Liberal Arts Honors The University of Texas at Austin 2014 - 2015
ECHO
ECHO Liberal Arts Honors The University of Texas at Austin 2014 - 2015 Aza Pace Editor in Chief
Miranda Adkins Design Editor
Keith Chew Production Editor
Readers: Kathleen Woodruff Kendall DeBoer Caleb Parker Katie Bland Kori Morris Barrett Smith Hunter Galbraith Torre Puckett Emily Varnell Amanda Morton Eli Hinze
EDITOR’S NOTE Miranda, Keith, and I all began our involvement with Echo as voluntary readers and contributors excited to showcase the creative abilities of our fellow students, especially those in the Liberal Arts Honors Program. As editors, we have learned a great deal about what it takes to produce a successful publication, and we have endeavored to help Echo fulfill its potential as an exemplary student-run literary magazine. As I prepare to graduate in May, I look back on my experiences with Echo and wonder at the outstanding literary and artistic talents that our contributors have to offer. We would like to thank our poets, writers, and photographers for their excellent work. This year’s issue includes a wide range of literary styles, forms, and moods that speak to the skill and imaginative diversity of our contributors. It has been a pleasure to engage with their work. As Miranda Adkins assumes the role of Editor in Chief next fall, we wish her well and trust that Echo will continue to grow and reflect the creative talents of UT Austin students from all areas of study. Aza Pace Editor in Chief
CONTENTS Poetry To a Pisces from their Aquarius Alicia Ramirez
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Steps for Chiral Waltz Reed Erlandson
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Scene in Sea Glass 5 Reed Erlandson Gypsies on the Metro Jourden Sander
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Why Don’t You Come Over? Ina Grose
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Bedbug Extermination 11 Ina Grose People Say 12 Caitlin Machell Raw 15 Ena Ganguly I Am 16 Rachel Osterloh
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Fiction Otherkin 18 Jourden Sander Madame Zenith’s Reification Elixir Leo Gonzales
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Photography The Youthful Dead cover Megan Dolan Last Light 3 Madhu Singh Happy 7 Madhu Singh Gloria 9 Jourden Sander Volcanic Sand 10 Madhu Singh Nainital 15 Madhu Singh The Colorful Now 17 Megan Dolan 139 33 Madhu Singh
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POETRY To a Pisces from their Aquarius Alicia Ramirez
You are a gold-fish. Yellow-bellied, Flip flopping, forgetting Every three seconds. Forget promises promises promises. Hooks that didn’t catch You float on through, taking little bites Of me with you. But what’s a gold-fish to a water-bearer?
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Steps for Chiral Waltz Reed Erlandson
Ice cubes jet from a glass, gracious curve trailed behind, tumbler: whip snap pitch, its roll, its meticulous pitch flow heaved to life, fractured glass unblooms like flame on oak. Phosphorous tic winks the room in, lo watt headburn shake-out beauty, flames digress. Slow lope smoke unblooms like fractured glass like flame on oak. Ski cut pulls the wrong thread, weight of shift staccato kick of snow, dormant drift-ton hill unblooms ‘ lope smoke slow, like fractured glass like flame on oak.
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Scene in Sea Glass Reed Erlandson
Where I’m from, the rain is sinking ships and the human form belies a kind of elegance I’ve since quit trying to match. I still remember cows, the smell of their waste, how that same stench fathered flowers, mushroom trips, a young man the crop. Ominous geometry, fixed. After the third shot, the clip, a scope glint made him; fair refraction cast the last card adrift, unbeing the stack. I recognize my love by the small glass bits I find in my feet three weeks after.
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Gypsies on the Metro Jourden Sander
She eats Jalapeño Kettle chips to keep warm as she walks in the strange “winter” of Texas. When she meets me, my hands smell of Dancing Waters, an anti-bacterial, which smells like Paris. She could smell it too, and calls me a biological terrorist for having used it. I only like the smell, I say. It reminds me of the Metro. I hated the Metro, she says. Yeah, we got pick-pocketed on the Metro, by a little girl. A gypsy? Yeah. Those Bulgarian gypsies…She’s probably one of my neighbor’s back home. We go to dinner at some bistro with a name I cannot pronounce. I order water and soup. She talks about the difficulty of cooking macaroons and the difference between them and macarons. We talk about hair styles, and about God. Do we believe in God? She picks her nails. Eh. Maybe a little, but mostly no, I say. Fox in the hole, then? Eh. Maybe. I hate religion. Me too. We spend the evening at her studio getting drunk off whatever we can touch. She tells me about her village in Bulgaria and about the drawer in her bathroom that she never shuts because it makes her nervous when open. She describes her fear
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of commitment and how she has slept with 22 men in the last three years. I don’t judge her for the 22, and she doesn’t judge me for my 1. Those were my slut years, she says. A mole, seen from a hole in the hip of her pants, winks at me. Slut is a socially constructed idea, I respond. We listen to a band I’ve never heard of on her floral record player and get tired. We change. I, a Chuy’s t-shirt and underwear, and she, a matching flannel pajama set with silk ribbons. We, no bras. We didn’t wear bras for anyone. Not if we didn’t have to.
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Why Don’t You Come Over? Ina Grose
White ivory plateaus — greenish yellowish suds erupting out of floor cracks. Mold? Mucus? I reach out, hand disintegrates. No pain, sulfur eating my fingertips. My boot thumps against a rock, bruise kisses disperse — Slowly creeping up on my ankles. Isn’t that the Christmas wreath I gave you last fall? A melody lilts into the floorboards reminiscent of the smoked meat I had for dinner last Friday or was it tuna? Dribbles of Mozart and Rachmaninoff fell into my water glass. blaring fluorescent light Invades my eyes — I can hear blood
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wriggling in tubes and I can feel sand of skin falling through cracks in the striped wall paper. Sit down, you say? The highchair buckles against my right shoulder a long wet feather tongues my skirt hem I am very comfortable, thank you More water?
