Creatures

Creatures NMC Magazine Volume 42, Issue 1 Fall 2019

NMC Magazine Staff

Tamara Wiget Editor-In-Chief

Amanda Coddington Literary Editor

Deanna Ray Luton Social Media Manager and Event Coordinator

Hannah Carr Literary Staff Writer

Design Editor

Hannah Strong Design Co-Editor

Madison Babcock Design Staff

David Bruner Design Staff

Jackson Douglass

Liza Hollenback

Ann Hosler

Journey Krajnik

Literary Staff Writer

Literary Staff Writer

Natalie Preston Literary Staff Writer

Randi Upton Literary Staff Writer

Alissia J.R. Lingaur Literary Faculty Advisor

Paper:

Cover: Neenah Leatherlike13 pt. with a Satin Foil 476 Gold Inside: #80 Cougar Natural Text

Printing:

Volume 42 Issue 1, Fall 2019, printed by: Allegra Marketing Print Mail

Fonts:

Kristy Tompkins

Headlines: Fantasy Caps 1 &2, Std, Pro, Ornament.

Body: Adobe Garamond Pro

Design Staff Design Staff

Jessica Solem Design Staff

Hannah Witte

Design Staff

Caroline Schaefer-Hills Design Faculty Advisor

Table of Contents

Ode to High School Art Class Kristy Tompkins............................Cover Possum Hand Hannah Witte..................................................................................... 1 Lucid in the Morning Jackson Douglass..........................................................2

Juice Connie Jason...................................................................................................... 4

Winter's Champion Anna Pattok....................................................................5 Twisted Tamara Wiget...............................................................................................6 Gnorman Jessica Solem.............................................................................................9 Indulgence Sharon Angel.....................................................................................10

The Cryptozoology of Race James Asava................................................. 11 Bear-Ibis Joseph Beatty.........................................................................................12

Walking the Dog Jessica Solem........................................................................ 13 A Rogue Rat's Surrender Lili Clendinen................................................. 14

Possum Head Hannah Witte............................................................................19 Standing Tall in the Flatwoods Dahlia Vincent.................................20

Lake Eerie Blushes Blue-Green Deanna Ray Luton..........................21 Nobody's Home Chloe Allmayer.................................................................... 24

Magic Squicoffe Gavin Hanna......................................................................25 Rainbow Dragon Madison Babcock..............................................................26

The Croc Hunter: Reborn Liam Strong.......................................................27 Camper Turtle Sarah Allen.......................................................................................32

The Norddamon Andrew Veith.............................................................................33 ..

Requin Noire: Indonesia Natalie Hornacek...............................................34

Coated Cottontails Liza Hollenbeck...................................................................35 Vulnerablility Kristy Tompkins................................................................................36

The Voices in Our Heads Randi Upton....................................................... 37 Ghostly Creatures Kelsey Boyd..............................................................................45 Song of Sorrow Hannah Krohn.............................................................................46

Shelf Life Amanda Coddington.................................................................................... 47

Altered Reality Olivia Schmitt............................................................................. 50

Bless the Flowers Anne-Marie Kabat.................................................................51 Hive Avery Partak..............................................................................................................52

A Little Fairy Tale Bethany Vang..........................................................................53 Illusion of Safety Liza Hollenbeck......................................................................54

Frank: Man's Best Hunter Hannah Carr..................................................55 Born Wild Susan Burks...............................................................................................62

Digital Dreams Caroline Schaefer-Hills ........................................................63

The Adventurous She-Dragon: Quetschen Hannah Strong............64

Pipe Fox Nicholas Johnson............................................................................................65 The Goddess and the Beast Anna Parsons..................................................66

Crimson Ann Hosler...................................................................................................... 69

It'sssssss Time to Boogie Kam Williams.....................................................72

Dear Mortality Deanna Ray Luton....................................................................... 73 A Mouse William Walton-Case................................................................................... 74

Free Range Connie Jason.............................................................................................79 The Electorate Alissia J.R Lingaur........................................................................ 80

Innocent and Inquisitive Koree Bemiss........................................................81 Marrow Natalie Preston.................................................................................................82 Photographs Claire Butler.........................................................................................88

Serenity Shelby Bigelow..................................................................................................89 Place Between the Pines Reese "Max" Papenfuss...................................... 90

Elden Edward Glinski IV................................................................................................93

Beetle Kristy Tompkins................................................. Crawling Throughout Magazine

Buggy Man by Journey Krajnik Sage by David Bruner

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Possum Hand

by Hannah Witte

Creatures

Lucid in the Morning

by Jackson Douglass

T

here They are. Pancake eyes with darting pinprick pupils looking through my cabin window at night. They don’t know I’m not asleep. I’m TOO AWAKE for Them. They put Their hands against the windows when They peer in, tapping taptaptaptaptaptaptap always tapping to drive me crazy but I’m not. They lick at the glass, let out Their tongues to roam through the cracks or beneath my door, sweeping across the floor and leaving wet trails up the walls before They get lost. If They could taste me They would find me but Their tongues have no eyes.

There must be someone else, somewhere out there. Only a frail old man against these nightmare creatures, these beasts of many fingers?

I can feel when They are hungry I can FEEL IT IN ME. If They come from the forest Their skin is brown-green reptilian and covered in warts the size of my fist. If They come from the water Their skin is translucent and I can see their stomachs churning on people they’ve replaced. If They come from the sky Their glorious golden wings reach out to the horizon but Their skin is patterned like the Devil.

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Lucid in the Morning

There must be someone else left, more humans like me. I AM STILL HUMAN. When They are gone I steal down the dirt road to the town I used to live, stay hidden and watch.

And I see Them all there. And I see THEM all EVERYWHERE. They’ve taken our stores and cars and factories for Their own. Their children occupy the schools we built for ours. They leave footprints of fluid wherever They walk. The ooze runs down storm drains into the rivers and lakes. Their pollution is reprogramming nature’s code to better fit Their own.

One of Them was dressed like my daughter. So much time since I’ve seen her, back when I was still asleep when she was REAL. I remember how she used to smile. It tried to smile like she did but I saw through and I REMEMBER how she

used to smile so I KNOW. I only believed It was her for a moment, but They had won.

They finally knew They could fool me. I felt Them reach into my mind it’s MY PAST and you can’t HAVE IT only to discover They had done so long ago. When They laughed at me Their mouths unfolded a million times and the COLORS almost made me FALL ASLEEP again but I WON’T. The sun drops and They come back. They will find a way inside some day. My daughter it’s NOT my daughter comes back to pound on my front door. It knows how to use her voice, pleads with me to open to make me FALL ASLEEP. I wish I could believe them but it’s too late. They don’t know I’ve kept my rifle hidden away.

I’ll take at least one of Them with me before I go.

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Creatures

Juice

by Connie Jason

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Winter's Champion

by Anna Pattok

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Creatures

Twisted

by Tamara Wiget

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he Deformer is dying.

I try not to think of what his death will mean for me. I suppose it’s natural for an imbunche to outlive his Deformer, but his presence has permeated my entire life. I hadn’t considered until body-wracking coughs began to speckle his beard with blood that a time may come when our cave by the sea will no longer echo with his humming, that his body, bulky but full of an easy grace, will no longer cast shadows on the walls.

I have cared for him the best I can, but I’m no healer and the sickness in his chest has forcefully quickened. I try to give him comfort. He will not eat the ragged meat I try to place on his tongue, but his fever guzzles the water I give him from the spring tucked into the back of the cave.

I should alert the rest of the coven. Instead, I crouch in my corner. I want to sleep, but can’t lay comfortably anymore; the twisted hip socket of my left leg, bent so far backward that it hangs over my left shoulder, has begun to cause me much pain. Even with the slow passage of years spent diligently protecting this cave, I have become old.

I—we—don’t know where the coven is. The Deformer says its been months since they last came. I don’t quite understand the calculated passage of time; I only know that it’s been too long since I was last brought the portion of flesh that sustains me.

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The Deformer tried to divine the reason for their disappearance with his seeing bowl, but the water turned brown, suddenly murky with silt. Perhaps the bubbling in Twisted his lungs has diminished his power. I attempted to track them, but lost their trail just within the boundary of our closest neighbor, the coastal village of Quicavi.

Well—that’s what I told the Deformer. The truth is that I was too afraid to go near Quicavi alone. Despite my grotesque body, the unnatural gait on both Human fear hands and my untwisted is the smell of bowels loosening, leg, I hold no magic of vomit flowing of my own. from mouths My abilities stretched into a lie solely in silent scream. terrorizing the human mind; when we raid the local villages—sometimes for supplies, sometimes simply to instill fear—I am carried by the Deformer through the streets as, covered in the blood of the coven’s last sacrifice, I shriek and snarl like a mad diseased dog. We are upon the villagers 7 before they know it, before they

can huddle between the safe walls of their huts. Children— normal children, allowed to grow untwisted—don’t know to run anyway. They stare. But the elders of Quicavi know us; their bodies excrete fear. It permeates the air, excites me in a way that pulls the shrieks from my lungs. Human fear is the smell of bowels loosening, of vomit flowing from mouths stretched into a silent scream.

It is ecstasy.

It is what makes me imbunche.

But without the power of the coven, I am vulnerable.

I will away my terror when the Deformer makes a wet gurgling noise. My bones creak as I rise; my vertebrae crack and shift beneath my skin.

I can see the way they move, so far twisted is my head. Like the flightless birds that inhabit neighboring caves, I lumber over to the Deformer, sprawled on his bed of sweet sea grasses.

I have to step over the chivato to get to him. The bristly hair of its goat-like body brushes against my arm. I glance down to see how much remains. The coolness of the season will keep it from decay, so I’ve saved its Creatures

liver—the piece I savor most— for last. I look away as I pass its human face. Its human eyes.

My stomach rumbles.

I know by the ghastly pall and unblinking stare of the Deformer that it’s too late.

He’s passed into the next realm. Even if the coven came back now, there are strict rules regarding necromancy. The first is to never reanimate one

of your own.

There’s also an unspoken rule to never eat one of your own.

My thoughts turn to the chivato as my stomach rumbles again.

Gently, with the very fingers he twisted in my infancy, I draw the Deformer’s eyelids down over his gaze.

Twisted

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Gnorman 9

by Jessica Solem

Creatures

Indulgence

Title Here

by Sharon Angel

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NMC Magazine Fall 2019

TheCryptozoology of Race

by James Asava

The Dogman is a joke But what does this say of the biracial kid the colored kid You’re not taught about cryptids the way you’re not taught about race how to experience race Scared The white man thinks I will stab him in a dark alley but what does he see the darkness or my dark skin You see what you want to see You didn’t see a knife either Often monsters are how you write them My skin is an unreliable piece

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of clothing you see as a monster which at worst can make you one too Creatures

Title Here

Bear-Ibis byJoseph Beatty

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Walking theDog

by Jessica Solem

A Rogue Rat's Surrender

by Lili Clendinen

T

he rogue rat would have been sent to the cage by the rat police had that big old tube of metal not come barreling down right on time.

