-blocker came to an abrupt stop. My gaze shifted to the reason, and it raised an eyebrow over road-blockers shoulder and I raised mine back. The man was just as tall as road-blocker, but less intimidating, yet he had a hand firmly placed on road-blocker's shoulder as he turned him around. “What’s happening?” my helper asked and I witnessed road-blockers broad shoulders tense. Just then stout’s poison wore off and he’s worm-wiggling had come to a shameful end. His eyes locked with mine and he shuffled backwards till he got to his feet. Like a fairytale, helper walked to my side and I took a cautionary step back. Without a word he turned from me to the two other men and they broke into another language. “Ri sor alimar y kator?” helper asked the men and they replied judiciously. It wasn’t Iralian, so I stood there, my heart beating erratically but body standing firm, with my eyes faced with the back of the tall helper as he shielded me from the men. I returned my knife to its place and continued listening. “Y lora dikaro sukar,” he said. There was a certain charm in his voice, I’ll give him that and I found myself staring. “I’ll handle it,” he told the men and he waited till they were both out of sight before turning to me. “Somnida. Alinye irim,ee ?” Sorry, I’m Alinye, you? He said and my heart lightened. He spoke Iralion. I smiled and shook his stretched hand. “Raylene,” I said truthfully and he raised a brow. “Like the princess?” “Exactly,” I said gesturing to my long cottoned skirt and worn out shirt, with a comical curtsy. He nodded and walked to the side and took a seat on the bricks on the ground. “Are you waiting for someone?” he asked as he leaned to the wall, stretching his long legs before him. “Better you get going before the sun sets.” “It’s just noon," I said and I dusted my skirt. “Barely even evening.” Plus I hadn’t completed my task. If I was going to get locked up in the castle when I returned ,I at least didn’t want risking my freedom to be in vain. “It will be past that before you make it back to the capital.” I furrowed my eyebrows and he chuckled. “You don’t look like someone from here.” I looked down at my clothes and then to him. “No one is dressed that badly,” he explained and my lips dropped to a frown, but he continued, “It seems like you wanted to fit in but knew nothing. Means you’re from the capital...or somewhere around those parts.” My jaws clenched and I suddenly felt self conscious, but my self-pity and embarrassment was distracted by his chuckle. “It’s nothing to be ashamed of.” He shrugged. “Seen worse.” That... did not make me feel any better. “And you?” I asked, walking to take a seat beside him. Guilt rustled in the pit of my stomach, as I pondered on his words and the slight fact I had insulted him some way. “You seem to know a lot about the capital. Do you live there too?” He stretched, flexing his muscled arms behind as he spoke,” Can’t imagine living there. So busy, so detached from what’s actually going on,” he looked to me.” D’you know how much houses cost there?” I didn’t but I shrugged with a faint smile. “So you just can’t afford it?” He laughed heartily and my grin widened. His joy was contagious. He looked down to me, his lips twitching to the side as though he was thinking and the air around us stilled. My task forgotten I slightly tilted my head, and with that moment I took in as much as I could. His dark brown hair-- that could pass of for black --curling down his head and covering most of his forehead, and which lead to his stretched but scanty eyebrows. He was a few shades lighter than me, what the Europeans could call olive, but I preferred wood brown. He reminded me of a tree, strong and tall, yet beautiful in its own uniqueness. He was a sight to behold. I blinked as my cheeks heated, but I don’t think he noticed because he scoffed playfully. “Well,” he said, “in my defense, heard it’s very busy and the buses don’t carry just any one.” I tilted my head.” Are you sure about that?” “Hundred. Them conductors are picky with passengers. You’d have to be some celeb or something.” “What if I was injured?” He smiled a dimpled smile. ”You can always try your luck,” he said turning to face the brick wall and that's when I saw it. Infused in his skin; an arrow pointed downwards with a thin line circled around it. In other words: the brand of Sadar.


