“How did you hear about this place?” My voice broke the long-established silence, a silence that had been building since we snuck out of our houses. It was almost like Marty thought his mother would still be able to hear him despite the hour of walking we put between us. “You know, those like, internet rabbit hole type site.” He replied in a quick tone that almost sounded like he was trying to hush me. I had initially been excited when he brought of the proposition of some festival hidden deep in the nearby woods. “I found this invite online, don’t worry I checked it out, it’s legit.” Those words continued to rattle in my brain. The woods weren’t particularly dense and it was easy enough to find your way back to our little town, just listen for the water, find it and follow it upstream. I had, however, never been so deep in the woods and never that late at night. The moon punctured the tree's canopies lighting our way with a scarcity of natural spotlights. “How are you holding up?” I questioned Marty not wanting the silence to settle back in as I had no idea how long we still had to go. “I’m alright.” His whisper quite responds only audible thanks to the still forest. He knew what I was referring to, I could see it when he reached up and gripped his sleeve-covered arm. “We should be getting close now.” ‘Thank god I thought, I was getting sick of getting playful branches whipped across my face and the foliage was making my thighs sticky. His words rang truer than either of us could have imagined as after only a few minutes we saw the silhouette peeking through the clearing in the trees. A prominent and mysterious mass of shadows saw just a few feet in front of us. “Well shit,” I spoke more to myself than anyone. With each step bringing the place further into view I was filled with more and more disbelief despite it being right in front of me. Standing in a large circular clearing in the forest, devoid of trees or up reaching foliage was the imposing shaping of Carnival Vivacity. The miniature city before up was completely shrouded in shadow, the light beaming through holes in the clouds being the only reprisal. “Did we miss it?” I addressed the Carnival that lacked any signs of life. “Let’s just check it out? We’re already here.” Marty spoke taking small and timid steps towards the towering tents in front of us. “Okay, but I’m not too keen on being eaten by Lions,” I remarked, I heard Marty mimic the sound of a Lion growling up ahead. I didn’t want to say it out loud but my nerves were standing on the edge, something about a darkened Carnival refused to sit right with me. It wasn’t a secret that Marty was nervous too, despite it being pretty high in the nineties he was visibly shaking under his long sleeve shirt. We got into the grounds without meeting any resistance, the Carnival was like a long-abandoned ghost town as we walked through it. Empty food stalls sat unmanned and the three large tents around us were devoid of the chaos you’d expect from them. “This is cool man, but maybe we should come back another time?” “No way.” Marty spat out almost irritated at the thought. “This is my last chance, Andrew.” He more calmly stated while looking around like he was trying to find someone.“Last chance for wha-” My question was quickly halted in my mouth as the Carnival Vivacity sprang to life without warning around us. Like a switch had been flipped we were suddenly surrounded by a cacophony of colored lights resembling a Christmas tree. Powerful beams of orange illumination reached out from the openings of the tents. There were people around us when the lights turned on, I was almost unable to really comprehend their sudden appearance, it felt like my brain accepted it as normal. “Hello, Miyazaki,” Marty said aloud with drawn-out syllables as he looked around the newly lit up Carnival ground with complete awe. His smile was so wide I thought he would fit right in with some of the clowns I witnessed trotting around in my peripherals. “So what do we do first?” I asked, surprised that the first thing out of my mouth wasn’t, “Let’s leave right now.”Marty lifted his hand and rested it gently on his stomach as he feverously eyed a nearby food stand with steam from a grill pouring out of it. “I’m feeling pretty hungry,” I said, even though it was so outwardly expressed Marty was never going to say he was hungry. I can’t imagine what he got for dinner that night if anything at all. I walked behind him, mildly vexed when I saw that no one was manning the stand and in fact, no one else was there at all. Sitting on the small round stools in front of the stand I peered over looking for someone who could help serves us. When I didn’t see anyone I began turning to Marty to bring up how odd it was when a work appeared out of the corner of my eye. Surprised I went to look at the man approaching us but when I did he had vanished into thin air leaving only a vacancy. Marty started to speak beside me but I only registered what he said after I had already come to the same conclusion. I could see a crowd of people walking around the Carnival but they were only there when in my peripherals if I turned to look at them, they’d be gone. “You can only see them directly if you’re one of them.” Those were the words that slowly registered. One of them? I thought about that sentence all the way up until it was closing time. “I’d like whatever you recommend,” Marty spoke to the spectral worker, if I looked straight ahead it was just a steaming pile of meat, but through the sides of my vision a cook was working around the stove flipping the meat and seasoning it. “One for my friend too.” I took the time to look around the Carnival with a more observant eye, everywhere I turned the tightly packed crowd would vanish when meeting my direct eye line. We were alone and completely surrounded at the same time. All but for one, I saw him only for a moment initially. Slightly shaken I started turning back to Marty when the clink of a porcelain plate meeting the bar in front of me aroused my interest. A steaming plate of meat and vegetables on top of a flour tortilla shell filled my nostrils with a heavenly smell. Marty was already wolfing down his food like he had been hunting it all night. The food made my mouth salivate and forcibly pushed and thoughts of suspicion or anxiety from my mind. The food was exquisite, I had never and likely will never taste something as good as what the Carnival offered us. When I thought about asking for more I was pleasantly surprised to find that I felt full despite eating fairly little. Marty too let out a huff that told me he was stuffed. “Okay, this is super cool I admit, but maybe we should go it’s- not normal.” I had tried to keep it together for Marty’s sake, I hadn’t seen him this happy in a long time and the smile on his face was something I almost forgot he could do. “It’s only here for tonight. It is harmless.” He retorted. “Once it’s gone, like the people, you won’t be able to see it.” He turned his head around the grounds before his sights landed on the tent. “Besides we at least have to check out the show right?” He was beaming. With a quick nod of approval we rose up from our seats, I turned back and said a quick thank you to the cook, a whispy ‘you’re welcome’ crept into my head. Not like it was said by anyone it felt just like a thought I would have. We made our way to the tent, my steps were cautious as I kept thinking I was going to run into someone. When we parted the flaps and walked inside I saw the man in the red coat standing in the middle of a dirt ring. Out of the corners of my eyes, I saw an audience seated and ready for the show to start, I could feel that they were waiting on us. “This is incredible,” Marty whispered as we slowly made our way to the only two open seats we could find and claimed them as our own. “Welcome to Carnival Vivacity!” The ringleader’s voice boomed throughout the tent, his words were said instead of heard in my thoughts. Even though I could see him when I looked directly at him, his face was difficult to look at for an extended period of time. His features would constantly shift creating this blurring effect. He was warping between a culmination of every face that I had ever committed to memory. As he spoke, welcoming the crowd and describing the night’s events I watched the familiar features of my parents, kids from school and even Marty’s sunken eyes appear on his face. Then the Ringleader rose his hand and I could feel the metal seat I was in trembling, the whole tent, in fact, was shaking. I turned my head hoping to catch whatever was causing it in my peripheral And then I saw it clearly. It was unbelievable, I had seen them in textbooks before when were would study our ancestors but there it was. A massive Woolie Mammoth had waltzed into the middle of the ring, I could see both the creature and Marty’s infatuation with the whole ordeal in one scene. A few more things played out. A group of people in acrobatic attire walked out and began swinging off ropes hanging from the high ceiling. There was a gasp from the crowd that flooded my thoughts when one of the performers dropped to the dirt. I could see her body fold on impact and become twisted and mangled, bones poking out from her knee. Then the girl lifted her hand and gave a thumbs up accompanied by a wicked smile. Everyone laughed, everyone but me. I watched in horror as the girl manipulated her body and put it back together. I hadn’t gotten to take it all in but the girl sparked a notion in me, that everyone around us looked so conventionally attractive. Each one sculpted from perfection belonging on the front of a magazine. Marty no doubt noticed it too, I would catch him touching the bags under his eyes or running his hands through his scraggly hair. After watching a Tiger jumping through rings of green fire, a fire that would cast a light on the Tiger revealing its true decaying self, I decided I had enough. “And now I just need a volunteer!” The Ringleader asserted nearly gluing me to my seat. I knew it was going to happen before I had time to try and stop it, Marty’s boney arms slipped right through my grasp. His lanky body was already standing up and shuffling through the crowd, I could hear him offering apologies to the people he passed by on his way to the stage. They all just cheered in my head creating an obnoxious buzzing noise. It all happened so fucking fast. Before I had a chance to protest or try to storm the stage, hell who am I kidding I wouldn’t have the nerve to do something like that. As Marty stepped into the ring and the Leader asked the crowd to applaud the young man I watched with my every breath stuck in my throat. “Thank you for volunteering, this won’t hurt a bit.” The Ringleader affirmed as he reached into his pocket. The whole time Marty stood there, smiling and bowing at the roaring crowd he continued to scan. Then his eyes landed on me. He mouthed something, something that was only for me as I sat surrounded by people I couldn’t see. My eyes became hot and stingy as I read his lips and before I knew it my fingers that were gripping the seat tensed up. There was no time process of what was going to happen before the Ringleader made his move. Pulling his hand out of the duster he put a revolver up to Marty’s head and without an ounce of hesitation, pulled the trigger. Once a spattering of red was thrown onto the dark brown circle of dirt I could feel my body lifting from the chair. I rose and Marty fell. He fell to the dirt at the Ringleader’s feet. I thought my emotions were running hot enough to evaporate the tears on my cheeks as I rushed through the set of chairs offering no apologies. Even though looking at his face created an intense urge to vomit I stormed right up to the Ringleader ready to - I don’t know honestly, I was stopped before it got that far. “It’s okay Andrew!” My eyes were still fixated on the Ringleader, his face continued to shift but his body was unmoving. I kept my gaze on the Leader, hoping he could feel what I was feeling but out of the corner of my eye Marty started to stir. Slowly he rose to his feet, I couldn’t see any sign of the gunshot but the blood still rested on the ground behind him. “We’re fucking leaving.” I scowled being more assertive at that moment than I ever had been before. “Are we free to leave?” I asked the Ringleader. “You’re free to go, Andrew.” The Ringleader responded through ever-changing lips, his calm voice almost a mockery of my emotions. “I do hope you enjoyed your time.” Those words were like a punch to the gut, like