The Sextant - Spring 2022

The Sextant Spring 2022

Table of Contents Writing Solved……………………………………………………………………………….………………………………….Kevin Simmons, V, Pg. 9 The Polarity………………………………….…………………….…..…………………………………………….Jake Kornmehl, IV, Pg. 14 Faults……..…………………………………………………..…………………………….……….……………Timothee Simonin, VI, Pg. 17 OC………….……………………………………………………………….……………….……….………………….Albert McField, V, Pg. 22 Change is Natural…………………………………………………………….……….……….…………………….Jack Abbrecht, V, Pg. 24 I Hold On…………………………………………………………………………………..….…..…………………….Chris Milmoe, V, Pg. 25 Anger……………………………………………………………………..……….……………….…………..…………….Kalé Mack, VI, Pg. 25 The Ball…………………………………………………………………………………..……….………………………….Will Marra, V, Pg. 26 Procrastination…………………………………..………………………….……………………..…………….Forrest Campbell, V, Pg. 26 Final Day………………………………………….…………………….……………………………..…………….Thomas Mackey, V, Pg. 26 Some Regrets……………………………….……………………………….…………………………………….Cameron Connell, V, Pg. 27 Where Are My Keys?…………………………………………………….………………..……………………….Aaroh Sharma, VI, Pg. 28 The Life of a Panel………………………………………..…………………………………..……………………….Max Carboni, V, Pg. 28 Inside The Jungle, Grief………………………….…….………………………………….……………………….Jack Abbrecht, V, Pg. 29 The General……………………………………………………..………………………………..….…………….Luca Mezzanotte, V, Pg. 32 Control…………………………………………………………………….……………………………………………….Aaron Green, V, Pg. 35 Fierce Eye of Blinded Justice………………………………………………………………………………………….Mac Bobo, V, Pg. 36 A Life’s Adventure…………………………………….…….……………………………………………..……….Joshua Doolan, V, Pg. 40 Hey I’m Black…………….……………………..…….……………………………………..…….……………………Igaju Agba, VI, Pg. 44 Untitled 3…………….……………………..…….…………………………………………..…….……….……………Bert Green, VI, Pg. 44 A Dream………………………………………………………..…….…………………………………………..……….Marc Butler, V, Pg. 45 To People………………………………………………..………….…………………………………………………….Chris Brusie, V, Pg. 46 American Country Love Song …………………………………………………………………………….Anthony Pelligrini, V, Pg. 46 Mrs. Margrove’s Almost-Friend………………………………….……………………………….…………. Cooper Nelson, V, Pg. 47 Humanoids……………………………………………………………………………………………..………………Charlie Cave, VI, Pg. 50 Puppy Love…………………………………………………………….……………………..……..….………….Kailen Richards, VI, Pg. 51 Turning Back………………………..…………………………………….………………………….…………………Max Wagner, V, Pg. 52 Hands Up!………………….…………..…………………………………….……………………………………………Gabe Klug, VI, Pg. 57 Untitled………………..….…………………….………….…………………………………………….………Forrest Campbelle, V, Pg. 57 Locomotive…..….…………………….………….………………………………………………………….………Austin Curtis, VI, Pg. 58 7th Grade…………………………………………………………….……………………………………………Kailen Richards, VI, Pg. 65

Photography Turtle Taking a Breath……………………………………………..………………………….…………………….Mark Price, IV, Cover Sand Dunes……………………………………………………..……………………………Rafael Rodriguez-Montgomery, IV, Pg. 13 Canyon Waters…………….……………..……………………..…………………………..Rafael Rodriguez-Montgomery, IV, Pg. 16 Canyon Tip, Colorado River………..…………………………..……………………..Rafael Rodriguez-Montgomery, IV, Pg. 24 Little White Buds………..…………………………..………………..…………………………………..………Jake Kornmehl. IV, Pg. 25 The Sitting Bird…………………,………….……………………………………..……………………………………Mark Price, IV, Pg. 43 Lonely Lampost………..……………………………..………………..…………………………………..………Jake Kornmehl. IV, Pg. 65

Editor’s Note Thomas Mann wrote, “A writer is someone for whom writing is more di cult than it is for other people.” Each student who contributed a piece to this year’s spring edition of The Sextant challenged themselves by communicating their stories and passions with our entire community. In this issue of The Sextant, upper school students have submitted creative pieces of various sorts. Some students shared intimate short stories while others contributed beautifully composed poems.

Despite the di culties we have endured this school year, our tremendous faculty and sta have continued to push students to exceed their own talents in and outside the classroom beyond what they believed possible. In addition, we feature beautifully-crafted select student art with various photographs and colorful ceramic sculptures that give our readers a view into Belmont Hill’s Arts curriculum. We would like to thank our school’s English and Arts faculty who have assisted in the creation of the 2022 Spring Sextant especially our advisor, Dr. Tift, and all the teachers who have supported us including Mr. Doar, Dr. Fast, Mr. Horwitz, Ms. Kaplan, Mr. Kaplan, Mr. Leonardis, and Ms. McDonald.

ffi

ffi

ff

Your Editors, Jake A. Kornmehl ’24 Jack Abbrecht ’23 Forrest Campbell ‘23

TURQUOISE DRIP BRADY MILLER, IV

GRADIENT BLUE DEREK POTAMIS, IV

PURPLE RISING CORD VALLIS, IV

A RIBBON’S SHADOW DANE CARTER, V

OCEAN SWIRLS SEAN HORKAN, IV

CUCKOO’ CLOCK ALEX WHITE, IV

BASS CLOCK BRADY MILLER, IV

WORN-IN GLOVE SAM DEAN, IV HARBORSIDE CEIBA WILD, IV

A HOUSE’S SHADOW MATTHEW FLAHERTY, IV

AWARENESS RIBBON MATTHEW FLAHERTY, IV

Solved Kevin Simmons '23 One thing that I pride myself on is my ability to solve puzzles and mysteries that nobody else can. This talent is what made me put on the badge. It’s what got me all of those promotions over the years. More than once, I’ve seen the whole precinct giving me a standing ovation for a job well done; I had found the kidnapped kid, or stopped the serial killer, or something. Countless times I saw my picture on the wall of the department, with the words, “Sean Gorman, Detective of the Year,” printed under it. It all becomes the same thing after so many years, it all blends together. The years feel like they’ve all disappeared from my life. Time just vanished, case after case, murder scene after murder scene, clue after clue. I’ve seen more corpses in my career than I could count, so many that I barely even care when I see a dismembered victim on the oor. I hardly even remember why I became a cop in the rst place. I’m sure that the naive, innocent, 20 year old me was raving on about “making the world a better place” or some such nonsense as he applied to the academy, but 40 years later, I feel like I haven’t made any impact at all in the grand scheme of things.

A le getting slapped on my desk snapped me out of my moping. My eyes icked up from my desk to the bright eyes of my new partner, Mike. I say “new partner,” but Mike has been my partner for the better part of a year now. He was pretty much fresh out of the academy when I rst met him, and we were partners shortly after. I thought it was funny, that to him it probably seems like ages since we became partners, but to me, it’s gone by in the blink of an eye.

“Come on, old man, we’ve got a case,” he said, picking up his keys and wallet from his paper-strewn desk energetically. He stopped, saw that I had not moved yet, and sighed at me. “Stop daydreaming and get moving, we’ve got a crime scene to get to.”

I grunted out of my desk chair and grumbled, “Yeah, yeah. I’m coming.” As I stood up, pain ared through my knees, which I promptly ignored. I was beginning to really feel my age these last few years.

From bad knees, to a sore back, to the start of arthritis in my ngers, I was nding it harder and harder to get around. Seeing Mike buzz around me everywhere we go only highlights these changes for me.

I followed as he strode through the boisterous station out to the parking lot, where I spotted his car.

We hopped in and I asked, “So what do we know about the situation?”

“Not much right now,” He said as he backed the car out of its parking spot. “Two victims murdered in their house, a boy and his father.”

“And the mother?” I asked him.

“Apparently she died four years ago,” Mike said, shrugging as he turned onto the street, following his GPS. “It was some type of disease, the doctors couldn’t gure out what it was exactly. She died after two months in the hospital.”

fl

fi

fi

fl

fi

fi

fi

fl

fi

“Did you hear anything else about it?” I said to him.

“No that was it,” He said. “We’ll know more once we get on the scene.”

We drove for a minute or two in silence before Mike turned on the radio. He ipped around the channels until he came to a sports station, saying “Providence faces o against Villanova tonight in the Big East tournament…”

Mike chimed in over the noise of the radio, saying, “Didn’t you tell me that your daughter goes to Providence one time? Jessica, right?”

“Oh… Yeah, Jessica did go to Providence,” I said, caught o guard by the sudden mention of my family. “She graduated about four years ago.”

“What does she do now?” He asked me. “Does she still live around here?”

“No, she lives down in Florida now,” I responded. I have tried my best not to think of her as much as possible these last couple of years. Ever since she moved away, she seemed to have distanced herself from me. She’s harder to talk to, and I hardly ever get a hold of her on the phone. It had been months since I had last spoken to her. “I hear she’s getting married pretty soon.”

“Oh, good for her,” Mike said. I knew that he was only trying to learn more about me and make conversation, but I was beginning to get mad at Mike for asking about such a touchy subject. “When’s the wedding? Is it down in Florida?”

“It’s in a couple of months, in June,” I said, with a slight tone of annoyance. What I didn’t tell Mike was that I still hadn’t received an invitation to the wedding. Nothing, I hadn’t gotten any indication from Jessica that I was invited. She wasn’t even the one who told me about the wedding, I heard it from her childhood friend who still lives up here. But I calmed myself after that; there was no way for Mike to know

fl

ff

ff

why I was angry with him, so I forced that tone out of my voice. “It’ll be down in Florida.”

“Ah, that’ll be fun,” Mike said. “Well, if she ever comes up to visit, you should bring her around. I’d love to meet her.” After that, we rode in silence for the rest of the drive, with only the sports radio making any noise.

We pulled up in front of a small yellow house with a little, weedy front yard. I walked up the cracked front walkway with Mike in tow, and pushed the door open to see the scene. The rst thing to hit me was the stench of it, it was like my nostrils were burning from the inside. I suppressed the urge to gag and continued in. I stepped into the living room, and through a small group of kneeling cops, I could see a stain of blood on the wall. We approached the group and Mike asked, “What are we looking at here?”

One of the cops turned around and looked us over, and I could see by the nametag on his uniform that his name was Jones. “Two victims,” He said. “One is right here in the living room, and the other is over in the kitchen. Both seem to have been killed with a knife, but they were both heavily mutilated.” He stepped to the side to reveal what looked like a scene out of a horror movie. The rst victim was a man lying against the wall, covered in blood. Half of his face was pretty much hacked o , and there was a slice through his torso, with his intestines spilling out. Again, I felt a gag welling up inside me, and I had to sti e it. “They’ve likely been here for a few days now,” Jones continued. “That’s why it smells so foul in here.”

“Do we have a murder weapon?” I asked.

“No, we haven’t found anything matching the wounds,” He responded. “From the cuts on the bodies, we’re probably looking for a kitchen knife, or a blade of a similar size to a kitchen knife.” Another cop tapped Jones on his shoulder and said something to him. Jones nodded and the other cop continued on.

Jones turned back to me and said, “I’ve gotta keep helping the rest of the guy with the crime scene. Good luck with this one, there doesn’t seem to be a whole lot of clues to go on.”

“Thanks,” Mike responded, and then he turned to me. “Well, I guess we’d better have a look at the other victim. Come on.” He continued through the living room, carefully stepping over tipped-over furniture and bloodstains on the carpet, and made his way into the kitchen.

This room was even worse than the last. The rst thing I saw was a thick streak of blood smeared across the tile oor, leading to the body of a boy, lying face down on the oor next to the kitchen counter.

“Looks like he started crawling away after he was stabbed,” said Mike. “The killer didn’t kill him right away, he just left him bleeding to death.” He got the attention of one of the other cops and asked, “What kind of wounds does this one have?”

“Just one stab wound, in the stomach,” The cop responded.

I looked again to the boy, and then to the counter above him, which had a phone sitting on it. “Looks like he might’ve been reaching for the phone there,” I said. And my eyes scoured the rest of the counter, until I landed on the knife block on the counter; completely lled, except for one slot. “I think Jones was

fi

ff

fi

fl

fi

fi

fl

fl

right on that kitchen knife guess.”

“Yeah, one missing,” Mike muttered, with his eyebrows scrunched. I’ve learned in my time working with him that Mike is extremely good at putting together the pieces of a crime scene. He gets there and just stands in the middle of it all, and doesn’t talk for a few minutes. His eyes glance around at the oor and the walls and everything in between, and he scrunches his brow in thought, the way that he was doing just now. I’ve seen him do it countless times now, and he almost always comes up with something good, sometimes on cases that were stumping even me. As I watched him do his thing this time, I wondered if that was what I used to look like back when I was rst rising up through the ranks. For me, the crime scene itself was never the place where I did my thinking. Ever since I started doing this so many years ago, it was always at my desk in the precinct that I had my epiphanies about cases. The bustling environment of the crime scene never really felt good to me for thinking. My desk was my sanctuary, my little chunk of the world that I could have all to myself, and that was where I did my best work. As I thought about all those times I was just staring at nothing at my desk while thinking, I decided that I probably did look like Mike once. My old partners probably used to watch me think too, marveling at how I just seemed to disappear from the real world.

Mike’s eyebrows loosened up, and I readied myself for the hypothesis. “Okay, I think I have an idea about what kind of person would have done this,” He said, nally looking back at me. “The target of the attack was de nitely the man in the living room, simply based on the severity of his wounds compared to the boy. It was a crime of passion, not premeditated. I heard one of the other cops say that seems like they were killed at night. There aren’t any signs that the perpetrator broke into the house, rather it seems that they were invited in, or at least allowed inside.” I listened as he broke it all down for me, all of his theories and his possibilities and all of the reasons that he thinks these things. Increasingly, I felt as though I were watching a younger me through the eyes of my old partners. I remember how I used to feel when I was in Mike’s shoes; I always had a little bit of disdain for my coworkers back in the day. I always had the feeling that I would work faster on my own, that the people around me were slowing me down. I felt like I had to explain every little thought in my head just for them to follow what I was talking about. I bet that’s what Mike was thinking about me now. When comparing myself to him, I can see just how much slower the years have made me, both physically and mentally. “... In any case, we’ll need to bring in everyone close to the victims and search for some sort of motive,” Mike concluded, snapping me out of my thoughts. “Let’s check the neighbors rst, then next of kin. I’ll call to have the family members brought to the precinct., and then we’ll go check in with the neighbors, see what they might know.”

“Yeah, you go on ahead. I’ll meet you there,” I said. In midst of this case, I had been given cause to reevaluate my usefulness as a police o cer. But what do I do with that? Retire? I had certainly worked long enough. That decision isn’t one that can be made lightly. There’s preparation and paperwork that goes into it, and I would have to plan some things out. But, the department was in good hands with a

fl

fi

fi

fi

ffi

fi

young star like Mike moving up. That spirit that I once had that had faded from me was seemingly

reincarnated in Mike. He would be able to carry on the duty that I no longer had the strength or will to ful ll. Yeah, I probably wouldn’t be missed all that bad.

I pulled out my phone, looked through my contacts, and came to the name “Ted West,” the captain.

But, before I had the chance to press call, my phone started buzzing, and displayed the name, “Jessica.” I stared at the screen for a moment, just registering the fact that she was nally calling me back. I pressed the green button to answer her.

