Where Were You? I had never made a therapist cry before.

“Inappropriate” was the word Judith, my therapist, used to describe my father. I sucked on that word as if it were a lifesaver, but not the good cherry kind. This was a yucky green one. I had always known something was not right in our family. I had witnessed the interactions of my friends with their families and relished sleepovers where I could feel like part of another family, even if just for a night. At one sleepover, my friend Laura’s father had yelled at her, but then apologized a few hours later, driving us to Chinatown late at night for a conciliatory meal. It was strangely wonderful and a favorite memory I bring out and savor from time to time. In elementary school in the 1970s, I watched reruns of “The Munsters” and identified with Marilyn Munster, the niece who lived with the ghouls. She was a beauty by societal norms, but unattractive by the Munsters’ standards. Though Marilyn was not a very well developed character, I felt in tune with her outsiderness, living in a family of werewolves, vampires and other monsters. Marilyn was my soul sister, sometimes even more so than my real twin sister was.  *** It was hard to be honest with Judith in therapy. My grandma said, “When you speak of your troubles, people look down, not up.”

My family was like a skein of yarn knotted with secrets that we kept from others and ourselves. My older brother was not mentally ill — he was just lazy . That heroin rig I found in the bathroom and showed to my parents did not belong to my sister – it was her friend’s .

 In time, I was able to play for Judith the cassette tape that ran in my head.

“Y ou’re a prude ,” dad said when I told him to stop making comments about my budding breasts.

“She wouldn’t even know what to do with him ,” dad chuckled when mom did not want me alone in the apartment with my high school boyfriend.

(You think you’re) “Smart, smart, smart — but you don’t know anything. I would never take you on a bank robbery,” dad spat whenever I said anything that proved that I did not have “street smarts” like he did. He was a scammer, putting scotch tape on counterfeit coins to use in parking meters, ditching his non-working car and reporting it stolen for the insurance, and sneaking into a second movie for the price of one ticket.  *** My parents, my twin sister and me, my older twin brothers, and our Cairn terrier occupied a two-bedroom apartment in a pre-war building in Brooklyn. Years of too many coats of paint meant that no door ever closed completely, not even the bathroom door. My sister and I stuffed socks in our bedroom door to help it close, but mom always told us to stop stuffing shmatas in the door.

Growing up in this household, I knew nothing about boundaries, but my body knew.

I kept guard constantly for perimeter breaches by my father. Doorways featured in every one of my recurring childhood nightmares — like the one where I went to open the apartment door and a big, amorphous blob-man fell on top of me, smothering me. In another, little men would enter my bedroom, put me on a conveyor belt and handle me roughly while my mom and sister would be watching from the doorway, unable to hear my pleas for help.

The truth is that in my day-mares, Dad’s eyes were always piercing my sister and me through the crack in our bedroom door. He made no bones about his constant surveillance and would say things like “You sleep with your butt in the air” to my sister. “Stop dad! You’re lying,” we protested.

Nevertheless, the next morning my sister awoke to find a Chiquita banana sticker placed on her butt cheek and a smirking dad at the breakfast table.

 *** I wish I could say it was not always this way, but it was. I buried a lot so that I could survive. My sister has an eidetic memory, well able to see things long after they happened. She has a catalog in her mind, an easily accessible collection of injustices, and dad and mom always said “ That never happened.” when she brought out her memories. When I would tell my sister I could not remember what she described, she would shake her head and utter three words: “Where were you?” I know what you are thinking. How was my mother complicit in all this? How did she not do anything? How did she not know? All I can say about that is that the science of gaslighting is serious business. Dad manipulated us all.  *** As a child, I had frequent nosebleeds. When I had my tonsils out in elementary school, the surgeon cauterized the inside of my nose, sealing blood vessels to stop the bleeding. But it did not stop. Mom had a bad neck after being mugged. After that, dad did more than just leer through the door crack. He slithered into our beds many nights so that mom could “ sleep bette r”. He reminisced years later that we used to fight over who would sleep with him. However, when I play the cassette for Judith, she hears me fighting with my sister over who had to sleep with him, our skinny little bodies unable to move under the weight of his legs wrapped around us. I would smash my nose into the wall trying to escape his breath on my neck, his greasy skin pressed against mine, leaving drops of blood on the wall and staining my nightgown From then on, when my mom removed the long green pillows from the living room daybed my brothers slept on, she placed them on my bed to cushion the wall at night. Problem solved. My sister ran away at fourteen to follow the Grateful Dead on tour. I can’t blame her. Two years later, it was my opportunity to run off to sleepaway college. Before she left on her real trip, my sister first took a bad acid trip. She was in our bedroom when, suddenly, the two drama clown masks hanging on the wall above my bed terrified her. Tragedy clown had a tear falling from one eye, its lower lip pushed out in a pout. Comedy clown had crescent moon eyes and dad’s grotesque smile – mocking, contemptuous, and smirking. I admit I could be projecting here, like the Ancient Greek actors did when wearing the masks to exaggerate emotions. Whatever it was, my sister fled.  *** I thought going to college meant leaving my family, but I brought them all with me. I started therapy senior year and then tried psychoanalysis with Judith after college. It was the whole shebang – Judith sat behind me and I laid on a couch talking to the paintings on the wall in front of me.

During one session,

I heard her sobbing behind me and she confessed that hearing my story moved her deeply.

She taught me the vocabulary of abuse, but it was a long time before I could even utter that word.

Though it was not as comprehensive as my sister’s catalog, I explored my own catalog of memories, played my cassettes for Judith, and started the work.

 *** After a couple of years with Judith, I started seeing Linda. Linda was like a mother to me, only one who could see. Linda encouraged me to face my childhood clowns. I started by writing apology letters to myself from my father as practice. I was an FBI profiler, trying to understand his manipulation, his deception, his narcissism.

It helped some to read the apologies I wrote from him, but I wanted the real thing.

In my mid-20s, Dad took me to Chinatown.

We ate Lo Mein and shrimp with lobster sauce and at the end my dad had us do a dine and dash and leave without paying, which, as always, exhilarated him but embarrassed me. Over the meal, we talked for the first time about my sister’s accusation some years earlier. She had been jailed briefly in Toms River being caught with heroin in her purse at the front gate of New Jersey’s Six Flags Great Adventure park. As part of her release, she had to enter a drug treatment program and attend family therapy. After a few sessions, she announced matter-of-factly to the family therapist that our father sexually abused her. Dad said, “ That’s not true. How could I abuse one daughter and not the other ?” He then asked me directly if he had abused me.

All eyes on me, I choked.

I did not have the language yet to describe what happened.

I shook my head no. Just like my sister fled into the night years earlier, she fled again out of the room and out the door. We never returned to family therapy. I was complicit with my father in my sister’s abuse, even though I, too, was abused.

I could not let this continue and gave him one last shot to make it right. I told my father over Chinese food that he did and said a lot of things that made me uncomfortable – made both my sister and me uncomfortable. He said neither of us could take a joke and that he was only teasing when he did and said those things. When he gave us “the business ” by pinning us down on the floor and pressing his face and his prickly mustache all over our bodies, that was just tickling .

I guess I had my day in court and I did not get my closure then, or ever, but he did acknowledge that my sister and I may have been uncomfortable. Uncomfortable .

My sister does not speak to me anymore and my parents are both dead. When my father was riddled with cancer, I remember helping my mom change his diaper days before he died. He was aware that I was doing it, and I could feel his humiliation at having his daughter wipe him like a baby. His defeat was a small victory for me. Now, I listen to Leonard Cohen’s song, “Anthem” and it feels like he wrote it for me.

The chorus goes: “Ring the bells that still can ring Forget your perfect offering There is a crack in everything That's how the light gets in” I am still confronting my brokenness, the crack in my door. To this day, I bolt awake screaming if anyone touches me while I am asleep. Sometimes I still find myself putting my arm behind me when I walk up stairs so no one can touch my rear. Life is flawed, and while those eyes

peeking through my door terrorized me, that crack also let some light in. Wading through sewage is sometimes necessary before you can allow joy and hope to come in through the cracks. You’ll never know unless you try.


Elise only ever wanted one thing in life; to take to the stars and soar. While other kids decorated their rooms with posters of pop stars and footballers, she collected models of the ships of the System Defence Squadron. When her classmates were busy partying or studying, Elise dragged her parents to conventions filled with starships, shuttles, and spacesuits. It was on one of those trips that she first laid eyes on the Low Orbit Combat Simulation Instrument—LOCSI, for short. The machine that would change her life. It was love at first sight—no, scratch that—it was love before first sight. The moment Elise heard about that machine, she knew it was her destiny. The young pilot with the highest score at the end of the convention would get free entry into the National Academy of Space Exploration. Her dream. In the weeks building up to the event, it was all she would talk about. ‘When I get the high-score I get to move into the academy as soon as I graduate! No entrance exam, no tuition fees, nothing! Isn’t that great!?’ ‘Settle down,’ her father had said. ‘I’m sure there are lots of other children with the same plan. Try not to get your hopes up too much, just in case.’ Elise only laughed. Sure, other kids probably wanted to win the prize, but she was different. She needed it.

On the day the convention opened, she leapt out of the car and sprinted towards the LOCSI, only vaguely aware of her father calling her name. It was happening. It was finally happening. All that time spent watching sci-fi dramas and movies, all those hours playing video games and reading books on the history of space travel, it was all leading up to this moment. Elise sprinted along the corridors of the convention faster than the speed of sound, barging over cardboard cutouts of astronauts, knocking ice creams from the hands of preschoolers, and leaving her dad to clear up the wreckage she left in her wake. Oh, she’d get the mother of all telling-offs later, and likely be grounded until she left for the academy, but Elise didn’t care. Every second she spent apart from the LOCSI, was a second spent not living her life the way it was meant to be lived.

Ignoring the shouts of angry adults, and the cries of now ice-creamless children, Elise darted between a corn dog stand and a display on the Mariner 2 space probe and into the simulator room.