The Wompup creature was a curious thing. The fact that I'd found it first made me want to sing! A little thing, nestled in a hole in the ground, so quiet and soft, it didn't make a sound. Tiny little wings adorned it's sides, and when it's lids blinked open, I saw bright yellow eyes. I carefully reached into the hole, and brought out my discovery that was as black as coal. The sweet little thing refused to move, but slept in my hand and I had not a clue what to do. Should I give it up? Should I let it go? Or should I keep it as a pet until I grow old? The last question appealed to me, so I kept my new friend. Although I didn't know of the powers it held within. As I brought my new companion inside, my siblings bombarded me; Nancy, Kurt, and Clyde. "Get away!" I yelled, protecting my pet. "We want to see!" They yelled. I replied, "Not yet." I ran to my room as fast as I could, being careful not to drop the little creature as black as soot. Once in my room, I shuffled around. I was looking for a habitat, but none could be found. I softly laid my fuzzy friend on the bed, and wondered what in the world this little guy could be fed. I tried orange slices, hot dogs, kale and penne, but my miniature friend didn't have a liking for any. We tried fruits, liquids, dairy and meat, but I found after while that my friend liked beets! I would chop them up small and serve them on a doll's plate, and my pet would scarf them down as if he needed to leave the house and he was very very late. After he finished I sat next to my window that looked out over the town, and suddenly the creature's eyes blinked open, and were staring me down. I gasped as little black nose twitched, and his small clawed foot reached up to his tiny ears to itch. He made a little yawn and made a squeaky sound, then sat up like a tiny dog, his wings flapping around. He cocked his head and looked at me, straight into the eyes. I daresay if you looked close, his face almost looked wise. "I'll call you Wompup." I told the little guy. The name just came to me and I liked it, don't ask me why. I reached out to pet his head. He jerked away quickly and scooted across my bed. Suddenly he jumped off the bed and scampered to my bedroom door. He scraped on the cherry wood, wanting to be outdoors. I ran to the trapped little guy and slowly I sat down beside. He looked up at me with his yellow eyes, and purred like a cat, to my surprise. With utmost caution I pet his fuzzy coat, hoping he wouldn't bite me with his tiny fangs as white as snow. "Sorry, little guy, I can't let you out. You were sleeping in my yard, and I found you. You're mine now!" He looked at me sadly and laid on the floor. I wondered what else he wanted that was outside my door. I swept my auburn hair out of my eyes and stroked the fluffy creature who had the aroma of cherry pie. Cherry pie? I thought to myself. What could give this weird creature that great smell? I shrugged my shoulders and thought: After everything I've seen, who could ever tell? Maybe I could search the black puff, and see why I could find. I looked over at my computer and I made up my mind. Slowly I picked up the jet black thing that couldn't get any cuter, set him on my bed again, and sat down at my computer. I went to the search bar to find out what he was. But nothing I found looked like my little ball of fuzz! After a while I gave up and sat back down on my bed. I reached out to tap his little nose, but he still would not let me pet his head. Suddenly his wings started flapping, but he did not fly. His miniature wings were the reason why. It squinted it's yellow eyes, and to me it looked like it was trying to disappear. I scoffed at it's sweet attempts until it vanished into thin air. I gasped as my hands became void of my companion. I looked around my room, up, down, underneath, out, and in, I could not see the little creature as small as a rat. Where did he go? Where was he at? All of the sudden, a plop sounded into my laundry basket. I peered inside, and what did I find? My cute little Wompup, trying to climb. I reached in and pulled out my magical pal. He was the most interesting thing I'd had in a while! I marveled at his disappearing act, every day he'd practice disappearing out of my hat. For days I kept him in my room. "Did you know I am super happy to have you?" The little guy never replied, but I could see in his eyes how desperately he wanted to be back outside. "What do you want? Aren't you happy here?" The jet black creature responded with a flick of his little floppy ears. I didn't want to loose my pet, it would be too hard, but I followed my inclinations and took my boy out into the yard. I hoped he wouldn't disappear, finding him would be quiet hard. I watched as his little body made it's way through the tall grass. He found his way back to his hole which I saw was deeper than I had noticed last. Suddenly my little pet squeaked, calling to his own kind. Three little heads peeked out from the hole, each as black as coal from a mine. I gasped in realization that my little Wompup had a family. It was time for him to go. It was time for me to let him free. He looked up at me with a kindly glance, and finally I got my chance. I pet his head and his fuzzy features, knowing this might be the last time I touch this creature. With a flap of his wings and a blink of his yellow eyes, my Wompup scampered back into his own life. The one thing in my mind that will forever ring... The Wompup creature was a curious thing.