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Bedbug Extermination Ina Grose
Sleep is on my mind wandering face first into the dresser drawer slurping up vowels in alphabet soup whispering war stories about that time when pillows could talk and there were seventy-eight pennies under the mattress. A flash of light releasing thousands tiny dancers that somersault among the prickly pears acting as traffic attendants leading the minnows and squirrel daughters to their launch pad it is this way — don’t turn left. Took a left turn and blast off behind the silk curtain of eyelids the purple fireflies begin the performance welcoming the quiet tinkling of bells and safety pins give a standing ovation — take a bow. The sound of howling tingles the palms of my toes quiver and wriggle like the first green bud on the first day in April It’s only February and the seed hasn’t been planted yet. Blankets embrace you tighter it was only the rabbit saying hello down the twisting airway of the lung to the soft velvet lips of slumber. 11
People Say
Caitlin Machell People talk about showers. they don’t know how it feels: dirt being dragged into obscurity, searing heat slipping past hugged knees and blistering, fragrant soap. watching it flood over damaged skin: fragmented, soiled parts. being naked is agony. my muscles go rigid, tightly gripped against being here. please: don’t look. don’t look at me. i said, “i can’t be alone with this body.” and they said “put on a t-shirt.” didn’t think that i would pick his — his fabric against my skin. every day lying in scum built from years of naked bodies washing away their sins. until time passed by and i cut it up: ripped through it with razors that slid through skin like he did. sometimes, wracking sobs. sometimes silence. venom: eyes flow like any other drop. People say there is no truth. they can’t know what it means. that he wasn’t right, and he wasn’t wrong, he just is — nothing. the measure of what was. daily i’m terrified into old habits, ancient addictions. i crave pain — damage slithers out from underneath possible worlds, as waves of spiders crack open soft white sacs 12
to crawl heatedly across my naked spine. touched, moved, consumed. i said, “i want out of this place.” and they said “put on makeup.” ice melts down a perfect, round glass. look at me!...please look. autumnal auburn, liquid fire burns my nose. my eyes. my heart. there is a yellow haze settling across grey eternities. electrocuted, i want to drown in a bathtub of virgin blood. lime popsicles between truths in the summer. learning how to be dead. People talk about true love. but i don’t believe them. someone has already been here. been here in this used, seeping waste that no one else will want. can there be forgiveness? for shoving whole lives into this vacuum of dark matter? what they want, my rage covers up. a rage filling all the gaps, poison sweeping up and through. i said, “it’s too much.” and they said, “break eggs and watch them scramble.” because it’s dark and it’s ugly. bursting with untenable bodies where splintered egos lay down to rest. too many months spent desiccated, wasting away while external, (un)spoken hallucinations run in rivulets of rancid oil. i imagine smelling like the sweat of whores while cockroach husks gather on dirty dishes. 13
People say crying is cathartic. but i don’t think they mean this. this violent, molten anguish: a hostile, heaving loneliness that no one can strangle out of me. will there be healing? from a crime reflexively, symmetrically done? water slides down silky sundresses under the moon’s nightly harvest, slowly gathering disembodied clouds. it’s more than i deserve. i said, “i think i’m better now.” and they said, “your strength is beautiful.” how wrong they were: it’s weakness, wretched weakness, so weak that i never saw it coming. couldn’t. so here i sit, watching the sun rise and set, set and rise, too frightened of dreams to find respite in sleep. i know i have a soul because i destroyed it. take me, smash my skeleton into smothering dust. i will wait for it to come back together.
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Raw
Ena Ganguly you would bear your wounds for me, and, i would try not to show you my tears in fear that the salt would burn you. 15
I Am
Rachel Osterloh I am, (Am I?) I am she, (Am I she?) I am she with half closed twilight sketched irises and delicately lacquered facial expressions capitalized by simplistic blood red grins, (Does she smile? Does she see? The eyes are closed, her answers chuckling.) I am she who delightfully burns with cherished but tainted thoughts and prickling but colorfully blurred memories, (Does she burn? Does she emerge from purifying flame? Her clucks her viper-tongue with rhythmic precision between her pearly white teeth.) I am she who is billowing and blustering with effervescence, newfound in her virginal and tumultuous rebirth into the warm folds of robin-egg blue time, (Robin-egg blue, her asks capriciously? Robin-egg blue, she answers forcefully.)
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I am she with expanding and light limbs composed of raving and trembling wavelets, seeping and stretching, seeping and stretching, seeping and stretching into roads and rivers, a perpetual loop of self-discovery leaning from futuristic melodic chaos and petulantly pushing toward serendipitous tranquility of mind, I am her who had a toxic skeleton of lead, drudging and slugging and sinking, blind to shapes, symphonies, sexuality, compelled by the societal motions of previous inhabitant, confined to a disease and stony body and wooden spirit. I am she, (Her asks, is she she now? She answers, I am she. We are she.) (A trio, her asks? I am here, always here‌) I am (I am she; I am she; I am she.)
