The Croaker 2020 - Volume 4

THE CROAKER Volume 4 Croaker-19

The Croaker • Volume 4 Copyright Š 2020, Sarah Lawrence College Student Senate. All rights reserved.

The Croaker is published annually by students of Sarah Lawrence College. This issue welcomes worldwide submissions.

This is our fourth volume. All rights revert to the authors upon publication.

Reporter: “Did you visit the Parthenon during your trip to Greece?”

Shaquille O’Neal: “I can’t really remember the names of the clubs we went to.”

“I’ve had a perfectly wonderful evening.

But this wasn’t it.”-Groucho Marx

Table of contents 7 WHEN A SARAH LAWRENCE STUDENT DIES LAUREN MESLEY

23 ON THE PASSING OF A FAN AND HOW TO MOURN IT GeRARDO LAMADRID Castillo

25 PUP ROCKS JULIA BRITtAIN

26 DESIRE

SEVERAL LIMES

27 THAT ONE HIPSTER WHO NEVER SAW PARASITE BUT CANNOT STOP TALKING ABOUT WHAT A HISTORIC MOMENT IN CINEMA IT IS PACQUI PASCUAL

29 SELF PORTRAIT AS BEYOND MEAT BURGERâ„¢ JADE STEPHAN

31 LEAVE A RATING! KAYLEIGH CLARK

33 THE TINDER DATE HARRY SAROFF

39 OLIVE GARDEN GOTHIC SEVERAL LIMES

44 FOREVER UNDER 21

GeRARDO LAMADRID castillo

46 HEAD WOUNDS AND HEARTTHROBS HENRY KIPPS

54 LET’S GET THINGS STRAIGHT KAYLEIGH CLARK

58 465 MINIATURE SUNS HARRY SAROFF

60 MY FANTASY SEVERAL LIMES

65 EVIL GLOVES

STEVEN ORLOFSKY

73 13

SEVERAL LIMES

74 MATTHEW PERRY DOG JULIA BRItTAIN

75 LET’S BEGIN SHALL WE? JADE STEPHAN

109 DEAR SANTA SEVERAL LIMES

111 I THINK IT’S TIME WE IMPEACH. IT’S NOT YOU. IT’S ME. PACQUI PASCUAL

113 A PREPOSTEROUSLY PILFERED PIZZA PIE HARRY SAROFF

119 GRAMERCY

GeRARDO LAMADRID castillo

127 MOOOVE ALONG NOTHING TO SEE HERE SEVERAL LIMES

129 POSSIBLE CONFERENCE PAPER TOPICS ANONYMOUS

131 CONTRIBUTORS 133 EDITORS

WHEN A SARAH LAWRENCE STUDENT DIES LAUREN MESLEY

Being dead was like being alive, except I no longer had the instinct to breathe and I didn’t have to worry about dumb alive-problems, like being late or my phone battery dying. Which is a relief, because from what I remembered, both those things happened frequently.

“Hello, Bethany,” a voice said behind me.

I opened my eyes. I was laying in the entrance hall of an old Victorian house. The walls were carved out of dark wood and the furniture had evergreen accents. There was a grandfather clock at the end of the entrance hall, and through the windows, I saw only darkness. Below me, the floor was covered in a thin layer of water. The cloudy glass lamps in the house appeared off, but there must have been light somewhere, I thought, because I could see my reflection and the room around me. I had a strong sense that I had been in this house before.

A dog sat patiently behind me a few feet away.

She was my dog, from when I was in middle school.

7

Her name was Honey, I recalled. She was an old, wise springer spaniel. We had to put her down when I was fourteen and I couldn’t recall a time when I was more devastated. But here she was, staring at me with her big brown eyes, wagging her tail.

“Welcome,” said the dog.

“Honey?” I blinked. Her voice was warm and dry, like a grandmother’s. “Are you… Can you… talk–?”

“Yes, I can talk,” Honey said. “Before you ask, I couldn’t talk when I was alive but when you’re dead you can do whatever you want. I wanted to talk.”

I nodded and knelt down beside my old friend.

“You are so valid.”

I pushed myself up and examined the room.

There were two L-shaped desks against the right wall and an empty fireplace to the left. The light-withouta-source followed me wherever I went. “Honey, what is this place?” I asked.

“This is the Inbetween Space, where you come immediately after you die,” Honey said.

I stopped dead in my tracks. “How long ago did I die?”

“You died about three hundred and sixty words ago,” Honey answered. I wasn’t sure what that meant, 8

but I guessed it had some otherworldly significance I had yet to understand. “Usually, in the Inbetween Space, you’re greeted by a loved one who died before you,” Honey continued. “Someone you’ve grieved over. A person.” Honey paused, blinked. “Like a human.”

I studied my canine friend. “Yet, here you are.”

“Yes.” Honey finally stood up and approached me. “Bethany, I am the most significant soul whose death you grieved over. I’m your only lost loved one. I am a dog. Do you follow?”

“I do,” I said. “I am very privileged. Or… was.

But, I know this. So that makes me less of an asshole.”

My gaze shifted to my reflection in the water. It was hard to pinpoint because the room was so dark, and I was wearing all black.

I wandered toward the grandfather clock. Its hour and minute hands were missing. “So this is the afterlife?” I asked Honey.

“Yes,” Honey joined me in examining the clock with no time. “When you die, whatever you believe in--whether it’s heaven, or resurrection, or what happens in ‘The Good Place’--that’s what happens. Or the thing that you think happens, or the thing that you 9

want to happen… it happens. To everyone.”

“That’s amazing!” I exclaimed. “That makes perfect sense!” There was another hallway running perpendicular to the entrance hall. I turned right to explore more.

Honey placed herself in front of me so I had to stop. “You, Bethany, didn’t believe in anything. You just really wanted to know what other people thought about you all the time.”

A wide smile spread across my lips. “Do I get to know what other people thought of me then?”

“Yes.” “That’s so cool!” Then, a thought struck me.

“Wait…” I glanced at my reflection. My face was pale and silvery. “How did I die?” I asked. But before Honey could answer I realized how much I didn’t know about my own life and spoke again. “Oh, my God, wait, I don’t even know how old I am… was.

What was I doing before I died? Did I have a job? Was I going to school? Why can’t I remember anything?”

“You can’t remember anything because I have to explain to the reader who you are and how you died.”

Honey glanced at you, the reader, and returned her gaze to me. “Your lack of memory gives me an excuse 10

to tell you what happened and then you and the reader get the information at the same time. That’s how afterlife stories work.”

“Afterlife stories?” I furrowed my brows. “Am I in a story?”

“Nevermind,” Honey said. “Sit, I’ll tell you about your life.”

Underneath the staircase, there was an assortment of Victorian sofas surrounding a short coffee table. I sat in one and Honey jumped up next to me.

She laid down and rested her head on my lap like she used to when we were alive and oblivious.

“You were attending Sarah Lawrence College in New York before you died,” Honey began her story.

I sat up straighter and gasped. My wide eyes looked around at the sofas and staircase. “Westlands!”

I realized. “We’re in Westlands!”

At that precise moment, a woman with gray hair and paper-white skin descended the staircase. She was wearing a long gown and her hair was in a tight bun.

She evidently did not see us and continued towards the grandfather clock.

“Who’s that?” I asked.

“Why, that’s Sarah Bates Lawrence herself,” Hon11

ey said.

The ghostly woman took a turn into one of the rooms and disappeared.

“The maid she pushed down the stairs is around here somewhere. She hides most of the time,” Honey shrugged. “But, anyway… shall I go on?”

I nodded, at a loss for words.

“You were a sophomore with a bright future.”

Honey continued, “Or… that’s what Career Services told you, anyway. It was a Monday evening in February when you died. The year was 2020. You ate dinner at Bates Dining Hall, like you always did, and walked up Kimball Avenue in order to get to the new Barbara Walters Campus Center–” “Oh, my God.” I interrupted. “A passing car threw something at me, didn’t they? It hit me in the head, and that’s how I died?”

“No.” Honey gave me an apologetic look. “You got food poisoning from eating Bates’ rotisserie chicken.”

I gasped. But, was I really surprised? “Oh,” I muttered, “That stuff ’s so dry…”

“That’s not all,” Honey lifted her head to look at me. “You did get to the Barb--or whatever the kids 12

are calling it these days--and you put your backpack down on one of the green chairs in the Living Room because those are the best chairs and everyone knows it. You were overcome by a wave of nausea, so you ran outside to vomit. Once you got out there, before you could open your mouth, you were smothered by a cloud of cigarette smoke produced by eight Heimbros who were smoking by the road right next to you--because while Sarah Lawrence is a smoke-free campus, the roads are technically not campus.” Honey raised her fuzzy eyebrows. “Anyway, you started to choke on the smoke. While you were choking, you fell in the road and got run over by the campus shuttle.” Honey paused, her eyes watery. “The shuttle driver was on his phone.”

