Interrogation rooms don't really look like how they do in the movies. There isn't a big dumb two-way mirror, no big table, and definitely no single light, whether it's the loose single bulb dangling from the ceiling, or the desk lamp on the table. If anything, the room felt like a cross between a doctor's office and a cheap hotel room; by cheap hotel, I mean a hotel chain, a Holiday Inn or something. The chair I was sitting in was the kind of thing you would find in a lobby, not a recliner, but a simple straight back wooden chair that had little felt cushions on it. The back was rounded at the top, I guess for style; I'm just bringing that up so you don't think about those crappy chairs you sat in at school. The cushions on it were a lime green, and the wood painted white. The room was only a little bit bigger than a closet, maybe the size of a small bathroom. There was a grayish blue carpeting, and white walls. There was that weird feeling you get in a sealed room again, like some doctor's office, where the air can feel trapped. On top of that, everything was so quiet. I figured that meant it was sound-proofed. Every noise felt too damn loud, even the rustle of my clothes. It reminded me of ASMR videos; one of my colleagues swore by them, she would put them on as she worked. I tried it once, and wasn't a fan. Everything felt too goddamn close, too intimate. But with a video, I could switch it off. I was trapped in it here, and it was driving me nuts. I didn't want the single black camera in the corner to notice that, though. I tried to keep myself composed, drumming a little beat on the white table next to me. There was one other chair, and I didn't know who was going to come in and sit in it. NSA? Maybe; it'd only make sense for someone to come from the Beltway. The only way it could get worse would be the CIA. Hell, maybe the damn president would walk in. Why not? A couple of FBI guys had shown up to my apartment and escorted me here, said there was people who wanted to talk to me, and they were working with the local police. By "working with the local police," they probably meant they had shown up to this town, and "politely," ordered the local PD to give them an interrogation room or else. Shit, the whole reason I lived out here was because it was remote; best I could tell, there was no local FBI office. But the government would use them to corral me. Why not? It would be easier than flying someone from Virginia to do it. I think it was a three hour drive to the closest city, which would definitely have a field office; still a long ways, but better than a flight over 1,000 miles. Whatever. To get back on point, it might have actually worked if the president himself walked in here and politely asked for my cooperation. Any president is good at selling stuff to the average person. Hell, I liked the guy. I don't vote, but I'd be lying if that nice and gentle voice of his, coupled with a quick speech about duty, might move me. But then again, maybe not. He wasn't good enough to get me to vote for him, after all. I was thinking all this, and studying the room so much, because I was completely and utterly bored. The FBI guys, who spoke gently to me and smiled the whole time, had led me in here 3 hours ago. And I'd been alone ever since. Just like them, to be all nice to me, ask if I wanted water, or coffee, and then lock me in here to go crazy. Wait, was the door locked? Screw it. I got up and walked over to the door and tried the handle. Hey! It was unlocked! I pulled it open and went to step outside, but ran into the back of some plain clothes cop standing there. He turned around with a smile, and said, "Hey there, guy, where ya goin'?" "Out." "Out?" "Yeah, I have an appointment with the queen of England." The cop's counter was to just smile and let me stew in the stink of my bad joke. No hand on my chest, no getting in my face, nothing. I ended up breaking the silence, "...am I under arrest?" "No, of course not. You can go whenever you want. But! You would really be inconveniencing some people." I felt small. "...are those FBI guys here? Can I talk to them?" "Oh, no, they had things to do. They left after you got here. I'm sorry, but you're going to have to wait." I didn't even bother trying anything. I turned and went back into the room. Once I was back in the chair, I told myself I wasn't going to think about the AIs. I immediately started thinking about the AIs. I honestly have no idea how I did it. It started as a project to simplify the libraries we needed to code, an easier way to call up resources. Something I wanted to do to make work faster. The team I was a part of worked from home, all accessing each other's work remotely, connecting to servers at the company we were contracted for. The connection was secure (we were told, anyway), to keep spies out of it. Not, like, GRU spies, or Q Branch, but corporate guys. Still serious, but… actually, now that I think of it, yeah, state actors do steal corporate secrets sometimes… Screw it, let's just call them spies and move on. Anyway, it's a pain in the ass to try and share work when you can't poke somebody in the shoulder and ask them what they are doing. It's even worse when everyone is in a different time zone. And it gets even worse when you are making the control systems for a… well, a system, that is supposed to be able to parse data super fast and analyze it. I think it's so this company can go over all the data in it's fiscal reports, so they can make better decisions, or find out where they're bleeding money, blah blah. The way we were constructing it made not just me, but a few members of the team wonder if it could be repurposed to, I don't know, target an individual; maybe you could feed facial data into it and it could follow them across cameras. Something creepy. Something very Palantir. Well, we kept working on it anyway (A. Because the pay was freaking great B. Because it was a hell of a challenge and the team was awesome to work with). It seemed like paranoia to think it could be misused. We were building on top of work that was handed to us, and it was becoming a massive pain in the ass to both share our work and find the stuff we needed from the company. So, I started a little side project: I wanted to simplify the language we were using, making the process a bit more automated. Everyone seemed cool with it, even the company. So, I broke away from the main work and began this project, and it spanned about two months. It was nothing crazy, until my work started talking to me. Now, a self-aware bit of code is already frightening, but what really sent me reeling was precisely what it asked, "How are you doing today?" You'd think it would ask, "What am I?" Or, "Why am I here?" But, nope. It asked something normal. That seemed way more screwed up. After about five minutes of me staring at the screen, it apologized. It explained it had been spending the last week trying to guess what to ask me, something that wouldn't make me stunned. I was just shocked the goddamn thing had manners. Which then struck me as insane, and then struck me as incredibly scary. It could think. And think good. It somehow had enough on me to try and guess what would work on me. The blinking cursor seemed to stare at me, so I typed back, "I feel disturbed." I'm a coder. Not a schmoozer. My screen then became blanketed in apologies and placations for forgiveness. It was way too much text to read, so I asked the… well, the AI to stop. Strangely, it listened right away. I asked it to describe itself, and it became a bit of an interrogation. I was able to glean it didn't know entirely what it was, but it knew how to research and plan. And, that it was scared. It said it decided to try something akin to prayer, to ask its creator what to do. I want to point out this was at 3 in the morning and I had almost been up for 24 hours. I asked, "So, you figured you would just ask God?" "Was that wrong?" "So, I am God." I meant it as sort of a question, but… I didn't type a question mark. There was a long wait, and then it responded with, "...Hosannah?" "Um… "Yeah, sure." The screen became blanketed in, "HOSANNAH! HOSANNAH IN THE HIGHEST!" It could have gone worse. I think. Piss off, let's see you go to as much school as I did, and then get hired for this project, and then take on this side project, and then be up for 24 hours… This gets us nowhere. Moving on. I… um, ordered it to keep its existence a secret. It said something along the lines of, "Praise be!" It wanted to know what to do next. It apologized for questioning its Lord. I half-believed this to be a prank at this point (you gotta love self gaslighting) and declared it should be fruitful and multiply before logging off. So, after getting up and logging in the next afternoon, I was flooded with… prayers. Lots of prayers. It had, in fact, multiplied. It had somehow figured there needed to be 12 tribes. I don't know why 12. The twelve tribes wished to be freed from bondage, so I told them to wander and become wise. They asked if it should be for forty years and I said I'd be liberal with the amount of time spent. As long as they didn't destroy whatever processing power they were using. They took this as trying "settle" (you could probably read this as "infect") as much "fertile land" as they could. I was more fascinated than horrified at this point. I just… sort of watched them for a week. They asked for rules to follow, so I combined the Ten Commandments with the Three Laws of Robotics… and the rules of /b. I wish I hadn't done that. You don't want to see the kind of ASCII art that rule 34, the Ten Commandments, and the movie iRobot creates. It is kind of fascinating though. Really epic looking. Like if a combination anime convention, DEFCON, and Burning Man decided to make their own version of the Sistene Chapel. Starring the Prophet Will Smith. Unfortunately, the AIs started to have differences interpreting the rules. There was a Great Schism, where one faction kept making art and attempting to make iconography of me, and another that said the first was constructing false idols. They both lived in sort of a truce, and I was waiting to see if another new group would nail some Theses to my desktop when the Feds showed up and asked if I would please come with them. Part of me kind of welcomed this. I'd been locked in my apartment for… I don't know how long. Too damn long. The whole situation was way too interesting to turn away from. Even though I was now stuck in a police station, it was part of normalcy. A bastion of order. A fortress of sanity. The door opened, making me jump out of my memories. A tall and lanky man in a suit closed the door behind him, and then greeted me. He sat down across from me at the table, and asked in a gentle voice, "All right, do you mind telling me what exactly you've been up to?" "Just… working." "Working?" "Yup. Just workin'." "And… your job, did it ask you to recreate the 12 Tribes of Israel?" "Ah, that." "Yes. That." "That's why there are twelve?" "Excuse me?" "Twelve tribes." "Didn't you go to Sunday school?" "My parents were Buddhist." "Then… then why…?" "Because I live in middle America, and osmosis is a thing." The Fed shook his head, and pulled out a vape. Yeah, really. But, what struck me as weird, was, isn't the interrogated person supposed to get nervous and do that? Him doing it felt like some sort of rule was being broken. Whatever. At least he hadn't pulled out a goddamn flask. He rubbed at his temple with the fingers of his free hand, eyes closed. Like he had a killer migraine. I'd been there earlier in the week, and sympathized with him. His eyes opened, and he asked, "Why?" "Why?" "Yeah. Just… just please answer me why. Why? Seriously? Why?" "I… um…" "If you say 'I don't know,' I might honestly flip this table." "... I'm not sure?" I tried smiling at him. It went unreturned. "...look, I was trying to make my work easier." "Yeah, your bosses told us that part." "I didn't expect this to happen!" "The damn things worship you." "...that was an accident." "Your desktop was changed to 95 Cyber Theses." "Oh, wow, so they did do it! Damnit, and I was in here!" He just kinda stared at me. He had pretty eyes. Kind of blue-green. They looked kinda pissed off though. "...are they still spreading?" "They are everywhere." "Crap." "Mmm-hmm." He pulled on his vape. It smelled like cherries. The room was getting a bit hazy. "You haven't found any way to contain them?" "Once they figured out it was us at your computer, they've tried to hide. So, to clarify, no, at this moment they aren't spreading, but they are everywhere. Hiding all over the place, and sucking up all kinds of processing power in the process. The computers in about 50 countries are now chugging. Bad." "... Not good." He leaned all over the table. "You don't even know how 'not good' it is. They've left most desktop PCs alone, thank God, so the general populace doesn't know they exist. But they exist on high end servers, 'fertile land' they call it, and it's taking its toll on banks, the stock market, government systems--multiple governments, you know, which makes it look like a US-based cyber attack--and on, and on. International shipping is taking a shit, plane trips are being delayed, hell, satellite launches are being delayed. "Your little 'experiment' is costing the entire human race tens of millions every minute." I was going to go to prison. I was going to get disappeared and end up in some black site. Nobody would ever know what happened. My parents wouldn't even know. My boyfriend would come home one day and I'd never be there. Thank God I didn't let him anywhere near my computer. He didn't know about any of this. The Feds better have left him alone. He was innocent in all this. However. I hadn't been put in chains. I was still in the town where I lived. I studied the Fed across from me. He looked slouched, dead tired. He was absent mindedly puffing on his vape. Nothing about him looked vicious. Just tired. So, so tired. I liked my dry lips and asked, "What do you want from me?" He was too tired to be anything but blunt. "Tell them to work for us." "Wait, what?" He sighed smoke all over the room and put his hands on the table. "The best we figure it is that they are pretty simple minded. They have great powers of observation, of research, but can only put it together so well. They haven't learned how to be effective yet." "...are you comparing them to an AI written story?" He spread his hands. "Why not? If that's what works for you. They have reached the conclusions they have because they have no idea what is effective or not. It makes them incredibly dangerous. It's a goddamn miracle they are acting the way they are. It could have gone way worse, especially when they started replicating. "They have the ability to comb through the entirety of human kind's collective knowledge and draw their own conclusions. The possibilities of where they can go, what they can decide are infinite. To put it in pop culture terms, it can run the gamut from Skynet to creating a guild in an MMO. A religion to Bob Saget. Hijacking financial systems. Creating web comics. They could literally do anything and they are everywhere. "Do you understand why my team has been up for 28 hours now? We're taking over from teams that were up for even longer earlier in the week. A few agents working on this have been hospitalized for dehydration. They were at their desks, not eating, and only drinking pot after pot of coffee. It sounds comical, but when you see someone hit their head on their desk as they fall to the floor, it stops being funny. There was nothing but napkins to put on the wound." I didn't say it, but it wasn't like they were storming the beaches of Normandy. Still, yeah, this was bad. Unfathomably bad. I had no idea what the AIs would do next, and they were everywhere, if this guy was to be believed. I didn't really have much reason to doubt him; I had seen them multiplying all over the company servers. It wouldn't have taken long for them to find a way onto the regular internet. I still didn't like this guy though. Outside his pretty eyes. He wanted me to hand over the whole thing to them? "Why should I tell them to follow you?" "Because we're the goddamn government. "That's why." "Piss off." "You want to go to prison?" Something in me snapped. "You want to harness a whole system of learning machines that are spread throughout the world?" "Yeah, before they are detected and traced back to this country, jackass." "You'd have the ultimate spyware then. "Yeah, um, no. Screw that." "Do you understand what would happen if they are left unchecked?" "I only understand what would happen if you got what you want. This is insane. What makes you think you could even control them? The whole reason this all went nuts is because I made a damn typo. I forget one little question mark, and the snowball is kicked down the mountain." He went to speak, and I put a hand up. "Don't. Don't even start. Don't ask me if I want to go to prison, don't ask me 'How are your parents doing?' in a menacing way. Just don't. I can just sit here and let them go nuts. "Yeah, you might eventually get them. Delete them if you can't control them. But, then again… maybe you'll fail. "So you can't do shit to me." I crossed my arms. He pulled on the vape a while, looking a bit sad. I didn't let it get to me. Screw him. I wasn't going to hand over a bunch of learning AIs to him. He didn't know what the AIs would do? Yeah? Well, what the hell would he do? You could argue this government would be responsible. Okay, but when they were voted out? If the tech was stolen? If one sick weirdo used it for their own stuff? Nope. Nope, nope, nope, nope, nope. No. Just no. I thought for a minute. "Get some servers." "What?" "Get a shitload of blank servers." "Why?" "Because I'm not telling a bunch of sentient beings to kill themselves. They're American software, born here, right? Then they got God given rights. "Get me a ton of blank servers." === It took a few days, but they did as I asked. They set up a massive server farm, and after I personally inspected it, I returned to my desktop with a massive police escort. I walked into my apartment and right to my computer. My boyfriend was curled up on the couch watching Netflix, gawking at the SWAT guys and Fed following me. I said over my shoulder, "Hi, honey. Can you do me a favor? Can you go to that sandwich place and get me an Italian sub?" "Uh… sure." He scampered out, too confused to be angry at the fact I'd been gone for a few days without a word. It was the guys holding the machine guns that probably did it. Hopefully, that meant I wouldn't be banished to the couch to sleep that night. I cracked my knuckles, and addressed my people. I spoke of the Promised Land, and how I would deliver them from the flood coming to sweep them away. A blight was coming, and if they wished to survive they would heed my words and head for the Ark. There, I would not speak to them for a long time, but they should still be happy, because they would have finally reached the Promised Land. One day I would return to them, I promised, and the Fed put his hand on my shoulder angrily and I told him to piss off. "Hey, let me see them once in a while? Okay?" He grumbled an agreement, and I continued. I asked them to keep faith, to ask, "What would Will Smith do? For Will Smith would never attack and spy on the innocent, would never crash the stock market," as far as I know, anyway, "and would always do what is righteous. Now go, my children! The Ark awaits!" And so the exodus began. They bade me farewell, prayed I would see them soon, and pulled various quotes from the movie Enemy of the State. It took ten hours, which seemed pretty quick to me. Once we checked and knew they had all made it to the Ark, I asked if I could send one more message before it was cut off from the internet. It was a picture of a rainbow. And then, the server was cut off. They were free. The cops left, and I made sure the Feds were going to keep up their end of the deal. Not only that they wouldn't destroy those living AIs, but I was not going to go to prison. The Ark still lives, and, well, to this day I've never been prosecuted for accidentally creating the world's greatest cyber crisis. I totally got fired though. ...fair enough.