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FICTION Otherkin
Jourden Sander The Dragonkin Jenna Copenhaver was having a fine day until someone sat on her tail. The businessman scurried on the bus and plopped down before Jenna could reposition it. He shifted in his seat, drops of coffee splashing from the top of his thermos and onto Jenna’s scales as she looked forward in quiet indignation. A cloud of fire exhaled from her mouth like a sigh, threatening to sear the cardigan of a woman standing in front of her, but Jenna knew she couldn’t be angry. No one else could see it, so how could they know? She could hardly expect decent politeness (to not sit on her tail) if the folks around her didn’t know the tail was there at all. Despite the normalcy of it all, Jenna still didn’t know how to proceed; so instead, she sat in silence and tried to ignore the pain of her phantom limbs. Her wings were folded and cramped— an attempt to keep them from being torn or crushed by passengers—and now her tail was in peril as well. Occupying the neighboring seat with her backpack only lasted so long; once the bus began to fill, passengers would insist she remove her backpack and relinquish the seat. On occasion, Jenna left the City ahead of time in order to catch the early bus, when few people were on board. This allowed Jenna’s scaly, serpentine body to fill the isle and nearly every seat, wings and tail extended in full glory. How could she ever take a car? A vehicle just that much smaller? As a teen, Jenna once carpooled with friends, her tail and wings crushed and ignored—ever since then, Jenna was instilled with claustrophobia and promised to never ride in a car again. The only option was the bus, but it 18
was uncomfortable nonetheless. The City slowly fell in waves behind the horizon, leaving behind a trail of gas stations, family diners and abandoned buildings as the sky scrapers receded. The City: wise and old yet infused with the new blood of dreamers and the bruises of those who came to die (they were rare, those who came to die). Jenna knew about these people, and understood them with reverent gusto; to die is an terrible thing—is it not?—but to die in a Small Town, or Suburbia, a Little Village, a Pocket in the Woods, or a Forgotten Place—it seemed so awfully sad; Jenna would rather perish in a place of dreams and hope—the City—even if it meant sharing her bruises with the Dreamers. There were no real bruises, of course. There was hardly enough passion for bruises to be involved; in fact, Jenna wouldn’t mind an altercation here, or there. A heated conversation or a tense moment; life was so painfully dull that even pain would have made her day more alive. Like the City, which was always alive. But she had dreams too, dreams that began at the sidewalk and ended at the summit of some mountain, or skyscraper, or point before heaven; anywhere higher than the bus, than the City, than her family, than her home. Jenna first realized she was Dragonkin when she was a child. She didn’t have a label for it at the time, but it—her dragonness—existed inside of her, cocooned by a reverence for flight and freedom. Most people, (especially little girls) were afraid of heights, but for Jenna, it was just the opposite. Where others feared the fall, Jenna kissed it with the tip of her toes, leaning as far over the edge as possible. It was always like that for her. Near the edge without tipping over. Safe. Grounded. Until, that is, she met Elliot two years ago. He went by the username Vampguy33 and frequented the otherkins.com chat board. People visited the website begging to define their otherness and understand why they didn’t feel human. After months of chatting with Vampguy, Jenna finally met Elliot in person, who was 15 at the time. 19
Jenna knew the bus was getting closer to her destination as they passed Suburbia. Jenna flushed as she thought about Elliot again and wondered if he would make it out to today’s meeting. He hadn’t been to one in a few months. She terribly missed him. The last remnants of Suburbia disappeared at last as the Trailer Park came into view. It was the place of living for whom she was journeying to visit: a fellow Otherkin named Allen Prout. The Fictionkin Page 26—that is when Allen Prout’s life began. Not on page one, or ten, or even 25—it happened on page 26. That was the moment he knew. And when he reread the book, the capturer of his past life, he would begin by reading quickly, and all at once. Stumbling over the words in his mind as he raced ahead. And then…page 26. The moment his eyes hit the dog-eared page (heavily highlighted and woefully underlined), Allen would slow down. He would take in every word. Every single one: the nouns, the adjectives…even the articles and the conjunctions. Slowly. Bit by bit, to delight in the moment he found himself (as young idealists say). But truly: it became the moment he understood his identity. The moment that he realized he wasn’t Allen Prout: he was the Invisible Man. Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man. Being that the Invisible Man was a nameless narrator, Allen preferred people call him by his birth name, rather than anything else. Allen accounted it as a trait of selfishness: only he referred to himself as the Invisible Man and shared it with no one else. To share it meant to absolve it of its celestial, awe-inspiring significance; maybe one day he would share it with others….but even at 85 years old, he wasn’t ready to share it just yet. So, page 26. Allen remembered that special moment like it was stitched in his eyes and weighing his tongue down; it was 1970 and he was 41 years old. 1970 was an odd time: four pounds of apples cost 59 cents, 12 cans of dog food $1.00, 20
the average annual income $9,400. America was in the midst of Apollo 13 and the Beatles disbanding. And America was coming out of the Civil Rights Movement. Not that the fight ended there. As a black man in The South, Allen boycotted, cried and cheered with the brothers of his oppression. He tried to figure out what his blackness meant to his peers, his country, and to himself. It was a big year for people of color in literature and art: Toni Morrison published her first book, The Bluest Eye, in 1970. Allen read that book in four days and promised he would follow that woman’s career for life. What a good choice that had been. While chatting with a friend about the novel, he was suggested to read The Invisible Man. Allen wasn’t sure what he expected, but he couldn’t have predicted the cathartic, meditating effect the first 25 pages would have on him. And never could he have foretold the bewilderment that would overwhelm him on page 26. His identity ambushed him like a swift besiege to his heart; he didn’t know how to explain it to anyone just yet, but it was then, in November 1970, that he realized he was born as the nameless narrator, as the Invisible Man. It wasn’t until much later (after regretfully acquiescing to technology and the “Internet”) that Allen learned about Otherkin, and more fondly, Fictionkin. He learned that other people were born as fictional characters too. Allen saw himself as human, but not as the human others saw himself as. He could called be Allen, or whatever else people wanted, but he knew that he was the living embodiment of the Invisible Man. At some point, he started to identify as Fictionkin rather than human. Allen exhaled, at first smoothly, and then rough— coughing droplets of spit on page 26. When he was younger, Allen panicked about defacing the page in ways like this, but as he got older, he realized how difficult it was to prevent such an occurrence from vandalizing the page; that occurrence being, getting old. The page was splattered with spit, stained with gravy and applesauce. It was ripped near the bottom 21
