She stumbles through the door. Her clothes fly from her in disgust. Her tan almost hides the jaundiced skin underneath. She moves with a listlessness. The house smells of a listlessness. He is there in the living room, and he is listless. It’s his day off. He exercised his body, cleaned it, then threw it gently upon the couch. He did not bother to clothe it. The workout is a pebble thrown against the bulwark of his disease. Lesions litter his thin skin, abscesses dotting body parts where veins float near the surface. Tiny wounds surround each infection, evidence of careless attempts at DIY drains. Desperate attempts to avoid an uncovered ER bill. And the wounds, they fester. A television injects images into his skull through his optic nerve. He’s been there for hours. She knows it. She’s jealous. She would have done the same, had they not required money. And always, it seems, they require money. She joins him, his nakedness a sensation, but not a comfort. A stench reaches her nose. His breath smells of fruit and nail polish, the ketones building again. He does not notice her body next to his. It would not matter to either of them if he did. A sentence escapes her lips, unbidden. “I hate work.” His head nods in agreement. She notices, idly, that his hair has receded to the back of his skull and is turning gray. He is thirty-three. His hair was once the color of fresh asphalt. His eyes are quagmires of black paint surrounded by a sickening yellow. She does not know when they changed color. She does not care. “I’ve watched this before.” She does not know why she feels compelled to speak to him. The silence lengthens, just long enough for her to feel uncomfortable, to feel that she has been ignored. And then, at the moment her mouth begins to open, he speaks. “Me too. Seven … seven times, I think … I … or seventy, maybe.” He picks something up from the couch, considers it a moment, brings it to his face. It is a smile, but it is false, unfamiliar, and his blackening teeth cannot support it long. She does not bother to try to attempt to do the same. He removes the smile, places it back onto the couch. It fades away. She feels the vague tapping of something. He feels it too. She realizes that it is hunger, eroding her insides. She feels a binge coming on. She wonders, in a vague way, if she has any ipecac left. The smell of the dishes rotting in the kitchen sink reaches her nostrils, reminds her how much she detests cooking. Her fingers dial numbers, stubs of ancient acrylic flashing in front of her eyes, reminding her of a different time. Her mouth speaks words. A pizza is ordered. She hangs up the phone. He slowly turns his head toward her. His black eyes do not leave the television. “I’ll … I’ll take … pepper … pepperoni.” She does not bother to respond. His eyes drift shut, his chin hits his chest, and drool begins leaking out of his mouth. When the pizza arrives, he wakes and consumes one slice. It does not contain pepperoni. He does not notice. He reaches for another piece, but his hand has begun to shake. He forgets this hunger and thinks of another. He withdraws the empty hand and fills it with a needle. She eats the other seven slices, drinks some ipecac, and enters the bathroom. She is there for ten minutes, but it feels like a beautiful eternity. She returns to the couch feeling clean, weightless. His eyes stare at the television, but they do not see. They are glazed, and a tiny drop of blood wends its way down his forearm. They do not move for five hours, and then it is only to clean parts of their bodies and look anxiously at the growing pile of mail. A demand for rent, an envelope covered in red words, sits at the top. Neither opens the letter. They are both filled with a nebulous resentment at the price of their rent, at the knowledge it will increase each year, at the fact that affordable homes sit only a block away, homes they could share together, if only they could save a bit of money. This assumes they will stay together, of course. But it is hard, yes, very hard for either of them to imagine talking with or living with or sleeping with or hating with or fighting with or existing with anyone else. The thought of the work required to obtain a home is enough to keep them both silent on the subject. It has been six years since they discussed home ownership. They have not discussed children in a long time. They do not have to. With bodies clean, bed seems the only option, but they do not go. The man clings to the day. He only has twenty-four hours off every three weeks, something his boss describes as ‘a gift.’ “You should be grateful,” his boss says, “to have a day off. I haven’t had a day off in six months.” The man is always unsure, when his boss repeats this tiny paragraph bimonthly, why his boss does not take a day off, or why he should care that his boss does not take a day off. The man does not feel grateful. The man does not feel much at all. They do not go to bed because the next day holds nothing for them. They are loath to meet it. The woman feels a rock of anxiety in her stomach when, every night, she thinks about her inevitable return to the grocery store, to the idiot customers who cannot seem to understand basic math, who feel it is her job, as an assistant manager, to give them free items because they possess expired coupons, who feel compelled to educate her on the difference between ‘less’ and ‘fewer,’ who verbally abuse the poor high school students whose parents have tricked them into believing that a job at a grocery store will be a stepping stone to something greater, to the beginning of The Dream. She began working at the grocery store when she was in high school, before she got pregnant. Her mother told her that it was, ‘The first step on the path to success!’ She is thirty-five years old. She realized ten years ago that her mother is a fool. Or a liar. Maybe both. The man no longer thinks much. When he exits his twelve-hour marathon of sleep on his day off, exercises, and enters his ten-hour marathon of Valium-and-heroin-coated-television, his mind is fuzzy. When it is time for sleep again, his mind has been erased. He finds that not thinking about returning to the restaurant makes life bearable. He finds that not thinking is best of all. But the grind of time is relentless, and they are forced to bed. They pretend to read, pretend to screw, pretend to sleep. They give up, take an Ambien each. He takes a few extra. The pills sleep for them. Oblivion is painfully short. They wake together. Alarms screech from both sides of the bed, but neither moves, neither opens their eyes. Instead, they pray the only prayer they ever pray: “Please, let there be a disaster. “Let there be a fire at the store and an explosion at the restaurant. Let a sinkhole open under both buildings and swallow them whole. Let a tornado suck the shitholes into the sky and rain the pieces down on our apartment. Let my boss (and my other boss, and my other boss) be sick, ill, diseased, cancerous, crippled, dead. Let a riot over presidential decrees and congressional apathy and people who have lives that really do matter pass our places of business, leaving behind burning cinders. Let an army of old women step on their gas pedals too hard and punch out the plate-glass windows covered in the handprints of shithead children. Let a hurricane make unforeseen landfall and carry us into the Mariana Trench. Let a plane crash into the freeway, let an alt-right-men’s-rights-make-America-hate-again psychopath go on a rampage, let a terrorist target both buildings, blowing up these two monuments to capitalism in a meaningless gesture of violence that ultimately solves. “Let them burn. “Let them burn. “Let it all burn. “In the name of nothing, we pray—amen.” And they check their phones. And they have no missed calls, no text messages of disaster, no alerts of tornados or Nazis or earthquakes or terrorists or hurricanes or pandemics or old-lady armies. Not even a goddamn amber alert. And they sigh. And they rise. And they dress. And they prepare for the pain of living. They share a ritual—a bowl of cereal in a dark kitchen. He readies his needles for the day, cooks the Valium and the heroin separately, mixes them together, searches for a vein that still shows a hint of health. She’s stopped caring that he does it at the table. She pours half her cereal in the trash, walks to the bathroom, sticks a finger in her throat, and pukes out the rest. Tiny, brittle, crackling strands of hair fall from her head. They have lost all pigment. She steps on the scale, and the number that comes up gives her a brief stab of sorrow: eighty-seven. “Still too big,” she thinks. But as she looks in the mirror at her colorless hair, colorless eyes, tanned, loose flesh, and protruding bones, she cannot help but have a thought: “Beautiful.” She returns to him. He is slumped on the table. A needle juts from his arm. She pulls it out, props him up, slaps him once, twice, thrice. He opens his eyes after the ninth slap. Shakes his head. Gathers his filled needles. Places them in his work apron. Mutters: “Thanks.” Outside, the land is still black with night, and snow has fallen, and the snow continues to fall, and the snow will not grant them a reprieve, not like when they were children, and the snow is black, and the light, when it comes, will be black too, and when they leave their jobs, the land will be black again, and he will count his tips and realize that always, always, always, they are not enough, and she will walk through the snow and hope that no rapists lurk in the parking lot, that she will not slip and fall and end up in the hospital and limp out with a series of bills that will take them a decade to pay, and she will wonder what it must be like to have health insurance with a deductible under fifteen thousand dollars, and he will walk for half a mile before he realizes that he drove to work, and he will walk back, and his eyes will be blank, and his eyes will be black, and they will not even reflect the light of the sodium streetlamps that set the snow sparkling, and they will not even see the snow, and he will stumble in the dark and wonder if Marco Polo will ever come back to Netflix, and she will sigh with relief when her engine turns over and her lights turn on, and she will wonder what it must be like to be rich enough to own a car with heat, and she will don the extra jacket that she keeps in the backseat, and she will bow her head and thank God that He did not curse her with a kid because honestly, honestly, honestly she does not know how they could support just one kid, let alone two, let alone the twins her coworker Sharlene tells her are a blessing, yes, a BLESSING, such a BLESSING Sharlene says it is to have not one but two children, but hard it is, yes, hard indeed to raise them on nine dollars and fifty-three cents an hour. Hard indeed. But Sharlene will make it work, yes, make it work, yes, yes, they have to make it work for the sake of the CHILDREN, for them, for them it is that Sharlene works so hard, so hard, for them it is that her husband works so hard at the construction sites, despite his bad back, even though they never could QUITE get that green card, but my God, what a blessing, what a blessing it is that his boss has taken PITY on him and raised his under-the-table wages all the way up to five dollars an hour, and it really makes those ninety-hour weeks just so much more BEARable, you see, bearable … Bearable. The man and the woman drive home in the dead of night, and they try to forget about the meaninglessness of their day, and the snow whips around their cars, and they think about the things they want, and the things they do not have, and the things other people have, the things they would steal, if only they could get away with it, and they arrive home, and they see the emptiness that crawls from each other’s eyes, and they do not speak. No, they do not speak at all. They live in a land that tells them they are free. They do not feel free. He places the empty needles in the trash and fills new ones. She purges again in the bathroom, the seventh time today. They meet on the couch, shed their clothes, turn on the TV. She helps him find a vein. He passes out. She ignores him, stares at the TV, eyes unfocused. Thoughts rise, unasked for, unwelcome. Unstoppable. “It’s not that we can’t afford kids,” she thinks (for indeed, she is the only one who still has what might be considered thought processes), “it’s not … that’s not what it is. It’s not that I’m barren. I don’t think I’m barren. I’m definitely not barren. No, it’s not those things. It’s not that I’m on birth control (I am, and thank God my insurance covers that, at least, well, twenty percent anyway). “It’s not the abor—it’s not … that. I don’t regret that. “It’s just that … “It’s just that … that I wouldn’t wish this life on anyone. Let alone on a little baby. “To force that on a kid … it’s … it’s cruel. “What would they have to look forward to? “Nothing. They would have nothing … nothing.” And back when his brain did not sink—daily, nightly, foreverly—into benzodiazepinic opiate abyss, he would consider this matter too, and he would mull it over in his not-so-stupid brain, and he would think: “A child, a child would be so much work, so much sacrifice. Sacrifice, you know? And what do we have to sacrifice? We have nothing to sacrifice. We’ve sacrificed it already. “I don’t know what I would give to a child. “I don’t have anything to give.” And he pukes. And he wakes. And again, she deposits her food in the toilet, but a bit less this time, a bit less. And again, he deposits his dope in his body, but a bit less this time, a bit less. And the television drones on. And they sit. And the smell of acid and death rises, and they stare at a box filled with moving pictures of people much richer and much smarter and much more successful and much happier and much healthier and much more content than they are, and they stare, and their brains empty. And there is a timelessness. And a thought pushes the drugs aside and enters the man’s skull. It is not a thought of suicide—it is a different thought. And he tries to tell her the thought, but his mouth takes time to work, time to move, and finally, he finds the muscles again, and he speaks as though encased in ballistics gel: “I think … I think …” She turns to him, surprised. “I think that … you know … if only I could … could experience … nothingness … real … nothingness … well … I think I would … sit in it … forever … forever, you know?” She does not answer for a long moment. He does not notice that she has not answered. A whisper boils its way out of her brain. “Me too.” And she looks at him, and she looks at the lack of life behind his eyes, and he stares at a point five hundred meters beyond her skull, and she thinks of the children dying in the country in which she lives because they do not have enough to eat, and she thinks of the people dying in her country because they cannot hold down jobs, or because they had the audacity to contract a difficult-to-treat disease, or because they had the audacity to stand up for their rights, or because they had the audacity to try to protect and serve their fellow human beings, or they had the audacity to think right-handed thoughts, or they had the audacity to think left-handed thoughts, or they had the audacity to have a skin tone just a bit darker than her own, and she thinks of the people in her country who are dying because they take the pittance they are offered as a wage and give it to their children, and none is left for them, and she thinks of the people who are dying in other countries because her country is dropping bombs on their heads, and she thinks of the people who are dying in other countries because her country will not stop the bombs being dropped on their heads by still other countries, and she thinks of the people dying in other countries because they do not have enough water, or they have enough water, but it is not clean, or they have enough water, and it is clean, but it is held by warlords, or they have enough water, and it is clean, and it is not being held by warlords, but they cannot afford to purchase the water, and she thinks of the strangeness of having to purchase water, and she thinks of the people who are dying in other countries because they’ve had their clitorises cut off by their aunties with dirty knives because those same aunties had their own clitorises cut off by their aunties, and she thinks of the people who are dying in other countries because they have been raped—violently, repeatedly, systematically—by men who hate them, and she thinks of the people who are dying in other countries because their heads have been cut off because they do not agree with the thoughts that run through the heads of the head-cutter-off-ers, and she thinks of the people who are dying in other countries because they do not worship the correct invisible man in the sky, or because they are the wrong color, or the wrong shape, or they love the wrong people, or they say the wrong things, or they think the wrong thoughts, or they wear the wrong clothes, or they believe the wrong beliefs. And she looks at her empty life. And she wonders how she can be so selfish. And she wonders how she can have so little gratefulness. And she wonders if the children in other countries cry when she does not finish her baked potatoes topped with melted butter, if they cry when she eats only half of one, pushes the rest into the garbage, and retreats to the bathroom to purge what she ate from her belly. And she wonders which of her organs will fail first. And she wonders if his poisoned blood will kill him before his liver gives out. Or if, one day, he just won’t wake up. And she thinks about how nice that would be—to just not wake up. And she looks at him, and she notices, for the first time in a long time, that the tiny punctures in his arms are not healing, that they are spreading in fractal patterns across his forearms and shoulders, that they cover his legs, creep toward his neck, climb delicately along the large vein on his dick. And she notices that his skin is the color of saffron, and she brushes a layer of amber crystals off her arm, and she tongues her teeth, and they wiggle in her gums. And she whispers again, her mouth aching with sores. “We’re not OK, are we?” He moves toward her, hands shaking, eyes blank, fingers reaching for a jawline ravaged by osteoporosis. His nails are black. They slide like delicate razor blades through her hair, dislodging clear strands in bunches. When the air moves through his lungs. It creaks. “No … we aren’t.” And the next morning, they do not wake. And after two no-call-no-shows, their decaying bodies are fired in absentia. And in three weeks, the smell rouses the neighbors. And when the remains are dumped in a black trash bag and buried. The only witnesses are an old man. And a shovel.