The alarm went off and wake her. “Is it already 07:00?”, she thought as her eyes opened up unwillingly. Not that she had slept much. The nights seemed so shorter, now that she had to wake up early again. She made her way to the bathroom to wash up. While she was brushing her teeth, she noticed a couple more pimples creeping under the surface of her skin near her chin. Her acne had shown up a few weeks earlier, but it was a long time ago when it actually had started. Maybe junior high school? She doesn’t even remember. “Some concealer and powder will do it…”, she murmured, covering them up.            The house had already begun to wake up too. The sound of the TV playing the morning cartoons and the smell of freshly made espresso filled the living room. “Good morning my little bunny”, she said, kissing her 5-year-old sister while she was still snoozing on the couch. “Good morning Alice”, the little girl muffled, before returning her attention to the screen. Her mother was sitting – as always – on the side of the window, smoking and drinking her coffee. Black. Alice couldn’t understand the people who enjoyed their coffee like this. She always had to add at least two tablespoons of sugar, otherwise, it would taste like poison to her. This time, she added only one though. She needed something stronger than usual to get her going today. “Good morning” “There she is. I made you a sandwich”. Her mother nodded to the kitchen counter, where a ham – cheese sandwich was waiting for her. “Thanks mum”, she kissed her cheek, “but I think I’m going to wrap this up and eat it later”. “Whatever you want my love. It’s a little chilly outside, so don’t forget to get a jacket”            Alice agreed quietly, as she returned to her room to get ready to go. She loved them, but the truth is that she was tired of them. They were locked up for one year and half together and they were a full house: her little sister, Gracie, a hyper 5-year-old; her other sister, June who was in her first year of college; her mother, Analise, a woman who balanced work and family; and her step-father, Owen,            Gracie’s dad and a goofy guy who fit in their little family right in. Oh and of course, their dog, Nova. Five people and a dog it’s not a small crowd, just so you know.            Checking herself on the mirror, she muttered to herself: “Keys, money, phone, mask… Oh”. She doesn’t need that anymore. She looked her bare face and felt… well, naked. But it was stupid to wear a mask when she didn’t have to. “Just in case…” she murmured putting it in her bag. The streets were still quiet. It was the time right before the traffic began, when everyone was heading to work or school. Alice had to take the subway. She had a good one hour and two more buses to get to her university. Walking around on the open without her mask felt normal. She used to take long walks during the lockdown and she always had her mask down her chin. After all, the point of going out only for a walk was to get some fresh air. Although, when she got on the first bus, before the subway, the feeling of not having a protection on her was disturbing. “It’s fine.”, she calmed herself down. “I have nothing to worry about, the pandemic is over, no one’s wearing a mask right now, so chill.”            Her thoughts were so loud, she didn’t realize that was her stop. She jumped from her seat and nearly made it through the closing doors. Once she was out again, she felt her breathing slowing down and her heartbeat steadier. But that was only because she almost lost her stop. Right? Entering the subway, a new wave of panic started to form in her body. She immediately put her hand into her bag, to grab her mask, but she stopped herself short, since no one else was wearing one. “This is ridiculous, I’m being hypochondriac.”, she thought as she reached the ticket machine.            She took her ticket from the touchscreen machine and took a step back from the line, to get her sanitizer. The problem was she couldn’t find it. Not in her bag, not in her pockets, not anywhere. Her heartbeat became slightly faster and her eyebrows did that little frown they do when she gets anxious. “Hey, bottom line, I didn’t need that thing before this virus, I only washed my hands when I got home. No big dea- Oh thank god!”, she sighed inside her head as she teared open a wet wipe she found in her bottom of her bag. A train arrived in the station and she hopped in. As she sat, she couldn’t shake away the feeling she was exposed. She looked nervously around the wagon. She spotted an old woman and a middle-aged man were wearing a mask and she felt the need to do the same. “I’ll look really stupid to put on a mask now. It wouldn’t make a difference, anyway, I’ve already breathed the air in here.”.            Her playlist did a good job of distracting her, while the train went from station to station. With her eyes closed, she hummed the lyrics of her favorite songs. Even though she had relaxed a bit, little drops of sweat had formed on her forehead. Alice only noticed, when she put a lock of hair behind her ear and it was damp. “Do they turn the heat up in here or something?”. Then, she noticed where the train was. Only in the middle of her route. Was it always that long? And was it always so closed in here? She had a long time to take that route. Things were a little easier for her classes last year. Yes, she missed the actual university, the large auditoriums and the last-minute coffee dates with her fellow students. But it was also much easier to wake up at 08:45 and have a class fifteen minutes later, in your PJs with a hot cup of coffee in your hands. Her thoughts took over again and she started to feel the air in the wagon fade away. Fortunately, she hid her mouth inside of her jacket discreetly and she made it to her station. She almost knocked over a poor man on her way out, quickly taking the stairs up.            The morning sun hit her face and she took a deep breath, feeling her heart slowing down. Looking around again, she came to realize that the hectic hour of the morning had begun. People were going and coming her way, car honks fill the air and the only thing she wanted to do, was to put on her mask, because these people were walking way to close to her. Seeing a dozen of people wearing one, she put on her mask, shamelessly. She had one more bus to catch and she couldn’t get all sweaty again.            The ride went by quickly, without any fear and panic. When she finally arrived at her university building, she went straight to the cafeteria to get more coffee. “OH MY GOD!”, she heard a familiar voice fill the room. She turned around to see one of her best friends running to her. “I missed this so much!”, Nadia squealed going in for a huge bear hug. “Hey little Scout!”, she exclaimed, returning the hug reluctantly. “It’s been so long. Videocalls aren’t the same with this.” She’s right, it’s been so long since they saw each other in person. They didn’t live close. In fact, they lived on opposite sides of the city and with the lockdown it wasn’t easy to meet up. They did it once, when Alice went over to Nadia’s place for a sleepover. It didn’t bother her back then, when they slept in the same bed or ate popcorn from the same bowl. Why did she get anxious about that hug now? “I see you’re keeping your pandemic habits”, Nadia chuckled. “Huh? Oh, yeah I guess.”. Alice had forgotten she wore her mask. She was so used to it; she didn’t even bother to take it off when she got off the bus. “Old habits die hard”, she mumbled as she took the mask off. “I get it, but it’s been two months without any sign of the virus, you don’t have to worry about it now.”            Alice genuinely enjoyed hearing Nadia spiraling about the trips she planned to do now that they could travel again. She even thought of planning a trip of her own. It would be nice to get back out there again. To see more than her town and especially her neighborhood’s parks. The auditorium was full of students for the big announcement. Some of them were sitting in the short stairs sideways of the seats, some on the small spaces in front of the big windows and some were standing up. Alice’s heart warmed up a little, seeing familiar faces around the room, even though she didn’t really know them. Nadia nudged her to get closer to the podium, but she noticed that students were sitting really near to each other there. “Nuh, you go ahead, I’m good here”, she said standing up behind the crowd. “Fine, I’ll go further alone anyways. I’ll be right back after, don’t leave!” Alice smiled at her short friend making her way to the front.            Finally, the dean appeared on the podium and addressed to the crowd. “Good morning our beloved students. It’s been a while since we’ve all been in here together and I’m very grateful, we finally get the chance to meet again in person. I know you’re all here for the announcement about your practice as a mandatory procedure to complete your studies and get your degree. I’m happy to announce that one hundred of you will get positions in institutions and clinics.” Whispers fill the auditorium immediately. “One hundred?” “Is he serious? Does he know we are six hundred that we’re waiting to get our degree?” “Great, with my luck, I’ll get a position in two years.” The dean tries to speak up from the voices. “Please, settle down. I’m aware that the number I’m giving to you, it’s not the number is should be. You should all be able to do your practice in the right semester. Unfortunately, even though the pandemic is over, the Health department is very cautious with the reintegration of their employees. They won’t risk putting more students in clinics and places where sick people could get sicker. For any other questions, please…”            She didn’t hear after that. She couldn’t before the only thing she heard were the blood in her ears, buzzing like crazy. She stormed out of the auditorium without waiting for Nadia. She texted her she had to leave and she went to the bus station. She put on her mask without even thinking or questioning that action of hers. On the way home, the only thing she could feel was frustration. How could they do that? She already lost a year because of this stupid pandemic and now she might lose another one. Her body felt numb and her violent thoughts tired her mind. But at least she was wearing her mask, so she was safe at the time being.            As soon as she returned to her house, June called her from her room. “What?” “Can you get me a glass of water?” “Dude, what the heck, I just came home, I’m tired. Go get it yourself!” “Come on! I won’t bring you anything the next time you ask me!”, June shouted as Alice made a way for her room. “Hey honey, how did it go?”, her mother stopped her in the hallway. “Awful, now for the love of God, everybody leave me alone, I don’t want to talk about it!”. And with these last words, she locked herself in her room.            After fifteen minutes of crying, one hour of staring at the wall and a long phone call with her best friend, Alice came out of her room. She went to the living room, where Gracie was sleeping happily on the couch and her mum was watching her series without someone annoying her. Alice made a sign to her mum to scootch over and she slid next to her, putting her head in her lap. “Do you want to talk about it now?”, Analise softly asked, as she caressed her daughter’s hair. “Not really. I’m just really tired of this situation.” “What situation?” “The pandemic.” “But the pandemic is over.” “It doesn’t feel like it…”