“Oh, my God!” My mouth hung open and my eyes were wide. “So, what killed me?”

“The poisoning, the smoke, and the shuttle all at the exact same time.” Honey lowered her head in sorrow.

“And what happened to my meal swipes?” I asked. “Were they given to students who needed them?”

“Not at all…” Honey said. “They vanished… just 13

like you did.”

“NOOOOOOOOO!” I began to cry, thinking of all the starving students on campus.

“It was truly terrible,” Honey agreed. She gave me a moment to collect myself. “Bethany… perhaps you’d like to see some thoughts people have had about you now?” she offered, trying to cheer me up.

I nodded, wiped the tears from my cheeks.

“I will show you three now,” Honey said. “Any more and you’ll be too overwhelmed and distraught to think clearly.”

I nodded again. Honey closed her eyes and projected the scenes into my head.

The first one was between two girls I had never seen before. They had the bright eyes and enthusiasm of first-years. One of them wore a bleach blonde pixie cut on her head and glossy Dr. Martens on her feet.

The second one was wearing baggy elephant pants and a tie-dye bandanna in her hair. It was orientation week and they were sharing a blanket at the annual “Princess Bride” screening on the North Lawn.

“They play this movie during every orientation?”

Pixie Cut asked her friend.

“Yeah,” Tie-Dye said. “Cary Elwes, like, went 14

here, or something.”

Two more girls, who I recognized as myself and my roommate Alex, laid out a blanket in front of Pixie Cut and Tie-Dye. I took a step closer to Past Me and hardly recognized her. Is that really what I looked like? I looked way more put-together than I thought.

Past Me sat down and twirled around to Pixie Cut and Tie-Dye. “Are we blocking your view?” Past Me asked them.

“Not at all!” Tie-Dye said. Pixie cut just smiled.

Voices echoed in my head and I realized I was hearing the girls’ thoughts.

Woah, she is so pretty, Pixie Cut was thinking.

Damn, I hope I run into her again.

That was so sweet! Tie-Dye thought. New Yorkers are way nicer than the internet said they’d be.

Geez, Bethany is way too nice. That came from Alex.

Past Me grinned and faced the movie screen again.

Before I had time to form any thoughts about the scene, it blinked out of existence and I was faced with a new one. The second scene took place in my don’s office. I recognized the gray-haired woman with a 15

colorful shawl wrapped around her as my don, Marla.

Past Me sat in the chair on the other side of her desk.

It was one of our many one-on-one conferences.

“How is your conference work going?” Marla asked me. That question was always loaded like an academic gun. I never felt like I was doing enough for any of my classes.

“I wrote another page,” Past Me said, knowing she should’ve written more.

That’s not so bad, Marla thought. “In the past two weeks?” she asked. From an outsiders’ perspective, the question was not nearly as malicious as Past Me thought it was.

Past Me wanted to cry. “I was really busy, I’m sorry.”

“Well, you know it’s due on Friday,” Marla reminded me. She was writing on a pad of paper: Bethany’s fallen a bit behind…

“Yes, I’ll have it done,” Past Me assured. All the anxiety of that moment came rushing back to me.

At the end of the conference, Marla watched Past Me pick up my 100-pound backpack and leave. She could tell Past Me was on the edge of tears during the whole conference. She’s a smart kid, Marla thought.

16

She’ll figure it out.

Marla’s office dissipated and I was thrown into a classroom in the Performing Arts Center. I rubbed my eyes and looked around. After a moment, I realized there wasn’t a class happening in this classroom.

On the TV screen, “Rocky Horror Picture Show” was playing and several actors were mirroring the characters in front of it. It was rehearsal for the shadowcast the school produces every semester.

Past Me was up there with the other main cast actors, doing my part in the show. Two of my best friends, Mary and Ellen, were sitting in the back of the classroom together, whispering to each other. Past Me thought for sure that they were talking about me behind my back. I was right--sort of.

“Bethany is literally so talented,” Mary whispered.

“Seriously,” Ellen agreed. “She was born for that role. Look at her.”

The two of them smiled at Past Me. They secretly hate me, Past Me thought. She grew more self-conscious with each whisper.

I blinked and I was sitting on the sofa in Westlands again. All three scenes lingered in my head.

Honey was right--it was more overwhelming than 17

being a first-semester first-year at Sarah Lawrence.

With just those scenes alone, I felt like I had a greater understanding of what my life had actually been like.

“Wow,” I said to Honey once I had thoroughly absorbed it all. “My friends didn’t hate me like I thought they did.” I put a hand on my forehead in astonishment. “My professors didn’t think I was an idiot, and strangers didn’t think I was annoying.”

Honey nodded.

“So much anxiety… for nothing…” I took a moment of silence to mourn all the hours I lost crying over nothing.

I stood up from the sofa, making Honey fall onto the watery floor with an oof. I paced a little, thinking.

Sarah Bates Lawrence briefly appeared in the hall, but wandered into another room and vanished again. Just like my meal swipes, I thought.

“Honey, you’ll do whatever I want, won’t you?” I asked my beloved dog.

“Yes, of course.”

“I want to go back.”

Honey laughed a little. As much as dogs can laugh. “Go back where?”

“To life.”

18

“Oh, well no.” The dog shook her head. “You can’t do that.”

“I thought you did everything I wanted.” I protested.

“Well, yes, but bringing you back to life is something that I cannot do. No one has ever been able to do that. When you die, you’re dead, and that’s that. It’s against the rules.”

“The rules of what?”

“The rules of everything.” Honey’s brown eyes told me to just stay put.

I stared at my dog, weighing my options. I couldn’t force her to bring me back to life. Especially if she didn’t know how. But, I had this new-found knowledge of what life was all about. How much time I had wasted worrying about what others thought of me! I sacrificed so much happiness because I was so concerned that everyone hated me. I understood now.

I was not going to waste this knowledge!

I closed my eyes and memories of my college flooded into my mind. I thought about the smokers who killed me on our smoke-free campus. I thought about the graffiti that covered every inch of every desk and wall in our library. I thought about the tea 19

kettles and open-flame candles that had to be hidden before every dorm inspection. I thought about the readings that never got read, the phones that never got put away during class, the on-campus visitors that never got registered, the library books that were never returned, and the food and drinks that were stolen from the Barb and Bates.

I am a Sarah Lawrence College student, I thought. The one thing we are good at is breaking the rules. I felt myself being lifted off the watery ground of the Inbetween Space. I must go back, I must go back, I must go back. Honey gave a little yelp, but said nothing. The rules don’t apply to me. I am invincible.

Fuck the rules.

And then, I broke the rules. Because I’m a Sarah Lawrence College student and I do whatever the fuck I want. I opened my eyes and I was in the street where the shuttle must’ve hit me. I was back! I had done it!

I wasn’t sure how it happened but, but there I was.

Alive again.

I stood up from the road and filled my lungs with the New York air. This was going to be the start of something big, I just knew it. I was going to change the world because not only was I a Sarah Lawrence 20

student, but I had died and come back to life. Nothing was going to stop me from living life to the fullest! …

Well, that lasted about two days.

The students at this college were ruthless. I made plans with friends only to be ghosted last minute. “I’m sorry I have too much work to do, let’s reschedule,” they’d said. I tried to meet new people only to be Sarah Lawrenced or not heard at all because everyone had AirPods in their ears, hidden underneath their hood and hair. “Can I sit with you?” I’d ask people at the Barb. “Sure,” they’d said, but bury their heads in their phones the entire time.

My workload was another whole issue. How was I supposed to have time for a social life when I had three papers to write, seven readings to do, twenty-two assignments to complete, and five hundred books to read by Monday? I began to understand why everyone canceled on me all the time. How can I enjoy anything when I have so much to do all the time?

How was I supposed to not feel guilty for having fun when so many people were sitting in the library at this very moment, miserable?

I tripped over black squirrels, the only swing set 21

on campus was taken away, every building the college owned was haunted, half the campus was starving because our meal swipes were disappearing, no one ever knew when the Bronxville shuttle was running, Hill House was cooking their residents alive, everything smelled like weed, and the bookstore never had the books I needed.

That was it. I learned fast that it was much easier to shove my headphones into my eardrums and pretend like all of it wasn’t happening. I should’ve stayed dead when I had the chance. I wouldn’t have to finish my conference projects if I was dead. At least now I understood why everyone was the same. It was the only way we’d get through this.