There it was. The LOCSI. It didn’t look like much—a simple white cuboid made of advanced plastoids and suspended on a bed of tubes, gyros, and cables—but to Elise, it was the most beautiful thing she’d ever seen.

She took her place in line, never taking her eyes off the contraption in front of her. Some part of her mind became vaguely aware of her father stepping up beside her, but her focus remained solely on the LOCSI. She’d been waiting for this moment for so long and now it was finally here. One by one, the people in front of her took their turns. Elise watched their attempts on a large screen at the other end of the room. The LOCSI simulated a battle against the Beasts from Beyond—a mysterious race of giant extraterrestrial creatures who came from outside the solar system with the goal of destroying and consuming all life. With their leathery skin, masses of tentacles, and countless dagger-like teeth, they looked horrific—like something out of her father’s HP Lovecraft books. Elise wasn’t afraid, though. In her starfighter she could take them all on.

That being said, she was glad that most of the people before her in line weren’t responsible for the defence of Earth. Some of them did okay, but most were absolutely hopeless. One spotty-faced boy wearing a football jersey didn’t even manage to blast a single Beast. Elise would put them all to shame. Her score would be in an entirely different stratosphere to theirs. ‘Next,’ the attendant running the simulator said.

At last, it was her turn. Elise shot forwards and dashed up the steps leading to the entrance. She poked a head through the doorway and— She froze. The inside looked… different to how she’d been expecting. Spaceships on TV seemed so sleek and open. This… didn’t. The simulator consisted of a single padded chair crammed in front of a control panel, and there was barely enough room inside for even those.

‘Awesome, isn’t it?’ the attendant said. ‘It was designed to mimic the interior of a Helios Mark V Starfighter.’ ‘This is what the cockpit of a Helios 5 looks like?’ Those were the main ship flown by the SDS. When Elise went to the academy, it’s the ship she’d train with, and would most likely be what she’d fly as a pilot. Elise had known that. She just hadn’t expected the interior to be so… small.

The attendant nodded. ‘Yeah, get in. Try it out. You’ll feel like a real SDS pilot.’ ‘I… I don’t know,’ Elise said. She’d been waiting for this day for ages, but now, some part of her brain was telling her she shouldn’t go. Staring into that tiny, cramped space, she felt… nauseous, and hot, and cold, and sweaty, and dry, and— The attendant nudged her back. ‘It’ll be fine. Go on.’ Still, Elise hesitated. ‘Look, kid. There’s a line. Either get in and get on with it, or get lost. Everyone wants a go on this thing. I don’t have space in the schedule for time wasters.’ Elise’s body trembled. Her heartbeat rose and rose and rose. Thumpthumpthumpthumpthump. ‘Last chance. Get in the simulator, or get out of line.’ Despite every ounce of her being telling her to do otherwise, Elise climbed into the LOCSI and slipped into the chair.

‘Great. Sit tight, go through the interactive tutorial, and give it your best. The controls are pretty intuitive, and a lot like some of those video games all you kids are playing.’ ‘Wait, I—’ But the attendant was already gone, and the hatch was closing.

‘Wait!’ Clunk .

The hatch shut, leaving Elise alone in the darkness. Okay, it wasn’t actually dark. It was actually pretty bright, lit by a few strips of fluorescent lighting that changed colour depending on the status of the ship. Elise would have found that really cool if it wasn’t for the growing black spots in her vision, and the way her chest felt like it was being crushed by the steel gauntlet of a mech suit.

What was wrong with her? Elise didn’t understand. She wanted to cry, scream, and throw up all at once. Are the walls getting closer? They are. They’re shrinking! The attendant’s voice crackled out of a speaker. ‘What’s wrong, kid? The tutorial’s started.’ Elise hadn’t noticed, hadn’t even looked at the controls. There was a tingling in her bladder telling her she needed to use the loo, even though she’d gone right before leaving home. There was a tightness in her chest telling her she couldn’t breathe, even though she could feel air being pumped in through vents. All the while, the black spots in her vision grew larger and larger, darker and darker, until— Her body trembling, Elise passed out.

She found out later that she’d wet herself in the LOCSI, meaning the simulator had to be shut down for the rest of the day to get professionally cleaned. It was embarrassing. Humiliating, even. But that wasn’t even the worst of it. Not by a long shot.

Her father took her to a doctor, who diagnosed her with something called claustrophobia. He said that she could live a perfectly normal life, but that it’s possible she’d always have to avoid tight and confined spaces. That included starfighter cockpits. To Elise, that meant she couldn’t live a perfectly normal life at all. Her dream lay in tatters. *** Elise jolted awake as a fist hammered on the door to her room.

‘Elise, get up. The Saturn Patrol just got back and there’s a ship on platform three with a burnt-out plasma connector. Oh, and take a wet repairs kit. The pilot’s waste disposal pipe malfunctioned.’ Mike Thomas, Head Ground Technician at the North Montana SDS Airbase, never was one to mince words. Still, it was Elise’s duty shift, so up she got and slipped on her overalls.

It had taken her a long time to come to terms with the idea that she’d never be a pilot. She spent many nights crying into her pillow, and many more with stomach cramps from the numerous experimental medications she tried. After she blew her life savings on a third attempt at hypnotherapy, her family and friends held an intervention. They drilled it into her that she had to accept she might never be a pilot and had to stop wasting her life chasing a dream that would probably never come true. First, Elise swore at them and accused them of hating her. Then she cried. And cried. And cried. Finally, when every drop of moisture had left her body, she made a plan. If she couldn’t be a pilot, she’d have to find another way to be around starfighters. She went to college and studied aerospace engineering, throwing herself into the work with a rabid enthusiasm. It might not be the same as flying the ships herself, but at least she’d get to touch them. To do her part. After years of rigorous exams, extensive coursework, and a growing mountain of student debt, Elise got a job as a ground technician at the SDS base in her home state. It wasn’t her dream, but it was a good second choice.

At least, she thought it was. As Elise headed for platform three, she passed a trio of laughing pilots. ‘Watch out Techie,’ one of them said. ‘O’Brien had bean paste in his rations, so you’re walking into a real biohazard.’ Techie. Techie!? She’d worked on this base for three years and that was still all she was to them. A faceless pair of overalls and a spanner.

She could name them all. There was David Jackson, who had been the captain of his highschool football team and whose home town virtually threw a parade every time he visited; Ranjit Agrawal, whose Hinduism never seemed to stop him from enjoying a grass-fed steak; and Jacob O’Brien, who pretended to be a massive Black Sabbath fan, but who Elise had caught listening to One Direction more than once. Elise knew everything about them, down to the tiniest details of how they liked their ships calibrated, but to them, she would always just be a techie. Once she got to platform three, Elise knew the repair it was an easy enough fix. She clambered aboard the ship and got to work under the floodlights. All she had to do was replace the old plasma connector and run a few simple diagnostics. It wouldn’t take long. As for the ‘wet repairs’, they were disgusting but all part of the job. Aside from the pilots themselves, only qualified technicians were allowed near the starfighters, so it fell to them to handle all aspects of the ships’ maintenance.

Less than half an hour later, Elise was just finishing up and glad of it. She still wasn’t entirely comfortable in the tiny cockpits, but as long as she kept the hatch open, it was usually okay. The problem was, she hadn’t slept well the last couple of nights, and growing exhaustion wasn’t exactly great for keeping the irrational part of her mind at bay.

As she ran her final diagnostic, Elise noticed a figure looming over her. An all too familiar figure.

‘What do you want, Brad?’ she said. Brad Thorn, a fellow ground technician, grinned at her. ‘Just to see how you were getting on. I know interior repairs can get a little… difficult for you.’ Of course he did. A short while after she’d started working at the base, Elise had had an… incident. She’d been trapped inside a broom closet and panicked. By the time someone found her, she’d fainted twice and was drenched in sweat. A few of her colleagues treated her with sympathy, but many laughed. And who was the one who laughed the most? Bradley. Fucking. Thorn. ‘Well I’m fine, so get lost.’ Of course, he didn’t move. ‘Say, all those overcomplicated games you play, you must know how to fly one of these, right?’ ‘In theory.’

‘It must kill you that you’re stuck down here doing repairs instead, huh?’ ‘Not really.’ It did, of course, but she’d sooner take a one-way trip into a black hole than confess her innermost feelings to Brad Thorn.

‘If you say so.’ Elise didn’t see it until it was too late. His hand. He’d been distracting her so she wouldn’t notice it drifting towards the mechanism that would close the hatch.

‘Don’t you dare!’ He dared. The hatch slammed shut, and Elise was right back in the box she’d been in all those years ago. Immediately, the walls began closing in. Just as before, her chest tightened and her vision became patchy and distorted.

Outside the cockpit, Brad laughed, but Elise barely noticed. She took a series of gasping breaths. She could feel the air going in, but it was like it had no effect. Slowly but surely, her consciousness faded.

Her hands dove to the control panel, but with her vision spotty, she couldn’t find the hatch release.

The walls got closer and closer. Her chest tighter and tighter. Just before she passed out, Elise’s fingers found the right button and the hatch burst open again. One deep breath. Then two. Then three. As soon as she regained her balance, Elise got up, climbed out of the cockpit, and punched Brad in his laughing face. He dabbed at his lip. ‘Jesus. What the hell, you psycho! It was just a joke.’ ‘It wasn’t funny.’ Elise wheeled around and made to go back inside. Why did people think it was okay to treat her like that? Just because they didn’t experience things the way she did, they thought it was funny. They were pricks. All of them.

The doors to the base slid open and the three pilots from earlier came sprinting towards her. Behind them, a blaring alarm echoed out. ‘Is the ship ready to go?’ O’Brien asked. ‘Yeah. What’s happening?’ ‘Beast sighting. A big one. Huge. Bigger than anyone’s ever seen before.’ Elise wanted to ask more, but O’Brien was already gone, following his comrades to their ships. She turned around. Watching the ships take off was always the hardest part of working here.

But rather than the roaring of engines, it was the thump of flesh striking the ground and the scream of a man in agony that reached her ears.

