Editor-in-Chief: Ameera Salman
Assistant Editor: Maria Barbato
Faculty Advisor: Christine Uthoff
Chief Editorial Advisor: Sydney Keenan
Contributing Editors:
Treasure Affia
Kasey Deschler
Amelia Golembiewski
Isabelle Raudszus
Maxwell Schnorr
Jasmine Scroggins
Josh Smiljanovski
Victoria Smith
Marie White
Sarah Zimmer
Contributing Designers:
Laurence Bourdeau
Kasey Deschler
Amelia Golembiewski
Kelsea Pearson
Ashley Schemer
Cellar Roots Volume 49
staff
I
“To All the Girls I Grew Up With (And to the Ones Who Are Not Yet Grown),” by Catherine Lietz .....................................................................................................PAGE 1 “Your Room Faces The Courtyard,” by Catherine Lietz......................................................................................................PAGE 2 “Falling Off the Mountain (An Alaska Poem),” by Catherine Lietz......................................................................................................PAGE 3 “Indigo,” by Catherine Liez........................................................................................PAGE 4 “I Am One With the Fast-Moving Clouds,” by Catherine Lietz......................................................................................................PAGE 5 “Satisfied,” by Taylor Mueller......................................................................................PAGE 6 “Suffering Nation,” by Taylor Mueller.........................................................................PAGE 7 “Connection Lost,” by Taylor Mueller.........................................................................PAGE 8 “Goddess of Gorgons,” by Hadlie Daigle...................................................................PAGE 9 “Fragments,” by Hadlie Daigle.................................................................................PAGE 12 “Indelible,” by Ameera Salman.................................................................................PAGE 13 “A Voice Getting Louder (revisited),” by Maxwell Scnorr..........................................PAGE 14 “Cloud,” by Te’Nia Richardson.................................................................................PAGE 15 “Oatmeal Packets,” by Te’Nia Richardson.................................................................PAGE 16 “Summa Tyme,” by Te’Nia Richardson......................................................................PAGE 17 “grocery store,” by Elim Frevert................................................................................PAGE 19
Table of Contents II
Cellar Roots Volume 49
“The Hours Don’t Sit Easy (revisited),” by Maxwell Schnorr......................................PAGE 20 “survive, or,” by Elim Frevert.....................................................................................PAGE 21 “trans day of resuscitation,” by Elim Frevert..............................................................PAGE 22 “Purpose,” by Te’Nia Richardson..............................................................................PAGE 23 “Your Black Girl,” by Te’Nia Richardson...................................................................PAGE 24 “There,” by Maxwell Schnorr....................................................................................PAGE 25 “reunion,” by Elim Frevert........................................................................................PAGE 26 “Sweet Girl,” by Niamh Quinnan.............................................................................PAGE 27 “luvbug,” by Grey Stone...........................................................................................PAGE 31 “Hands,” by Joe Smith..............................................................................................PAGE 32 “Mine,” by Cook Crawford.......................................................................................PAGE 33 “Map to get lost in,” by Sarah Shafi...........................................................................PAGE 34 “Still Life With Fruits and Flowers,” by Joe Smith......................................................PAGE 35 “Red Still Life,” by Joe Smith.....................................................................................PAGE 36 “The Death and Subsequent Amelioration of a Subterfuge,” by Brandon Tester.....................................................................................................PAGE 37 “The Bitch!,” by Cook Crawford...............................................................................PAGE 38 “Waterworld,” by Joe Smith......................................................................................PAGE 39 “Transition,” by Hannah Theummel..........................................................................PAGE 40
Table
Contents III
Cellar Roots Volume 49
of
Checking my legs for stretch marks again
Greet them like a longtime friend
I traded sharp corners for soft gentle bends And reveled in my beginnings and ends
After years of a mind at war And growing pains that pulled me sore
And watching the young girls become shells Hollowed out, wide-eyed, under a spell
That leaves you hungry to fit in With the girls on the screens, paper thin
I emerged from the ocean Waves frothing beneath And flowers bloomed Right beneath my feet
For I was made to feel love For myself, full and warm Sending waves of sweetness To calm the storm
And you were made for that too You rare deep sea pearl
What a strange and wonderful Beautiful girl
To
Catherine Lietz
All the Girls I Grew Up With (And To the Ones Who Are Not Yet Grown)
1
Your Room Faces the Courtyard
Catherine Lietz
Winter winds his thick coils around my hands
And feet
Snug against the brick