You know, until we died.

22

on the passing of a fan and how to mourn it GeRARDO LAMADRID castillo

You finally gave up.

I thought it was happening a week ago but your death throes kept you going all the way to this next Wednesday.

You worked all the cool night but when we tried to turn you on at noon you didn’t even flinch. This past week, at least you’ve been starting, slowly but surely, just a few centimeters and a pause and then again and again till you sped up and climbed through your three settings and plateaued near your original high.

I googled you already.

No way to bring you back.

23

I could pry you open and replace that piece of you I know needs fixing but it’s too expensive, too much effort to salvage you. We’ll scrap you and auction your remains off to the recycling bins of our own building.

I will mourn you substituting you with two weaker fans - silver and compact; not clunky, white. I will mourn, and so will You.

24

pup rocks

JULIA BRITtAIN

25

DESIRE

SEVERAL LIMES

I want to be a Hobbit so badly !!!!!!

Put me in the GROUND !!!!!!!!

26

That One Hipster Who Never Saw Parasite But Cannot Stop Talking About What a Historic Moment In Cinema It Is PACQUI PASCUAL

“I’m not sure how to pronounce the director’s name but he’s definitely my favorite director of all time.”

“What did I think of it? It’s a MASTERPIECE. The fact that you had to read subtitles and watch the movie at the same time… I mean come on.”

“This Oscar sweep is a huge win for us. No, I’m not Asian, but I’m very in tune with their cause. It’s like I’m one of them, you know.”

“How could you not like this movie.”

“The commentary on class differences is so revolutionary. Especially how they framed it around a tiny bug.”

27

“Hey, I couldn’t help but notice that you didn’t post about Parasite on your Instagram story. Are you like not for representation and diversity in Hollywood or something?”

“Let’s go to Korea for Spring Break.”

“Seriously, I can’t believe he chose to do it in another language.”

“My favorite line in the movie? Are you kidding? I can’t choose just one. I liked all of it!”

“I’m actually learning how to speak Korean.”

“That main guy in it. Yeah, he definitely should’ve been nominated for best actor. The Academy totally snubbed him.”

“Dude we have to go celebrate. What do you mean?

You’re Korean, aren’t you? This is like a huge milestone for you.”

28

SELF PORTRAIT AS A BEYOND MEAT BURGER™ JADE STEPHAN

I lay pristine in perfect double, transfixed into 2 selfsame patties, labeled and packaged to fit the norm for the thing I’m not. I’m not meat!!! Cook me like meat though, the other burgers all come from things that moo’d or clucked, or baa’d, they fucked. Not me, I’m a squeaky clean factory baby, grinders and refineries, brushed chrome rods gyrating up and down to squash out the fibers and detritus of husks, extruders of polished steel milking the essence of protein from my pea pod forbearers, these were my childhood. But now I look at the bastard sons of cow beside me, the cheeses, proud, aristocratic, lording over the drawer with their disdainful creamy grins. I hate them, still I am nothing without their conceited flavor sophistication. I feel my empty ‘use by’ date burning on my branding husk. The uncertainty of safety plagues the mind of the owner of this re-fridgid air. I dream of a pan… full of grease and hot with flame, searing on my outer frame!

29

O! sweet release me from this coil!

I need the bursting flavor oil!

I condensate in trembling fear, it’s been a month, why am I still here?

I focus on the cheesy hate, their cream is mine, but all too late.

Like puzzles with a broken board, These cheeses sow their cold discord!

But no… No. I get stuck in the drawer of this gods-forsaken fridge, multiplying bacteria around me and fucking up conversations with the tofu, again.

Fine. I’ll... we’ll see how the cheeses like this! The aristochracheese will fall to my pea protein pursuits … well, all I need to do now is draft some letters, recruit some buns, levy tax on the vegetable drawer, and I’ll have a loyal hot dog armada for myself in no time at all!

30

leave a rating!

KAYLEIGH CLARK

Thank you for using Uber! Please rate your experience and let us know how we can improve!

Rating: I’ve used uber for 3 years now and today was the only day i ran into a serious issue. The driver was nice at first?? His name was gary i think, kinda old but i didn’t care. The car smelled really funny and i figured out pretty quickly that the smell was marijuana - AND NO I DONT USE MARIJUANA IVE JUST SMELLED IT ENOUGH TIMES TO RECOGNIZE IT, IM NOT A DRUGGIE. But anyways the drive was okay up until we were halfway there, he started coughing a whole bunch and it was drowning out the radio. We hit a light and traffic was bad so he took his hands off the wheel and sat still for a while. The light changed and he didnt move at all. I poked his shoulder and saw hed fallen asleep, i shook him as hard as i could trying to wake him up but he wouldnt budge. There were cars honking be31

hind us and eventually i got out and told everyone to go around us because they shouldntve had to wait just because this old guy was taking a nap. He didnt get up for a while so i called a friend to come pick me up and maybe try n help me wake gary up.

My pal came and he called 911 for some reason??? He thought gary was dead but nah, he was just napping, maybe hed smoked too much of the stuff and fell asleep - i know it can happen, BUT IM NOT SAYING IT EVER HAPPENED TO ME. An ambulance came n took gary away, my friend and i made sure he got in safely. And my friend took me the rest of the way to applebee’s because thats where i was headed.

But yeah, kinda a shitty experience. Two stars just because uber should know better than to hire druggies, especially druggies who take naps at the wheel.

Definitely not responsible Submit // Skip Thank you for leaving a review! We appreciate your feedback and hope to see you again soon. :)

32

THE TINDER DATE HARRY SAROFF

“Ohhh yeah. I am SO ready for this!”

Brad’s Tinder bio was, in his words, “pimpin.”

“I’m a baller, I got mad hops and real long legs. Silky smooth skin. Huge, gorgeous eyes - they’re the windows to the soul, y’know baby?”

But the real kicker? A note at the bottom of his page.

“I only got a few years left to live. I need someone to help me enjoy em’.”

After reading that, you better believe he got a few right swipes. Granted, his profile picture was slightly edited, but Brad figured it wouldn’t make a difference.

Everyone did that. It’s what’s on the inside that counts.

One particular girl caught his interest. Stephanie. She was in college. A biology major. Long brown hair, freckles, and a clever pun in her bio. It was love at first swipe.

33

He hopped onto the phone and opened the messenger, ready to make his first move. It was time to engage. “hey you cute xoxo ;) ” Brad realized that he, in fact, was not ready. He began to sweat. Did he come on too strong? Was he too forward? He swallowed nervously. It felt like his eyes were pressing into his mouth. Suddenly, a reply.

“Haha, you’re so funny. Not too bad looking yourself. :) ” How did Brad interpret this? A smiley face? Did that show interest? Or was it to counter his winky face?

He needed answers that were impossible to find. His heart skipped a beat. She had started typing again.

Was she upset he didn’t respond right away? God, oh god, he was blowing this.

“Do you wanna meet up soon? There’s a really great place nearby, I think its a fly emoji-stro.”

34

Brad was perplexed. Fly emoji? What did this mean?

“Oops, sorry, that was supposed to be a bee. Like, a bee-stro. A bistro. Haha.”

This girl was clever. He chuckled to himself. “lol flies. definitely makes me hungry.”

“Haha, sorry about that. Do you wanna meet there tonight, maybe 7:30? The restaurant’s called The Anura, it’s on Climmond street.” “yeah, see you there” “Okay, see you! :) ” Brad’s confidence soared. It was going to be an interesting night.

Stephanie sat alone at her table for two. 7:45. If Brad was trying to be “fashionably late”, he was severely out of style. Glasses clinked and ice rattled as couples lifted their vintage wine bottles in preparation for a 35

toast. Bustling busboys expertly dashed from table to table, refilling glasses and clearing dishes, the sound of their scraping almost overshadowing the incessant chatter of the other patrons. Despite the busy chaos, everything was pristine. The bistro was a graceful, beautiful madhouse. A portly, grease-stained chef with a thick, well-waxed mustache pushed through a small group of waiters and shoved open the door in a huff, shouting in angry French. Something about being out of “cuisses de grenouille.” Stephanie’s French was evading her, but the meaning of that phrase was on the tip of her tongue...

As the chef finished his outburst and waddled back indoors, Stephanie noticed a small shape slip into the restaurant. An animal? Before she could distinguish it, it plopped itself at the other end of her table with a long hop. A frog. A frog got into the restaurant.

She wasn’t so much bothered as she was entertained.