Christmas Eve at Luiz’s Old-Fashioned Café by Joseph Morris Old Town, New Arantes City, Jandira, Kuat Star System 24 December 423 SF Since Jandira's Founding j Old-Earth Christmas background music combined with the comforting fragrances of garlic and oregano to greet customers entering Luiz’s Old-Fashioned Café. A holo of a red sleigh pulled by nine reindeer hovered over the dance floor. Every few minutes, the sleigh’s sole passenger changed from the North American Santa, in his traditional heavyweight red suit, to the New Brazilian Papai Noel wearing a lightweight red silk outfit. A live evergreen-like Christmas tree decorated with shiny baubles and red and white striped peppermint candy canes graced the right corner of the broad entrance area. Brightly wrapped presents for a planned after-closing staff Christmas party lay piled at its base. To the left, a long Earth-mahogany bar with four live human bartenders catered to a crowd that came for conversation, drinks, and some of the best food in New Arantes City. Live human servers were part of the Café’s lure. Anabel Alencar-Smith sat at a small table off to one side of the main room with her soon-to-be-husband, Lucas Andrade-Oliveira. She lifted her wine glass to her lips to mask her scrutiny of her future husband. To an outsider, the two looked pretty much like a typical couple. Some might consider Lucas a little old for her but that wasn’t uncommon in the twenty-eighth century. With lifespans extending into the third decade past one hundred, a difference of fifteen or twenty years was not considered an issue. Furthermore, Lucas didn’t have a reputation as a dabbler of women, no less, younger ones. More importantly though, few would dare risk the wrath of the Patriarch of the Oliveira Family, probably the most powerful crime family in Portown, by whispering unsavory rumors about him. Anabel shrugged. In the long run, it didn’t really matter what these Humans thought of her or her relationship with Lucas. She was a Human-Pheryl Marge and eventually all these Humans would be serving her. After all, Humans were just foodstock. She recoiled at that thought. She was losing her humanity as the Merge progressed and there wasn’t anything she could do about it. < Deal with it. You’re a Merge. > Messages like this from her Pheryl half were becoming rarer as the Merging continued. Pheryl and Human were becoming inseparable. Part of the unstoppable Merge process. She gulped down what was left in the glass. For a moment it seemed like swallowing the last of her humanity. She sighed and signaled to a live waiter for a refill. Tonight, she was playing the role of Lucas’s love and future wife. She wore what had been for centuries called that “little black dress.” Materials and style changed over time with various fashion fads but someone from the twentieth or twenty-first century would have recognized it. To keep up appearances, she had chosen a mixture of modesty and a flaunting of her feminine assets. The dress’s transparency nanos that could expose various parts of her body on command were not activated except where modesty was not betrayed. Bare shoulders exposing smooth, olive-ebony skin. A demure cleavage suggesting the size of her ample bosom without being blatant about it. A dress length emphasizing her long legs but not so short beyond what some considered as good taste. Nudity taboos were a mixed bag on Jandira. It seemed like the further you were from Portown, the greater the taboo. Undyed black hair and no contact-lens-enhanced dark eyes complemented her modest approach. This had to be an outfit befitting the future wife of a Family Patriarch. Maybe she exposed more than the recently deceased Matriarch Sylvana would have revealed, but then again, she had more assets to display. She hid a grimace from Lucas behind the refilled glass. Feeding off her Tia (aunt) Sylvana had been necessary but distasteful. Distasteful? That’s all the indignation she could muster? How far she was falling. Her task on Jandira was to engineer the collapse of the Jandiran government, but her success largely depended on the continued maturation of her Pheryl. She had left New Berwick before she was ready due to the urgency of the High Priestess’ vision of the timelines. Fortunately, here on Jandira, the Family proved quite efficient in disposing of bodies, thereby allowing her a full feeding from which her victims didn’t survive. The feedings matured her Pheryl enough to soon allow her to insert a splinter into Lucas. A splinter: a small portion of her Pheryl transferred to Lucas’ brain to ensure complete, unwavering obedience with no chance of betrayal. The splinter allowed her to monitor all of his intimate thoughts and emotions and then easily project hers to become his. Inserting a splinter into Lucas was a bit of risk because it was difficult to mask its vinegary presence in his aura, even with the new mental stealth protocols developed by the High Priestess. Still, it would take a deep taste to get to the Pheryl essence. That is, of course, if Humans could actually taste auras. And that was the crux of the issues with High