paragraph and had been underlined like a coloring book. But, as Allen patted the worn page with his wrinkled hand, he thought it looked a lot like love, and a lot like life. Allen grunted, leaning back in his bed as he tried to adjust himself. He sat the book down, patting its tattered cover again. Who better to understand an invisible man than Invisible Man? *** “Knock, knock!” After Allen grunted an acknowledgment, Jenna entered his room. He was propped up in his bed, drinking coffee from a salsa jar that said “Mamacita’s Verde.” The nurse that led Jenna to his room greeted Allen with joviality. He waved his hand at the nurse in dismissal. She smiled and reminded him to take his medication, setting them on his nightstand, and then left the two alone. After she left, Allen knocked the pills to the floor. “Heh! That’s the thing about assisted living: you need to be alive to be assisted! The side effects of these alone will kill me if I keep takin’ ‘em.” Jenna sat at the armchair near his bed and clasped his hand as he reached out to her. “Good to see you, Allen. Cranky as usual, I see?” “I like to make ‘em work for their pay,” he shifted. “Good to see you too. How’s that husband of yours? Y’all still got that kid?” Until that point, Jenna had been smiling since she walked in the door. But at the mention of her family, her lips began to quiver and her eyebrows cinched inward. “Yeah, I’ve still got a husband. And a kid.” She started to weep. Allen didn’t say or do anything. He knew that sometimes, folks just needed to cry and to not be bothered. He wasn’t surprised by her outburst, and honestly, he intentionally provoked it. The two had been meeting on the first Monday of every month for the past two years. Three months prior, Jenna had opened up about her life troubles and slowly went into more detail each meeting. It was only a mat22
ter of when she would break down. A person can hold up under heartbreak for only so long. Some people said you couldn’t be heartbroken by life, but Allen knew different. “I hate them.” Allen sighed a deep, heavy sigh. He wanted to reprimand her for saying she hated her family. He wanted to tell her she was crazy and ungrateful and clearly couldn’t see the blessings in her life (even though Allen didn’t believe in God, Buddha or any other deity) but he knew Jenna too well. She wasn’t crazy. She wasn’t an ungrateful lady. And she didn’t believe in God either. “I’m just not myself with them…My own child! I can’t even look at him. He looks like his father. Oh, Brad….” Jenna paused to reposition her tail and fuss over her wings. Allen couldn’t see them, but he knew they existed, and frequently they needed repositioning. “They take so much from me. And as a mother and wife, I guess I’m supposed to give to them, but I don’t have any more to give! I just feel so trapped by them. By that house. And they can’t understand me the way I need to be understood.” She looked out the window: an airplane passed, then a flock of birds. She suddenly turned to look at Allen. “Oh wow, I’m sorry. I completely forgot about your own family trouble. I know that I’m selfish to think the way that I do, but…” “It’s fine, Jenna. That’s why we meet: to talk to each other. I guess my family is alright. I haven’t seen little June in over a month. My son won’t bring her to visit and he won’t answer my calls...I worry about her. They don’t understand Otherkin. They don’t take her seriously.” At this, Allen shakily reached for his salsa jar, drinking the last of the coffee. Drops of the now-cold liquid spilled on his shirt. He changed the subject. “Have you heard from Elliot?” Jenna brightened at the mention of Elliot’s name. “No! Well, no. I haven’t heard from him. I was thinking about him as 23
I passed Suburbia on the way up here. Do you think he’s decided to stop visiting us?” “Nah. Elliot’s an angsty teenager—he’s probably off with his friends doin’ who knows what. Or maybe he’s finally found a blood donor.” The Vampirekin Elliot Williams turned his back to the camera on the ceiling and slowly reached for the video game directly in front of him. Casually, without moving his head or body, he slid the game in his jacket and under his armpit, clamping his arm against it. Quickly he reached for another copy of the same game and then faced the camera, posing to read the back of the box as he continued to stroll through the store. “That game is awesome. It’s got a new multiplayer setting if you play online.” Elliot looked up and smiled at a store employee. He clamped his arm tighter to his body. “Yeah. I’ve got a few friends who already own it, actually. They’ve been buggin’ me to get it so that I can join in.” “Cool, cool. Well, you want me to hold it at the counter until you’re ready to pay?” “Nah, sorry, man. I think I’m actually gonna pass today.” “What! But how will you play with your friends?” “Maybe I’ll get it later.” “Okay, well in the mean time, you gotta look at this game over here. It’s a first person shooter. A lock and load kind of game. Lots of gore and…” The employee continued to rattle on as Elliot nonchalantly checked the camera’s position from this side of the store. Once the guy went back behind the counter, Elliot turned his back to the camera and placed the new game under his opposite arm. There were other games he wanted to steal, but these would do for now. “You’re not gonna buy anything?” “Nah. I might come back tomorrow though.” 24
Elliot’s chest grew tight as he slowly neared the exit. His arms pushed the games tighter to his body, causing a light crack in the air as Elliot tried to not appear stiff. The adrenaline pushed his feet forward, one step after the other until he finally reached the exit and bent his arm up at the elbow to rigidly wave the employee goodbye. As Elliot neared his Lexus he began to smile in triumph, his eyesight blurry. Once in the car, he tossed the games in the front seat and let out a victorious yell, his body shaking and sweaty. He threw the car into drive and swung out of the parking lot, his wheels screeching. Elliot rode down the highway for as long as he could suck the adrenaline rush from his body. His body pulsed with the familiar energy that he craved. That he needed. Not many events or activities elicited energy in this way. Aside from breaking the law, the only thing that gave him this kind of energy was drinking blood, and unless he found a willing donor (where was he going to find one in Suburbia?), or killed someone, he couldn’t do that. The first time Elliot drank blood, he was eight years old and lying face down on the floor. His mother hovered over him, yelling at the back of his head as she kicked him. A kick to his side with her heel caused blood to fill his mouth. That first taste…the pure, epileptic ecstasy of that rusty flavor as it ran down his throat—it was enough to give Elliot energy. Energy to sit up and try to get away. But he wasn’t quick enough, and after a kick to the head, Elliot slumped back to the floor. At some point, he woke up to find himself dangling in his mother’s arms. Like glorified trash, he was dumped into the bathtub and the shower turned on. Elliot’s mother closed the door behind him, soon filling the house with the scent of bleach as she cleaned the living room. Elliot laid in the shower, disfigured and confused as he touched a gash on his head. The blood dripped down his face, just outside his lips. He reached his tongue out and drank the blood. He almost felt better. Almost. Of course, he didn’t really feel better until his mom left five months later. And even after that, he still drank blood. 25