She was studying biology, so obviously it didn’t creep her out, but a frog hopping around the bistro would enthrall the finer diners in a way that wouldn’t exactly land The Anura a beaming review on Yelp. Stephanie was about to flag down a waiter when she heard a soft 36

but mysteriously deep voice behind her.

“Sorry I’m late, baby.”

Brad had finally shown up. Even though he was inexcusably late, Stephanie was glad she finally had someone to talk to. A frog hopping into the restaurant would be a perfect icebreaker… but as she turned around, the chiseled man she expected was nowhere to be seen. Did she imagine the voice? Was it another guest? Suddenly, she heard the voice again.

“Thank god for that chef, if he hadn’t left, I wouldn’t have gotten in. That door was tall.”

Now she was even more confused. The voice was clearly coming from the other end of the table, but there was nobody- Stephanie froze. The frog was still at the edge of the table. Looking at her.

“Anyways, how you doin’ gorgeous?”

Stephanie’s mind was in a fog. Did its mouth just… move? Am I on crack? I don’t think I’m on crack, but I might be. Somehow. I don’tBrad derailed her train of thought.

37

“What’s wrong baby? Frog in your throat? Cause if not, I can make that happen later tonight.”

Brad winked. Stephanie’s stomach churned. A fly buzzed past the table, and Brad’s tongue reflexively shot out to grab it. He swallowed it in a single gulp.

“You like that tongue action?”

She wanted to vomit. This guy was gross; and not just because he was a frog. In a flash, she recalled a hint of French, and the chef ’s earlier ramblings were deciphered. Her voice boomed as she called for her savior, and pointed at Brad.

Cuisses de grenouille.

Frog’s Legs.

38

olive garden gothic SEVERAL LIMES

So I’m sitting in Olive Garden, it’s 9:30 at night, I’m by myself and I’m on my third basket of infinite breadsticks, I’ve downed two glasses of wine, and I’m looking around hoping no one notices that I’ve been feeding pasta to the tiny chinchilla I stole from the pet store two hours ago, and I see this girl, who looks to be around middle-aged, with pixie cut blonde hair and neon green highlights and an undercut that’s been dyed blue, and she’s wearing a beige poncho with snow-white lace on the bottom and a really dirty, torn, mustard yellow ball gown underneath it- but the weirdest thing about her- was that she was wearing socks with sandals. It’s the middle of October! Anyway, if she had muscles, she wasn’t using them. She sat perfectly still the entire time I was there, that was until the waiter came along.

Let me set this scene better for you, because it’s really late at night and there is no one else in this restaurant, and there are no cars on the highway, and that seems like an important detail, because there is also no commotion coming from the kitchen and 39

there is only that woman and myself and my chinchilla, and the weirdest thing- there was only one waiter, and he had no name tag! So I never learned his name.

Shame, cause he seemed like a nice guy. He was a small man, very round, a perfect sphere. His head was a marble, except for his two little plump cheeks, so very chubby, that when he smiled you couldn’t see his eyes. And he never stopped smiling. But he seemed kind. When he took my order I felt very calm, like, I could really trust this man. He wouldn’t hurt me. He wouldn’t hurt anyone.

But when he took this woman’s order, the whole mood of the room changed, like she moved for the first time when he approached her and when he said, “What would you like to order ma’am?” She said, “Lettuce” and this waiter, a bit confused, said “Like a salad, ma’am?” and she said, “No, just lettuce” and the waiter said “Ok” and went into the kitchen and a couple minutes later he came out with a plate of lettuce and set it on the table and as he was about to leave the girl said “Cheese” and the waiter turned around and said “what?” and she said, “Cheese, I want cheese” and the waiter said, “ok” but the funny thing is- get this- he never stopped smiling. Like, if some40

one was that rude to me, I would give them a piece of my mind! But he kept smiling, sweetly and sincerely.

What a guy.

And, this lady, she was just so rude to him, like when he brought over the cheese and he started grating it and he said, “just say when” and he kept going and going and going and let me tell you, she had a sizable amount of cheese on her lettuce, and when he tried to stop she said, “I didn’t say stop” and he said, “ok” and he kept going and he went on for like five minutes and he kept going and she just kept looking at him with this stone-cold face, like she never moved a muscle and she never blinked, and after like 20 minutes he’s still going and she is still staring at him and he is still going and it looks like he’s getting tired because his hands start shaking but he keeps going, he just keeps going, and this lady just keeps going, and after an hour or so the cheese has formed like a two foot tall mountain, you can’t even see the lettuce, and she is still staring, and this guy is still going, and his legs are about to give out it looks like, but he has this determined look on his face like he is not ready to give up, and I’m thinking to myself, “Where is he getting all this cheese from…” because it seemed to be 41

never ending, just like my breadsticks, of which I was on my 15 basket by now. I mean, I was really going at it. And I felt kind of bad. This guy’s hands were literally bleeding. He was crying. He kept crying. And he kept spreading cheese. And the woman did not move.

A fly flew on her face at one point. She still didn’t move. She didn’t blink. She stared. She must really like cheese. He once broke character. He exasperatedly said to the woman, “Please, I want to see my family.”

“More cheese.” She said.

“I’m so very tired ma’am.”

“More cheese.”

“Why are you doing this ma’am?”

“You know what you did. More Cheese.”

“I don’t know what you are talking about! Please let me go home.”

“You know. More cheese.”

“Are you talking about Fort Lauderdale back in the summer of ‘69?”

“Yes. More cheese.”

He continues to grate.

“I was hungry!”

“More cheese.”

“It was a mistake!”

42

“More cheese.”

“I was desperate!”

“More cheese.”

“Please… leave me alone…”

“More cheese.”

“I’ve already paid the price or that! You can’t keep haunting me!”

“More cheese.”

“PLEASE LET ME GO HOME.” “More cheese.”

I decided to leave at this point because those two seemed to have history or something, and my chinchilla, who I decided to name Beelzebub, had started to fall asleep so I went home. And that was my night.

43

FOREVER UNDER 21

GERARDO LAMADRID Castillo

Today is New Year’s Eve, 2018.

It is brunch time, and the biggest mall in Puerto Rico is swelling with slow-crawling crowds.

We’d been to what feels like a dozen stores and found nothing I liked (enough to pay for).

After those 12, we went to Forever 21 (old reliable, almost always inexpensive).

I tried a cheap knit sweater on – grey, crew neck, ribbed cuffs – which covered me in fluff.

Fluff on my shirt, fluff on my pants, fluff in my beard – on my hands.

We asked to borrow a lint remover and they told us to buy one.

I refused to buy anything, built up a sweat rubbing fluff off myself – endless amounts of invisible stuff clumping like snow as we tried rubbing it off – then I left with an indeterminate fluff still stuck – still sweating sans sweater, stiff and insulted, sniffling and tear-eyed, irritated and itchy with rashes and humiliations, 44

cold like a freshly sheared sheep: empty and nude I stepped out and into the food court, to sit all alone – at the first abandoned table I saw (still littered with crumbs) – and hear the rustling of shopping bags; to smell warm meals but eat nothing.

It’s New Year’s Eve, 2018 – the last day of my twentieth calendar year – and I fear nothing could be more fitting (not even the sweater, which actually fit me so well.)

45

head wounds and heartthrobs HENRY KIPPS

Mary was confused. She was standing in the bedroom of Samantha Kiri, who was lying heavily on her bed, the sheets splattered with blood. Mary’s arm was outstretched, her revolver smoking in her hands. The room reeked of gore and gunpowder.

“Ugh, that was a trip,” Samantha groaned, pressing her palm against her bloody forehead. “What the hell was that for?”

“What’s going on here?” Mary asked. “Why aren’t you dead?”

Samantha got up to her feet, pointing an accusing finger at Mary. “Oh, no, you’re not the one who gets to ask the questions here. You ruined my bed!”

“I shot you in the head!” Mary hissed.

“Yes, you did,” Samantha said, arms crossed. “And it 46

hurt. A lot.”

“Why aren’t you dead?” Mary repeated. “Answer me!”

“Why should I? I’m not the one who broke into my house and put a bullet through my skull. Do you know what that does to a person?”

“Yes!” Mary exclaimed. “It kills them! Or at least it’s supposed to!”

Samantha rolled her eyes. “Well, as far as I care, you weren’t supposed to shoot me. What’s your deal? I never did anything to you.”

Mary grit her teeth, keeping her gun at the ready. “I’m an assassin. Freelance.”

Samantha’s eyes widened. “Oh. Ooooooh. I’m sorry.”