The rat had spent all morning and all afternoon prancing about Roosevelt Park, searching for shards of milk bones and sandwich crumbs left over from the dog walkers’ shenanigans. At the turn of the weather he scuttled down the steps of the train station where the Red Line was already rattling down the tracks and out of sight. It was well past six and the rat knew there would be few people on the platform. Stealth would be untaxing this evening, he thought.

He jumped down to the left side tracks and hopped over the electric steel bar. He had heard the ill fate of many of his brothers who perished on contact with the evil contraption. He squeezed himself up through the two inch cracks between the metal paneling that covered the tunnel wall and found himself resting easy. A bystander might have thought he was full of fright, as his breath seemed to beat on his ribs like angry dogs in a locked room. Perhaps the tinge of apprehension, if it in fact were apprehension at all, came from the threat of the rat police. They loitered about at inconspicuous locations nearby, waiting for a report, and then they’d come running down the escalator suddenly, tranquilizers blazing. If the officers were good, those darts would go shipping out and before the poor vermin even had the chance to think twice NMC Magazine Fall 2019

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A Rogue Rat's Surrender

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he was keeling over under the weight of the sedative.

The rat, who was now cleaning his whiskers ever so casually atop the warm metal panel, had cousins and pups of his own who had been captured and sent to the cage. His elders passed down horror stories of dumpsters filled with the discarded bodies of the incarcer-rats, some with diseased eyes and others with patches of fur missing as though toddlers had been going at them with hair trimmers. It wasn’t until PETA raised a riot that the head of the rat detention center was forced out of his job and was replaced by an ethical woman who devised the renewable energy initiative. Now the rats were stuck pedalling wheels all day.

There, too, were rumors of unashamed guards who, being fond of rodents, had affairs with the more impressionable incarcer-rats. They’d be released from the cage, after a month or two of good behavior, all tame and docile. Some even lovable.

The rat’s coat shook at the thought as he lay there in the dim warmth of the tunnel.

Finally, a woman came clomping down the stairs of the train station, her shoulders

rising and falling like a seesaw.

Her arms were laden with overstuffed Trader Joe’s bags. The rat raised onto his hocks, ears pointed skyward. The woman stood across the way at the right side of the tracks, her back facing the rat, whose mind was calculating inertia and the likelihood of himself colliding with those bags of groceries.

She slid one of the canvas totes to the ground and let out a sigh of relief while she shook her freshly liberated limb.

The rat sprung into action, hurtling down the metal panels and across the tracks.

He stopped to peek around the corner, waited until a young woman with blaring headphones had stopped peering around anxiously. From one’s peripheral view, the rat might have looked like a gust of grey mist tumbling fast across the white tile. The lights overhead paid him no favors, shining with a persistence that would surely irritate the eyes of the old. He hesitated at the foot of the bag, then climbed inside.

Beyond the smell of ripe strawberries was a luring scent, cinnamon, doughy, and crisp.

There at the bottom, beside a glass bottle of pure maple Creatures

syrup was a box of Trader The rat decided he would Joe’s apple cider doughnuts. take a leap at the next stop, The rat descended, his pink leaving the woman startled on nose twitching excitedly. He the train, and make off with a chewed a small hole through hefty nugget of her apple cider the plastic packaging and tore doughnut. He waited for his into the doughnut. These were chance as the train slowed. the delicacies that he so craved, He positioned himself. The not those stale milk bones that doors opened and he nearly Roosevelt Park unfolded like had to offer. a jack-in-theFrom one’s peripheral In the midst box, but the view, the rat might have of the rat’s train car was savoury bliss, looked like a gust of grey i m m e d i a t e l y the woman mist tumbling fast across flooded with the white tile. realized, as the men, women, train behind and children her heading to Howard began dressed in red T-shirts. They unloading its passengers, that were a rowdy group. The she was indeed standing on the woman, who was now gripwrong side of the platform. ping the handle of her Trader The rat was rocked out of Joe’s bag at her feet, read the his wonder. He weasled up to lady’s T-shirt who sat across the box of strawberries with a from her. “You can have your chunk of doughnut between his Nickelback,” it said. “They two front chompers. It was too make my coin purse sound late. The woman had already like a garbage bin.” She reread twisted her way between the it again in confusion. closing doors and was making The rat crouched like a bent her selection of the available statue inside the tote bag, his plastic blue seating. The rat eyes wide and unblinking. The sunk back into the bag as she doughnut still hung from his set it down on the floor. When mouth. Above him he heard he looked out moments later, the a man yell, “Fuck Nickelsight of the station lights flashed back!” and then in unison before him and then the train all the others dressed in their plunged into the dark tunnel. red shirts yelled it too. “Fuck NMC Magazine Fall 2019

A Rogue Rat's Surrender

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A Rogue Rat's Surrender

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Nickelback!” The rat dove further into the tote, and above him he heard the woman laughing among the commotion.

He waited until he felt the brakes being applied to the tracks and then cautiously climbed up, taking a peek, making note of his possible escape routes. It was then that the woman, whose pastries he’d been ravaging, screamed.

Unbeknownst to the rat, a small girl, whose ears were covered by her mother’s palms in protection against the obscenities shouted in the train car, had pointed him out to the woman. She’d looked down at her tote thinking the little girl might like a strawberry, only to find the rat there in his calculative stance paying no mind that his tiny head was unmistakably in plain view. So she screamed loudly and the rat, in all his fright, jumped up like a pole vaulter as she kicked the bag with her point-toe boot.

He landed on a man’s jean leg, but was quickly flung to the floor. By this time the car was rocking on its own accord as people pushed up on one another, scrambling to get away from the presumably rabid creature. The little girl

began howling with sadness as her imagination lit up with visuals of the rat squished and bloody underneath some man’s heavy shoe, sporting one of the more popular “Dog Shit > Nickelback” T-shirts.

On the floor the rat scrambled to get through the stomping forest of wool socks and fall boots, which, against the train car floor, sounded like inumerable kitchen rugs tumbling inside one enormous dryer.

He hopped onto a woman’s pant leg who had stayed seated praying that the rat would, by chance, evade her safety bubble. But he, in fact, was attracted to her stillness and climbed her body like he were Jack and she were a beanstalk.

The passengers at either side of her went lunging up and outward. The rat clung to the thin ledge of the window. The train had finally stopped and the passengers in red, who were not getting off for many more stops, cleared space around the doorway, trying their best to make the exit seem inviting.

Those at the sides of the train shooed at the wretched little thing, whose heart was at the verge of splitting wide open.

Upon exiting onto the platCreatures

form the rat found himself among a far larger sea of red, and to his amazement, an even grander sea of black T-shirts and blue jeans. The two seas were clashing waves, throwing insults and shouting out fractures of lyrics like a pastor before a church of heathens.

To the right a man wearing a dirty blond, middle-part wig with loose beach waves swung at an inflatable guitar as “Rockstar” played from a speaker in his fanny pack. The rat scurried away quickly, navigating the crowd, at one point being pinned down by his tail.

He let out a tiny shriek, though no one noticed, and it was upon opening his mouth that he realized he’d been carrying the nugget of doughnut with him the entire time.

Now it lay flat on the floor, half smashed beneath a shuffling foot.

He waited a moment or two, despite his panic, until the foot lifted. He snatched the nugget and darted toward the stairs.

Just then, a pair of army boots descended the escalator. The air chilled. Far gone now, the woman, having felt cheated out of her box of apple cider doughnuts, had called on the rat police.

NMC Magazine Fall 2019

The officers were drinking bubble tea in a shop just adjacent to the train entrance when they got the call. As soon as the crowd sensed the presence of the police, the seas parted, as if begging for the pesky thief ’s A Rogue capture. The rat ran and ran, Rat's down onto the tracks and Surrender was nearly on his route to safety when the police officer shouted, “Stop!”

“Running will only make it worse for you!” yelled the other.

The rat stopped, knowing he’d never make it far enough to be out of their range. He put one paw up, the other holding him steady on the panel. He let the nugget drop. His whiskers were coated in sugar crystals turned brown with cinnamon.

The whole platform had their eyes on the rat. Many He let out a tiny h a d t h e i r shriek, though no phones out, one noticed. catching their own personal evidence of the pathetic criminal. Suddenly the tunnels filled with wind and all the black and red t-shirts went fluttering at the belt.

“Don’t move!” cried the offi18 cer. “Don’t move!”

A Rogue Rat's Surrender

The rat saw the lights of the train ripping down toward him already. He waited three seconds more and then dashed away as the train ran right between him and the officers and the two seas.

When the train had passed, the officers were ready with their tranquilizers, but the only thing left was the burnt little nugget, which had been sucked under the tracks and, upon grazing against the electric steel bar, had met its unfortunate demise.

Possum Head

by Hannah Witte

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Creatures

Standing Tall in the Flatwoods

by Dahlia Vincent

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Lake Eerie Blushes Blue-Green

by Deanna Ray Luton

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Title Here

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Creatures

Title Here

Nobody's Home

by Chloe Allmayer

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NMC Magazine Fall 2019

Magic Squicoffee 25

by Gavin Hanna

Creatures

Rainbow Dragon

by Madison Babcock NMC Magazine Fall 2019

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The Croc Hunter: Reborn

by Liam Strong

I

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t was the summer of 2016,” Alex said, stalwart against the bonfire light. “No one fucking listened to me. I told ‘em it was all a ruse. He was back. He was back and remorseless. You know why?”

The scraggly nomads gathered around the fire with him stared bemused. Some of them were new. Some had been following Alex for days now, nameless vagabonds. It didn’t matter who they were.

“We destroyed his world. Killed his endangered species. Murdered his crocodiles. Burned a hole in his ozone. Ruined the environment with our refuse and technology. We did the exact opposite of what he wished for, and now,” Alex tossed a log onto the fire, solemn. “Now he’s come to reap what we have sown.”

“That’s horseshit,” one of the younger, and naturally skeptical fellows in the half-circle said. “You make it seem like you were there when it all hit the fan. Steve Irwin—the fuckin’ Crocodile Hunter—brought back to life by the same stingray that killed him? I don’t believe you.”

Alex turned ashes over carelessly at the edge of the fire, a slight grin kindled on his face. With glasses glinting so the skeptic fellow couldn’t see his eyes, he glanced at him. “I was there,” he breathed.

“The fuck you were.”

“Look, you don’t have to believe me. But if there’s anyone that knows the Croc Hunter’s greatest weakness, it’s us who were there to see it from the beginning.” Alex shifted, took a deep, profound breath.

“First, everyone seemed to rejoice. It was all part of their plan. The Creatures

officials in GreenPeace caught on quick, and Irwin recruited them first. Many others followed, environmentalists, conservationalists, and organizations alike. Under Irwin’s rotten fist he was able to convince them to commit mass genocide against civilians like us who ‘destroyed’ Irwin’s beloved world.”

“I don’t get it,” one of the other vagabonds said. “Why us? Maybe we didn’t know better. And how do you explain a bunch of hippy, earth-loving freaks suddenly taking over the planet?”

“Well, he realized this wasn’t enough,” Alex continued. “He had to take control of the animals as well. Once he had the koalas capable enough to fly B-17s over every major city in the world, dropping venomous snakes and crocodiles into the gorefest that followed, all government and religion fell within the year. The Americans took the biggest initial toll. Alliances were reluctant at first and by then it was too late. Everyone had to fend for themselves.”