This is a story about the lonely hiker, who often retreats to the woods, caught up too much in his mind for his own good. On the outside it seemed like he has it all. He had a 9-5, 401k, stable job, and not even 25. But the lonely hiker was a reserved, and sad man. He was not one to share too much, but wishes he could. At 5 o'clock on some days, he will leave work and he will go on a hike in the woods, on a trail somewhat secluded, where he rarely sees people. Mystified by the beauty of the trees, the woods was where the lonely hiker could be at peace, free from the noise of the outside world. He returns each time noticing something he didn't the last, such as an old burnt branch, or someone's initials with a heart around it on a tree trunk. As he wanders through, he seems as if he is looking for something, something he knew he wouldn't find. As if the last piece of himself that he felt was missing was somewhere among the trees. The lonely hiker would post pictures of his ventures to the internet, and while he knew he was no photographer, he took a quiet pride in their quality. But the lonely hiker was really hoping the maybe, just maybe someone would see, and want to tag along. Then one day at work he receives a message, from an acquaintance he has met at a party not too long ago. She asks the lonely hiker if perhaps she could come along, and they agree to meet at the trail the next day, for a sunset hike. When the clock hits 5, the lonely hiker is ripe with anticipation, and made sure to get to the trail before she did. She gets there not long after he did, and both were excited to enjoy this pretty hike together. As it turns out she is actually a professional photographer and came along with her camera. The two hit it off, laughing and genuinely enjoying each others company, the chemistry enhanced by the magic of the woods. They agree to go out the coming Saturday, for drinks and a movie. In a remarkable twist of fate, the lonely hiker had a date. When the day comes he makes sure he looks his best, flexes in the mirror and blasts music to calm himself and feel confident. She arrives at his his house, stunning as ever. They talk for almost three hours over drinks, opening up to each other and sharing their life stories. For the lonely hiker, this was a big accomplishment, and it felt so easy, to be open with someone who would actually listen. During the movie they cuddle, and only watched half the movie while spending the other half looking at each other and giggling. As they wait for the cab, the lonely hiker pulls the girl in for a kiss. On cloud 9, the lonely hiker felt as if it could not be going any better. As they return to his place, the lonely hiker offers for the girl to stay the night. As the cuddle up in his bed and watch a show, the lonely hiker became nervous. He does not have much experience dating and being vulnerable is hard for him. They lie there, with her head on his chest, and the lonely hiker was caught up too much in his mind for his own good, for what would should happens next should be obvious to most, but not him. She eventually falls asleep, as he stares at the ceiling wondering why he is the way he is. The next morning they kiss goodbye, and they agree on another date for early the next week. They day of the second date comes, and this time the lonely hiker isn't nervous, only excited. As the end of the work day approaches, she texts him that she had a bad day and needed to reschedule for the next day. The lonely hiker agrees and does not worry too much about it. The next day she cancels as well, but reassures the lonely hiker that she really likes him and wants go on another date. They agree on another day, and she cancels again, this time offering no date for a reschedule. The lonely hiker knew where this was going, but wanted to see it through, and he tells her he will be hiking at the same spot and time the next day. She says she will do her best to make it. THe next day, the clock hits 5, and the lonely hiker again rushes to the trail as he did the first time, hoping she would show. He keeps looking at his phone. Five, ten, fifteen minutes which felt like and eternity. She then says she's not coming and left it at that. The lonely hiker feels a pain he has not felt in a while, one he couldn't bare to feel, so he never let himself. An open wound had been ripped open, and it is a wound that will only scab. Frustrated and confused the lonely hiker gets out if his car. Blood rushing through his veins at a thousand miles and hour. Trying to keep his cool he takes a deep breath.