Her head whipped around. O’Brien lay on the ground next to a slick patch of oil, clutching his wrist. Ranjit and David stood over him, the latter swearing profusely.

‘Shit. Shit shit shit. We can’t fly a man down. Not against a monster this size. We need to call up a reserve.’ ‘We don’t have any reserves,’ Ranjit said.

‘Shit.’ David glanced at Brad, who stood gaping like a horny teenager seeing his first pair of breasts. ‘What about you? Can you fly?’ ‘No.’ And then realisation lit in his eyes. He thrust a finger at her. ‘But Elise can.’ He whirled on her. ‘You can?’ ‘Y-yes. But not—’ ‘What is it, yes or no?’ ‘I know how to, but I’ve never actually done it.’ ‘It’s easy. Just like in the simulations.’ ‘But—’ David frowned. ‘What the hell is wrong with you? Why are you blabbering like a lost toddler?’ ‘She’s got claustrophobia,’ Brad said. ‘She can’t handle being in the cockpits. They’re too small.’ Instantly, David’s expression softened. He approached Elise and laid a hand on her shoulder. ‘Hey. If you really can fly, we need you. I’m going to teach you a little trick I learned to deal with anxiety.’ ‘You don’t think I’ve already tried that sort of thing?’ She’d tried all the techniques. Everything. It wouldn’t work. It had never worked.

‘This is different. This one only works in times of extreme need.’ ‘I—’ ‘Remember who you’re doing it for. You have family?’ She nodded. There were her parents, her sister, and her little nieces and nephews.

‘Right now, Elise, they need you. Everyone on Earth needs you. When you feel the pressure rising, just remember that.’ Elise didn’t know. So much could go wrong. She wrung her hands, a trickle of sweat carving a path down her cheek.

David gazed into her eyes. ‘I swear to you, if you do this, I won’t rest until we get these ships redesigned to not trigger your claustrophobia. I know what I’m asking is hard. I know it isn’t fair. But if there is the tiniest chance you can fly that ship, I need you to try. Please, just get into the cockpit.’ Elise had never really believed in God. if she had, she’d probably have spent most of her life cursing his name. But at that moment, she felt something. A force that seemed to say, This is your moment. Seize it. Elise nodded. She would try.

This time, when the walls began closing in, she pictured her father, her mother, her sister. She pictured the little ones. She pictured her friends. Everyone who loved her. Everyone who needed her.

Alone, she wasn’t strong enough to fight the fear. But she wasn’t alone. Not then. Not ever. They were with her. All of them. Elise wouldn’t let them down. The walls stopped moving.

‘Elise, you with me?’ came David’s voice through the comm link. ‘I’m with you. Let’s fly.’


Bright, bright, bright. It was always too bright, always bright, always grating, grating at the back of his eyes, in the back of his mind. Peter no longer squinted. The lights that lined the room bored into his brain, boring and drilling, but Peter no longer squinted. The window, the singular window, told him it wasn’t food-time yet, but he couldn’t help but wait, shivering, by the door slot. She would come soon—or maybe not. Time didn’t exist in his blinding cell, not until the sky outside the window slit turned dark. When he stood, he could reach it, peering outside at the endless sky. Peter shivered, sitting on the damn floor. The room had begun to stink again, but he didn’t mind. It meant she would be arriving soon, to clean. Peter loved it when she came. She didn’t look like him, with her stomping boots and her black-eyed mask—Peter often wondered if they were of the same kind—but when he could see her hair, he felt at peace. They had the same brown hair, hair that trickled over her shoulders and cascaded down his back. Sometimes she let him touch it, gently and softly. On very special days, she would stay longer, and run her careful hands down the ridge of his backbone. She would help him to his feet, ever gentle, ever soft, and stretch out his arms and legs so she can run a bit of cold metal down them, bumping into his skin every so slightly, ever so often. He no longer made a sound when she did—she didn’t seem to like his sounds much anyway. He liked hers, though. Peter loved to hear the sounds she made when she came to see him. There was one she made, that she said so gently, with so much devotion. He longed to hear it. He practiced making her noises, so maybe she would stay longer, but she never stayed. Peter bounced up and down on the balls of his feet, both excited and cold. A very special day would be coming soon. Most days, all he could hear was the buzzing of the lights, but sometimes, if Peter huddled by the edge of his cell, he could hear muddled sounds. He thought they might be from others like him, but he’d never seen anybody but her. Maybe there were others out there, others like him. Peter longed to see them. Their sounds surrounded his dreams. He practiced making her sounds a couple times more—she would be so surprised to hear her sounds. Maybe then she’d stay. Food plopped through the food slot, and Peter rushed over, grabbing it as soon as he could so it wouldn’t lay for long on the damn, cold floor. It wasn’t bad—it wasn’t sweet today, but it was food, and he had been so hungry. At this point, Peter knew the routine well. After food came the darkness outside the slit of a window, and sometimes, if it was a very special day, she would come. Surely a very special day was coming soon, Peter thought. He had been waiting for a while now. It was! It was a very special day! Peter leapt to his feet, walking up to the door. She pushed him back as he walked in, which was normal—Peter knew by now that he was not supposed to see whatever was behind his door. She had less brown hair now, and she let him run the tips of his fingers over the feathery ends. He watched her adoringly while she did her measurements. She used the special sound, the one that Peter knew, only once. Peter waited patiently while she tested his memory, his reflexes, using a small shock to let him know what he would done wrong and something small and sweet when he did something right. This was all typical; Peter barely needed to think about it anymore. He made sure not to relieve himself while she was there; she didn’t like it when he did that in front of her, and it always made her leave sooner. Finally, she turned to leave, and Peter made his move. “Peter,” he sounded, and she turned with a start. Peter bounced up and down. He surprised her! Maybe she’d stay. “Peter,” he sounded again, and to his delight, she started making sounds of her own. “Peter.” She made more noises, wiggling her finger back and forth on the little item she always brought with her. Then she said something else to him, but that sound he didn’t recognize. “Peter,” he tried again, but she didn’t seem as surprised this time. He was far taller than her now, but she could still put one hand on his head. He closed his eyes. Maybe this time she’d stay. But she didn’t. She left, leaving Peter in the cold, bright room alone. It was okay. That was okay. He would practice her sounds and maybe next time she’d stay longer. Peter settled on the floor and put his arms over his head, ready to sleep. Next time, he would be better at her sounds. A muffled thump against his window startled him out of his rest. Something must have smacked against it. It wasn’t the first time that had happened, but as he trotted over to the window, he found it was different now, for the first time in eighteen years. There was a crack, splicing down the middle. Peter pressed on the window gingerly, and the freezing glass shifted under his fingertips. A cold stream of air swirled in, and with it, a tiny speck of something wet that settled and melted on Peter’s skin. He pressed harder, and harder, and harder and suddenly it snapped, and the glass under his fingertips was suddenly gone and his arm was out, out in an environment that was much colder than his own. Peter pressed on the other side, and this one cracked too, but this crack stung his skin, as if she was still there, shocking him for being wrong. Peter pulled his hand back in shock—it was wet now, and vividly red with blood. It was colder in the room now, with the frigid air flurrying in. Part of Peter wanted to stay behind, to huddle in the corner. He doubted this is what she wanted him to do. But part of him felt exhilarated. Peter propped himself up on one elbow, standing on his tippy-toes and ignoring the biting sting in his arm when it pressed against the jagged edge of where the window had been, and what he saw amazed him; there was so much outside his room, so many more colors, so many more shapes. Entranced, he stuck his other arm through, ignoring the cold, ignoring the stinging of his arm. Suddenly, wildly, taken by this other world, Peter launched himself through it, bits of where the window used to be piercing and tearing at this stomach and the paper-thin skin of his thighs until he was falling, and then he landed in something cold, something wet, knocking this wind out of his lungs. And when Peter stood up again, he wept. The world outside his room was so much bigger than he’d known. Something alive, something he’d never seen, fluttered over his head, making a sound he’d never heard. The wind blew over his naked body, making the thin hairs that covered his body bristle, before the wind swept past him, rustling a huge, spindling something farther down the path. Peter took a few steps toward it, his feet sinking into the white wet something that covered the ground. He took a few more steps, more than he’d ever taken in his room before, and soon he was running, speeding, faster than he thought he would ever move, and out of his mouth came a sound he’d never heard, and it filled his heart. He reached the spindling something, touched the rough covering, felt pieces break off and crumble in his hands. The fluttering thing, the one that had flown over his head, lighted on the spindling something, looking down at him, and making a sound that was high and piercing and startling and Peter couldn’t help but shriek after it in delight. It flew away from him, and he followed it, running faster than anything Peter had ever seen. He followed it a ways, until the white wet powder that coated his bare skin began to make his feet numb until they wouldn’t move. Peter was surprised—his feet pierced, like the cuts on his arms and stomach, but when he sat to look at them, he couldn’t see any holes or any blood. His arms started to feel sluggish too, Peter noticed, and when he looked at them, he saw them change color from pink to blue to grey. They were hurting too, and Peter started to feel less sure of himself. He took to his feet again, plodding after the little fluttering thing, but it didn’t last. His feet, his legs were too tired. It was okay, though, Peter thought, falling to his knees. He didn’t mind. He was starting to feel quite warm, actually, which was nice. He couldn’t help but wonder if he’d made a mistake though; he knew she wouldn’t like him being out here, and he hated to let her down. His stomach and thighs were sticky with blood now, seeping and dying the fresh soft powdered ground. Peter lay down. The ground beneath him was soft, at least—he liked it more than lying on the cold tile of his room. And the sky—oh! —the sky was so much richer now that he was outside, and speckled with the little fluttering things, calling to each other as they traversed the sky. Peter loved it all, as much as he loved her, and he wished he could show her all of this wonder that had been outside his room the entire time. Most of all, he just wished she was there. Peter couldn’t move his arms or legs anymore, but it didn’t matter. It was okay, just to look up, look to the sky. He had hardly closed his eyes when he heard her voice. She sounded so far away from him—he tried to sit up, to see her, and he found he couldn’t. That was okay. “Peter,” she called, and he sounded back. Peter was happy, as the strength left his chest. She had gotten to see the outside world with him after all.