The snow is dancing her waltz
Flurrying, fluttering
Across the tree branches
My old friends
That loom and leer
Peering in at me
And I stare back
In awe of the crystalline silver-white shawl
Draped lazily over their shoulders
Glittering in the sallow yellow light
Of a forlorn streetlamp
2
Falling Of the Mountain (An Alaska Poem) Catherine Lietz
Pieces of my mind
Buried in the silver-white snow
Blue and gray and plum purple
Bleed through the pale skin of these sweeping slopes
Sparkling with a wisdom far beyond my grasp
It is all I can do
To not fall off
The trees stand humbled, marching across those daunting hills
Freckles upon the face of a giant
I feel for them
Facing the great one who
Could fell a man with a swipe of his paw
His claws extended
Unleashing legions of shrieking snow and howling winds
I want to stand at the crossroads of land and sky
And beg the clouds for answers
But they are silent
Only speaking to a god
I’m not sure I know
But I want to
Because of you
The summit of all things good and beautiful
If only I could make it to the top of you
I would rejoice with the Sun and the stars
And dance across those peaks and valleys
Never again to set foot on even ground
3
Indigo
Catherine Lietz
She is the sky after the Sun goes down
After sunset’s rivers of gold and orange and pink have run dry
And an endless sea of indigo and deep blue have ravaged the sky
Creating the perfect backdrop
For an army of stars
Lead by their fearless commander
The moon
And through it all
The ribbon of the Milky Way
Caresses her body
The stars, the moon
The deep blue and indigo
4
Connection Lost
Taylor Mueller
I crave connection, Embodied with the will to evolve with affection. Meaningful friendships that arouse with love, Satisfying the will of dependence needed to trust. And yet I always fall short, Investing in people who can’t support. Forgiving and forgetting, Until it turns into begging. Restarting the crisis of connection, Eventually turning into a form of rejection.
8
Medusa
strong and tall, a weeping angel in a temple that was her own, one mortal amongst three sisters, immortal and murderous like vipers
fangs dripping venom and blood waiting to strike
she scrubbed at the altar the one she knelt before serving her goddess of beauty and wisdom and warfare but man is entitled and foolhardy he thinks that he is deserving of beauty
even if it does not want him so he takes at the altar he breaks her holy vows
he leaves behind what’s broken and lets her cry in pieces
Poseidon, god of the seas rapist of one of three false entitlement to what he could not have but he took anyway
Athena, traitor betraying her priestess even though she did not sin cursed her to bend and break with snakes bleeding from her head or maybe she was protecting her most loyal servant
Minerva was goddess of justice she and Athena were one they gave her protection and poison so no man would come near her again
Goddess of Gorgons
Hadlie Daigle
9
she rotted in her cave below, right above hades’ flame she could stand in the shadow of Cerberus and watch the old dead souls as they traveled down the river Styx where Thetis baptized her son she could steal away from a world that let a man take and take and keep taking because he was stronger than her she could turn them all to stone to right a thousand wrongs punish all the bastards that thought her rapist had done no wrong holy sanctuary of rock and stone bones that greened and broke maybe she was protected but she was still alone maybe she rejoiced when her final day came upon misinformed youth come to take her head for a story, not the truth Perseus, son of Zeus smiling with pride held up a gorgon’s head and boasted that she cried but maybe she cried tears of joy because her nightmares would end she would have to sleep no longer she could go home again Perseus the bastard killed an innocent girl held up her head in triumph to be used and left behind she could turn all men to stone but not the one that hurt her no amount of poison could fix her broken bones I wonder now thinking of her is there still a cave,
10
full of statues of men all those who came before that thought they could prove their manhood through defeating a victim girl? is there an art gallery whose statues still contain a soul?
faces twisted with terror burdened with sins for which they atone Medusa was a goddess the goddess of gorgons and pain one of the fated three slithering with vipers beautiful like acid rain she could join her sisters crowns of serpents upon their heads they stood together, victorious until one of them was dead Poseidon the bastard couldn’t keep his hands to himself he thought he could keep on taking with no recompense people kept on worshiping and thought Medusa a monster ugly and vain and cruel but deep down in Hades where she rests her slithering head Medusa is fanned by the corpses of evil, suffering men those that hurt those like her facing recompense she eats the grapes of wrath and envy and smiles at the sky after all she is a warrior, a priestess, a legend painted by Michelangelo poetry with every tear she cries
11
Fragments
Hadlie Daigle
sometimes I can’t help but feel like I’ve left tiny pieces of myself behind everywhere I’ve been like seashells and polished rocks and cracked up sea glass swept up by the tide little bits of my psyche left sitting alone on park benches and sidewalks and the places I love all breadcrumbs that show I was here, I am real, I am sane I’ve lost coats and jackets but that’s not the same just fabric, zippers, and warmth not parts of my soul to mark the places that I’ve left behind the fragments of me wherever I’ve been are bookmarks on the pages of a story I’ve yet to tell.