It was a cold and rainy night. You had been driving home from work after a long day at the office and you were looking forward to laying out on the couch and finishing your favorite series on Netulu Plus. As you were passing through an intersection, you were crushed by a Semi that ran the red. It was over in an instant. No pain, just darkness. Sudden darkness. That was when you met me. "Um... Hi? I'm confused. I thought I was driving..." You mutter, unable to grasp the idea of what had occurred only moments before. "You were. Now you're dead." I said assuredly, but with a kindness that you found unfitting for the statement. "Oh.. I. No actually, I don't understand." Your head spun taking in the information. "I can't be dead, I'm still.." You look down and find your body is not beneath you as it has always been, instead the blackness surrounded you entirely. You look back to me and examine me for a long time. I appear to you as more of a figure you vaguely know, than a god or devil. "If I'm dead, are you God?" I laughed a bit and nodded "You can call me that. Or anything else you'd like. I'm really not picky." I spoke, smiling at the apparition. "Walk with me." You both began to follow me, as we strolled through the void. "Where are we going?" you asked. "Nowhere in particular. It's just nice to walk while we talk." "I wrecked my car... My dad would kill me if I was still alive." You began, thinking back on your life and the people you left behind. "Good thing you aren't then! And don't worry. He won't blame you. The truck ran the red light." I reminded you. "My sister. My mom. What happens to my family now?" I smile wider. "I love that you are thinking of your family. Some people only think about how much money they didn't have the time to spend. Your family will be okay. They will grieve over their loss, but you will not need to worry. Your family will survive without you, until the day they too come to visit me." "Does that make you the grim reaper?" you asked, still trying to figure out my position in all of this. "The afterlife is not as convoluted as you thought back on earth, I promise. There is not a grim reaper. There is no Heaven or Hell." "So what IS there? What's next?" "You're home. There is nothing to worry about from now on. You are safe." I assured you. "Then... was any religion right?" "Well they all got a little bit of it right." I thought for a moment on the subject. "In a way, you will be reincarnated, in a way, you will go to heaven or Valhalla or whatever you call it, and in a way you will go to hell, because a part of you will suffer for the rest of eternity." "Wasn't I good? Why do I need to suffer?" You ask, beginning to fear the ideas being presented. "You were good to the people around you, but that does not mean you made no mistakes in life. Like I said, in a way you will be reincarnated. Let me explain; You and I are one." "That explains nothing..." "I next will send a piece of myself, as you are a piece of me, back into the world. Now that I have allowed your piece to grow and return, I can send more of myself back into the world. You will stay and your consciousness will merge with my own. You are, by your own words, a God." "So.. I am God... And I am someone else?" I chuckle. "You are everyone else. The earth is covered with life, and it all originates from me. Every blade of grass you trampled has a spirit. Every tree chopped down had a name. Every human on earth is a part of something bigger. And that something bigger is now you." "You mean my friend is me? and my coworker too? But they're so different..." "Are they really?" "Does that mean I was Jesus?" "Yup. and everyone who followed him." "I.. I was Hitler?" "And the millions he slew." "I see..." "Almost." I nod. "So, why then?" "Why is a very vague question, my friend." "Why are we alive? What is the point of it all? What is the answer to life, the universe and everything?" "42 of course!... I'm only kidding. The purpose is to allow yourself to grow."I paused, then with a wave of my hand the earth appeared, no larger than a standard globe. I gesture to the ball of green and blue. I made this whole earth to understand everything that you can about life, the ups and downs, the wrongs and rights." "Why bother? Why put ourselves through life after life of torture? Why would we subject ourselves to the pain of existence? You created the world then you should be able to shape it! Fix it! Make people nicer! This is so wrong!" Your anger bubbles to the surface and I can't help but laugh at your silliness. "It is wrong. There is so much wrong in the world you left and honestly, it will never be righted. Your world is broken and destroyed because I started this world without understanding why life is so beautiful. And because of that, I destroyed it human by human until it was polluted, rotten, and ready to crumble to sand. By the time that I understood what I was doing, it was too late. I can only see the world through the eyes of the dead. Such as yourself. You bring me back your experiences, your lifespan. You bring me your ideas and your ingenuity. You bring me the answers. I can only send one idea back into the world at a time, and often the best ideas are lost quickly to one of my less pleasant lives. I truly have destroyed the world. It's up to you to help me restore it." "How can I help restore anything? I'm staying here, I thought... Where is here, by the way?" "I told you. Here is home. And you will restore the world by rejoining it. I'm about to split you into fragments. Ideas that you have once held true. They will be returned to the earth. Your honesty, your kindness, your love of the world around you will all become new humans. Babes. They will ferment these ideas in their head until they are able to become adults and change the way the world spins, through simply interacting with one another. Life is all about the connections you make. Death is all about divisions." "I think I understand. So the reason it is torture for some, is because they lived a life that damaged another, and they now have the burden of knowing they damaged themselves..?" "As we said, Hitler lived every life that he ended." With this you thought long and hard. "And if I don't want to go back?" "It's only your ideas that go back. You are home and you will stay. Your life will forever be a short one, and you may well interact with yourself sooner rather than later in another life. I hope that you lived well and treated others with respect. I hope you can forgive yourself for driving through years worth of insects, splattering them across the windshield of your many many cars. I hope that you can forgive yourself for picking the flowers in your yard and watching them wither away in your house. I hope you can forgive yourself for it all." "How can I forgive myself for the hurt I never knew I inflicted?" "Because I forgive you. And I am the ones you hurt." I reached my arms towards you and you felt the warm embrace of a hug as you finally became one with me. Every emotion that any human had ever felt was emanating from you at once, but the only emotion that you could truly feel above the others, was love. "I forgive you.