“Hello?” I said, pretending for a moment to not know who was on the other end of the call.

“Hey Dad,” She responded in a low tone. “Listen… I know that I really haven’t been keeping in touch, but I need to talk to you. I’m getting married in ve weeks.”

“That’s amazing, Jess,” I said back. If she was telling me this, it probably meant that I was invited.

“Where is it? Down in Florida?”

“Yeah, it’s gonna be down here,” She said. “I would really like you to make it down for it. I know we haven’t really talked that mu-” “Of course I’m coming,” I said to her, cutting her o . “Don’t even worry about it. I'll be there.”

“Thanks, Dad,” She said with a sigh of relief. “Alright, I’ll see you there.”

“Yeah, I’ll see you.” This would be the rst time I would see her in years now. I looked down at my phone, now back on the contacts screen, and once again saw Ted’s name sitting there. That was one more reason to retire. If I retire, I could see her every day. That sounded nice to me.

Without looking back I pressed call.

“Hello?” Ted’s voice sounded from the phone.

“Hey Ted, it’s Sean. Listen, I gotta talk to you. I think I’d like to retire.” And with those words, I felt what seemed like the weight of the world lifted o my shoulders.

fi

ff

ff

fi

fi

fi

Sand Dunes, Rafael RodriguezMontgomery

The Polarity Jake Kornmehl '24

Winifred lies on her bed. Her eyes are glued to the metal ceiling above. Suddenly, her eyes focus on a minuscule, curved crack resting between the perpendicular white walls. She picks herself up from her rough, incandescent white pillow and crawls forward, her hands gripped tightly to the railings along either side of her bed. Winifred peeps through the tiny crevice.

“Winnie!” a gaunt woman shouts.

The woman’s face hides in a radiant blue scarf and large goggles cover her oval-shaped head. Winnie is not as unfamiliar with the situation as she was last time. Yet, she opens the locker above her bed and pulls down a rack of children's masks, worn to prevent disease.

This is no normal time.

Winifred climbs down the ladder of her bunk bed and runs to embrace the woman standing in her doorway. She follows the lady down the sparsely lit corridor into a dining hall with thousands of other girls her age. Menacing posters with various mandates line the walls, and middle aged men and women stand in front of them wearing electric yellow hazmat suits. One massive 666” at screen television is mounted in each corner of the vast room with sixty-six foot ceilings. As usual, the anchors spout the “news,” which is both hyperbolic and misleading. Winnifred gazes at the screens only to hear unending propaganda describing the fraudulent bene ts of division.

This is a typical evening in Complex R-843272.

fl

fi

A new empire arose from the age of COVID-19. One that promised a world of safety and compassion but brought the opposite upon Earth's children. Unlike before, unprecedented medical biotechnology should have prevented the current epidemic. Yet, the new political climate paved a path for insanity. The

novel age of division allowed even the least malignant of diseases to become international disasters.

Humanity descended into extreme polarization; minor infractions became crimes punishable by death; and disease went untreated.

Winifred sits in her seat, Seat 136. The mass of humanity engul ng her sits in seats sequentially numbered 1 to 3066. They rarely are given the opportunity to enjoy the bounty of the Compound’s enclosed gardens. The pantry stocks are frighteningly low on fruits, vegetables, and meats after only the second Category 5 hurricane of the week.

Meteorological disasters were often a daily occurrence.

Winifred quietly sips her cold soup, devoid of any nutrients, and is led back to her room by the same, frail lady that had previously beckoned her. She sits at her desk and opens her box of 16 rainbow colored crayons; the same box her mother gave her when she turned eight. Her smooth, slender, unblemished hand pulls a piece of paper from the desk's only drawer and she starts to scribble. Colorful shapes spring from the crayon onto the empty space. She hears steps coming down the hall, and Winifred quickly crumples the piece of paper and slides it back into the drawer. Her doorknob turns and through the door comes a man holding a packet.

Winifred has forgotten it is Friday.

She gets up and collects this week’s Newspaper and glances at it. Or, that's what they call it.

4/10/2047 Good Evening Citizens, Once again, it is a successful day in the new nation. Those who were diseased have been expelled as we continue our e orts to keep everyone safe. You hypocritical pigs insist we have done nothing but polarize this country. But, I have only exposed what already existed. All you ever wanted was to be alone with your own kind; the same thoughts; the same opinions. We have only created an environment where that is possible. I protect you from disease and the Lord does as well.

Your Chief - R01 Winifred closes the door and rips up the propaganda and adroitly molds it into a ball with her right hand. She jumps and tosses it into the small cluttered trash bin in the back corner of her room. An old, faded Boston Celtics poster above her unpolished steel desk is all that is left of her unful lled dreams of becoming the next great female basketball star.

“Three pointer!” she says quietly to herself.

The woman Winifred calls “ The Collector” comes to her door once again. The Collector peers into the trash can and sees the crumpled paper ball, and knowing Winnie well is certain it is the day's News.

She turns o the light and whispers quietly, “Goodnight Winnie.”

fi

fi

ff

ff

The lights go out, the day abruptly ends.

Winifred sits silently in the dark at her cold steel desk. She remains quiet with her eyes focusing on the same small crevice as before. Although there is nothing but metal behind the white-painted walls, they serve as a blank canvas where Winnie’s mind paints a world where everything is not divided to please the will of all. Her dreams and safety ended when the age of polarity began. Winifred’s stomach blackened with regret; the regime should have been prevented from gaining total control. Unable to sleep, she sits in her hard, uncomfortable metal chair, thinking of how humanity has descended into this abyss. Disease, regardless of the scienti c advances developed to vanquish it, is allowed to ourish by those unwilling to accept the science. She stands up and walks towards her bunk bed. She climbs up the ladder, and wraps herself with her single, blood red fuzzy blanket. Then, Winifred rolls over, facing the world's imperfection and closes her eyelids along with the promise of a hopeful future. A plague of division and darkness is all that remains.

fl

fi

Canyon Waters, Rafael Rodriguez-Montgomery

Faults Timothee Simonin '22 Jimmy scrambled into the diner parking lot weaving around the ditches trying to not further damage the black pickup whose engine rattled upon starting and whose brakes screeched at the slightest touch of the pedal. He left the truck and made his way through the crack- lled concrete that oozed out grass patches between its seams. About to open the back door, Jimmy caught Dale bringing the trash out.

“Sorry, dad, I slept a little through my alarm.”

“Long night, or what?”

“Yeah.”

“You smell like it. Go freshen up.”

Jimmy walked inside, headed to the bathroom, and leaned over the sink. He looked up at the mirror and saw the glaringly obvious eye bags under his bloodshot eyes. Jimmy felt like his mind and body were in a race to see which could collapse rst. Neither one ever did because sadly, the race had become an almost daily occurrence that he became accustomed to. Jimmy downed some mouthwash and rinsed his face before heading out to the kitchen. To the untrained eye, it’s hard to separate the di erent parts of the kitchen; some type of metal covers every square inch of the place. Between the knives hanging atop the counter, identical cabinets with the same once shiny coating, and the uniform gray appliances that only partially worked, the kitchen seemed like an inescapable steel jungle, especially to Dale and his son.

“Jimmy, come over here real quick, we gotta talk about something” said Dale from behind the counter.

“All right,” Jimmy said. He walked over and took a seat on the swiveling foam countertop seat with cracked vinyl lining.

Dale put his kitchen cap down and set his arms down on the counter, one work-worn hand over the other. “I don’t know how else to say it so I’m gonna just say it. You need to nd a way out of here. For your own sake.”

“Yeah, don’t we all,” Jimmy replied.

“No, I’m serious, son. I’ve been saving a little. Not much, but I think around $7,500 is probably enough for your rst year at college. But you have to drive down to State by next week. Semester starts then. They ain’t taking anyone after that.” Jimmy looked up from his cup of co ee and over towards his dad, who had just brought a thick envelope out from his jacket pocket. Jimmy’s face turned stale and his eyes opened wide enough to expose all of the red nerves on his eyes.

“Now where in God’s name did you scrape all of that cash up?” Jimmy chuckled.

“Oh, you know,” Dale began, “here and there, bit by bit.”

“No way. I would’ve heard about this if it’s been going on for a while.”

ff

ff

fi

fi

fi

fi

“A few years, by now. I started after your mother …”

“What does her leaving have to do with this? With us?”

“I didn’t want to see it happen again. With you.”

“What do you mean?”

“Why do you think she left, son? Back then I told you one thing, but you’re 18 now. I think you’d know if you thought hard. She saw nothing for herself here. This town. This restaurant. Hell, she didn’t even see any ambition in me.” Dale looked over at his son. “Now I’m starting to see what she was talking about. You go out every night until god knows when doing god knows what, running yourself into the ground. You’re running away from your future.”

Jimmy, taken aback, sat up and frowned. “I know that you know that there’s a dozen di erent things in the restaurant that could use that money.” Jimmy did a visual tour of the place and saw the four booths in the back with practically no cushion left, then over at the windows, where the white letters that spelled out “DALE’S DINER” on the exterior had peeled o .. Out of sight was the kitchen, which Jimmy knew had its own plethora of malfunctioning machinery. But Dale saw no rush to x anything as long as no one used the extra space or ordered enough to need the extra appliances.

“The money ain’t for that.”

“I-It should be.” spat out Jimmy. He clenched his st and his grip on the co ee mug in an attempt to appear serious and in control, but his face disagreed with his body. His eyes twitched around, peering around the diner yet never made contact with Dale. “Half of the at-top doesn’t work and don’t you dare get me started on the oven. It’s gonna go under, don’t kid yourself.”

“Jimmy, I’ll gure it out, I swear. But you need this. Look at yourself for a second. Where are you headed? What happened to … the old you? The one who didn’t run away from his life?”

“Why does it matter? I’m here helping you and we’re both managing. No one can even make it out of this town.”

“Well if anyone can it’s y-” “But why, dad, what’s the point?!” Jimmy interrupted.

“It--It’s…” Dale sighed. “I’m the one that’s got you trapped in here. I’ve never given you much and I don’t want you to have nothing much to give your children.” `“Stop with this crap. Quit trying to feel bad for me because we’re in a sh*tty situation. It was bad then, it’s bad now, and it won’t change. We’re cursed, dad” “There’s no such thing as curses, son. We’re just tight on money.”

“What’s the di erence?”

Dale pondered a response to Jimmy’s question and opened his mouth as if to say something, but he was left with an empty mind. He instead stood up from his stool and stored the envelope behind on the other side of the countertop.

ff

fi

ff

fl

ff

fi

ff

fi

“I just want what’s best for you, Jimmy. Now put your apron on, we open soon.”

Jimmy left the kitchen out the back, where the only illumination left was the icker of a buzzing streetlight. The pickup rattled to a start, and he drove over to Cole’s shoddy trailer for his nightly retreat where he could immerse himself in a timeless bubble. Cole inherited his trailer in his sophomore year of high school after cops found his mom with a needle in her arm and didn’t bother to relocate him. Since graduating, he barely held himself together with a job at the grocery store and the local theater. Cole introduced weed to Jimmy when Jimmy was still trying to nd his crowd in early high school. Ever since, they had been getting high together all too often. Jimmy didn’t know any better; he would get home from school only to arrive at an empty house, void of parenting until Dale would come back after closing the diner. Sometimes Jimmy and Cole got high to escape their realities, but most of the time it was just because it felt good and they had nothing better to do.

The issue of the money lived like a parasite in his mind; it started out in the front but quickly receded to the back, leaving Jimmy unbothered for a while. But now, alone in his thoughts, Jimmy let the barrier down and the parasite came back and crawled to the forefront. He parked in front of the trailer, in the divot that his truck had imprinted on the dirt and yanked open the punctured screen door.

“I need it bad today, Cole,” Jimmy muttered.

“You’re excited today. Sh*t, well I’m not complaining. I could use a good hit, too.”

“My dad’s just got me thinking.”

“About what” “About me” “Well that’s a rst!” laughed Cole while reaching for a lighter.

“But he doesn’t know what I need. Or what he needs, either. He’s trying to get me out of here. To State.”

“Damn. What’s there to think about?” Cole took his rst hit.

“I don’t think the restaurant’s gonna last much longer,” Jimmy muttered, “my dad’s in way over his head.”

“We’ve been getting high, talking about headaches for like three years. You don’t care much for that diner. Hell, you used to pray to god that your old man would walk away from it. It’s something else.”

“Maybe.” Jimmy took his rst hit and Cole went back for seconds. “I just don’t get why I need to leave. Everyone I’ve ever known who was born in Gorham never left. Like they’re bound to stay. Tethered to this place.”

“Well what’s that gotta do with you?” blurted out Cole. Cole was trying to keep his eyes open and help Jimmy, but his eyelids kept getting heavier and heavier and he had to ght the temptation of fading into his own thoughts.

“F***, man,” went Jimmy, “what am I gonna do if I go?” replied Jimmy with open eyes staring right

fl

fi

fi

fi

fi

fi

at the ground in front of him

“You’ll be ne, dude, just … you’ll be OK” spat out Cole. Jimmy was too zoned in on his thoughts to notice that Cole had taken his third hit.

“Will I? I don’t want to be the small town bum out there, man. I can’t change that about me, this town stamped it on me the second I was born. At least in Gorham there’s no expectation for success or whatever.”

“Why d-do you think you’re gonna fail.”

“I don’t know that I will, I’m just scared that I will, you know? I’m safe over here. I’ve got nothing to risk.”

“You know what, you probably know what’s best for you, Jimmy,” mustered Cole. Cole had receded into the back of his mind. His eyes were shut and his consciousness was in a world of its own.

Jimmy looked over at Cole and saw his friend passed out with his head slumped on his shoulder. Jimmy got up from the stained couch and left the trailer.

He tried to give his full attention to the road, but he was too plagued by the clawing enigma. As he drove through the poorly illuminated woods of Gorham, his thoughts began popping out all at once like an over lled bag of corn kernels in a microwave; the bag would soon enough explode, and it was just a matter of time. Would he let his dad down? What should he do? Would his dad be ne without the money? How much would the money help Dale? What should he do? Could he change at college? Could he make it worthwhile? What should he do? What would he do if he failed? Is he being sel sh if he stays?

BEEP! A blur of lights came whizzing from Jimmy’s right side before swerving left into a corner store just fast enough to avoid Jimmy’s truck. Jimmy belatedly slammed on his brakes after he passed the car and came to a stop on the side of the road, still coming to consciousness with what had just occurred.

Mentally shaken, he put one foot out the door and looked behind him towards the scene. A gray Toyota covered in broken glass embedded its front end into a convenience store. The driver, not bleeding yet holding his head, stepped out from the debris and looked around for the guilty party. He saw Jimmy, who had half of his body looking out of the truck and the pale face of a ghost.

“Dumbass!” the man yelled. “Red means stop! Where’d you learn to drive, huh?”

Jimmy threw himself back into his seat and stared straight ahead with his eyes wide open. The hiss of the crumpled Toyota engine slowly became louder and louder until it erupted into a deafening ring in his ears. The streetlight pierced straight through Jimmy’s winshield and onto him, where the shadow of his hair hanging over his forehead darkened his eyes.

“Don’t you hide from me boy! Look at the damage you done caused!” The man continued. “I know you now! You’re the black Ford! Come out and let’s talk!”