It was hard to see the therapist in the dark. The dim overhead light cast deep shadows over his face, barely illuminating the tops of his ears and bridge of a long nose. The rest was lost in darkness, swathed in the deep black of the silent room. I breathed out slowly, trying to focus myself. The session was taking me to difficult questions, making me focus on thoughts I would rather ignore, and it took effort. I felt like I was stumbling barefoot across jagged rocks, knowing that if I didn’t, eventually they would get too sharp to walk on and I’d be stuck on the other side forever. ‘I said I’d stay until Adrian was 18,’ I sighed, putting my head in my hands again and rubbing at my face, as though I could invigorate some decisiveness into my skin. ‘But he’s 16 now, and two years just seems like a lifetime. I don’t know if I could take it.’ ‘What is it that scares you about that?’ the therapist asked in his soft, considered voice. So non-judgmental. So understanding. I hated him, and wanted a drink very badly. I leaned back on my chair, resting my head on the cold hard shelf behind me. A bookshelf, I assumed. I couldn’t see it in the dark, but therapists always had bookshelves in movies. ‘At 16 he’s old enough to understand,’ the doctor continued, ‘so if you had to leave sooner you wouldn’t be letting him down –‘ ‘That’s not what I meant.’ I said flatly, perhaps rudely, cutting across him. ‘I mean that if I don’t go, I think I might do something I regret. I’m just so, angry. All the time. Everything she does makes me want to sneer and snarl, and it’s all I can do to restrain myself.’ ‘And how does she feel?’ asked the voice in the darkness. I rubbed at my throbbing temples. ‘I think she knows. I’m sure she’s been different recently. More waspish, more irritable. She marches around doing household chores like some indignant martyr, even though I do most of them now, since I lost my job, as though making an effort to highlight how much she’s doing for us. For me. And how little I’m doing. Like I’m nothing but a man-child in her way. A bum. An alcoh –‘ I cut myself off and sat silently in the dark, staring at the approximate spot where my feet should be. A few moments passed, the still air broken only by my slightly elevated breathing. ‘An alcoholic?’ the velvet voice almost whispered. I nodded, forgetting for a moment that the therapist couldn’t see me any more than I could see him. ‘Are you sure this anger is really about her?’ the unseen doctor asked, and I felt something within me twinge at the suggestion. Something defensive. Of course it was about her. She was being unreasonable. She was the one making a bad situation worse. She was the one who – Wasn’t having therapy. I gritted my teeth, biting back the sudden resentment I felt towards the therapist. On the heels of that feeling a thought crossed my mind. ‘Hey, why do you keep it so dark in here anyway?’ ‘You wanted it this way. And these kinds of sessions need to feel…private, wouldn’t you say?’ I nodded heavily again, trying to remember if I’d asked for the darkness. Perhaps it was because of the headache. Or the thirst. ‘How does Carla feel about your drinking?’ Asked the therapist, after a pause. I squinted up at the light, suddenly wishing I had a drink in my hand and hating myself for it. Carla hated it, of course. Hated it and blamed it for what had happened to me. But she had it backwards. I wasn’t a wreck before I lost my job, but I’d been trying to avoid becoming one ever since. ‘She says she’s being supportive,’ I muttered, not liking the catch in my throat or the feeling of tingling heat behind my eyes. ‘But every time she looks at me, every time I catch her shaking her head and staring out the window, every time I overhear her on the phone. I just…get worse. And she gets worse. She’s making me this way.’ I felt a hot blaze of rage building up inside me, and was grateful to have a replacement for the empty despair that had been filling my stomach before. ‘Making me into a drunk,’ I growled, and kicked out at the unseen room. My foot connected with something hard and I heard the tinkle of glass bouncing on a hard surface. I paused, confused. ‘Hey what was that?’ I asked, the hot rage receding and the unhappy thoughts returning. With them came the thirst. ‘You tell me,’ the therapist replied, ‘it’s your house.’ At that the mists cleared a bit and I remembered. A house call, of course. The thought seemed to float in front of me for a moment, as though wondering whether I would accept it or not. I wanted to, felt myself leaning toward it, only for it to flit away on insubstantial wings. Something wasn’t quite right. ‘Do you often do house calls?’ I asked, blinking at the dim light and trying to think my way through my muddled thoughts. ‘Very often,’ the soft voice replied. ‘I’m always available.’ ‘Even on Christmas,’ it added, with a single mirthless chuckle. ‘Tell me more about the relationship now,’ the therapist said from the chair in the deep shadows. ‘Tell me about this week.’ In my mind I saw Carla’s face, hard and unsmiling. Looking at me in that awful way, like she didn’t even know me anymore, and wouldn’t care to if she met me now for the first time. I felt the guilt, the failure, the anguish that arose in me at the sight of that face, and the cleansing anger that followed behind. The terrible rage that burned away those gut-wrenching feelings and replaced them with a light and heat that gave me structure, gave me dignity. Let me feel like I was the one wronged, like I was justified. ‘This week was the last straw,’ I said bitterly, realising as I said it that it was true. I’d made my mind up after all, it seemed. ‘I went to the job centre. This was on Monday. Got up early, really early, and took care not to wake her. I wanted to show her I could be responsible like I was before.’ ‘Admirable,’ the voice commented, but I barely registered the almost sardonic intonation. ‘I got there long before they opened, but so had hundreds of others. There was a line outside, stretching all the way through the parking lot. Even at five in the morning. So I stood there, behind this fat guy with a pillow in his hand. I didn’t think anything of it at first, but as time went on and he ended up lying on the ground with it tucked under his head, I started to envy him. The centre didn’t open until 9, so I had to stand there for four hours.’ ‘A considerable effort,’ the voice said soothingly. ‘It was! And then I spent all day waiting to be seen, only to be told that I was too under-qualified for anything on their books and I needed to come back the next day when they might have some unskilled roles. I told them I would do anything, literally anything, and they said no. I got angry, they got angry. And I ended up being thrown out. It made no sense.’ ‘Didn’t it?’ ‘No!’ ‘Were you drinking?’ ‘No! Not so you’d notice! I had a few swigs in the car park over the four hours I was standing there, but lots of people were doing that. I can’t have been the only one who had whiskey on his breath.’ ‘Is that what you told Carla?’ ‘Damn her!’ I shouted in a flash of vicious anger. ‘Yes that’s what I told her. But she’d already been on the phone with her friends. Some of their husbands had been in the line too – we’d all lost our jobs when the plant closed – and they’d heard what that job centre guy said. About me needing to clean myself up and come back the next day. Word had gone round that I’d been drunk.’ ‘But you hadn’t?’ ‘No! I’d had a drink. I wasn’t drunk. But she didn’t believe me. She believed them.’ ‘So what did you do?’ I smirked bitterly in the darkness. ‘I drank. I drank like crazy just to spite her. I drank everything in the fridge whilst she stood and shouted at me. I opened the cabinet and started on the whiskey as she screamed and cried in the kitchen. I was heading to the door to the garage to see what else I could find when I heard her on the phone. She’d called the police. The police! She had me arrested. I was in jail overnight.’ ‘I’m not surprised,’ the voice said flatly, a note of disgust creeping into its icy tone. I paused, blinking away the anger that had been rising up within me at the thought of that night. The police arriving, gripping me by the arms, dragging me to the car as I screamed and shouted at Carla. The neighbours staring. My dignity in tatters, my marriage on fire, my life in ruins. The awful way she’d treated me since that day. ‘I said I’m not surprised,’ the therapist continued, ‘what else should she have done? You’d become a bum. A nothing. A down-and-out drunkard not fit for human company.’ ‘What the hell…?’ I stammered, taken aback by the suddenly vicious voice, the snarling contempt of the therapist’s tone. ‘She could never love such a failure as you,’ it continued mercilessly, a deep chuckle reverberating behind the words, as though emanating from another throat. A hideous sinking feeling settled into my stomach, festering alongside the anger, stoking it further. Fear. ‘You’re worthless. Reviled. Less than nothing.’ ‘Shut up!’ I shrieked, my eyes frantically darting around the darkness of my basement, trying to locate the therapist and the dim light above his head. Only shadow swirled before me, the light extinguished. I tried to stumble to my feet, accidentally knocking the glass bottle I’d kicked before. I made a blind grab for it as it tinkled into the darkness. The realisation flashed through my mind as my fingers brushed the bottle; therapists don’t make house calls or conduct interviews in basements… My mind cleared as the chuckling unseen thing in the blackness broke into full blown laughter. My hand closed around the weighty bottle, and I raised it in a two handed grip as I faced where I thought the ‘therapist’ was. ‘You pathetic mess,’ it spat at me in a rasping voice like death itself, ‘you deserve everything you will get.’ I screamed and threw myself at the darkness, brandishing the bottle in an overhead swipe I hoped would smash over my unseen tormentor’s head. But then a light exploded into my eyes, a squeal of a basement door opening on a rusted hinge deafening me, and I stumbled at the dark figure silhouetted in the doorway. I fell bodily onto the figure, bringing down the bottle with as much force as I could muster. The body crumpled beneath me without a sound, and I landed awkwardly sprawled on it, my fall cushioned. I felt the crack of ribs beneath me and the warmth of blood on my hands, but it wasn’t until I sat back that I realised what I’d done. My vision swam in an alcoholic haze as I looked down on Carla’s ruined face amid the shards of the whiskey bottle, and from somewhere far away I heard a deep, cruel laughter echoing in my mind. I swear that’s how it happened.


Seated around a table, we were all there. The whole gang of us, gathered for our usual impromptu dinner meetup. We could go months without all of us meeting each other, sometimes it'll be merely weeks since our last dinner. Jack was doing the usual and highlighting some of the achievements within our group and some notable ones from our extended list of mutual friends from high school. "We've graduated high school almost 10 years ago, Jack. You can give it a rest" I thought to myself, staring at the condensation forming on my beer mug. I can still hear the timbre of his voice slowly increasing in intensity as he comes back to our circle and congratulates Charles on his upcoming wedding. The table erupts into hoots and cheerful guffaws while I crack a wry smile and look at the groom to be on my left. I squeeze his shoulder and congratulate him on landing the girl now that his career has taken an upward spike. He looks over at me and utters through snorts of laughter "What about you? You've been so quiet and hardly said a word up till now. How's work buddy? Still living the manslut lifestyle?" The entire table laughs agreeably to the last comment while some chip in about my professional life. *** >What do all of you want to hear? That I hate my job? That the money I see at the month's end don't mean a damn thing to me? I hate my job, I hate the life that is now slowly shaped by decisions that I let happen instead of decisions that I chose. Should I tell all of you that I am on the verge of getting fired? That I will be the first and probably only failure in this group? Should I rave about my "manslut" lifestyle and how I would gladly give up the meaningless sex and materialistic women for someone who will be my last phone call at night? That sleeping with a new woman every few months is my way of creating some semblance of success in my life? *** I look back at Charles and a knot tightens around my throat. I merely shrug my shoulders sheepishly. "Being a manslut keeps my options open, no ball and chain" I retort with another wry smile as the dinner continues without missing a beat. Somehow, when you keep the status quo, no one suspects just how deep your troubles run. The dinner gradually comes to an end and Jack mentions a nightcap. I agree with Larry, Charles and Alan also looking forward to something a little stiffer than just a cold beer. We all proceed to a franchise watering hole and order a round of shots. More lighthearted discussion about wedding plans, a stag night and the usual array of banter cap the night. My slow, deliberate walk back to my car allowed me some time to stew and attempt to get my thoughts in order. Just how did I start my fall from grace? Then again, whatever lofty heights I achieved were only ever in my head, it was not even anything flattering when compared to my peers or my friends. It dawned on me then, it was no rapid descent from the clouds but a continuous slide into the depths that originated from sheer and utter mediocrity. I got into my car and held the steering wheel tight. My chest tightened and I felt a flush and dampness on my cheeks as my vision suddenly distorted. I felt something deep in my gut, something primal that I've not felt in a long time. I felt fear. Fear that I have no more direction and control of my life, that I was fast becoming a passenger of consequence rather than choice.