12
Amid newfound chaos, old names whisper what could have been said but weren’t.
Allow me this grace to move forward without expired apologies soaking on my tongue and poisonous treasure maps leading me astray.
I wouldn’t find the end of the rainbow even if I tried.
To sugarcoat the stories is to lose them, but I will lose them if I don’t let them breathe.
Indelible Ameera Salman
so
13
Maxwell Schnorr
I could die here.
Wintergreen gum would be the last thing in my mouth, but I’m sure I’d still taste caramelized onions. That smell of a flavor dances up from my tongue everytime I stop chewing. I could jam the wheel hard and that Kia Soul could turn me into a mess of burnt plastic and insides become outsides.
I wonder what would be here after.
I wonder that everytime I whiteknuckle a steering wheel.
I have a little scene I always play.
I’m dead and someone walks into my room and they make it into my laptop. In this case I like to imagine a close friend I can picture, but rather wouldn’t share details about, and she gets in and starts reading all the writing I haven’t shown anyone. She shows it to my family because it’s really good and they somehow, through the miracle of deluded dreams, manage to get something published. Now I’m a dead guy with one published poem, or one published story, and a mossy grave on some cute little plot of land with a quote from my published work.
Then I don’t have to worry about what I’ll do tonight when I start to feel the way I know I’m going to feel. When I want to pace until my feet tear, or write until dawn when I have to get up at dawn.
It’s such a perfect day to dream. The sky is blue, the light is cold, the trees are gray and this minivan’s subwoofers are vibrating my spine. I think I can hear Etta James a couple cars down. At last, at last.
I keep cramming pieces of gum in my mouth, but I can’t get rid of the fucking onions. My jaw hurts.
My eyes hurt.
The light’s green.
I blinked for too long.
I could die here, but I don’t and I’m surprised they haven’t honked at me yet, somebody should, but I press down the gas and I could die here, but I haven’t written enough and its such a deluded dream, such a sick fantasy, such a twisted wish that I couldn’t die here knowing I was going to die here.
If I die here, let it be an accident. An accident that makes no martyr. Just another kid’s corpse on an American highway.
A Voice Getting Louder (revisited)
14
I want to travel with the Clouds a nomadic life is fine by me.
I could leave the human world behind and sail the sky, greet the sea.
I want to feel the cool air and kiss the earth with my tears.
I would if I didn’t have the curse of being born with eyes and ears.
Cloud Te’Nia Richardson 15
Oatmeal Packets
Te’Nia Richardson
I am from oatmeal packets
Ten packs per box
Brothers fighting over the best flavor They’d always get mad at me When I’d mix banana and blueberry
I am from worm picking Getting dirt in my fingernails finding these little creatures To become my new friends That I’d never see again After the rain
I am from arts and crafts Construction paper, markers, scissors, and glue galore All I needed
To make my Picasso’s And Da’ Vinci’s
I am from long forgotten memories In my brain, my heart, my soul Where did they go? It took me too long to remember
I apologize to myself
For leaving the land I hail With the oatmeal, the worms, the art, and me I am from the land of the forgotten
16
Naturally waking up too early, pretty much naked while covered in sweat. Being the only one awake so early, I’d read.
Getting up to open the window hearing the birdies sing their birdie songs. When brothers woke up, we’d fight over instant oatmeal as always. This was our morning ritual, and I’d always end up with peaches.
Brothers in the backyard with friends, playing basketball and having fun without me.
I’d ask mom if I could get on my bike
so I could pretend to have fun without them. Going to the park to be forced to play tennis with mom.
Or going to the splash pad with brothers.
Chasing down ice cream trucks
Never having to beg dad to get me a drumstick.
Walking down our basement steps, feeling the temperature change as I descend. Putting my head into the deep freezer, little legs dangling out just to get a cool breeze.