Jimmy buried his forehead in his palms and ran his ngers through his oily hair, trying to conjure a solution to the problem he had just created. He peered up at the rearview mirror and saw the man walking over. Jimmy gave himself no choices. He took his car out of park and began to pull out from the

fi

fi

fi

fi

fi

side of the road.

“Don’t you dare!” the man yelled to no avail. Jimmy drove o and nothing the man would have said could have stopped Jimmy’s tear- lled eyes from looking back. “Come back, boy, you’ll regret it!”

Hands shaking, Jimmy made it to the diner. Once inside, he picked up the envelope and held it in his hand. In the sheer thickness of it he could feel new vinyl seats and could hear the crackle of a perfect ame of a new stove. But those sensations faded quickly as Jimmy pocketed the envelope. He took out and wrote on a waiter’s notepad that he left on the counter, saying: “LAST TIME I RUN AWAY, DAD. ”

OC Albert McField ’22

fl

ff

fi

FRANKLIN in a state of confusion

Hey? Do you know where I can nd the best Philly Cheese Steak in town.

OC Aye, bro don't step up to me like that you almost got f***ing shot. I don't play that sh*t move around.

FRANKLIN Bro, I am new around here and I was Just simply asking where I can get a good Cheese Steak. I am not with the gang stu . I go to U Penn bro relax. I'm sorry if I stepped to you wrong.

OC Relaxxxxxx bro, I was just joking. I am also a student at THE University of Pennsylvania. Oh, I forgot to introduce myself I'm Octon Claus, but just call me OC. FRANKLIN Word I almost sh*t myself bro wtf. I'm Franklin by the way. It’s great to meet another brotha on campus. Do you know what the verdict on campus is?

OC Nah, bro. let's go nd out.

INT. UPENN DORM - NIGHT In the tiny corridor of Riepe College house, OC and Franklin are su ocated by the smell of cigarettes and Busch light. what they manage to hear is that one of the RA's got locked in their Dorm room. All-out chaos ensues.

FRANKLIN Hey Bruh! it's about stu y as hell in here. I can’t see a damn thing and it stinks.

OC you smell the nasty a** Newports too. Boy, these people have a serious issue.

ff

ff

fi

ff

fi

As the pair walked through the corridor it seemed like they were parting the red sea everyone moved out of the middle of the walkway.

FRANKLIN ayeee man people are into di erent things. couldn't be me though.

OC It is what it is bro. Supposedly there's a party on this oor. might as well go in without being invited. ask for forgiveness not for permission.

FRANKLIN you got that right. Let's go.

The two enter the party. The only thing visible was the strobe lights.

OC Yo Franklin! I'm going to the other room these strobe lights are going to give me a brain aneurysm if I don't get out of here. plus they are playing cup pong in the other room. I suck at pong but imma still play.

OC ask's anyone if they want to play pong with him. one girl comes to the table and they begin playing together. What he doesn't know is that she is one of the best players in their grade. they absolutely swept their opponents.

FRANKLIN (WINKING AT OC) Woahhhhh, bro she is tu at pong, she's cute, and she is smart. You have to continue the dialogue bro. You have to get the snap or the number. If you are him, you will make that happen.

OC Keep it, casual bro. I am already ten steps ahead of you. I'm actually going to get brunch with her tomorrow.

FRANKLIN Wowwwww. Bro you are him

I Hold On

fl

ff

ff

Chris Milmoe '23



Change Is Natural Jack Abbrecht '23 A reservoir, frosted over, suspended in time.

Pebbles, frozen upon the bank, sliced geometrically by a diamond edge.

Crystalline stars, with their rigid bodies, blizzarding to the forest floor.

Some tiers of icicles, strung together by their unyielding edges, competing for the sharpest point.

Towering timber, absent from visible life, yet still stubbornly hard-lined.

But, cracks begin to form.

A veiny circuit, budding-until, unleashed from beneath, a warm sanguinity. the air, flowing freely, radiates a constant stream of warmth, gently shaking bundles of vibrant emerald leaves strung loosely from the limbs of their trees a current, free from its frost-worn shackles, ebbs, its surging tide washes a torrid shoreline, and above, a blazing sun, its flames holding onto each other while sporadically reaching down, trying to cusp cyclicity, command consistency, trap transformation, fruitlessly

Canyon Tip, Rafael Rodriguez-Montgomery

When the enemy starts ring from all around I hold on When the mortars wreak havoc on all the buildings around you I hold on When the walls start caving in around you I hold on When the man beside you starts weeping for his family I hold on When your best friend is lying lifeless in your arms I hold on When it seems all hope is lost I hold on Until my life is the one that’s lost I hold on Until freedom is won I hold on

Procrastination

fi

Forrest Campbell ’23

This time it’s beautiful.

He’s high up somewhere far away from the others, the palms of his smooth hands gently caressing the clouds, as if he were using them as blankets.

His mind focused on the glint given o by the sunlight.

He knows what lies beneath him.

The papers and pens lying on the streets, laptops, and assignments are hanging from rooftops.

All of them waiting patiently to be used.

He knows what must be done.

But he remains oating high above, as the wind whistles by.

He looks down and smiles, as the objects slowly sink into the ground.

Anger

Kalé Mack ‘22

“Tomorrow,” he says, drifting away into the abyss.

Anger grinds me like the gears of a car engine The aggressive banging of the drums That scream through the brains of the audience It consumes me like re A body covered in gasoline That burns like a newly lit cigarette I refrain from being angry, But it knocks and bangs.

Too long have I let it overcome me, Too few times have I been able to hold myself back Frightened

Final Day

fi

fl

ff

Thomas Mackey '23

Step, Step, Step, Step I could hear it above me Slamming each foot like a basketball being dribbled I was petri ed thinking it was gonna catch me Step, Step, Step, Step It was getting closer and closer Chills going through my body like electricity I could hear it getting in my proximity Step, Step, Step, Step Getting really near now If I survive I won’t do anything wrong, I vow It is too late my time is now Step, Step, Step, Step

The Ball Will Marra '23 Checkered ball jumps up.

Scraped the sky, cut the stretched blue Nestled in the ground again

Some Regrets Cameron Connell '23 I will. I will. I will. I never did. Not now. I’ll do it later. I don’t feel like it right now. I never felt like it. I’m too nervous. I’m scared. What if it goes badly? Guess I’ll never know. What if he gets mad?

What if he takes it the wrong way? What if he doesn’t want to be friends anymore? We’re not friends anymore anyway. I should have been honest. What if she thinks I’m weird? What if she thinks I’m annoying? What if she says no? She never got a chance to say anything. I never asked her. I wonder how well I’d do? I wonder if I’d have a chance at winning? How happy would I be if I won? I never tried. I’ll walk him later. Can you walk him? I’ll do it in a bit. I should’ve walked him more. He’s gone now. Mom, stop it. Dad, it’s not funny. I hate both of you, can’t you just leave me alone. I’d rather be annoyed with them than not have them anymore. No, you guys can go without me. I’ll catch you later. No, sorry, I don’t feel up to it tonight. I should’ve gone with them while I still could. I should learn guitar. But it takes too much time. I’ll learn when I have more time. I never had more time. I wish I’d learned it back then. No we really shouldn’t. What if we get caught. I don’t wanna get in trouble. I should’ve just done it. I should have been carefree while I still had the chance. I should have lived life.

Where Are My Keys?

fi

Aaroh Sharma '22

Where are my keys? I swear I had them just a second ago. How am I supposed to get to my interview?

Shit. I have to nd my keys. Are they on the countertop? Nope. Only the Bud Lights from last night. Did I leave them in my old overused Ford Focus? Nope. Already checked there. How about in my coat pocket? Nope, checked there too. Where are my goddamn keys!? Where could have I kept them? Do you know Pablo? Of course you don’t know. You’re a dog. I think I’m going crazy. I should not have drank this morning. Or last night. Or the night before. What was I thinking? This interview is going to go poorly. I need to be there in twenty minutes. I need this job. How will I pay rent this month? Where are my keys!

Alright, where was the last place I went? The supermarket! Wegman's! Then I drove home. And went upstairs. And took a shower. Then walked Pablo. Then I came home. And ate dinner. What did I do after that? I forget. Probably because I drank those beers. I’m never going to nd my keys. I’m going to be trapped in this house forever. I’ll need to ask my mom for car rides. I’m so screwed. I wish I was more organized. If only I kept my stu more neat and clean. Then I wouldn’t be in this predicament. My ex was so right about me. So was my mom. I need to sit down for a second. This is too stressful to think about right now. Oww what just poked me in my back pocket. I’m such an idiot. I can’t believe I could be this stupid. This is why I’m struggling in life. I found my keys.

The Life of a Panel Max Carboni '23 Some of you consistently see the half-shirt tucked students storm the halls to be rst to the notorious milk and cookies that wait before them. Some of you meet newly acquired students and their families, and you teach them to appreciate you through our tours. Some of you have a lot of brothers, and they are lled throughout the walls and barriers of our beautiful world. Some of you are lying on a table, waiting to be carved by an impatient sixth former. Some of you are deeply appreciated by others, and unfortunately, some of you are not. Some of you have history, and some are in the process of being completed. Some of you have never met each other and perhaps never will. Some of you still don’t know what you will look like, but you receive more hints every time your artist stops by. Some of you have met di erent woodworking teachers over the years. Some of you have your artist's son look upon you and realize the intense feeling of family. Some of you sometimes get curious little rst formers to read you, and you feel more appreciated. Some of you achieve the panel prize, and you are looked upon as the best.

Some of you got unlucky and placed into the rare and unappreciated territory. Some of you are the last footprint that a Belmont Hill Student makes here. Some of you, actually all of you, will forever be a part of the best Belmont Hill tradition.

Inside The Jungle, Grief

fi

fi

fi

ff

fi

fi

ff

Jack Abbrecht '23

The

rst time I heard that chiming

Macaw's song, I stood just outside the entrance to a theatre of winding timber, shaded by never-ending canopies of vibrant green foliage. I remember the mouth of the damned stream that owed towards me, mu ing the avian tune; its super cial state of serenity, its tranquil trickery, its plotted placidity. In my warranted ignorance, I failed to recognize an unstoppable force brewing beneath the sedated surface.

And so, machete in hand, I broke the rst layer of frond and ora. Five feet, ten feet, and deeper, I marched. I halted for a second just to see my trail. A golden sun fell from its celestial nest, breaking beyond the horizon. Blinding beams of fragmented light fought for a path, squeezing through the ever-so-small holes between bushes. As my monstrous blade continued its slashing course, I moved parallel to the stream, hoping the clear and calm ow would aid my direction on this trek. With every step, I planted my boots deep into the marshy oor, evading rocks, stones, and the occasional slithering serpent. Suddenly, my Machette failed, dulled by the hard bark which had been biting bitterly into its once cutting edge.

Grasping onto the long handmade handle, I put the sword to work for one last swing, anxiously hoping that it would slice cleanly through the dense foliage; instead, however, it continued to resist. "Can't go any further," I thought to myself as that rich luminescence tucked behind its worldly crest, unsheathing a cloud of darkness over the jungle. ⼀⼀⼀⼀⼀⼀ When I turned around to head back, however, it was only logical to deny what appeared before me.

The jungle, as if alive, extended its natural limbs, replenishing what I had cut and rendering my path useless. I couldn't believe it. Trapped. A panorama of once verdant frondescence, now made more ominous by a cloak of blackness, blurred my vision. Small beads of sweat began to form; with every thud of my rapid heart, skull pounding from its hammering beat, they crawled down my skin. My breathing became erratic, uncontrollable, dominated by disbelief. "The stream," I remembered excitedly, "I just

fi

fl

fl

fl

fl

ffl

fi

fi

need to follow it back!" And so, I ducked through the organic extremities, following the sound of that

now augmented murmur. I marched frantically, and marched, and marched - to no avail. "It wasn't this long before," I thought; no, I knew.

My panic and confusion unfolded into a scorching rage. My heart continued to pulsate; now, however, my blood turned hot, burning me from the inside. I began to run faster and faster. I grasped aggressively, making any attempt to pull myself away from the hellish situation; instead, cutting thorns broke out from their nemoral sheaths, sticking into my hands and covering their surface with a deep crimson hue. Under the sound of my abnormal and o pace breath, I heard a bubbling rumble, the sound of roaring water. As I ran, my legs began to burn, covered in the sweltering liquid of a now boiling stream.

My vision was cloaked by an impossible fury, a vibrating anger, as I ran carelessly and directionlessly.

Suddenly, some object obscured by the dark caught my foot, and I catapulted face rst into a heaping pile of stones, mud, rotting fruit, and fallen leaves.

My owing sanguinity began to infuse with the earthly presence, a bargain with that obscure undergrowth. Thick blood oozed into the ground, intermingled with the roots of trees and bushes, found its way into the diets of the snakes and mice and frogs and sh, and even into that cool stream where I placed my hands. As it seeped into the now less energetic ow, a cloudy mixture formed; the entire body of water gushed together with my life force. It was then when I remembered back to the moments just before stepping into that leafy gateway. "If only I had not entered this emerald hell, just turned my back and walked away. If only I had cut that brush more carefully, I would not have lost my path," I thought to myself. "How could it all go wrong? How could I have done this to myself?" I continued to reconsider my idiocracy, my absolute ignorance of a clear solution.

But quickly, the ponderance of my stupidity solidi ed into salty tears, an objecti cation of my overwhelming depression, as clear as the stream that I rst witnessed. They owed down my muddy cheeks, washing away a shroud of earthy material. Every drop electrocuted polluted skin, burning a sorrow- lled path o my chin and onto the ground below. The stream moved quicker now, but its once pulsating current lay completely at. A chilling wind lled the somber air, brushing the water with a pallet of deep, melancholy blues. My weak hands tried to grip the tide, but it slipped through my ngers coldly and owed out of sight. Aching muscles purged my thoughts and a migraine burned through my skull, like countless papercuts dicing my eyes and brain. Gagged by misery, I tried to withstand the immense pressure on my chest that moved my body down towards the stream.

Finally, at that moment, I accepted my fate—a pointless ght. Hopelessly, I let my emotions take control, and in an instant, my limp body drooped into the stream. As the water soaked my clothes, I was dragged away by a soft current. ⼀⼀⼀⼀⼀⼀ Heavy blinking and cold water blurred my eyesight, but I soon began to see an incredible glow from behind. The sun's astonishing glimmer was blossoming over the horizon. Through clouded vision, I

fi

fi

fi

fl

fi

fl

fi

fi

ff

fi

fi

fl

ff

fi

fl

fl

admired its warmth, its clarity, its enormous size. At that moment, I felt my body stop, grinding against

small pebbles and dry dirt. I looked around and saw no foliage, no brush, no trees, no thorns. I rubbed my eyes and pulled my back up a little. There I sat, just outside the jungle's border, cherishing my freedom.

For now, I could wander on the outskirts, day by day. Still, however, that Macaw, chirping its repetitive and somewhat sinister toon just inside the archway of leaves, reminded me that I could not, and would not, be out for good.

“The reality is that you will grieve forever.”

-Elisabeth Kubler Ross

The General Luca Mezzanotte '23 Rain pattered against the starchy cloth tent, making it heavy, yet somehow it resisted the constant bombardment of water and kept the interior dry. I already had on my uniform; it was covered in dirt and blood; the badges and insignias were cockeyed and falling o . Conversations could be heard from around the camp, both solemn and cavalier. And how could I forget the gunshots, the gunshots persisted in the background without ceasing. With all this monotony, something was o ; something tugged at the back of my mind like a loose thread. I tried to sort through my thoughts while tuning out the cacophony of war.