N.B: A general parody of Dr. Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes series. I'm not even close to his shoe's level but, just wanted to give it a try as a fan. In this parody, Jhonlock is equivalent to Sherlock, Sherlson is equivalent to Watson. Decided to keep Mycoft and Moriarty unchanged.

The case of the GrassYard Café :

  By the time I stepped outside, the leaves were on fire. It's Autumn alright, the season of letting go. But in my case, it brought an end to my long wait for a vacation I was so desperate for. Of course, there was a reason for my being so mad. I was wild to meet my dearest friend.

  Describing my friend's abilities with a pen and paper is an impossible task for me. I've always struggled to keep pace with his melodic methods and sheer intelligence but still, never let down any chance to witness his charishma. But my luck wasn't that good as I got transferred to another district soon after marriage. Of course, marriage wasn't enough to hold me back from the honey of wisdom my fellow pal always offered me.

  Since the day I was transferred, I had been looking for a chance to meet my dear friend Johnlock Wats. Yesterday, the chance had finally come.

  **********

  It was only a 20-minute walk from the station to reach his apartment in B122 hocker street.

  I could have enjoyed the crisp fall air and the fiery trees around me by taking a walk, but decided to take a cab being unable to check my intense ambition to meet him.

  "Too many passengers, sir. You have to share."

  "No problem, anyone would do as long as he wants to go somewhere near the hocker street."

  "Oh, then you are in luck. There's already one waiting inside that one." He pointed his index finger towards an old looking cab, scratches, and stains all over the steel cage.

  "That will do." I was desperate to see him. So, that kind of thing didn't even compete as a disturbance.

  I settled down myself beside my travel companion, an old man with a bushy white beard, bent forward as a result of age. Couldn't say for sure but it was obvious at least 3 layers of clothing were wrapped around him.

  I was looking outside from the window as soon as the cab started to move. As the temperature dropped to the tune of leaves falling, autumn was illustrating the beauty of letting go. But I wasn't interested in it. "Oh my dear, Sherlson." A familiar voice startled me to my limit. I looked at my companion, The old man beside me got back the fire in his eyes. His spine straightened, all the wrinkles are long gone from his tanned face.

  "Jhonlock, You!" It was the exact person I was so mad to visit.

  He chuckled, "It appears that you are stunned as always, yeah, Dr? Nevermind. Why did you choose 'Amanda express' over 'Rose express'?"

  "How in the world you know that?" It was true. I always preferred to travel on the trains of the Rose express. But in this particular case, I chose to go with Amanda express. I couldn't find a way how he could know that.

  My companion giggled." I didn't know, Sherlson. I deduced. The thing itself is, absurdly simple."

  I insisted, " Please tell me, the method, if a method there is, how you could guess that?"

  "Explanation is always tougher than realization. I know you always prefer to take a window seat. It wasn't altered in this case to-day. And more specifically, you took a window seat from the right row of that specific train."

  "Yes, It was just as you described, but I don't see any connection."

  "That's because you don't observe. It's only human nature to peek from the window of any transport they are in. You naturally placed your right hand on the window without even realizing it. There IS a connection, dear Sherlson. If you observe the right sleeve of your black cotton shirt closely, there are some stamens of 'Autumn Hawkbit' stuck in the right corner. It's only the slightest bit of it, but you know, I've done much research on stamens of flowers, so I'm not wrong."

  I looked at the sleeve and found his ever right observations to be correct once again. "But I still can't see any connection."

  "Ask yourself, why the stamens stuck in your sleeve?"

  "The train window?"

  "Exactly. And where did it come from? Certainly from an area rich with that particular flower species within the route of that particular train. There are only five railway transport agencies working on joining your district to mine. And if you've done your homework, you should know, the Rose express route doesn't cover any such area. According to the data I have, only Amanda express' route agrees with our conditions. So, Amanda expresses it is!" Childlike pride bloomed in his over-expressive face.

  "Wow. I didn't see any of that coming. By the way, what are you doing here with this kind of disguise?"

  "Waiting for the cabman to take me to the heart of all mysteries, one of my born enemies."

  "So you are in the middle of something."

  "Indeed. At times like this, I never regret a collaborator, especially you, Sherlson. If you have any energy and time to spare, you're welcome to join me in this bizarre adventure."

  "What's the case?" I was already agreed, in fact, I was born agreed to go on an adventure with this fellow 'candle of wisdom'.

  "This one is nothing but a tiny-simple puzzle. It seems to be ridiculously obvious but still, there is no string to pull. I, at once deduced 'how', but couldn't find any 'why' in this particular Riddle."

  "And what might that be?"

  He looked directly in my eyes," Mr. Garrison. An average unmarried government employee went to the GrassYard cafe to enjoy some Autumn drinks with his fiance. And guess what? She died. The police started the investigation only to find she was poisoned. Until then, it was pretty normal. But the next findings startled them to bits. The 'pumpkin spice iced coffee' was poisoned. But the problem was poison strain was found in both servings. But mysteriously, Mr. Garrison wasn't affected."

  "Certainly he didn't drink that."

  "No, you're at fault. He did drink the coffee."

  "How in the world that's possible! So, who was the culprit?"

  "The police have imprisoned the bar owner and staff. Though they don't have the slightest clue."

  "And, what about you? You can make something out from it?"

  "Just as I said. I know what happened. But don't know 'why'. And I'm in this peculiar form only to find that 'why'. You know where are we going now?"

  I moved my head, "No. Where?"

  "To the magistrate office."

  My eyes almost popped out of its sockets, "The magistrate office!"

  "Quite so. There, we'll receive the key information to pin the king piece."

  "And....." I couldn't finish my sentence as I looked up at my dear friend, already switched to his typical thinking posture; eyes vacant, looking upwards, mouth slightly opened, a mysterious shadow playing upon his passive face. I was his only friend but still didn't have the might to disturb him in this situation, as I had only one head on my shoulder. ( meaning if he blows one up, I wouldn't have any more head to spare.)

  Our cab continued and I continued to think over a question that arose in my mind but couldn't let it out. The office wasn't far. It didn't take more than 10 minutes.

  By the time we were standing outside the office, a content smile was lying upon my companion's lips. Of course, he was again the 'old shrunken man' as soon as he descended from the cab. We were standing just outside the office when I saw a pickpocket entered his hand into my pal's pocket. I was about to say something but reassuring me with a knowing gaze, he went inside the office followed by me shortly. There wasn't much crowd, maybe one or two clients waiting, and one ongoing. We didn't sit close to each other as I didn't have any idea what's going on there.

  Suddenly I saw the old man fall upon the floor with a terrible scream gathering crowd around him. Everyone in the room became busy with him instantly. "What happened! What happened!"

  "It's maybe a cardiac arrest!"

  "We must take him to the doctor."

  I didn't know what to do, but I thought it to be one of his tricks. Many of the inside men along with me handled him outside the room to put him in a cab standing outside. Who will accompany the patient? I instantly declared myself as the candidate. Everyone was quite helping, but, they had their own business, so, no one argued much leaving me the only one with Mr. Jhonlock in the swiftly moving cab. Soon the unconscious man sat down perfectly normally with a melodically smiling face.

  "So, it WAS one of your tricks."

  "Quite so."

  "When did you attained the information?"

  "Oh my dear, Sherlson. It wasn't me who secured the evidence. It was one of my faithful rats, one of the irregulars. I noticed you got quite startled by the pickpocket. He just provided me this." He dragged out a piece of paper from his pocket, holding the corner of it with his thin fingers.

  "And what may that be."

  "This the testimony of the authenticity of the hypothesis I was working on. Or, you can also say, this is the method of catching the 'smaller fish' of this mystery pond."

  "Oh, can you clarify the matter for me?"

  "No need for that. We're heading to the hotspot of mystery to solve the problem once and for all. Now my one last question. Did you recognize the cabman or not?"

  "Huh?"

  "Very well. It's Mycroft and he is the person who secured the key evidence from the 'irregular''." I could only offer him an amused stare.

  ********

  Now, the time has come for me to write about the method, the climax, the checkmate. My hands are shaking. How melodic! The method of his deduction was indeed extraordinary. I am getting the thrill only to think about it. It's unlikely for someone like me to ever be able to describe the method properly. But I'll try my best to underline.

  We got into the cafe, Johnlock already disposed of his disguise, revealing his real human-calculator form. My friend told me about this cafe's being shut, but he requested the police to bring the bartender, Mr. Garrison, and other staff back to the spot. It seemed like the police abided by my pal's suggestions. We took a seat across Mr. Garrison.

  "So, Mr. Wats, any progress?" Mr. Garrison asked, still grieving over his fiance's death.

  Johnlock giggled, "Progress? We already reached our conclusion."

  "So, who is the killer?"The officer standing by the table asked impatiently, scratching his reddish cheek harshly with his right hand.

  "Mr. Garrison himself!"

  "No, what?!" Garrison slammed his fist on the table rising from the chair.

  "Pray sit down, Mr." My friend still calm as usual.

  "Impossible! He drank juice too." The bartender pointed out trembling with shock

  "But he didn't die, did he?" My friend spoke in his ever assured voice.

  "No, but..."

  "You saw him drinking?" Jhonlock snapped before the bartender could finish his sentence.

  "Yes, he finished his glass even before Mrs. Carl getting the chance to take her first sip."

  He smirked, "That's why he is alive."

  All of us still remained in the dark, unable to form any connection. I pinched my friend with a questioning gaze.

  "What?"Oh, you still have no clue? The poison was in the ice! He drank the juice fast only because he knew it. Ice needs time to melt."

  As always, he made everything explainable. The matter, at once revealed itself to be crystal clear to me, along with everyone standing there with dropped jaws.

  "Mr. Wats. You can't just blame me like this. Do you have any proof?" It looked like Mr. Garrison was about to cry.