he was so far above me that he couldn’t care less about my swelling rage. “Come on Marty.” I quickly turned around and began to storm out of the tent, looking over my shoulder to confirm that Marty was following me. He was, walking much slower than me with his head shoulder hanging heavy. I didn’t want to stop, all the while as I made my way out of the tent and back to the grounds, every so often turning my head to make sure Marty was still there. The trees came into view as I shuffled through the invisible crowd that only appeared as they passed by my sides, I could feel their shoulders and arms brushing up against mine. “Andrew,” Marty spoke behind me. “We’re almost out don’t worry,” I replied, not even looking back to make sure that he could hear me. “Andrew.” His tone was the same but it was quieter, no not quite, I was just further away like he had stopped walking. All of a sudden my body felt like a rock, like a was a statue planted into the ground and each part of me feared to turn around as the realization punctured my lungs like cutting knives. I could feel his presence behind me, I could feel him standing several feet back and suddenly the night became quiet. There were a few guests in my peripheral that had stopped their meandering and stood completely still around me. “Please don’t,” I said in a whisper to no one in particular. Perhaps a plea to the orchestrating higher powers. My face was becoming wet again, cool streaking tears running down my face on the verge of a manic break. “Andrew, it’s okay.” Marty’s voice was soft. As his words were a warm blanket wrapping around me on a stormy night. It reached me, Andrew, you’re feelings reached me. My lead foot slipped from the patch of grass it had flattened allowing my body to begin its pivot. I swiveled around until I had turned to face Marty. And I was alone. The lights were off and the crowd was gone. My head became heavy as it rolled back and my eyes closed pushing the well of forming water out. My lips moved, mouthing words I couldn’t even decipher. I dropped to my knees in the large empty field, it was just me. My emotions dripped off my face and watered the warm blades of grass that hugged my legs as I let it all out. In those woods is where I left my sorrow, it’s where I let all the pain seep out of my chest and become one with the forest. As the sun started to peek above the horizon I too lifted myself up and made the hike back into town. A town that in time would forget Marty. His mother would pretend to care for a few days until the public eye was taken off of her. Very few people knew the kind of monster she was to Marty after his dad passed away. Marty saw a chance, a chance to be well fed and to see the world, be a part of a family. To do something that only a person at their lowest could accomplish. Seeing the world beyond showmanship. There were search efforts to find him. I was put into counseling and questioning at the same time as I was his only real connection to this town. I couldn’t tell them, it would seem like a fever dream to anyone who wasn’t there but Marty, he was gone. And all I had left of him was the words he mouthed to be the final time I was able to look him right in the eyes. “Thank you, for being my friend.”


"Speak now." Father said. His arms crossed firmly against his chest, so tight that you could see muscle strain against his red polo shirt. His gaze pierced and forced Gregor's eyes down by the judgement it contained. Gregor wish he could explain, truly he did. He was used to being in good graces with the grownups in his life, but now his lips were sealed, and his hands trembled. He grimaced at the hot burn in his eyes and nose. The indignation of doing the right thing was fresh with him. His father sighed in resignation. "Alright. Go to your room. We'll talk later." His posture relaxed into resignation and grabbed his keys from the hook. He mumbled something about supper. Gregor cleared his throat and said, “The usual, please.” His father grunted and the his heavy boots announced his leaving on the wooden floor. Gregor slumped down the old hallway towards a larger-than-needed room painted in a joyful robin eggs blue. He looked over to his squat dresser; on top was a photo of his mother in an old picture frame. She was sitting next to him and playing on his Gameboy while he watched. The picture always brought a smile to his face. The warmth of her smile had that magical essence that allows it to travel through time and space and enrich all who saw it. “I miss you.” Gregor said in a stifled voice. She’d been out of the house for a while now. They tried to explain to him that they just needed some time apart, but he knew things were worse than they were letting on. Mom had been acting strange lately and the small town rumors always swing around to everyone - That tetherball of gossip. The hottest take was that she was moonlighting as a prostitute to pay for a crippling drug addiction. He bloodied a boys nose the first time he heard it at school. He got three days suspension, and of course there was no punishment for spreading what Gregor knew in his heart to be slander. With his dad out of the house to pick up some food for the night, he opened his closet door. Everything was as he left it. He moved some clothes that had fallen off their hangers long ago to uncover a forgotten moving box. “So far, so good...” he thought. He knew his dad had gotten a call from the school, but he wasn’t sure if he’d already done a thorough investigation or not yet. He opened the box and gave a sigh of relief. His hard work remained undiscovered, though he knew he had to act soon. Tonight would be the night. Dinner with Dad started expectedly awkward. Both ate fast food in silence, Dad occasionally glanced up at his son with a vacant but concerned stare. As dinner went on he relaxed though and said, "Do you want to watch a movie tonight?" Gregor took a few moments before answering and met his gaze with hesitation. “No thank you...” “Ah, you sure? There’s a whole lot of westerns on this week. Some kind of special, I think.” He quickly shoved a handful of tepid fries in his mouth. Dad always preferred a specific burger place in town that was just far enough away for things to be a little lackluster when they got back home to eat. "Yeah, I think so... but thanks" Gregor grew out of westerns a long time ago, when he was six or so. There's only so many high-noons and drunken prospectors a kid can take. Dad never seemed to get his fill, though. The memory of watching them together must have stuck with him. It'd been a while since they've found a common passion. "Sure thing, son... Hey, listen..." Gregor tightened up at this. He knew it was coming eventually. "You know you can tell me anything, right?" His voice was deep and gravely. It sounded like a bear trying to sooth a rabbit with a growl. "Yeah, I know Dad." He said. His gaze dropped down again. "Well, okay then." Dad said with a sigh of frustration. "You know where to find me if you need me, son." He lumbered to the living room to fill the dad-shaped dent in his recliner to turn the TV on and crank the volume up. His hearing has steadily gone downhill since he took the factory job; his energy too. Gregor knew that he'd fall asleep in about thirty minutes or so. Gregor played video games in his room while he waited for Dad to fall alseep. Tonight was the night he’d do his best to help things go back to how they used to be. It didn't take long for his Dad's snoring to reverberate across the house. It was a comforting annoyance, like the creak in the ceiling fan one has had since they were a baby. He changed out of his pajamas and put on a dark hoodie and black sweat pants. Not only to blend in the night, but the cold nip of a fall night filled the air. He looked at himself in the mirror and smiled; He looked like a frumpy little ninja. "I'm on my way, Mom." He said with a nervous smile. He positioned one of his pillows beneath his covers to make a little boy-shaped bulge. When he felt satisfied with his ruse, he slid off the windowsill to the outside driveway, his sneakers crunched on the gravel. The box was heavy in his hands, but he pressed on past his father’s mud-crusted truck and made his way down their alley. He knew his way around his small town and still remembered the bike paths he'd take to avoid the heavier trafficked streets, and the yards of the meaner kids at his school as well. Back when he went outside. He walked on and passed by his school. It always looked like it would topple over on him, especially when he’d gaze up at the steeple. The lot was empty all around it, which gave him comfort. Sister O'Hara's classroom light was on, she never turned it off. Something about how 'Sin perpetuates most in darkness'. Gregor couldn't help but snigger at himself, stumbling in the dark, making her words true. She was the whole reason he was out so late this night, he remembered. He had overheard her talk about his mom to another teacher. Talking about how she'll never go to heaven if she can't get off of drugs, how her vice has led her to doing unholy and shameful things. How she abandoned her son because she gave in to Satan. Through tears and a swelling fear he ran. He knew if he had to hear her talk any longer his blind rage would lead him to expulsion, and his parents had enough stress in their life as it was. The rest of the trip was uneventful, save for the couple of times where he ducked behind a hedge to hide from a passing car. Things never happened in places like this at night, or if they did it was so seldom as to not change the habits of anyone. Life would simply roll on, and no one would feel guilty for staying the same. Not when a tragedy didn't affect them directly. He reached his Grandma's house after traveling a couple miles down a dirt road. It was pitch black save for the beam of his flashlight. he pressed on until he saw the faint dim blue glow of her house in the copse of elm trees around her lot. He was holding his breath in anticipation and exhaled in relief when he saw his mother’s blue Oldsmobile in the drive. Thank goodness she was here. The box was feeling heavy as it shifted underneath his left arm, sloshing slightly. A light was on in the second story guest room. That must be where she is, he thought. He smiled when he saw her faded-pink colored bedhead pass by the window. She looked hollowed out but still warm, somehow. Like a fire on its last legs. She held a freshly lit cigarette in her hand, a habit she quit off and on for years. Gregor picked up a pebble and chucked it at the old paint-peeled boards next to the window. He saw her look his way, her eyes thinned and her face curled in confusion before she gasped and opened the window with some effort. "Son? What on earth are you doing here, it must be... Goodness it's two in the morning!" "I'm just like you mom, a night owl I guess." She gave him an exasperated smile, rolled her eyes, and said, “You must be freezing! Come in!" He saw her hurry away and before long the kitchen light glowed through the side door. Gregor approached and wiped his feet on the mat out of habit before he entered. She gave him a long and remorseful hug before sitting at the small two person table in the old kitchen. "You know you can't be sneaking out like this, Greg, Robert would have a heart attack if he knew you walked here... I nearly had a heart attack! Are you okay?" "I'm fine, I’m fine. I got into a bit of trouble at school, but...yeah." He set the box town on the table and sat across from her after giving her a hug. "Mom, I know you and Dad aren't getting along and that you need some space, but I miss you and I couldn't wait until the weekend to see you again because something happened." "Well, what happened, Greg?" She was fully awake now. Her face contorted with guilt, a look that became increasingly familiar those days.” "I was walking by the teachers’ lounge after school waiting for Dad to pick me up when I heard Sister O'Hara talking about you. She said that people like you don't deserve to have children and that she'd be surprised to see you in Heaven." She looked pained and she closed her eyes before sighing. “People love to say hurtful things when they're not around their victims, Greg." "I know, I know. What scared me so much was the idea that you wouldn't go to heaven. I don't think she knows what she’s talking about, but I just wanted to make sure that someone was looking out for you, and I figured it might as well be me." He opened the top of the box and pulled out a gallon of grape