Going over to Rutland, the street Papa lives on, during those hot summer block party nights. Seeing cousins who never acted like me, it was always hard to fit in with them.
Staying longer than I liked, but mom and I would always leave early
Summa Tyme Te’Nia Richardson
17
since she got tired easy.
Playing on the Nintendo DS I begged my parents for after I saw one of my brothers get one last Christmas.
Using that same DS light to shine on my book, I could read some more. Under too many covers, that would cause me to wake up in a sweat.
18
As a kid, my favorite dream was the one where I was in a grocery store without my family
And I had a wallet full of crisp bills because I didn’t know what credit cards were back then
I had a shopping cart and I would wander the aisles, plucking things off the shelves
Whatever I wanted
Sweet things, salty things, loaves of egg-washed bread
Family-sized boxes of cereal, brand name snacks, boxes without the Weight Watchers label
In my dreams, I never got to the checkout line
And I think even in that fantasy, I wanted to prolong that feeling of freedom as long as possible
Because even if it never happened, it was nice to imagine that no one was looking
And I didn’t have to distract my parents in the other room just to run into the kitchen shaky
To grab a granola bar that tasted like cardboard, knowing what would happen if they saw
Pressing the bland oats into my mouth like a real kind of holy communion
Grinding every stale bit between my crooked teeth to savor the taste and texture of something
I’m 22 years old and I’m realizing for the first time that maybe this isn’t normal
It’s kind of fucked up for a 7 year old to lie in bed, their last thought before sleep:
“I hope I dream I’m in the grocery store”
And there’s something so profoundly wrong about the way I couldn’t wait to fall asleep Just so I could dream about buying food I couldn’t even eat
And how I would spend my waking hours excited to trick myself into feeling full
I still go to the store in my sleep at least twice a week
And I don’t know what to buy anymore that wouldn’t make me sick
So I just wander the aisles and listen to the muted sounds of 2000s pop music
And I don’t know how tall I am anymore
I’m in the grocery store now with my own fistfuls of sweaty bills and a credit card with that kid’s name on it
And sometimes I buy them something sweet for making it this far.
grocery store Elim Frevert
19
The Hours Don’t Sit Easy (revisited)
Maxwell Schnorr
When there’s a clock I stare at it. That’s been true since high school. You’d have your head down drawing wisps of a world only you could see. From that cutesy squid you built a million stories around in eighth grade to the lovecraftian beasts that grew spines from their mouths and used intestines as toe rings. All while I watched the little hand. Well, the wet heat that bred your life is eating itself. The mud is piling up around your old pens and frogs sing on your steering wheel. You’re wading, holding the jazz bass you tore the frets out of over your head, mosquitoes dancing in your sweat, taking their sweet time to bite. All while the rains make my drought a memory.
I called you on your birthday. It had been a couple months. Time was moving to me like a vapor, hurtling away at frightening speed, and I couldn’t quite catch an hour to talk. You were sober again and I was happy for you, sad I couldn’t be there with you, happy I couldn’t be there. When I called you were looking at the stars.
You were in that field near the Quabbin we all would go to at 3 in the morning. Almost all of them were there with you. They got so excited, thinking they’d seen a meteor fall, exploding in green showers when it hit the atmosphere. You were silent. I said I should call more. You said you understood why I hadn’t. We said goodbye. I waited, listening to the static until you hung up. Looking at the few stars that poked through the cloud cover. No matter how bright, always out of reach. No matter how silver, always dead. We knew real meteors fall artlessly and the twinkling stars burned out long ago.
20
Everyone is so proud of me when I call myself a survivor instead of a victim
And I realize that I’m saying the word for their benefit, not mine
Because when I call myself a victim
They have to think about my strangled pleas Or legs open and shaking and knuckles white Or numb and wet with blood on the floor
And it’s easier for them to think I’ve forgotten the hands around my neck.
survive, or Elim Frevert 21
trans day of resuscitation
Elim Frevert
“Oh yeah, and there’s been a massacre. So that’s not good.” And what a sick way to phrase it, to distance myself from it, from all of it And my father offers a figurative shoulder to cry on but I can’t even feel my face.
Pictures of people clutching each other in the brazen wind of refusal surface in the news
And I see myself in every sleeve stained with snot and tears
And I see myself in the passion of the outrage
It’s a pang in my healing chest to see the social media posts by the victims And interesting, distressing but detached, to know I’m not able to cry for them.