“Wait, what’re you, then? Ain’t you American like us?” the first skeptic fellow said.

Alex looked up from what he was doodling in the ashes. “I’m nobody,” he said. “Fuck nationalities anymore. We have to save each other’s skins now.” Alex jolted to his feet, twin fire-axes ducttaped together brandished in his hands. His mega-cleats had been ravaged a week ago against a patrol unit of attack kangaroos. Fortunately, he still had his abnormally large hedge-clippers slung across his back, having seen battle with many a stingray and armadillo squadron alike. But the noise he heard now was unmistakable.

“DROP-BEARS! RUN!” While he ran through the forest, Alex swapped out his fire-axes for his stupidly enormous hedge-clippers, knowing that they were the best substitute for a spiked-umbrella—the greatest defense against drop-bears. He knew by the sound of curdling throats being gashed out that the newbies had no experience with drop-bears, let alone ever seen one. “It’s almost like hearing thunder on a clear day, like the lightning hits you from out of nowhere,” he had said years ago, having been part of a resistance team that had been decimated on the northern front. He hadn’t seen Michigan since. Preservation of the Great Lakes was one of Irwin’s major first goals. He NMC Magazine Fall 2019

The Croc Hunter: Reborn

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The Croc Hunter: Reborn

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lost many friends in that initial he couldn’t hear anyone, alive scourge. Now his allies were or dying. He realized both like bandages— those things there for a time were the same Alex swapped out before they too for the lifestyle his fire-axes for his were thrown of a survivor. stupidly enormous out by the Croc At his two hedge-clippers...

Hunter’s purging. o’clock he saw Above him the honey haze he faintly sensed the trick- of lights. It was a warehouse ling thunder. He thrust his the color of oatmeal. He knew hedge-clippers into the black never to trust buildings much empty space. In a flash of heavy anymore; staying in them was fur, he clamped the huge clip- like asking to be killed. The warepers into the bear’s throat and house was rectangular, made for heaved the massive mammal function rather than fashion. down onto the leaf-skin of the To his surprise, Alex found forest floor. “Fuck you, too, that there were only two guards you filthy animal.” outside. There wasn’t even a Alex ran. He forgot about gate. Just an inconspicuous the others, something that warehouse. He was surprised had kept him alive for the past how close he and the other fifteen years. Was there any nomads were to this, how hope anymore? Irwin’s cleans- hidden it was below him, down ing wouldn’t cease either until in its narrow kettle depresthe resistance was stamped out sion. Explained why they were completely or if Irwin himself attacked so quick. There must were killed. His body was prac- be quite a few patrols out. tically immortal.

And then he saw something Alex had to slow down now, he had only ever seen once stop his thoughts from burning before. It pulled up through his skull inside out. How far a two-track further down the had he run? The forest looked little valley—a Jeep adorned the same as it did before they on all corners with flags of the pitched camp. Either his ears Australia Zoo. A figure stepped were ringing or he had run far out of the car and greeted the enough from the ambush that guards. Even in weak light, Alex Creatures

could discern the discoloration on the man’s face. The khaki, the boots, the unseasonably cold yet functional short shorts.

Him. Alex waited until they all went in, leaving one guard outside. It was too ideal. Maybe just a dream. A fifteen-yearlong dream. He didn’t know how to feel at this moment, but he slithered down the hillside, to the back of the warehouse. Some sort of machine thrummed on the other side of the wall and he wandered around until he found a spot where the sheet metal had been bent slightly, the slant enough for him to see what was causing the noise. There was an unnatural blue, almost brighter than the summer sky. He realized it was a massive tank, an aquarium. Something hovered inside it, pacing like a black kite in the wind.

And then it spoke. An uncomfortable, thin, hollow voice, like the grating of fingers along guitar strings.

“Steve...” the stingray rasped.

It hovered weakly. “You’ve been gone so long. Explain.”

The Crocodile Hunter’s voice was the same as it had NMC Magazine Fall 2019

been when he was truly alive.

“Cleansing patrols found a group of resistance fighters not too far away from here. I had to ensure their destruction.”

“You know I haven’t much longer, Steve. We had wanted the resistance eradicated long ago. And now, now they’re sprouting up right next to my hiding place!”

“Yes, yes, I know—” the Crocodile Hunter sounded powerless in front of his former killer.

“Be gone! Go take a walk and think about how to perfect the world we planned on!”

Alex heard retreating footsteps, then a slam from the front of the warehouse. He crept along the wall to where the aquarium would be on the other side. He climbed a nearby oak and slid through a window.

Perched right above the open tank, his boots unsteady on the sill, he watched the old foul ray pace in the beautiful water, oblivious. Alex dove with the ferocity of a lion, hedge-clippers first. The monster could barely swim around before Alex clamped with all his aggression onto the stinger, its only asset.

Once that was hacked off, he

The Croc Hunter: Reborn

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The Croc Hunter: Reborn

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went for what he thought was its throat, or its abdomen. This proved to be enough to disable the stingray.

Alex unslung his twin fireaxes to smash his way out of the tank. His lungs tried to rebel, and his head throbbed as if it would collapse. When the glass finally gave way, it felt as if he were sucked into a vacuum, all the water imploding, shattering the entire tank.

The ray thrashed blindly. Alex gathered himself from where he was swept across the room, near the two guards who had been thrown back as well. He quickly cleaved their heads with his axes before they could level their guns.

The heavy doors shook as Irwin struggled to get inside.

Finally he rushed in, machete aloft, eyes sickly, malignant.

Any crocodile—or man— would surely have been petrified. He gasped at the death of his mentor and greatest ally, who had planned all that they had now wrought—including the necessity of Irwin’s untimely demise, all to set up a ruse. Irwin appeared shocked, and before he could rally himself to find the cause of all this mayhem, it was standing right behind him.

Alex swung his axe at the Crocodile Hunter’s machete-wielding arm, hacking the decayed flesh with ease. He slammed Irwin to the ground, pinning him face-down, preventing him from seeing Alex’s face. He raised the ray’s severed stinger to Irwin’s throat.

“Any last words, motherfucker?” Alex asked, hauntingly.

There was a gulp and a disheartened, unfathomable whisper. “Crikey.”

Creatures

Camper Turtle

by Sarah Allen

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NMC Magazine Fall 2019

Title Here

TheNorddamon

by Andrew Veith

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Creatures

RequinNoire: Indonesia

by Natalie Hornacek

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NMC Magazine Fall 2019

Coated Cottontails

by Liza Hollenbeck

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Creatures

Vulnerability

by Kristy Tompkins

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NMC Magazine Fall 2019

The Voices in Our Heads

by Randi Upton

Part 1: Too Many—October, 2017 y sister, Faye, had disappeared again.

Randomly throughout the years and without notice she would disappear, both unlike and like Mother. The reasons similar usually regarded men and drugs; the reasons different were that she did not live under the delusion that she was a good person. I had been quite used to Faye leaving me at chaotic times to fend for myself, going from the protector to the missing.

This time was worrying, though. Nearly three months before, I had spoken to her and she seemed erratic, manic, confused. She claimed her name was not Faye and she had no knowledge of the children she had left with their fathers over the years. She lashed out at me, which was surprising but not new. I expected her to apologize to me yet again when months went by. After Dad passed away a year before, she went on a bit of a bender. He had left her a large chunk of the millions he had. Most of the money she had received went toward frivolous shopping sprees and drug binges with redneck men who looked at her and saw an easy ride in more ways than one.

So when I received a call from a random number in Alabama, I was intrigued. I knew she wouldn’t hit me up to get her out of

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a financial bind because she had more money than I did. When I picked up, before I could even say hello, she spoke in her quick southern twang, “Hey sissy, I am in a looney bin. I turned myself in. I am going to be here for a while.”

I sat staring at the wall in disbelief. It would take time and many conversations to piece the puzzle together. She spoke in fast, short The Voices sentences, and I wondered what medications they had her on, or even what her diagnosis was. I did my best to focus on what she in Our was saying: I left Mark. He did not want me better. He wants me Heads sick. He wants to control me. I don’t know what happened. I can’t remember so much over the years. Everything is black. I did not know I had a daughter. I do not know who her father is for certain. I barely remember getting married. I always thought I was like this because of drugs. Something is wrong with me.

Uncharacteristically of Faye, she danced around what was going on. I took that very seriously. We talked to each other about everything. Nothing was taboo. As a teenager, my awesome and fun sister was diagnosed as having antisocial personality disorder. I never believed that diagnosis because I knew she loved and cared for me. We were just both products of our upbringing.

Faye rambled on in her short sentences, and I heard her hurriedly dragging on a cigarette and pacing back and forth in whatever room she was standing in. “I have dissociative identity disorder.”

The whole world stopped spinning while spinning faster around me at the same time. “What?” I demanded.

“Yeah. Fucking crazy, right? Well, I am fucking crazy. Yeah, the whole multiple personality bullshit. It explains everything,” she said, laughing.

“What… I don’t… how?” I stuttered. Of course We were just I knew how it happened. I know what makes that both products of disorder happen in the minds of its victims. Severe our upbringing. physical and sexual abuse and neglect from a young age into adulthood—exactly like we had.

“Fucking-a, right? Come on, we always knew I was batshit crazy.

I mean, you are too, so we get to be crazy bitches together. I will 38 buy us a house in Florida and we can be crazy old bitches on the NMC Magazine Fall 2019

The Voices in Our Heads

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beach, scaring the neighbors with our shit.” I heard her pacing faster and faster.

This mental illness had fascinated me since I read When Rabbit Howls, a book about a woman with the same mental illness and same upbringing as we had. I just could not believe that my sister had such a rare disorder. “So,” I said, “how did they diagnose this? Like, what were the deciding factors?”

Faye sighed heavily on the other end. “I dunno, lots of stuff. I have huge memory blackouts, and just everything.

Look, Nichole, this is just how it is. I am not going to explain this to you right now but yeah, here we are,” she said with finality.

I struggled to find words.

“This isn’t fair,” I said.

“Yeah well, that is life,” Faye replied, exhaling cigarette smoke.

“No, I mean, this isn’t fair.

You have the looks, the personality, everything, and now you have the cool mental illness,” I whined into the phone.

“What do you mean? You have a cool one, too,” Faye was doing her best to cheer up her little sister. “Borderline personality is cool. Winona Ryder acted out your mental

illness. Plus,” she added, “you got the boobs.”

“Yeah, I had the boobs and then you went and got a boob job,” I pointed out. “And borderline is not cool. It is the manic pixie dream girl of mental illness,” I said.

“Sorry that I had a husband who loved me, unlike your divorced ass, who got me the bosom I wanted—” “You are divorced now too,” I insisted.

“Separated. Hard to do paperwork from the looney bin. Anywho, as I was saying, you may be a manic pixie dream girl, but you are my manic pixie dream girl.”

There was an awkward silence.

“Ew,” I whispered. I heard Faye cussing out someone in the background. They were trying to get her off the phone.

“Look, I gotta go. Love ya, sissy. I am going to be here a long time. I will call you soon,” she said, and before I could reply, hung up.