Elliot brushed a hair off of his school uniform, pushing his memoires aside as he laughed at the stupid emblem in the corner of his uniform: Suburbia Private Academy. Fuck that. Who needed school anyway? It wasn’t like he needed to go to college; his Dad had enough money to set Elliot up for life. After 30 minutes of aimless driving, Elliot slowed down, rolled the windows up, and turned the music off. His eyes sunken, his mouth hung open, his breathing slow and unsteady. Abruptly, he pulled off to the side of the road and put his flashers on. Elliot rolled down his window and took the games in his hands. After viewing them for a moment he tossed them out the window. He didn’t need them: he already had a copy of each game at home. After getting back on the highway, Elliot saw a sign: Trailer Park exit now. He looked at the calendar on his smart phone. First Monday of the month. He exited. The Alienkin June Prout couldn’t be bothered to tell the truth; that’s what everyone said about her. Other children, some older than she and some younger (even those bratty five year olds. The nerve!), teens and adults: they all found her suspect of lying, faking, storytelling. That’s what her homeroom teacher at Trailer Park Elementary said: “June, please stop telling your stories during class,” or “June, were you telling a story?” But she only told stories at school because she didn’t want to go home. The longer her stories took, the longer she stayed at school. Or, that’s the plan June was coming up with. At first, her classmates (especially the boys in homeroom) were eager to listen. They gathered around her, fighting to sit next to her as she talked about what it was like to be an alien. June would tell stories about what she ate, what she did and how she felt different, but she wasn’t storytelling. She always told the truth. She didn’t eat much because she was allergic to nearly everything and she didn’t like to play the games that other kids played because they were all so boring. Her hob26
bies were painting, fortune telling, and watching alien movies. Whether anyone believed it or not, she was an alien. And dang proud of it. But it got lonely, being an alien. Once the newness of having an alien for a classmate wore off (and once June started to get in trouble for storytelling), her classmates soon disappeared. Even worse, they started to think she was weird. Even in art class, where painting was ordinary, her teacher wasn’t very nice. “What’re you painting there, June?” Her teacher from last year wearily eyed her canvas. June shrugged. “I’m painting an alien invasion,” she pointed to the UFO. “Oh, well that’s…interesting, but maybe you should paint more…normal things.” With that, her teacher never asked her what she was painting again. Everyone thought she was weird, but it was better to stay at school. Even though her classmates weren’t friendly, she participated in the after school program for kids whose parents work late. Her parents didn’t work late (at least, not in an office), but she pretended like they did. It was a better day when she got home a little later. On this day, nothing could get June down. Not her mean classmates or her stupid art teacher. Or even her parents. On this day, June was going to visit her Grandpa. It had taken a lot of asking, a lot of being nice, and a whole lot of doing things for her parents, but her Mom and Dad finally said “okay.” They said they’d even drive her to the assisted living home where Grandpa lived. She may have been an alien, but being with her Grandpa—she felt a little less like one. *** June walked up to her trailer home after the school bus dropped her off. The house was walled with white panels and red accents. A small porch that could fit about two people was filled with folding chairs (for Mom’s poker games). While many neighbor’s yards were filled with playhouses, bikes and toys, the Prout front yard was notorious for building up trash. The living room window was just next to the recliner, where June’s father would eat frozen meals and then toss the paper plates 27
and plastic silverware on the front lawn. On this day, all the windows were open, making June’s heart drop. With this, she knew her chances of seeing her grandfather were very low. She would have to ask her parents if they were still taking her. And she would have to tread lightly. She pushed the front door open with as much force as she could, while being as quiet as possible. She knew a mattress would be sitting just behind the door, and a table pushed behind that. On Cook Day, her parents took every precaution to keep people out, but they also left just enough room for June to squeeze in. After slipping inside, June pushed the table with as much power as she could muster against the mattress. It wouldn’t budge. “What’re ya doin’ ya little moron?” June jumped as her mom’s shrill voice interrupted her concentration. Her mother was young but very wrinkly. Her teeth were rotten and her eyes were dark. Sometimes, June thought her mom might be alien too. “I thought…I thought today was Cook Day.” “No, stupid. Yur deliverin’ today.” June took a small step back, her eyebrows cinched inward. She swallowed some spit that had built up in mouth. Her head lowered closer to her body, like a turtle. “I thought I was gonna see Grandpa today.” Her mom grabbed June by the collar of her shirt and dragged her down the hallway. “You ain’t doin’ nothin’ today except deliverin’!” Her mom shoved June to the ground, not seeming to realize (or care) about the 15lb dumbbell on the ground amidst the trash and trinkets. June’s face slammed the dumbbell, her right eye and cheek taking most of the damage. It hurt bad, but she knew better than to cry. After a moment in The Room, her mom came out and harshly threw a bag of crystals at June. “Deliver this batch t’day and we’ll talk ‘bout seeing that crusty tomorrow.” June perked up, nodding her head. She knew it wasn’t 28