  "Quite so. I think you happened to lose a very important paper today. Can you recognize this?" He dragged out the land record certificate, the cabman, or should I say, his brother, Mycoft gave him earlier.

  "That's mine! What in the world!"

  "Indeed. You knew Mrs. Carl didn't have any relations whatsoever. You didn't love her, you loved her property. That's why you secretly married her a week ago and killed her off to get a hold on the property."

  "That doesn't make sense. You have nothing on me."

  "Maybe. But he does." A fragile-looking boy entered the scene from the open front door. I could see some of the regular 'irregulars' behind him laughing hysterically.

  "Sith!" The bar-owner exclaimed.

  "Correct. Sith, the boy who supplies ice cubes to this cafe. Hey, now, Mr. Sith, do you recognize this coyote?" He pointed his thumb towards the shocked person, sitting across from us.

  "Yes, he is the person who gave me the bucket of ice I delivered."

  Mr. Garrison hurriedly stood up realizing the defeat but failed to run away, as he saw a steal-made handcuff wrapped around his wrists.

  "Do you have anything to say?" My friend asked in a cold voice.

  "Wait. Why Sith delivered the ice, he gave him. Why he didn't deliver from the factory as usual?" The bar owner asked.

  In answer, my friend just smirked and fixed his gaze upon the questioner, "That's because he was bribed."

  Hence, the case was closed.

  At last, I got the chance to ask the question arose in my mind during our cab journey earlier.

  "Oh, Johnlock."

  "Yes, my dear, Sherlson."

  "Why you didn't...."

  "I understand. There is a reason for that." I don't know how, but somehow my dear fellow figured out what I intended to ask. I really wanted to know, why he needed Mycoft in a case like this? And why was he waiting in the cab in the first place? Is there still something in the dark?

  I asked with some scared confusion, "Could it be?" My guess was correct.

  His gaze became sharp, lips tightened, "Jim Moriarty."

  *****


“Ugh,” Hanna uttered under her breath. Her laptop charger had escaped the wall outlet yet again, as it had four times before that same day. Or was it night? She could not tell. As far as she was concerned, the library was her home now, its grayish-tan walls and dusty bookshelves emitting a strangely hospitable aura. Stretching like a contortionist, she maneuvered the plug back into the inconveniently-placed wall outlet. The charging light turned orange, and Hanna leaned back in her chair and sighed in relief.

She looked at her watch; 4:00 AM, The writing in geometric font blazed at her bloodshot eyes. She sat there and simply stared at the numbers until they read, “4:03,” then swiftly got up and began to throw things into her backpack. “HOW,” she questioned aloud, clearly the only living person left in the library at this time. How did she do this? Did she fall asleep? Where did the time go? Hanna reflected on other events similar to this. She was known to fall asleep just about anywhere, and to get so caught up in her work she would forget the time. No matter. She just needed to get home and finish her essay, her grading for grad school, and bake a cake for her friend’s birthday party. She would be able to finish all that and get to class at 8 AM. Perfect! she thought.

Hanna meandered through the rows of shelves, bumping into the occasional section of books. She was sure she knew how to get to the exit… Or was she? This was actually a different section of the library than she normally visited, and her three and a half hours of sleep from the night prior were finally catching up to her. But that was college! You were supposed to never sleep, survive on the pure sodium of ramen, and drink coffee instead of water. Right? “Hanna…” a faraway, raspy voice called. Hanna stopped in her tracks, a shiver running up and down her spine. Wow , she thought, I really need to get some sleep! She smiled and shook her head as she began to walk once again, trying to reschedule her night to include a one hour nap.. But as she continued her quest, sections of books that she swore were never there previously began to appear in her path. She tried to read what genres were on the signs, but she could not read them anymore. Each sign seemed to be written in Hieroglyphs, or Cuneiform, or some other ancient language unknown to her.

“Haaannaaa,” a different voice, lower and weaker, beckoned to her. What she had formerly believed to be an auditory hallucination was now becoming more real by the second. Glancing behind her, she continued to walk, quickening her pace until she was striding, then running, then sprinting. Her aching bones and tingling muscles worked as hard as they could to carry her along as she ran, dodging falling books that fell from disturbed shelves. After what felt like a lifetime of running, Hanna screeched to a halt. In front of her was a door. But it was not like any other door in the library that she had seen. It was made of a darker, older wood than the others, and did not have a rectangular window with chicken wire on it. “What the-” she said under her breath. “Hanna,” a third, higher-pitched voice whispered behind her, and she decided it was not time to admire the door any longer. Faster than lightning could strike, she had grasped the golden handle, swung open the door, and thrown herself through it, slamming it behind her. She breathed in relief for only a second, and then absolute horror coursed through her body. Before her was a dark, dripping room full of moldy old bookshelves that towered above her. In front of her stood three figures, each shrouded in darkness. Her vision spun as she gazed upon them, thinking about how this would be her last night alive. “Who are you!” she managed to sputter out. The figures looked at each other, looked back at Hanna, then moved into the only dim light in the room, the source of which Hanna could not discern. When she saw them, she felt as if a cold hand had clasped her windpipe shut. The three souls stood in a row, sad eyes bulging out of pale, translucent-skinned heads. The grayish-pink of their brains shone through their skulls and fading skin, and their gaping mouths quivered, dry and decomposing. Hanna’s eyes traveled down to their hands, which each figure had folded politely in front of them. Their hands all bore the same translucent skin as the rest of their bodies, and Hanna could see thin, bony fingers with long, yellow, cracked nails. Some of the skin on their fingers had come off, and Hanna could see bloody bones. She suppressed the immediate urge to vomit, and instead wordlessly stared at the three figures, inspecting them individually. The person on the left wore a long, blue skirt and a white button-up polo shirt with a yellow sweater wrapped around her neck. Much of her hair had fallen out, but what was left was stringy, the color of urine, and pulled up into a high ponytail. Her faded blue eyes bore into Hanna’s very being, and protruded slightly from their sagging sockets. Hanna’s attention moved to the middle figure, who was holding a beat-up book with a maroon cover that looked as if it were from biblical times. She gasped and jumped back slightly as she inspected their face more closely. Their skin was the color of rice paper, and was sunken in so much that it seemed it was glued closely to their skull. Some bits of their skin had sunken in and opened up, like great craters on the surface of the moon. Shaking like a bad washing machine, Hanna adjusted her eyes and fixated on the third figure. He reached for something in his pocket, slowly and with great effort. He pulled out a most likely decades-old cardboard box, slid it open, and picked out a cigarette. With another trembling hand, the figure searched his pocket for a lighter, and pulled one out. The other two figures slowly rotated their rotting heads towards him, and stared disdainfully. He brought the lighter up to the cigarette, flicked it a few times, and seemed very confused when it refused to spark. The other two figures seemingly exchanged a look, then went back to peering woefully at Hanna. “Hello, dear,” the person in the middle finally said, speaking in one of the voices she had heard before. Their voice sounded even more dry than before, and Hanna shuddered. “Hi,” Hanna replied, eyes jolting every which way. She searched for an exit, any door she could possibly see. But there was no escape in sight. “Are you studying, too?” said the man on the right in his wispy tone. He flicked the lighter absentmindedly with his left hand. “Yes, I was studying Sociology and writing my essay on Aristotle,” Hanna responded, starting to feel eerily calm. “Aristotle! He is quite interesting,” the girl on the left said, smiling from cheek to cheek with black gums and corroded teeth. “I prefer Gorgias, myself,” the man said, glancing over at the ponytailed woman. She glared at him with sunken eyes. “Where AM I?” Hanna managed to ask. “Why sweetie, you’re Awakened,” the middle figure replied, smirking. “What does that mean?” asked Hanna, “And why me?” “Because,” the woman on the left chimed, “You’re dedicated.” “Dedicated?” Hanna responded. “Yes,” the man on the right added, “And that’s why you should stay here. We have all the knowledge we need, right here. We never sleep, we never eat, we never bathe. We have all we could ever ask for. Nothing else is needed but to KNOW. To be AWAKE.” Hanna was completely still now. What information lay in these tomes? What could she acquire from learning all these things? Would she discover something new in the name of Sociology? Would this finally get her the A+ she had been striving for since day 1? Since she knew how to think, speak, and write? “All you have to do is open a book,” said the middle figure, grinning with their disturbingly jagged teeth. Their black gums glinted at her. “How did you all get here?” Hanna asked. She felt off. Something was suppressing her normal inhibitions, and she couldn’t figure out what it was. Her brain felt strained, like she was thinking about imaginary numbers in Calculus. “Just open a book, honey. It will all be okay,” the man on the right added. The three began to walk slowly towards her. As the three loathsome learners closed in, her brain seemed to click back into place. “I think I’ll be going now,” Hanna stammered, backing up. The figures pressed in even more, their eyes glowing menacingly in the now inky darkness. Hanna did not care what was behind her. She kept backpedaling, and backpedaling, until she fell back, breath catching in her throat as she tried to scream. As she fell, she could see the faces of the three half-dead library enthusiasts gazing down at her. They all wore frowns on their moist, indented faces, and their brow bones drew together as they glared down at Hanna. She fell away, and only hit solid ground after a few feet. She blinked, and was back in the library. Sitting up, she looked at her surroundings rapidly. She found herself in the place where the door had been. It was no longer there. This did not surprise Hanna, but her body and mind were in shock from the entire experience. She pushed off of the rough, carpeted floor and took off running in the opposite direction. Instead of strange, unfamiliar bookshelves and sections seemingly materializing in front of her, this time she knew exactly where she was. Following her knowledge of the library’s interior, she took the exact directions she knew would get her out. She sent out a prayer to whatever forces would answer that she would make it to the front of the library and out the door. She went down a flight of stairs, and finally saw the large, glass doors of the library. However, she would not let herself be relieved yet. She had no clue how she was going to get out if the doors were locked. On her first try, the giant library door opened up, releasing her into the cold nighttime air. Hanna exhaled a huge sigh, and her breath vaporized. Never before had she walked home that quickly. The next day, Hanna emailed all of her teachers and supervisors that she would not be coming to classes. She texted her friends quick messages canceling her plans for the day. That day, she decided, would be completely for rest. From now on, her health and happiness was her top priority. Not school, not other people. Herself. And never, EVER, again would she find herself in the library at 4 in the morning, speaking to half dead students who had never made their way out of the trap of academia.