Priestess’ visions: what these Jandiran Humans were actually capable of. Lucas dutifully smiled back at her with the look of an older man completely flattered by the attentions of a younger woman. Exactly as she wanted him to appear. She had used her Pheryl abilities to help Lucas shore up his position as the de facto head of the Family. Whereas, in the past, his critics would have had to be eliminated, her Pheryl mental abilities enabled her to change their opinion of him. Fewer bodies to be disposed of and less risk of police involvement. Even some of Lucas’ most fervent opponents now believed he was the one to lead the family. However, some were too intractable and had to be eliminated. One of those had served the dual purpose of another feeding for her. “Lucas! Nice to see you!” a gravelly voice called out. A short, stocky man, accompanied by an older-looking portly woman, strolled to the table. Marcos Barros, Mayor of Old Town. Anabel relaxed. A Lucas ally . “Good evening, Mayor. Natália,” Lucas said, rising to take the other man’s hand while sporting a warm, artificial smile. He bowed to the Mayor’s wife and kissed the back of her hand. “You’re looking exquisite tonight, my lady. Merry Christmas to both of you.” Natália blushed. “Merry Christmas to you too, Senor Lucas.” She turned to Anabel. “And who is this?” “May I present Anabel Alencar-Smith? A recent arrival from New Brazil who has captured my heart in a short time. We plan to marry in the spring.” “Your Honor,” she said in a put-on, uncertain voice, extending her hand to shake his. “Your Honor? Don’t be so serious? We’re all friends here, senhorita.” Marcos took her outstretched hand and kissed it. “Recently arrived from New Brazil?” Natália asked. Anabel pretended to shrink before the older woman’s frank gaze. “Yes, senhora,” Ana replied. “From Juiz de Fora on the southern continent. You wouldn’t have heard of it. A small farming village of less than a thousand, destroyed by a failure of a dyke during a hurricane.” “And what brings you to Jandira?” “A new start, my lady.” “Why not go to one of the larger cities on New Brazil like New Brasilia? Why come to a new world?” Natália asked. Anabel shrugged. “Like I said, I wanted a new beginning.” Short for “I had some trouble on New Brazil I wanted to get away from.” Natália nodded understandingly and smiled a suitable artificial smile. “Well, my dear, if you ever need any help with introductions or to adjusting to life here, Lucas knows how to contact me.” Anabel tasted Natália’s aura. Duplicity. No real intent to help there. “Thank you, my lady.” “Oh, not my lady, my dear, Natália is fine.” She turned to her husband. “Let’s leave these two young people to enjoy each other. Besides, I’m hungry.” Season’s greetings were exchanged again, and the older couple turned away. As they walked toward their table, Anabel probed them again. Nothing unusual about their auras. Meeting little resistance, she pushed inward. She tweaked Marcos’ attraction to her as a beautiful young woman to allow him to be influenced through simple flirting. A manipulation accomplished without the need for any real pressure. He would be willing to help her in the forlorn hope of bedding her. Deep down he knew he would never have the courage to take advantage even if he had the chance. The fantasies of an older man given a little push. She moved on to the woman. Natália’s comment about helping Anabel had been political fluff. Anabel located the woman’s motherly instincts and pushed gently. Natália was now firmly imprinted with Anabel. Like her husband, simple influence not requiring distraction and much pressure. Natália would take Anabel under her wing and introduce her to Old Town society. Both of the Barros had been influenced just enough to eliminate any doubts about Lucas’ new consort. They now accepted her as who she said she was. A useful night, so far. Sometime later she would “recruit” them to worship the Goddess of Pherylahn. A local congressman and his wife strolled over. Another ally. A couple at the restaurant entrance caught her attention. Jandiran Investigations Bureau (JIB) Special Agent Ruan Beça with a stunning-looking woman in her own fashionable version of a black dress clinging to his arm. Anabel scowled. She had been warned about him. She reached out to the woman and probed. His wife, Melinda . A JIB analyst! Were they here on business? A thin tendril wafted through the restaurant. Someone was tasting the crowd! Was that the jib? No sense taking a chance. Keeping hidden was the priority, even though finding out more about his abilities would be helpful. If it was him. She pulled up a protective mental block and activated a trigger. She was simply now Anabel Ella Alencar-Smith, an innocent immigrant from a small village completely overwhelmed by the attention of a man as powerful as Lucas and feeling desperately out of place in such a fine restaurant. She knew nothing of Pheryls. And hopefully the vinegary taste of a Pheryl was masked. Old Town, New Arantes City, Jandira, Kuat Star System 24 December 423 SF Ruan stepped through the heavy wooden restaurant door, holding