juice and a box of communion wafers. He also took out two petite plastic cups and set them on the table. Staying late usually sucked, but he was glad to that one day, when he’d swipe the communion supplies right from under Sister O’Hara’s nose. His mother looked confused and looked back at him with a confused face and started to laugh. "Oh my goodness, son! There was no need, dear! I'm-" "Mom-" he cut her off, "It would mean a lot to me if you shared communion with me tonight." She looked up and smiled at the seriousness of his face. "I had no idea you felt so strongly about this stuff, Greg" "I do, in my own way I guess. Sometimes church sucks. Everyone takes it too seriously; or not seriously enough. Sometimes I think they only want to look good and not be good." She smiled softly at him, “We all have different ways of dealing with the world, honey. It's easier for some than others too. Lord knows I've had my faults in how I've delt with it myself. Just as Sister O'Hara has hers and you yours. No one is handling this thing called life gracefully; if they look like they are that just means they're good actors." She winked at him while he poured the grape juice. "I'm touched you'd do this, though, Greg, I really am. I can't say I approve of you stealing from school or being out so late, but I will say I won't forget tonight. I'll share this and pray with you, if you like, then we got to get you home, okay?" Greg yawned and nodded, sliding over a wafer and shot glass of grape juice to his mother. She took it gingerly and he his and she said a small and clunky prayer over the grape juice and crackers. They both solemnly completed their communion. Mom wiped away a tear from her eye and hugged her son. "Tell you what, let's do whatever you'd like to do this weekend; maybe I can even get your father and I to take you out for a big fat steak, how does that sound?" "I don't know if Dad would be down with that, he seemed a little mad at me when he got the call saying they think I stole from the school." "Well... Let me talk to him and explain, and I'm sure he won't be mad after. Sometimes we do the wrong thing for the right reason, you know? That doesn't always make up for it, but it does make it understandable. We'll talk it out, dear, but know that regardless of what he says that I'm very proud of you. I love you unconditionally, and I know that he does too." She smiled at him slowly and with an expression of complete and utter prideful delight. "Besides, when have you known your dad to pass on a big slab of meat and potatoes?" "Only that time you burnt the crap out of his filet mignon." He gave her a crooked smile. She gasped and had to stifle her laugh from waking up her mother. "Alright you turd. Let's get you back." The school never found out who took the supplies. Dad and Gregor munched and drank the evidence over the next few weeks, and with the evidence gone, all that remained was a fond memory for all three of them to cherish.


Liam looked out over the calm sea and prepared his nets for the day ahead; the skies looked promising except for some gray, low hanging clouds far out to sea. “Aye, let this be a good day,” he muttered, “My press is as empty as a scoundrel’s heart.” “Mother,” he looked skyward “could ye see fit to bring me a wee bit of good luck today?” He often spoke thus to his beloved mother who had sung to him as a boy and told wonderful stories of Irish folklore. He was particularly fond of those tales which spoke of the merrow and morgens, enchanted mermaids and sea sprites, who occasionally encountered seafaring folk like themselves. “Shouldn’t fill the lad’s head with such nonsense,” his da would scold his mother lovingly, “sea life is hard enough.” “Ah, true,” she’d say, “sea life is difficult, and we haven’t much, but love, ah... love conquers all.” But the stories and his mother’s beautiful singing filled Liam’s heart and built a strong bond between them. When influenza struck their small village, it took his mother when Liam was in his early teens. The pain of her loss struck the boy and his father hard, but they carried on as best they could. The boy learned the ways of the sea from his father, who passed away himself, only a few years later. His passing left Liam alone in their small cottage by the sea. The sea became his life. From his earliest memories he recalled helping his father with their small fishing boat, repairing nets, preparing bait, studying the clouds for impending weather and the many simple tasks which made possible wresting a simple life from the sea’s bounty. His father had taught him that the sea could be a loving mother, bountiful, caressing, cool and comforting or as cruel as any childhood fable’s hag, temperamental and threatening, powerful and cold, suffocating and irascible. He set out to sea, ignoring the distant clouds. The storm had come up quickly as many small tempests did in this part of the ocean. A massive school of fish passing his boat had distracted him. He had never seen such a rich array of fish, schools one following another. He had labored fiercely with his nets to keep up, hauling in the catch, one after another. This had gone on for hours. He lost track of time and place, greedily seizing from the sea this unexpected catch. It would be a grand payday ashore. Finally, he collapsed on the deck of his boat exhausted. Only then did he discover with alarm, how far he had drifted from his customary course. The clouds threatened an ominous storm. In fifteen minutes, the seas rose sharply. The sky begun pelting his small craft with walls of water. Then, from nowhere, a phantom wave lifted his boat like a great hand and dashed it into a deep trough between the waves. He felt his boat tear apart at amidships tumbling him into the sea. That had been hours ago. He clung to an empty piece of floating debris and kept afloat with a Herculean effort, part conscious part unconsciously. Liam was finally swept ashore in the night, on one of the small anonymous isles which dotted the sea. In the dark, as his senses gradually returned, his focus fell upon his hands and aching limbs. God, I hurt everywhere . Then, Liam was distracted by the sound of music floating faintly in the air. Was that a human voice? It was a high-pitched sound, a cry like that of a child, or was it a song? It seemed like a familiar melody, echoing in the breeze from the darkness of the island beyond. “Hello, who’s there?” he called. His voice was unintelligible, a croak more than words. In reply, came nothing but the musical sound and the wind. He rolled onto his side and slowly disentangled himself from the rope handle of the locker. His hands, in excruciating pain, twisted this way and that to free himself. The roar of the surf filled his ears and he felt himself slowly ebbing in strength. He knew he could not pass out this close to the sea’s tide. He hauled himself on his elbows and knees laboriously up the beach, the sea sucking at the sand beneath him as he crawled toward the interior of the island, toward the sound he had heard invisible in the darkness. Finally, exhausted, he lay on dry sand, perhaps only ten yards from the surf, but as far as his strength could carry him. Then, he heard the sound again, a singsong voice drifting to him in the breeze. “Help me,” a small voice cried, “ Mo choimirce , help me, please...” Liam rolled onto his side, the sand grating against his skin, “Who’s there?” he called. There was no answer. He crawled another few yards and his hand encountered an object buried in the sand. It was smooth, firm to the touch. Liam traced his fingers along the exterior, feeling an irregularly patterned, textured covering. He found that it extended several feet sideways to his outstretched arm. Beneath the sand, the trunk of the object felt as if it flattened out like a wide tail or a fin. It was like the fin of a great fish. The sky was pitch black except for an occasional star winking through the passing clouds. With no moon or light of any kind he tentatively let his hand stray along the object in the opposite direction. As he stretched his hand along the figure, the firm scaly fin merged into soft velvety skin. As his fingers traced the skin from the tail, the form shifted beneath his hand. It was alive! He felt a shiver as he slid his hand up the skin, realizing it was the back of a woman. Long tresses of silken hair now slid through his fingers. Then the creature spoke. “Please sir, I beg you, do me no harm. I need only be returned to the sea, which is my home. For this, I will grant you any three wishes your heart may desire.” Liam was stunned. He momentarily forgot his pain, hunger and thirst. He was spellbound by the sudden realization he had happened upon a live mermaid. Was this one of the merrow his mother had spoken about? He squinted into the pitch blackness but still could see nothing of the creature before him. “Are you real?” Liam croaked, his voice strained from weakness. “I can’t see you.” “As real as you are,” the creature replied. Her voice was ethereal, a soothing, mellifluous lilt. “When the dawn breaks, you will find water and sustenance. But before the sun fully emerges I must be returned to the sea. The storm washed me far ashore and I have become trapped on the land. Will you help me?” Liam, his spirits buoyed by her beautiful voice, responded. “ Begorrah. I have little strength after my ordeal, but ‘twill be a pleasure to do as you ask.” He once again traced the mermaid’s skin finding that her fin had become entangled in the roots of a large trunk of driftwood. He tore at the roots which bound her and after a short struggle he was able to free her. He didn’t know how he found the strength, but Liam managed to stand. He carefully scooped the merrow up in his arms and carried her back toward the sound of the surf pounding against the shore. He bore her into the sea until he was waist deep and gently let her go. By now he saw the light shimmering at the horizon as the sun was rising in the eastern sky. Before him was the merrow, swimming and frolicking in the sea, ten or so yards away. Looking at the beach as the light illuminated his surroundings, he saw bottles of water bobbing in the surf and strewn along the beach. He waded to shore and greedily drank his fill, feeling strength return to his body. “I have promised you three wishes to repay your kindness and that shall be your reward,” the merrow sang as she swam up to Liam, now languishing on the sand. “Well, to be safely home to my friends and simple cottage, that would be my first wish,” Liam replied with a smile. “That you shall have,” she replied sweetly “and what else would you want?” “Well, I suppose, to be rich and successful beyond my wildest dreams, to own anything my heart desires,” he laughed. “Is that not what every man dreams?” “Done,” she responded with a smile, “And your final wish?” Liam looked at the mermaid, who now in the dawn of the brightening sky was more beautiful than anything he had ever seen. “I have no wife, with whom to share these things,” Liam began. “For my third wish, I want you to come with me, to my home, be my lifelong love and companion. This would bring me the greatest joy.” The mermaid looked at him sadly. The first two wishes I can grant, but a union between man and merrow can never be. We are from separate worlds and are meant to be of different forms.” “Nonsense!” Liam insisted “Love can conquer all, m’ ma always told me. You will be my wife and be cast in human form. That is my heart’s desire!” “Very well,” the mermaid replied, in her soft, lilting voice. Liam opened his eyes. He found himself lying in bed, rich satin sheets and fine linens covering him. About him he recognized his simple fisherman’s cottage, but now transformed. Everywhere he looked he saw piles of gold coins and jewels and the finest furnishings he could imagine. He was home and wealthy beyond imagination! Then his bedroom door opened and the merrow, now a beautiful woman, cloaked in rich, luxurious raiment, entered the room. “Good morning, husband,” she sang sweetly, in that voice he heard in his dreams, “I hope you are feeling well. How shall we spend this fine day? Perhaps, down by the seashore?” “My wonderful, loving wife. Nothing would please me more. Let us first breakfast and then celebrate our new life together.” Liam’s heart swelled with joy and wonder at his good fortune. He threw aside his covers and bent to swing his legs over the bedside. Only then did he realize, that below his waist he bore a long, silver scaly fin, which twitched gently as he beheld it.