Who was I kidding, though, by now, it was just white noise. Not only had I been deployed here for what seemed like an eternity, but I had served for at least seven more eternities before this. I knew the sounds: feet shu ing, quiet chatter, mourning, weaponry. I knew the smells: soiled uniforms, smoke, cigarettes, shitty food. I knew the feelings: fear, responsibility, excitement, duty, dread.

I left the tent and watched the tan uniform soak up the tears of the sky and turn dark and patchy.

Men, my men, sat spattered throughout the camp as if thrown down at random, plucked from their homes, and placed haphazardly in a war zone. Tent after tent after tent. I walked by, peering in each

ff

ff

fl

ffl

partially open ap to see some sulking, with smokes in their pursed lips, some praying - probably for this

nightmare to end, and the occasional tent of good humor. The occasional tent with soldiers sharing their company, whatever crappy drink they could nd rationed out among the group, cards being passed around, laughter coming from the cockeyed table. I didn’t know what they were talking about, but I did know what they weren’t talking about: war.

The only people that could even fake happiness were so detached from the current situation they were of no use to me, they couldn’t ght, and those that were caught up in it were so depressed that they too could not function. Not that this was news, that's what happened. There are winners, and there are losers, yet somehow, everyone loses. The victor makes their terms and imposes them upon the vanquished with no one to stop them, and not until it's too late feels remorse. The vanquished had to live with these harsh terms and pay the consequences. Lose-lose. I was looking at men who had lost parts of themselves; they died with the enemies they killed. Every soul falling down to the depths of hell made its way into each soldier’s pack, adding weight and pulling them down too.

They lost connections, the only proof they had that they were loved was in the memories, but what does that prove? Feelings change. Would they still love a man who murdered tens of other men also wrestling with loss, with families and friends of their own? Even the winner loses, even the enemy feels.

No matter how much it hurts to think about, every man killed was being pulled away from their people. I knew that every single soldier in my camp was thinking about it. Dwelling on the grimaces of pain on the enemies' faces just before they went white and still. Remembering the cries of terror, the cries for mercy before putting a carefully aimed bullet right through their skull. The thought, what if it was me? I could watch them all dive down the rabbit hole as they lled their lungs with sweet, sweet smoke trying to burn these dark thoughts. They couldn’t. They pictured their girlfriends, wives, and children all on their knees, looking up at the sky and yelling, “why god, how could you do this to me?!” Their shirts wet from real tears, not the rain.

What a world. Truly tragic, the nature of battle. My shoes sunk into the wet dirt deep enough that they tugged every time I took a step. It was as if the earth was begging me to turn around; it was grabbing me by the ankles and saying, “please don’t go.” But I wasn’t going anywhere; I was just walking.

I walked past crates of weapons, now wet from rain dripping through the large cracks running down the wood. Soon the weapons would be covered in mud mixed with dark crimson - what a terrible thought.

Why did I do it, this whole ghting thing? I needed to. It was my purpose. My family. Unlike the men who I looked at when walking down the rows of sagging tents, I didn’t have a family to mourn for me. I didn’t have the nagging in the back of my mind giving me endless playthroughs of death. Not anymore, at least. I had the demons, but by this point, we were friends. I couldn’t leave them now. My life had gone so far down the gutter that it was now at that point where the water is in free fall before hitting the ground, and all it feels is fresh air and gravity. That was me, stuck in a state of fake pride and meaning,

fi

fi

fi

fi

plummeting back to reality.

I walked past a tent that stood out. It was half fallen, the door fully ajar. The man sat on the edge of his cot in a trance. Staring down at a picture, he held gingerly in his hands as it got soaked by the rain.

Unlike the others, he wasn't crying, or smoking, or twitching. He was simply looking, wishing that he could be in the picture. I couldn’t even see what it was, but I knew. I had seen enough of them. A blond girl in a pretty red dress irting with the camera. Her hair and dress being tossed about in the wind. The perfect picture. I knew all he wanted was to put on a fresh suit and join her. Tear o his dirty uniform, wash away the blood, wash away the memories of this hellscape, and jump into the picture. But he couldn’t. Just like me and every other man in the camp, he was stuck here.

I was frozen in time watching this man yearn for happiness just one more time. I reached for my pocket instinctively but knew my picture was gone. I remember seeing her, all my prayers answered. Every moment spent building up this very interaction, just to see her with someone else. The pain, worse than a bullet ever could’ve been. All I wanted was to look at the picture one more time, but I remember watching it utter into the dirt and turning away from it leaving her and my dreams behind.

I forced myself to move on, to leave him to his sorrow. My intervention would do nothing; I couldn’t grant him his one desire. I kept moving down the line with no real purpose. I just tuned out the gunshots and the cries and trudged forward. Still yanking my boots out of the mud with every step. I shoved my hands into my pockets as the rain had soaked my skin, making it cold and clammy. I made it to the end of the line without seeing anything else truly heartwrenching and stood there. I looked at all the tents, destructive smoke billowing up in the horizon line, lives being taken. I looked down at my shoes, crusted over with dried mud and the occasional spatter of blood. Everyone’s clothes had the occasional spatter of blood.

I stared on and realized the futility of it. Of war, of this mission, of this camp. I felt the remorse that every soldier feels before putting a bullet through an enemy. I carried the weight of the people I killed and any burden I could pull of the shoulders of my men. I was being crushed and needed to alleviate part of it.

With that, I walked back down the line with purpose this time. I still walked slowly, of course, observing the scenes I remarked on at the beginning of my walk, but I had a plan. I needed to make a speech, something to rally the troops, give them something to focus on. I stared at the conditions trying to formulate words. What sort of compelling beauty could I nd here?

Maybe I didn’t need to rally the troops after all. I pushed away the heavy tent ap to my quarters as the rain rolled o the fabric soaking my already soaked skeleton. I sat at the rigid wooden chair in the corner, dug deep into the soft dirt, and pondered. I had the words.

“Gentlemen,” my voice boomed out across the tents, and people begrudgingly joined me in the rain. “I have something to say. This morning, I observed the sorriest bunch of soldiers I’ve ever seen and realized that even if we win this war, we all lose. We all lose time and memories, and we get corrupted

ff

fl

fi

fl

ff

fl

with horror,” I paused to observe the stark faces in front of me. No one was paying much attention; they

were fed up with rallying speeches. “This is not meant to rally the troops; in fact, the opposite. Go home,” now I had their attention. Shocked, their eyes panned up from the water sinking into the mud. I took another pause, realizing what I had said. “I am staying; I have nothing to go home to, but you… you have families and friends and dreams and lives. Go live them,” I didn’t know who would leave and would stay.

Dozens of faces still stared at me through the rain, falling fast as the bombs on the battle eld making a subtle thumping on the ground and tents. A drum roll while I awaited a response. I still stood waiting for something, a word, a movement but got nothing. “You can leave!” I shouted. “Go!” I lashed out. I didn’t expect anyone to leave, they had signed up to serve, and I knew they would do that. Some of them had been with me since my rst deployment, others, the ripe age of 15.

Starting with the back, they turned. One by one, they peeled o to return to their tents. But they didn’t continue to wallow in their misery. They gathered the few possessions they had and walked right back out into the rain. They marched, more uni ed than I had ever seen them, away from camp, away from the battle, toward the city, toward home.

I moved back to my tent and sat on the edge of the cot. My uniform soaked the thin brown sheet; I didn’t really care. What had just happened? I had freed my men. I wanted them to go but didn’t expect them to. Or at least this many too. My words echoed through my head. “You can leave!” The sharp words piercing the air, interrupting the gunshots and the rain, clearing the fog in the soldiers' heads. I had won.

War doesn’t have winners, only losers. But today, there were winners.

Every man in my squadron who walked away to go see the woman in their small polaroid picture or to hug their mother one more time had won. I had won because for once in this goddammed cycle of destruction I created opportunity. It was over for them.

I stood up and walked back down the rows of tents, all of them now empty, until I got the warped wooden crate. I reached down and tightened my blood-stained boots, xed my dirty uniform, threw the lid of the box into the earth, and prepared to ght.

Control Aaron Green 23’

fi

fi

ff

fi

fi

fi

Just let me be

I don’t want your advice I don’t want your support I don’t need your help.

You ask what I want I don’t oblige Your kindness is much appreciated, Like seeds to a struggling farmer, But there is a line Between your reality and that of mine

Fierce Eye of Blinded Justice Mac Bobo '23 The screeching of a hawk overhead permeated the thick, muggy air, startling me back into reality.

My lips, cracked and bloody, throbbed with pain; my throat was as dry and battered as the jagged rock I was sitting up against. The heavy breeze shaped the movement of the sands like an invisible hand. The sun, an idol sitting atop its golden seat of judgment in the sky, beat down on my face and the dust around me, making no distinction between the two. I reached down and placed my nger on my side. My body convulsed, and I involuntarily let out a loud, pain- lled groan, as my nger met warm esh. The noise broke the omnipresent silence of the Texas canyon. Don’t look. It’ll only make it worse, I thought. My vision started to blur, and the world was spinning uncontrollably. I closed my eyes, hoping it would just go away.

— I’m working past sunset for the third time this week. Several more unexpected requests have come in, and I refuse to put out an imperfect piece just to go home early. It’s just a busy week, I tell myself.

She’ll forget all about it next week. I get to work sanding down the last of the tables. The rough sandpaper grinds into the grain of the wood, producing dust that jumps into the dark air, illuminated by the nearby lamp. I grab the brush resting on the ground and dip the bristles into the viscous varnish and

fl

fi

fi

fi

slap it onto the table, turning the nearly-white wood into a sullen, dark brown. Once the whole table is

covered in the glistening polish, I grab my coat without wiping my hands. The cool night breeze hits me as I walk out the door, and I turn left, walking down the road leading to our house. I don’t make it ve steps before I hear quick footsteps behind me. Turning around, I see a disheveled man, on the younger side, and big – at least six foot ve inches. In his right hand, he grasps several pearl necklaces, dangling low through the cracks between his ngers. In his left is a large sack, lled to the brim but not weighing too much. I step aside to let him pass, and he looks at me with the con dence of a man who knows that there are no consequences - at least not in this town.

“You didn’ see nuthin’,” he says, glaring at me.

I stand still as I watch him turn the corner and vanish.

— It felt like time didn’t exist. It could have been minutes, hours, days before I woke up again. My head had stopped spinning, but it pulsated and ached, desperate for water. My body, broken and tired, longed for rest, and for once I decided to listen to it. As I closed my eyes, I saw Sarah, the subject of a portrait in my mind. She looked like she did the rst time I saw her, not as she looked the last night. I saw owing dark hair, dark brown eyes, a smile as bright as the sun’s re ection o a glass. She didn’t hold back. That’s what I loved most.

I’m waiting for you, I heard her say. I lifted my head o the rock, and the world started spinning again. Slowly, I got my feet under me and took a step. My leg couldn’t hold the weight, and I fell face- rst into the dirt, causing a cloud of dust to rise around me. Coughing, I got back up again and took a deep breath before taking my next step. With wobbling knees, I started o across the desert, a man alone without direction.

The immense cli s on each side looked down upon me as I traversed the dusty landscape. I no longer felt the aching in my legs, as they had gone numb at some point I no longer remembered. I didn’t know how much longer I could go, but I knew it wouldn’t be long before my legs gave up supporting the rest of my body. I wasn’t sure what I would do then. Give up, maybe. Lie there on the ground. Die slowly without seeing her again. But I kept moving, looking for something, anything.

— “How are we going to start a family when you’re never here, Jackson?” she asks.

“How are we going to start a family if I give up on every order that comes in?” I reply. She looks into my eyes; disappointment and sadness are etched into the wrinkles which appeared only recently.

The image of the man holding the pearls on my walk home appears in my mind. How are we doing to start a family in a town like this? I think to myself.

— I had given up without realizing it. At one moment I was walking, and the next, the sound of hooves and men caused me to stir. I slowly lifted my head and saw a stampede of horses rushing towards me. I

fi

fi

fl

fi

fi

ff

ff

fl

fl

ff

fi

fi

fi

ff

closed my eyes again, hoping for a death without pain. I didn’t even inch or grimace, wince or cover my

head. Silence soon followed, and I was sure the end had come. I looked up and saw the mammoth horses standing over me, blocking out the sun.

“Y’aren’t lookin’ real spry, there, fella,” a voice uttered. I could only muster a groan in reply. “‘Way I see it, you can either hop on one of these horses ‘ere, or we could leave you out ‘ere to die.”

I tried to stand with wobbling knees, but as soon as I got up, I fell back to the baking, cracked ground. They seemed to take this as a request to join them, and I soon felt strong arms lifting me up and into the back of a wagon and onto a bench running along the side. I heard someone else hop into the back and sit down across from me.

“Glad we found ya in time. Couldn’a been much longer ‘fore you died out ‘ere.” said the same voice from before. I looked up and saw him looking right at me. Long silvery hair owed from the back of his wide-brimmed hat. A long, gray beard slightly blocked his mouth, but a hint of a warm smile poked out from the mangy mass. Underneath his hair-covered, inviting face lived a menacing black bandana with a sharp white pattern.

“Why don’t we get goin’, ‘ere, Clyde,” he said, tapping the back of the man with the reins at the front of the wagon. Clyde whipped the reins, and the wagon started its slow, lurching march. The man with the black bandana sat back, stretched his arms along the side of the wagon, and crossed his legs. He still looked intently at me, and no matter where I turned, I felt his eyesight burning into my face. Horses on each side of the wagon trotted slowly along, ridden by the men who had lifted me into the wagon.

“D’ya got somewhere to be?” he asked after several minutes of silence. I wanted to say, away from that town, but thought better of it.

“Back to Fort Bliss, after visiting my parents in Odessa,” I said.

“Well, wudda nice surprise, we’re headed’n that direction too,” he said. “Lucky fer you. I dunno what you were thinkin’, tryna get to Freeport on foot. Couldn’t gedda wagon?” he asked, with a smile on his face. I felt a sudden moment of panic. He’s onto me. He knows I’m running from something. I felt the sudden urge to escape. The smile that seemed inviting at rst suddenly became jagged and cold.

“What’s yer name, anyways? Pardon me, not askin’ before. No manners!” he said with a full laugh.

“Luke Davidson,” I said, without showing any signs of reciprocating his amusement.

“Well, Luke, I sure am glad to have some comp’ny fer the journey,” he said. “It gets a little lonely on the long trips, yunno. Ain’t that right, Clyde!” he shouted to the man in the front. Clyde only nodded in response.

“What’s your business, being out here?” I asked, hoping to get the conversation away from me.

“Well, yunno, a little bitta this, little bitta that,” he said. For a moment, he shifted his sight away from me, surveying the land around us like a hawk – or a hunter. “We mainly help out some guys, get some shit done for them, yunno. Just some favors, here an’ there.” Now his gaze was again intensely focused on me.

ffi

fl

fi

“Yunno, been doin’ this for a while now. Clyde, Jim, Clint, ever since we was young. Gettin’ perdy good at it too!” I was squirming in my seat. I couldn’t tell for sure, but I thought he could see how uncomfortable I was, and it was making him smile all the more. “Use’ta be in uniform, yunno. All o cial,

ff

ffi

fi

ff

ff

ff

fi

fi

fl

ff

ff

ff

ff

ffi

ff

fl

the four of’fus. Nobody shows o ’sers any ‘spect, these days,” he put special emphasis on the last two words. “Couldn’ get anythin’ done. Now we like to do more under tha table type stu , yunno. Uno cial, but we get shit done!” He threw his head in laughter, and Clyde started to chuckle a little too.