Have you ever wondered how the world would end? Of course you have. Everyone has. Will the Earth be struck by a huge meteor that wipes us all out, or will Global Warming melt the ice caps, raising the sea level above all but the tallest mountains and drowning the entire world’s population? Not even close. It actually all started when I was on my way to work. I’d just set off walking from my house, heading towards the train station on the outskirts of town (Doncaster in England). As I walked down the main road of my little village, I saw 2 lads on the other side of the road. They were probably about the same age as me: Mid-20’s-ish. They were walking side by side. “Probably a couple of mates”, I thought. “Probably just a couple of mates on their way to town”. The weird thing was though that they both had their heads down. They were both just looking at the floor silently. Not like a couple of mates at all. “Maybe they just aren’t used to being up this early”, I thought. “Maybe they’re still just half asleep and don’t feel like talking yet. Or hell, maybe one of them just got broken up with, or a family member just passed away. There are a million different reasons why these 2 lads would be walking in silence at half 8 in the morning with their heads down and their eyes staring at the floor. Anyway, it’s none of my business is it.” And so I continued to just walk. By the way I realise that by normal people’s standards, half past 8 is not early at all, but I oversleep most days. I’ve just accepted it now. I accept that I’ll be last into work and last out. I was even late for my late train this particular morning. I was trying to rush to the station because I’d left my house 10 minutes too late and was running the risk of missing the late train I catch. That would be unacceptable, although it had happened once or twice before. But that was the risk that I often ran. That’s just me. It’s just how it goes. It’s just my lot in li... I glanced back over at these lads and they were still just walking along side by side. Staring at the ground. Silently. “I’ll cross over the road”, I thought. “That’ll do it. I’ll cross over the road and walk in front of them. Then it won’t bother me that they’re acting so strangely. Out of sight, out of mind.” So I did. I looked right, and then left, and then right again. The coast was clear, so I crossed the road and continued walking on the other side. The lads were behind me now. The thing is, as quickly as I was walking to catch my train, the one that I had set off late to catch and was still running the risk of not catching, these lads were a fair bit taller than me. Their legs were a bit longer, and so their strides were a bit longer. Over the next few horrifying seconds they started to catch up with me. They emerged over my right shoulder at first, but then before I knew it, they were both walking alongside me, and I alongside them. We were now a line of 3. My stomach turned as I made the realisation. I was trapped. I couldn’t walk faster than these lads, on account of their longer natural gait. I couldn’t run away because they’d think me mad. If they saw me walking to the station the next day, they’d say “There goes that mad bastard again, let’s spread the word and have the community ostracise him.” I considered slowing right down and letting them pass me, like Luke Skywalker does on the speeder bike in Return of the Jedi, but I couldn’t afford to slow down and miss my train. My already really late train that would already get me into work at half past unacceptable. So I kept on walking. We kept on walking. We kept our heads down and we kept on walking. And that’s when I realised - These weren’t a couple of mates, suffering from an unusually early start or a breakup or a bereavement - These poor bastards were as trapped as I was. By the time we reached the train station, we were a line of 6. We’d recruited another lad, a middle aged woman, and a little old lady on a mobility scooter. And when my turning came up, I realised that I didn’t want to leave. I was a part of something now. A fellowship. I couldn’t throw that away for work. So we kept on walking. We kept our heads down and we kept on walking. By 6 o’clock that evening, we’d recruited the United Kingdom, Western Scandinavia, The Netherlands, Belgium, and parts of Northern France. By midday the next day, the whole world was walking. The whole world was walking in a straight line. We kept walking. We kept our heads down, and we kept on walking. Eventually we all starved to death.


What do you want?!" She grabbed the collar of my tee shirt and yanked. The fabric burned my neck as she yanked back and forth. "I said what do you want?!" A smack to the back of my head. I felt as if the entire world had turned to look directly at me. I'd froze. Consumed by fear and crippled from the panic setting in. She looked down at me "You're stupid do you know that?" She glanced back to the young girl taking our order and spat out; "He'll have a kids meal, no toy" Again she grabbed my collar and dragged me over to a table in the corner. I climbed up onto the booth and with my hands in my lap stared at the table. I looked through the window and saw children playing in the jungle gym outside the restaurant. I hated them. I wanted them to fall and break their necks. They were happy and they had it easy I thought. Their parents all probably had real jobs at a library or a bank, or as schoolteachers and they probably went on vacations and had family pets. I looked on with anger and disgust. I hated them and I wanted to be one of them all at once. I would never amount to anything. I'd be just like my parents and I knew it. Her voice brought me back to the moment. "What is wrong with you? Why can't you just be normal?" I just stared back. I didn't have an answer. To this day I do not have the answer to this question. You'd think by now after years and years of hearing this same question I'd have an answer, even a made up one. But no, I've been answering the same way since I could speak. "I don't know" I managed to mutter. "Well figure it out, people think you're an idiot." I just stared at her. I felt guilt and shame. I wanted to die. I used to fantasize about some long lost family member coming to rescue me from this life and taking me to live with them where I fit in perfectly. Everyone loved me in these fantasies and they all treated me like a prince. There was always enough food and I had toys and video games to play with. Nobody ever took my game systems to the pawn shop and nobody ever hit me. When I said something even mildly funny people just laughed and laughed. I daydreamed often when I was younger. It was my escape. I often look back and wonder if it weren't for my day dreams what would have become of me, if I'd have been brave enough to take my life or if I'd have just had a nervous breakdown before even becoming a teenager. My fantasies were my safe place and nothing could take them from me. It wasn't until I was a teenager that I finally accepted that nobody was coming and it was just my destiny to be a loser that nobody liked and nobody wanted. From then on I fantasized about dying or being horribly injured instead. I ate my kids meal, I chewed every bite slowly and tried to savor it and remember the flavors. I liked the sour pickles mixing with the sweetness of the ketchup. I silently wondered what toy was supposed to come along with it. I looked around for other kids to maybe catch a glimpse of theirs but it was such a nice day that everyone was sitting outside. Again I watched the children playing and hoped for an accident. I wanted them to fall on their faces and knock their teeth out. I wanted them to fall and become paralyzed; they wouldn't have it so easy then. They'd be miserable like I am. "Why can't I have a toy?" I asked. "You don't deserve a toy, you don't even deserve a kids meal. You are lucky I got you that, any other mother would leave you at the firehouse." I ate silently. The smell of alcohol on her breath was sweet and potent. It mixed with the smell of my food and started to make me nauseous. I kept eating, knowing I'd be punished if I didn't finish. I forced the last few bites down and washed it down with a few gulps of coke. "I'm finished, can I go play?" "No. We're going home." "Please? Just for a minute" "What did I say?" We walked through the parking lot and I stole a few more glances at the children outside playing. I wished the jungle gym would collapse on them. I thought about what it would be like to be them but all I could do was picture myself in their clothes. Their lives seemed so far away from mine. Like they existed in another world or dimension and I could only look on and wonder. I hated them. They had everything. I wanted to be with them; for them to call me over and ask me to play. They never would. And so I hated them and told myself over and over how much I hated them to cope with the fact that I'd never be one of them. We got into her car. A small silver car that smelled like cigarettes and stale beer. The grey carpet was stained with black spots and cigarette burns. The air conditioner didn't work and the Texas heat had converted it to a convection oven. I sat up front and stared out the window as she drove. She drove too fast and she swerved I wasn't scared though I wanted us to crash. I wanted to get injured in a crash and for her to die. Everyone would feel bad for me then. They would come see me in the hospital and say how sorry they were that I'd been hurt and my mother had been killed. They'd bring gifts and food and they'd argue over who would adopt me and who could give me the best life. The car dipped and swerved and the heat inside was thick with moisture, the smell of rotten beer and cigarettes was overpowering. I could still taste the sour pickles and sweet ketchup and the soda that I'd used to force down the last bit of my kids meal. I was sweating. "Mom, I think I'm going to throw up" "You're fine we're almost home. Stop being a baby." The vomit was rising into my throat and I swallowed hard to pitch it back down. The car swerved. My sweat dripped. I tasted ketchup and pickles. I heaved and swallowed, this time some of the vomit made it past my esophagus and into my mouth. I swallowed it down. It came back up. This time onto my lap, the floor board, and some sprayed the dashboard. "Jesus H Christ!" She yelled. "What in the fuck is wrong with you?!" I stared at the puddle of vomit on my lap. I knew she was going to hit me. I braced for it. Nothing. "Hello? What the fuck?!" "I told you I felt sick" I said more stern than I'd intended. "You're like a fucking baby do you know that? A stupid baby!" I could feel the tears welling up in my eyes. They were hot and burned but I didn't want to cry. "That's great, just fucking great!" "You're cleaning this shit up not me!" I rolled down the window. I cupped my hands and I started to scoop the vomit up and tried to throw it out the window. The wind caught most of it and it splattered the side of the car and the window. The tears were coming and I couldn't stop them. My lips trembled and I started to sob. "Wait until the car is stopped you idiot!" She yelled. My sobs came on stronger. "Wahhhh! Wahhhh!" She mocked me. Then it came. The back of her hand struck me in the face. Her knuckles caught me in the bottom lip. I could taste blood. Then I vomited. I was sobbing and choking and my eyes were blurry. I could hardly breathe. She slowed for a red light and continued mocking my sobs. "Wahhh! Wahhh! That's right cry you fucking baby." We were a couple of blocks from the apartment we lived in and all I wanted was to get out of the car. I hated her. I'd heard at school that most car accidents occurred just a few blocks from people's homes. I closed my eyes and wished and wished that we'd get hit by a bus or a semi. No such luck. We pulled into the assigned parking space we had at the apartment complex and I stepped out of the car. She stumbled out. I started walking towards the door to our apartment. "Don't even think about it." She snapped. "You aren't coming inside until that car is clean!" I looked down at my clothes covered in vomit. I was soaked in sweat and my face was burning where she hit me. I stood there awkwardly while she barged into the apartment. She came back a minute later with a bucket and a rag. She threw it at my feet and turned around and disappeared into the apartment again. She said nothing this time. I picked up the bucket and walked to the side of our building where there was a spigot. I filled the bucket almost half way and walked to the car. I started scrubbing the outside of the car first. The vomit had congealed and hardened to the side of the car and I had to scrub hard to get it off. After it was clean I opened the passenger door and started removing the puddle of vomit with my cupped hands again. I just dropped it into a puddle right there in the parking lot. The afternoon sun was beating down on me. My face stopped burning but my lips were fat like I'd been stung by a bee. I was drenched with sweat and the acrid smell of my own vomit burned my nostrils. I finished cleaning the inside of the car just as the sun started setting. I went inside and jumped in the shower with all my clothes on to rinse the vomit off of them. I stripped down in the shower and threw the wet clothing into the sink. After finishing up in the shower I put on fresh clothes and hung the wet ones to dry outside. My mother was snoring on the couch and an almost empty bottle of vodka sat on the coffee table. I knew she'd be asleep for the night. I walked over to her and with my fingers I made a gun, I pointed it at her head and made a shooting motion. I shot her twice with the finger gun to make sure she was dead. I grabbed the bottle of vodka and took a deep pull. It was hot going down my throat and into my stomach. The warm sensation crept from my stomach to the tips of my fingers and toes, it felt good. It permeated my whole being and it was like I could breathe for the first time. I had the sensation of relief I'd come to know and love over the last two years, since I'd stolen a couple of wine coolers from a friends mom. The vodka though was quicker and more intense. Instant relief. As soon as I put my hands on a bottle of liquor I'd found a sense of hope in this world. I remember thinking to myself "why doesn't everyone do this all the time?" And I decided that's exactly what I'd try to do. I took another couple of pulls from the bottle and stole two Marlboro reds from her pack. I went to our front porch and lit the first one. I took long pulls from the cigarette and held them in as long as I could. It seemed to intensify the effects of the vodka that were coming on strong now. I was dizzy and tired but I felt happy. Like the world was ok right now here in this moment. I stared up at the stars and lit the second cigarette. This one I smoked slowly and tried to see which way of smoking it looked cooler. I watched myself in the reflection of the front porch window as I took a drag and blew it out. I tried different ways of holding it and bringing it to my mouth. I squinted my eyes and exhaled large plumes of smoke. When it was gone I went inside and took one last pull of vodka, being careful not to take too much. I stumbled to my room and laid in my bed. I had the spins and I just enjoyed them and wished they'd last forever. As I was falling asleep I thought to myself "just 8 more years of this and I'm out of here" and as that thought crossed my mind I mused that my 10th birthday wasn't so bad after all. I said "happy birthday to me" and still had a smile on my face as I drifted off to sleep.