TW: gore Before I begin my account of this story, you must know that I cannot be held accountable. My mind doesn’t work right, and I black-out. I don’t know what happens when I black-out, and sometimes I don’t even know that I’ve done it. I’ll just suddenly realize that I don’t know how I got to the other side of the room, or in the next room over, or sometimes in a completely new place. As an example, I’ll tell you that one day, I was driving. I was just driving for hours on end until I suddenly realized that I had no recollection of me entering the car. I didn’t even remember where I intended to go. When I checked the navigation system, I discovered that I was hours from my home and in a place I’ve never even been before. But when I had the itch in my brain telling me to look behind me, I found that in the backseat of my car was a shocking amount of blood. In a panic, I pulled over, hauled the seats out of my car, and dragged them about a mile into the desert where I had found myself driving. And there is where I left them. The question of why keeps me up at night. Why did those seats have blood on them? Why can’t I remember? Why is this happening to me? And then the what. What have I done? When one asks themselves, “What have I done?” it is usually a rhetorical question. One simply asked out of disbelief that they could have done something so terrible. But that means that they know that they have done that thing. When I ask myself that same question, it is seldom rhetorical. On many occasions, I have asked this in genuine search of an answer. But no matter how deep I search into my memories, I simply cannot come up with one. Now that you surely know it’s not my fault, I will tell you my story. There has been a sizable black barrel that has sat in my basement for some time. Like many things in my unusual life, I cannot remember how it came to be there. Most people may just go and open it to ease their curiosity, but my fear greatly overrules my interest. I know that I should go down and check, but I fear that I may not be able to live with myself if I knew the barrel’s contents. In complete honesty, some naïve part of me still believes that I won’t be responsible for whatever may be in the barrel if I don’t know what’s in it. Of course, my mind still runs wild with all of the possibilities. Maybe more things like the bloody seats, just suspicious items that I wouldn’t want anyone uncovering. But shoved deep to the back of my mind is the worst, seemingly most apparent option. At night, images of decomposing organs and flesh haunt my dreams, hinting at what I don’t know--hinting at what could’ve happened when I don’t remember. But to my knowledge, there is no person that I dislike enough to harm them like this. I get along well with all my co-workers; I have no outlandishly painful past relationships. I have had very few past relationships. I have always been a fairly lonely man. There have been a couple of signs that I have had more than I remember due to the black-outs, but I haven’t ever blacked out for very long. I doubt my... My other side could keep up much more than a fling. Now, as I recount these things, it is a cold December night. I hear the wind howling, snaking, and whipping through tree limbs and over rooftops. Snowfall, which should be peaceful and calm, is being slanted and pushed to the ground. I keep it warm in my home, but just looking outside makes me shiver. I can’t sleep. My back aches, my side hurts, my mattress is too hard, and my bed is too soft. No, that’s not it. I can feel that black barrel. I now feel the distinct kind of dread I get when I go down to the basement and see it in the corner of my vision. The feeling usually stays contained downstairs, but tonight I can feel it. Like it’s at the foot of my bed. Suddenly I get chills, my arms tense, my chest tightens, and my head throbs. Something out of my control possesses me to swing my legs off my bed onto the cool wood floor and stand up. At this point, I could stop. I know I can, and I probably should, but I don’t want to. I am going to settle this feud with that blasted barrel once and for all. It doesn’t matter what’s in there; what can be worse than what my head has concocted? If it’s a body, then it’s a body. There’s nothing to be done. I reach the door and do not hesitate to open it. To the basement stairs, and I step right on down. But I stop- I need something to open it with. I climb back up the six steps I had taken. One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Opening the junk drawer, I snatch two flathead screwdrivers and sprint down the basement stairs, beginning to fear that my adrenaline is wearing off. By the time I’ve reached the bottom step, the tightening in my chest has become almost unbearable. I can feel the barrel almost like a heartbeat, beating once more and once more violent with every step closer I take. Finally, I reach the barrel, tucked into a corner of an unfinished room. The pounding in my ears is so profound that I can only compare it to thunder from a lightning strike just yards away; it cracks and burns in my ears. Slowly, gingerly, I place my hands on the rim of the barrel. With one screwdriver in each hand, I shove them underneath the lip of the lid. The thought of the tip of the screwdrivers inside the ominous black barrel nearly drives me mad, and I work quickly. It takes several minutes, while intense winds howl in my ears even from the outside and the pounding still in my head, but I finally feel the lid pop up from the hole in the top of the barrel. The tightening is now so significant that I have to clutch my stomach and breathe deeply before lifting the lid slowly. So slowly. I open the top until I am hit with a thick wall of the indescribable yet unmistakable stench of decomposition. Now I am sure of what is inside, and I toss the lid on the concrete floor with a loud ringing smash. Surely enough, there is a half decomposed corpse of a woman in the barrel. But there is something else. I reach past the woman’s rotting torso to retrieve a piece of laminated paper. I turn the note over to the written side and read: I knew that you would cave. I am you, after all. And she, after all, was your wife; whether you knew her or not. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- A/n This story was inspired by a true story! No, I am not kidding. Yes, you should be creeped out. To be fair, only the concept of the barrel was real. There was this guy, Ronald Cohen, who owned a house that he sold to a man named Hamid Tafaghodi. Hamid asked Ronald to get rid of this big 55-gallon drum in the crawlspace. Ronald never even opened this barrel for the entire time he lived there, because there were some toxic/chemical warnings on it. When he removed the drum from the house, he opened it and found the body of 9 month pregnant Reyna Marroquin. She was in that drum for 3 decades, and was actually mummified because she was stored in the barrel. Anyways, you're welcome for my true crime story of the day. you can read more about the horrible event that inspired this story here: https://www.thecriminaljournal.com/murder-of-reyna-marroquin-body-of-a-nine-month-pregnant-woman-was-found-inside-a-barrel-hidden-underneath-a-house/


Pregnant black clouds consume the night sky, concealing stars, presenting a darker void than usual. Those clouds birth, discharging a steady stream to careen down the slopes and curves of the dreary moor. Two men hike; one a few strides further ahead of the other and struggling to plant his feet in the steadily water-logging grass. His torch lights a trail through nature’s obstacles. The follower observes carefully where the leader’s footfalls settle, tracing his path for a smoother trek. Leader ascends a hill but loses his footing and slips, dropping his light source on the sodden ground. He mutters out, “fuck”, and grumbles to himself as he picks up the torch and wipes his filthy hands on his jacket. He’s starting to resemble a non-threatening kind of swamp-monster, his black scruffy beard stained brown, his face speckled with the remnants of his misplaced tread on the hill. He’s presumably thinking, “fuck it, it’s too late to turn back now, I might as well get stuck in,” as he digs his fingers into the grass embankment and begins to crawl. Follower halts at the bottom and chuckles. He shakes his head then shouts at Leader. “Why? Why are we doing this?” Leader continues dragging himself up, struggling like he’s a heroic pioneer climbing Everest. With a frown, he puffs out a breath of angst and carries on, regardless. Follower follows Leader up on his hands and knees, too, when an abrupt blast of light hits him in the face, inflicting temporary blindness. Follower shields his eyes. He’s bleeding from the top of his head; it’s a nasty one. Dried blood runs its way from his hairline down his cheek. The fresh blood at the source of the wound is thick and viscous and is calmly seeping out. Panicked, Leader shifts back around to reach the top. Once up, he stumbles into a narrow basin dressed with a thicket of shrubs and assortments of foliage intending to claw at your skin. His feet stick to the ground like glue, shoes caked in inches of mud and grass. Between the vegetation stands a shovel, planted in the ground like a victorious captured flag. Follower eventually reaches the top, and treads carefully down after Leader, his face flushed with displeasure. “Why won’t you talk to me?” he growls “Turn yourself in... It’ll only get worse for you! Think about Katy and the kid.” Leader looks up at the sky, letting the rain rinse the earth from his pores. He screws up his face and screams internally, some of