“Ya musta heard ‘bout the sheri in Pecos?” he asked. I pretended to think for a little.

“No, doesn’t come to mind. Must’ve been after I left Odessa,” I said. He eyes me questioningly.

“Well, f***er done killed the sheri !” he exclaimed, making me jump. “Coulda told ya it was comin’, way folks be treating o ’sers these days. Guy by the name of Jackson, if I remember right.” His eyes ventured outside of the wagon once again.

“Damn shame,” I said. The wagon wheels turned slowly as he turned back to me. I looked down at the bottom of the wagon beneath his feet.

After what seemed like an hour passed but was probably just a couple of minutes, I said, “Well, I probably don’t need to get all the way to Bliss. If you can drop me o at the nearest town, that would be great. I can probably catch a ride–” “Now, why wouldja wanna do that when you can ride with me an’ Clyde, ‘ere, aye Clyde?” he asked.

Again Clyde only groaned in response. “To be honest, I’m feelin’ a little hurt thatchu would wanna leave us,” he said with a smile. Without moving the rest of his body, his right hand slowly moved his coat back, exposing a holster with a revolver that re ected the hot, blazing sun.

As I looked outside the wagon, I started to recognize much of the landscape. We are going west, I realized. We’re going back. I looked back at the man, a sudden wave of dread paralyzing me.

“When I saw ya, collapsed on the ground, I knew it was you,” he said. “Scum always tryta escape, but they never make it out ‘ere.” He looked right into my eyes. “An’ yer real scum, Jackson. What I wouldn’t give to kill ya right now, slowly, watchin’ the life drain from those there eyes. But we got our orders, and I been doin’ this long ‘nuf to know what I gotta do.”

The wagon continued its march, and I realized why the others were riding alongside it. It didn’t make sense that a landscape so vast could close around me so tightly. I knew what they would do to a sheri killer. Hanging, probably. Not before a long deal of torture, though.

I looked up and was met by the barrel of a revolver. I looked into his eyes, meeting his gaze – those cold eyes matching the cool white pattern of his black bandana.

“You think yer gonna escape, don’tcha? Well, that ain’t gonna happen, Jackson.”

He swung the revolver, hitting me square in the jaw, knocking me right to the ground.

— I’m walking home from the shop, just like any other evening. The house we share is just around the corner, and it only takes me turning this corner to hear the wailing. I start to jog, hoping it’s not my wife.

Dust ies up around me as I approach the house, and as I get closer, I hear the sobs and the almost animalistic groans. I throw open the front door and nd her sitting in the middle of the kitchen, tears streaming down her face as if they wanted to escape the su ering embedded in her mind. She tells me the story, struggling to do so even to her husband of ve years.

The sheri ’s o ce is just down the road, as is everything. I throw open the front door of our house and head in that direction, with no real plan having formed in my mind. The sun just nished its descent below the horizon, leaving only the mask of darkness. Once I get to the station, I enter through the front

door and see him sitting at his desk in the corner. I remember making that desk. I worked hard for such a beloved gure. Only a town as shitty as this one would worship a man like this, I think.

He’s the only one there. Everyone else has gone home for the night. He asks me what he can do for me, but I don’t reply. I go over to his desk, grab him by the collar, lift him up and shove him against the wall. There’s fear in his eyes. I can see it.

He asks what the hell I’m doing, and I say that I think he knows what I’m doing. I see his revolver on that desk, and I let him drop to the wooden oor as I grab the revolver and pull back the hammer with my thumb. Looking away, I pull the trigger. The loud bang is followed by silence. I walk out of the station and look in both directions. The gravity of what I just did hasn’t hit me yet. That would come later. I run back to our house and see her still sitting in the kitchen, no longer crying. She looks up at me with horror.

She asks what I did, and I tell her. She breaks down. There are shouts and screams down the road, and I look back into her face, knowing it will probably be the last time. I turn back and head out the door, hearing her screams from behind me, pleading for me to come back.

A Life’s Adventure Joshua Doolan '23

ff

fl

ff

fl

fl

fl

fi

fi

fi

fl

I was oating through space towards the head of some sort of mythical creature. It was a huge head with no skin left and all that was left was the skull. Although everything had fallen away the eye was still in its place being harvested by the people living inside the head. I was shivering in my suit. The cold oxygen hitting my face from the suit and the freezing cold temperature of space was getting to me. As I started losing consciousness I saw a light slowly coming toward me. It was a small landing craft that was used on the mythical planet. These vehicles were used to get around the planet for trading and mining of the eye. The skull's head, Grotius, was an unrestricted place for trade and collection of goods. It was one of the wealthiest planets in the galaxy with no empire rule it was free. The light got closer and closer and soon there was an orange blob right in front of me. I saw a shiny metal claw reach out and grab me. It was one of my bounty hunter friends, Keem Jok. He always wore this mask and never took it o for anyone or anything. He was extremely smart with some of the best weapons in the business. Although I never saw his face, he and I were virtually brothers.

I made it back down to the surface and was taken to some art collector. I was still groggy from the cold temperatures. I stumbled around his collection as he looked at me like I was an alien and was supposed to be in one of his cages. He looked like Santa Claus but with a shorter beard and crazy glasses.

The glasses did not t his all-black suit and his white u y hair and his groomed pearly white beard. The collector and Keem escorted me to the back room where there was a Bacta tank. A tank with light blue water and used for healing. I lay on the oor of the tank while the bubbled glass covered the top of the tank. I was locked in and as the tank lled up a tube with a scuba mouthpiece oated in front of me. These

fl

ff

fi

fl

ff

tanks were great for healing but awful for the user's mental health. As I started falling asleep I started slipping into a dream. Bacta’s are notorious for causing nightmares and vivid memories to appear as if you are living in them. I went straight back to my past.

I used to be a bounty hunter. That’s kind of wrong. I used to do anything for anyone. I was in fact a bounty hunter but I was also a gun for hire or anything that anyone wanted. I just wanted to make money, be feared, and shoot people. So that’s what I did. I stole from people I didn’t like and made as much money as possible. This was the life I wanted to live.

The memory I got from the tank was the time that I was hired on a mission to rescue a friend from prison. This particular prison was a ship that traveled from galaxy to galaxy picking up prisoners at every stop that they made. The man we were rescuing was named Jin. He was a strange-looking man that had orange skin and long tails coming out from his head. He was a bad man who had stolen credits from his employer. I had worked on a previous crew in the past. In that group, we did everything under the sun.

We made so much money that we bought our own planet. There I was doubled crossed by Jin and left with my ship and all of the group's credits. Now going back and rescuing him from jail was not a good feeling. I felt almost as if to fake the mission and leave home in that cell to rot away. Although the feelings for this mission were very uneasy I decided to go on the mission although I did not need the credits.

Although fuel was super expensive during this time it did not change my partners or my needs for credits.

The mission was pretty simple considering we were going to go into jail for the sole purpose of getting ourselves out. There was a little raccoon-shaped creature that was on our team. His name was Satellite.

He was in charge of getting us and the prisoner out of the prison as he had broken out of 8 of these imperial prisons.

Satellite was crazy and id does not give a rat's ass about anything or anyone. His goal was to piss o as many people as he could and make sure that he was having a good time. This was the same with the escape of the prison. Although he acted like a nut job he knew what he was doing. He started to come up with a plan as we ate that day for lunch and it escalated quickly “I need an alternator, the guys metal arm, and that guy in the corners leg.”

“Ok where can we get the alternator,” I responded.

Keep in mind we have a rag-tag group of people that are bounty hunters and are completely crazy.

I forgot to mention we also have a crazy tree guy on our team named Captain Coco. He was a thing that was made out of trees and could extend everywhere. They could stretch and grow rapidly and could grab onto anything and everything. When he got angry he got really angry and would shoot his tree limbs into people he didn’t like. Then there was some green thing or person. It was hard to tell. It was the same size as a human but had many di erent physical features. Although it kinda looked like a human it didn’t act like one. Instead of speaking the thing was named Angeliarc. It had many scars on her body with lots of mechanical parts from the ghts in her childhood with her mother. These mechanical metal parts on her body represented losses to her mother and when she lost a new part of her would be changed. The rest of the group consisted of Keem and I. The whole group is experienced bounty hunters the chance to win the bounty of this prisoner in theory should be easy.

I woke up from my daydream by getting dragged out of the tank by Keem. The room still smoking from the battle that had ensued before I had woken up. The collector dead on the oor was lying face down on the oor next to his desk. The desk was large a dark deep burgundy color with huge drawers on each side. With one of the drawers open there was a bucket with a lock on the top. As I stumbled around the room I saw lots of other creatures in these tanks. Almost like they were being displayed as art. The collector collected everything in the galaxy. From metal orbs to the rarest creatures.

It was a dark room with spotlights on the tanks and all the cases throughout the room. There were glass cases with crazy-looking weapons and ancient armor. The lights were bright enough to see what was

ff

fl

fl

ff

ff

fi

fl

fi

fl

fl

fl

ff

fl

fi

inside but the lights showed the dust oating around the room well. The room was very humid and the steam created white walls where the spotlights were shining down. As we left the double doors opened up like an escalator. As the door opened we got blasted with steam. My legs were still weak from the freezing temperatures of space I hobbled out of the top oor of that nightclub. As I walked down the stairs the whole entire room stopped dancing. The music stopped and the large group stared at me as if I had killed their brother.

I tried to open my mouth and all that came out was a loud moan. My vocal cords had been completely frozen from the cold and dry nitrogen that went into my lungs. Although the loud moan was better than not being able to function it was still embarrassing. As I continued to walk down the stairs the band stopped playing their smooth jazz and I could hear the eyeballs staring at me. As I stumbled down the stairs I tripped on the second to last step and landed directly on my stomach. The pain was unbearable but the embarrassment was the real thing that hurt. The large room burst out in laughter. Keem stepped in and blasted one shot into the ceiling to get everyone's attention. The room went silent and Keem started to speak, “If you want to mess with my friend then you will have to go through me. What he has done in the last 24 hours will dwarf anything that any one of you have done in your whole life.” The room stayed silent as a couple of murmurs came from the back of the room. The crowd parted for one man. It was Jin. As soon as I saw him my body collapsed.

The mission was going to be easy but there was one problem with this ship. It was manned by a human captain. This was extremely dangerous because droids can act in a certain way when brought upon the problem of being threatened with their life. Humans are very di erent as they can act in di erent ways. The captain of this ship held a beacon with him at all times. If the beacon was pressed, a squadron of ghter pilots would show up at the doorstep of that ship that had been the source of that beacon. As the ship rose from the ground and started shaking from the turbulence we got closer and closer to the cabin the ship started getting faster and faster. We faced a group of droid ghters that was protecting the command station doors. As we went up the stairs to ght them captain stretched out his limba and penetrated every single droid. After he had done so he interlocked his two arms and started throwing the droids back and forth against the walls of the staircase. After the sparks and the metal parts went ying.

The commander of the ship locked the doors. Lucky for us Satillitte brought a door breach and we got in without a miss-step. After entering the room the four of us surrounded the commander. We pointed our weapons at him as he held the beacon in his hand. Threatening to press the button to activate it if we started coming closer.

Crack! The sound of an electric shock coming out of Satellites new weapon. It was a ball of electricity and as soon as it hit the guard he was lifeless on the oor with static electricity coursing through his body. The fob dropped to the ground and landed face down a couple of feet away from the guard. I walked up to it, picking it up slowly making sure not to touch the button. As it left the ground the fob was making a re ection o the ground and I could see the light coming from the fob illuminating the ground. I turned it over and the light around the button was ashing. We had 20 minutes to get o the ship before it was blown to smithereens. Making our way out of the control room we searched around looking for our prized prisoner. Moving our way quickly through the long hallways with all the prisoners the dirty looks continued to get worse as the other prisoners looked us up and down as we stormed the halls looking for our key to getting out. Jin was the farthest cell from our escape door. The other part of the mission was our employers put a ship on the doorstep of the prison as an escape from the wretched moving metal box.

We got to his cell anmd it wreaked of the smell of fecise. The smell was so wretched that I puked all over the wall. Making the smell worse and making Satilliet follow my lead and evacuate all over the oor.

Keem put in the key to the door and the little cell lock beepeed and the roar of the door opening spread throughout the hallway. The door opening up like a garage door and Jin standing in the middle of

A Resting Bird, Mark Price

fi

fi

the cell gave an even more sourer taste in my mouth. When the door nally opened the full smell of his cell lled the hallway and the sound of other prisoners throwing up ecoed throughout the whole prison. As soon as I saw him fully the hatred spread over me. He was a man I did not like, a man with zero talent and was a scrub. He was able to move still but was badly beaten by someone or something recently. He had been in that prison for two years and the years had not been nice on him. He was uglier than I remeber with scars all over his face and body. He took one step out of the prison then collapsed.

Jin walked up to me with his evil grin on his face and looked at me from head to toe.

“Looks like your the one in bad shape this time,” exclaimed Jin. “How are you alive?” I asked.

“Do you know that little tracking becon you placed in my pocket? You destroyed my planet and all of my people. I managed to get away in a speeder and make it out as the X-wings bombed my people.”

“Maybe next time you shouldn’t steal, and maybe, just maybe you should take a shower,” I said jokingly as the room brokeout in laughter.

“You will pay for what you have done,” screamed Jin. He started running towards me with hatred in his eyes and Keem stepped in front of him killing him with one swift motion.

Hey I'm Black Igaju Agba '22

ff

Hey guys I’m Black by the way Does that o end you?

Does that scare you?

Why? We can change that My color roars like a lion, but it brings you fear like hunter to a monkey Well sometimes your fears of me Floods my mind with the same fears The fear that even though I didn’t choose to look like this I’ll be hurt I’ll be beaten I’ll be shamed Can you understand me?

Bert Greene '22 Today, the big event.

My friend, a zealot, a martyr, will stand before judgment.

He whose name will not be uttered Not yet 2:00, Belmont Hill, but where?

We want to watch, but we don't know how Why hide,

A Dream

He hid, my friend

Marc Butler '23

But they found him.

Cowards.

My engine began to overheat. I started to push over 130 mph in the dodge charger I was driving. I could feel the heat from the engine sneaking its way through the ac vents to get to me, glancing up at the mirror and looking at the money just sitting there, a promising future. Constant blue and red ashing lights immediately interrupted me, trying to hypnotize me into stopping the car. I thought to myself, if I do, at least the sirens will stop. It’s been almost an hour from the bank. I can’t take them anymore. Shutting my eyes and ears o , I see a picture of me sitting on the beach in peace with no peace and no more speed. The picture was turning into a short lm. I was beginning to do a ip on the beach. I realized that my dreams were slowly becoming a reality.

Opening my eyes, I was turned over on the top of the car.

The car was ipped over on the side of the road. Air whistling out of the tires from their former prison into the open air. It must have been a spike strip based on how much air was leaking out of the tires. Slowly gaining consciousness, a puddle started forming around me, which wasn’t good because I don’t remember having any water in the car. With all the strength left in me, I slowly lifted my hand to be in my blurry eld of vision and saw it was covered in blood. I couldn’t let my dream escape; I knew I had to chase it. I glanced out the side of the ipped car, and I saw a clearing in the forest that looked like a bright blue ocean, one that belonged in the Caribbean. I had to run to it. I gathered myself and grabbed the money from the and ran to it. I was not even able to think or see my next step. I just knew I was running to the beach, back to my dream. Hopefully, I can get away from the cops. I heard small waves slowly crashing along the sandy shore and then retreating back into the water. I felt the sand between my toes. Thinking I was losing the cops, I looked back, and the puddles of blood were following my every

ff

fl

fl

fl

fl

step j, leading the police on a treasure hunt to me. Attempting to look back even farther, I saw the police

fi

fi

Untitled 3

have come to the x on the treasure map. They started to pull their weapons. Turning forward, I kept on running in the hope of keeping my dream alive. The sirens began to go dim until I could nally not hear them anymore.