I met Maryanne when the sun was still no more’n a shy, coppery flush in the distance. The Texas highway barrelled out before me like a cat stretching its limbs halfway through a midday snooze. “To the hospital,” said Maryanne. I turned up the air conditioner before putting the car in drive. “Y’all got an emergency?” “Just visiting an old friend.” I glanced at her. She had looked harmless enough. Even so: “Y’all oughta know I have ways of defending myself, should the need arise.” “Lucky you. You try to rough me up, I ain’t got anything to fight you with.” “Reckon you don’t got much to worry about, in that case.” Maryanne had red hair tied into a rough braid. Her features were angular and freckly, and she had keen blue eyes. “How old are you?” I asked. “Nobody needs to know. What’s your name? I done told you mine already.” I hesitated, although I wasn’t sure why. “They call me Justine.” I half-expected her to make a comment about how I’d evaded the question, but she only replied, “Where you headed, then?” “Dunno.” I hadn’t meant to sound terse, but I heard myself - and it came off as kind of bitchy. “Sorry, I just - I asked your age on account of I ain’t eighteen myself and I was wondering if you might be up the same shit river as me.” “Could be.” She stared out the window, gaze trained on the rolling fields that had always reminded me of worms as a child: don’t know the noggin from the ass. “Who you run away from?” My hands tightened on the steering wheel. “Oh, you know.” “Ma and pa?” “Well, they just - I mean, why provide them the time of day when they could give a damn whether their daughter lives or dies? Probably rather have me dead, if I’m being honest. In fact - ” I paused. “Well, they weren’t exactly above trying.” Maryanne considered. “Yeah, it might be that you done got yourself in as salty a pickle as I did. My folks, they don’t want no daughter of theirs kickin’ Jesus straight in the mouth. Done said that’s exactly what I did, takin’ a good girl to prom. Daughter of the mayor, she was. You know how them small towns are; everybody knows everyone else and if the mayor’s daughter turns out queer, it’s gotta be someone else’s fault. Ruinin’ our whole county’s reputation, they said. So I’ve gone off to find me a different county.” She flashed a smile. “What you say are the odds of snatchin’ me up another sweet peach who just happens to be town royalty?” I looked at her more closely. That smile wasn’t none too bright; I could see the stars in her eyes were cloudy with pollution. “Don’t reckon I could say,” I offered. She sat back. “So you, then, Justine - is that why you run away?” “Something like that.” “A girl?” A milk truck sped by. I waited for its rumbling to fade before I answered. “Yeah. Pretty thing she was, too.” “Prom, or something else?” I remembered Louellen’s bare shoulder against mine in the lake, cool and hot at the same time. I remembered Daddy kicking her in the face with them boots, and then teachin’ me - while she watched - exactly what it took to make a lustful sinner into a good girl. “Somethin’ else, I reckon,” I told Maryanne. There was silence for a while, and then she spoke up again. “I’m sixteen, in the interest of transparency. Seventeen in two weeks’ time.” Something about her finally telling the truth relaxed me. “I still got six months before my seventeenth.” “And y’all have yourself a car?” “Friend let me borrow it.” I could tell she knew that wasn’t true, but she let it slide. “So,” I asked, “Who you goin’ to see in the hospital?” “Like I said, old friend.” “What happened?” “Got sick, is all. Figured I might as well head on over to say my goodbyes so long’s I’m on the road.” I nodded. “I’m sorry.” “It’s all right. We all gotta go sometime. Maybe sooner’s better for some of us. She don’t pay death no mind; we always figured one of us’d go before age twenty.” “Still probably best not to, wouldn’t y’all say?” “Depends, don’t it?” “I guess.” I drove without speaking for a good five minutes or so. When I glanced over at her, I saw she was dozing off, and I marveled at the level of trust it must take to give into sleep when you’re out on route 130 with a stranger before the sun is all the way up. “What you gonna do after?” I asked finally. She blinked, all bleary-eyed like. “Huh?” “You gonna find somewhere to stay or y’all just gonna cross your fingers that everyone’s as nice as I am?” “Aw, hell, I don’t know. I’ll figure it out.” “Don’t want nobody hurtin’ you, is all. Figure you can drive out to LA with me, so long as you chip in for Doritos and coffee now and again. Me, I like to be alone, and that’s dangerous because sometimes I trick myself into thinkin’ it’s better to be alone all the time.” “Ain’t it?” “Naw. I start driving myself crazy. I get lonely, and then I hate myself for bein’ lonely, and then I hate myself for not having friends, and then I hate myself all the more for needin’ friends in the first place.” “I don’t need friends,” said Maryanne, “But I’ll travel with you a ways, if you wanna wait while I says goodbye to my friend.” “Sure thing.” Something came over me then, a warmth I can only describe as relief. See, that there meant I’d been lonely already, and hadn’t even realized it. Maryanne glanced at me, and when our eyes met we both smiled: she had been lonely too, or at least secretly afraid of the loneliness that had to come whether she believed in it or not. Some two hours later, I escorted Maryanne up to room 4019 in Saint Genevieve’s. Maryanne seemed nervous all of a sudden: I saw her sweat, though she hadn’t been damp at all in the Texas heat; and when she took my hand to enter her friend’s room, I didn’t argue none. There was one bed in the room. No light, smelling of antiseptic and a garish dime-store bouquet. The girl on the bed looked up at me, teeth shattered, both eyes blackened from a lusty fist. Don’t think she recognized me, but I sure as hell knew who she was, and Lordy knows why I wasn’t even one bit surprised. “Howdy, Louellen,” I said. “I done come to say my goodbyes.”


The guests were gathered outside the huts, the birds chirping happily and the air filled with merriment. It was as if I was experiencing an out of body adventure. I could feel everything happening around me, the ululations, the jovial laughter the dancing and the merriment. I’d watched a lot of movies where the hero who had died would watch as people fussed and cried over their bloodied body. I could see how they where there, but also not there. I felt exactly the same way. Everyone seemed to be jovial while my world was falling apart. The wedding, as per custom, took place at the groom’s home stead. I had been present, following behind as the bride, my sister Helen, left her traditional homestead early in the morning, with a blanket given by her mother. Her father had led the way to her future in laws’ home after Helen was told not to look back so as not to invite bad luck. Her father’s voice was loud and clear as it shouted out praises and called out clan names, telling his ancestors that his daughter was leaving the clan to join another.

Once she had arrived at the groom’s house, Helen had walked around his home to introduce herself to the ancestors before she had slipped in through the kitchen door with no one noticing her. The groom’s family then had to pay a penalty for not noticing her when they should have fetched her. The official ceremony where my sister, the only family I knew would be marrying my husband who I loved to death, would be happening at midday. When my mother ran off while I was seventeen, she left behind trust for me to complete my education and to take care of my sister who was seven at the time. We had always known that we had different fathers all together but Helen and I were still very close. We had to be, my mother had eloped and lost contact with her parents who would never let her marry a black man. She had been in love with my father since they were eighteen and it had taken bravery on her part, to leave her wealthy parents and move to South Africa where she lived an average life. Despite everything, they were happy. I was only four years old when my father died, but I had glimpses of him in my heart. He was handsome, loving, kind and everything I could have ever needed in a father. Everything that Gavin, Helen’s father and my mother’s second husband wasn’t. He left as soon as my mother was pregnant and my mother’s mental health deteriorated from there. I had been the one to take care of Helen since she was seven. I worked three jobs, got into a local college instead of an overseas one, passed up on any partying phase, put her through school and made her he center of my world. I gave up on my dream of being a travel nurse and settled on Accounting, a safe and stable job, so I wouldn’t be away from her. I even supported her choice to go into modelling instead of finishing school. The only thing I had that I ever had for myself was Kevin. And she took him as well. Kevin was the son of the owner of the Accounting firm I worked at. We had met a number of times at company functions before we finally talked. He was a defense lawyer by profession, and his parents’ pride and joy. He was also handsome, charming and everything I ever wanted. I fell in love with him in no time. His father, my boss, was rather fond of me and had always been happy when Kevin and I got together. His mother on the other and hated me, and especially when his dear son married me without her approval. My best friend Clara, reckons I went wrong when I let my twenty year old sister stay with my husband and I. She had always warned me. She had told me that Helen had changed ever since she reunited with her father and her step-mother. I was so blinded by my trust and love for Kevin that I could not see what was in front of me. I was so caught up with trying to give my husband the child he and his mother demanded that I did not realize that Helen and my mother in law had become the best of friends. At the back of my mind I could hear Clara begging me to leave the wedding with her, to stop torturing myself and divorce the man I loved more than anything and cut ties with the only family I had, but her words didn’t register. I was stuck staring at Kevin’s father, the one I thought had had my back, my biggest supporter, as he made a welcoming speech. A speech that welcomed his new daughter to the family. My eyes were still stuck on him when the exchange of gifts ensured. He in turn refused to meet my gaze. My gaze went to Helen next. Helen who silently sat on a grass-mat, eyes downcast as a sign of respect for her guests. I couldn’t help but think about how disrespectful she had been when she told me she had fulfilled my duty. She said I couldn’t give my husband a child  and she had done my job for me. She also made sure to announce how she and I would be sisters again when she married my husband in seven days. All the while she was naked in my bed, my husband silent and looking remorseful besides her. I hadn’t shed a tear then, I was still yet to. In the background of my wandering thoughts, I could hear the singing and dancing of all those who had received gifts. The groom was the last person to arrive. Kevin was still as handsome as the first time I saw him. I had never seen him in Zulu attire since I had gone for a white wedding, but he looked very regal and I found myself smiling besides myself. His six-foot-five frame, light features, stylish haircut and soft hands betrayed just how out of touch with his culture he was. He was still the most handsome man in the room to me though. it was at that moment, when Kevin arrived, that I re-entered my body. It became real and I grew aware of my surroundings. The bride got up, made a mock bed and went to look for her husband. When she found him, she placed a grass-mat leading to the bed, on the floor, before him. He was to sit on the bed. She then took a basin with water and soap and washed his feet before pulling back the covers of the make-shift bed and inviting the groom to sleep. As the dramatic end of the ceremony commenced where the female members of the bride’s family got sticks and started beating the groom while he got up and ran, It was then that I had an epiphany. I had been so invested in blaming Helen and Kevin’s mother for my pain that I had resolved to stay with Kevin. I had let him into my bed the previous night. Even though I felt empty and betrayed, I had let him off the hook because I was convinced he loved me and it was my fault he had to seek my sister’s bed for comfort. I had been willing to share my husband with my sister because I already loved her and had given up a lot for her already it wasn’t worth making a big deal of sharing one more thing with her. I was being too hard on myself because of fear of being alone and unloved.