“Fuck,” I said to the empty air.

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Part 2: Don’t Fear The Reaper—September 2013 I sat in my psychiatrist’s office, which was in his home.

When he told me that his appointments would be in his basement, my first reaction was that this was going to end up being some back couch casting thing. I went anyway because he was one of the few doctors who would take patients with borderline personality. Plus he let me smoke during our meetings.

He walked into the office and sat in the recliner across from the couch I was parked on. He smiled and asked me how I was doing. The hour went by quickly. We spoke to each other as colleagues. We discussed the latest research on a controversial and polarizing drug in the medical community, a documentary I had seen the week before, a book recently on the bestseller’s list. I was intelligent and witty. He laughed at my jokes, and honestly, if you can deflect your pain and trauma so well that you make a psychiatrist laugh, then you should be getting free therapy. The appointment ended and he shook my hand. “As always, it was NMC Magazine Fall 2019

lovely seeing you this week,” he said, smiling and patting me on the shoulder.

I smiled back and walked to my car. Turning the key in the ignition, I slowly pulled out of The Voices his driveway and navigated onto the road before I started sobbing. in Our The mental illness that Heads tortured me had gotten so bad that I was self-harming again, headed down the road to another suicide attempt, but I couldn’t keep the damn mask off my face long enough to be a patient and not a friend to my own psychiatrist. I cared more about him liking me as a person, the gentle flirtation that validated me, than my own life, which had currently gone to shit. I was close to a mental breakdown again, being ...if you can deflect your pain and trauma so self-destructive and well that you make a using drugs psychiatrist laugh, then to cope, not you should be getting to mention free therapy. the rare lucid moment where I sold my handgun because I knew I was going to use it on myself.

Before I knew it, I was driving nearly 100 miles per hour down the road, screaming 40 into the steering wheel. Electric

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bolts shot out of every nerve in my body. My heart racing and breath short, I pulled into a Starbucks parking lot to catch my breath. Once parked, I continued to scream nonsense in my car but with the window down. A woman getting into the car parked next to me stopped and stared with no regard to the fact that I could see her.

Every hair on my head prickled. My limbs shook. My skin rose in goosebumps that dragged along every nerve. I felt it coming, the impulses, but I was reaching the boiling point and I could do nothing to stop the vicious monster that was a borderline personality. I jumped out of my car and slammed my door shut, ready for a confrontation.

“Just what the fuck do you think you are looking at, huh?” I screamed at the lady, who stood there and stared at me. Why didn’t she run? Why didn’t she leave? Fight or flight should be kicking in for her, and I was ready to fight.

I stomped toward her, screaming obscenities. I needed to break something. Someone.

Hurt anything and everything.

I stepped over a curb that lined the parking spots and noticed

loose hunks of concrete from the crumbling infrastructure.

Quickly, I gripped a large hunk of the gray rock in my hand, staring at the frozen woman.

Out of my periphery, I saw something move in her car.

Two wide-eyed children stared at me, one about the same age as my daughter, who had been taken from me and sent to live with my ex-husband after my last suicide attempt.

“Shit!” I screamed, and then screamed some more. The need to destroy was still coursing through my veins, but in a split second of clarity, I turned around and sent the concrete rock in my hand through my own windshield. The tempered glass shattered, and I ran my arms down the sharp edges, laughing.

By the time the police got there, I was sitting on the hood of my car, a pool of blood in my lap and the world was spinning. I stood as they walked toward me and the asphalt rose up to meet my face.

I was laying in a bed, and a slight chemical smell was the first thing I noticed. The next was the Creatures

faint sound of “Hotel California” playing, so of course I thought I was dead and in Hell. I then noticed a gentle yet annoying beeping, which took me a few seconds to realize was a heart monitor. Suddenly, my face was very itchy, so I tried to lift a hand to scratch it. My arms would not lift. This got me to open my eyes, and I looked down to see the soft cloth restraints that tied my hands to the side of the hospital bed, and a wristband with my name and the code “51/50” on it. As the room came into focus, exhaustion hit me. The radio from the nurse’s station played classic rock, and though it could have been worse, The Eagles will always be an assault on the senses and should be banned from any healing environment.

I called for a nurse a few times, but no one came. I laid my head back on my pillow to sleep. The radio switched to another song, and I chuckled at the irony.

Cowbells pierced the hallways of the otherwise quiet hospital: Love of 2 is 1 / Here but know they’re gone / Came the last night of sadness / And it was clear that she couldn’t go on… / Don’t fear the reaper…

NMC Magazine Fall 2019

When I awoke again, it was obviously daytime. The normal hospital madness filled the halls beyond my room. The nurse came in to check my vitals and gave no appearance of whether or not she cared that I was awake. She told me that my doctor would be in to see me soon.

“Can I have these restraints taken off? I don’t think it is legal to keep them on me,” I pointed out to her.

She shrugged and walked out of the room. The television was on, but she had not handed me the remote, so I was stuck watching soap operas. As some time passed, I realized I had not felt like I needed to urinate. I glanced down at the side of the bed to see a piss bag strapped to the edge of the gurney and a tube that went under the covers and between my legs. Great. I laid back and waited.

Some time later, my psychiatrist came in, his face heavy with concern.

“Nichole,” he said as he sat in a chair next to my bed, “what the hell happened?”

Tears welled up in my eyes and I let them fall. “I’m not doing so well, doc.”

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Part 3: All of Us, or None at All—Current Times Trauma is the ultimate killer of all humanity. Physical injuries and mental scars can twist bend the body and mind The Voices and so much that we become shells, in Our sick minds attempting to funcHeads tion when they have no idea how to do so. My sister and I suffered abuse and neglect at the hands of several family members, beginning with our parents and on to many others. This has led us to have opposite mental illnesses: she has too many identities, and I have none. Dissociative identity disorder and borderline personality disorder are both mental illness formed from coping mechanisms learned in childhood to deal with the demons and monsters that exist in reality. The Trauma is the only reason our ultimate killer mental illnesses of all humanity. are so different is because of the developmental age when the abuse began—me being three and my sister, seven when it truly started.

I see the world in black and white. Good and evil. There is no middle ground, and there is 43 no gray area. Friendships and

relationships are cut off for the smallest slight, while others are clung to in desperation for validation. The part of the brain that deals out emotions is overgrown, and the part of the brain that handles them is underdeveloped, leading to extremely strong emotions with no ability to handle them.

This leads to a lack of impulse control and self-destructive behavior. My impulses have put me in dangerous situations, like going on a drug binge and ending up in a meth house, tweeking out, and eventually getting stabbed during a fight. I would self-destruct, knowing what I was doing was dangerous, but with no regard for my own safety because my brain was not capable of forming those thoughts. I lied all the time, about everything, because as a child I had to lie to survive. The disorder is heavily misunderstood, with people saying we should just control ourselves. It is impossible for us to do that. For many years, all I knew of love was sex because that is how my family members expressed love to me. According to Dr. Jerold Kreisman, the man who wrote the borderline bible I Hate You, Don’t Creatures

Leave Me, 85% of people with borderline personality disorder attempt suicide, while 40% of that number end their lives.

My sister feels little to nothing. She is still my guardian and protector, and has been since childhood, but she has The House to deal with. The House are all of her identities.

When she told me about her diagnosis I had a hard time believing it, until I remembered her temper, a temper that was so bad, it was like she was a totally different person.

The House is what our family built on a foundation that is crumbling under walls that can barely stand. There are two children in the house: Seth and Sally, ages three and nine, respectively. Seth’s only way of communicating is by screaming, and Sally only cries and whimpers. Lilith is in her twenties and organizes everything, but is also the drug addict who causes my sister to relapse constantly. Pandora is in her thirties, and has gotten The House in trouble a lot due to her sexual thrills in receiving pain. The House has been nearly beaten to death a few times for her orgasms. Pandora’s best friend is Dox, short for NMC Magazine Fall 2019

Paradox. He is a masochist, and enjoys inflicting pain as much as Pandora enjoys receiving it. There are many more that we do not know of. Some just come and go; some are hidden deep within the walls and cracking insulation. There are some that come to us only at rare moments, ones that are so horrible the House had to make new rules to keep them away.

Because of the Mean One, the Bully, whoever she may be, the House is not allowed any animals of any kind. This makes Seth and Sally quite sad, but they saw what happened the last time they brought home a stray dog.

The horror villains in this world are not the made up creatures in fantasy books and R-rated movies. The devil is real and possesses the abuser, only to be exorcised to take on the host in the victim and twist their mind.

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45

Ghostly Creatures

by Kelsey Boyd

Creatures

Song of Sorrow

by Hannah Krohn

NMC Magazine Fall 2019

46

Shelf Life

by Amanda Coddington

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ach morning I awake to the same violent sunshine. I lie in the domestic smell of unwashed bitterness. I don’t want to care, to feel anything, especially anger. Anger is an emotion specific to only those who care. Each dawn that Mother Nature breathes her light into the confines of these walls, do I remember that I must get up and leave their safety.

Home once was a place only for rest. Merely a shelter to which I would escape every now and then. Now this house, my home, holds within it every aspect of me. I don’t leave. I can’t leave. Inside you’ll find bits and pieces of my soul strewn around. Parts of me that I’ve given up. I am trapped. Incarcerated. This house is not my home. I am a slave to his actions now.

He’s made it so.

Come inside and you’ll see the disarray, the remnants of a woman who once lived, buried beneath guilt and shame. It sheens, embedded in the carpet. The shattered bottles of self-medication splinter my soul, cut through petrified skin, and burrow their dependency within. I’ve been captured, held hostage inside this shallow carcass. But if you look beyond the exterior, beneath the façade to the fraying paint and broken beams, she’s there.

That woman I used to be.

Creatures

My hands shake with fear. My stomach turns on itself whenever I venture beyond the house’s threshold. I know I must go out. I must continue to do the things that humans do. Some days I can’t force myself to try. He could be there watching me with those perverted eyes.

Why did he choose me?

Shelf I wonder if he enjoys his playthings to be helpless. Everything I do, my every action, depends on him. I’ve been forced to live a Life life of reclusion, because when I don’t, he’s there, waiting for me.

In the dark cobwebbed corners of this house. Inside the deepest, most private areas of my mind. Entrenched beneath the structure I’ve been condemned to. He’s everywhere.

How can I stay here in this chasm of a place that he’s managed to defile? Where would I go? I’m locked inside this isolated cavity with nothing left that’s mine—nothing left that truly is just a part of me. Something sacred that hasn’t been ravaged.

This house can never be my home.

I look at my reflection in the mirror. My once gentle features distort into something volatile. My toes grip into the rug of last night’s comfort blankets, and the toilet Come inside and you’ll still contains the chunked remains of see the disarray, the yesterday’s therapy. I cry, and silently, I pray for God to kiss me with electric remnants of a woman wire. It would be easier if he, my huntswho once lived, buried man, had just killed me. beneath guilt and shame.

I cannot do it myself.

This house once stood proud. Protected my body from the elements outside. From those infectious critters that would work to penetrate their way inside and drive one mad. But like the rodents that scurry within the untamed grass, he finds a way. He wears down the moldings and rips into the shingles one by one. A vermin seeking a way to invade. Digging those greedy little five-fingered claws into the spine of my dwelling. Corrupting my life from within.