To People Chris Brusie '23 I used to watch among a eld of family The greatest wars of men The most powerful kings rule the lands I used to witness adventurers trekking through unknown lands Now what I see, I see endless My brothers and sisters around me ripped from their roots The land, once sacred, once respected Has been taken over at last Now with my time soon to come To be rooted and discarded for the ever-expanding man Pedals soon to shrivel and fall, I stand in my place

American Country Love Song Anthony Pellagrini '23

fi

fi

The Weekend. Blonde. Baby Blue Eyes. Eyes on You. Star of the Show. One of them Girls.

Unforgettable. I Took A Chance. You look Good. We Were. Up All Night. Slow Dance in a Parking

Lot? I Like the Sound of That. Spin You Around. Running Out of Moonlight. Middle of a Memory.

Head Over Boots. Hooked. Take Back Home Girl. Guy With a Girl. She’s With Me. I’d be Jealous Too. What Guy Wouldn’t. Good Vibes. I Love this Life. Life Changes. Fight. Gaslighter. Let me Go. You Broke Up With Me? Grew Apart. Happens Like That. I hope you’re happy now. Try Saying Goodbye.

This Bar. Drunk Me. Whiskey Lullaby. There’s a Drink for That. Drunk and I miss You. One Number Away. Alcohol You Later. Drinkin’ Problem. If I’m being Honest, I’m Drowning. What if I never get over you? Almost Maybes. Leaving New Orleans. Life Rolls On. No Such Thing as A broken Heart. It Don't Hurt Like it Used To. Single Saturday Night. Every Time I Hear That Song. Thinking Bout You. What Ifs. Call Me Up? Want it Back? It’s About Time. On My Way To You. Love You Like I Used To. We Back. Everything’s Gonna Be Alright. Better Together. Born To Love You. Happy Anywhere. Big, Big Plans. Getting Good. Yours If You Want it. I’ll Do Anything, Just To See You Smile. Greatest Love Song. Forever and Ever, Amen. I Love This Life. Marry Me?

Mrs. Margrove’s Almost-Friend Cooper Nelson '23 Mrs. Margrove’s living room was perfectly presentable. Placed loudly in the middle of the space, a concert grand piano acted as the centerpiece for the room. Despite being an antique, the keys were polished, paper-white, and appeared untouched. She could play a few short pieces if prompted by guests, but she didn’t care for the instrument, so her skills were moderate at best. The walls were an inviting shade of slate, even though Mrs. Margrove personally preferred green. The couches were aligned for conversation, with two facing each other and a knee-height co ee table in between. Aside from a narrow recession on the space closest to the window, the couches had no signs of use. The co ee table seated six but was only ever set for one. In the far section of the room was a cage, elevated o the ground and containing a kaleidoscopic parrot. The enclosure was labeled “Polly,” but in private, Mrs. Margrove called the bird Jane. This way, she could hear her own name repeated back to her when the bird was feeling talkative.

She spent her hours tending to her house, cooking one meal a day (she cooked enough for three and had leftovers), and passing the time in her living room sewing. She sewed day and night, making clothes and quilts, her creations spanning the color spectrum like the feathers of the parrot that kept her company.

ff

ff

ff

With all the time that she had alone, she had grown quite skilled, able to weave intricately designed

garments. Despite this, upon completion of her creations, she tossed them aside, using them as fuel for her hearth.

Like the inside of her house, the exterior was closely manicured as well. The lawn was thriving and uniformly cut, and deliberately shaped bushes surrounded the house’s walls. The bushes, which she harvested herself, provided the cotton that she sewed with. The front door, a deep shade of pumpkin, was bright and inviting. Each window was clear, revealing the complementary interior. Everything was perfect, and everything was intentional.

Mrs. Margrove did all of the grooming herself in hopes of putting on a good appearance. Every day, she would spend time trimming bushes, tidying the house, and mowing the lawn out towards the forest that encircled her house. The edge of the lawn formed the demarcation between the order inside and the chaos outside. Beyond the orbit of Mrs. Margrove’s e orts, trees were strewn without a pattern, interspersed amongst bushes of varying height, width, and shape. From those who had been through it, the forest was said to make you feel alone; there was no faint inkling that you were being followed or stalked, just pure, pervasive, chilling loneliness.

Surrounded by this entropic wilderness, it was this exact sensation that Russell Mann experienced as he stumbled out of the forest and onto the homogenous lawn. A slender man in his early twenties of about six feet, he was dressed in rugged outdoor clothing and wearing a small satchel that was de ated due to its partial emptiness. The chills from being lost and alone soon faded to confusion and then broke to relief, washing over him like a cool breeze. The house was an island in an ocean of loss, a lighthouse of hope. It seemed to reach out to him, grasp him in a sunny embrace, and beckon him to nd solace inside its walls. He started towards the front door and then noticed a face staring out at him between the bars of one of the front windows. It was the face of an elderly woman, wrinkled with the burden of life. The edges of her mouth grimaced into a smile, and her eyes sparkled wide with the light of years of troubling wisdom. It was the type of expression that, just like the house, invited him in, welcomed him into its midst, and comforted him with the knowledge that answers were forthcoming. It o ered a glimpse, an insinuation that its owner could expunge the tumult that had de ned his last 24 hours.

fi

ff

fi

ff

fi

fl

He walked to the front door, but before he could knock, the door swung open, and he found himself eye to eye with the woman he had seen in the window.

“You’re lost. Please, come in,” she said, opening the door wider so that he could step through.

“Thank you, ma’am.” he replied exuberantly as he stepped inside. “I’m Russell.”

She shut the door behind him.

“Call me Mrs. Margrove. You must be famished,” she responded slowly. “There is plenty here, allow me to prepare you a meal.”

“Oh, no need to go to all the trouble, ma’am. I’m not much hungry for anything. I suppose I’m just stopping by.”

“But surely you must need to eat. We all do,” she insisted, unwavering in her demeanor.

“No really, I’m quite ne. I appreciate your generosity, though,” he responded, not wanting to impose.

ff

fl

fi

fi

ff

fi

ff

fi

ff

fi

She stared at him for a few seconds, with the smile remaining plastered across her face.

Something about her eyes changed, like a candle being put out, leaving emptiness behind. Then the color returned.

“Just tea then,” she stated, “You can have a seat in the living room while I put it on the stove. Make yourself feel right at home.”

Again not wanting to impose, he accepted, this time feeling that he needed to oblige her eagerness to accommodate.

“Please. Do make yourself feel right at home,” she called as she left towards the kitchen.

He took a seat on the couch, noting its rmness and unmarred surface. He could tell it had not been broken in. He examined his environment, confused at the peculiarity of the piano’s front-and-center placement and the chilling neatness of the room. He then peered down and jumped: the corpses of three mice lay in a pile near the foot of the couch. A repulsed expression spread across his face as he lifted his foot away from the rodents, but his confusion vanished when he noticed the bird.

It stood motionless, staring at him through the bars of the cage. It was calm and subdued but stared at him in a way that only an animal can: with unwavering focus, like a lion staring at its prey. He was about to get up to look at the bird when he noticed Mrs. Margrove standing in the doorway. He did not know how long she had been standing there. Like a sleeping beast awoken by a nightmare, she snapped into action.

“I put the tea in the kettle, it should only be a little while. Please, don’t go,” she spoke as she limped over and sat opposite him on the couch. She sat upright, with good posture and her hands on her knees.

“I suppose you might want to know what I’m doing out here” Russell responded.

“If it interests you,” she replied.

“I was looking for a friend of mine who disappeared yesterday. She’s a woman, about my age. 5’8’’ with red hair. She mentioned frequent walks in these woods, which is why I decided to search here. I’m grateful to have found you because I admit, I had lost my way. I imagine you haven’t seen-” “Don’t worry about your friend. I am con dent she will be found,” she replied instantly, cutting him o . “Funny thing to do. For a friend to do. Running o like that.”

“Well, I’m… I’m not certain that she ran away.”

His sentence trailed o as she abruptly stood up and hobbled over to the birdcage across the room. Each of her steps creaked on the hollow-sounding oorboards.

“You see, a pet will never do that. I can open this cage, and she stays put. She is here for me, she speaks to me, and she nds joy in the little things. Do you agree?” The bird, melanocholy, not by circumstance but by choice, remained silent.

The teapot in the kitchen began to whistle, disrupting Mrs. Margrove’s speech. It broke her rhythm for a moment, then seemed to reinvigorate her, and she continued her narrative.

“Even after they die, they stay with you. Always in solidarity. In … mourning.”

“I’ve never had a pet, I, I can’t relate. But I think the tea is ready. it’s making quite a racket.”

She squinted, staring him down like a lion stalks a wildebeest that is just out of reach. After a few seconds, she lifted her head, her eyes widened to normal width, and her mouth curved into a smile.

“Of course, how silly of me,” she said playfully. “I will go fetch that for you right now. Please, do make yourself feel right at home. She disappeared into the hallway, leaving Russell alone with the bird. It had not taken its eyes o of him, so he stood to take a closer look. “Polly” remained perfectly still, like a gure in a painting. Con dent that the bird would stay put, his curiosity overtook him, so he reached forward and clasped the door handle of the cage, delicately swinging it open.

As soon as the door was wide enough to t a parrot’s abdomen, the bird dashed for the door as if it would never get another chance to see the light. Like a balloon rapidly running out of air, it ew around the room in erratic fashion, crashing into walls and glancing o of the furniture. It bounced o of the piano keys, creating an awkward chord that even Mrs. Margrove would be embarrassed by. It continued to y, disrupting the order of the room, its claws tearing fabric and spreading dust. This hurricane of destruction squawked loudly like a regular bird as if it had forgotten it could speak. Its erratic sounds blended with the ever-louder whistle coming from the kitchen.

Russell stood in the center of the room next to the piano, ducking periodically as the bird ew overhead.

“Mrs. Margrove,” he called, “I need a little help.”

He got no response. He turned to look into the kitchen but saw no movement except steam shooting out of the kettle. He spun around and was immediately hit in the face by the bird, knocking him o his feet. He reached to his cheek, and his hand came away tinted carmine. He winced and, now unsettled, called out again.

“Mrs. Margrove, I should be leaving before dark,” he shouted. Not hearing a response, he got on his feet and hobbled towards the kitchen. Before he passed the doorway into the kitchen, he heard a mu ed thud, and a quiet, sickly cry. Assuming his delicate host had fallen, he rushed to nd her. As he arrived, he noticed the sink over owing with dishes, the counters covered in plates and food and utensils, littered without care like the remnants of an airplane crash. The knife block was empty and tipped over sideways on the countertop. Mrs. Margrove was nowhere in sight.

He noticed a door leading to a staircase heading down that was slightly ajar and walked over to it.

“Mrs. Margrove?”

He got no response, so he decided to walk further down the stairs. The creaking of the stairs below his feet became drowned out by the progressively louder tea kettle and bird, still clattering around upstairs.

He took in a breath and descended to the bottom of the stairs.

In the basement, lying on a table, stu ed with cotton and partially sewn up with thread, was a redhaired gure.

He scrambled to run, then felt an impact on the back of his head, and everything went dark and silent.

In the living room, the bird settled into its cage, carrying a mouse in the claws it had been hiding under its vibrant coat.

Humanoids Charlie Cave '22 We are all cyborgs, Malfunctioning without phones,

fl

ff

fl

fi

ff

fi

ff

fl

fi

ffl

fl

ff

Now, our second brai

Puppy Love

by Kailen Richards '22

He said, “you know I love you.”

She said, “Then why did you cheat?”

He said, ”Why would you think I would cheat on you?”

She said nothing.

He said, “who’s putting these thoughts into your head? your friends?

You know they never liked me!

And you know they don't care about you like I do!”

She said nothing.

He said, “You’re just paranoid because you know nobody else will love you as much as I love you!”

She wept softly He said, “Don’t cry. Why are you crying? See childish, that’s all you are.

Weeping like a “child.”

She dried her tears He said, “Stop listening to your friends, they are just trying to turn you against me. Okay? You know I know what's best for you.”

She peeped, “okay” He said, “I love you” All she could muster was a nod.

Max Wagner '23

fl

fi

fi

fl

fi

fl

fi

fi

fi

fl

fi

fl

fl

I turned my wrench, tightening the nal bolt before the emitter could turn on. Soon the place would be ooded with fundamental particles, the same sort of universe soup present at the beginning of all things, that would be present at the end. I reached for the familiar cold metal handle of the door behind me. My hand met its rectangular edges, and I pushed down. It didn’t move. I tried again. Again. Nothing.

I pulled out my radio, but it had no signal. The massive electromagnets that kept the particles within the chamber were already powering up, disrupting any wireless signal that would attempt to reach the outside. The radio trembled in my hand. I looked down in horror. I was about to be sucked to the wall, massive magnets preparing to reel me in like an experienced sherman. I could already feel the pull. I hastily unbuckled my belt, set down my radio, and took my phone and keys out of my pockets. Seconds later, the items started to skitter across the metal grate platform, moving faster and faster until they leaped into the air, clanging against the massive magnets embedded within the walls. I was untouched, for now, but I knew I would soon be evaporated by excited particles. I banged on the door again. No response.

Bang. Bang. Bang. I knew everyone would be cleared out, that humming electricity and warning alarms would down out the banging of my sts being brought to blood on the cool metal walls. Outside, the room’s air was slowly thinned, becoming a vacuum to contain any accidents. Sound wouldn’t travel anywhere. I sat down and closed my eyes. This is how it ends. Torn apart by my own life’s work. I knew I couldn’t get out. I’d designed the machine myself, and it couldn’t be opened. That was the entire point. I felt the heat around me. The humming grew louder, louder, deafening. The emitter red. Subatomic particles red at lightspeed around the ring, lling it with energy. My closed eyes went from black, to a dark glow, to red, orange, yellow, white. This was it. I opened my eyes, and there was no completed machine.

I saw it deconstructed, like a reverse time-lapse, piece after piece of metal and technology removed and placed into trucks and shipped away. I saw the building around me taken apart, concrete and rebar being moved out of its place in a matter of moments. The lights in the streets disappeared, replaced by lamplit shadowy nights, cars replaced by horses replaced by men replaced by endless forest.

Farther. Forests disappeared, giving way to a clouded, ery hellscape. Farther. Dinosaurs appeared, then disappeared, creatures grew smaller, then the world was grass, then sand, then rock. Primordial seas ashed by, the breeding grounds of life. Farther. Before life. A world of re and brimstone and death. The world stopped ashing. I stopped turning back. I exhaled. Then, nothing. I frantically sucked the air.

Nothing. There was no oxygen before life, nothing to sustain me. What the hell was going on? Is this what happens at the end of one’s days? I’ve heard of a person’s life ashing before their eyes, but every life?

The world’s life? I closed my eyes. Please take me back. Please, god, just let me go back to my time. I was an atheist.

I looked around. Lava bubbled, seemed to ow faster. Faster and faster, it rushed by. The sun accelerated, spinning through the sky. Seconds later, it set. I turned around, looking for the moon.