And everyone is so concerned with the kinds of things you check on the census forms
So much that they forget that before they ended, these people lived lives of their own
They’re added to the growing statistics by all sides– for what, to forget that they were alive? To forget that they were not names to list in a speech, symbols of whatever seems appropriate?
Not figureheads to hold up covered in posthumous judgment and stripped of all human context?
Everyone has a say except the dead
It’s easy for some to look for the faintest flicker of perceived inhumanity–
The dead can’t defend themselves against politicians who never knew them when they lived Against men on their talk shows feeding corruption to the people with their morning coffee
The dead can’t tell people how they want to be remembered.
The good-intentioned want to emblazon the words of the dead across banners and T-shirts
To prove that the world lost so many good people who have done so much for us
And that we will remember
And I want to remember I breathe to remember.
Within the cacophony of morality plays, the person is lost, and what remains forgets the truth
That you can distance yourself from it if you can imagine yourself in the mugshots
That you can distance yourself from it if you are too tired to allow yourself to cry
But the massacre was not a tragedy because saints were lost from this earth
It was a tragedy because people are dead.
And won’t they be shocked to learn that there were no saints there that day
No saints but people who we can’t forget.
22
Staring at a screen
Whose purpose is to connect you and me
To the world we live in Play in Breathe in.
Breathing in the flames of anarchy
From the oppressed youth who still remain unseen. Capturing moments in time
To share with the sweet susceptible minds.
Wringing the towel, dripping corruption. It’s cloth fabricated by the bloody fingers of slaves, my brethren.
I wish my ancestors could look at the world today and ask, “What has become of us?” And to that I would say, “We have lost all hope and trust.”
We stare at the screen of false light for answers
As if Google were God.
Our fight does not go away. We may not be in shackles today, But we are still slaves.
I know we can not compare our experience to theirs, But I can sympathize and I will answer their prayers.
Purpose Te’Nia Richardson 23
Your Black Girl
Te’Nia Richardson
You see me, your black girl
Through an artificial lens
With my hands on my hips
With nails and lips painted red
With a body so nice
You wouldn’t think twice
To see through my clothes
With your glare
Yes! I have nipples
They are through my dress right there
Please don’t shield your eyes
Don’t hide your stare
My existence
Might make you uncomfortable
But how can I stop
Being so untouchable?
I am not your plaything
To grab and nibble at
If I wanted that kind of attention
I’d get a cat
You dog you
Barking at me from behind
Maybe with your fat build and pig nose
I should call you a swine
I am not your black girl
24
When I pull the fresh red shirt with gray buttons over my head
Or when I pour, black boiled water into the coffee grounds
Waiting in a neat pile. The smell sticking to my collar, my teeth.
Softly. Softly.
In your car I am ruin
A sucking mouth under a heartfelt smile
My starved yellow eyes
Peeking from this downy coat.
In your house
The house where your siblings sleep
I’m there to rake your back with filed claws
Leave the scent of stale coffee on your breath, but I’m not
I’m not
I’m not the man who would bite your neck softly
And leave hot breath on your thigh, I’m not Not this hunting creature, sweating and panting in your sheets
Yet. I am there.
Close as two can be and still a distance
So far that when I go through the bathroom door I lock it behind me
Just in case you come and try to wrap your arms around my waist Or kiss my cheek.
There
Schnorr
Maxwell
25
I never know how to leave. I look up packing tutorials with clipart graphics about how to fold your pants to optimize suitcase space; I wonder if the TSA would want me to use the original bottle for my Tylenol considering that the labeling has worn off; I make overly specific lists because somehow it’s important that I have exactly 6 pairs of socks but only one pair of them is ankle length. And should I leave on a light so hypothetical robbers, whom I picture to be somewhat similar to the Hamburglar, don’t suspect I’m gone and take the opportunity to sneak into my apartment and steal my microwave with its light burnt out and smears of burnt-brown food on the formerly crisp white insides?
Most of all, I wonder if it’s worse to just shove the essentials in a backpack and take off to the Amtrak station, if it’s really any worse than the itch, the feeling that I’m forgetting something. If it’s worse than the feeling that I won’t be coming back and the knowledge that this is a distinct possibility.