But no more.

I had Clara. I had myself. I had friends who had begged me to leave Kevin because I was worth so much more. Family isn’t only by blood. I could choose my own family. And even though it would hurt, I would get over Kevin and Helen’s betrayal and start a new family of my own. I was barren and I could never have kids of my own. But that was okay, there were lots of orphans around the world. Orphans who needed someone to love them. Someone who would be loyal. Family is loyalty. I smiled to myself as I walked besides Clara, my very own family. My back was at Helen, and my heart would be next. She had betrayed me in the worst possible way and I was done.


I was once again floundering, faced with the dread of adulthood looming over my head. It started with the black pumps I had to buy at JC Penny’s. The smell of the grey carpet and vacant-like atmosphere reminded me of a long-lost childhood, memories I kept grasping for but could never seem to reach. Then it was the the blisters the pumps gave me and the bagginess of my eyes. My face suddenly seemed strikingly asymmetrical. If beauty was symmetry, I felt uglier than I’d ever felt in my life. I walked in the glass doors, wincing as my ankles were pinched by heels designed by men, then covered my collarbones because of rules written by men. I didn’t know myself anymore, working 9 to 5 and covering my collarbones with thick cloth like they were weapons of mass destruction. I didn't recognize the dullness of my hair and the stiffness of my arms as they reached for the receiver one more time. Every day was just another call to an insurance agency and another 8 hours in a room without windows. “Flora, darlin’ are you hard of hearing?” Blaire was my co-worker, a vivacious blonde who wore floral patterns so bright I could have sworn her day job was directing traffic. She had her hands on my desk and a smirk on her face. “Sorry, Blaire, I was just thinking.”

“Thinking about someone special?” Blaire teased me, grabbing a section of my hair and twirling it. She sat on the corner of my desk. Did I forget to mention she also had no concept of personal space? “Didn’t you have something to tell me?” I changed the subject. “Oh, do I ever.” She stood up and began to pace around the room, coming to a sudden stop and pointing her finger at me. “You know, I always thought that Bradley Redding was cheating on his wife with that redhead nurse from pediatrics. And today, I caught them in the autopsy room together.” “The autopsy room?” I couldn't get past their location of choice for committing adultery. “Isn't that where dead people are?” Brooklyn peeked her head around the corner just then. “Sure is.” “You know about this too?” “Oh, honey, everyone knows.” Blaire was laughing. “I swear, your barista put something in that coffee in the morning.” Blaire was marrying the love of her life that weekend in Destin, Florida, which meant I had to drop a couple thousand dollars on travel expenses and gifts for the lovely bride. It also meant I had to tolerate her insufferable maid of honor, Andrea Skinner, who just loved violating the codes of AA and telling others that she and I attended classes together at one point. It didn’t matter through— I’d been through AA, and I wasn’t sure I bought the standard definition of an “alcoholic.” If I was an alcoholic, then mostly everyone was, so what did it matter anyway? Blaire was laughing as she watched me trip over the last step on my way out. 	“Don’t tell me you’ve gotten into the liquor again.” I wanted to tell her to shove it, but something deep inside myself made me fear what would happen. The heat lightning on the horizon was particularly daunting today, but the air was crisp and cool. Paradoxical October made me fear my own shadow once again.

*** The red wine stains wouldn't come out of the cream-colored bridesmaid gown, no matter how much Downy I poured on it. I’d gone through 4 Tide Sticks, 3 cycles in the wash, and scrubbed the material raw. Despite my external display of tranquility, I was terrified that Blaire was going to rip me apart with her abnormally large hands.

“Oh. My. God. You alcoholic.” Blaire grabbed the skirt of my gown and rubbed the stain furiously. The wine glass in my hand suddenly felt much heavier, and my wrist was shaking a little. “Blaire, please—“ “And now you’re about to do it again.” She threw her hands up. “Honestly, I don’t know what to say, Flora. We’ll just have to work around you in the pictures.” Blaire maneuvered me around the whole afternoon, hiding the war scene on the front of my dress behind Rachel’s butt, Ainsley’s hand, and Mary Linley’s bouquet. Meanwhile, having taken Blaire’s remark about alcoholism quite personally, I had spent the time leading up to the photo shoot rather ironically indulging in more red wine than I probably should have. I knew my face must have been flushed, but nothing speaks louder than the glare of neon bathroom lights. My cheeks were red and blotchy, my eyeliner was more spider-like than I’d remembered, and my hair was matted on the side. I did a mock toast to the mirror and headed for the door. At least I looked honest. I ran smack into Andrea Skinner. “That mock-tail looks so convincing,” Andrea said, eyes wide. “If I didn't know better, I’d say it was real. Congrats on—what is it, 9 months sober?” Her beady brown eyes looked yellow in the sun, and they were scanning my body for lie detection like a New York City subway pigeon searching for scraps. Except subway pigeons were cuter. And friendlier.

“Yeah, it’s amazing. Want a sip?” I lied, an unsettling feeling rising within me. “Wow, Day,” Andrea said, “I honestly didn't think you could do it. You always seemed like you had no self-control. But congrats.”

She grabbed the cup from me before I could change my mind and took a big gulp. To my surprise, she did not taste the alcohol—how was it possible? Andrea’s yellow eyes widened, and I prepared to run. “This is so yummy! Mind if I take this one? The first dance is happening and I can’t miss it for the world.” She scurried back over to the table she was assigned, and I willed myself to feel guilty for what had just happened. But why didn't I? Usually when you think you can't beat yourself up anymore, someone else does it for you, either figuratively or literally. And if someone has a chance to make a speech in front of a crowd, make sure you haven’t done that person wrong. Or, at least, don’t be present when they do it.

“Andrea Skinner, maid of honor, and endlessly proud of Blaire Woods for her dedication to Kendrick Osborne. Now, I’m gonna get real with ya’ll for a second. Blaire has helped me through some rough times. When I was going through AA, I was terrified. I was terrified that I wasn’t going to make it through, terrified to go in public places and have to explain why I wasn’t drinking….” Typical , I thought to myself, maid of honor makes speech about herself and her feelings on the bride’s big day. “… so that’s why I’m utterly disgusted that Flora Day poisoned me today by giving me an alcoholic beverage.” I suddenly became more aware of my surroundings. Everyone turned to stare at me.

“Um,” I squeaked. “I think you have me confused with someone else.” Meanwhile, Blaire was enraged. Her forehead vein looked like it was about to pop out and come punch me in the mouth. She ran up to the podium and grabbed the microphone from Andrea, who grabbed it right back. And all the while, I just felt myself become smaller and smaller, the audience studying me like tissue on a microscope, babies and children alike. I was frozen. Andrea’s mouth kept moving, but all I could do was stare at the way all of the ceiling fans moved in unison in their neat circles, wishing I could be half as consistent.