Nothing. How long ago was I? I stood, my body consuming the last of the oxygen, as I sped up, up, catapulted forwards. The scenes I had seen played out in reverse. I saw a huge impact, a dark period, then a moon. Plants grew in the pools that formed around me, ourishing underneath the ashing sun. All of

fi

fl

Turning Back

fi

fi

ff

fi

fl

fl

fl

fi

fl

ff

ff

fi

fi

fl

evolution, the beginnings of life, played out before my eyes. Too fast. I had no time to take in the sights.

Once again, I saw the dinosaurs, their death, new animals, mammals, forests, tents, a town, a city, and I stopped. I was in the reactor, but this time the door was open. I leaped out, turned a corner, and burst outside. The sun was shining, cars crowded the streets, and the familiar newsstand lay on the corner. I ran over and looked at the newest papers. May 12th, 2022. Just a day before where I should be. Forward.

Cycles of light and dark, too many. A ash of clouds, of rain, of sun. May 20th, 2022. Backward. May 10th.

Forward. May 13th. This was the day I died.

I ran back into the building. I sprinted down corridors and twisting hallways to the control room. The machine was powering up, and there was nothing I could do to stop it. It was hard-wired into the reactor to never stop at this point, as any sudden change could prove disastrous. I looked around.

Other scientists looked at me with questioning eyes, no doubt wondering how I was covered in sweat. I didn’t have time to convince them. Backward. I hope this was the right time. I hope this is the night before today. I ran back to the branch in the halls, into the containment room, and nally entered the machine once more, taking a wrench that had been left outside. I tightened the last bolt now, hopefully saving myself from all this in a few hours. Would it? How did this even work? Scientists have always had theories of time travel, but who could say what was true. Could I change my past? Many had theorized about time travel, but nothing is really known. If I died, or if the other me died, what would happen?

Could I ever go back? Guess I’ll gure out. Now’s as good a time as any. I guess any time is good for me.

Stepping out of the machine, I heard the thud of the heavy door closing behind me. I navigated the corridors to nd the unused secondary observation room, the one with cameras rather than the traditional reinforced windows. Forward. This was the next day. And there it was, proving my suspicions, my fears. I saw myself on the cameras. He was, or I was, walking the same familiar path I had earlier today, but I didn’t turn into the reactor room. It worked. I’d saved myself from entering the machine. Did I save myself? Or did I save another me? I didn’t have time to celebrate, though. I felt a hand on my shoulder and whipped my head around. I saw a futuristic mask, seemingly a liquid metal in the shape of a face. It appeared to be a man, with his body covered in another material, one that seemed to suck the light out around it, making him appear more like a hole in my vision than an object. For a moment, I just stared, taking in the sight of his owing out t, trying to comprehend what I was seeing. Then we moved.

His hand was rm on me as time ew back to before the building was created, then across the country.

He could y as well. I guess that makes sense. It’s a common theory that time’s just another dimension, so why should space be any di erent? How could he do that? Could I? I didn’t have time to think about it. It was a distinctly di erent feeling than time traveling, which I hadn’t even realized had a feeling at all. Earlier, I’d felt like I was going up and down, forward and backward in the river of time. Now, I was being pulled to the side, yeah, de nitely pulled. I wasn’t in control. I could feel his willpower moving us. Forward. It worked. While we were still traveling, all around us, buildings formed as I ung us back to the correct time. I felt his attempts again. The days slowed, the sun crawling in the sky and then stopping. I could feel his own force, his own attempts to go back, canceling my e orts. The world was still. Then we slowed, our feet touching the desert ground, and stopped. My stomach lurched as I saw what lay in front of me. The Grand Canyon, in all of its terrible glory, like a God had taken his wrath out on the Arizona desert. I'd never been here. Once again, I had no time to savor the sights. He pushed, and I fell. Back. BACK! The sun rocketed from the West to the East, looking like a streak of light across the sky more than it did a single circle. In just a second of my fall, I traversed millions of years of history. Splash. I landed in the river at the bottom of the canyon. I was alive. I looked up. Twenty feet above me, the canyon walls gave way to the ancient blue sky. Who the f*** was this guy, and what did he want? How did he get the same powers as me? What did he want with me?

fi

fl

fi

fl

ff

ff

fl

fi

fl

fi

ff

fl

I didn’t want any of this. I want my wife, my kids, and maybe to help the world. I want my life. I want its issues, my short hours of sleep, my same breakfast every morning that I felt was sometimes torture, my colleagues who disagreed with me, and the times my car broke down. At the top of the canyon, the man appeared. How did he track down when I’d traveled to? He leaped down at me, arms outstretched. Back. I rose out of the ground, rising up on the heated earth. Tens of thousands of years passed. Seconds later, he showed up. What the hell do I do? I needed to travel as he did. Could I? I don’t even know if he got his powers the same way. I had to try. Go somewhere. I couldn’t control this the same way I time travel, at least not yet. The man showed up right in front of me and grabbed me. I hadn’t moved anywhere, not even a few steps of distance. I raised my leg to kick him. I struck, and my foot connected with what felt like the hardest material possible, somehow rigid despite its uidity. What once seemed like a owing void condensed into a glossy black material where I made contact, and engraved on it were a few words. LZN Polymers, 2183. Could that be the year he was from? Could I maybe nd some answers? I kicked o his chest again, creating some distance. Forward. I passed by millions of years, back to the present and forward even further. Tourist attractions popped up near the now deepened Grand Canyon, and I tracked the years passing on the newspapers and signs adorning them. 2000. 2050. 2100.

2150. 2183. Here I was.

Without a way to know if the man could track me, I had to assume he was coming. I ran inside the nearest building, hiding under the counter. It was a futuristic restaurant, or I guess just a restaurant for this time. Surfaces of polished white surrounded me, with not a worker in sight. Small drones ew silently through the air, delivering food to hungry tourists. I stayed for a few minutes, hoping he’d lost me.

Customers walked in and out, appearing not to pay. As they left, I simply heard a beep. I stood up and walked out. I hadn’t ordered anything, so hopefully, the machine wouldn’t be checking me for however everyone paid. I had to nd some answers.

Just as I exited the restaurant, I felt it. Maybe I’d had the feeling before and was just now realizing, or maybe it was a new development. But I knew with absolute certainty someone had timetraveled to here. To now. It felt like someone had broken something, like the feeling when you just know someone has snuck into your living room uninvited. And I could feel where they had arrived. Eastern United States. Washington, D.C. After thinking about the implications of this sense for a moment, I realized. Holy shit. He could have the same thing. Answers to what was going on, what happened to me, and why he’s chasing me must be where he went. In the capital. The only problem was getting there.

Stepping further out into the blazing sun that shone down the canyon walls, I rose o the ground almost unconsciously. Looking down, the sight of my shoes levitating o the coarse sand surprised me, and I almost yelled. Good timing. I needed to go East, but what if I ran into the other guy? His visage was still branded in my mind, his owing metal face, his ethereal darkened body. What did he want with me, and more importantly, what could I do about him? I continued to rise, above the clouds, hopefully out of sight.

Staying just above the great layer of wispy vapor, I began my ight to the capital. Cities, forests, and elds passed between the great bodies of white, seeming so strangely similar to that of my native time. Not too much had changed. I arrived in the outskirts of D.C., landed lightly in an abandoned lot, and began the trek inwards.

I passed the suburban houses, no doubt lled with content families enjoying the blissful amenities of the future. Roads were nearly empty; only the occasional sleekly designed car passed silently by. Kids must be in school right now since they were absent from the sidewalks. Nearing the center of the capital, I could feel that strange feeling again, someone traveling in and out of 2183. In. Out. The feeling grew stronger, deeper in my stomach and my brain, and I knew I was getting closer and closer to the point it was coming from. When it was almost deafening, I turned a corner to where I knew it must be. It was an unassuming building, just a blank rectangle of faded red bricks around a mile from the Capitol

fl

fl

fi

ff

ff

fi

fl

fi

fi

fi

fi

fl

fi

fl

fi

fi

fl

Building. Opening the door, I found an even more uninteresting interior. Newspapers lay scattered around, some collecting dust and some seemingly just placed there. I bent over and picked up one from the Seattle Times. 2180. U.S. Capital Destroyed by Nuclear Bombing. I looked out one of the windows.

Not destroyed by a nuclear bomb. Then I looked back at the newspaper. On the top right, there was a checkmark written with a blue marker. Piles on piles of newspapers lay marked with the same blue marker. I picked up another. Child Hit by Car, Dies. 2179. Weird. Doesn’t seem like the same tier of event as the rst paper. Still, it had a blue checkmark on it. I guess if he has all the time in the world, he may as well use it. The persistent feeling still emanated from the next room as I looked around. Nothing new was apparent where I was, so I inched closer to the door and deeper into the building. I was wondering why there was no security or even locks here, no alarms or warnings. Then I thought. If it was another time traveler who operated out of here, he didn’t really need to bother. Whenever he heard word of an intruder, he could go back and stop them, leaving the timeline as if they had never come. If he wanted to, he could make the world be as if they had never even existed. Would that happen to me?

Step by step, I drew closer to the door, placed my hand on the handle, and cracked it open.

Inside, the man was appearing and disappearing, marker in hand, checking newspapers. I wonder what they said. The assassination of a world leader? Petty crime in some tiny city in the midwest? After he disappeared, I rushed into the room, positioning myself behind where he last left. He appeared again, facing away from me, and drew a checkmark on the newspaper sitting on a lectern in front of him. 2182.

Mother, Two Children Killed in Heist. How long had he been gone xing that? It likely just took him minutes. Godlike powers tend to do that. And then he spoke.

“What are you doing here?” It was the rst time I’d heard him. It was obviously ltered, and sounded more like a group than an individual. His deliberate words felt like they came from all around me, or from inside of me.

How do I respond? “Hold on! Before you do something… what do you want with me?”

“I want…,” his voice was quiet, solemn, rageful. “I want to punish you.”

What the hell did he mean? “What? What did I do? Please, I can x this.”

“You could x it for you. You can’t x it for me.”

“What does that mean?”

“I can’t forget. It could never be the same.” he turned around, clicking the end of his blue marker, and a thin blade of crackling energy extended from within. The room was illuminated in ickering cyan light, like the summer sun shining through shimmering water at an aquarium. He lunged at me, and I skated backwards across the room, landing next to the back wall. He rushed forward again, arm outstretched with the knife held forward. I evaded his strike, falling forward to the left. I grabbed his leg and pulled us through time. Backwards. Before he could react, years passed, newspapers disappearing from the cluttered room around us. Before long, just after all the papers had disappeared and been replaced by cobwebs and dust, he reacted, pushing us back forwards. Our e orts counteracted, leaving us trapped in the normal ow of time. He raised his left leg and kicked my right shoulder. The impact shocked through the entire side of my body, and I felt my bones crack from the force. I kept my grip, refusing to let go.

I thought for a split second, then ew us out the wall. We crashed through the bricks, his owing armor redirecting the dust and cracked red stone. I began to y west, over the houses and buildings of D.C., desperately trying to come up with some way to live through the day.

“There’s nobody you can take me where you’ll win,” he said, simply sitting still, holding his knife of energy to my neck. “You can’t ght me.”

I didn’t respond. What could I do? Then it hit me. Seattle Times. Mount Washington. I ew us to Seattle, lowering over Mount Washington. He continued to ght my e orts to bring us back,

pushing harder and harder forwards. Then, I stopped pushing backwards. Without my e orts counteracting his own, we ew forwards through time until I saw what I was looking for. Lava bubbled on the slopes below, and I returned my grip onto our position in time. Instead of ying, I pushed us downwards, countering his will to stay in the air. Only gravity would move us, and it was taking us straight towards the crawling mass of molten rock.

“You’ve made your choice, then,” he stated simply. He dug the knife into my stomach. Every crackle of its blade, every tiny bit of motion, sent a jolt of electricity through me. I refused to let go. I could feel the blade cut and cauterize, sending excruciating pain through my system. I refused to let go. We fell nonetheless. A hundred feet o the ground. Fifty. Zero. He hit the lava and screamed. The sound was distorted and crackling as the technology of his suit melted away.

“This will be your path, then. You will come to regret this.” His face was neutral, but as the last bits of his body melted away, he gave me a slight smile, cruel and uncaring. I could feel myself being scorched by the heat, clothes burning away slowly as I stood on the precipice of my certain death. I took a last look at where the man had once been, turned away, then turned back.

I arrived back in my time, passing hundreds or thousands of years of unchanging forest before the eruption. I passed out, blood trickling out of my not-quite cauterized hole in my stomach onto the forest oor.

Three Years Later.

ff

ff

fi

fl

fi

ff

fi

fi

ff

fl

ff

fi

fl

fi

ff

I woke up, got dressed, brushed my teeth, and walked down the stairs. While cracking open the eggs for my breakfast, I hit the button on the silver co ee machine in the corner of the kitchen. While it whirred, dispensing co ee into the mug placed below, I nished making the simple eggs I’d been so accustomed to my whole life. As I ate, I watched my twins walk out the door with their little backpacks, o to rst grade. My son laughed as he skipped out, his little blue shoes skipping out the doorstep. My daughter turned around. “Bye Papa!” I smiled. I couldn’t wait to see them tonight. Minutes later, I walked out the door, locked it behind me, and stepped into my car. I began my usual route to work. And then, minutes after I’d left, just after I merged onto the highway, I saw it. A destroyed school bus rolled o the side of the road. Ambulances surrounded it, and kids were lined up behind the driver with cuts and bruises. Some were taken out on stretchers. Where were my kids? I couldn’t nd them. Not in the line, not on stretchers. I looked down. Two body bags, with tiny lumps in the middle, unable to ll them. And I knew what I would nd inside. Wishful thinking told me they could still be in the bus, or already in an ambulance, but I knew better than to hope. I could feel it. All my life, I’d been asking questions, questions about how to move forward, how to help others, and how to help myself. My career as a scientist was based around asking questions, but nally, I didn’t have a question. I had a single truth. An answer. My kids were dead.

I could save them. But then I realized. I couldn’t forget. It could never be the same. And I realized what the man had told me all those years ago. I wish he’d killed me. I’d come to regret my choice.

I knew what I must become. What I already was. What I’d always been. I screamed, releasing all the energy of time, space, and pain inside of me, jumping years, decades, centuries forward and back. I saw the world, saw all of history, all of time and space, and I landed.

My eyes opened again. I was in a room, built of brick and full of cobweb and dust. In its center lay a lectern, and on that lectern lay a single blue pen. There was no turning back.

Hands Up! Gabe Klug '22 Surrender. Give up. Maybe apologize?

Cease re! Wave the white ag! Make an e ort to say hi?

Humanize. Help them out. Have them see the person.

Shake hands. Say sorry. Can we just chill?

No beef. No hard feelings. No reason to hate

Untitled Forrest Campbell '23 Sweat pours down my neck Heavy breathing lls the room I must win this point

Locomotive Austin Curtis ‘22 His horse sighed deeply, then exhaled. Its head dipped and shook violently only for a moment before Darvy whipped the reins; summoning the beast’s attention. In the distance, a bellowing noise itched his ears. The small rocks under the horse's hoofs began to shake, rattling against each other as a steady chugging approached.

"Alright, it's time, boy, this is it." his father said.