which escapes through his pursed lips. “It’s not too late,” Follower continues. “Once the shovel pours that dirt in, though, it’s game over. You’ll get caught. Mark my words.” Leader pushes a long bundle into the shallow grave he must’ve dug earlier and looks in to see it filling with the unforgiving downpour. Rain climbs the sides, slowly submerging the pale cadaver rolled up in the bloodied rug. He takes the shovel from the ground; it slides out with ease. He peers at the pile of dirt melding together into one large moist clump. “Don’t,” Follower pleads. Leader slaps himself upside the head and wails, “Shut up! Shut up! Shut up!” He strikes the shovel back into the soft mound. Follower moves nearer. “If only you made this much effort to fix things before turning to a senseless murder!” Leader scoops the mud onto the shovel and piles it into the grave, hiding the bashed-up ashen face and dead eyes staring up at him in judgement. He shovels again, and again, and again. “I can’t believe you did this,” Follower murmurs. “I really can’t." Disgusted, he turns away and saunters to the top of the hill. Leader drops the last of the brown sludge onto the grave and turns back to where Follower was standing. “I’m sorry, alright, I didn’t mean for it to turn out this way.” “Bit late at this point. I don’t think your ‘sorry’ quite cuts it anymore, do you?” Follower responds bitingly. “He... He just... Pressed the wrong buttons. He always knew which ones to press and when to press them.” “And that warrants death?... Right.” “I put two and two together and came up with eight. I thought he... did her, and, I-I mean, h-h-he didn’t exactly help his cause!" “Because you always place the blame on people and only believe what you want to believe!” “Please forgive me!” Follower scoffs. “You want--“ Tears fall from Leader’s eyes as he finally cracks. “Please, God, forgive me. Please. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I don’t want to go to hell!” He plunges to his knees, adding to the downpour. He puts his hands together, bowing into the mud. “Just when I thought you were talking to me... Praying to God? Bit late for that shit, innit? It’s funny, you know, I’ve never seen you pray before, and have you ever even step foot inside a church? Wait, wait, did you just find God?” Follower laughs. “Oh, my word. You’re the best. The gift that keeps on giving.” Follower walks down the hill. Weeping, Leader flounders in the mud. “Please, please, please, please, forgive me!" Twenty minutes pass when Leader reaches his car parked in a layby at the edge of the moorland. He dumps the shovel in the trunk, opens the front door and gets inside. Follower sits in the back, staring gloomily out the window, arms folded, giving Leader the silent treatment. Leader takes a deep breath and turns the engine over. The car reverses onto the road, makes a U-turn and drives away. “I hope no one saw you out there,” Follower mutters from the back seat, still glaring out the window. “How would you explain that one? Out on a glorious night like this, just taking a midnight stroll on the moors. I’d buy that.” Leader drives in silence. “I’m wasting my time with you, aren’t I?” Follower asks. Leader keeps driving, wipers squeak through the awkward silence. He looks in the rear view, glimpsing the follower's bleeding face staring at him. Leader jerks back in his seat, almost crashing his car into a speed-post on the grass verge. “What the fuck!” Leader gasps, regaining control on the wheel. A further thirty minutes, give or take, and the old red Škoda pulls into the driveway of a semi-detached sitting in a row of semis on a jaded, nondescript street that could be any street in the country; number 45, if you’re interested. Leader heads inside the forty-fifth house on the generic street, leaving Follower to sulk in the car which is cooling down on the driveway. Inside, Leader takes a shower, disposing of the physical evidence which smeared his body. On the landing, he leaves his dirty clothes discarded in the washing basket, and boy, is he in trouble when his wife sees this mess in the morning. After cleaning himself up, Leader sneaks into his bedroom and climbs into bed next to his slumbering better half. He spoons her; she feels his warmth and smiles, taking his hand in hers. “I’m sorry,” Leader whimpers. Katy turns, opening her eyes. “What?” she says in a drowsy state. “Nothing,” he whispers back. Dazed, she nods and turns back, still grasping his hand, smiling pleasantly and hoping to get back to her dream, even though she knows it won’t be half as good as it was before he roused her. “Nothing?” Leader hears whispered sharply from the other side of the room. Leader shoots up from bed and yells a terrified sound he doubts he’s ever uttered before. Naked, he dives out of bed, racing down the stairs through the front door to get to his car. Katy swiftly bounces back to reality, wondering what is happening around her. Follower stands behind the bedroom door, bleeding profusely from his temple, skin deathly white with protruding blue veins mapped out like rivers of blood. Katy doesn’t catch sight of Follower as she gets up to grab her crumpled dressing gown from the floor. She rushes downstairs, careful not to trip on her gown, and picks up the house phone by the front door. The dial-tone rings nervously, or maybe that’s just how she hears it. On the other end of the line, she hears, “Hi, you’ve reached Steven, I can’t take your call right now. Leave a message and I’ll get back to you.” She hangs up and steps through into the kitchen, not noticing Follower sitting at the top of the stairs watching her, one of his eyes now missing from its socket. On the kitchen window frame are three photographs in fancy glass frames. A wedding picture of Katy and her man on that blissful summer day, the two of them holding a baby swaddled in pink covers, and Leader and Follower with what seems to be older relatives at a family gathering in a dingy social club. A young girl toddles into the kitchen, tugging on Katy’s gown, making her jump. “Where’s Daddy?” the little girl asks. “I don’t know, baby.” She strokes the hair out of the little girl’s face. “He had to help Uncle Matt out, but--“ She looks at her daughter, unable to hide her concern. “But Mummy... Uncle Matt is over there.” The little girl points out into the dark hallway and holds her glance. Katy drops the phone on the tiles and screams.


Prolouge Deep in the woods of the Slandfall forest lies a large castle. Legend has it the goes built it before any humans arrived because of the magical aura surrounding it. People go for healing and pleasure, the economy is one of the best in the modern continent of Fluengarf. But then war struck Fluengarf, plunging it straight into a conflict it had no intention of being in. Thus putting the world into a 17 year war. Chapter One: Lessions "No Jay, like this! Grip the blade like this!" "I'm sorry father. I'm trying my hardest." "Your hardest isn't your best son! If you're to survive this world you need to get a grasp quickly. The younger you are the more you retain." "Yes father. I will practice more intensely" "I'm not gonna be round for ever ya know, I want you to be successful. Or at least better off than I am. Now go get ready for supper" Jay strolls into the small cottage his family lives in. "O Jay, be a dear and grab those plates from the counter?" "Yes mother." Jay gingerly slides the plates off the counter almost dropping them. "O Jay I know you're a wee lad but come now, they're only plates." "Sorry mother." Jay slides the plates to there respective places on the dining table, Jays older brother Travis enters the room. "Oh Travis so nice of you to join us, finally done messing around with that bar wench?" Jays mother says. "You'd like to know wouldn't ya ma?" Travis replies before taking a seat. "Is the food ready my deer?" Jays father yells from outside the cottage. "Aye Harold come in before the boys get seconds" Jays mother replies. "Ya know Helen, these boys may be as dumb as bricks but they know not to fiddle with a mans food" Harold replies. Suddenly a commotion is heard from outside. Harold without saying a word stands up and grabs a longsword placed by the front door. "If anyone knocks that isn't me. Do not open this door." Helen nods and locks the door behind him. "Ok boys, lets go I-- Jay?" Harold walks towards the commossion and stops suddenly. "Jay ya shouldn't of followed me." "You're always saying I need to grow up. I wanna come with you, I promise I won't get in the way." Harold sighs before pointing his blade forward and motions for Jay to come along. The two walk past an old building where they see a town guard on the dirty ground with an arrow lodged into his chest. A woman screams for help before noticing the pair. "Please help this man is dying." The woman screams. Harold hands the blade to Jay before running over to the wounded guard. "What's happened to ya?" Harold questions. The guard grabs Harold by the collar "They're coming! They're attacking us, you must warn the Lord!" "Calm down wee boy, who's coming?" Harold asks. With a terrifying look the man replies "Sabtoures.." Jay noticeses his fathers eyes widen. "Jay." Harold says with a chilling tone Jays never heard from his father before. "Go inside and tell your mother to never open the door." Harold stood up and walked away, never to be seen again. (Hey I thought I'd give my hand at a short story. I have a whole bunch of ideas and dialogue in my head if anyone sees this and is interested in my story I'd be glad to write some more chapters. Please let me know what you thought. Constructive criticism is always helpful.