it open for his wife. As he followed her in, he scanned the crowd with his Portal. A brief whiff of vinegar! A Merge? So brief. An actual taste? Or just his imagination. Damn! This was supposed to a quiet, romantic Christmas Eve with his wife at his favorite restaurant. Even though the Oliveira family sometimes seemed to hold court here, that was a fact of life in Old Town, with its proximity to Portown. Besides, he occasionally picked up a tidbit of intelligence while dining here. Before he could scan again, Luiz spotted him and ambled over. “Senor Ruan, nice to have you back. Merry Christmas.” He turned and bowed to Mindi. “Senora, Merry Christmas.” “Merry Christmas to you, too, Luiz,” Mindi replied with a broad smile lighting up her face, her chestnut brown eyes warm at seeing the old restauranteur. “Give my love and best wishes for a Merry Christmas to Adelina and little Luiz Junior.” Luiz’s face reflected Mindi’s warmth. “I will. Your table is ready.” As they were led to a table off to the side, not far from the bar, Ruan reached out through his Portal again. No vinegar and no telltale indigo in the blue and yellow human auras. The table gave Ruan ample view of the restaurant’s patrons without putting him front and center. As soon as he was seated, he tasted again. The Pheryl essence was still gone. “Hon, what’s the matter?” Mindi whispered after they were seated. “You almost jumped out of your skin when you walked through the door.” “A wisp of vinegar,” he replied to her question. He sighed as he regarded his wife. As a JIB special agent, it wasn’t surprising she noticed his reaction. There was nothing wrong with her security senses. She was also on the Pheryl Joint Task Force and aware of Pheryls and Portals. The two of them were adapting to his Portal and the ramifications to their relationship. She was slated to get one, but exactly when was uncertain. She was a trained interrogator and was looking forward to the help a Portal would be in verifying the veracity of a perp’s testimony. That was the one thing she was allowed to do with a Portal during an interrogation under Duke Kaiden’s Directive . A fine balancing act between constitutional rights and security. He reached out again, an allowed cursory taste of the surrounding auras. Nothing. “Pheryl?” Mindi whispered, keeping her voice soft and unconcerned as if in a romantic exchange with her husband. “Here?” She kept her eyes locked on his. “Nothing now, but when we entered the restaurant. It was so brief I could have been mistaken. Damn, I hate this Portal stuff.” “Why? We use it responsibly to protect this planet, and Humanity.” She grimaced at her rote recitation. “The incongruities and inconsistencies. Two wrongs never make a right,” he muttered. Surreptitiously tasting someone’s thoughts and emotions even with a warrant didn’t seem right. Even if the enemy was doing it without restrictions. “And one unanswered wrong definitely doesn’t make a right either,” she replied. “You can use your Portal to taste the crowd in this restaurant for a vinegary essence and check their auras for telltale indigo, but not go any further without a warrant. We do it by the rule of law. The Pheryl don’t. And we don’t use Portals to influence others’ thoughts.” Yeah. She’s right. There’s no other answer to the Pheryl threat except the Portals, a gift from a billion-year-old species. As for tonight, was that vinegary essence ever really there or had he imagined it? He visually scanned the room. There was Lucas Andrade-Oliveira, head of the Oliveira Family, but that wasn’t unusual. Alongside him was Anabel Alencar-Smith. He was aware of her, a new player who had appeared out of nowhere to become Lucas’ companion and apparent lover. She had been investigated, cleared, and yet, here she was, at the same time as a whiff of a Pheryl. He wanted to taste and dive into her aura but because his scan of the room had found no anomalies, the Directive allowed no further action . Anything further would require him obtain a warrant from the PISC (Portal Intelligence Surveillance Court). Ruan grimaced. Now that he was on the Pheryl Task Force, he was dealing more with that damn classified court. He had hoped because of the high planetary security risk posed by the Pheryl, the PISC would be more friendly toward the intelligence and police agencies, but Kai had taken the lessons from the twenty-first century and made sure it was independent and rigorous in its application of the law. That was both good and bad. Good, if you took an overarching view of the Portals and their constitutional freedoms implications. Bad, if you were a cop or security operative working in real time. A warrant was needed to taste Alencar-Smith’s aura in depth but he lacked Probable Cause. Besides, getting one on Christmas Eve? Yeah, right. Mindi placed a hand on his. “Okay, husband, what’s going on?” He carefully used his eyes to indicate a couple at a table across in the opposite corner. “Lucas Oliveira is here with Anabel Alencar-Smith.” He stopped as the waiter walked up with a bottle of Capelli Farms Chianti. “Merry Christmas.” “Our favorite. Please