Darvy swung his ri e from his shoulder to his hands, holding it up towards the sky with one hand, silhouetting the full moon behind him from atop his steed. They stood side to side, creating a line parallel to the tracks. On the rails, about 100 feet ahead, was 5 pounds of TNT, wired to a primer which ran back to Darvy, who stood dismounted next to his horse. He watched the black metal locomotive round the corner of the trees in the distance, spewing opaque white smoke from its chimney as it barreled

ff

fl

fl

fi

fi

down the tracks. The engine pumped out vibrating energy, shaking everything while approaching. He

passed, and the two held their breath in anticipation, but nothing. The TNT remained stagnant, sitting in the center of the rails, ready to take out the train that was now dangerously close to passing by. Without hesitation, Darvy's father mounted his horse in one fell swoop like a gymnast, swinging his legs around as he propelled himself up by his arms.

"Lets go, get on your damn horse we ain't letting this train get away, oh no!" his father belted out.

His face was now red with rage, and his veins protruded from his neck like the railroad tracks beside him. Darvy slung his ri e behind his back and mounted, then caught up to his father, who was now matching the train's speed. In the passenger cabs stood armed guards stationed to protect the bonds, which remained locked in steel safes. They raised their ri es from the platform on the back of the cabs and shot unrelentingly at the outlaws. The bandits cut back behind the last cargo cab, now on the other side of the train.

"Hey!" Darvy screamed, calling out to his father.

"You gonna tell me what the hell we're gonna do?".

"I think we have to stop the train," his father screamed over the sound of the thunderous engine.

"No!" "We got no chance to stop this thing; we gotta jump on!" Darvy ordered.

"You wanna jump on this f***ing train boy?, go ahead, I'll follow your damn lead, I'd rather die than let this money get away."

Darvy pulled alongside the passenger cabin, his horse rode at equal speed, and Darvy could see the platform where he needed to jump. He swung his leg around the horse, so both his feet stood on one stirrup, then leaped across the gravel tracks. He landed with a thud as he rolled into the passenger cab.

The rst thing he felt was the butt of a ri e slamming his back, then darkness.

The twang of the bullet rang out when it ricocheted o the metal sheet. A six-gun shooter ipped around the man's fat nger; then fell gracefully with the guidance of his hand into the leather holster. Dirt rose from the ground as he walked downrange to set up bottles to shoot again. The horizon was in nitely far, and the cactus pierced the purple orange sky and silhouetted the sunset. Burgundy rocks rose in the distance from the ground, like a boundary to his world. He arranged the empty beer bottles on the fence post, near the edge of his property and on the trail that led back to his cabin. He took 15 steps back, counting as he measured his strides to perfection, then stopped with a stamp of the foot as he squared up downrange. He leaned back slightly, knees bending and shoulders high and ready to engage.

fi

fl

ff

fl

fl

fi

fi

His right hand drifted down to his side, a few inches above his belt, and his ngers pointed down the

fi

fl

grabbed the fuse handle and pushed down, sparking the wick which fed into the explosives. Moments

silver hammer of the pistol. Then, he removed the gun from its holster, perfectly grabbing the handle of the weapon and yanking it up towards him, moving his elbow back and pulling the trigger all in one swift move. As a boy, Darvy McCoy would hike the narrow dirt trail behind his cabin, ascending up the nearby hill, which seems mountainous to youth; and collect sticks to then be used as pretend ri es. Hours alone at his makeshift range eventually shaped Darvy into a marksman. His cabin sat at Mt. Redsokket, and the dried grass and dirt, paired with the lea ess trees, exposed the shanty from all sides and could be seen from in the valley below. Running down the trail, Darvy carried his stick like it was his own ri e. He gripped the sanded-down wood of the stick and brought the butt up to his head, looking down the branch, using the protruding splints of wood as iron sights.

"Bang!" he yelled out.

"Darvy, get over here boy!"

A burly man stepped out of the cabin. His thin hair dangled down to his shoulders, and you could see his scalp through the sparsely planted follicles. His eyes were sunken in, and wrinkles accumulated at the corners and continued down to his cheeks, making his face seem saggy and tired. He had a small head, though, and the gray beard he grew out extended from his unkempt sideburns, failing to hide his shallow jawline and chin.

"Darvy!"

"Yes, father?"

He dropped his stick quickly, and his feet moved soon over the dusty trail once more, kicking up dirt that caught the golden sunlight. The man extended his large hand down to his shoulder of Darvy as he walked by, grabbing it rmly and throwing the boy o his balance.

"We told you about that trail, didn't we?" the man asked.

His grip tightened, and his other hand came down from above and struck Darvy in the face, spinning him around and sending him down on his bottom. The familiar feeling of the burning sting on his face became a reminder of his father, his strikes were almost recognizable by now, and only his tears soothed the ames on his soft cheek. The childhood nights spent either outside among the trees or inside his one-room shack shaped him into an independent boy, yet each time the door to the cabin ew open and his father stepped through, there always came fear. A coonskin cap hid his face, so only his raggedy gray hair and beard came out from under the shadows of his hat.

"Darvy, where are you boy, come here!" he slurred.

Growing louder, his father's footsteps shook the windows. His blue eyes locked onto his sons.

fl

fl

fl

ff

fl

fi

fl

He saw the boy in the corner, crying, holding his knees with his head down. Approaching closer, he

slowed his stride and taunted the boy by nonchalantly humming as he reached down and grabbed Darvy by the hair, bringing him to his feet. His scream rang out as his toes dragged along the wood plank oor, scraping the material o Darvy's small homemade shoes. Powerful yanks stretched his neck as he dangled above the ground, becoming a canvas for his father's red paint. Strikes berated down upon his brow, cheek, and chin, leaving him sore and unable to speak. Once again, the rusty hinges violently pivoted. The door closed itself after it slammed behind Darvy, and he found himself bleeding, slumped down at the foot of his cabin, with the sound of his father breaking bottles inside. The summer night's heat swaddled Darvy as he slowly walked down to the creek, where he rinsed himself for a moment, then leaned up against the big log he'd use as a lounge chair. Stars twinkled in the sky and re ected o the still water which lay just next to him. Crickets chirped, and an occasional subtle uster of wind shook the leaves and cast dancing shadows along with the white fabric of his shirt. Sleep fell upon him as he stared into the universe, still feeling the hot pain all over.

As he lay face down on the vibrating oor, he felt the blunt force of leather shoes on his ribs. His sight was blurred, and his breaths were short. He tried to roll over, but the barricading wouldn't allow it. He counted 8 shoes as his face scratched against the oor. Then, their kicks suddenly stopped and were replaced with yells.

"There's another one!" one of the gures exclaimed.

Two bangs exploded then a thud hit the oor. Next to him fell a guard, his eyes staring into Darvy's. Darvy thought it was ironic that an outlaw and this man of morals lay next to each other, but only one remained alive. The footsteps continued to shu e as the sounds of esh colliding emanated from above. Darvy felt the rm grip of a man's hand pull his jacket, and his feet soon hung above the ground before nding himself standing, looking back into his father's face. While pulling Darvy o the ground, his father managed to hold o three other fully grown men. His pistol remained quiet for the moments after I stood up, then rang out in quick succession. The four shots left in the revolver quickly emptied and found their nal resting place wedged between the eyes of each man.

"Aright! Hurry up and grab those f***ing bonds Darvy before those other guards get here!"

Still ustered, Darvy followed and broke open the metal safes once by one with the help of his pistol. Together they counted the stacks that lay in long rows within the safe. A eld of whitish-yellow

fl

ff

ff

fi

fl

fl

fl

ffl

fl

fl

fl

fi

ff

ff

fi

fi

fl

fi

paper, stretching far, would provide a new life for himself. A few cabs down, the yells of more men grew

louder. Darvy saw them running down the corridor from behind his cover. Instinctively he pulled up his freshly loaded gun and took aim, blasting the guards in the chest as they ran towards him. He hit the rst one square in the ribs, sending him crumpling to the ground behind him, a fellow dove behind a passenger seat.

"More of 'em up here!" Darcy called out to his father, still bagging the bonds.

"Hold em o ! Ain't that many more left!"

A guard peeked his head over the top of his cover, his eyes staring blankly into the sights of Darcy's revolver. Blood splattered the window, and he dipped down below the seat without any noise after Darcy pulled the trigger. Another ran to his aid, swapping between cover, but Darcy's quick reaction caught him mid-jump, planting the fat bullet into the neck of the guard. He too fell, and his neck poured out hot red liquid, staining him and his friend.

"How many more of those bonds do we have left?" Darcy called out frantically.

"Almost there!" he replied.

His father stopped his frantic emptying of the safes. He stared for a moment at his son, who stood in the middle of the train cab. The landscape behind him moved as a blur of green and blue, yet he remained stationary. Sweat dripped from his black hair, and his hat cast a dark shadow over his brown; the light re ected o his silver pistol, which he held at the waist. His son had grown, becoming something else. His father thought he saw himself for a moment. .

This was Darvy's rst big score, and he was only 17. The proposition came to him on a summer night, when his father burst into the room drunk. He rambled on about this so-called perfect crime, his highest goal, and to his father, the measure of his character. Darvy had no choice, really, when his father forced him to tag along with the gang, and couldn't deny the demand for his participation, which to him seemed like an insigni cant contribution of skill on his behalf. Nevertheless, his opinion had no weight against his dad's, and Darvy knew it, and it slowly ignited a rage inside him. Had he known his fate of train robbing, Darvy would have made an e ort to lessen his time around his father, around that trail, and maybe spend more at school.

"Nevermind those uptown fools," his father used to say, and Darvy would smile and nod his head in agreement.

Unannounced to him was the weight that his father's actions carried, the same actions that left

fi

ff

ff

fi

fi

fl

ff

him crying in the dirt behind the house or in the river, washing away the dried blood which left stains on

his body. It was impossible to predict this situation, and how an innocent child could be shaped through violence to eventually carry out a robbery which he would never have agreed with. Nevertheless, the true feelings Darvy felt never left innards of his mind. In the days leading up to the hit, nights spent in the cabin with his father were used to prepare. The scraggly-haired man was not a perfectionist by any means, he let many variables run their own course, throwing caution to factors that could undermine their heist.

However, his attention to speci c details had served him well over the years, as his gun was never short of bullets, and each man that his bullets hit was always accounted for days earlier. The fear of getting caught in a pinch by Pinkertons lessened the reason to spread the word of this robbery, and his father made it clear during his drunken rambles that the implications of squeaking would be fatal to their plan. Even during the cold nights, they stayed up, studying train routes, what they carry, and who protects them.

These factors were essential to them. Darcy understood that without proper planning, things would go wrong; the stories he's heard of fallen crooks killed during their endeavors ingrained an underlying feeling of uncertainty in all that Darcy thought was right. The light shone through the small windows of the cabin the night before they left, with full stomachs, rested and prepared. When the sun nally dipped below the horizon behind the pines and the orange sky turned to black, Darcy and his father mounted their horses and headed down the dirt trail that led o to the distance. Somewhere they couldn't yet see, the metal rails which carried the promise of a new life chugged on steadily.

The glimmer of the moon through his father's sweat beads ltered the light, which was once bright and pure, into a dirty, contaminated beam. The antique train's invisible eyes watched as the bandits stood in the corridor.

"Here, this is all we got," his father screamed over the noise, holding out the bags stu ed with paper bonds.

"Hey look!" Darvy yelled back, In the distance, a eet of men on horseback cut in and out through the woods, before popping out and bolting to the side of the cab.

"Get down!" Darvy warned.

Darvy's hand fell down hard against his father's bony back; he could feel the ridges of his spine, his loose skin over his skeletal frame. Darvy covered their heads with his forearms while simultaneously diving back onto the bloody oor. He tasted a sour avor of iron on his tongue, spit, then saw the mist of red dissipate into the air. The collision of bullets missing their mark along the side of the metal passenger car sent

fi

ff

fi

ff

fl

fi

fl

fl

sparks overhead, which fell on the ground and were quickly extinguished by the stale blood. Amidst the

The bag of bonds, the holy grail, the one thing which he and his father went to these lengths to acquire, hung loosely, somehow stuck on the metal between the cars. The tting which connected the cars together snagged the extra fabric of the bag, and now it is held by a thread over the gravel below. As it blew in the wind, ailing frantically and appearing as if it could y away at any moment. Darvy imagined the pieces of paper ying through the air, leaving the sack and catching the wind left behind the locomotive. Picturing the faces on the paper uttering, their beautiful white color contrasted the greenery of nature surrounding them, a nightmarish moment in which everything was lost. He snapped out of his trance when his father returned shots back at the lawmen, who had now closed in and was within jumping range to the train.

"The bag! Get the bag!" his father screamed, nally noticing the danger.

"I can't! Too many bullets dad!" he replied "I'll cover you son!" his father said, taking a moment to look over and show a slight grin.

Darcy looked away; he blushed and smiled to himself. Down on all fours, he crawled on the ground as the pistols shot through the windows, trying to avoid any stray shots. He heard the revolver in his father's hand unload, retaliating with hot breath upon his foes. Head pounding, Darvy dragged himself across the oor, nally just out of reach of that bag. He extended his arm out over the end of the platform, trying to catch the bag which hung on the rail only a few inches away. His ngers waved, but the fabric wouldn't blow his way, and he couldn't nd any edge to clamp on to. Worry set in while Darvy tried to inch his way further o the platform, his chest and head now hung over. He looked down and saw the blur of dark gray whizzing past and felt the wind whipping at his eyes. He blinked hard and stretched even further; he pushed more and more o the platform until his ngertips were occasionally brushing the ailing cloth. More shooting continued behind him over the consistent echo of men's voices yelling and calling out inaudible commands.

"Almost-there!" Darvy grunted loudly One last attempt. Darvy took a breath and stretched out as far as his body could, moving o the platform to a dangerous extent. The sweaty hand which secured him to the oor had slipped. His upper half opped o the edge of the train, and the bag ripped o the railing; his hands were ripped apart immediately as they bounced on the moving rocks below. Somehow, Darvy found himself back on the train's platform; he tried to wipe his eyes o the dirt but only felt two wet eshy stubs smear across his cheek. He saw what was left of his hands, only mangled stubs with tendons hanging like the tassels on his

ff

fi

fl

fl

fi

fi

ff

fl

fi

fi

fl

ff

ff

fi

ff

ff

fl

fl

fl

boots. He screamed.

fl

fl

chaotic frenzy of bullets being shot from outside, Darvy noticed something which made his heart drop.

"Oh my god!" his father screamed, noticing the blood from his shooting position.

"Help me, it hurts so bad please!" Darvy bellowed The mess of esh pulsed blood. His father stood to run. As he did, his face changed from a red scrunch to a soft frown. His eyes relaxed, and he stared into Darvy's. His hands moved to his stomach, and he looked down to see a red hole in his stomach.

"No," Darvy whispered.

His father fell onto his knees, still looking at his son, who stood in shock. His father closed his eyes, gave a toothless smile, then fell facedown. Darvy moved to the body. His handless arms hung below his sides as he stared in disbelief at the man at his feet. He didn't even mind the bullets passing by his head each second. Darvy turned his head, so he could see the men who shot his father. They rode along, still pointing and shooting with neither mercy nor remorse. Darvy now stood at the edge of the platform.

"It was all I had!" Darvy cried out to the men.

fl

He didn't hear the last shot before his vision went black.

The Lonely Lampost, Jake Kornmehl

7th Grade Kailen Richards '22

It’s 6 am I’m here I’m ready Waking up on the world Two hours until My day begins Sitting Waiting My work for the day Sitting waiting For me

”

"To survive, you must tell stories.

-Umberto Eco