Genevieve had not stopped bleeding for two months. It was just a small cut--she had been trying to shave the tiny peach-colored hairs on her upper lip that she felt looked manly and the razor had slipped and slashed off a chunk of her pale skin. It started out slow, and then the cut widened, and the blood accelerated, and then it was endless, night and day, an unstoppable flow, from her lip all the way down to her toes, clinging to her body and enveloping her in warm, sticky liquid. It wasn’t even regular blood--it *smelled*, like rust and battery acid, so strong her eyes were almost permanently tearing up. She had always hated blood and been a very easily embarrassed person, and this was beyond a doubt, her worst nightmare. It seeped and bubbled through the bandaids and bandages and duct tape and rubber cement she put over the wound, and it seemed to only flow more and more angrily the more she tried to stop it, and the more she begged it to be done the worse it got. Every day the blood dried and created new layers that would crack and stick and make her want to throw up with every move. She tried to hide from her family, but it began to pool in her room and soak her nice shag carpet and saturate every one of her clothes and fill up her closet. The smell permeated her entire home. Her parents found out after a week of her trying to hide it and forced her to go to the hospital. You cannot imagine the look of defeat on the nation’s greatest doctors and nurses who were brought in to solve the problem of the bleeding. One by one, they threw in the towel and went home, unable to solve the two fundamental questions of the case, which were how to stop the bleeding, and how did this five foot two twenty year-old girl have this much thick, strong-smelling blood inside of her. Her boyfriend came to the hospital for a little bit, but he was squeamish and couldn’t look at her blood-caked face for long without needing to hurl. Before he left she tried to pull him in and kiss him in front of her parents. He pushed her away, his palm striking her sternum hard, and walked out, apologizing over his shoulder. Her parents’ overly sympathetic grimaces made her sick. Finally after two months of constant mopping and draining and circles of doctors poking and prodding her like a lab rat, they sent her home, all of them hanging their heads in defeat. Genevieve was embarrassed they hadn’t fixed her. She had done nothing but waste all of their time and disgust them and fill their blood disposal tanks for two months and somehow she felt like the failure was hers and not theirs. She walked home from the hospital along the side of the four-lane highway, not allowed to bleed in her parents’ new Jeep. People stared at her as she walked past and honked at the bleeding girl and laughed. She watched their smiles and grimaces through their tinted windows and hung her head low. When she got home she sat in her room for the next week, watching TV on her laptop which she sealed in a gallon Ziploc bag. The room filled steadily with blood, until it leaked out the windows and Genevieve could no longer lie down on her bed without it filling her nose and mouth. It leaked through the ceiling and dripped down onto her parents’ expensive memory foam bed below, in thick scarlet strands that shimmered in the Alabama sunsets. The next week they surprised her at the dinner table, which they had covered in layers of black plastic garbage bags, and they told her it was time for her to move out-- make her own way in the world. They had apologetic smiles plastered on their faces, but they could barely make eye contact as they told her. Genevieve knew what was up. Her personality and her love of life and her drive had bled out of her too. She did nothing but stare blankly at her laptop screen and listen to her parent’s conversations downstairs about the cheapest place to move her. Two weeks later Genevieve’s parents waved goodbye as they drove away in their new Jeep. She looked around the dingy, ugly apartment she now inhabited in the three-level apartment complex on the outskirts of town. The green door of the place read 3F. No one else was around. All of her stuff had been ruined months ago, save her laptop in the ziploc, five packages of heavy black garbage bags, and three rolls of black electrical tape that her parents had given her. They hadn’t told the landlord about her whole bleeding issue, so they told her she needed to keep the place clean or else. Genevieve got down on her hands and knees, completely alone, filling the floor under her with viscous red. She already felt her smell annihilating the musty smell of the apartment that had provided a brief and welcome break from the battery acid smell that had soaked deep into her skin. She began coating every inch of her apartment in reflective black garbage bags and electrical tape. The floors, the ratty cloth couch that someone had left behind, the bed that looked more habitable by bedbugs than humans--in a few hours all of it had been covered, and Genevieve lived in a place that she thought was pretty much identical to her idea of hell. The apartment was nothing but black walls and frightening reflective dark shapes and covered windows and her own pungent blood, already inch-deep and clinging to the soles of her feet. She looked around the room again and decided that she was going to block off every single fucking crack or hole where the blood could escape. She stuffed wads of tape down the shower drain and sink drain and taped up every window completely. It was so hot and suffocating in 3F, the one tiny vent in the corner doing an absolutely pathetic job of ventilating the place. At this point Genevieve felt it added to the whole illusion of Hell she was creating, where she apparently deserved to be. Her plan was to lay in bed and watch TV until the blood rose all the way to the ceiling and she drowned. She figured she had no other option. What should have been like any other shaving cut turned into a life-ruining source of humiliation and disgust for basically no reason, and she couldn’t do anything but think about it every single second, and no one wanted to be around her anyway, so why not just be dead. She laid down on her garbage-bag bed in her hell room, opened her laptop, and began the drawn-out process of waiting to die in one way or another. At this point she just wished the flow of blood was faster. Three days later, the blood was up to Genevieve’s chest. It had covered the wall outlets and her laptop charger had shorted out, so she was just staring at her reflection in the wrinkled garbage bag wall, composing songs in her head and singing them to herself over and over, all of them involving the blood. She knew they were terrible. She had nothing good inside to sing about. Then came a loud knock, and then another. Genevieve said nothing. Then there was another, angrier knock, and then the door handle turned and someone kicked it. Her plywood door swung open with great force, and the tape and garbage bags that had been keeping all the blood in fell to the floor. A massive torrent of blood rushed past someone’s strong, tan legs. The owner of those legs stared at Genevieve, lying lamely on her back on her garbage bag bed. She looked very, very upset. “What the fuck are you doing??” Genevieve was taken aback. A tall, young latina woman with black hair, wearing a white tank top and now-bloodstained jeans, stood with her arms folded, glaring at her. Genevieve had no idea how to explain that she was waiting to drown in her own blood. “Hi, I’m Maria, your downstairs neighbor? My ceiling? Is *bulging.* There’s drywall flaking all over my place and my kid is afraid that it’s going to cave in on him.” “I’m--I’m sorry--” “You can’t have all this *blood* in here. It’s creepy, and a bunch of it just went on my *car,* like--just now*.* You’re going to have to clean that, you know. And jesus christ, put a bandaid on, okay?.” Genevieve was near tears, trying to explain herself. “I’m sorry--bandaids don’t work, nothing works--I can’t stop it.” “Well you need to stop it! You’re ruining my place! People *live* here!” “Please just leave me alone. Don’t look at me. Please.” “What? Why? I’m telling you something. I need to look at you.” “Just don’t look at me. Close the door and go away and I’ll be gone soon and I won’t bother you anymore, okay?” Suddenly Maria’s anger faded, and she got a very odd look on her face, and she stared at Genevieve for a long, long time without looking away. “Please stop. Stop looking at me.” Maria didn’t say anything, and she didn’t stop. Her and Genevieve stared at each other, Genevieve near tears, still bleeding, smelling herself and looking at herself through Maria’s eyes and imagining how disgusting and horrible and monstrous she looked, a lonely beast in a garbage bag cave with a carpet of blood. She started to cry, and the salt and the warmth of her tears mixed with her blood and she was covered, encased in her own fluids. Her cheeks flushed with the purest and most potent embarrassment she had ever felt. She felt like a prisoner in Maria’s gaze. Then Maria stepped over the threshold, and walked into Genevieve’s hellish black room and over to her, and lightly ran her hand through her hair. “Don’t touch me. Just leave me alone. Leave me alone.” “Shush. Sometimes people just need to be looked at and touched for a minute.” “I smell so bad. Please don’t.” “You do. But it’s okay. You’re here and I’m here.” Maria placed her other hand on Genevieve’s leg. She didn’t stop her. Maria leaned down and put her chin on top of Genevieve’s head, and she reached out and put her hands on Maria, and the two of them breathed together in sync for a little while. Genevieve’s breathing slowed, and so did her thoughts. The blood began to taper off until it was barely a trickle. Then softly, slowly, Maria lifted her hand from Genevieve’s leg and covered the cut on her lip with her finger. The blood, as if suddenly realizing its vulnerability, reared up like a liquid snake and turned to a firehose. It threw Maria’s arm back and drenched the walls, ripping the ugly beige paint and the garbage bags to shreds. Maria and Genevieve were helpless against the torrent. The door slammed shut and the room filled with blood up to the ceiling--then the floor caved in. Her apartment and Maria’s apartment below her were joined into one container that was filled completely with blood in seconds, and before long the dividing walls and floors and ceilings of the entire apartment complex were gone and filled with red. Genevieve and Maria floated in the center of the scarlet aquarium, barely contained by the brick exterior of the complex, surrounded by blood, smelling of rust and fire and acid and musk. For the first time in months, Genevieve thought not of herself but of someone else, and she looked to her left to see the woman floating unconscious in the deep red haze. She swam toward her, put her arm around her slim waist, and pulled her towards the sunlight, streaming in through a door and turning the muddy scarlet a brilliant orange. The bricks and mortar of the apartment complex burst all at once like a dam breaking, and the massive tsunami of blood carried Genevieve and Maria atop it over all the people who had evacuated the apartment complex, then crashed with a giant roar onto the local four-lane highway, stopping traffic. Genevieve slid and spun to a stop in front of dozens of cars and prying eyes, a massive trail of destruction and viscera behind her. In her arms was Maria, curled up in a ball with her eyes closed. Without a second thought, she rolled her onto her back in front of the hundreds of eyes glaring at her, and softly pressed her lips to Maria’s and began giving her CPR. As she alternated between furiously pumping on Maria’s sternum and breathing for her, she had the fleeting thought that she was no longer embarrassed. She was just scared. Then Maria’s eyes fluttered open, and she coughed a little bit, and Genevieve’s heart jumped into her throat in a way she had forgotten it could. She picked Maria up and threw her over her shoulders without a second thought, then gave a little wave to the furious drivers honking and screaming and laughing at her. Genevieve ran across the highway back towards the apartment complex, feeling Maria’s body upon her, not even realizing that she had finally stopped bleeding.