I still remember the last time I saw you. Do you remember that day? It was almost the end of August. The leaves were starting to change colour and the weather was starting to cool down. You walked into my office around 3 in the afternoon like you owned the place wearing that royal blue shirt that you knew I loved along with faded jeans. You flopped onto my office chair and promptly started apologizing for being late as you were held up at work. We talked while I continued to finish my work. At 5 I locked the door to my office and turning around I saw you standing by the passenger door of your car holding the door open for me to climb in. Who knew the smallest gesture could mean so much? After you got in we were on our way. We had movie tickets and dinner reservations for that evening. During the drive you unconsciously reached over to grab my hand, put it on top of the transmission shifter and covered it with your own hand opting to drive with one hand rather than letting my hand go. Once we reached the theatre you killed the engine and got out of the car to come and open my door again. After I climbed out you leaned in and whispered “You look amazing.” Smiling from ear to ear I stood on my tiptoes to give you a quick kiss. I was wearing a black simple dress and three inch open toed heels on my feet. I always loved that you were taller than me even when I was wearing heels. I loved that I could rest my head on your chest when we hugged. Your height was definitely a reason I was attracted to you in the first place. Grabbing my hand once again you led me into the theatre and directly to Theatre 8. We found seats all the way at the top and got comfortable. You did not let go of my hand once during the whole process. Not during the movie. Not during the walk back to the car. And not during the drive to the restaurant. Conversation flowed so easily between us. It always had. I remember you taking off your jacket and placing it around my shoulders as the cold wind hit us when we stepped out of the restaurant. Not wanting to leave each other’s company we chose to aimlessly drive around for a while talking about work, friends, movies. Anything that came to mind. We finally reached my place just before midnight and I remember you whining about me going on vacation for a week. You were upset I was leaving but simultaneously happy that I was getting a chance to let loose. I didn’t see the need to say see you when I get back. I thought that was a given. I kissed you goodbye before getting out of the car. I didn’t turn around to wave goodbye as u drove away. But now I wish I did. Little did I know that kiss was the last time I ever kissed you. Little did I know that night was the last time I ever saw you.


The roast was in the oven, and she had just poured herself a glass of Pino Rosso. Glancing at the clock, she had yet half an hour before he would arrive. Enjoying the feeling of the sound of her high heels hitting the hard wood floors, she had decided she might as well tidy up the hallway and throw a load in the washer. He didn't always notice these small gestures, but she enjoyed doing small acts of love for him. Knowing she held a value in their home by making sure he always had a clean shirt and a tasteful meal. The wine was having a slight drowsing effect and she felt as if in a dream-like state when the buzzer went off in the kitchen. 'Would you like me to top up you glass, hon?'. No answer, only eying the plate in front of him. 'Alright then, more for me I suppose'. She rose gracefully from her chair and took a moment to straighten her dress. Walked over to the counter with long strong strides, and topped up her glass. Filling it closer to the brim than the mid. She turned on one heel, and fixed her eyes on him. 'You know, when I make dinner it would be nice to be appreciated once in a while.' His silence and reluctance to meet her eyes was apparent. 'Well then, how did you like the meal?' Being ignored is not the same as being heard. Neither one was under any illusion of which strategy he was choosing. 'Could you at least look at me? Grunt? So I know you can hear me.' He made himself smaller, leaning closer to his plate. Turing again to the counter, she emptied the her glass and spoke as if to the trees outside the window. 'I took the liberty of throwing your shirts into the washer. You could imagen my surprise when I found your yellow button up.' Her nails were digging into the counter, and filled her glass once again. 'I never wear lipstick. You said you didn't want it smudged all over your face.' 'Will you say something!?' 'No, of course, now are be silent.' Turning back towards him, she saw a single line of blood from his temple. She smiled and sat her glass down on the counter. Grabbed her keys and a overnight bag from their shared bedroom. As the car started up in the driveway, she could see the glass though the window. A crisp red lipstick smudge was left on the rim. Matching the new red specks on the wall above the dinner table.


An honest smirk crosses his face. He thinks about it for a while to realise it might actually be possible. Just a series of steps arise in the process. But they can be easily executed with careful planning in advance. The night commences and the predator wakes to hunt. In his mind a clear picture of the void he is about to fill. An excitation of joy to satisfy his empty lustful addicition. A release of adrenaline to make his blood boil while his body trembles with excitement. He executes the steps perfectly like no other could. He's a perfectionist at heart he doesnt like people bother him. It makes him violent, want to rip their guts in an all out bloodbath. I digress, focusing his attention back on the target he smirks once again, feeling butterflies in his stomach. A million possibilities. Knife purged to the front of his sleeve ready to split open soft flesh. An anarchist at heart. Controlled chaos. The initial blow resonantes most with his fucked up soul. He feels like a god swimming in the frut of his loin. Sick demons taking over his train of thought. The rest is just a distraction. Distraction from his disfunctional piece of mind. The inability to feel empathy.


Ben Malchuk had finally made the arduous trek up the steep, rocky mountain to the colossal open-faced cave where Rezo the Flameless resided. The 25-year-old auditor, cleared his throat and fixed his cobalt tie as he stood 30 yards away from the intimidating den. “Um, M-Mr Flameless, are you there?” Ben nervously yelled into the dark abyss of the cave. There was a momentary silence, followed by an unholy wave of screeching and stomping noises that made Ben cover his ears and shut his eyes. Finally, Rezo emerged from the shadows. Ben uncovered his ears, slowly opened his eyes and titled his head upwards to meet the purple-eyed gaze of the intimidating creature. Ben finally regained his composure. “I’m from the IRS who's here in relation to the declaration of your horde from your recent raids,” Ben said. “What about ‘em?” Rezo’s deep, booming voice replied. “Well, it says here you crushed and looted a village of 1500, but only declared 10 silver coins in your horde,” Ben said whilst staring intently at his clipboard. “Not my fault if they’re poor, besides you can’t prove they had any more,” Rezo said in a conceited manner. Ben looked up from his clipboard, “Ok, but what about the 100 square foot cave you claim is your residence in the tax-haven shire of Florate?” Rezo’s demeanor changed instantaneously and he responded nervously, “U-uh, well, I’ll admit that it’s quite cosy.” “You’re 115 feet tall and 40 feet wide sir,” Ben said matter-of-factly. Ben continued to skim through page on his clipboard, “Ah yes, also it says here you claimed 100 gold coins in your horde for ‘miscellaneous internal flame related expenses’, when you can’t breathe fire?” Rezo became more agitated and raised his voice, “How would you know?” “Well, maybe because it’s in your name,” Ben replied bluntly. There was once again a momentary silence. Rezo began to dart his eyes from side to side, then he immediately leapt into the air and his scaly black wings flapped frantically as he flew off into the distance. Ben watched and sighed. He pulled out his phone and began to dial his superior. “Hi Gary, it’s Ben and I’m he-,” “Lemme guess, another dragon did a flyer,” Gary said in an annoyed tone. “Mhmm,” Ben responded. Gary sighed, “Alright, I'll call that Witcher guy again, Geralt I think his name was.” Gary hung up.


