Alone by Jacques Moore-Roberts

and confusing. “Were are yuo?” “i gues you rlly don’t love me.” “please” “see what happens” “my sister hats you.” “i love you” “bitchh” “i;ll take you”.

I was a block away and decided to listen to the voicemail he left me at 5:40 in the morning. My stomach dropped when I heard it. “Scout… I love you. It’s your fault. Goodbye.” I don’t even remember running at that point; I could have sworn I was flying. I flung the building’s front door open and bolted down the hallway to the door leading into our apartment. The door wasn’t even locked. Our one-bedroom apartment, rented to us by a man who everyone in town knew to be a slumlord. Upon walking in through the front door of it, one could immediately feel the draft coming in through the cheap, thin windows. There were cracks in the ceiling and roach traps everywhere. The walls had been painted with multiple coats of cheap white paint, in an attempt to cover the yellow walls, stained by years of indoor smoking. The first room was the living room. Empty. I held my breath as I walked towards our bedroom. I peeked my head into the door to see my dog on the floor, anxiously chewing on the case of a CD that a friend had lent me. My dog was still wearing her leash, and my

eyes followed from where it was attached onto her harness. The leash led up to the bed, into Martin’s hand. He was lying on his back, with his mouth wide open. He looked like he passed out drunk. “You asshole!” I yelled, “I thought you hurt yourself or something!”

He didn’t respond. “Flapjack still has her leash on. Were you so drunk that you couldn’t even stay awake long enough to take her on the walk she was expecting?”

As I walked closer, I got more aggravated.

I stood over Martin. I looked at his face, hating every inch of it. He had curly brown hair and a scraggly beard. He was 26 but looked like he was in his mid-30s. His skin was weathered from years of alcoholism and heroin use. I stared at him, wondering how I could ever have loved him enough to marry him. “Get up. I want you out of here. Now.”

I was met with silence, no movement.

“This isn’t funny. Come on. Stop messing with me. You need to get up and leave.”

I grabbed Martin by the collar to shake him awake, and that’s when I noticed the needle sitting on the nightstand. His head rolled back and stayed there when I lifted him up by his shirt. In a panic, I slapped him

Home by Laura Dymond

across the face, hard. He still wasn’t getting up. “How about I call 911? Do you really want the cops in here? I’ll call 911! I mean it.”

My body temperature went up. I had a hot flash. My sense of balance disappeared and I fell forward, catching myself on Martin’s chest. Tears were welling up in my eyes, uncontrollable tears over this person I hated so much. I felt so weak. I pulled my phone out of my back pocket to call 911. My vision was blurred trying to see through my tears, as I frantically explained to the operator that I needed an ambulance. Her words seemed so drowned out in my ears, her voice competing to be heard against the pounding of my heart. It was beating so loudly I could have sworn it was in my head. The lights in my bedroom were so bright, and my head hurt from trying to comprehend what was happening. The room was spinning and getting smaller, and I thought my chest was going to explode–and then everything stopped. I couldn’t hear anything any more; it was like someone pressed mute on a remote. I looked down at Martin. Why did I care what happened to him? I stared at him, this man who had tormented me for the past 8 months. This man who isolated me from my friends, gaslit me, convinced me nobody else would ever love me, told me I was nothing without him. What if I did just that? Nothing? What if I was all he ever believed me to be: nothing. For once, he would be nothing without me. The calm I had from my sudden numbness was quickly interrupted, as a geyser of blood-red vomit started spewing from Martin’s mouth. I screamed, and my soul connected back to my body. The first thought that hit me was, “Oh god, the smell.” The first thought that hit my dog was apparently, “SNACK TIME” because she ran up and started trying to eat it. With my right hand, I grabbed a handful of Martin’s hair to pull him upright so I could keep him from choking. With my left foot, I tried blocking my little 20-pound Boston Terrier from diving straight into it. My left hand was still holding onto the phone, and I finally registered that the operator was telling me to crate my dog. I stuck Flapjack into her crate as cops burst through my front door.She was barking, but the cop nearest to me was barking questions at me even louder. He was screaming at me for crying, telling me I needed to calm down, that I wasn’t helping. The EMTs rushed into the bedroom.

“SIR, SIR, PLEASE STAY SEATED!” one of the EMTs yelled.

Martin had immediately started swinging on them when they hit him with a shot of narcan.

“It’s fine,” the loud cop said, almost laughing. “Junkies always wake up mad if you take their high away.”

I despised Martin more than anyone, but had to resist the urge to slap the officer for referring to him as a junkie. Martin was moving, though. He wasn’t dead. Was I relieved, or just a bit disappointed? I sat in the living room, trying to stay out of the way. I watched the EMTs emerge from my bedroom, wheeling out a sit-up stretcher. Martin was strapped into it, with blood red vomit splattered all over his chin and neck, as well as the front of his shirt. The EMTs told me which hospital they were taking him to, but I didn’t care. I had been through enough. I spent the rest of the day cleaning, stripping the sheets off of my bed, and tossing them into the garbage. I took Flapjack on a long walk. She really deserved it. I ended my day going to Brendees, the dive bar where I knew I would always see at least one familiar face. This is what made Brendees such a safe haven for me: I could never truly be alone there. I sat and drank my rum and coke, which was way too generously poured by the bartender, who knew I had had a rough day. That’s when I saw my friend Micah walk through the front door. He told me he saw Martin, covered in what appeared to be blood, getting wheeled out of my apartment, which was surrounded by cop cars. When he asked me if Martin was going to press charges against me, I realized he thought I had hit my breaking point and beat the living snot out of him. I smiled at Micah. “I sure hope not! Do you know how expensive lawyers are?”

Micah laughed. I’m not sure if he realized what had really happened, but he didn’t say anything else about it, and I didn’t dispute the idea of it either. He and I both knew I was tired of being terrified. Maybe I was more terrified of what I could have become.

The Sun Sign by Luis Felipe Marques