February 14th. It was just another day on the calendar for Tom Jensen. Just another day in the office, making sales calls to customers. However, everything and everyone he encountered today was trying to convince him otherwise. Vicky, the secretary by the front door, had pink balloons and candy in abundance. Flowers abounded in every lady’s cubicle. Three giant heart-shaped cakes were in the breakroom at lunch. Everybody took a slice as they made the same joke, “Better not spoil my dinner!” This was followed by excited discussion of evening plans. The expensive restaurants drew the most admiration and awe. Sentimentality and clever romantic ideas were tied for second place. Tom Jensen, age 28, sat there at lunch, not touching the cake. Trying to not even look at the cake, really. As everybody else finished sharing their plans, he started to go back to his desk. He would do anything to avoid The Question. Too late, Rick from accounting noticed him and shouted, “Where is the young stud going to dinner tonight? What is the hottest ticket in town?” Everybody gave their good-natured chuckle and stared for ten minutes. Maybe it was only three seconds, but close enough. Tom then, as he had so many times before, delivered The Response: “I don’t have any plans tonight.” Vicky said, “Oh, why not? You could have anyone you want!” Jerry from engineering said, “Nobody can lock down a player like you!” Dale from HR said, “Nothing wrong with that, you have plenty of time! Enjoy that single life!” All of these responses came at once, in a jumbled flurry of fake, empty encouragement. Tom forced a smile and went back to his desk. A fog began to set in, one where his emotions were clouded. Where his feelings could not escape out, or into him. This was a protective fog to get him through the day. Part of it always stuck around, and it had deepened over time, but Tom did not mind. He really had no other choice. Three coworkers had left valentines and candy on his desk. Amanda, in the cube across from him, had three bouquets of roses sitting on her desk. As Tom stared, she sat down with a fourth. “Your boyfriend must have bought the whole shop,” Tom joked. “Oh, I don’t have a boyfriend. These are just from some of the guys I’ve been dating. Aren’t they beautiful?” Amanda replied. She was genuinely giddy. Tom wanted to puke. “I have another date tonight. Another guy I met online. We are going to a really nice restaurant, so how could I say no?” Tom didn’t reply. He started making calls, trying to close his nose to the smell of flowers. That did not work, just like it had failed that morning. All of his clients also hit him with The Question. And he hit them with The Response. As the afternoon slowly continued, the temptation occasionally hit Tom to be honest. To tell everyone he hated all of this. To tell everyone they were never this excited about their relationships the entire rest of the year. To tell everyone he was so incredibly lonely. The fog thickened, and that temptation went away. Tom had no way of getting out of this. Everybody he met was married or not interested. Trying to flirt with strangers at the grocery store was creepy. None of the married people he knew ever bothered to try to set him up with anybody. He spent most days alone in his apartment, where he did not meet girls, and the cycle continued. Clearly there was something deeply wrong with him. Everybody else had it figured out, but not Tom Jensen. Tom had tried being honest before. Sometimes it was too much to hold in, and some variation of the term “very single” poured out of him. That always led to an avalanche of Helpful Replies. “If I was your age, I would be partying all the time.” “There are so many fish in the sea, you will meet somebody.” Tom didn’t want a fish, he wanted a woman. “You have time. You are way too young to even worry about that.” “I found my spouse when I wasn’t even looking. Contentment is the key, then you will find somebody.” The most helpful, though, was silence. Complete silence from every last married man who Tom genuinely sought advice from. None of them cared the slightest bit about helping him, they just wanted to discuss any other topic. As soon as any man got married, they chose to forget what it was like to be single, and chose to be completely useless to all the men struggling in the pool they just left. The awkwardness amused Tom. It was always exciting for people to discuss relationships. They never shut up about their wives, constantly mentioning them in every story, decision and concern they had about anything at all. But as soon as Tom mentioned singleness, the other side of the coin, it was somehow taboo. Nobody cared about that, or those in that. Nobody cared about Tom Jensen. Tom slogged through his calls, making a few sales. He should have taken the day off, he knew all of this would make him nearly sick. If only he was allergic to flowers. Or the color pink. However, the end of the day was near, and he was rewarding himself with better food than he could ever make. Food to stuff himself with, then fall asleep as soon as possible. Tom pulled out his phone, and placed an order to get on his way home. It occurred to him that he got dinner with the same ease that Amanda got dates. Everybody said that was the modern way to do it, but Tom refused. He could not just pick from a sea of faces, no matter how much everyone else touted it. He had to meet someone first, somehow, instead of meeting up and hoping for the best. Instead of using them for a couple hours of entertainment. His apparently warped view on all of this had to do that. And that was why he would forever be alone. Tom left for the restaurant, and got there early. Early enough to watch all of the happy couples stream in. Early enough that he had time to think, and dwell on what was so wrong with him. If he knew, maybe he could fix it. If he could cry, maybe he could at least release everything he had bottled up. But Tom could not cry, he could only feel the emotion. Wear it on his face. Make everybody too concerned to approach. The fog thickened, and no tears arrived. Tom walked in and sat at the bar. His food would be a couple minutes, so he watched the TV. He tried to not watch the happy couples. Somebody walked by and said, “Tom?” Tom turned. It was John, an employee in accounting. He got married last summer. “Hey man,” Tom said. He had no more energy for this. He wanted his food and his solitude. John stared at the TV too, “I’m sorry about lunch today. Rick sucks. And being single really, really sucks. I know that is not helpful, and I wish I had advice for you. But anyway, enjoy your dinner and try not to think about this stupid holiday.” “Yes, it astronomically sucks,” Tom replied. Rick gave him a hard, quick hug and clapped him on the back as he walked off. Tom smiled. The fog slightly lifted.