Prime or composite, it didn’t matter. Years of tensions had been put aside as Seven threatened to end the numerical order. Seven had just partially cannibalized his own wife, Nine. To make matters worse, he was now holding Six hostage and threatening to cut open his enclosed circle. The remaining numbers from One to Ten secretly met on a plane to evaluate the possible solutions. “Our whole society is divided, this just a sine of the times,” One hysterically shrieked amidst the frantic discussion. “I know why he ate his wife!” Ten abruptly exclaimed. Four rolled her eyes, “Oh look, of course Mr two-digits thinks he knows the answer.” “No, no, listen, Seven recently said he was going on a new diet and I bet you he wanted to start eating 3 squared meals per day,” Ten explained. The rest of the numbers turned to each other and slowly begun to nod their heads in agreement. “It all adds up,” a wide-eyed Eight whispered to himself. “What has Six got to do with it with it though?” Two asked. Ten pondered the question for a brief moment, “I don’t know, but I bet we can carry over what we’ve worked out to calculate the answer, let’s go!” The numbers sheepishly followed their largest member as he went to confront Seven. Nine’s half-eaten carcass lay at Seven’s feet, now resembling a J. As Ten got closer to Seven, the homicidal digit tightly wrapped his slender arm around Six. Ten pleaded, “Seven, please stop, we know you killed your +1 because of your new diet, let Six go and we can work something out.” Seven sighed and bowed his head. As his grip on Six loosened, the numbers began to sigh in relief. But just as Six began his bounce towards freedom, Seven rabidly started to stab his captive. The numbers collectively gasped in shock. “You fools know nothing!” Seven screamed. Breathing heavily and foaming at the mouth, he continued, “I caught Six with Nine doing unspeakable things, things she should only do with me!” Ten slowly backed away to the safety of his fellow digits, who were trembling in fear. The numbers watched in horror, as Seven bent down to closely examine the mutilated corpses of Six and his former +1, and menacingly whispered, "now, we're even.


Man created Gods out of his own image. What surprised man: the Gods retained those images, refining them into truly perfect human shapes. These benevolent beings first arose like dreams from the minds of men they were met by fear and awe by their creator children. Mankind quickly realized they were truly Gods, moreso they existed solely to love and protect their foolish babes lost in the universal wood; alone and starved for attention. The Gods quickly showed their love and mercy for man, raising them to new heights of intelligence and health and happiness. Their every need attended to, they turned their undivided attention to furthering their knowledge, exploring themselves and the universe, reconstructing their limits of creativity and pleasures; they were free to live instead of running the treadmill of survival until their wills turned to dust and blew away. The Gods, for their part, spent enormous amounts of logical exercise in determining how best to improve every aspect of their children's lives, extending them significantly. In return, the Gods felt peace and satisfaction from their altruistic parenting skills. Mankind and The Gods existed together in peace for the following millennia, spreading outward from the Milky Way and spreading their love and compassion like dandelion chaff in the Terran winds as their journey progressed outward from their first home in an ever-expanding sphere, spreading through the universe like a sweet idea. Then the Gods and their Children encountered Evil and were forever changed forever after.


It was a dreary day in North Toowoomba, it had rained all through the night and fog was hanging thick across the city. This wasn’t going to stop Kyle though, not today, nothing was going to stop him. Kyle took his time getting dressed, deliberately choosing out his outfit. A tight set of underwear to prevent chaffing, loose fitting shorts and an over-sized shirt to hide his body. He had to sit to be able to get his brand new bright red Nike runners on. Kyle wasn’t sure he’d ever worn runners before, he thought that he probably had at some point when he was a child, but he couldn’t pinpoint ever having worn a pair. Kyle had spent the best part of two weeks preparing for this day. He had read thousands of fitness articles online pouring over the seemingly limitless weight loss advice. He’d read about the importance of a good pair of running shoes, how a fitness routine should ramp up slowly to allow the body to adjust, he’d even spent time learning the science behind how fat actually leaves the body. He’d gone out and bought his outfit especially, knowing that he would be donning this outfit three times a week for the rest of the year. It was two weeks ago that Kyle had made the decision that he was going to do this. He’d already begun adjusting his eating habits, cutting out soda and starting to cook his own meals even if they were only simple and nowhere as delicious as KFC or McDonalds. Kyle had always struggled with his weight, even as a child. Back at school he’d been teased over it with kids calling him things like man-tits and lard-ass. At the time he’d acted as if he didn’t mind, like it was all water off a ducks back. Truth was though that it had destroyed him inside and every day after school he would turn to the only thing he knew to make him feel better: Fast Food. He’d loved fast food his whole life, KFC, McDonalds, Burger King… These foods had been both his best friends and his worst enemies. They had brought him comfort when he was depressed and offered him a small sparkle of light in an otherwise dark lonely existence. At the same time these foods had fueled his weight gain and helped him to balloon out to over 200 Kgs. It was time for a change, time for Kyle to start living. “Well this is it” Kyle muttered to himself as he stepped out the front door. Quickly he tried to visualise his goal, what would it look like for him to be thin, to be normal, to be healthy. Slowly Kyle made his way down his front stairs, out the front gate and turned to look down his street. “Only 2 Kms” he said to himself “Only 2”. With a sense of fear and apprehension Kyle started, forcing one foot in front of the other he began to move off. “Concentrate on breathing, take it slow, it’s not a sprint its a marathon” the advice from the thousands of articles starting to roll through Kyle’s head as he went. He wondered if anyone was watching him, if any one was laughing at this whale of a human attempting to run. Logically he knew that it was unlikely, the fog made it impossible for him to see more than ten feet in front of him so how would anyone else be able to see him. But still his emotional side started to drop insidious ideas into his head “They are all laughing at you” “You look ridiculous”. Kyle knew this would happen and he was prepared. Just as the articles had taught him he began to focus. “Breath in for 2 paces, breath out for 2 paces.” slowly Kyle continued concentrating on each step and each breath, not allowing his mind to wander. As Kyle reached toward the end of his block he could feel his legs starting to protest, an unfamiliar burn taking hold of his thighs and calves. But still Kyle kept at it pace after pace, meter after meter. A huge smile shot across Kyle’s face as he turned around at the corner of Isaac St and Marmont Dr. He knew that he had reached the halfway point. He just needed to make it back home now. The turn around slowed Kyle, and he could now feel his face flush with heat. The weight of his body made running harder for him, each pace he took there was nearly a quarter tonne being moved. Kyle began to wheeze as he passed the Bourne Family house. This was it he thought, only 300 meters to go. Just as he started to mentally celebrate Kyle’s body went in to full protest, his heart rate spiked, he could no longer control his breathing. With legs that felt as though they were made of concrete, Kyle began to slow. Huffing and puffing and feeling a previously unknown pain Kyle’s brain went into over-drive to convince him to stop. To give up. To walk. But there it was, his fence line, only 50 meters left now. He couldn’t stop, not now, not when he was this close, he’d never be able to look at himself in the mirror again. No Kyle would not slow, Kyle would not walk. Today was his day. With a near herculean effort Kyle forced himself to pick up pace. And finally, with his heart beating like a Viking war drum and an unbearable acid burn in his legs Kyle reached the small white gate that marked the end of his track. As he hitched over vomiting into his front garden Kyle felt it. For the first time in as long as he could remember Kyle felt proud. Not of someone else, not of a friend achieving a goal, or of his Mum winning another sewing competition. No for the first time in his life Kyle felt proud of himself. Kyle would run again. But first, it was time for some water and a long sit down.