He’s taken it all.

48 NMC Magazine Fall 2019

Shelf Life

Festered into every aspect of my life, he’s left behind invisible wounds and an invisible victim.

My sleepless nights aren’t seen.

My terror won’t be heard. My desperation for release can’t be felt. No amount of paint can cover up the agony that seeps from my blemishes. But if you look deeper than the cosmetics you’ll find her in there.

The woman who works to rebuild this structure.

Myself. This home.

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Creatures

Altered Reality

by Olivia Schmitt

NMC Magazine Fall 2019

50

Bless the Flowers

by Anne-Marie Kabot

Little honey bee, do you understand why I envy your view?

Your nectar-swollen stomach, your pollen-dusted feet bless the flowers I managed not to kill when I haphazardly mowed yesterday Your erratic buzzing, surely in response to my thievery, is mourning for the bundle of chicory and daisies withering in a vase on a table you will never grace Tiny droplets caress your wings, soon replaced by a torrent of drizzle that pulls you from the silky petals that support you more than those who rely on you Little honey bee, is the sky still pretty from the ground?

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Title Here

Hive

by Avery Partak 52

NMC Magazine Fall 2019

Title Here

A Little Fairy Tale 53

by Bethany Vang

Creatures

Illusion of Safety

Title Here

by Liza Hollenbeck

54

NMC Magazine Fall 2019

Frank: Man's Best Hunter

by Hannah Carr

A

s I climb out of my car, I gape at the sight before me: a gorgeous house, built into the side of a hill. The ground floor, with its tiny rectangular windows, slopes elegantly up the hill to grow into the second floor. A stark contrast to the lower level, this one is laden with floor-to-ceiling windows, side-by-side like soldiers. I see a dark, swampy pond, stretching behind the house. It clashes with the lush grass coating the rest of the property.

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I turn my attention back to the upper windows and smile at all the natural light that must just flood in. Letting my bubbly co-worker, Judith, talk me into dog-sitting isn’t the worst thing I could have done with my weekend.

“Oakley!” Judith yells as she approaches from the house.

I startle and hustle to meet her halfway.

“Thank you so much for doing this,” Judith gushes. “Frank isn’t around right now, so I’m afraid I can’t introduce you two, but let’s get you settled. I have to leave soon.” She grabs my hand and pulls me up the stone walkway to the front door. There’s a doggie door next to it big enough for a Great Dane.

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“I thought you said Frank was a chocolate Lab?” She follows my eyes and squeezes my hand a bit tighter. “He is.

The doors—there’s another one in the dining area—were put in by the previous owners.”

“Have any wild animals ever gotten in?” I ask.

“Like in those funniest home video shows?” Judith asks. She cocks her head to the side and smiles faintly. “No, nothing like that, unfortunately. Now, let me show you your room.”

After a speedy, twenty-minute tour, we’re back in the driveway beside Judith’s car. “I’m really going to miss you, Oakley,” Judith says. “ Thank you for being my friend.”

I laugh to hide how uncomfortable her statement makes me.

Being two of the ten women in our office has not made us that good of friends. “You’re only going to be gone for what, two days?

You’ll be back here with Frank in no time, and I’ll see you at the office on Monday.”

Judith slams the trunk shut and hugs me fiercely. “See? That’s what I mean. You are such a good friend.”

I pat her back and wonder where she’s going this weekend.

Maybe a funeral. That would explain her sudden sentimentality.

Judith retracts from the hug and doesn’t meet my eyes as she turns to open the driver’s door. “Goodbye Oakley.”

I see her eyes in the side mirror. They are red and watery.

As soon as she’s gone from sight I head back into the house and up the stairs to the kitchen table where I left my computer bag. The smell of wet dog assaults me when I reach the kitchen. It makes my eyes water. Maybe she gave Frank a bath yesterday? I should have asked her. I still haven’t seen him, but Judith said he’s pretty anti-social in the mornings and that I probably wouldn’t until dinnertime. I think this is the easiest job I’ve ever had, to watch a dog who isn’t even here.

I look around the kitchen for signs of a family. At work, Judith talked about how nice it was of her parents to let her stay with them while she saves money to finish her Ph.D. If I remember correctly, NMC Magazine Fall 2019

Frank: Man's Best Hunter

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Frank: Man's Best Hunter

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she said it wasn’t uncommon for her siblings to come for family dinners either. Maybe Judith is meeting them for a quick vacation. As I get up to snoop a little bit, my foot knocks into my duffel bag. I snag it to drop off in the guest bedroom.

On the stairway to the underground rooms, I observe the family photos hanging on the walls. No photos of Frank though—not in the early days at least. He shows up in the later photos, where Judith and her four siblings are adults, maybe late teens. Frank’s just barely in the frame, and the family seems to be watching him out of the corners of their eyes, as if they’re waiting for what he’ll do next.

I reach the bottom of the stairs and turn down the hall.

Several closed doors lead to bedrooms while others are vacant. By-gones from the days when family reunions were held here, Judith had said. These photos are different from the ones lining the stairs.

Frank’s still in them but there are fewer people. There are no more family reunion photos, and the people I’d assumed were her parents stop appearing. The last photo in line

gives me chills. It’s Judith and her siblings—her sister close to Judith’s age and an older brother with a few grey hairs.

It was taken inside the house, not outside like the earlier ones. They’re standing in front of the living room’s floor-toceiling windows, the sky blue with twilight, and behind them, outside the house, is a dog like Frank. Same coloring, but larger. A dog that needs a door sized for a Great Dane.

I step back and rub my hands up and down my arms to dispel the goosebumps. It must have been a joke photo ...this is the easiest or something, using job I’ve ever had, to watch a dog who Photoshop. isn’t even here.

There are leaves visible on the ground. I bet that’s what it was—a photo taken for Halloween greeting cards.

With my mind still on the photos, I nudge open the wrong door and find myself in what must be Judith’s room.

The walls are painted bubblegum pink, and there’s a bulletin board on the far wall coated in well-worn pictures of Judith with family and friends.

I hover in the doorway. I Creatures

should leave. There’s looking at photos out in the open, and there’s snooping through a room. Besides the bulletin board, there’s nothing on the walls. Her bed doesn’t even have sheets. Maybe she left them in the wash.

I take a step further in.

Tentatively, I open the closet door. It’s empty.

That’s weird. Judith always struck me as a person with an abundance of clothes. Is she really that much of an over-packer?

I back out, closing the door as I go, and peek in the room next to it. There’s not even a bed. I move down the hall and open another door. I check every room, my panic rising as I go. I don’t stop until I’ve looked in every single one.

Most of the rooms don’t even have furniture in them. I stop in the hall, my breath shaky.

The only room with both a bed and sheets is the one that Judith had shown me earlier to use as my room. Strange for a family house to have only two furnished bedrooms.

I pick up my duffle bag, abandoned in the doorway of the first room, and take it to mine. I ignore the shivers that NMC Magazine Fall 2019

travel down my spine when I pass the empty rooms. On my way back up the stairs, I shut every single door.

I can’t leave, I won’t leave.

Leaving now would be letting fear win—something I haven’t done in so long, I won’t revert to my old ways now. There’s an explanation for the empty rooms, and I won’t make a mountain out of a molehill.

I’m not that scared girl anymore who couldn’t even survive the haunted houses at the Fair.

It’s hours later when I’m heating up my ravioli that I start to wonder if I need to call Frank in. I’ve never had to call a dog to eat. All the dogs I’ve had are just there when the time comes. I crinkle my nose as the smell of wet dog wafts through again. I’d gotten used to it over the course of the day but it seems to have revitalized itself. I shut the microwave door with a click.

Heading to the table, I see movement and jump.

Coming through the doggie door is Frank. At least I think it’s Frank. He matches the dog in the photos. Once inside he

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stops and stares at me. His lips lift and for a moment it seems like he might growl. Instead, he puts his nose to the ground and starts sniffing. I watch as he follows the trail Judith and I must have left when she gave me a quick tour this morning.

He disappears down the stairs.

In his wake are wet footprints, though the paws look bigger than his. I shake my head and look again. They’re not there.

The microwave timer yells for me.

I don’t see Frank again until after I finish my dinner. He re-enters from the stairwell as I dump the used container into the trash.

“Come on Frank, your turn for food,” I call as I head toward his dish.

He follows and sits by the lone bowl. Why doesn’t she have a water dish for him too?

Maybe it’s somewhere else in the house and I overlooked it.

I make a mental note to fill a bowl just in case.

I open the bin that has a hastily scrawled label dubbing it “Dog Food.” There’s a single, unopened bag. I rip

off the tear seam and fill the measuring cup, then empty it into his dish.

I stand next to him, waiting for him to eat. Judith had said he’s a very old dog, and it’s important that he’s fed. I should make sure he does this one thing.

Frank makes no move for the food. He just stares up at me, gives my hand a long, slow lick, and looks at me expectantly.

I suppose this is his way of making friends. I reach out to rub his head but pull back when my fingers meet his fur. He looks dry, but his fur is damp.

He thumps his tail against the floor and gives my hand another lick.

I wipe my hand against my pants. “I’ll just leave you here to eat in peace.”

Frank eventually takes himself back out the doggie door. It’s definitely three times his size. I peep over to check that he ate. The food looks untouched. I think about calling him back, but I can’t exactly force-feed him.

I’ll just leave it there until he decides he’s hungry enough.

After setting out a water Creatures

dish, I plop back down in front of my laptop.

It’s much later when I realize the natural light I enjoyed this morning has dulled, and the floor-to-ceiling windows no longer seem chic but rather impractical. There are no curtains, not even shades. Absolutely nothing. It strikes me now how similar those windows are to the terrarium I had for my childhood pet lizard. I wonder if he felt like I do. Exposed. On display. Vulnerable.

I haven’t seen Frank since dinner. It’s too dark now to see if he’s still out there. Who doesn’t even have porch lights?

Earlier I’d thought the main floor looked nice without the clutter of so many lamps, yet now I crave lamplight. There’s not enough of it, just an upright one beside the desk in the far corner. The quiet that helped me focus and make so much progress earlier? It screams.

I flip on the television hoping the voices of the actors will fill the silence. There’s an episode of I Love Lucy. I sigh as I settle into the single armchair in front of the screen. I’d been NMC Magazine Fall 2019

worried there might only be late-night scare shows. I Love Lucy is just what I need to clear my head before trying to sleep.

By the middle of the third episode I know I’m fightFrank: ing a losing battle. My eyes keep straying to the uncov- Man's ered windows and despite the Best uproarious laughter outpouring from the speakers, I can’t shake Hunter the feeling of being watched.

I reach for the remote to turn off the T.V. when I hear a noise: a snuffling sound, like someone breathing through a plugged-up nose. It must be Frank, probably using one of the doggie doors.

I turn in my chair, The quiet that helped remote still me focus and make in hand to so much progress look, but earlier? It screams. h e’s n o t there. I must have imagined it. I watch the T.V. power off but stay seated. My legs don’t want to move. Come on Oakley. It’s only your imagination. It was one little noise, has zero meaning. My muscles bunch as I try to force myself up.