I think it would all be easier if I was sure I was doing the right thing. Because a part of me knows I’m not. Because another part of me knows that I have never done the right thing; I am the wrong thing and if it’d be easier for everyone, I would do something more fitting. But they wanted me to come. They wanted me to join them, and I know that despite that, they won’t look me in the eyes, and I’ll be the afterthought, and if there are five beds, I’ll be on the floor with my face pressed into the wooden panels and a scratchy plaid blanket covering me like a mess that’s better to hide.
The train will be in town soon, and I already paid for the ticket, and the additional price for a refund guarantee was too much so it’s inevitable. I only wish I wasn’t forgetting something. Or that I was forgetting it all.
For someone who isn’t good at leaving, I do leave a lot of places. Today marks my third month living in this apartment, and before that, I went through four college housing assignments, five if you count the one in February that lasted less than a week, which I usually don’t unless I’m drinking chamomile tea.
I should be used to this.
It should be easy by now.
And it’s not easy, and somehow, it gets more unfamiliar each time, like I’m leaving behind the person I was bit by bit, and I don’t know who that was, or what’s left.
Reunion Elim Frevert
26
I’m at a doctor’s appointment. I sit in the waiting room, the fluorescent lights flickering just enough to irritate me, and I wait for the wrong name to be called so She can go get Her yearly physical. I glance across the room to the stranger dully gazing into their phone, slumped in the same uncomfortable chair that I sit in. Their eyes flicker up at me and I feel a sneer of disdain behind the stranger’s face even if I can’t see it. I feel like a spectacle even while underdressed my unassuming, plain sweatpants and hoodie. The stranger bares their teeth and sneers at me, flashing angry eyes. But not really, really they just look back to their phone and melt again into the stiff plastic chairs. They really should get better chairs in this waiting room.
The news is on one of the courtesy monitors for us to stare at and dissociate to in this liminal space; a reporter is speaking, with tanner so bright orange and skin so caked with makeup she looks like a wax figure. I wonder how she’s not melting under the set lights. As she talks, her stark white teeth clamp together jarringly like a dog snapping its jaws. She’s reporting on the Florida proposal to ban gender-affirming care for trans kids. I feel a sigh well up inside me but I keep my gaze fixed on the news anchor and remain motionless. A door opens and a nurse looks up from a clipboard, peering around the half opened door, and chirps, “[Redacted]?” That’s Her. She stands up and strides towards the door, the nurse smiles, opens the door, and says “Right this way, miss.” In truth, I am not who she’s talking about, but I am who she refers to.
I follow the nurse back into the examination room, sit down at the cot, and begin waiting for the second time, now for the doctor. I stare down at my small hands. My fingers are slender and my nails are delicate, but my cuticles are gnarled and shredded, rough and dry from incessant picking. I think about my hands often in how they give me away. They are Her hands. The doctor raps on the door and I startle and tuck my hands away into my pockets as he enters. He sighs and hardly looks up from his collection of papers on a clipboard and he begins, in what feels like one long groan, asking me about how She’s been doing and about Her personal health concerns. She replies plainly and more or less politely. The doctor checks Her blood pressure, looks into Her ears and back into Her throat, notes Her height, Her weight. He reminds Her that Her slouch is ruining Her posture and warns Her that bad posture is unbecoming of a lady, and She obediently sits rigid and straight. My cheeks burn. I am not a lady. I act the part well though. Maybe I should get into acting, with the right training I could get an Oscar. I’ve been acting most of my life, haven’t I?
“Miss? Miss, did you hear my question?” I blink and realize that I’ve completely missed everything he just said. The only “miss” applicable to me is the entire monologue I apparently just spaced. She takes over and I retreat into myself as She politely explains She was just lost in thought and asks him to repeat himself. He says to Her, “I was asking about contraceptive options. I noticed you haven’t refilled your oral contraceptive for almost a year. Is there any chance you’re pregnant?”
She just blinks. I would have rolled my eyes or broken into a fit of laughter, but She just blinks, and says “Nope, there’s not,” through what I imagine looks more like a grimace than a smile. Do I want to refill my prescription, he asks. Absolutely not. Frankly I wish I could cancel my monthly subscription to uterUS Weekly altogether, but that’s too expensive for
27 Sweet Girl Niamh
Quinnan
me to swing at the moment and would require a lot of explanation to my completely oblivious parents. “Surgery??? What the hell do you need that for? You got cancer or something? You don’t want to give me grandbabies?” I can only begin to imagine that conversation and would rather not even imagine it at the moment.