Every Sunday morning I take a light jog around a park near my home. There’s a lake located in one corner of the park. Each time I jog by this lake, I see the same elderly woman sitting at the water’s edge with a small metal cage sitting beside her. This past Sunday my curiosity got the best of me, so I stopped jogging and walked over to her. As I got closer, I realized that the metal cage was in fact a small trap. There were three turtles, unharmed, slowly walking around the base of the trap. She had a fourth turtle in her lap that she was carefully scrubbing with a spongy brush. “Hello,” I said. “I see you here every Sunday morning. If you don’t mind my nosiness, I’d love to know what you’re doing with these turtles.” She smiled. “I’m cleaning off their shells,” she replied. “Anything on a turtle’s shell, like algae or scum, reduces the turtle’s ability to absorb heat and impedes its ability to swim. It can also corrode and weaken the shell over time.” “Wow! That’s really nice of you!” I exclaimed. She went on: “I spend a couple of hours each Sunday morning, relaxing by this lake and helping these little guys out. It’s my own strange way of making a difference.” “But don’t most freshwater turtles live their whole lives with algae and scum hanging from their shells?” I asked. “Yep, sadly, they do,” she replied. I scratched my head. “Well then, don’t you think your time could be better spent? I mean, I think your efforts are kind and all, but there are fresh water turtles living in lakes all around the world. And 99% of these turtles don’t have kind people like you to help them clean off their shells. So, no offense… but how exactly are your localized efforts here truly making a difference?” The woman giggled aloud. She then looked down at the turtle in her lap, scrubbed off the last piece of algae from its shell, and said, “Sweetie, if this little guy could talk, he’d tell you I just made all the difference in the world.” Once upon a time a psychology professor walked around on a stage while teaching stress management principles to an auditorium filled with students. As she raised a glass of water, everyone expected they’d be asked the typical “glass half empty or glass half full” question. Instead, with a smile on her face, the professor asked, “How heavy is this glass of water I’m holding?” Students shouted out answers ranging from eight ounces to a couple pounds. She replied, “From my perspective, the absolute weight of this glass doesn’t matter. It all depends on how long I hold it. If I hold it for a minute or two, it’s fairly light. If I hold it for an hour straight, its weight might make my arm ache a little. If I hold it for a day straight, my arm will likely cramp up and feel completely numb and paralyzed, forcing me to drop the glass to the floor. In each case, the weight of the glass doesn’t change, but the longer I hold it, the heavier it feels to me.” As the class shook their heads in agreement, she continued, “Your stresses and worries in life are very much like this glass of water. Think about them for a while and nothing happens. Think about them a bit longer and you begin to ache a little. Think about them all day long, and you will feel completely numb and paralyzed – incapable of doing anything else until you drop them.” The moral: It’s important to remember to let go of your stresses and worries. No matter what happens during the day, as early in the evening as you can, put all your burdens down. Don’t carry them through the night and into the next day with you. If you still feel the weight of yesterday’s stress, it’s a strong sign that it’s time to put the glass down.

During a research experiment a marine biologist placed a shark into a large holding tank and then released several small bait fish into the tank. As you would expect, the shark quickly swam around the tank, attacked and ate the smaller fish. The marine biologist then inserted a strong piece of clear fiberglass into the tank, creating two separate partitions. She then put the shark on one side of the fiberglass and a new set of bait fish on the other. Again, the shark quickly attacked. This time, however, the shark slammed into the fiberglass divider and bounced off. Undeterred, the shark kept repeating this behavior every few minutes to no avail. Meanwhile, the bait fish swam around unharmed in the second partition. Eventually, about an hour into the experiment, the shark gave up. This experiment was repeated several dozen times over the next few weeks. Each time, the shark got less aggressive and made fewer attempts to attack the bait fish, until eventually the shark got tired of hitting the fiberglass divider and simply stopped attacking altogether. The marine biologist then removed the fiberglass divider, but the shark didn’t attack. The shark was trained to believe a barrier existed between it and the bait fish, so the bait fish swam wherever they wished, free from harm. The moral: Many of us, after experiencing setbacks and failures, emotionally give up and stop trying. Like the shark in the story, we believe that because we were unsuccessful in the past, we will always be unsuccessful. In other words, we continue to see a barrier in our heads, even when no ‘real’ barrier exists between where we are and where we want to go.

After spending nearly every waking minute with Angel for eight straight days, I knew that I had to tell her just one thing. So late at night, just before she fell asleep, I whispered it in her ear. She smiled – the kind of smile that makes me smile back –and she said, “When I’m seventy-five and I think about my life and what it was like to be young, I hope that I can remember this very moment.” A few seconds later she closed her eyes and fell asleep. The room was peaceful – almost silent. All I could hear was the soft purr of her breathing. I stayed awake thinking about the time we’d spent together and all the choices in our lives that made this moment possible. And at some point, I realized that it didn’t matter what we’d done or where we’d gone. Nor did the future hold any significance. All that mattered was the serenity of the moment. Just being with her and breathing with her.


The day I realized I was nothing was the same day I destroyed the one thing I worked my whole life to find. My mind was still foggy, as it had always been. I was still mindlessly working, searching for fire stones, as if nothing was wrong.

Nothing had changed, and only then did I realize that nothing ever would. I walked obediently in a single-file line, standing in the very back because I was the smallest, the one least likely to be successful. There weren't many children in our village. In fact, there were three. None were younger than thirteen. The entire village, from the elderly, down to me, were in the same line. The strong young men stood at the lead, the fathers and mothers behind them. Finally, there were the two young boys and then me, the only daughter in the group.

We all carried heavy mining tools, enchanted to be able to break through any stone. Everyone ahead of me was looking around like hawks for the one thing that they were trying to find: the cave of fire stones. I didn’t fully understand what the fire stones were, and come to think of it, I don’t even have the slightest idea why we are searching for them. For some reason though, that didn’t matter. My scrawny arms never got tired under the weight of the tools. No one ever needed to sleep, or eat, or drink, but none of this ever crossed our minds or stood out as strange to any of us. “Stop!” The head of the line announced to us. Everyone stopped at once at his command. “Mine here.” The same young man yelled back to the group, pointing at a small mound. As if right on cue, everyone started forming a circle around the hill, making it so everyone had an area to hit. I raised my pickaxe above my head in time with everyone else. I closed my eyes, mustering all my energy, and struck the sharp edge down into the cold, hard earth. The impact caused the pickaxe to fall out of my grasp, a mistake that never happened before. Before I could even grab the tool again, a hand grasped my shoulder and pulled me back, out of the circle of mining villagers. I screamed and yelled in shock, trying to get myself out of my captor’s grasp. I looked to my fellow villagers, seeing if anyone noticed or heard my screaming, but they simply spread out a bit to close the empty gap. “What…? No!” I strained in the grasp of my captor, but their grip was too strong. Once my village wasn’t able to be seen through the dense trees, whoever was grabbing me finally let go. I scrambled to my feet and whipped around to finally have a look at who dragged me over here, “What do think you’re-” I froze. I was expecting to look up at a huge, scary man, but instead a young boy, my age, stood in front of me. I screamed in shock at seeing another person as young as I was, but I was soon silenced by the boy putting a hand over my mouth. “Stop! I’ll explain, but you need to stay quiet. There are things in this forest that you don’t want tracking you.” he said. My mouth snapped shut. “Where do I start?” the boy mumbled to himself, then looked back up at me. “How would you react if I told you that everything you ever knew was wrong and you actually don’t exist because someone is controlling all you do and think?” I took two steps back, worried the boy was mental. “That's what I thought.” Before I could run, the boy grabbed my arm. “Hear me out.” He said seriously, “If I’m so wrong, then what's your name… actually, what’s this world even called anyway?” I raised an eyebrow, “Well, duh, it’s…” I froze, then held my head as if I was having a bad headache. Of course I knew what the very world I live in is called! Except… I didn’t. I stopped trying to run, curious to hear the boy’s explanation. “Exactly. It’s called nothing. Everyone here is nothing. You're under a spell; the reason it was so easy to snap you out of it was that you're a kid, so the curse is less potent.” He motioned to the darkness of the forest. Before I could ask what he was doing, kids my age, and younger started coming out of the darkness one by one, shocking me with each young face. “Each one of us,” the boy continued, gesturing to the children, “came from your village. I’ve been working hard to free the children from the curse before it was too late. We-” It was too much for me. “Hold it! Back up! What on earth are you talking about?! What curse?” “The curse was cast so that the very universe has complete control over you; you were hardly human, just their minion ready to do their bidding.” The boy paused, “The fire stones, what you and the rest of our village were looking for, are the source of the curse. If your… if our village finds it, then the curse will take complete hold and we will no longer be existent at all, not even under another’s control.” “No. No, this can’t be true! That means… that means that this whole time, I've been searching endlessly for something that will be the end of this world as we know it?!” I was stunned. “Precisely, we need your help to block the fire stone cave before they find it. I already tried multiple times to free the other two children in our village, but it seems they’re already knee-deep in the curse.” the boy said sadly. “So will you help us?” I was still confused, my mind was overflowing with the new information, but I nodded. “But… How will we even find the cave? Our village has been searching for ages… and they’re adults! We’re just a bunch of kids!” The boy looked worried, as if just realizing they don’t have much time, “We already found it.” “Wait what?!” “The problem is, it’s in the exact location that our villagers are mining as we speak!” “Why didn’t you lead with that?!” I shouted at him as the whole group started running back through the trees. By the time we got back, the villagers had already made their way very far into the mound that I just recently left. Glints of red were already glowing through the dirt and stone. One of the villagers, a huge man, was mining very quickly, at his rate it wouldn’t be long before he hit the fire stones. “What can we-” I started but was cut off when I saw the boy pull a sword out of my abandoned tool belt and jumped in front of the large miner, crossing his weapon with the man’s pickaxe and causing his fast progress to stop. The man was stunned for only a moment, then raised his pickaxe and started dueling with the young boy, trying to get back to his job.