There’s another snuffle—this time behind me. Silence, then it repeats from the original spot.

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I’m not certain it’s the same sound. I settle and sit rigidly in the chair. I slow my breathing and listen. Really listen.

There’s that noise again.

I shut my eyes and strain, trying desperately to pick apart the sound so I might drive some semblance of sense into my head.

I’m being ridiculous. It’s just Frank. There’s only one Frank.

Why would I be hearing two?

I remember the Halloween photo of Judith and her siblings with the dog looking in on them. They were in this room.

I shake my head, and open my eyes again. It’s late, I’m tired, I should have gone to bed when it got dark. Instead, I fed my unease by staying up late.

My toes curl in my fuzzy socks. “Frank!” I call out.

I hear steps. Crisp and clear.

I freeze. More snuffling. It’s amplified, just outside the doggie doors. I hear it from my right and behind to my left.

Then the smell hits me, wraps around me like a sticky blanket: wet dog, more intense than earlier. My right-hand flies to my face in an attempt to cover my nose but the stench has already slithered into my

nostrils. It blocks out all else.

My eyes water from it and tears run down my face. When they hit my lips, I learn this smell has a taste.

I am so focused on the offending smell that for a moment I forget about the steps. I’m reminded though when the next one lands. It’s claws. They clack on the wood.

They’re inside now.

“Frank?” I whisper, but it comes out more like a strangled ‘f ’ that dies as soon as it is born from my tongue.

More claws scrape the floor.

Footsteps, more footsteps than any one dog has to give.

My feet slip on the floor as I make another attempt to rise.

The stairs are right next to me.

I curse the fuzzy socks.

Another set of claws scratch on the floor, this time from behind, near the doggie door by the dining table. More clack on the wood in front of me, beyond my line of sight.

Maybe if I stay really still…

I close my eyes once more.

The smell from earlier seems trapped under my eyelids and burns like acid. Still I keep them closed. I don’t want to see it. I don’t want to smell. I Creatures

don’t want to know anything.

The scratch of claws digging into the floor gets closer. More approach until there’s a whole orchestra of claws in the room.

They sound out a pattern and I imagine them making figure eights around the chair, tight-

ening the path with every cycle. I understand now. Why the family photos shrunk, why Judith wanted me to dog-sit.

So she could escape. Will he find her after I’m gone?

Wet fur brushes my hand.

Frank: Man's Best Hunter

Born Wild

by Susan Burks

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Digital Dreams

by Caroline Schaefer-Hills

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Title Here

The Adventurous She-Dragon: Quetshen

by Hannah Strong

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PipeFox

by Nicholas Johnson Creatures

The Goddess and The Beast

by Anna Parsons

W

here a prosperous village once stood were ruins.

Every roof, long-since caved and every building collapsed. Carts and stables in shambles. All that remained was a statue in the town square, a hearty chunk of rock carved with great care: the goddess, a faceless woman, and at her feet, a beast, felled by her mighty spear, the only weapon that could stand against such a powerful adversary. She once stood as a protector, though centuries later, she guards the remains of the village abandoned long ago.

“Tonight,” the slayer announced, “I will wait for the beast in the village square. I will let it come to me, and I will slay it there for all to see. Keep inside, but watch from your windows as I, the Great Beast Slayer, finally take down the beast of legend that has hounded your village for weeks!”

As afraid as the people were, they believed the slayer would succeed with his plan. When darkness fell, the people scurried into their homes and waited. When the moon started to rise, they peered out their windows to watch the square where the slayer stood next to a mounted torch with his sword clutched. His gaze slid over every home as he waited for the beast to come.

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Suddenly, after the moon had settled far above the trees and illuminated the square, the slayer froze. His mouth opened in a silent scream as he began to jerk and spasm. The townspeople watched in horror as his body contorted and swelled.

His arms grew into sturdy legs and his feet expanded into enormous round paws. The man dropped to all fours as his armor melted, spreading itself over his body like a second layer of skin, lightening to a bright white that shone in the moonlight. The leather straps that had held his armor in place shriveled into jagged strips on his sides. His dark eyes began to glow like yellow beacons as his sword fell to pieces, curling and burying into his fingers and toes.

Where a man once stood was now a beast. It was the largest thing the villagers had ever seen, bigger than four grown men combined. It had sharp claws and teeth like a wolf, though it was no canine. Like the beast slayer had described, it was a feline, though it was far larger than the pets wealthy families often kept. Whatever the strange beast was, none of the villagers could fight it themselves.

The beast clawed at the stone under its feet, leaving deep trenches behind. It roared in the moonlit square so loudly that the entire village heard the echoes. This was the beast. This was what killed Mr. Dobson. This was what ate all the livestock and families and destroyed homes. The shining savior sent to protect them was none other than the one responsible for their suffering.

The villagers nearly lost all hope when the beast circled the square and eyed the houses like it was choosing its next meal. It licked its chops as it stopped in front of a house known for many children. The beast closed in, leaving the children who watched from inside screaming for help.

Silent and swift, something slipped from the darkness of the woods. The figure glided into the town square, illuminated by the moonlight. It was a feminine figure wrapped in flowy white clothes that floated around her. The bottom half of her face was covered by part of the cloth, though her eyes were visible and shone like twin torches. She almost glowed as she came to a halt in the middle of the square. Long, Creatures

silver hair danced in the breeze Once she was sure the beast as it cascaded down her back was dead, the woman pulled and tapered off at her thighs. her spear from its body. She She was ethereal, paused, turned, an angel walking His dark eyes began and looked to the earth. the house full to glow like yellow of children who The beast beacons as his sword had nearly been noticed the woman, paus- fell to pieces, curling eaten. She stared ing just as it and burying into his unblinkingly, the expression behind fingers and toes. was about to her covered face attack the village indecipherable. family and charged for the woman instead. She didn’t As quickly as she emerged move as the beast closed in on from the forest, the woman her, and when it jumped, she returned to it. She disapraised a long spear clutched in peared into the darkness, her her hands and deflected the silver hair and white clothes beast easily. trailing behind. Like magic, The beast fell to the ground she was gone without a trace. when it landed, then growled as When someone dared leave it jumped to its feet. It charged their house to follow her into the woman again, and in the the forest, they found no signs of her presence. All that blink of an eye, she was gone. remained was the slain beast in The beast stopped abruptly the town square and a village when the woman disappeared, of dumbstruck villagers who looking and listening. Its couldn’t fathom what they confusion didn’t last long, and had witnessed. suddenly her spear had pierced its side. The spear cut between its ribs and straight into its heart, the other end gripped loosely by the woman’s pale fingers. She stared the beast down as it crumpled, then stood motionless until its chest stopped rising and falling.

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Crimson

by Ann Hosler

M

69

y steps slow as I distance myself from the crowded parlor. Just a few minutes alone in the hallway, that’s all I need. Tonight I’m playing my typical role of society girl—the only role I was raised to excel in. Women in wealthy families who desire to ingratiate themselves in the Washington D.C. political scene just need to be quiet, wear a tight dress, and have a pretty face.

The hallway ends with a pair of carved walnut Victorian chairs. They are turned intimately toward each other with a bay window, mostly obscured by midnight blue curtains, as their backdrop. I shiver as I approach the chairs, and the hallway light sconces dim.

Perhaps the window was left open by a previous escapee from tonight’s event. Yet another environmental fundraiser, this time to fight the fires in the Amazon rainforest. I reach for the curtain, but tense as an icy chill caresses me.

A low thrum ripples through my chest.

“Do you feel it?” a sultry voice whispers.

The voice is familiar. I nod, transfixed by a smoked glass rose. It’s small and nestles in my palm, but I don’t recall picking it up. A flicker of moonlight breaks through the heavy curtains and the dusky coloration in the rose deepens. The sensation is stronger this time. My body responds in kind as her fingers skim down my spine.

Creatures

It’s the most alive I have felt in a long time—but it’s tinged by guilt. After more than two years of engagement to Ben, our idea of a romantic night is falling asleep by 10 o’clock. It wasn’t always that way, but he’s changed. I’ve changed. We’ve become too comfortable. I’m neither adventurous nor passionate about much anymore.

But every woman has needs.

Crimson “It’s beautiful,” Jocelyn says. Her long nails glide across the back of my neck. Lips graze my skin. “So beautiful. He doesn’t deserve you.”

The rose is stunning, just like my gracious host. Her tooth grazes me. It’s sharp and I shiver in delight. Jocelyn hums her approval.

I push away my final doubt, the one insisting that I don’t fool around—not with strangers, and especially not at a fundraising event.

But the hall is silent. Those details are unimportant. Jocelyn’s laugh is deep, as if she agrees that nothing besides us, this rose, this moment, matters. I close my eyes.

“It’s just us, sweeting,” she whispers. There’s a rustle of cloth as she moves in front of me. “My lovely Marion. So beautiful. So delectable.”

Her lips graze my cheek and I tilt my head to the right, offering myself to her. Wanting whatever it is she can give But every woman me. This time, a pinprick pain radiates through my neck.

I sway and reach out a hand toward Jocelyn, starting when has needs.

I grasp the arm of a chair instead of hers.

I pull my hand to my chest and gasp. Cold desolation embraces me. The hall is well-lit and vacant. There is no rose. No Jocelyn.

Laughter filters in from several feet away where donors mingle inside the parlor. My mind struggles. Through a haze, I recall stepping out to escape the noise and recharge briefly in the pseudo-silence the hallway provided.

Something tickles my neck. I rub my hand against it and shock lances me at the veneer of crimson smeared along my fingers. Retrieving a handkerchief from my clutch, I wipe the worst of it away, then check my ivory sheath dress for smears. Thankfully, it’s spotless.

An image of lips on my skin flits through my mind. Fool70 ishness. It’s just that this near-barren hallway is unsettling. The NMC Magazine Fall 2019

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scrollwork wallpaper is lovely, but who doesn’t hang at least a token piece of art on the walls?

I take a few centering breaths then force myself to return to the parlor. Crossing its threshold, I scan the room for my fiancé and find Ben, who is speaking with the mayor and a few senators. He smiles at me before returning to his conversation. Everyone else is oblivious to my presence.

That’s no surprise—I’m simply here for appearances.

My gaze collides with the fundraiser’s host. Jocelyn Farrow, environmental activist, smirks with her crimson-painted lips. She’s a recent addition to the neighborhood who moved into the largest mansion with surprisingly little fanfare. Big houses equal big money, so everyone who’s anyone flocked to tonight’s event. Sleek, wavy black hair tumbles over her shoulder. A few curls dip into the plunging neckline of her red chiffon dress. Donors surround her, chatting away, despite the loss of her attention, as if being in her presence is satisfaction enough.

Jocelyn tilts her head a fraction and one of those curls

shifts, revealing a smoky roseshaped pendant on a delicate gold chain. A piece of me demands that I should look away. That I should rejoin Ben. That she’s not mine to lust over.

Yet I remember a dim hallway.

Moonlight on my hands. Feeling beautiful, more than arm candy. Being desired and desiring in return.

For a moment, I hear and feel a thrumming sensation. A burst of life ripples through my body and vividness saturates the world. Jocelyn’s crimson lips curve upward as she tilts her champagne flute toward me.