“Any other questions for me today?”, my doctor asks, dropping himself into the chair opposite me. A shock of nerve rushes through my body, from deep in my gut to the top of my head as a voice in me shrieks, “This is your chance to ask about starting testosterone. This could be your only chance. You have to ask.” “No,” hisses another voice, “Are you crazy? This is your family provider. Your mother could come in with the flu next week and hear a funny story about how her daughter wants to play pretend as a boy. Don’t be stupid.” I realize that She’s just sitting there with blank eyes like some half deflated blow up doll. Before I know what to do, She’s already opening her mouth to mutter something, I don’t even know what She says, but it seems to satisfy the doctor. He grunts and stands up, thanks Her for Her time, and says She’s all good to check out, they’ll bill Mom and Dad’s account as usual, waving a hand aimlessly in Her general direction as he lumbers out of the examination room.
I sit there staring at the wall for a moment and now that I’m alone, She’s gone. It’s just me. I feel shame and dread sinking into my stomach, seeping into my bones. I won’t have another chance to ask. How could I even pay to do that on my own? Obviously I can’t just slyly make my parents foot the bill and play dumb when the insurance and medical bills find their way to the mailbox of my family home. My parents would kill me, if not for the unspeakable evil I must be committing by daring to start hormone replacement, then at least for the money I’d cost them.
As I stand waiting for the bus, I try to make myself look as masculine as possible. I’ve practiced this often of course, and my formula is as follows: Slouch just enough to look like you don’t give a shit, but not so much that you look small. Position your feet just a little wider than shoulder width apart to show that you’re comfortable occupying space that you likely do not deserve. Have a flat expression, and if you show any emotion it should be disinterest or mild scorn.
I make an effort to look less feminine standing here at the bus stop not only to try to pass, but also for my own safety. I probably shouldn’t make it obvious that I have female sex characteristics when I’m standing alone on the side of the road. She probably shouldn’t be alone and unprotected on the side of the road.
The bus pulls up a little early, lucky for me. I climb the stairs and search the aisles for a free seat, and for a second my heart stops as what feels like every person there’s eyes are fixed on me. They stare at me and through me and selfishly I am the center of the universe for a second and they all know. They can tell. They’re brandishing weapons, loading bullet chambers with slurs and aiming them at me in case I make the wrong move. They’re practically shouting obscenities at me through their eyes. But they’re not. And I continue down the aisle as they all continue to not think of me. I sit down next to a woman reading a magazine and across from an old man who seems to be almost falling asleep in his chair, his head nodding with every bump in the road. The woman shifts slightly away from me and I feel her glance towards me as she does so. Is it wrong that I feel a moment of thrill from this? She acts like she finds me a threat, or at least a mild
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inconvenience, in the same way that an old woman furrows her brow and pulls her hand bag a bit closer to her as she walks through the back of a parking lot passing a group of raucous teenage boys with their skateboards. The thrill fades as I consider that she might just not want a stranger to be in such close proximity to her, but I hold no resentment towards her. I would feel the same way.
The old man jolts as we hiss to a stop, the last before mine. He glances at me and his gaze sticks a moment longer than it should, like he’s in the process of figuring me out. Like he’s salaciously peering through my baggy clothes to see my fragile, shameful body underneath. In my mind he leers over Her and thinks horrible things about Her body, Her shape. But he gets up and totters to the front of the bus, just going home, not plotting and scheming ways to hurt Her.
I step down the stairs after the bus reaches my stop, and I pause before entering my family home because it’s not where I live, it’s where She lives. I fix my posture and tuck away the masculine slouch, the mild scorn slides off my face, and I prop my eyebrows up to open my eyes and my face, to look more fearful, more unassuming, more Girl. I brace myself as I walk down the street and up the driveway to Her house.
I pause at the steps of the porch. I exhale and force myself up, pull open the door, and as I pass through the threshold, She envelops me and She sighs “I’m home!” in a soft, high pitched voice.
“How was your appointment?” mMy father wheezes from the lounge chair in the living room, eyeglasses sliding off his face as he watches the news. It’s unsurprisingly blaring FOX Nnews.
“Business as usual,” She chirps in response., “Everything seems normal.”
My mother is bustling around in the kitchen, but she chimes in anyway, “My baby girl is the picture of health!” I wince but quickly contort it into a grin, and She says “That’s what they tell me!”
In the background, oh joy, FOX is refuting academic arguments against Florida’s Mmedicaid ban on gender- affirming treatment. “A group of scientists and a law professor from Yale University have said in another report that the AHCA’s conclusions are ‘incorrect and scientifically unfounded,’ as well as ‘crafted to serve a political agenda.’”