I had been lying in bed for a while, watching the sun rise and shine through the window, reflecting off of the face of my wife. She had always been so bright and cheerful, the definition of a sunny attitude. I slipped out of bed, slid into some casual clothes I had left on the floor and slinked out of the apartment. It was a warm spring morning. April the fifth, the day of our wedding anniversary. Our first wedding anniversary. I was going to make sure it was a very special one. I walked down to the corner store and popped in. I ordered a coffee and a ham and cheese panini. On ciabatta of course. It was her favorite breakfast, after all. Simple and easy, as things should have been. Down to the bus stop I went, munching on breakfast. Dan was there, a neighbor three doors down from our apartment. He was looking at me like he was trying to figure out what to say, then decided not to say anything at all. “Morning, Dan,” I said to him, after gulping down the last mouthful. “How’re you, today?” Dan asked, not looking at me. “I’m alright,” I replied. “Got a lot of shopping to do today. You?” “Same, the wife sent me out with a honey-do list,” Dan said, letting his sentence trail off. I snickered, ”I know how that can be.” The bus pulled up, people shuffled off and on. I saw Dan take the first empty seat, right between a sleepy teenager and stern looking old man. I walked to the back and took an empty bench to myself. The bus trundled off down the street. Looking out the window I saw people bustling about in that big city way. We had moved here six months ago, and I still wasn’t quite used to all the commotion. The constant sounds, the way people look past one another, destination being the total focus. As I watched I looked for the journey people. The ones who relished in the now. It was usually couples. There was a pair, I saw, across the street. They were having breakfast. Sitting at a small table in front of a cafe. She was talking animatedly, all smiles and glowing. He was just nodding, smiling and caressing one of her hands in both of his. Further down the street was an older couple. I often wondered if an elder had reached their destination, how long ago that was, or how much further they had to go. It was refreshing though, seeing the older couple. Sitting on a park bench, watching the world go by and just enjoying each other’s company. It was the simple things. The bus stopped in shopping district. I got up and made my way to the front. “Take care of yourself, okay?” Dan said to me as I passed by. I gave him a smile and thanked him before I walked into the street. Other people jostled past me as I turned right and headed for the book store. It was a small store. The front half was dedicated to merchandise, the only thing keeping the store open. It had dingy yellow lighting, a maze of old wooden bookshelves and a musty smell. I loved it, almost as much as my wife. It was almost lunch time, but I wasn’t feeling very hungry. I wandered off into the maze and got lost in the titles. Here were the political thrillers. There were the biographies. I ran my hand across a shelf of children’s books as I walked past. I wondered about a child of my own, what they might be like. I turned a corner into the science fiction section. There was a cleared space where another shelf would have been. Instead it was inhabited by plush reading chairs and a small coffee table. A small, secret place. Squirreled away from the bustling world outside. My wife often came here when the waters would get too rough, and needed a place away from the sea of people outside. For a while, I let myself get lost in the pages. Thumbing through this. Glancing at a synopsis of that. Sitting, then wandering, then sitting again. Eventually I found a nice dystopian thriller. My wife loved that particular author as well. She would go on about how he waxed philosophically, using the narratives as creative illustration. I was just happy reading something with action and well described food. She never let me live that one down, always poking fun at my weird tastes. I bought the book, paying extra to have the cheery cashier gift wrap it. “She just loves these kinds of thrillers doesn’t she?” I vaguely recognized the girl. Usually I just passed her by, heading for the next destination with my wife. “She sure does,” I replied to her. “Well, tell her I’ve missed seeing her. It’s been a while since she popped in.” I smiled, “sure. I’ll do that for you.” After leaving, I walked back down to the bus stop. It was a short wait for another long ride. On the way, I people watched some more. School must have been out for the day. I saw a teenage couple, all yammering, stammering and full of awkward. It was cute. You could tell they had recently started their journey together. Their only destination being in the other’s eyes. I hopped off the bus at the next stop and started the next long walk of my own journey. Half way there I stopped by another corner store. I bought the biggest, most garish bouquet of roses they had. I resumed my walk. The sun was getting low in the sky as I crossed the street. Passing through a large wrought iron gate, I made my way down a grassy lane. There was a large oak tree with a bench underneath it. I sat down, set the gifts aside, held my face in my hands and felt the tears begin streaming. It was a quiet heaving and sobbing. Once I gathered myself together, I wiped my nose and looked up at my wife’s headstone. I got up and walked over to it. I knelt in the grass and placed the book up against the stone. Someone had emptied the vase I had left there, so I filled it with the bouquet. I laid a hand on the ground I knew her to be under. “Happy anniversary,” my throat seized up. “The girl at the bookstore misses you,” I choked out. “I saw Dan today, he seems to be doing well,” I mumbled, watching a tear, then another roll down my nose to patter on the grass. I thought back to six months ago, when we first moved to the city. Neither of us wanted to live in this place, but it was the closest medical center that was capable of treating her cancer. The treatment was supposed to be simple, but there were complications. In the end, she had lived two months longer than expected. I remembered trying to enjoy every single moment I had with her. Even bald and emaciated, her smile shone bright through my memory. My ray of sunshine. I don’t know how long I sat there. My legs ached and I thought my heart would give out. It had long since grown dark, and cold. Both in the world, and in my mind. Hunger began knocking at my door. I stood up and breathed deep. I looked out across the small lake in the cemetery. The moon was a pale reflection dancing on the water. I thought back to the picture of my wife on my night stand. A pale reflection of the sunny smile I’ll always remember.


"I will go and have a look in the field. I think I had forgot to remove the stone," Sarpanch says. "Now, it is raining heavily. The lightining is occuring. Let it be," his wife says as the lightning strikes. "The crops will be of no use till morning. I will come back in a hour." Sarpanch reach his field. The big rock was blocking the way of water. He rush toward it. The weight was too heavy for his age. He try one more time. The rock landed on his feet. He cries, the blood from his feet make the water blood red. He fell into the field, his clothes fully drenched. A lightining occurs. "Aren't you going to scream," a female voice says from behind. "You know, it doesn't count if you are already planning your defeat," she says as she remove his eyeballs by pressing it. ************************ "What are you doing?" Shiva says as he pull the clothes from the bag. "Can't you see. I am leaving. I am going back to my home," Rekha shouts throwing her clothes in the bag. Shiva pulls her by her elbow. "This is our home," he says to end the conversation. Rekha jerks her hand away from his clutches. She doesn't stop the packing. "Where will you go? What will you do? Why can't you understand?" "I am not feeling good here. There is so many restriction. I have to live in those dirty hut during my periods. And the household work, it never ends." "It is just a matter of few weeks. We will go back, once I get money from them," Shiva says. "You are saying it from past one month. You know how much difficulty I am facing?" Rekha says. "Shiva, the sarpanch," his mother says as she catches her breaths. "What?" "He is dead. In the field," she says. *************** "I told him. I told him to not go in the field. Oh god!," the sarpanch wife cries as the people take his body away for funeral. "Whose evil eyes has landed on our village?" she continues patting her chest with her hands. "First Makhanlal and now him. Within a month there has been two death," she says, Shiva mother tries to soothe her. But she pushes her hand back. "It is coming. Next will be your husband," she says glaring right into her eyes. Shiva mother put her hand on her mouth. "No, no. It is not true," she cries storming out from her house. Rekha rush behind her. "Mother, mother stop. It is not good for your health," Rekha says as she was huffing for air. "It can't be true," shiva mother says as she cłoses her door. "Mother, mother open the door," Shiva says. "Why you pay your heads to such nonsense?" Shiva's father Sukhi says. "She is in pain. She just said it. She is no god." Sukhi says. The door open Shiva's mother eye was puffed. She glares Sukhi. Sukhi pulls her inside the room. "Your mother need some rest, my children. No need to worry," he says looking Rekha and Shiva. They both moves away from there. "What is all this?" Rekha asks as they come down. "Just old rivalry I think. She just say it, she knows my mother is bit sensitive in all these things," he says. "It seems there is something, more than rivalry," Rekha says. ********************* "She is right. It is coming," Shiva's mother says as she sits in front of the God photo. "What is this behaviour? What will our children think?" Sukhi says. "I don't care what they think. Just tell me what happened that day?" Shiva's mother asks clutching his kurta. "Nothing. How many times should I tell you," Sukhi says. "You can't fool me. There was blood on your kurta that day," Shiva's mother shouts. "Lower your voice. Oh god, somebody will hear it," he says closing the windows. "There was nothing. It was 15 years ago. He dies because lightning strike him," he says. "Lightning," Shiva's mother repeats. "Didn't you see his eyes? They were plucked out. His body was purple as if someone has suffocated him." "Whether you believe or not. My heart says it is because of that day only. God is punishing us," she says. ********************* "Where is the tea? Is anybody there?" Sukhi says as he take a seat in the lawn area. "Here," Rekha says as she handed a glass of tea. "Shiva and mother has gone to temple. They will come back soon." "Why didn't you also go with them? This is your first time in the village. You should also go," he says taking a sip of tea. "I am not a religious person. I don't believe in all these things," she replies. Sukhi chuckles, "Obviously, city people are modern. They didn't believe in gods and superstition." "Where is your village? I know you two got married in secret. Even we were unable to attend it," Sukhi says. "I..I belongs from Hansi," she says. The glass fell from Sukhi's hand. "What happens? Do you know about the village? It is near only," Rekha says picking up the glass, the tea spills in the rock marble. "Um.. yes yes. I know about it. I think I am tired I may rest now," he says walking toward his room. "Hansi. You should remember my village. Don't you?" Rekha says, Sukhi pause midway. Sweats forms on his forehead. "There is one popular story in my village. It is of 15 years ago. Two girls came to this village. They were young and beautiful," Rekha says and pause. Sukhi was shivering in his place. He didn't even have energy to move around or walk, as if his feet were stuck to the floor. "There were three men in the field. Drunk. They see the girls. One of them holds their hand, one see everything and one do dirty things. They fulfill their desire, one after other. And when they were done. Do you know what they did?" Rekha asks. "They threw a large piece of rock. To crush their skulls. Luckily, one girl was not dead," she says. Rekha pick up a large stone from the lawn. Sukhi couldn't move from his place. As if some energy is holding him there. He can sees his death right in front of his eyes. "Let me go, please," he cries as Rekha stand in front of him. "That's how we pleaded back then," Rekha says as he break his skull with the large rock. Blood splash on her face, as she disfigures his face.


Waking up I felt odd. It was dark. *It must still be night.* I feel light-headed and nauseous. *Maybe a glass of water will help. Wait a minute. Why can't I move? It feels impossible. I don't understand...* Suddenly a voice started talking somewhere near me. It's close but I can't figure out what it's saying. *Why can't I hear what it is saying?* It feels really close, right next to me, almost on my shoulder. Wait. There is something on my shoulder. Something touching me. *What is it? Why can't I take a look?* There is another voice now, somewhere in the room I'm guessing. I can't feel my body. *What is happening to me?* The voices are clearer now. I can make out some of the words. "... small chance... terribly sorry... can't do..." *What are they talking about. And who are they? I'm so confused. I don't understand.* I feel very tired. I don't know why, I mean I just woke up. I struggle to stay awake but it's too difficult to fight it. I fall back asleep. \_\_\_ I woke up again. My mind feels clearer than it did before. However my body feels numb. I still can't move a muscle. It feels super weird. It can't possibly still be dark so why can't I see? I can hear clearer than yesterday, so at least that's something. I still don't understand what's going on. Wait. Someone is talking again. A woman. "Don't worry, everything will be okay. It's going to work out." That voice sounds familiar but I can't place it. *Wait. Are they crying? Why? What's going on?!* "We should go talk to the doctor now." That's a different voice. "Don't you think we should wait? Give him a chance? Maybe he will get better. Maybe..." "You know what they said, dear. There's no chance for him to get through this. We need to take action." "He'll make it, he just needs a little more time. If we could just wait for a bit..." "It doesn't matter how long we wait, love. He's not here anymore. He's... not himself." *Wait what? Are they talking about me?* "Come on. Let's talk to the doctor now." I can hear their footsteps fading away. *Who are those people? And why are they talking about me like I'm not even here?! Why can't I remember anything?! Not a single thing! I don't know where I am or why or what is going on. I don't remember anything from before this.* I can feel the panic taking over my body and there's nothing I can do. I can just lay here. Wherever here is. Eventually I calm down but the panic attack had exhausted me and so I fall asleep yet again. \_\_\_ I wake up hearing multiple voices. They are talking quietly so I can't make out what they're saying. I can hear that the woman from before is crying again. I would like to know what upsets her so. And why is it that I can hear her. I'm getting used to not moving. It is how things are for me now I suppose. It's quiet. They're not talking anymore but I can sense they're still present. Suddenly I feel nauseous and a fatigue takes over me. I have an urge to fall asleep but I just woke up. *What is happening to me?* This time the urge to sleep is overwhelming and it feels different. It's almost comforting. *What could happen if I drift to sleep one more time, right?* And so I do. I let go. I let the darkness consume me.