Creatures

It'sssssss Time to Boogie

by Kam Williams

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NMC Magazine Fall 2019

Dear Mortality

by Deanna Ray Luton

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Creatures

A Mouse

by William Walton-Case

T

here was a mouse in the log when I threw it in the fire.

I didn’t know that there was a mouse in it, not when I threw it. But when it landed in the fire we heard squeaki ng then, a second or so later, it popped out of a hole in the log. It ran around, panicked, and I didn’t know what to do. Lee just held on to me and I watched it try to scramble up the sides of the pit.

I didn’t know what to do. Tyler crushed its skull with a stick and Lee looked at him.

“What was I supposed to do? Just sit there and watch it die,” he said.

“I—I guess not,” said Lee. We sat for a little while longer. Things were just starting to cheer up when the mouse finally caught alight. It smelled, a lot, and so we decided to head down to the river bank. It was October, my senior year at Kingsley, and the nights were finally getting cold. Still in the evenings of early autumn, if you’re quiet, there’s no better place to be than a river.

Critters of all sort roam about, working to prepare for a long winter. I suppose that’s what we were doing ourselves, one last outing, one last fire, one last homecoming. Preparing for the long winter.

Growing up it had always been the three of us. When Lee and I started dating I wanted to keep it that way, but Lee took issue with NMC Magazine Fall 2019

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the ‘always’. After a while I saw why, and as we grew closer, Tyler, more often than not, got left behind. It was nice being able to talk alone with Lee. We’d talk about college dream jobs. She was going to be a vet.

I wanted to be a psychologist, but I didn’t have the grades for college. And, of course, it was nice having sex without worrying about sneaking in or out late in the night. Sometimes Tyler would text us when we left him behind—he sent us pictures of his dog, mainly. He didn’t say anything, not back then at least, but I could tell it bothered him. In a year he’d be off to West Point, and after that there was no guarantee that we’d ever see each other again. So when it came time for the last camping trip of the season, I didn’t have the heart to leave him out. After all, it had always been the three of us.

It was tradition.

Lee took my hand as we walked through the woods. As the crow flies the river is barely a mile, but in the woods you do not walk as the crow flies. The man-made path weaves past tree and rock, around not over the hill. The game paths might be faster, but to a modern man

they’re almost unnavigable.

Meandering, overlapping, the denizens of the forest are not professional city planners. As we walked the sun fell low, Tyler leading the way whistling Streets of Laredo, Lee and I hanging back, giving ourselves some breathing room. As we approached the river, Lee tightened her grip on my hand. She did that when she was anxious, held on tight like she was going to fall off the face of the earth if she let go of me. I really liked that about her, but I don’t know if I ever told her that.

“You okay?” I asked.

“Yeah,” she said. “I was just thinking about the mouse.”

“Oh,” I said. “That was pretty messed up. Do you think we should have helped it?”

“I don’t know. It probably was already hurt, by the fire I mean. Right?”

“Yeah, probably.” I tightened my grip, matching hers. She turned to me.

“Do you think it’ll be gone when we get back?”

“Gone?”

“You know, burned up.”

“Yeah, I think it will be.” I squeezed her hand even more Creatures

for a second. Then I relaxed.

After a moment, she relaxed too.

We sat on the bank. Lee kept pre-rolls in a mint tin then.

Tyler, the paranoid West Point prospect, made sure to sit up wind. We talked quietly for a while but eventually stopped altogether. In silence Lee and I sat together as Tyler read a book, probably Tom Clancy, and sure enough, the river came to life. Deer, racoons, even a few turtles trying to suck up the last of the year’s sun. Lee kept calling the muskrats beavers and I didn’t correct her. The trappers in this part of the state had killed all the beavers a long time ago. Eventually, after sunlight but before moonlight, when the last deer took his last drink and turned to walk away, we let ourselves make noise again.

“So,” Lee said.

“So,” I said. Her head left my shoulder and we turned to look at each other.

“Should we head back?”

“We can, but if it’s okay with you I’d like to stay a while.

Maybe see an owl.”

I looked out, toward the woods, and Tyler’s eyes caught mine. He nodded, NMC Magazine Fall 2019

closed his book, stood up.

He dusted off his jeans.

“I’m going to head back,” he said. “But if you guys want to stay then I could make sure the fire’s ready for you.”

A Mouse Lee looked at me and smiled.

I smiled back.

“You know, that sounds pretty nice actually,” she said.

“Okay then, I’ll see you guys back at camp,” Tyler said.

“Alright, we’ll meet you,” I said.

“Yeah,” said Lee. “I don’t think Mike will last that long out here anyway.”

“Hey,” I said. The three of us laughed. Tyler disappeared into the woods, whistling, and when we couldn’t hear him anymore, we kissed.

The air was crisp, fall had finally arrived in earnest, but we didn’t care. Our jackets, spread like crude blankets, After all, it provided enough had always separation from been the three the ground.

Afterward we of us. It was laid there for a tradition. moment. Lee reached for the tin, lit another joint. She looked at me and grabbed my 76

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hand. I smiled. She didn’t smile back so I stopped.

“Something up?” I asked, using my off hand to brush some hair from her eye. “Are you still thinking about the mouse?”

She took a hit from the joint and passed it to me.

“No, it’s not the mouse. I mean, it is, what happened to the mouse is sad and gross but I don’t want to talk about it now.”

“Okay, we don’t have to talk about the mouse,” I said, putting my arm around her.

“But there is something you want to talk about.”

She swallowed and looked to the river.

“Are you sure you don’t want to go to State with me next year?” she asked. I felt her tremble before I saw it.

“Lee it’s not—of course I want to go to State with you,” I said. She looked back to me. “I really do, okay.

I just don’t know if they’ll take me.”

“Of course they will,” she said.

“You’ve seen my grades. You’ve written my essays,” I said. “I’m just being realistic.”

“Well, there’s a community college in Lansing,” she said.

“I know it’s a lot, but think about it, please.”

On the last syllable I heard her voice crack.

“Okay,” I said. “I’ll look into it.”

I kissed her and passed the joint. She hit it hard, coughed as she tried to say thank you.

I stood up and started to get dressed. She did the same. As I bent down to grab my jacket a twig snapped in the wood.

“What was that,” I asked.

“No idea,” Lee whispered.

I stepped back cautiously— what I thought was cautiously—into Lee. She stumbled, pulling me with her as we fell together into the river. It took us a moment to get our bearings. When we stood up, a young spike-horn walked out of the woods. It saw us, looked at us. We saw it, looked back. Standing there in the moonlight it looked like a painting that my grandpa would have owned. I moved first, stepping forward just an inch. The young buck ran back into the woods.

We were both freezing but I let Lee borrow my jacket as we walked back to camp. We didn’t bother holding hands or talking much, but she asked me again about the mouse. I told her I was sure that it had to have Creatures

burned to ash. My teeth chattered “Okay,” I said. “I’ll probably and I bit my tongue. Lee tripped do that in a minute.” on a root, ripped her jeans and Lee walked off and I heard scuffed her knee. When we made her unzip the tent door. I it back to camp the fire was tall, turned around to face the fire, rising about a foot, maybe two Tyler walked and stood beside above the pit. We stood with our me. He held backs to the out his hand, I expected the fire light fire, warming waiting for our asses when to dance across her hair, a high five.

Tyler came but the water that still I gave it to down the him, but I permeated her locks path from the kept staring muted the reflection. outhouse. at the fire.

“Jesus,” he said. “What “Yeah?” he said. happened to you?”

“Yeah,” I said.

Lee looked up at me. I expected “Well alright.” the fire light to dance across her We stood there watching hair, but the water that still the fire and Lee came out permeated her locks muted and joined us. She leaned up the reflection. against me and I put my arm “We had an unexpected visiaround her. After a while the tor,” she said. “But Mike took fire started to die. Eventually care of him.” it became just dim enough Tyler looked at me, head that I could see the skeleton of cocked, and I decided I wasn’t in the mouse, flesh burned away, the mood for a joke. sitting by the base of the flame.

“We got spooked by a deer,

man,” I said. “Fell in the river.”

“That sounds about right, I guess,” said Tyler.

Lee let go of my hand and stood on her toes to give me a peck on the cheek.

“I’m going to go put some dry clothes on,” she said.

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Title Here

79

FreeRange

by Connie Jason

Creatures

The Electorate

by Alissia J.R. Lingaur

I see them in my periphery, at the line where walls begin to fade and shadows hint at shape: faces with mouths spread beyond speech, sightless eyes x-ed, as fingers fumble to bubble their values.

In churches, VFW halls, cafeterias, our hearts smash or else we get EXACTLY what we want and hang triumphant banners on houses and pick-up trucks.

As we duck behind cardboard dividers, allegiances invisible on our lips, I whisper, Will I ever know your name?

Can I even meet your gaze?

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Innocent and Inquisitive

by Koree Bemiss

Creatures

Marrow

by Natalie Preston

L

aurel’s father was fired from his job at the end of August, a sure way to sour the remains of an already over-ripe summer. Its heat had been unbearable, with not even the small relief of a breeze to cut through the swelter. There was only the movement of mosquitoes and gnats, circling the backyard in masses that looked like suspended plumes of smoke. Laurel’s hair frizzed and curled in the damp air, aided by the droplets of sweat that clung to the back of her neck. She spent most of the summer lying face-down on the cool tile floor in the kitchen, centered among a semi-circle of three stuttering fans. If she got bored enough, Laurel would choose one and let her finger drift between the wire frame, see how close to the blade she could get without losing skin.

Her father had worked at the hardware store for eleven years. An old Employee of the Month certificate still hung precariously on their fridge, dangling next to a square of sloppily cut newspaper—her mother’s obituary, pinned down by a magnet in the shape of a cross. He never told her why he was fired, but Laurel could guess. She would often wake to find his car parked resolutely in their driveway, and her father stoic in his living room recliner. She was unable to confront him, only ever aware of how small she felt, the scrawniness of her limbs, the too-delicate pitch of her childish voice. Instead, Laurel tried to NMC Magazine Fall 2019

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keep an air of indifferent curiosity when she would ask why he wasn’t at work. His excuses were never well thought out, nor were they well executed, as they happened at an alarmingly implausible rate. His boss had a family emergency at least four times a month, always miraculously opting to leave the store closed for the day. “Lucky for me, right Laur?” he would say, flashing a weak smile. Laurel was almost offended by his inability to create an even somewhat convincing lie, if only for her. Most days, she wanted nothing more than to be convinced.

After his initial anger had dissipated, the ravings about poor management and unfair dismissal weathered down to the occasional grumble.

“Good luck without me,” he often whispered sternly under his breath. It was a mantra that he nurtured, carried with him throughout the day.

Laurel didn’t see him much after that. He claimed to be in search of Help Wanted signs around town, but she could just as easily imagine him driving aimlessly, alone and unbothered by the well-wishers and hearty condolences

from friends and neighbors.

When he was home, he could barely meet her eyes. His gaze was always somewhere else, lingering in the empty corners of their house. It gave her the sensation of being entirely see-through, like she wasn’t even there at all. She would pinch herself sometimes just to be reminded of her own solidness.