good to get her hopes up, but the only thing pushing her forward those days anymore, was hope. *** As June walked to The Spot, she thought about her family. Not her human family, but her real one. She touched her face where her cheek was now swelling around her eye. She had grabbed a handkerchief and wrapped it around her face but it wouldn’t help her at school. The last time her parents gave her a black eye, they were called in and almost arrested. Once at The Spot, June knew the drill. She was to sit at the swings and fold her arms together until she sold the whole bag of crystals. June’s mom said that this was the signal for customers to come buy, and her mom told her only buyers would approach her. Would June’s alien parents have ever hurt her? Where were they and why did they leave her on Earth? Ever since she was a little kid (like, four years old), June just had this feeling that she was different. She didn’t look like her parents, or even like her grandfather (and she loved him). But she didn’t love her mom and dad, and they didn’t love her (how could they when she wasn’t a human like them?). She always felt lost. And out of place. It didn’t matter where she went: she knew she didn’t belong. The Vampirekin Elliot parked his Lexus at the Trailer Park playground, feeling self conscious, but he shut his engine off anyway. Getting out of the car, he surveyed the scene, looking for someone who might be selling meth. A buddy of Elliot’s claimed there was a seller at the main playground in the Trailer Park, but now Elliot wasn’t so sure he believed his friend. Other than a child swinging, no one else was around. Suddenly Elliot froze. What if he was being watched by the drug dealer? “Hey Mister.” Without much warning, the little girl had approached Elliot. She walked toward him slowly, a backpack secured over her shoulder. “Oh. Hi, little girl…Do you need something?” 29
“Are you looking to buy crystal?” Elliot’s body shook from his feet up, a small shock jolting through him as he ascertained what the little girl was saying: she was distributing the meth. “You…you are selling it?” “Yes. One-fourth of a gram is twenty dollars. A whole gram will cost you eighty.” Elliot stared at the little girl. Her skin wasn’t black but it wasn’t white either. Her hair was pulled into a messy pony tail (some of the hair wasn’t even in the tail), and her tattered clothes were mismatched. A scratch could be seen under her chin and a portion of her face was covered by what looked like a towel. A red stain could be seen where her eye was under the fabric. “What happened to your face?” The little girl grew stiff, turned around and headed toward the swing. On the very top of her backpack, in messy handwriting, Elliot could barely read Prout. “No, wait! I’m not trying to scare you I’m just worried…” The corner of the towel drooped down as she sat on the swing, revealing her eye to be swollen shut, surrounded in fresh bruises. She quickly secured the towel in place, ignoring him. But Elliot was at a loss for words as he remembered his own childhood. As a toddler, his mother would beat him. It went on for two years until she left for good. But he could still remember the beatings…and the bruises. And the behavior. This little girl didn’t act like a normal kid (aside from the obvious drug selling)…She acted like an abused child. Anger welled in Elliot’s face as he looked at her, remembering the backpack. Prout. “There’s no way…Hey, is your last name Prout?” She ignored him again, dedicated to looking forward. “Because I know someone named Allen Prout. Are you related?” At this mention, her entire face changed: her good eye widened with desperate excitement. She stepped off the 30
swing. “You know my grandpa?” Elliot’s mouth dropped. So it was Allen’s granddaughter. Just as Elliot had guessed. His anger swelled again. Allen was always talking about this kid. How lovely, and smart, and kind, and loving this little girl was. She was an Otherkin too. Specifically, an Alienkin. He hadn’t been to visit Allen and Jenna in a while, but he knew for sure, this was Allen’s grandchild. Elliot suddenly realized: Allen doesn’t know his granddaughter is being beaten. Or being used as a drug mule. A lustful, violent adrenaline swarmed Elliot’s head. He allowed his thirst (an actual thirst that was a step further than the cliché) for blood overwhelm him as he kneeled down to talk to the little girl. “Tell me where your parents live.” The Fictionkin It had been several hours, about the usual amount of time Jenna visited, when she gathered her things to leave. She was just about to hug Allen goodbye when all of the sudden, Elliot burst through the door. And behind him followed little June. Jenna dropped her bag at the sight of Elliot. Allen turned his attention to Elliot’s appearance: blood and grime stained his shirt and he wore a wild look in his eyes. His face was spinning like a lazy Susan, each emotion only present for just a second as his thoughts turned. “Dear lord…June! What are you doing here? Elliot! What’s going on?” June ran up to Allen with delight, throwing herself on his bed. She rested her head on his stomach. “Grandpa, I came to visit! And thanks to your friend, I can visit whenever I want!” Elliot waved nervously at them, his hand moving too quickly. He had either stolen something, or drank blood. Allen had never seen this kind of energy in Elliot before. He feared it was worse. Jenna put her hands over her mouth, nearing Elliot. “What happened? What’s going on? Are you hurt?” She 31
reached toward his face, where blood was streaming from his hairline. A drop of dried blood sat in the corner of his lips. “I’m…I don’t think I’m okay…I did something really bad.” Jenna pushed his hair back, revealing a gash on his forehead. Allen recognized the look in Jenna’s face; she revealed her attraction for the boy sometime last year. Earlier that day, Jenna talked about leaving her husband and her child, so what Jenna said next didn’t completely shock Allen. “Whatever you did…it will be fine. We’ve always been here for you. I’ve always been here for you. Just…Come with me. Let’s leave this place. I will protect you.” Jenna’s eyes teared up as she wiped the blood from the corner of Elliot’s lips. Elliot’s eyes seemed to glaze over, but he nodded yes. Allen sat, flabbergasted, with June still lying on his stomach. What was going on? Just as Jenna and Elliot began to head out the door, Elliot stopped. “Allen. Look at June’s eyes. ” Allen lifted June’s face up, staring into what would be her eyes. One was blocked by fabric. He smiled shakily at June, motioning that he was going to remove it. She didn’t stop him. “Oh, June! What happened to you?” Tears filled his eyes wondering how such an ugly, painful thing could have happened to such a beautiful child. As he continued to look at her, he noticed small, round bruises on her forearm. Those bruises were much older than the fresh ones on her face. But once asked this question, she buried her face in his stomach and said nothing. Allen looked up at Jenna and Elliot frantically. “It’s her parents. They’re beating her. That’s a fresh bruise. And it wasn’t on accident.” With that, Jenna and Elliot quickly left the room, leaving no trace behind them other than a few scattered drops of blood. Allen was in shocked disbelief, suddenly seeing his whole life to be a lie. Allen’s own son, beating his daughter. Allen’s precious granddaughter. All the separation between little June and Allen…it was to allow her bruises to heal. How could he not have seen? Seen her hurting? Her pain? Her alone32
ness? Was she alone in this world, like him? He began bawling uncontrollably as he swept her in his arms. “Oh darling. I really am an invisible man. I…didn’t do anything to protect you.” Tears ran down Allen’s cheeks, fat and catching on each cliff of wrinkles. Weathering the skin away. “Grandpa! What do you mean? I can see you right here.” June put her hands on her grandfather’s face, gently wiping his tears away, softening the cliffs and stopping the weathering. “Let’s go far away together, Grandpa. I want to go.” Where they would go, Allen wasn’t sure. He only knew that he wanted to go too. So he closed his eyes, and with June, left.