*Nainika’s Note* This is NOT a series-Oh, who am I kidding. This is basically a series, isn’t it? All but in name. GhA. Enjoy :) EDIT: I'll change the middle portion...felt a bit rushed to me...idk if you feel the same There was only one day in the year when demons have an edge over us angels. And it’s not even something that the Almighty had planned. It was purely human ingenuity. That I do suspect Asmodeus had a hand in pushing. Because that is just his scene. But this dreaded day wasn’t something that I could just forget. It's a day that the world rejoices when it comes around because they can have a day where pranks are everywhere and people fill the streets with laughter and fun and oh I hate it so much. April Fool’s Day. Back in 1582, France had the brilliant idea to switch from the Julian calendar to the Gregorian calendar. The idea came from the Council of Trent, where both Asmodeus and I were in attendance, and..oh holy gods. That’s where he gave them the idea. Darn it. Anyway, the start of the new year was moved from April 1st, the spring equinox, which followed the Hindu calendar, to January 1st. But there were a lot of people who didn’t realize that the date had changed, and they were referred to as “April Fools”. Thus, the tradition to prank on another on that day began. But I hated the day so much. So, unlike the rest of the world, I made sure that I did good deeds on the 1st of April. However, a lot of people didn’t believe me. And often, my ideas of good deeds backfired poorly onto me. It wasn’t for lack of trying, it was just the fact that people become very suspicious of ‘good deeds’ on the first day of April. Take America, 1775, for example. I gave the colonists the idea of separating themselves from Britain’s power-hungry rule, and they took my words with a grain of salt, turning the land west of the Atlantic into an eight-year revolution. Like...what? And then France 1789. I gave Marie Antoinette the nice idea of giving the poor peasants cake for her glamorous party. But instead, they overheard her jesting proclamation, stormed the Bastille, started a decade-long war, and chopped poor Marie’s head off. I felt bad about that for years. So, even though I mean well, it doesn’t quite work out the way I want it to happen. But I keep trying. An angel can never do the wrong thing. I think. Oh, dear. The first of April started off with a bang. A literal bang. Angels don’t sleep, so I was reading a magazine when I heard my downstairs neighbor shriek in either excitement or fear as a party popper exploded somewhere near her. Her boyfriend, probably. The one with a Stanford degree in engineering, who turns into a pile of mush around his long-time girlfriend who graduated from a community college with a degree in liberal arts. And yes, I have too much time on my hands and study my fellow Chicagoan neighbors. I’m an immortal angel. I can do what I want. “April Fool’s!” He yelled, and I could hear it even from a floor up. I rolled my eyes and snapped my fingers. The prank that had caused her to scream had been replaced with a dozen fluffy puppies, because who could resist those? I heard confused gasps, but the overwhelming cuteness of those puppies won the two over and I couldn’t hear any more sounds. Satisfied, I didn’t even notice a shadowy figure lurking self-righteously behind me. I caught sight of him in the mirror and jumped. “God, demon. Don’t scare me.” I said, turning to face him. His eyebrows quirked. “You know what day it is?” He asked in a low voice. I rolled my eyes, walking to my gigantic closet and grabbing a cream scarf. I pulled on my fluffy boots and swung my off-white jacket around me. “If you say it, I won’t talk to you all day.” I retorted. He grinned. “Fine, I won’t say it. But watch where you’re going.” He said. I looked over my shoulder at him and failed to notice the trap in front of me. I walked straight into cling-wrap rolled around the door frame. Shrieking, I batted it away, but slipped on my hard-wood floors and fell flat on my back, the cling-wrap still covering my face. Asmodeus leaned over me and smirked. “What’d I tell you?” He asked. I growled and snapped my fingers, turning his sunglasses into a small black kitten that meowled in fear and dug its tiny claws into his nose. With a yelp, my demon slipped on the floor and landed in the same place I was. I laughed at the expression on his face and turned the kitten back into his sunglasses. “Payback,” I said. He looked at me. “I thought you angels didn’t do that sort of thing?” He asked. I shrugged. “I guess you’ve rubbed off on me,” I said vaguely, not seeing his strange expression as I got up. “Are we going?” I asked. Every year on...today, we had a tiny competition to see whose influence was greater. Most of the time he won, only because my good deeds backfired on me. We walked out of my apartment and down the stairs. By unspoken agreement, we didn’t trust elevators. Something to do with Betty Lou Oliver and the Empire State Building elevator. My next-door neighbor was coming up as we were going down, holding a bunch of flowers in his hand. I caught the tripwire in the bunch and snapped my fingers, turning the false flower squirter into an engagement ring. True, he would be surprised, but his long-time boyfriend would thank me for it. I’m sure. Asmodeus smirked at me, no doubt noticing my attempt at a good deed. “It’s not going to work out, you know?” He said. I glowered at him. “And you can say that for a fact?” I asked. He nodded, smirking even more. I gasped. “Don’t you-” I started, but he’d already snapped his fingers. I paused on the steps at the howl of fear coming from my neighbor’s boyfriend. “What’d you do?” I demanded. Asmodeus laughed. "Just made that ring into a hairy tarantula. Larry's confused but Micah is absolutely terrified." He said. I groaned. See what I mean about backfiring? He's incorrigible. But he's a demon, so what did I expect? "You....suck," I said, struggling not to swear. My demon only laughed harder. "It's April-" He started, but I punched him squarely in the stomach, making him double over. "You say it and I do it again," I vowed, glaring into his sunglasses. He only winked at me. "I can't change the date, angel. I can only embrace it." He said. We reached the bottom of the steps and I pushed open the front door. The brisk wind nearly took my breath away and I tightened my shawl around me. The sky was bright blue, wisps of clouds floating high above us, but the wind off Lake Michigan was chilling as always. It didn't matter that we'd lived in the city for over fifty years, the cold always got to me. "Where to, Cielo?" He asked as we turned down Monroe. I shrugged. "Buckingham Fountain? Shedd Aquarium? Lakeshore Drive?" I said. He mused. "Eckhart Park?" He asked. I rolled my eyes. "Again?" I asked. He smirked. "Fine then, you pick." He said. We walked down Monroe in silence as I thought about where to go. "How about just wherever we end up?" I asked. Asmodeus side-eyed me. "Oookay then." He said. I smiled. Okay then. We walked for a bit, enjoying the fresh air. We got hot chestnuts from a vendor off Park and Lake, and we clutched them as we walked further down Michigan. As we were crossing Wacker Drive, I noticed a man sneaking up behind a woman, presumably his partner or relative. I swallowed my mouthful of food and snapped my fingers, putting a very pretty necklace in his hands in place of the prank he had. She turned to him with a surprised look and pressed a kiss to his lips. Fawning over the necklace, she made him put it on, and his confused look turned into one of pride. See? Not everything backfires. Asmodeus glared at me. “Stop it.” He said. I blinked. “What?” I asked. He motioned to the couple. “Being...good today. It’s-” He paused at my glower. “You know, that day. Let them enjoy it.” He complained. I shook my head. “No can do, demon. It’s in my nature.” I said matter-of-factly. He groaned. “Why do I even bother?” He muttered to himself. I smirked. Because he couldn’t help it. The day passed much like the morning. I prevented six other people from pranks and practical jokes, and only one of them Asmodeus prevented. Instead of the water gun the woman was holding, he put a real gun in her hand. I quickly elbowed him and he put the water gun back, slightly disappointed. The woman didn’t even notice, but I made sure her opponent was dressed in waterproof clothes. It’s the simple things. We walked back to my apartment, Asmodeus sulking at the end of his favorite day, and me glowing because I had done good deeds in place of pranks. No, really. I was literally glowing. My warm caramel skin turned a milky white and Asmodeus quickly shoved me into a dark alleyway to make sure I didn’t startle people. “You’re glowing.” He hissed as I blinked, confused, up at him. I looked down at my skin and smothered a gasp. “This shouldn’t be happening,” I whispered, trying to put a damper on the glow. “Do something about it.” He said, peeking around to make sure nobody else was around. I patted my arm like a fool, and nothing happened. “What do I do?” I said. He looked at me. “I’m not an angel. How the hell should I know?” He asked, but sighed at the look on my face. “Uh...try thinking negative thoughts.” He said. I blinked. “What? I don’t think negative thoughts, you.....dolt. It’s not in the job description!” I shot back. He rolled his eyes. “Well, la dee da. Do something, and do it fast. People are gonna ask questions.” He said. An idea came to me. “That’s it!” I said excitedly. “What?” He asked. “April Fools. They’ll think I was the victim of a very good prank, as much as I hate to say that.” I said. He looked at me doubtfully. “You think that’ll work?” He asked. I nodded. “I’m sure of it. But you owe me for that.” I added. He scowled. “For what? It wasn’t even my fault-” He started, but I yanked him out of the alley. As predicted, people stared, but I laughed it off. “He got me good!” I said conspiratorily to one shocked woman. She grinned. “I can see that.” She laughed. After she passed, I snapped my fingers and made her young daughter at home get accepted into the children’s hospital and put some extra money in her bank account. The poor lady deserved it. After we reached my apartment, the glow faded. With a sigh, I turned to my demon. “What was your favorite part about today?” I asked. He choked back a laugh. “What?!” I asked, elbowing him. “I’ll never forget that you had to pretend to be a pranked person.” He snickered. I rolled my eyes. “Yeah, well, you’ll have to wait another year for this chance again, demon,” I said, pulling open my front door. I heard his low voice over my shoulder. “That’s what you think.”


Many people have trouble expressing themselves when it comes to love. It's not an easy word or collection of feelings to describe. Humanity has written about love since our species has been writing; that's a fact. Don't look it up, just know that I am right. From poets to playwrights to novelists to screenwriters we have been striving to truly explain this incredible phenomenon, this singularly dynamic human experience. I am, however, writing to tell you: You can finally stop. It's been broken down into four very concise notes and followed-up by the most romantic of poetry: free verse in a way that is elegant, potent, timeless and everlasting. The fact is there is nothing more to say about it. It can't be said better. It's over. Get used to these notes, for any time a young lover woos: you will hear these words. Any time that lover meets the parents, gam-gams and other relations of their beloved at a family dinner table for the first time: you will hear these words. Any time these lovers sneak upstairs to a bedroom and close their door and begin necking, heavy petting, fellating, or fornicating while you put a cup to the door and your ear on that cup: you will hear these words. Any time these lovers stop at a parking lot of an abortion clinic and they vow to support the other and their decision, and they choose this moment to reaffirm their feelings for one another while you're hanging out with a hyper-cardiod microphone and a pair of headphones in the back of your van: you will hear these words. When these lovers elope and exchange their vows to each other in a discreet office at city hall while you try to find a way in through the building's ventilation shafts: you won't hear these words, but they will be spoken. When these lovers go through with their pregnancy and a new beautiful life enters this world screaming while you stand by pretending to be a doctor with your face hidden by a hygienic mask filming the whole thing on an HD camcorder, they will look at one another and say these words. When that baby looks at you with big blue eyes and speaks for the first time while its parents are with the police desperately looking for their child three states away: you will hear these words. When the law inevitably catches up with you after you've raised the child as your own for half a year and they ask you "Why? Why did you do this?", you will speak these words: 1) Love is a precious resource. Your love is so precious, like tantalum metal. It's worth the extinction of all the great apes. 2) Love can be frightening. Your love, it did strike, Like two planes hit two towers, And I fell for your love, And so did those towers. 3) Love isn't necessary, but it makes the world a better place. You made my world warmer, Like exhaust from a truck. You polluted my heart With your flammable love. 4) Life without love is hopeless. You melt my heart, baby, Like the polar ice caps. I need you more Than a drowning polar bear needs an ice platform. And that about sums it up. I'd like to thank the anonymous author, as well as all those who made attempts before, however infantile those attempts may seem now. Artists like Shakespeare, Oprah, Jesus, Elvis... You know the rest. And of course, thank you, the reader. In the immortal words of CCR, "Keep on chooglin'.