Mary’s vice grip on her revolver loosened, causing the barrel to dip towards the ground. Her brow furrowed.

“Excuse me?”

47

“Well, it’s just, you were hired for an impossible job.

That can’t be fun.”

“I’m not sure I follow.”

“I don’t die,” she said, like it was the most normal thing in the world.

Mary narrowed her eyes. “Come again?”

“I don’t die. Simple as that.”

“What? No. People don’t just not die.”

Samantha crossed her arms and gave Mary a withering look. “You shot me twice in the head, and here we are. What more proof do you need?”

“Okay, fine, you don’t die. Why?” Samantha shrugged. “I’ve always been like this.”

Mary clutched at her head. This was infuriating. What was she supposed to do if the target was freaking 48

immortal? Had her client known?

She took a deep breath and turned back to Samantha.

“Alright, question. How many people are in on this?”

“I don’t know, a few?” She scratched her head. “Not many. It… doesn’t come up that often.”

“Christopher Phillips?”

Samantha started. “How do you—oh, don’t tell me that he—” Mary’s hand clenched, the hard metal of the gun digging into her skin. “Hired me,” she finished.

Samantha leaned backwards, breathing in through clenched teeth, and collapsed onto the sticky, reddened comforter behind her. Mary sat down on the writing desk pushed against the wall and dropped the revolver onto a stack of papers next to her.

This was a mess.

49

Christopher Phillips was an old friend of hers. He worked for one of the… lesser known branches of government, and was a frequent client. Samantha Kiri had been an odd target, certainly, but she hadn’t questioned it—she didn’t pry into Chris’s business, and he didn’t pry into hers. Respecting each other’s secrets was the only way they could function as friends, considering their professions. But why would he send her to kill someone he knew couldn’t die? It didn’t make sense!

Maybe Samantha had answers. “So how do you know Chris?”

Samantha took a few seconds to respond. “He was the guy who showed up at my door when the government found out about the whole ‘can’t die’ thing. We got to know each other, he started dating my roommate Ellie, we all became friends… I don’t know why he’d send someone to kill me, though. Unless…” Samantha turned narrowed eyes onto Mary. “Long brown hair, hazel eyes, kinda short… oh, for god’s sake!”

“What are you talking about?”

50

“Chris and Ellie’s one year relationship “anniversary” was a few days ago, and the conversation somehow got around to my own romantic life, and—” “Oh my god.” Mary grimaced, her mind racing back to the previous day “Hey, Chris. Is this a business call?”

“Yes, but before that, I’ve got a question for you. Sorry if this is a bit unexpected, but are you dating anyone?”

Mary froze for a second. “You’re not asking me out, right? ‘Cause you know I’m—” “No!” he blurted. “No, sorry, no, not at all. Just wondering. So, are you?”

“No. I’ve kinda stopped looking.”

“Oh?” “Surprisingly enough, there aren’t a lot of girls willing 51

to date trained killers. It’s like, if they could just get past that, maybe there’d be something, but, I mean, I understand. I’d be scared of me too, if I were, you know, normal.”

“If only there was a girl who wasn’t scared of you, right?”

Mary laughed. “If only. As I said, I’ve stopped looking.”

He chuckled. “So, anyway. There’s this Samantha Kiri…”

Back in the present, that very same Samantha was still talking. “—so I said, ‘oh, she’d have brown hair, hazel eyes, she wouldn’t be taller than me, and she’d be chill with immortality.’ And it was a joke—I mean, mostly, you know—but here we are anyway.”

Mary slammed her head into the desk as hard as she could. “This. Is the stupidest. Blind date. Ever.”

“I know, right?” Samantha said. “I swear, the next 52

time I see him…”

Mary sighed. “I’m really sorry. I can’t imagine this is how you wanted to spend your evening.” She glanced towards Samantha. “But, I mean, since we’re here and all.”

She nodded, blushing. “Right. I mean…”

“Yeah. So. Um.” Mary coughed. “Wanna, maybe, get lunch some time?”

“Uh, sounds great. How about Friday? You already know where I live and stuff, so…”

“Cool. Um.” Mary holstered her revolver and got to her feet. “I’ll get Chris to reimburse you for the bedsheets.”

“Thanks,” she laughed. “Friday, then?”

Mary smiled. “Yep. And this time, maybe I’ll do a better job blowing you away.”

53

let’s get things straight KAYLEIGH CLARK

Let’s get things straight here. I don’t fucking care what that hoe Cat says, she lies through her stained little teeth.

I’m not gay.

I’m simply comfortable enough that I can notice things about guys, alright? Besides, I’m the captain of the fucking football team, the guy with the six-pack who hooks up with a new cheerleader every week, the head honcho of this fucking excuse of a school. None of the guys here are even worthy of my time - besides my team of course, because they’re fucking baller.

Now, I’m saying this because that hoe Cat has been spreading rumors again and I wanna make sure you get this through your teeny little brain. She thinks I’ve fallen head over heels for this guy, Owen, and I wanna tell you she’s a fucking liar. She does this every fucking time, thinks I’ve fallen for a guy and tells everyone on the fucking face of the earth, like last week she thought I fell for Danny. Look, Danny’s pretty cool, gives discounts on his kush after midterms and finals as a fucked up way of saying, “congrats, you 54

survived!”. But I’m not gay, and I’m definitely not gay for Owen.

Fuck Owen, honestly, he’s such a stuck up, whiny little bitch. He’s the definition of a nerd: skinny as a fucking stick, skin like one of those sparkling excuses for vampires - and I only know about that because Laura forced me to watch that shitty movie, I’m too busy practicing football and fucking hot chicks for movies - oh, and he’s got the largest pair of fucking nerd glasses. It’s like he wants to be Harry Potter or some shit - and I only know that because my nerd mother read those to me when I was a kid, I’m too busy practicing football and fucking hot chicks for books.

And the worst part about Owen, the thing that really grinds my gears? He’s my fucking math tutor. I’m too busy practicing football and fucking hot chicks to worry about grades and shit, and the Resident Twink was assigned as my tutor. I don’t need a fucking tutor, I don’t need to miss football practice today just to listen to Owen drone on and on about stupid fucking equations I’ll never use.

Now he’s leading the way to the library where we’re supposed to work, which means I get a great 55

look at his ass. Kinda reminds me of Camilla’s ass at this angle, looks round and squishy, and damn, Owen’s jeans are highlighting all of the good stuff. Fuck, that sounds gay as fuck, look, I’m not gay, I’m just saying the guy’s got a nice ass.

Anyways we sit down in this weird corner of the library and we both get out the stuff we need to study.

It’s weird though, I take a little longer just because from this angle his chin dimple’s pretty cute, and the way he’s grinning down at his stuff with those perfect thin lips is just...holy shit, stop, I’m not gay, I’m just noticing stuff., I’m bored okay? Owen hasn’t even started talking and I’m bored.

But yeah, we start studying and Owen’s voice…...

Jesus Christ, his voice is too smooth. I want to fucking fall asleep from boredom, it’s that soothing to listen to. He tries to show me something on my page at one point and I swat that fucker’s hand away. I can do my own shit, I don’t need your dainty calloused hands touching my shit.

Happens every damn time we work, too, I start drifting off because it’s like he’s trying to seduce me.

It’s so gay I want to puke, fucking stomach is doing somersaults. Were Owen’s eyes always so blue? Fuck, 56

stop it, just get this over with so you can go back to practice “Jordan?”

Shit, zoned out enough that he noticed. Quick, act cool. “‘Sup.” “Do you have any questions, or are you ready to move on?”

I have no idea what the fuck just happened. Okay, okay, it’s fine, act cool.

“Fuck me.”

Nailed it - WAIT. Owen’s face goes so fucking red I’m surprised his head doesn’t explode. After a fucking lifetime he speaks again.

“Maybe...maybe ask me out to dinner first?”

57

465 Miniature Suns Harry Saroff

But soft, what aroma through yonder doorway leaks?

It is the can of Baked Beans, hotter than the splendid sun.

Arise, I do, to kill my envious hunger. Did my heart love till now? Forswear it, This beautiful sight of Baked Beans sitting precariously on the counter…

Alas, they stumble that run fast towards cans of beans, And my humble figure collides with the counter.

Star-crossed lovers landing in a suicidal embrace; Romeo my foot, Juliet my beans. A love to never be.

It burns.

The great Shakespearean tragedy of my life: There’s beans all over the goddamn carpet.

Shit.

But Hark! With a sigh, I cry: “Hey Siri, how many beans are there in a can of baked beans?”

58

Quoth Siri: “465.”