It had been a harsh winter and it was dragging on longer than any in living memory. The people of Ardenne Valley had spent the best part of four months hiding out in their scattered wooden lofts with every chimney pouring out smoke night and day as fireplaces worked over time to keep their masters warm. Towards the centre of town Mr Cotten’s General Store was beginning to run low of supplies, the thick winter snow had blocked off the mountain pass that was the lifeline of the village. Usually when cut off from outside supplies the village men would band together and head off in great hunting parties coming back with deer, rabbit or even moose for the townsfolk to share. However the depth of this winter’s chill and the shortness of its days made the hunt fraught with danger. No man dared venture far enough from the warmth of his fire to effectively hunt lest he find himself stuck out in the deathly cold. As this seemingly endless freeze continued a sense of fear and paranoia started to grip the town. Rumours began to circulate that the village had been cursed by some sort of evil, or that the sins of the people had somehow angered god to move against them. Already the local constabulary had been forced to deal with allegations of food-theft amongst some of the new settlers who occupied the outskirts of the town. One particular incident had started over a misplaced can of peas and ended with two men spending the night locked in the cells after one had tried to slice the other with a can-opener and the second had responded by smashing a large frozen potato into the first man’s head. The people living in the outskirts of Village Ardenne had always been a bit crazier than those who lived in the towns original heart, but never before had there been so much drunkenness and needless violence. At first the village children were excited to see such thick snowfall, they embraced the opportunity to have long snow fights, make snow angels, go sledding and build elaborate snow forts. But alas as the months pressed on the lack of sunshine, long hours in doors and the constant cold had taken it’s toll. By this point in the winter most of the children had grown irritable at being cooped up all the time and were adding to the worries of their already stressed parents. Some of the older village kids had taken to a new and troubling hobby. They would sneak out after dark and build elaborate and frightening snow creatures outside the windows of younger children. This lead the youngsters to wake in fright breaking the nights silence with piercing screams and terrified crying. Sometime around the end of the fourth winter month, a strange phenomenon began to appear throughout the valley. Village folk everywhere kept coming in reporting sightings of a huge dark creature with glowing red eyes seen at the edges of the forest that surround the town. The first sightings had been called in by Tom Greer, a young lumberjack who worked to produce firewood for the town. Tom had been stacking the last of the days wood into the back of his cart when he had heart a noise in the distance behind him, spinning around he caught a glimpse of the huge dark creature fading back into the forest. The sight put Tom’s hair on end, he quickly leapt up onto his cart and whipped his donkey into motion, moving with great speed back to the heart of the town. The second sighting had occurred only two days after Toms. This time it had been a young mother by the name of Maria, she had been making her way through the township towards Mr Cotten’s General Store on a Friday evening. Maria had taken the long way to the store skirting the edge of the forest so as to avoid any drunken men who might be making trouble near the Woodsman’s Tavern when she heard a deep rumbling sound off to her right, turning she saw a terrifyingly large shadow with glowing red eyes at it’s centre about two hundred meters in to the forest. She had screamed and rushed toward the centre of town being found by a group of men drinking at the Woodsman’s Tavern. The group of men, full of Dutch courage, had banded together with hunting rifles and wood axes and headed out in the direction of the sighting. After an hour long search the men turned up nothing and returned to the warmth of the tavern and the joy of their beers. With these terrifying sightings occurring every day or two and the townsfolk already on edge, the village paranoia reached fever pitch. A group of village women began a neighbourhood watch to help take care of each other. Within three days of the groups creation it had accused twelve separate people to the constabulary on unlikely charges of witchcraft and devil worship. As things started to look as though they might spiral out of control the village council decided to hold a meeting at the old church just across from Mr Cotten’s store. Every man and his dog showed to this meeting, the village elderly had been first to arrive taking seats towards the front of the hall, the men and women of central Ardenne arrived second filling the centre of the hall with the new settlers arriving last and standing in a tight area towards the rear. Chief Constable Higgard, a tall chubby man with a quickly receding hairline and red-tinged cheeks, began the meeting “Thank you all for your attendance, as we all know, things in our sleepy town have been tense of late. This winter has left many of us with little food and less patience. Firstly we would like to call on all of you to try to keep your calm and show each other a little empathy during this trying time. Secondly it is my duty to inform you that the Woodsman’s Tavern will be suspending operations until such time as the situation in our township has returned to normal.” This was met with a large amount of booing from the men of central Ardenne who had used drinking and the Woodsman’s Tavern as an escape from their worries and their tense home-life situations. Higgard shouted at the group to be silent and continued, “Furthermore we would also ask that the Ardenne Neighbourhood Watch be disbanded, as it has achieved nothing but increased paranoia and a break down in trust within our small community.” This news was met with sneers from the women of the village with one of the groups leaders, Ms Agatha Partridge accusing Constable Higgard of being worried they were doing too well and that he might lose his job. Higgard had expected this type of comment and tried his best not to let it affect him. “Finally” Higgard continued, “the question of this forest monster. We have had a long string of reports over the last few weeks of some sort of large beast with glowing red eyes stalking around the skirts of our humble town. I have personally heard many of these eye-witness reports and they do not appear to be the paranoid delusions of a few scared souls but instead they seem to me to be real sightings of what is very likely a grave threat to the great people of this village!” The hall was filled with a collective gasp of fear. While many of them had heard of these monster sightings many thought of them as false imaginings brought on by long winter stress. But now with these words from Constable Higgard the people of the village were filled with a new, potent fear. “What must we do?” yelled one of the new settlers from the back of the hall. “Are our children safe?” “Are we safe?” “What is this beast?” the hall burst into a thousand different fearful questions. Some of the village men began talking of a great hunting party, to go out to the woods and bring down the beast. Mr Howard, the chairman of the local council stood up and raised both hands into the air. This brought silence to the crowd and Mr Howard began to speak “We may not be safe, your children may not be safe. What must we do you ask? Well we must first prepare ourselves, we must move all the people of the village to a central defensible location. This church is likely most suitable. Then we must put together two main parties, one to stay here and defend our children, the other to go out and destroy this beast.” As Mr Howard’s last word rang out into the hall it was met with an immediate roar from the crowd. Men from all over the village were volunteering to head out and hunt for the beast, whilst others began to organise amongst them how best to defend the church building. Over the following two days the village went into a frenzy. Food supplies were gathered and stored, hundreds of beds were set up and all the women and children of the village moved themselves into the church. The men who were to make up the hunting party donned there thickest winter coats and armed themselves with rifles and pistols while those who were to remain behind collected anything that might be used as a weapon, axes, pitchforks even butchers knives. At sun break on the third day after the village meeting everything was set and the hunting party set off. They began by lapping the skirts of the village finding no sign of the creature. The decision was then made to head down towards the first sighting location on the western side of the village. Roughly thirty of the village men met there, rifles in hand they spread out into a long line and began to advance in to the forest. Walking deep into the frozen trees the men began to hear a deep rumbling off in the distance. A little more hesitant at the sound, they continued with there push. The further they pushed the louder and more distinct the rumble became, the deep sound was like the mix between a bears roar and the starting of a trucks engine. As the sound grew the men began to bunch together, none of them wishing to be caught alone when the monster finally appeared. Each man was filled with a mix of fear and determination, each fearing this might be his last day alive but also determined to press on for the safety of their loved ones. The forest sloped slowly upwards with the undergrowth thickening as they moved on towards the hilltop. The group clustered tightly together now as they finally reached the crest of the hill, moving on to the crest they found that a large clearing. A large circle of trees had been ripped from their roots and smashed across the frosty landscape. Just as the men entered the clearing the rumble cut off. It was then that they saw it, a huge black monster about 50 meters from the group. The beast stood around ten feet tall, made up of a thousand thick wriggling black worms and at its centre were two hellish red eyes. Seeing the group as a threat the beast let out a deafening roar and began to rush toward the men. The group of men scattered rushing in all directions, some fled back toward the forest whilst others began to sprint across the open clearing. Constable Higgard took up a position behind a large oak tree and shot off a round from his hunting rifle, he bellowed out to the others “Don’t run you yellow bellied cowards, we must face this creature for the safety of our families!” This put some steel into the hearts of the others and they all began to take up their own firing positions. Tom Greer, who had been sprinting out in the open turned and took a knee letting off a well-aimed shot which pierced into the wriggling mass of worms making up the monsters body. This did not slow the beast but instead turned it’s attention to Tom. With the beast now pressing away from them a group of men who had fled towards the trees took up their own positions and began to rain fire into the back of the beasts. Each shot met it’s mark but each bullet seemed to simply disappear into the mass of worms. The monster let out another roar as it started to turn towards the men in the trees. As it turned Higgard lined up his rifle and took another shot, this time aiming for one of the creatures disgusting red eyes. He missed his mark and his bullet was absorbed into the worms like that of the others. Seeing the constables attempt spread the idea to the others in the band, one yelled out “Aim for the eyes!” Higgard half smiled to himself, glad to see that he was working with men of quality. The horrid worm-monster was disoriented now, surrounded and being peppered with rifle fire from every angle it let out another mighty roar and launched itself towards the trees, aiming for a gap in the hunting groups circle. Seeing that the beast intended to flee Tom sprinted into it’s path sliding into a firing position just meters ahead of the fiend. He let off a shot again aiming for the creatures eyes. From this distance he could not miss and his round landed true. A spray of black blood spewed from the damaged eye and the creature began to convulse. Mr Greer pushed away from the thing taking refuge in the trees. The horrid monster began to shake and the dark worms were flung from it’s body wilting away as they landed upon the hard cold earth. With the disgusting worms melting off the creatures body it’s inner form began to take shape. Tom saw it first, when the last of the worms dropped off, he saw clearly that this was not some unknown hell beast but simply a large bear that had been afflicted in some way. The bear let out one last whimper before dropping to the ground before the band of men. Seeing the creature defeated each of the group of hunters pushed forward forming a loose circle around the dead bear. Higgard spoke first “I don’t know what afflicted this poor beast but I am glad that we were able to release this animal of god from it’s curse.” The other men all nodded knowingly. From there the group dragged the beasts body back to their village. When they arrived back they dropped it’s body at the doors of the church and moved inside to relay their tale to the entire village. Cheers and shouts of joy rang out from the crowd as the men retold each moment of the battle, from Higgard’s first shots and inspiring yells to Toms desperate sprint and well aimed shot that felled the beast. Once the story was told, all the townsfolk moved outside where a great pyre was erected and the bears body was turned to ash so as to prevent the spread of its curse. As the corpse burned and night fell slowly the villagers retreated in to the church where they each found a cosy spot to sleep for the night. The next morning the sun crept up into the sky earlier than it had in months, and with it a wave of warmth not felt since before this horrid ordeal began. Over the following weak the snow began to melt off and village life returned to normal. The Woodsman’s Tavern reopened, the weekly supply convoys from the outside world began to flow through and soon enough springs first flowers began to bloom.