“Don’t just stand there!” the boy yelled at me, throwing my old pickaxe in my direction. “Do something!” I shakily reached down and grabbed my tool as a miner started charging towards me. I realized I was standing in between him and the fire stone mine. I dodged his attack and let my mining instincts take over, helping me fend for myself. The attacking villager recovered from his miss and struck at me again, this time I met the blow with my own pickaxe, pushing him back. Suddenly my eye caught on something, a small trickle of water was spilling out from between two rocks and running down the hill to where a group of fire stones were gathered. Each fire stone that was splashed with the water turned black and lost its red glow. That gave me an idea. I pressed my pickaxe hard against my attacker’s own weapon, forcing him to back up. When he had backed up close enough to the source of the water, I released the pressure on his pickaxe and used the moment of his confusion to strike my pickaxe down onto the rocks that were blocking a stream of water to spill out. Immediately, the rocks broke and water poured out of the hole, drenching me and many others. The water splashed ferociously down to the fire stone mine. I watched as it hit the uncovered fire stones, turning them black one by one and taking a bit of the curse away with them. The blackness spread until the entire hill was covered in it. All around me, villagers dropped to their knees, dropping their pickaxes and causing the children fighting them to look up in confusion. When they saw the mine, their faces turned into smiles. “What… happened?” The villager who was attacking me earlier asked, “Who are you? Who… who am I?” “You're free!” I said happily, “They’re free; we're all free!” “What are you saying? Where am I?” I thought for a moment, “You're in Zumari, land of the curse-breakers.”

It sounded right the moment I said it.


I remember the day i met them like it was yesterday. It was a hot summer day, i was 15 and visiting my grandmother in the countryside. I was mowing my grandmother's lawn when i saw a tall, blue tree in the distance. Trees are not usually blue and neither were they that large. The tree seemed like it was growing as i got farther from it while i was mowing the far west side of my grandmother's lawn. Curious, i made a note to myself to go explore that area with the tree after i finish mowing the lawn. When i finally finished, it was 3pm in the afternoon. Perfect for exploring. I asked my grandmother if i could go explore the east part of town and she let me. Off i went with a backpack filled with snack bars and water bottles. The east side of the town was a thin forest, barely thick. enough to be called a forest. Weirdly enough, with each step i took towards the tree the smaller it looked, i barely managed to find my way to the tree as it got smaller than the trees around me. I arrived at 4:30pm, the view was honestly breathtaking. There was a small pond, around 2 meters wide and filled with fish that i've never seen before. The blue tree i saw earlier in the day was at the center of the pond, reduced to the size of a toddler. I took off my backpack and stepped inside the pond to take a closer look at the tree. As soon as i was close enough to touch the tree i suddenly found myself back at the pond side next to my backpack. "The tree likes you, interesting." I looked around but couldn't see anyone. "Hello?" I called count. There was no answer, i didnt know what i was expecting i was going to call it a day and leave until an apple was thrown onto my head. "Up here, genius." I looked up at the trees and saw a person sitting on one of the branches "uhm, who are you" i asked. They didnt answer me and instead slid down the side of the tree and faced me eye to eye. They pointed at the tree and said "If you wernt luck you would've drowned." surprised, i asked TheM "what do you mean?" They shook their head and said "come on, lets get out of here." I reluctantly followed them back out of the forest. "Take this" They said and handed me a worn out jacket. "Bring it to the house right next door to you grandma's" "What?" The pushed me away from them and the next thing i knew, they were gone. With nothing else to do, i went back to my grandma's but before i went in i remembered i still had the jacket so i knocked on the neighbors door. "Hi, its the neighbor from next door." They opened the door and i was surprised to see that he wasn't the person that gave me the jacket. "How can i help ya" he asked. I gave him the jacket and his eyes went wide. "Where did you get this?" 'a person gave it to me" "wwho?" "i dunno, they were gone before i could ask" He invited me in for a cup of tea and we hit it off well. "And that kids, is how i met your father" "Whatt, motherr it cant end like that, who's the person that gave you the jacket, why did they give you a jacket, why was there a blue tree that got smaller as you went towards it and bigger as you went further from it, how did you return back to the pond side and-" "Whoa one question at a time sweetie, i have answers for them all" "okay.. so wwho gave you that jacket?" "I found out a few years later that the person who gave me the jacket was a teen that drowned in the pond before i arrived there." "How did they give you the jacket then?" "I actually dont know, maybe my mind tricked me into thinking they gave me the jacket but in reality i found it and it was too much for my brain to handle" "ok.. why was there a blue tree that changed size?" "There were actually 2 trees, the bigger tree was at the far back of the forest and it didnt actually change size, the trees were blue Spruce trees, i can get us one if you want." "no thanks. ok but why did you get the jacket?" "I honestly dont know, maybe it was the least traumatic thing i could've carried back with me" "How did you return back to the pond side then?" "I think i have a theory that i never really went into the pond as i was dry when i returned to the pond side, it probably was just my imagination that merged with my memories. It also could have something to do with the fact that i might have seen a drowned person and my brain couldnt handle the stress" " why did you knock on father's door, if there wasn't a person that told you to, why did you decide to knock on his door?" "I like to think that it was fate." "ok, last question, why did father not freak out when you handed him a soaked jacket of a missing girl?" "Because father was the one who drowned them." "What?!" "Nothing, now eat your breakfast and go off to school hun. The bus is outside already" "ok-" She picked up her packed lunch box and put on her backpack. Off she went and into the school bus. I waved goodbye to my daughter, i was about to go inside when i saw them on the bus, looking right into my eyes and making a terrifying grin. They had a knife and pointed it at my daughter. Goodbye they mouthed and the bus drove away.


March 15, 1963 Dear Depths of My Heart, Red enveloped me today as I set foot in a land I have never known before. Though its contents are a mystery, I feel an excitement and eagerness to explore what gives this place life and interest! Perhaps, after all these years of searching, it will be the place I can call home. The ground beneath my feet is red. A fine-grained texture runs through it. Many thin streams rush by and the liquid that they hold is thick and red as well. Some streams run up a slope while others run down. As I take in my surroundings, I know there is much to learn here, but I cannot dig deeper alone. This journey requires that I have a companion, and the only person who has explored this land is Bridgett Gwynet. Today, I followed Bridgett for just half a mile before we sat down and rested. I was hoping to go further but she claims this place is best explored one small piece at a time. She told me about her family and friends, and I felt quite shy as I tried to politely keep eye contact during our conversation. She has striking blue eyes that are outlined by thick black lashes and whenever her irises catch the sunlight my cheeks flush with color. I enjoyed the stories she told me about her family. I can tell that she misses them. She’s been far away from them for so long, but she has been on a journey to discover new things, and I am honored that she has opened an invitation for me to explore the things she has discovered. March 19, 1963 Dear Depths of My Heart, This morning, as we were walking along, we came across what appeared to be a smooth red canal. The thick, red liquid that runs through most of this land was rushing through it. As I took notes in my mind of the things I believed made this place so special, I listened to Bridgett share more of her experiences. In an instant, I found a moment to drop a humorous comment in our conversation. Bridgett laughed and looked at me. Her bright blue eyes sparkled. All at once, the liquid that was running through the canal immensely quickened in pace and the ground below my feet started to pulse fiercely. I nearly lost my balance! It was then that I realized there had always been subtle pulses in the ground, I just had not yet noticed them. March 21, 1963 Dear Depths of My Heart, Each day as I’ve studied these new surroundings I have found myself falling in love – with Bridgett Gwynet that is. She has such a calm aura about her, and she is so sure of her decisions! She is always determined to learn more and excel in what she is learning. I’ve adored her company and hope that our traveling will continue for a longer time. There is a lot more territory to cover! April 16, 1963 Dear Depths of My Heart, I can no longer hold my tongue. I must tell Bridgett how I feel! Our time together has been short, but she has been so open and willing to guide me along as she explains the intricate details of the atmosphere that surrounds us. She is so skilled in the knowledge of this land. I can tell she has studied it thoroughly and has given her studies much thought. I want to build a home here, and I hope that Bridgett will have an interest in pursuing the dream I’ve contrived.

I will tell her all tomorrow. Truthfully, I am frightened to know her answer. I want her to feel the same feelings I have, but I don't know her mind completely. I do have reason to believe that she has at least some interest in me. After all, yesterday she smiled widely at me as I trekked down a slope, stepping over small streams as I went. Once I reached her, she stretched out a hand and grabbed my own, giving it a quick squeeze before letting go. “You made it, Steven! I thought you were going to stumble head first for a second,” she said with a chuckle. I smiled, but said nothing, still dumbfounded by the imprinted sensation her touch had left on my hand. April 17, 1963 Dear Depths of My Heart, I am numb. Bridgett does not feel the same way I do. I asked her why, but she stumbled in her words and would not give me a clear answer. She told me she thought I was wonderful, though, but I suppose that isn’t enough. A strange awkwardness arose rapidly between us and Bridgett politely concluded that she would not be my guide any longer. She kindly advised me to go no further into this unknown land because I had never explored it on my own before, and without her, it would be nearly impossible to discover the secrets that lay within. I walked away feeling sheepish and stupid. I wish I would’ve never said anything about my affections. But most of all, I wish Bridgett would give me a clearer understanding of her response to them. My curiosity has stirred in me for hours, and I have concluded that I will spend one more day exploring this land before I quit. Though I will not be able to know what direction to go, and I won’t be able to find the hidden places, I will perhaps at least settle my mind by feeling like I have fully finished my exploration. April 18, 1963 Dear Depths of My Heart, I have had a grim conclusion to my expedition. While walking along a section of land, I came across a large formation made up of a soft but firm substance. Three, what appeared to be tunnels, set atop it. I found an opening near the bottom of the odd configuration. My inquisitive nature took over, and I entered. The walls that surrounded me were pulsing in time with the ground. Streaming up them was the peculiar red fluid that I had become so familiar with. I looked at it in awe, wondering how the rushing liquid could defy gravity and run upwards. The sudden sound of someone clearing their throat made me jump. I turned around and saw a man. He was tall, had dark hair, brown eyes, and a chiseled jaw. “Who are you?” I questioned in a surprised tone. “Joey Allbrook. Who are you?” Who am I? The realization sunk into me, making me stumble back. I fell against the rushing liquid. Its current was fierce, and in a moment, I was lifted up from the ground and pulled towards the opening of the tube above me. I looked below and watched Joey Allbrook grow smaller and smaller. Who am I? Well, I can tell you who I’m not. I’m not the keeper of Bridgett Gwynet’s heart. I looked up as I was pushed through the end of the tube. The red liquid engulfed me. My mind whirled. I had to get out or I would drown in the overwhelming torturous turmoil. I collected my thoughts and realized the only way to survive was to accept the truth and make peace with it. “I am not the keeper of Bridgett’s heart. I am not the keeper of Bridgett’s heart.” I repeated this to myself over and over until I believed it and realized I had to live with that factuality. In the moment of what felt like my last breath, I closed my eyes and when I opened them the liquid was gone. I gasped in the air and frantically looked at my surroundings. I was sitting on the bench at the park where I had last seen Bridgett walking with a man named Joey Allbrook.