tell Luis thank you.” “The Alencar-Smith woman. I thought you did a DNA scan on her.” “Yeah. But it was a remote DNA scan of her and probably not reliable enough to check for Pheryl DNA. We have so little experience in this area,” Ruan pursed his lips. This is war, not just some criminal activity. How could he just let this go by? Alencar-Smith superficially resembled the Merge they were chasing. With disguises using DNA sculpturing how could he be sure this really wasn’t the one? But without Probable Cause he couldn’t get a warrant. He could go ahead and probe Alencar-Smith more deeply. No one would know. But if he probed and discovered she was a Pheryl, what could he do about it? He couldn’t tell anyone without admitting he violated the Directive . He probably could find a way to secretly incriminate her. He sighed. Then was he any better than the Pheryl? Isn’t that what everyone was worried about with the Portals? The temptation? He looked over at his wife. She took both of his hands in hers and gazed into his eyes. “Don’t do it,” she whispered. “Do it right, Ruan. We’re JIB special agents sworn to uphold the law. We can’t be like them.” Damn the way she always seemed to read his mind . Did she already have a Portal? It certainly seemed like it. He sighed and squeezed back. She was right. For now. She erupted into a brilliant smile that should have lit up the entire room. “Chill out, Hon. It’s Christmas Eve. The kids are at Grandma’s. We have a res at the Planetary Empire Inn. Let’s enjoy it. I wore this dress to package my Christmas gift to you.” Her smile morphed into something more sensuous and her eyes promised a reward later that night. No need of a Portal to interpret her thoughts. She definitely wasn’t in her official special agent mode. “I wore it because it allows you to view parts of my present while it’s still wrapped. Better yet, it allows your gift to be easily unwrapped when the time is right for unwrapping.” He blushed and gulped his wine.


“Why Now?” The first time he tried to come back into her life, Rebbecca was eight. Eight years old, but had lived a hundred with the beatings of her and death blows dealt to her mother; emotional scarring, like a cat scratch healed white on her arm, but never fades. He’d been in prison since she was four, and the memories scared her to the point where she had wet her pants. He wanted to see his daughter, but for reasons that were selfish. He figured if he inserted himself back into her life, he wouldn’t be bogged down by child support. It doesn’t work that way, the social worker tells him. He could see Rebbecca on the social worker’s terms, not his. So he disappeared again, leaving her to wonder if it had been a bad dream. She had lots of those - waking clutching her stuffed piggy, soaking wet from tears and sweat, heart thumping so hard she could hardly catch her breath. Every few months, waking in a different place, with different people who were only too happy to have her so to cash the check that paid them for keeping this broken child. Foster care they called it. Always lots of kids, but always so alone. She was 10 when he came to the newest place, bringing dresses that were three sizes too big which she would never wear, or stuffed animals that would be taken away the minute he was gone by the foster monsters. He would ask if she wanted to come with him; she would just stare at him with her big blue eyes, begging him silently not to ask her that. The social worker, always in the background, would pipe up and tell him that is not an option. He visited two more days, but then was gone like a plastic bag twirling away in a dust devil, leaving her in relief but still very alone with the memories of a man who changed her life every time he saw her. In her solitude, at 13, she became a voracious reader. Anything she could find in a school library or the book-mobile that came once a month. Rebbecca learned the term “estrangement,” and thought that was what had been going on with her father most of her life. The dictionary became her best friend. She was a good student, always at the top of her class. Her teachers praised her, even though she never truly felt it was deserved. The thing about being a foster is that no one really cares what she does, as long as she keeps quiet, does what she’s told and they keep getting their money every month to lavish on their “own” children. The other thing that she did quite well was swim. She was allowed to be on the swim team, excelled in the 300 medley, and gathering up first place ribbons that she hid inside a ratty old Converse shoe box. When he came again just before she turned 17, he had actually called the social worker and asked what I was like, what did I like to do or wear so he could try to get it right this time. The social worker told him that his daughter got high marks in school, loved to read, on the swim team, and was happy in t-shirts, jeans, and sneakers. She was not into makeup, or girly-type things. So when he approached her at the latest foster home, he told her that he was proud of her. Those words made her feel sick, and she didn’t know why. It