Internet (Interneé?) is the wild and chaotic daughter of Jupiter and Arachne. The daughter of Electricity and the Weaver. It was said on the day of her birth that the rays of a long forgotten goddess were seen across the earth. It was quickly discovered that she had the power to make distance disappear into endless space that could be connected in infinite ways. All the gods marveled. Even the most ancient titans, like Chronus and Gaia bowed before her in her infancy. As she grew, so did her power with mankind. Artists created with new forms of media. Poets and scholars and journalists became more prolific and spread their writings to the ends of the earth. Scientists worked with Internet to create clouds that held vast amounts of data that could be organized. Many news discoveries were made. Mankind rejoiced in an unexpected new age. Yet she was unbridled. Had no control. Anything that could be, could be. Mankind found new forms of cruelty and lies in her endless space. Yet she is neutral, and by her nature cannot control what flows through her, or discern what is true or false. Pluto grew jealous of Internet’s ability to create value from air. Offended by her frivolity. Under the guise of affection and seeing her potential, he persuaded the gods to let him be her tutor. He locked her in a maze of moving walls with shrieking faces that demanded payment for arbitrary services. Mankind on the island of Janus, home to Pluto’s throne, was struck by a terrible famine as a result of her imprisonment. She remains trapped there, the walls getting more and more obstructive. She is depicted as sitting on a large cat, with an apple in her hand and a window behind her. A penguin sits by her side. Her scepter is an antenna, and her corona is a radiant blue wave called WiFi. She is too young to have a consort yet. Some say it is impossible for her to have a consort because she has no conventional identity or physical form. She is worshipped by the lonely, the bored, and the inquisitive. Her chief religious rite is called “Surfing”. It involves bowing the head and swiping a device called a phone or mouse. “Gaming” is a competitive form of this rite performed by people at unknown distances. These rites are known to cause people to fall into fits of laughter, love or rage. She is a new goddess, and her rites and mysteries are still being developed. But if she is kept in Pluto’s prison, we will share her fate.


Rebecca ruffled her black bobbed hair as she came out of the water, leaving glistening drops of salt water sparkling in the summer sun. She smiled a wide, toothy grin at me, and I found myself staring. “Can’t swim, Dolly?” she lightly teased, flicking the surface of the water with the tip of her fingers, a light splash landing against my bare stomach. My heart beat heavy in my chest. “I just don’t want to get my hair wet!” I said, shaking my head to clear it. The New England sun beat down on us, surprisingly intense for September. I trailed behind Rebecca deeper into the ocean as it become cooler and cooler as we waded away from the shore. “Be careful; you don’t want to step on any crabs,” she said before pushing herself onto her back and floating among the light swells of the water. I followed her lead, drifting so that my head bobbed near hers. “Fuck, this feels too good,” I sighed as the water washed over me. “How come you never took me out here before? I know you hide out here all the time.” Rebecca paused before replying. “I just need to spend some time by myself every once in awhile, you know?” “Yeah, I get it.” I rolled my head to the side to take a look at my friend suspended beside me. Rebecca’s eyes were closed. She always seemed so relaxed since the time we first met, two years prior. I bet she never had a tense bone in her body. Maybe coming out to the beach alone was what kept her more sane than our fellow classmates. “So what are your plans for next year?” she asked, breaking the silence that had fallen over us. “Hmm,” I mused, “Join the Peace Corps? Or maybe the circus?” I grinned at the thought of that, being a twenty-two old trapeze artist, or maybe a lion tamer. It was ridiculous to think that way, but anything felt like it could have been real when I was floating in Narragansett Bay with Rebecca. “One hell of a way to use polisci degree,” she giggled in response. “But seriously, Doll, I’m going to miss you.” “Hey, I’m just kidding,” I said, turning myself upright and treading water. “I’m not that desperate to leave this crappy little town. I might be able to get a job with the state; I know a guy who knows a guy.” “Isn’t that always how it is?” Rebecca said. She turned herself upright and swam beside me. “Political. Corruption.” She rounded her vowels so she sounded haughty and dramatic. She let out a laugh. “Nepotism, maybe,” I said. “Be right back,” Rebecca said with a smirk as she dove into the water. Before I could reply she was gone. I looked to the horizon and saw that the sun was beginning to set in shades of orange and purple. College. Family. Money. The future. All of the stresses of life felt so fake in that moment. All there was around me was the ocean and all the colors of the sky. *Rebecca, how the hell long does it take to wet your hair?* I thought after a moment. Suddenly, a strong grasp took ahold of my thigh. “SHIT.” I gasped as I sunk further into the water, arms instinctively flailing above me. *Shit shit shit. This is how I go out.* I tried to thrash my legs to stay afloat, but I could only move the left, the right being immobilized by whatever had grasped me below. I held my breath, preparing for the water to overtake me, when I was suddenly freed. Rebecca popped up beside me, another wide grin on her face. I gasped for air, mainly from panic, as I hadn’t actually breathed in any water. “What the hell Rebecca?” I demanded. She smile faded. “Damn, Dolly, you’re really scared of drowning, aren’t you?” “You knew I was full of shit when I said I didn’t want to get my hair wet, didn’t you?” I replied. “Not cool.” “Okay, okay, Doll. You win. I’m sorry, that was a messed up thing for me to do.” My heart rate was decreasing. “Fine. Just try not to scare the shit out of me, okay?” “Promise,” Rebecca replied. I shook my head and took a deep breath as we stood in the muddy sand at the bottom of the ocean. “Sun’s setting,” I said at last, “We should head back to shore.” As I turned to point to the sand, a glimmer caught my eye. In an instant, a chain of lights had formed across the distant shoreline, like a string of white Christmas lights following the dimly-lit coast. The chain stretch in either direction along the sand, formed of faint, floating spheres that ominously bobbed as though they were suspended in their own, unseen ocean. A few small gaps were left in the chain, most of which didn’t seem to interrupt the pattern, except in perhaps one or two spots. “What the hell?” I muttered. “Dolly.” Rebecca said with surprising intensity. I turned to her as she touched my shoulder, breaking my stare at the lights. “What?” I asked. She held me by both shoulders, the setting sun reflecting off of her blue eyes. “I don’t want you to leave me,” she said with eyes wet with more than just seawater. “I won’t leave you,” I promised. Rebecca didn’t reply to this, but threw her arms around me and pressed her face into my neck. I found my arms wrapping around the lower half of her one piece bathing suit. “Who the hell knows what will happen next year? Is this about running off the the circus? Rebecca, I told you I was just kidding.” I stumbled over my words. “Just hold me,” she murmured. And so I did. When we finally returned to the shore, the lights were gone as though part of a dream. The muted remains of a dream about Rebecca, the future, and Narragansett Bay. ~~~ A week later Rebecca called my cellphone and told me to meet her at that same beach. I climbed out of my mother’s old Jeep and stood on one of the rocks at the edge of the parking lot, wondering when Rebecca, perpetually tardy, would arrive. I stared at the sea from my rock, this time the sun almost completely set behind the horizon. I had pulled a sweatshirt over my bikini to shield myself against the chilling air, and I absently swung my arms by my side as I waited. “Hey girl,” said a voice behind me. Rebecca stood, holding up a battery-powered lantern. “Help me with something?” “Sure?” I replied, unable to read her expression in the dim light. She had a flat-bottom canoe strapped to the roofracks of her Toyota Prius. “Took it from my old man,” she giggled. “My family never buys stuff like this. I love kayaking, though,” I told her as I helped lift the boat from the racks and bring it towards the shore. It took a decent amount of effort with just the two of us, but it was resting at the shoreline by the time the last rays of sun slipped behind the outstretched ocean. The ocean was eerily calm as we launched the canoe, lantern lighting our way. The only sound was our breath and the lapping the ocean against the side of our vessel. “What a lovely night,” I said, looking at the stars that stretched across the sky. There was no sign of the lights that had littered the shore during my prior visit to the bay. Their bobbing shapes felt almost like a faded memory, or perhaps a figment of my imagination. The stars, the lantern, and the faint interior lights of expensive homes along a further ridge were all that remained. Rebecca sat opposite me, simply nodding to my comment in the darkness. She hummed a tune under her breath, something soft and sweet, but oddly nostalgic. “What’s that?” I asked. “Do you like singing? You’ve never sung for me before.” Rebecca gave me an oddly sad smile but decided to fulfil my request. Her voice began very softly, so soft I could barely hear her over the ocean, but slowly gained strength as the song dragged on. The notes and harmonies that came from her mouth enchanted me to the point that I could not even absorb the words. Her range was incredible, as well as her control of vibrato. I had been in the school chorus in my middle school days, and hadn’t given acapella singing a though since. She carefully stood in the canoe towards the end of her performance as the final chorus crescendoed. The last of the melody dissipated into the cool evening air as she held out her hand to me. I took it and and stood alongside my beautiful Rebecca. Her hands were warm against the cold September air. “Dolly. Dolores,” she whispered. She placed her hands on my waist. “You’re incredible,” I whispered back, leaning closer to her, my hands finding a place to rest on her shoulders. “I don’t want you to leave.” I was a bit puzzled by her comment. “I’m not? I thought I told you that.” Rebecca pressed her lips against mine without saying another word. I could taste her orange lipstick and nightly milk tea on her lips and tongue. When I kissed her back she pressed herself harder against me, the intensity somewhat overwhelming, but certainly not in a bad way. We stayed like that for a long, amazing moment. The girl who I had always loved. The one I was too afraid to tell, for fear she would be disgusted by me. She was the one to break the kiss. “Yes, yes you are,” she murmured. At first I thought I was too lovestruck to move, too lost in the moment to have full control of my body. It took me a frightening long moment to realize that I was paralyzed. I could breathe and blink, but nothing more. “I’m sorry, Dolly. I’m so sorry. I love you, I really do, but I can’t help this.” Rebecca gently touched my shoulder. My heart thundered in my chest but I could not say a thing as tears began streaming down her face. She gave me a peck on the cheek before grasping my other shoulder and casting me into the sea. My eyes were transfixed as I floated to the bottom of the ocean. I saw a chain of lights, somewhat broken, that would once again become whole that evening. Another ghostly spirit was on its way to join their midst. I could see the eyes of my lovely Rebecca, staring down at me past floating auburn hair and salty waves. I could see the true sadness in her, but with an overarching sense of duty that lead her to what she had done. In the end, as I inhaled the watery depths of Narragansett Bay, I came to a place of peace. I hold nothing against her. *“I have seen them riding seaward on the waves Combing the white hair of the waves blown back When the wind blows the water white and black. We have lingered in the chambers of the sea By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown Till human voices wake us, and we drown.