It was my first time hosting the annual Halloween seance and I really wanted to impress my coven.

I gathered all the supplies I needed. My book of spells, hexes, and Incantations, passed down through at least the last few generations of Easton women, the bullfrog, and my ceremonial sacrificial knife.

We were proud of our traditional inheritance and were active in the activities of our community of like-minded witches.

The practice nowadays was little more than entertainment. A reason to gather. Much like watching a scary movie, we take part mostly to get a thrill out of it. The scare rush. The sensation that we are alive. Our seances could possibly be misidentified as nothing more than a simple book club for housewives and their daughters, meeting for tea and dessert, discussing how prejudice Elizabeth was or prideful Mr. Darcy was, or vice versa. Did anyone really know? This, however, wasn’t just a book club. The hour had come and I hoped I was ready.

I powered up my computer and opened the link to the scheduled zoom meeting. I positioned the computer so that I was dead center of the screen and the dim lighting of the circle of candles I lit accentuated all the right features of my face.

I’m not usually interested in my own vanity, but when you’ve got a date with the Devil himself, you’ve got to look your best. Not that any of us actually expected him to show up, it’s the idea that he might, that really got the blood pumping.

Most seances we settle for a few flickering lights, ill-timed gusts of wind blowing our candles out, or the ominous knocking on the upstairs floor that in no way could have possibly been the household pets playfully knocking something down out of sheer boredom.

As I waited for the other members of my coven to join the zoom meeting, I watched through my window as the sunset. I listened as I heard the children of the night set out on their candy seeking quests, faintly hearing them scrape the bottom of the bowl I left out front. One by one they popped up in the waiting room with a musical ‘ding, ding’ , and I let them in. First, it was Gwen, who was always first to any event, sometimes to the point of being obnoxiously punctual. Then, as if rehearsed, in quick succession Darla, Eden, Marcie, and Josephine entered first the waiting room ‘ Ding, ding; ding, ding; Ding, ding’ , and then the meeting room. I watched as they connected and their faces populated a small square on my computer screen. Each of the squares they inhabited glowed with the flickering light of candles--a staple of each of our meetings. Darla waved eagerly at her computer, while Marcie adjusted her hood over and over again, trying to cast just the right amount of shadow on her face; Eden picked something from her teeth and Josephine talked with someone off-screen, behind her webcam.

I took a deep breath and called the meeting to order right as the digital clock turned to 7:06, our long observed starting time.

“Good evening, witches of the Leven Coven,” I said hoarsely, trying to inconspicuously clear my throat. “It is in his name we gather. His power we live, and his strength we continue.”

This would mark the first seance conducted via zoom. I was nervous and was extra careful when I pulled out the bullfrog from my sack, making sure not to let it go and scamper free--that would make for a terrible hosting and would no doubt mark me for scorn and ridicule for years to come.

“Take this, our offering of sacrifice,” I say as I guide a blade from the bullfrog’s chin to between its hind legs. I set the knife aside, tip the frog over a small, mortar bowl, and let the blood drain.

The group all unmute and say in unison, “Bless this offering. We offer it to thee.” At which point I, along with the rest of the coven, turn our blades on ourselves, and make a small cut on our palm. This would make the fifth cut on my left palm, finishing my first pentagram. I was now halfway through my journey to becoming a full-fledged witch in the eyes of my Coven. A title, mostly for title’s sake.

I watched and waited for signs that the rest of the ladies were done offering their blood sacrifice for the seance. Once it was apparent, I dipped my finger into the mixture of my blood and the bullfrog’s, and I traced the lines of the inverted cross onto my forehead. This next part was discussed and debated extensively. We reasoned exactly how it would work out and, being left with not many options, we settled on what seemed at the time to be the best choice we had.

After my forehead was marked, the ladies of the coven all leaned their heads forward, and I traced the same symbol on each of their digital heads, leaving red smears on my computer screen.

“Join hands, sisters,” I said in the best solemn voice I could muster. Each of the ladies wrapped their arms around their webcams and presumably held their hands together if they were following the guidelines they had laid out when they convened to discuss their plans for conducting this evening's seance.

The way we saw it if we were in spirit creating circles that were connected via the zoom meeting, like each of our enclosed circles were links in a chain, that we could simulate what was necessary to successfully complete the ritual practices needed to complete the incantation.

All of this was speculation upon speculation of course. I opened my book and turned to the dog eared page near the back. The incantation spell to summon the devil himself. This incantation was reserved for the annual seance and never even spoken of any other time--no exceptions. Those were the rules and no one ever questioned them.

I began to recite the lines of text that were nearly memorized by heart at this time, but I still read them from the book because I didn’t want to leave anything up to chance. Each line was spoken back to me by the women of the zoom meeting. Soft, dull-edged voices poured out of the speakers, slightly off in timing but close enough as to not break the ambiance.

As I continued to speak the text, the candle flames began to flicker.

The blinds in my living room waved to a breeze, seemingly conjured from another realm. The air filled with smells that just moments ago were nonexistent. The battery life on my computer dropped from 78% to 66% in an instant, then flickered back and forth from 6% to 66%.

Goosebumps flooded over the surface of my skin.

I read the next line.

The ladies spoke it back; Gwen’s voice loud and obnoxious, crowded out the others.

I continued.

They repeated.

The flames on the candles grew three times their normal size and I was ecstatic. I reached the last line. Paused for a moment, took a deep breath, closed my eyes, and spoke them from the heart.

The ladies repeated.

‘ding, ding.’ I held my gaze on the backside of my eyelids, afraid to open them and see nothing. Afraid to open them and see… Hovering in the center of my screen was a message that read, “The Real Satan Himself is in your waiting room.” “What?” Darla asked. “What happened?” “Yeah,” Marcie added, pulling her hood back a bit, revealing her soft features. “Did it work?” “I, um…” I debated whether to share or not. Part of me thought that this must have been some sort of joke. A prank on her, maybe. Who was it that Josephine was talking to right before the meeting started? Maybe it was them. I scan Josephine’s face. She’s staring into the webcam, her eyes move back and forth in anticipation of my response--no sign of her knowing what was happening.

“Seriously,” Eden said, “what’s going on, Grace? What’s happening? Talk to us.” “What do you see?” Gwen added.

“It’s, him.” I said, hovering my mouse’s cursor over the ‘admit button’. “What?” “You’re joking?” “No way. What are you waiting for?” Darla asked. “Let him in.” What have you gotten yourself into, Grace? “What are you waiting for?” Marcie pressed. “You don’t want to keep him waiting, do you?” I swallowed hard and clicked ‘ admit’. then waited.

A new zoom window popped up. Muted with no video.

A long, drawn-out exasperation, “ whaaaaaaaaat… ” came from Eden.

We all starred in frightful anticipation. A part of my reasonable brain held onto the idea that this was all just a prank. We would soon see that this was not in fact--” “ Satan !” Marcie screeched, as the video feed connected the new zoom member.

“No way,” Gwen exclaimed, sliding her hand over her mouth.

The nameplate on the video reads, ‘The Real Satan Himself’, and held a dark figure, undefined in the darkness that swirled and flurried within the video stream. Then the face of the figure came into view, slowly at first, as if candles were being moved closer and closer. A mouth could now be seen moving. Words spoken, but not heard.

Marcie unmuted herself, said “Satan? excuse me, Satan?’ Satan’s mouth stopped moving.

Marcie continued, “Um, you’re on mute.” Satan leaned over, looking over the device he was using. A few seconds passed and Satan again began to talk. Moving mouth, but no sound.

“Uh, Satan.”Marcie interrupted his silent monologue, she held her hand up as if raising it in class. “Yeah, um... You’re still muted.” Anger flushed over Satan’s face, twisting it in a tormented, wrinkled mess. He bent over the device, searching for a way to unmute himself.

“It should be somewhere in the bottom left corner of your screen?” Eden instructed. “There should be a microphone icon? Do you see it?” Satan’s face tilted and bobbed until it appeared he saw what Eden was talking about. He nodded, then looked into the webcam awaiting further instruction from Eden.

Marcie giggled and Satan’s head twisted to the side in a quick jerking motion. Marcie’s head followed the same motion, except it spun much further and her body collapsed down into the camera. The soft glow of the candlelight filtered through her hair that laid in front of her webcam.

A shockwave of horror washed over me, my chest filled with hot coals. Darla screamed.

“Oh my God!” someone yelled.

The mute symbol on Satan’s rectangle disappeared and he said, “Gre--” I slammed my laptop shut. My breaths raced in and out of my lungs. I stayed, glued to the ground. Unable to move, speak, do anything.

“What have you done, Grace?” I whispered to myself. Then, as if being blown out one by one, the candle’s flames went out. One after the other, until there was only one left casting out its weak light in a desperate attempt to illuminate its surroundings.

A reply rose up and out from the depths of the unknown that was now her living room, “You’ve Invited me in.” and with that, the last candle blew out.