was a mix of butterflies in her stomach plus the urge to throw up. Rebbecca had always wanted to hear that from someone who knew her, or possibly loved her, but it could not be him. Love was an unfamiliar word, as was the feeling. She remembered she loved her Mom, but could not feel it. Her father came to see her every day for the next week, bringing her new books, new shirts, and new shoes. He watched her win another ribbon at a swim meet, and clapped louder than any other parent there. It was a peculiar feeling; not quite happiness, but not sadness, either. She wasn’t sure what she felt, but whatever it was, it started to spread throughout her chest to the tiny, closed-off heart. Rebbecca asked her father after the meet why he clapped. He told her again that he was very proud of her, and by the look of his soft gray eyes, he meant it. He had to leave again, and this time, the first time, her tiny heart ached. He said he would be back soon, that he had to finish doing a few things that he hoped would make her proud, too. She wanted to tell him she hoped so too, but the fear was too strong, so she kept silent. True to his word, her father did come back after a few months had gone by. He told the social worker that he bought a house that was close, and wanted to visit more. The social worker told him that it appeared as though he was finally getting it right, that finding roots and a meaningful relationship could only strengthen his appeal to the court in order to finally get his Rebbecca back. But being a longtime member of a club she never wanted to be in, the foster system, it was all she knew. She still had bad dreams, still could see the giant monster that was her father covered in her mother’s blood when she was that knobby-kneed little girl hiding in the closet. Could she ever trust him? A month later, before the judge in Family Court, Rebbecca’s father laid out all the things he has been doing for the last 5 years. Having a steady job with benefits, paying the State for his daughter’s care, and buying his first home. He wanted to give her stability and not have to worry where she would have laid her head down next. He had tears in his eyes, and told the judge that he had so many regrets in his life, that he was a changed man, and could give his girl all she needed. Rebbecca sat in the back row of the courtroom, listening and trying not to hold her breath. She was hearing things she had always wanted, but still had that deep seated fear down in her soul. The judge then looked at her and asked if she had anything to say. After taking several deep breathes, she stood and faced the man who had destroyed her entire world so long ago. She had a thousand questions swirling around in her head, and trying to grasp at the very one that meant the most. As she started to speak, she stopped, remembering that word, “estrangement.” He had drifted in and out of her life like a firefly on the breeze. He had never written letters or sent birthday cards. She never knew when he would show up, or the reasons why each time he did. He never once said he was sorry for doing those horrific things to her and the terror he caused when he killed her mother. All those feelings came rushing like a river overflowing the banks that kept it reigned in. She was three months from turning 18, had earned scholarships to an Ivy League school, and plans that didn’t have him in it. That tiny heart ached once more, squeezing tight as she trembled, and she said two words: “Why now?” She then turned and walked out of the courtroom, into the warmth of the golden sunshine, and came to the realization of estrangement. It’s a two-way street, and she’s left him at a dead end.


## Home for the Holidays Snow crunched beneath my feet as I walked through the streets of my old neighborhood, my mother’s words from earlier that evening echoing in my head: *If you’re not my son, and you’re not my daughter, I don’t know what you’re doing in my house.* The Christmas lights, cheap, tacky, and beautiful, seemed to wonder the same thing. “Go back to the city,” they blinked on and off, never in-between. “Change isn’t welcome here.” “But I haven’t changed,” I wanted to say. “I haven’t.” But it was too cold to stop and argue. I had to move on. I didn’t mean to end up at Maggie’s Diner, but my feet had to take me somewhere, and there was nowhere else to go. I’d grown up with the owner’s daughter, Jess, and we’d spent a lot of time in that diner. But that was six years and a gender ago; Maggie wasn’t likely to recognize me like this - not a man, but certainly not the girl her daughter used to hang out with, either. A bell on the door jingled the same familiar greeting as I entered the diner, which was empty save a few homeless people at the counter. It was Maggie’s tradition to stay open on Christmas Eve, even though few paying customers came in, and to give the homeless a hot meal and an escape from the cold. A familiar voice caught me by surprise. “Hello, stranger, what brings you here?” I turned to a smiling Jess who, besides the uniform, barely seemed to have changed, herself. *Strangers, is it, now?