33
Madame Zenith’s Reification Elixir Leo Gonzales
Margie waited patiently on the couch listening to her daughter chop carrots. Elma was making dinner for the seventh night of the seventh day of the week and Margie feared she was getting sick of it. Norm shuffled his way into the kitchen, grazing the counter for scraps. “Pa,” Elma told him. “Dinner’ll be ready soon, go and watch TV with Ma.” He chewed and grunted his way back to his bedroom. Norm and Margie always watched the same channel on television and just as often made sure to do it in separate rooms - he watched in his bedroom, and in case anyone came to visit, Margie watched in the living room. His TV always received the signal a little later than the other and Elma would sigh when she heard the echoing. Elma thought of how awful her parents’ hearing was, how it was so broken and out of touch with reality that she was the only one who could hear the reverberation, whether she was gardening outside, cooking, or taking a bath, it was only her. All her brothers and sisters went off when they found someone to marry and then they all had kids and played, but Elma worried often about the fact that she was the only one that remained. Her hands stopped chopping. She looked at herself in the blade and thought about how ugly she was, grimacing at the interconnected lines in her face. She was used to hearing the same old words bounce around the house and used to ignoring the televisions but when she snipped the last tip of her last carrot she felt something rise out of her as if the volume grew louder. A tinny melody from a soft pan flute bounced around her head and a softer woman’s voice was tossed in. “Elma,” Margie called from the couch. She tried to lift herself but stopped. “How much do you have left of your check?” “None, Ma.” She lied. She had one hundred dollars and planned to go to the cinema with the girls from the 6th floor, maybe go out for drinks afterward, maybe finally meet a man. 34
“Okay,” Margie said. “Okay,” she said again, quieter. Elma came out to sit with her Ma while the tomatoes boiled. She looked down at Margie’s arthritic hands shake the volume down. “You want some Tylenol, Ma?” Margie shook her head and shut her palms tight. “I shouldn’t. Already had four.” “When was the last time you took one?” Norm shuffled his feet out of his bedroom with stolid eyes. “Dinner ready?” he asked. “It’ll be ready soon,” Margie said, raising her voice. “Now, would you let her be?” Elma shook her head and got up. “See what you did? Now she’s leaving.” Norm went back to his bedroom and the springs creaked. The tomatoes were bopping around the surface of water, getting hotter when Elma walked in. She thought of what would happen if she let them boil for a bit longer than they should, if they burst at the rind’s seams and became a hot, drowning mush. Norm legally couldn’t drive and Margie could barely get up so Elma supposed they would starve if she did nothing. She turned off the stove and took the tomatoes out, humming lowly at the window above the sink. It was dusk and the ice cream man was caroling down the drive. She scrubbed the pots and pans, looking out past the singing truck at some woods that leaked into the neighbor’s property. Frost covered the window and the woods looked just how they did one winter when Elma and her sister hopped the neighbor’s fence to explore. They were darker and bigger when she was little. When the sisters were back there they found bugs under rocks and used those rocks to build a dam across a little river to see which path the stream chose. Elma remembered tossing over a thick stone and seeing a small skull underneath — she found it cute, like a little teddy bear skull. She picked it up with a smile to show her sister but when she turned it over she saw a colony of maggots eating and breeding each other. They crawled up her wrist and she 35
dropped it with a noiseless shout, falling back against some unknown bark. When Elma and her sister returned, their Ma scorned them. “Don’t you know!” Margie yelled, wielding her broom. She leaned in close with eyes that shook like chains. “There’s a man in those woods and he cuts little girl’s throats.” Elma remembered a shivering crawl go through her body like maggots and felt it once more as she peered out the window. She looked down at her pruned hands and remembered the washing as well — she must’ve washed her hands a hundred times before bed that night. Elma chuckled quietly at how actually small the neighbor’s woods were — just a fifteen-minute hike really, nothing to be afraid of. There was no man ready to cut little girl throats and even if there was, she wasn’t a little girl anymore. The branches grazed her eyes, the density and dark blue that crept out of it. There was nothing to be afraid of. A slight moan came from the living room and Elma shut off the sink water to listen closer. “Ma?” Elma called out. “Everything ok, Ma?” The TVs echoed the pan flutes like last time and barely underneath, Elma could hear the ice cream truck stopping in front of their house. She walked out to Margie and lifted her arms up. “Ma?” Margie squirmed within herself and moaned a bit louder. “Oh,” she puffed out, her hands scrunched and tugging at her dress. “I’m sorry I can’t help with dinner. You know I would if I could.” Through a sliver of the dense curtain that hung in the living room, Elma could see the ice cream man hand out rainbow surprise to a little girl, the same flavor she used to get. Elma was amazed at how the ice cream bar’s wrapper still had the same design, let alone still existed. “It’s okay, Ma,” Elma said. She had a dishtowel in her hand and rushed it around. “That’s what I’m here for - to give you what you can’t get yourself. Don’t worry.” “You know I would if I could,” Margie repeated. Elma nodded and looked at the TV, its sister sound trailing behind. On 36