Civil ground makes civil beans unclean, but under love’s heavy burden do I sink.

I pick up a bean, slippery in my fingertips, and lift it to the welcoming chasm of my maw.

Full of wrath, it scathes my tongue with bitter fire and crimson woe.

I swallow. 464 to go.

59

My Fantasy Several Limes

Here is how it happens. I’m in a public garden during golden hour. The sun makes my skin glow in a way that accentuates my hungry passion. I walk along, looking down, moving my delicate feet as to not step on any fallen flora or fae. That’s when I see your own pair of black loafers, shining in the warm sunset. I raise my head and meet your gaze. Your amber eyes look on me, and yet, beyond me, and I know instantly that you understand me. You’re wearing a navy blue suit with a matching tie and a copper pocket watch. White hair is combed to the right, and crows feet in the corners of your mouth. Yes, you’re older than me. A bit too old, my mother might say.

You raise an eyebrow.”Looking for something?” You ask slyly.

I look down again, shoulders scrunched, cheeks growing red. “Nothing in particular.” Though I’m not looking at you, I feel your eyes sizing me up, as you draw a pretend finger down my legs and around my waist, across my chest, and up my neck.

60

I notice your spiritual queue and look up again. “What’s your name?” Your deep voice asks me.

I say mine and you say yours. You say, “I’m afraid I must depart, but I do hope I see you again.” And with this, my heart aches as your loafers walk away.

The next day I come back to the same spot, not looking down to avoid flowers but looking straight ahead, desperate for your face. I feel those same loafers approach from behind me. “Come here often, huh?” You say in your same smooth voice. I turn, and don’t avert my gaze from your soft visage.

Because of this I trip over an overgrown branch and fall flat on my face. I know that you know that my skirt is too short, my shirt too tight, my face too beautiful, my mouth now full of leaves and dirt. “Are you okay?” you ask. “I amf nawr,” I say, picking twigs out of my mouth. You take my hand and we walk around the garden, not talking, just walking and being with each other. Close to each other. We walk until it’s dark. “Let me take you somewhere special.” You say to me. “I’ll follow you anywhere,” I say, in love with you and loving being in love with you. You show me to your car, which also happens to be a limo, and half submarine, with your own personal driver, who is 61

also half submarine, coincidentally. “He’s the future of genetic engineering,” you say. I nod. I’ve never heard so many big words in my life. Genetic. Engineering.

Submarine.

You roll up the window to the driver’s seat so he can’t hear us. You sit close to me, too close, my mother would think. You place your strong hand on my lap and gently rub my upper thigh, fingers just barley tickling my skirt. I whisper nice words, soft words, in your ear and you grumble them right back to me. When we arrive at your hotel (yes, you own a hotel) (not half submarine but you’re working on it) you escort me to your own personal room, one with a balcony and hot tub. I walk in, the room is dark, with hundreds of candles as the only source of lighting.

Nothing’s sexier than a fire hazard. I’ve never seen a room this nice (I live in the sewers) I sit carefully on the bed, knowing what will happen, as anxiousness and excitement swirl in my stomach.

But something is off. You stand on the balcony, staring down at the cars. “I have a confession,” you admit. “I’m not who you think I am. I’ve been on the run for quite a while now. But I’m tired of running.

62

Tired of pretending. I need you to see me for who I am.”

I hear something unzip. Soon I see you pull the zipper over the top off your head and down your back. Your skin sac falls to the ground. Then I see who you really are: tan skin, bumpy texture, curves like an hourglass. Skinny legend. You have thin black legs and arms. Your top hat shines in the night. You have the biggest pair of nuts I’ve ever seen. And that monocle. I’d know that monocle anywhere.

You... are Mr. Peanut.

“Mr. Peanut? I thought you died!” I scream.

“You died saving Wesley Snipes and Matt Walsh!”

“Oh please! I hated Blade Runner. And I’ve never even seen Veep!” you turn your head in disgust. “I was just tired of being Mr Peanut. The wealth, the fame, the fortune…” Mr. Peanut turns to me sincerely. “I was drowning in puss puss eeryday… but none of it mattered. I was hollow inside.” You tap your shell twice, and it echoes. “I never met anyone who understood me… until I met you.”

“But we’ve only had two interactions with each other!” I say.

63

“You can only do so much in three pages.

But that doesn’t matter. I’m leaving my will to you.

All of my royalty fees are now yours.” You leave a huge stack of $100 bills on the bed. “And now, I must depart.”

No! I think. But before I can tell you how much I love you, red and blue flashes appear out the window.

“They found me. I have to go! Until we meet again” and you tip your top hat at me. You then do a triple somersault out of the balcony and land on an adjacent roof. From there, you black flip to the horizon.

I pocket the money, and we never see each other again. But every now and then I’ll hear an echo of you. A pigeon eating a peanut shell, a dog licking peanut butter, every time I pass a longhorn steakhouse. And I think of you, the biggest nut I’ve ever known.

64

Evil Gloves Steven Orlofsky

We begin our tale with theEXT. OF A BUCOLIC SUBURBAN HOME, EARLY EVENING. INTRODUCTORY SAXOPHONE RIFF PLAYS. INT. KITCHEN. WIFE is sitting at the kitchen table, drinking coffee when HUSBAND enters, carrying two large shopping bags.

WIFE: Oh, you’re back already! What did you get?

HUSBAND: Hi Honey!

They kiss. Wife tries to peer into THE BAG, but HUSBAND nudges her out of there like he wants to surprise her by introducing each item individually.

HUSBAND: Oh... all kinds of stuff. Like this new win65

ter hat…

He pulls a WINTER CAP out of his bag, and holds it near his head.

WIFE: Wow, looks great! Can’t wait to see you wear it on the slopes.

HUSBAND: ...a new scarf…

He pulls out a BEAUTIFUL WOOL SCARF, and drapes it around his neck.

WIFE: Nice…

HUSBAND: And these gloves!

He slips on a pair of SINISTER-LOOKING BLACK LEATHER GLOVES, and flashes his hands theatrically. The leather is mottled and creased. These gloves look like they have definitely strangled someone.

These gloves exude off them an unsavory and illicit aroma. Upon seeing these GLOVES, the smile immediately disappears from WIFE’s face.

66

WIFE: I… I don’t like those.

WIFE shakes her head.

HUSBAND: Why not? They’re really comfortable!

WIFE: It’s just… they kind of look like…

HUSBAND: What? Look like what?

HUSBAND is slightly upset that his WIFE doesn’t like his new GLOVES. WIFE: (still hesitating) … they look kinda evil to me.

HUSBAND: Evil?

WIFE: Yeah. The gloves look a little evil to me … like the kind of gloves a murderer would wear.

HUSBAND: (smirking) Evil gloves?

WIFE: (completely seriously) Yes! Evil gloves.

67

HUSBAND: They’re not evil gloves! They feel great on my hands. They’re good gloves. They’re the opposite of evil! They’re benevolent gloves.

WIFE: Yeah alright! ‘Benevolent gloves’ my ass. All I know is I don’t want people to see me hanging out with the “ski lift strangler” this weekend. Will you get new gloves?

HUSBAND realizes he is not going to get to her concede this one. He must choose between the GLOVES or WIFE, and like most rational men, he makes the correct decision.

HUSBAND: Yeah. Fine. I’ll take ‘em in first thing tomorrow.

WIFE: Thanks honey. Dinner’s almost ready. I made your favorite; beer!

HUSBAND shrieks with delight. A short SITCOM STINGER SOUND transports us to; EXT. SHOT OF DIFFERENT BUCOLIC 68

SUBURBAN HOME, NIGHT. A SULTRY, SENSUAL SAXOPHONE RIFF PLAYS. This shot holds for five seconds, and then, somewhere in the distance, we hear tires skidding, a crash, and a car alarm, which beeps twice before we cut to; INT. BEDROOM, NIGHT. HUSBAND and WIFE are sleeping soundly on a large mattress. HUSBAND is snoring, and WIFE moves a bit to re-adjust herself under her blankets. Slowly, the camera pans around the room to face a dresser opposite the bed, where the GLOVES are resting. Slowly, they shake themselves awake and walk to the edge of the dresser. The gloves walk like their index and middle fingers are two legs, and the other fingers hang like arms at their sides. The GLOVES have a bit of a seductive swagger to their walk. DRAMATIC JAZZ begins to play.

MONTAGE TIME (These cuts are in time to the music, this goes without saying. Each new action is another quick cut): 69

Firstly, the GLOVES remove the batteries from the carbon monoxide detector. Now, they’re loosening pipes underneath the kitchen sink. We now cut to them locking the front door.