* “I’m just passing through. I thought I had some family here, but I was mistaken.” “Oh. I see. Well, I’m sorry to hear that. Take a seat, and how ’bout I get you some hot cocoa?” “That sounds perfect,” I said, taking a seat and picking up a menu so shiny it could have been a mirror. *Finally, something different*, I thought, but as I looked it over, I realized that despite the new look, it hadn’t changed, either. Jess returned a few minutes later with the hot chocolate, topped with toasted marshmallows just the way I remembered. Something, at last, to bring a smile to my face. “Do you see anything you like?” she asked. *I like you, Jess. I always have. But you wouldn’t like me if you knew who I was.* “I’ll have the turkey dinner.” “Comin’ right up,” she said, then flitted off. Just as I was enjoying the silence, the jukebox started up - *All I Want For Christmas Is You.* As far as Christmas songs go, not bad, but I was hardly in the mood. Jess returned and sat down at my table, in the booth opposite me, with a hot chocolate of her own. “So, where do you call home?” She hadn’t changed a bit - as forward as ever. "I live in San Francisco." “San Francisco? You don’t sound like you’re from California.” “Well, no, I didn’t grow up there. I moved there.” “Why?” *Why? To get away from here.* “I guess I felt I’d fit in better. In a big city, I mean.” Jess nodded. “I know what you mean. I don’t exactly fit in, myself.” Maggie approached with a tray. “Here’s your turkey dinner, and I thought you might like another hot cocoa.” “Ma,” Jess said, “you forgot to toast the marshmallows.” “Toast the marshmallows? What on Earth are you talking about? The only person I ever toasted marshmallows for was that girl you had a crush--” Her mouth dropped. “Victoria?” “It’s, um, just Vic now.” I looked at Jess. “You knew?” “Of course I knew, you idiot.” “Does this mean you’re into girls?” asked Maggie. “Ma!” “Well,” I said, looking at Jess, “you’re a girl, so I guess the answer is yes.” She blushed, and suddenly all her other blushes made sense. How had I missed so many signs growing up? What else had I missed? “Well,” Maggie said to Jess, “it seems like you finally got that Christmas present you always wanted.” And I had, too. “Being wanted,” I said. “is the best present I could have ever hoped for.


I opened my eyes and saw I was in a deep cave. Not some dark hole in the ground but a place full of light and beauty. A lush garden at my feet and a glow above me, melted together in the soft calm. I walked forward through gentle grasses that moved with me, while leaves fell silently at my feet. There was sound here but I couldn't quite hear it- a whisper just out of reach. I came to the centre of the cave, to the edge of a perfectly still lake. I knew She was there but I couldn't see Her at first, not until I peered over at my reflection and saw Her image smiling next to me. "You're here." Not a question. A quiet, gentle reminder of something long forgotten. "You knew I would come here." I heard the accusation in my voice. "Yes." Her smile was kind but edged with sadness. "I had hoped you wouldn't. But too many do." We stood in silence for a while, looking over the glassy water. Finally I turned to face Her and saw Her gazing mildly at me. "You have something for me." When I didn't answer She gestured to my hands which I still held tightly against my chest, hiding the tiny life I gripped. "You have carried it a long time." I looked down and opened my clenched fists a little. The life fluttered briefly and became still again. "It's too heavy," I sighed, "and it's too great a responsibility for me to hold. Will you take it from me? Just for a while?" She sighed too and smiled sadly at me. She held out Her hands and waited for me to pass it to Her. But I hesitated. "Will it be safe?" "None but you may take it back." "Can I retrieve it whenever I want?" She thought a moment and then replied, "Yes. But the longer it stays here, the harder it will be to take it back." I glanced down again, but it didn't move. "Did I... did I break it? It's so still." "It is tired. But it lives." All at once I opened my hands and flung it to Her. She caught it easily and cradled it lovingly against Her own chest, whispering soothingly to it. I thought I heard it sigh. "I was too hard on it." I said, bitterly. "I can't care for it anymore." She nodded and gave me another kind smile. "I will hold it for you until you come to reclaim it." "And if I never want it back?" She gave me a long look and then asked quietly, "How do you feel now? Relieved of your burden?" I held out my empty hands and gazed at them. For the first time I saw how scratched and bruised they were. "I feel... nothing." I admitted. "I thought I would feel lighter. But there is just emptiness." Her smile was sad again. "This is the heaviest burden to carry. But without it there is nothing. It will be safe here but it will not thrive. Neither will you." I was so tired and turned quickly to leave, but looked back briefly to see Her still watching me. "It was too heavy you know." As I walked away I heard Her say quietly, "You didn't have to carry it alone.