In September, she dug out the small bin of school supplies from the back of her closet, sorted through them and hoped what she had was enough to cover the list Mrs. Parson had sent out to the eighth-grade class. She ate bowls of cereal for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Occupied herself at night with the black and white movies that played continuously on one of the public access channels—saw her mother’s face in every grainy, doe-eyed film actress.

She slept a lot too. Something had settled in her bones, burrowed its way in, made it difficult to stand or run or climb trees. Maybe it had always been there.

Creatures

When school started, she would leave and return to an empty house.

and dull conversation. Her father never touched his fork.

Joanne pecked at the vegetables on her plate one by one before moving on to the miniscule strip of turkey she’d sliced It was one of her father’s old for herself. Marcus did most of coworkers who offered to take the talking. him hunting. He showed up at “You’d love it man, I’m tellthe house over Thanksgiving ing you,” he said, pointing his break—his wife and an armful fork at Laurel’s father, a piece of brightly colored Tupperof turkey still speared on the ware containers in tow. Word end. “I know it’s been a rough had spread that her father was year for you,” he continued, found passed out ignoring the cough in the front seat of Most days, she Joanne stifled under his car on some dirt her hand. “But,” he road on the outskirts wanted nothing stressed, “this would more than to of town where the be such a trip. I still be convinced. bars sprouted up can’t believe you’ve like neon-signed never been huntbeacons. Laurel suspected ing before. It’s like a rite of this was more than a random, passage.” good-natured visit. Her father’s Joanne chuckled lightly, the coworker—Marcus, a salesman sound echoing uncomfortwith perfectly straight teeth ably loud in their sad dining and an oddly pointed chin— invited himself in with a natu- room. For such a small house, ral ease. His wife, Joanne, stood the rooms had a way of feelstiffly at his side and compul- ing cavernous, like they might sively plucked at the wool of swallow you whole. her emerald green sweater. Her Marcus remained persistent, father didn’t even feign embar- “Its spiritual almost. You’ve got rassment over the state of their too much going on up here.” house.

He tapped his middle and The dinner was a stiff collec- pointer fingers roughly to his tion of mumbled pleasantries temple. “You’ve got to let that anger out somehow.”

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After dinner, Marcus and her father sat lethargic in the small wicker chairs in the backyard. Laurel watched them from the kitchen window, eyes peered around the flimsy white curtain stained yellow with water damage. Marcus gestured openly to the wooded expanse before them. Her father only nodded.

She was relegated to dish duty with Joanne, who had the chore down to an exact science. Laurel watched with poorly concealed awe as Joanne scrubbed the white porcelain with more strength than she imagined possible of the small woman. Joanne would stop, hold a plate to the light, and instantly find a new smudge or food stain to obliterate with the rough side of her sponge.

“Maybe I could talk to your father about letting me take you shopping for some new clothes,” Joanne said casually, setting the last plate down to dry.

“Yeah, maybe,” Laurel replied, distracted by the blistered, raw edge of the woman’s fingers.

Her mother’s fingers had been long and slender, reverent in the way they used to comb through Laurel’s hair at night.

She wondered if there would be anything left of them now, or if they’d deteriorated to bone.

She heard them first when they returned, a faint hum of noise buried beneath sharp winds and static from the TV. The men hollered, their heavy boots crunching on tightly packed layers of fallen and dried leaves. Laurel scrambled to watch them from the window above the kitchen sink, overlooking the dense woods that crowded the edge of their property. The forest, without its plush of green, resembled barren lines drawn from charcoal, endless columns of wood in early stages of decay, a disease from the Emerald Ash Borer that spread hungry through the state.

They hauled the buck behind them, its front and hind legs tied together with stretchy black cord. Laurel could just make out the brilliant white of its antlers—extended like two hands, each finger broken.

Her father, usually quiet, looked strangely sullen despite the success of his first hunt and the buzz of praise that Creatures

flowed steadily from the men over its disturbingly empty around him. His shoulders face. She only saw herself slumped, and each step he reflected back. took dragged along the dirt, his own body too laborious to carry, a dead weight that The blizzard arrived rivaled the buck being slung suddenly.

The light flurry about beside him. of snow that Within the was constant month of her Her mother’s fingers t h r o u g h father’s return had been long and December with the buck, slender, reverent in turned wet and its head had heavy, burying the way they used to been stuffed, their house in d r i e d a n d comb through Laurel’s a single night. hair at night. placed obnoxThe power iously center lasted for a on their living room wall. day, enough time to watch the Marcus had insisted that news broadcasts and weather her father display his kill, announcements that declared and also, he knew a guy who their county in a severe winter did the best taxidermy in storm warning. Laurel moved the county. The trophy was blankets, two sleeping bags, placed in a way that kept it and a handful of pillows into visible at all angles, a dark the living room, assembled spot that congealed in the around the fireplace. Her corner of the eye. father collected himself long Laurel caught her father enough to kindle a fire with staring at it several times. leftover chopped wood from She tried to discern what it last summer. The buck was was that he could be seeing in still, only ever watching from the eyes of the buck, now just its mantle on the wall. two shiny black marbles. She One evening, he sat quietly attempted once, to mimic in front of the weakened fire, her father’s stance and stare its flames fizzling out in desperbravely at the buck—resistate licks across the splintered ing the urge to toss a blanket NMC Magazine Fall 2019

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wood. From Laurel’s spot, upright in her sleeping bag against the wall, she watched the fire shift over his face. Its shadows lift and fell over his eyes and nose and cheeks. His very bone structure changed by the whims of the tiny orange blaze. She wondered if she ever knew him at all. Laurel could run her fingers over her own face, feel the shape of her sloped nose and deep-set eyes, from her father. Feel the shape of her small forehead and high cheekbones, from her mother.

He must have sensed her stare, turning quietly to face her. Laurel was struck by their similarities and was at once forced to acknowledge that the loss of her mother had left twin incisions in the both of them.

“I hate that thing in here,” he said, nodding towards the trophy on the wall. “It didn’t make me feel any better when I shot it, and it doesn’t make me feel any better now.” He laughed, dry and low, deep from an empty belly that sloshed only on alcohol. “Your mother would hate it.”

Laurel couldn’t remember the last time he’d spoken about her. “Yeah,” she responded, unsure of how to proceed.

She’d gotten so used to their new dance, the tip-toeing in each other’s presence, that she didn’t remember what it felt like to simply talk with him.

She hoped to catch and hold tight to his sudden sentimentality before it fluttered away.

Outside, the sheets of falling snow made hazy, luminescent curtains across the window, obscuring the world beyond the small square of their living room.

“I’ll get rid of it,” he said.

“When the snow melts, I’ll get it out of here.”

He shuffled closer to her, his hand reached out slightly before pulling back to rest adjacent to hers on the wood floor. There was the crackle of firewood, the sniffling of their red, runny noses and the soft exhalation of breath. When he glanced back at the buck, she looked back with him, and wondered if everything looked the same in death.

Creatures

Photographs

by Claire Butler

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NMC Magazine Fall 2019

Serenity

by Shelby Bigelow 89

Creatures

Place Between the Pines

by Reese "Max" Papenfuss

N

ight is not the domain of mystery; it is the domain of revelation. That is what my experiences have made me realize. Once I was like you—another Hawk Owl walking back to my dorm late at night after a long lecture in Scholars Hall. My eyes were weary, and my legs hastened to get me back to East Hall. I passed the pine grove, and it was there I saw her for the first time: a girl, barely six, her whole body glowing like the moon, raven black hair straight as a line, all ponytailed in a little red bow.

She smiled at me like only small children can, and then said in the most gleeful way, “Can you find me mister?” Her body twisted in the wind.

I did not know who this girl was, nor why she glowed so palely when the moon was new and the lights on campus were out, but I was pulled to her in such a way I cannot describe, just as I cannot describe what else I saw.

There above her, peeking around the pine, something with skin like leathery snow, its eyes a scarlet hunger, its mouth full of blood. Would you judge me if I ran as I did, out of breath across campus, no thought owed to how that abomination did not chase me?

Ironic then, that while they did not chase me that day, they chased me in my sleep. Night after night after night after night I inhabited the worst nightmares, visions of running through a vast arbor of pine so tall NMC Magazine Fall 2019

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it scraped the starless sky and so moment she bobbed between wide it went to the end of time. the trees of the pine grove, me And in every dream I chased following her around every the girl, I lost the girl, that thing corner and every branch. It arrived, and I was slaughtered. wasn’t until I lost her that I The days became mirages, noticed droplets of blood falleach collapsing into each other ing from the trees, and saw as my grades steadily dropped above me the same creature and my friends quickly aban- that had made me run from her doned me. But while my life in the first place. But there were was a purgatory, my dreams many now, and those gaunt became a hell. Each and every forms of white leather and bone night filled me with dread, spidered their way throughout and dread could only lead to the labyrinth of pine above me. one thing.

As I ran from them, I realized the infinity of conifers that It happened near midnight, surrounded me. Row upon row the culmination of the worst dream waking me to a silent of madly mazing pines, each one tall enough October night. to scrape the I looked out Night after night the window, after night after night starless sky, each and every and there, I inhabited the worst row running right there, nightmares. infinitely. she stood: the moonskin girl, I ran throughhair in a bow, smile peering out that grove, realizing in at me, gaze cutting through panicked observation where the glass itself into the core the only lightsource in this of my maddened soul. evergreen hell was: a wide and I knew there was only one glowing moon, its light my hope. So I ran to it, hounded way to stop it. by the creatures as they chased I chased her down the sideme on all fours. walk, my pajamas fluttering in Each moment more anxious the wind, without my phone than the last, drops of blood or key, running fiercely into the night after this girl. In a spattered in front of me and the creatures darted on all fours Creatures

to get me, hounding, doglike growls bouncing between the pines. Finally, I reached the nexus of the light, a ring of pine surrounding a central grove.

The moment I crossed the threshold, the whole forest reached a standstill. The needles stopped rustling. The growls, howls, and snarls of the creatures vanished from my senses. Even the wind stopped completely, leaving only tension and the moonskin girl, standing in the center of all the pines. She smiled at me all knowing, her eyes staring not at me but my soul, my worried harrowed soul now desperate for release. She didn’t have to say anything; she was my escape. She must have known this place. After all, how else could she have come there?

Slowly I walked to her, while she did nothing but smile and stare. She only reacted when I got near, reaching her arm out to me with knowing comfort. I raised mine to match and took hold of her arm. It was when her gnashing teeth tore into the flesh of my forearm that I realized what was happening.

Paralysed, I stood there, watching her laugh as the blood fell from her wolfish mouth.

NMC Magazine Fall 2019

A moment later, the creatures poured from the blackness, fang and claw rending my body to devour me, flesh and bone.

Their teeth broke every part of me, eating all that I was as the little girl laughed and laughed for all the pines to hear.

Night is not the domain of mystery, but that of revelation.

Had I known this, I might have been saved, but now I am lost, my body twisted and broken as my soul. I am left to wait for my prey, above the smiling moonskin girl, my skin leathery snow, my eyes a scarlet hunger, my mouth full of blood.

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Elden

by Edward Glinski IV Creatures