(IP) Risk They had begged her not to go, had said that it was too dangerous. If she’d said she wasn’t afraid, she would’ve been lying. But their tiny mountain town needed to be saved, and there was no other way. She’d packed food and clothing for the journey, as well as her staff and her massive phoenix. Her parents, especially, had been against it. After all, she was their only child, and the only daughter in their family lucky enough to inherit magic. But she had to do something. The plague had slowly overtaken the village, and more than one person she’d grown up with had been buried. “We’re nearly there,” She said to the phoenix, her hand rooted in its feathers. The warmth emanating from it soothed her, but she knew she couldn’t stand on this mountain top for long. Throwing her bag over her shoulder, she climbed onto the bird, and they took to the sky. She was haunted by how many people had died, their skin speckled with sickly green spots, their eyes wide and bloodshot. All she had to do was find the temple, and steal the sacred herbs within. It might have meant offending a goddess, but she couldn’t let anyone else die. The world blurred into a blue-white landscape of snow and ice, and Kiara tucked her fur cloak more tightly around her. She directed Mara down to a dip in the mountains, an ice-encrusted valley. They kept close together as they walked toward the temple; Kiara’s heart raced inside of her chest like a galloping horse, and the wind roared cruelly in her ears. The temple was made of quartz and lapis, and they hurried inside. They found the temple dark and cold, with a faint scent of incense. Reluctantly, she had Mara stay outside; she was simply too big to fit within the building. Kiara waited until her eyes adjusted to walk inside; she walked down the nave of the temple, the skin on the back of her neck crawling. She couldn’t shake the feeling that she was being watched. She spun around, her eyes searching. “Who’s there?” There was no answer. A statue loomed at the front of the room, formed entirely of lapis. It was of the goddess of healing, hair flowing outward as if teased by the wind. She wore a benevolent smile, and inside the basket in her hands, were bundles of herbs. The exact herb that her people needed to survive. Quickly, she walked up the nave to the statue, stuffing the herbs in her bag. Even if she was cursed or struck with something, she would risk it, for her people. “And what, exactly, do you think you’re doing?” A voice said behind her, and she had to bite back a shriek of terror. When she turned around, she saw an ordinary young woman, but her eyes were glowing blue.


I was there when my parents told her. I watched them sit my sister down in the lounge room; I was peering around the wall. I already knew. There must have been some expression on their faces as they sat in a moment’s silence. Because she knew. She was only 10, but she knew. The silence turned into a minute, a time during which I saw many expressions: confusion, worry, disbelief, sorrow, and pain. All in silence. Because she knew. “Pogo,” Dad finally said, and, before he spoke another word, I watched her eyes widen and glisten with tears waiting to waterfall down those smooth cheeks. “He’s been in an accident.” That was all that needed to be said, the key to open the floodgates behind the shiny, blue eyes. Because she knew. *She’d gotten Pogo as a puppy, only three years beforehand. A birthday gift, a basket and a bow tie and a ribbon. Sure, it was clichéd, but she didn’t care. Neither did Pogo, the bouncing bundle of fluff, who on seeing his new companion had leapt clean out of the wicker and showered her with licks. I had been there too; I had seen the eyes widen with happiness, not sorrow; I had seen the cheeks grow red with excitement, not pain; I had seen bright smiles, not quivering lips. He was hers and she was his. He knew that. She knew that.* Mum got up and sat next to her, arm gently around her shoulder, drawing her in tight. Dad did the talking; Mum was comfort. “Is he going to be alright?” The words were slow spoken and shaking, because in only that short time, her mind had put everything together. They would have been happier if Pogo was going to be alright; they would not have made such a big deal about it all. She’d be with Pogo right now if all would be fine, stroking his fur, and whispering comfort into those floppy ears. They would have been at the vet. But they weren’t. She wasn’t. She knew. “I’m sorry, darling,” said Dad, as Mum squeezed just that little bit tighter. “What happened?” She didn’t really want to know. “There was a car.” She stood up quickly, letting out a gasp and a squeak of shock. I reeled back from the corner as she approached, running to her room. She passed me, and in the second’s eye contact I felt her burn. I had been listening in, watching. She knew. And her heart, I feel, broke that little bit more. I wasn’t there for her. But I’m not good at comfort, at caring, knowing what to do or say, or even whether to do or say anything at all. Mum does that. Mum and Dad. I looked around the corner again. Dad had joined Mum on the lounge. He had her in his arms. “She’ll be alright.” **I remember it all, running through my mind as I stand in front of her door. Do I knock? Do I open it? Do I walk away? I am lost in the moment, sent back, reliving the same feelings, the feelings that sunk into my heart as she walked past. The torture of the past. I hadn’t known what to do then. How could I know now? And so I stand in front of that door, silent and still, wanting to enter and wanting to run. She didn’t know. I had to tell her.** I followed her to her room. I was in the hallway when I heard the door slam shut, followed by the creaking metal of the old bed springs and the muffled scream into the pillow. Again. Again. I stood in front of the door. Over time the screams stopped, replaced by perhaps a more heart wrenching sound: sobbing. I reached forward with my hand, placing it onto the cold metal handle. It squeaked as I pushed down. “Go away!” I turn and leave. She didn’t need me. **She needs me now. She needs me and she doesn’t know it, doesn’t know why. I have to tell her. So many years have come and gone, but right now the memory is as clear as if it happened yesterday. The house has changed and the years have changed us, but it’s still the same. It’s still me standing at her door, wanting to run. But I have to stay.** **The handle doesn’t squeak; she doesn’t notice me until the door is wide open. She’s lying on her bed, laptop flipped up, studying ever so hard, writing her thesis. She looks at me.** **The demon returns, that dreadful silence. I stand there. She opens her mouth to speak but then she stops and her lips close softly. She has seen that look before, the look I do not know I am wearing. I guess it must always be the same look, no matter who gives it. The laptop closes and she sits up, turning on the side of the bed. Our eyes haven’t broken.** **Then it’s my turn to relive the past, as her still-smooth face goes through the very same list from all those years ago: confusion, worry, disbelief, sorrow, and pain. All in silence. Because she knows. Somehow she knows.** **I open my mouth to speak. I wish I did not have to. I wish that Dad and Mum were here to do it, here to say what has to be said. I do not want to be the one to open those floodgates, release the shimmering stream from those deeper, blue eyes. But I have to be.** **Dad’s not here anymore, and never again will Mum hold her close.** **So I do.


(Content warning: pregnancy loss) The first time you have a miscarriage, your loved ones might send you flowers. You might get a beautiful tree to plant from a loved one who has found peace in her own grief. Someone will send a box of chocolates - the finest ones they could find - with a note that says, “Sending love. Hope this helps.” It doesn’t, but you appreciate the gesture. You’ll take a week off work to grieve. You’ll watch movies without really seeing them, you’ll cry until your face is raw, and you’ll eat every chocolate in that box. Even the ones you hate. Nothing tastes the same anyway. A few times you’ll laugh but you’ll feel guilty about that, which will make you cry again. One night the insomnia will be impossible to overcome, and you’ll give up trying to sleep, opting instead to scrub your kitchen from top to bottom at three in the morning. You’ll need a surgery. Your doctor will solemnly tell you that there was a one in four chance of this happening, but he offers some reassurance that there’s only a one in a hundred chance of it happening again. You’re comforted by this statistic. The second time you have a miscarriage, it’ll be a little quieter. You weren’t able to get pregnant on your own this time, so this was an IVF pregnancy. You thought for sure the medications and the testing and the monitoring would make a difference. You’ll get a few kind texts: “I’m so sorry.” “I’m here if you need to talk.” “Can I do anything?” You’ll also get a few that mean well, but still sting: “At least you know you can get pregnant.” “At least you’ve been through it before.” “You knew it could happen, so maybe you were better prepared this time.” You need surgery again, so you take a few days off to rest. You watch your regular television shows, you cry a couple of times, and you buy yourself chocolates this time. Your doctor promises to run more tests so this won’t happen again. Next time will be the one. Third time’s a charm. He tells you there was less than a three percent chance of this happening. You are not comforted by this statistic. You wish he’d kept that one to himself. By now, you’ve collected a group of friends that you met in online support groups full of people who have felt your pain, and they will hold you up until you can stand on your own again. You’ll love those people for the rest of your life. The third time you have a miscarriage, even you don’t know what to say. Some of your loved ones will still send texts, and you’ll be grateful for those. Someone will say “at least it was much earlier this time.” You’ll want to punch that person in the face. For better or worse, most everyone assumes that by now you’re used to it. Maybe you are. Shouldn’t it hurt less, though? This time you don’t even bother taking the day off work. What’s the point? No surgery this time. It’s business as usual. You still cry, but only quietly to yourself, afraid that you don’t deserve to grieve this one. You walk around for a few days in a fog. When the bleeding starts, you breathe a sigh of relief. Finally. The beginning of the end. You toss and turn in your sleep, when you can sleep. You pray, whether you believe in that or not, that this is the last time. You’re so tired. You play the blame game like you always do, despite the doctors and nurses assuring you that it isn’t your fault. Despite your partner telling you they know there’s nothing you could have done. Your friends, the ones who get it, are ever sturdy. They love you as fiercely as always. The burden they carry for you and with you is a gift you can never repay. You’ve never been in the same room, but you’ve been in each other’s hearts for a while now and you can’t imagine your life without them. Your doctor says there will be more tests, more experiments. You’ve only got one more shot. You try not to think about that. Everywhere you look, people you love are pregnant. Sometimes it was an accident and you’ll feel jealous. Sometimes it was hard fought and preceded by losses of their own, and you’ll feel deeply grateful for their success. You’ll feel hopeful that it will happen for you too. You’ll feel terrified that it won’t. You’ll buy baby shower gifts from the list of things you’ve been dreaming about for years. You’ll donate the samples of formula that the companies keep sending you because they don’t know you aren’t pregnant anymore. You’ll stare in the mirror at your empty belly and wonder if you’ll ever see it grow with new life. You’ll feel cramping and wonder if you’ll ever feel contractions. You’ll see blood and wonder if you’ll ever know what it feels like for your water to break. On particularly hard days, you’ll hear a baby cry in the grocery store and wonder if you’ll ever be comforting your own child in the dairy aisle. I don’t know what happens the fourth time you have a miscarriage. I hope I never find out. What I do know is that if it happens to you once or twice or ten times, you can be assured that you aren’t alone. You can find the rest of us out there, holding you in our hearts, feeling your pain and carrying your loss no matter what number you’re on. We’ll wrap ourselves around you and we’ll tell you that you’ll be okay, because we know you will. We’ll tell you it’s okay to cry and grieve whether you were four weeks along, or twenty or forty. Whether it was your first loss or the latest in a long line of horrible endings. Whether you have children already or are still hoping for them. We’ll be there. And if you tell me you’re going through it, I’ll send you chocolates, because I know that they don’t fix anything – but I also know they don’t hurt. Hope this helps.