My father guffaws. Some red-faced sweaty man bellows, “This is just another example of the left-wing academia propaganda machine.” My father grunts affirmatively and starts muttering to no one in particular about damn tranny kids not knowing what’s good for them, and I am. Screaming. In my head. I slink into the kitchen so as to not explode and leave my bloody brain matter gummed about my family’s living room.
Desperate to ignore my father, She sits down at the counter to watch Her mother buzz around the kitchen, turning off one burner and turning up another, straining pasta in the sink as the steam billows up around her, opening and closing the fridge.
“Oh, honey,” shouts my mother over the clamor of her cooking, “I brought home a dress for you to try on!” Oh, we’re off to a great start. “My coworker’s daughter was trying to get rid of her prom dress from last year, you know, and it should almost fit you perfectly! We’ll have to get it altered since she’s a bit more–” she pauses, glances down to my chest and back up to my face before turning around to attend to her frenzied work, “–well-endowed than you, bless her heart, but I’ll just call up Aunt Franny and she can fix it up for us. You’ll
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look so gorgeous too, it’s just the perfect shade of pink for your complexion.” Perfect, it’s pink too. That feels a bit on the nose. I’m shriveling up inside, shrieking and feeling impending doom start to consume me just a little bit, but She does well to seem unphased; “That sounds… nice.”
“Well considering how things went last time I took you to Macy’s to try on dresses, I was getting a bit nervous we wouldn’t find the right dress in time. All that crying, goodness me, sweet girl. You’ve got such a lovely figure, [Redacted],” she huffs, turning to face me, with one hand on her hip as the other errantly batters the contents of the skillet she’s sweating over. “Do you know how many women would kill to look like you? And you hide underneath those ratty clothes, what happened to that skirt I bought you for Christmas? I haven’t even seen you wear it.”
I shrink, but She pricks right up and says “I know, I’m sorry, mom. You’re right, it’s just that the weather’s been so–”
My mother interjects immediately, “You’ll try on that dress for me after dinner, won’t you? I’ll even do your hair so we can get it perfect for the dance, it’s gotta have the right shape, you know.” Even She gives up and just nods in agreement. “Good girl, now go call your father in for dinner, he’s got that damned TV turned up too loud again– HAROLD! DINNER’S READY!”
After dinner, I try to hide in my bedroom, but the dress is already there. We stare at each other. I try psychically bargaining with it, but it’s no use, it’s sticking to its guns. Pretty tough for a skirt. My mother knocks at the door.,
“Sweetie, come on now! Come out and show me my pretty girl!”
I wrestle with the gown, I’m putting up as good a fight to get it on as it is to keep me from wearing it. Of course now it doesn’t want to cooperate.
“Just a second, it’s tighter than I thought it would be,” She trills.
I yank the dress over my head and stare at my reflection. My mother was right, the shade of pink does flatter Her complexion. I hate it. She pulls back Her shoulders and contorts Her body to flatter the fabric imprisoning me, and right on cue, my mother barges in.
“Now what’s taking you so long, do you need help with the zip– Ohhhh, my sweet girl!” she coos, fawning over me and fluffing my hair. “Now that looks just lovely, don’t you think? And it’s nearly perfect! I was right about the bust, wasn’t I, don’t you worry. I’ll just chat with Aunt Franny, she’ll be so excited for you!”
I’m possessed now by Her, practically outside of my own body as She occupies me and squeals– a sound I forgot I was even capable of making. “I just love it, Mommom, doesn’t it look perfect?” It does not. “I think this is the one. It feels right.” It feels wrong. To really sell it, She does a twirl, and I feel like gagging.
My mother clasps her hands and her eyes glisten, “I’m just so excited, you’re gonna make me so proud!” She embraces me and sighs happily. I am not there. She has plastered a smiling mask onto her face so convincing almost I believe it. Beaming, She says, “I feel so good in this dress, Mommom. This is me.” I cease to be. My mother turns me to face the mirror, peering over my shoulder, “Oh honey. This is how I always see you, sweet girl.”
“I know, Mom,” I say.
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luvbug
Stone 31
Grey
Hands
Joe Smith
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Mine Cook Crawford
Map to get lost in Sarah Shafi
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Still Life With Fruits and Flowers
Joe Smith
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