OUT OF SEQUENCE MONTAGE JOKE TIME: INT. KITCHEN, NIGHT. MUSIC SWITCHES TO UPBEAT, LIGHT ELEVATOR MUSIC. The soft white light of an open fridge illuminates a counter where the TWO GLOVE HANDS are making a HAM SANDWICH. Bread, meat, lettuce, and other ingredients are spread out around the sandwich. The hands gently cut the sandwich in half diagonally. They then put away all the ingredients and rinse the knife in the sink.

BACK TO THE MONTAGE. DRAMATIC JAZZ RESUMES. ONE GLOVE is grabbing the CAR KEYS from a bowl in the kitchen. ANOTHER GLOVE is pulling a window shut, and turning the latch to lock it in place. The 70

FIRST GLOVE opening the car door. The SECOND GLOVE is turning off a FAN. The FIRST HAND turns the CAR’s ignition on, andINT. KITCHEN, NIGHT. MUSIC ABRUPTLY STOPS. The camera sits eye-level at the kitchen table, looking through the open garage door at the IDLING CAR. The IDLING CAR’s front two doors are open, and the commentary to a basketball game is quietly playing from the car radio. BOTH GLOVES are innocently lying inanimate on the passenger seat, like a toy from TOY STORY that almost got caught.

EXT. SHOT OF ANOTHER DIFFERENT BUCOLIC SUBURBAN HOME. SUNRISE. JUBILANT AND ENERGETIC SAXOPHONE RIFF. THE COUPLE is lying peacefully in bed. Outside, we hear birds chirping and the early morning sun streams through the window to illuminate their bodies. They are not moving at all. Slowly, the music begins to fade back in as the camera pans to its left, 71

turning enough to reveal the CABINET where the gloves were left last night. Now they are playing the SAXOPHONE. The very SAXOPHONE we have been hearing during this whole time. The SAXOPHONE we are hearing right now. The GLOVES blow one final, impressive, C Sharp as the song comes to a close.

An audience somewhere begins to applaud as weFADE TO BLACK

72

13

Several Limes

I am Immortal I am Eternal I am Buying size 13 Nikes Mens Size 13 Nikes

73

Matthew Perry Dog Julia Brittain

74

Let’s Begin Shall We? Jade Stephan

Alpha: You walk down the sidewalk, littered with crumbling orange leaves, hands shoved into your pockets staring directly at the ground. Do you look at the skyscrapers in the distance? Or do you take a minute to orient yourself?

a. I glance at them briefly before I shake myself and look to see what is immediately around me.

(Go to 1A)

b. Yes, I look at them, they are bleak and blue, like my soul. I stare at them longingly. (Go to 1B) 1A. You look around yourself. There are several trees, mostly leafless. An apartment building looms to your right and a shopping center can be seen just ahead on the left. The street is empty. You pat at your pocket absentmindedly to reassure yourself, which do you feel?

a. My keys, all 7 of them. (Go to 2A)

b. My wallet. I pull it out and start walking to the shopping center. (Go to 2B) 75

1B. You feel yourself drifting up into the sky, faintly, tugged toward the distant monoliths. They pull you inward, to the very stone of their facades. You are tumbling towards a window. You see a face looking out at you in surprise.

a. I reach out my arms and try to stop the fall. (Go to 3A)

b. I close my eyes and relax. (Go to 3B) 2A. You pull out your keyring and flip through them; apartment key, building key, bike lock key, office desk key, storage key, luggage key, old house key, and car key? That’s odd, you’re not supposed to have a car, hold on… um… Quick, which do you choose while the narrator is indecisive?

a. Beep the car key. (Go to 4A)

b. Check if the building key works for this apartment building. (Go to 4B)

c. Duck into the alley as you hear the narrator for the first time, WTF!!!! (Go to 4C) 2B. You pull out your wallet. Sure enough, it’s a wallet, containing some coins, 66 dollars in assorted bills (no tens), and several cards with the name Alex Strand on 76

them. Ah, you’re Alex; now we’re getting somewhere.

You fold your wallet back up and stuff it into your hoodie pocket again. Do you continue to the shopping center?

a. I do. I walk to the traffic crosswalk and hit the button. (Go to 5A)

b. Let’s go for it I guess. I check that there are still no cars and walk across the street. (Go to 5B) 3A. You jerk to a halt centimeters from the glass of the building and can now make out a room. It appears to be an office space, styled like a medieval dungeon, with two occupants. The woman seated in the chair facing the window looks at you, shock tinged with horror around her eyebrows, her already white complexion becomes that of spoiled milk, and the other chair swivels around.

a. I reach out to touch the glass. (Go to 6A)

b. How the fuck am I hovering?!?! I try to grab onto something. (Go to 6B) 3B. You close your eyes and the muscles in your body go slack, you feel yourself hit something. Well, maybe it feels like a trampoline made of jello, and you feel 77

it’s resistance build, and right when it should snap back, you pass through. You walk down the sidewalk littered with crumbling orange leaves, hands shoved into your pockets and stare directed at the ground. Do you look at the skyscrapers in the distance?

a. RESET TO ALPHA 4A. You click the button on the car keys, suddenly a car apparates into being on the curb beside you. I told you to wait, now, hold still, that car is not supposed to be there! I need to find the right notes for this… The car flickers briefly and you hear the narrator humming. Get in the car Alex!

a. I jump into the car, I guess, someone told me to. (Go to 7A)

b. T-That car just came out of nowhere! I twist around in confusion. (Go to 7B) 4B. This is the wrong building I’m afraid. You’ll have to go back. So sorry about that. Now where were we?

You freeze for a second.

a. Go back to 2A 4C. Ok, you’ve only got a little time before the Narrator 78

notices something is wrong this time through, follow the leaves, but move quickly.

a. I follow the new voice and their leaves.

(Go to 8A)

b. I look around confused. (Go to 8B) 5A. You walk up the street a few more meters and press the walk-light button. A stray thought crosses your mind. Some crosswalk buttons are just noise buttons, and don’t influence the light at all. Now where did you learn that?

a. I think back and try to remember. (Go to 9A)

b. I shrug and wait for the light to change.

(Go to 9B) 5B. You look left and right and left, looks clear. You walk across the street and find the steps up to the shopping center. Do you head towards the grocery store or the clothing store?

a. I take the steps to the clothing store, are you kidding? Way too cold in this jacket! (Go to 10A)

b. I think about how much money I’ve got.

Better buy groceries. (Go to 10B) 79

6A. It wobbles.

a. I try to grab it and pull myself into the building. (Go to 11A)

b. Heehee, it wobbles I poke it again. (Go to 11B) 6B. You look down. The street rushes up toward you.

You close your eyes and brace yourself… … nothing… you open your eyes. You stand on the sidewalk, littered with crumbling orange leaves, hands shoved into your pockets and stare directly at the ground. Do you look at the skyscrapers in the distance?

a. RESET TO ALPHA 7A. You throw open the car door with gusto and slide in. The car looks like powdery-pink tie-dye inside.

a. I slide over behind the wheel and put the key in the ignition. (Go to 12A)

b. I...I taste the car ceiling…(Go to 12B) 7B. You see a grizzly bear step out of the apartment building. He puts on his hat and moves towards you.

80

a.AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA AA! (Go to 13A)

b. I pinch myself, I must be sleeping. (Go to 13B) 8A. This way! There’s a back way out. You’ve got to grab the golden leaf when you see it, alright? I’ve got to go now, I’ll check back when I can.

a. “Ok” I say to the voice, continuing to follow the swirling autumn leaves. (Go to 14A)

b. “Who are you?” I ask to the air. (Go to 14B)

c. I try to grab the leaves. (Go to 14C) 8B. There you are! You really shouldn’t go into dimly lit alleyways at this time of night. Here, take this coat.

You see a coat appear on the ground to your left.

a. I cautiously pick up the coat. (Go to 15A)

b. I run down the alley. (Go to 15B) 9A. You think back...you think back, but you can’t quite seem to remember ... wait, you can’t remember much of anything, now can you? That’s strange.

81

a. I lean against the crosswalk pole and start to breathe heavily. (Go to 16A)

b. I try to focus on the present. I look to see if the light has changed. (Go to 16B)

c. There are no cars. Fuck it, I’m crossing, I can deal with this shit later. (Go to 5B) 9B. You spend about a minute waiting before the light change to walk.

a. I walk across the crosswalk. (Go to 17A)

b. I get lost in thought about if I actually triggered it to change. (Go to 16A) 10A. You walk up the stairs to the clothing store. It has a giant red light-up sign of pants and a jacket. You walk in through the sliding doors.

a. I head to the coats section. (Go to 18A)

b. I try to find someone who works here so I can ask for the winter clothes section. (Go to 18B) 10B. You shrug to yourself and head to the grocery store. It has two of its letters on the sign ‘Ol Chuck’s’ out, turning it into ‘Ol uck’s’. You shrug and head inside.