I could feel my heartbeat pounding in my chest. It was true, even after all my exploration and deep desire to learn all I could about that beautiful blue eyed woman, I could not succeed in making her heart my home. In fact, it was impossible to succeed. Joey already resided in the place I had hoped for. And so, dear depths of my heart, I am back to searching for a place to rest you.


Everyday he opens me, digging through my insides, searching for something to appease him. I’ve seen nobody else with the privilege to do it. Just him. I feel like that creates a bond between us. When only he is in the house, I don’t see him as often as when there’s company here. I look forward to company, I’ve come to love those days. That’s when his hands are inside me the most. Digging, pushing, re-arranging my interior goods like he’s tickling me. I must admit, we’ve been together a long time and I care about him as much as he cares about me. That’s why I get so concerned about him when he’s alone. He doesn’t like to be alone. When he has no one to cook for. No reason for his hand to embrace my handle and pull my door open, peeking at my insides once again. He doesn’t care to cook for himself, though I think he should. Oh! Where are my manners? I should take this opportunity to introduce myself. I’m Electric General and my owner is Ralph. Ralph’s a great guy. He has a happy heart and a smile that could move mountains. He’s more than ready to do anything for anybody. And to feed others? He would do at the drop of a hat. I’ve seen him give away his last meal just so someone doesn’t go hungry. Since he lost his job though, he has a fog of melancholy seeping around him that weighs down that heart and smile. It’s been getting worse as the days go on. And truthfully, it started before he lost his job. He worked hard everyday but lacked a partner to spend his free time with. That was upsetting to him. Then losing his job made the fog grow thicker. I’d see him sitting at the kitchen table, on the phone, or computer looking for work. He’d stick reminders on me with those magnets I like. But he had no luck so far. Then, to make matters worse, our house got broken into and his wallet, keys, including the car was stolen. The cat crawling silent ninjas even managed to find his shoebox of rainy day money. Ralph cursed those pills he recently started taking for depression. They made him sleep so soundly he never even stirred while his house got cleaned out. Those criminals even had the audacity to handle my doors and open me up like they owned me! They rummaged through food on shelves and violating me even further, opening drawers as well. It had my Freon boiling. Those no good robbers even took some food right out of my body! I was upset, but my buddy Ralph, he took it real hard. He was talking to himself and saying how not only is he broke now but he’s still alone. Just to make the hard knocks worse. I think about him going through the days so lonely without a girlfriend or even a friend for that matter. I worried about him to the point where I blew my bulb! His deep depression was wearing off on me and I was dark for days. While I was wondering in dark despair if my bulb would ever get changed again, he was wondering if he’d ever meet someone who he could cook for. He reached the end and Ralph seemed broken now. He needed food and his means of buying some was gone. He was all alone, hungry, sick and just wishing he had food in me. I was tired of being empty too. When he had people over on the rare occasion, he would open and close me so much, my hinges loved the workout. These were days when he’d smile and laugh like he hadn’t a care in the world. When he’s creating some culinary temptation for others at the job side of the stove, it brings him such uplifting happiness. Whomever enters this home will get an amazing dish to eat, that’s for sure. But he was alone and so tired of his life he wanted to end it all. I’ve even heard him crying and that really shook my shelves! I wished I could make him happy. I couldn’t take watching him go on like this. I did the only thing I could think of to help. One of the papers he had under a magnet on my beautiful face was for a support group. I hadn’t seen him use it yet so I did what I could to shake it loose and have that paper fall on the floor in front of me. Imagine my relief when it worked. He picked up that paper and made the phone call. He went to his first support meeting that night. It turned out great. He met a few people who were going through what he was going through, and it really helped him see a light at the end of the tunnel. To top it off, the group was having its big annual members meeting next week and needed a caterer. Of course, Ralph jumped at the opportunity. I was feeling great, Ralph finally changed my bulb and with the commission for the catering, filled me full of food he would process into culinary delights. As far as how Ralph felt, well, things were finally looking up. This was the perfect opportunity for him to feel useful again and needed. He was going to cook! And for so many people. He would make this feast a memorable one. At the meeting, everyone was going wild over Ralph’s cooking. He had taken the time to ensure all members palettes were covered. Carefully making notes about allergies and general likes and dislikes had paid off. Everyone was so pleased. Especially Ralph! It just so happened that a girl at the meeting pointed out a chef in the crowd to Ralph. Her name was Susan and she said he would be a good person to get to know. Holding a plate, he repeats the question he’s been asking everybody all night, “Would you like something to eat?” He gave a plate to a man named Norman Rose, who worked for an exclusive restaurant downtown. This man had been attending the group for years and wondered if he could help Ralph in any way. He thought the food was so delicious, he asked if Ralph would come on an interview with him. Norman owned a few restaurants downtown and one had an opening for a chef. The man wanted to do what he could to give Ralph a chance. He just hoped he wasn’t making a mistake. For the second time that month Ralph got to cook for someone! And this time it could land him a job that he so desperately needed. I loved the way my hinges were getting a workout from being used so often again. Ralph practiced some of his most challenging dishes to find just the right one for his interview. I was in bliss with all the poking and prodding he was doing with my insides. With no surprise from me, he got the job! The last thing he packed were my insides to sufficiently keep everything temperature locked. There were so many bags and boxes to take with us to our new place in the city. This would be an adventure, I thought. Ralph had to move himself closer to the city for his new job as Head Chef at Chez Louie’s. Right in the middle of the thumping downtown core. He was so happy now. He couldn’t believe he ever wanted to kill himself. Things were so good now. Especially since Ralph met Susan. Finally, he wasn’t alone. Time could do some amazing things. Ralph and Susan decided to move in together. She already had a spacious apartment in the city close to his job, so he would move right in with her. But he wasn’t going anywhere without me. I’m a state-of-the-art machine.  A well-oiled machine. I was expensive and besides, I was his first. That’s right, I was the first appliance Ralph had purchased as his grown up self had needed one. I had the best heating and cooling system this side of the state line. The chef that lived alive and beating in Ralph would never let me go. Besides, we had a bond. I did such a good job for him. Making sure the food was cold and fresh so he could cook such good food to serve his friends, his company. He slid the dolly under me with an awkward squeak and Ralph’s hands slid on the blue arms of the dolly I was being snugly and squarely affixed to. Gravity was thick with an object like myself when it came to falling off a dolly. We certainly didn’t want that to happen. So there I was, snug, square, and secure on the carrier seat of this dolly where the corner edges had sharpened to a paper cut of an edge. The blue paint had worn off the bottom of the dolly so that it showcased the stainless steel housed underneath. It shone and flickered in the midday sun. Ralph set about moving me to my new home. To my surprise, the new apartment already had a fridge. I wonder what Susan’s fridge is like. Is it a lady fridge and if so, what’s her make and model? As he was pivot spinning me into my new space in the new kitchen we touched handles, and I almost blew my door gasket. I asked her what she had inside her. She giggled again and said “Maybe you, if you play your cards right, cutie.” “Oh really? What’s your name sweetie?” “I’m Jenmore. What about you?” “I’m Electric General.” “Well, that name suits a handsome stocky fridge, such as yourself. I salute you Sir!” I couldn’t help but brag about what was in my own belly. I started in on a real nice story about the food inside me and how we escaped a dire situation of depression and loneliness. I bragged about Ralph and how he defeated all the odds stacked against him. “He’s a genius with food and he just got a new job as a chef in a fancy restaurant. He’s got such a huge heart and he shows how much he cares through his cooking. Now I always have leftovers of the most expensive foods. Oysters are always present on my shelves.” I HAD to boast about that. “Not to mention truffles!” Jenmore chimed in, “Ok, enough now you braggart or I’ll take back my handsome remark. I just met you; you don’t want to make my evaporator coils freeze already, do you?” “No ma’am, my heat radiator fans are hot for you!” “Well in that case, its my turn to brag to you. I’m a Smart Fridge so I know some of that fancy food your owner loves to feed people will end up over here relaxing inside me. After all, my control panel can detect best before use AND store data of items inside me like his delicious meals. Believe me, I will keep those oysters in temperature regulated luxury.” “Oh, so you’re a fancy fridge, are you? No wonder you’ve got my compressor turning up my heat.” Jenmore giggled again. “I’m fancy enough to store your fancy food, Sir Electric General.” One more giggle. “Well Madame Jenmore, I think our makes and models will get along just fine. Living with you shall be a pleasure. And that it was. Ralph was happy all the time feeding others and spending time with Susan. As for Jenmore and Electric General, once the lights were out, they would coil up together for the night. 😉