the screen, hands rolled smooth stones back and forth before a flickering flame. Relieve yourself of all the pressure, of all the pressure, and get back to feeling like yourself again, like yourself again. “Elma!” Margie yelled. “Elma! Look Elma! This woman is advertising a cream that helps with what I have, she’s been advertising it all day.” Elma saw the owner of the hands, a dark woman with braded hair and Afghan makeup who squinted her eyes through a misty room. She glowed orange and puckered her lips when she spoke. I am Madame Zenith, Madame Zenith, and with my reification elixir, elixir, you will go back to feeling like yourself again, yourself again. When Madame Zenith recited her name, the pan flutes accompanied each syllable and echoed throughout the house, dancing with discord. “Do you think it would help me?” Margie asked with big eyes. “With my arthritis?” The notes hit something sour and Elma shook her head at the window. “It’s not true,” Elma wsaid. “What the doctors say is true.” Margie lowered her body and rubbed her chin. She was still sharp for her age and liked to get into debates. “How can you say it’s not true?” she asked. “Especially when you’ve never tried it? I’ve been around 92 years and I can safely say there’s a lot I haven’t tried.” Elma’s eyes tracked the man’s hand give away another ice cream to a milky little claw; she followed it up to the shoulders and into his green eyes. Elma didn’t get ice cream anymore but when she was younger Margie would always stare. She smiled at him even though he didn’t see her and shuddered when she thought about Margie staring at the two of them from the doorway. Elma would think to herself, why? Why did she always have to stare? She didn’t just ask herself this when she’d stay up late scowling at her piggy bank, but now even, as a woman. She hated ice cream. “That’s foolish,” she told her mother. “Unknowable things are unknown because they don’t exist.” She started to walk back to the kitchen and turned quickly after three steps. “And 37
even if I wanted to get it for you, I couldn’t. There’s no money, I already used it all for bills.” She turned to the kitchen again and could feel Margie’s frown; she could always feel her Ma’s frown. It was the same face she’d make when the bread caught mold. Elma got all mixed up with cutting carrots because she got to thinking and found herself cutting the onions instead, crying a heap of tears onto all the vegetables. Margie got up, hobbling her way to the kitchen and Elma saw her brittle fingers wrap around the edge of the room before she entered. “Ma, stay in the living room,” she sniffled. “I’m cutting onions.” Elma continued cutting as she looked up at her Ma’s hand, and snipped her own finger in the process. “What are ya cutting onions for?” Margie squinted her eyes and shook her body when the scent hit her. “Oh for heaven’s sake, what are ya doing? We don’t need that much onion for lasagna!” “I don’t need any help, Ma. Just go back to the living room.” Elma looked down at the blood squirting from the tip of her finger, mixing with the ingredients. “I won’t!” Margie shouted. She clenched her nose and her words came out like bees. “I will not sit down anymore, I’m doing laundry!” She hobbled out of the room with clenched fists. Elma stopped cutting for a second and breathed heavy out her nose, the biting smell hitting the back of her eyes. She knew Margie couldn’t do laundry - even Margie knew that. It would take her twenty minutes just to get one load in and after that she needed a fistful of acetaminophen to keep her from weeping at night. The ice cream man turned his song back on and started to drive off as Elma bit her lips. She hated ice cream. Elma looked into the blade of the knife, pouting at her reflection within the little beads of crimson. She hated the age-old idiom of turning into your mother. She heard people at the bank talk about it like it was something cute, something to pass over tea, but when Elma looked at herself, she was horrified by eyes that looked no different than the ones that watched from the 38
doorway. She began listing all the reasons she figured her Ma refused to give her anything pretty when she was younger; because her Ma didn’t want to get her hopes up, because she’d tried wearing her sister’s makeup but it ended in catastrophe, because it would be a waste of money. Then she thought, as she looked at the sharpest edge of the blade, that perhaps her Ma made her the ugly one — that she made her ugly so she would stay. She figured it was her Ma’s fault she was stuck here, just as much her fault as the fresh cut. The commercial came on again. Relieve yourself of all the pressure, all the pressure, and go back to feeling like yourself again, yourself again. Even Susan, her sister’s daughter, was getting married and she was in her twenties. Margie hobbled from the living room to the kitchen. “I started half a load,” she said, rubbing her arm. “Do you know where the Tylenol is?” Elma scanned her mother’s fragile body, her wispy hair as the commercial finished up its last line. And remember one thing, remember one thing, Madame will never let you down, let you down. Elma turned away and looked out the window past the short brush of woods and felt that sinking feeling of maggots again, that same sinking feeling that would happen when she’d shuffle awake at night wondering what would happen if her parents were to die the next day, how quiet the house would be, how there would be no one to cook for, no one to talk to. That feeling that made her zoom away from herself where she could look back and see her body the size of a pebble floating in space. Elma dropped the knife and licked her lips as Margie walked out. She set the lasagna to bake in the oven, bandaged her finger and walked out into the living room with a bottle of Tylenol. She sat beside her Ma, clutching a pillow with her feet and curling up beside her. “Next time that commercial comes on,” Elma said softly, “let’s go ahead and give ‘em a call.”
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SPECIAL THANKS to the Liberal Arts Honors Program
Dr. Larry Carver Director
Stacey Amorous Associate Director
Dr. Linda Mayhew Academic Advisor
Mary Cone
Senior Administrative Associate