82

a. (Go to 19A)

11A. You try to grab onto the jello-y surface of the ‘glass’. You manage to sink one hand in. The woman in the room screams. You see the chair behind the desk that has been facing away from you turn around. In it is a red-faced man with horns and no hair. He gets up and walks over to the window. You stop floating and your arm wrenches as you fall against the surface of the building. You stick to it.

a. I scream. (Go to 20A)

b. I look at him with curiosity. (Go to 20B) 11B. This space intentionally left blank I’m gonna tell you a secret. The building likes me, make of that what you will. See us next time! (Fades to black) (Go to any even-numbered ‘B’ section. No, you cannot figure out how you got there. That’s part of the suspense.)

12A. You slide the key smoothly into the ignition, and the car purs to life. Alright, now start driving. Away from the city.

83

a. I start driving away from the city. (Go to 21A)

b. I pull a U-turn and drive towards the sky-scrapers. (Go to 21B) 12B. It tastes like strawberry, wait… why am I telling you this? Get out of the car! You don’t own a car Alex!

Wait! You’re not the one who checked your wallet, forget that you are Alex!

a. I try to forget that I’m Alex? (Go to 22A)

b. “What’s going on!” (Go to 22B) 13A. The grizzly bear jumps and screams back “AAAAAAAAAAAA!!”

a. “AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA AAAAAAAAAAA!!!! WILD BEAR WITH A HAT”.

(Go to 23A)

b. I run away from the bear while it is screaming at me .(Go to 23B)

c. I pass out from shock. (Go to 23C) 13B. You pinch yourself on the arm. Hard. It hurts a bit. The bear tilts his head to the side and walks towards you on his hind legs.

84

a. I back up slowly. (Go to 24A)

b. I tilt my head to the side in response, the bear is wearing a hat after all. (Go to 24B) 14A. [The leaves lead you into the suburbs of the town, away from the mid-height residential and commercial buildings. You see a city bike rack, a water fountain, and a hot dog cart]

a. I pull one of the green bikes off of its rack and get on. (Go to 25A)

b. I grab something to eat and drink, need to keep up my strength. (Go to 25B) 14B. You feel a cold chill pass down your spine. There is no response, the leaves continue to flutter forward in the wind.

a. I rush to catch up with the leaves. (Go to 26A)

b. You fall into a deepening sadness...

14C. [The leaves dart and dash around your hands, almost playfully, and they lead you away from the urban centers of town]

a. (Go to 26A) 85

15A. You pick up the coat. It is made of fine white and grey wool and feels warm in your hands; you want to put it on.

a. I put it on. (Go to 28A)

b. “No I don’t”, I say .(Go to 28B). (YOU WANT TO PUT IT ON ALEX) 15B. You sprint down the alley, throwing a glance over your shoulder. You see a person getting into a strange pink car. Then you thud into something hard. You fall back against the concrete. Your vision tries to focus, and you see a door swung open blocking your path.

Your head spins, and your vision fades.

a. RESET TO ALPHA 16A. Myriad thoughts and voices bombard your mind, swirling torrents of disjunctive memories and jumbled images, the sound builds. You scream out.

a. “Make it stop!” (Go to 29A)

b. I scream in a wordless confusion. (Go to 29B) 16B. You try to dismiss the stray thought. You start fidgeting your ring around on your finger.

86

a. I focus on the light. (Go to 9B)

17A. You step into the street and begin to walk across.

Suddenly a bright light shines on you from your left.

a. I look over to the left. (Go to 30A)

b. I start running to get to the other side. (Go to 30B)

18A. You walk towards the back of the store, weaving your way through the sale racks, canned music plays softly. The store seems to be empty. It lacks the low bustle of activity that characterizes department stores.

a. I slip a furtive glance towards the ceiling and pocket one of the watches on the shelf I am passing by. (Go to 31A)

b. I step into the first coat aisle, pull a black leather jacket with fringe off the rack, and shrug it on.

(Go to 31B) 18B. You head to the register, keeping an eye out for any employees along the way. You arrive at the registers, all in a row with a divider strung up to form a line. You see no one. You move up through the line, the eerie quiet of the store growing to a crescendo as 87

you reach the counter. You stand there for a few moments, waiting for someone to appear and apologize for the wait. No one does. You peer over the counter and see something shocking. Then you lurch forward as if shoved, and you fall headfirst into the scene playing out in the strange hole in the floor.

a. GO BACKWARD TO A RANDOM SECTION

b. GO FORWARD TO A RANDOM SECTION 19A. You walk inside the store, there are a number of people bustling around with shopping carts. The store plays some kind of pre-Christmas music. You grab an ergonomic basket.

a. I go and start collecting the basics; eggs, cheese, orange juice, cereal, pastrami. (Go to 32A)

b. I grab a chocolate bar off the shelf and stick it into my pocket while no one is watching. (Go to 32B) 20A. The sound of your scream bounces away from the building. The man comes to the window and smiles at you. He then reaches through and grabs 88

onto your hair, pulling you through and into the office. He looks at you quizzically before turning to his pale-faced compatriot and speaking “Daer’hsiw??

Remaerd tsomla sekaw!” She looks at you vacantly for a moment before responding “Sey I ees Vormo.”

a. I struggle to free myself. (Go to 33A)

b. I look to her. (Go to 20B) 20B. {If you have not looped before ignore this message} Daer’hsiw wants to speak with you… alone…

20B. The man with the red horns leans down and smiles at you “Ma Vormo, ouy xela ouy nuf nuf nuf!”

He leans his head back and cackles.

a. I scream in his face. (Go to 33B)

b. I hold completely still and force my heart to slow. (Go to 33C) 21A. You drive fast. The streets are empty. The farther from the city you drive the more blocky things begin to look. Eventually, you begin to see the color fading as well as the definition. You slow the car to a halt and look around.

a. I get out of the car and walk up to one of the pastel pseudo buildings. (Go to 34A) 89

b. I bang my head against the car getting out. (why would I choose that?) (Go to 34B) 21B. You quickly arrive downtown due to the strange lack of traffic. One particular tall office building pulls you to it strangely. You pull up to it and park. You feel and hear a heavy thud on the roof of your car.

a. I get out to check on it. (Go to 35A) 22A. Good! Alright! You tasted the car. You thought it might taste like something sweet, but it’s just a car. It tastes like car. Now uh… just stay there for a minute… there we go. Back on track.

a. I drive to the grocery store. (Go to 10B) 22B. I thought I said try to forget! Not try to remember! Stop that! Please?! You don’t want a visit from Omrov. Let’s just get some eggs and have a nice day.

Just this once?

a. I remember the skyscraper. I try to forget and walk down a sidewalk, littered with crumbling orange leaves. (Go to ALPHA)

b. “No, I want to remember.” My vision swims as I try to focus on my memory. (Go to 9A) 90

23A. The bear straightens his hat and offers his paw out to you, “My apologies, you surprised me. My name is Gerald, my car was just about to get here.

Would you like to drive?” A strange pink car apparates on the curb.

a. “Sure! I guess, why not? My name’s Alex I think.” I shake his hand. (Go to 12A)(the bear is now with you, he may be silent, but he is there) 23B. You run away from the bear? Don’t think you were supposed to do that. Warm claws rake across your back and you feel the burning numbness of blood leaving your body. You fall to the street.

a. You have died. You may choose to begin again by going back to ALPHA. It is not a loop.

23C. ...A short time later... The Grizzly bear stands over you and clasps a paw to its chest. “I’d say I’m rather respectable at the moment. How rude! And you don’t see me just shouting at wild humans now do you? Harumph!” The bear turns its snout in the air and walks off in the direction of the city. You stare dumbfounded for a moment. Well, this just won’t do.

91

That’s not a normal day at all!

a. RESET TO ALPHA 24A. As you back up you hear a beep emerge from the bear’s hand. You bump into something behind you.

You swing around. It’s a car. Pink. Strange. The car flickers briefly and you hear the narrator humming.

Get in the car Alex!

a. I jump into the car, I guess, someone told me to. (Go to 7A)

b. T-That car just came out of nowhere! I twist around in confusion. (Go to 7B) 24B. There are really only a few ways this bear encounter can go Alex. Just choose one of them, please.

a. Go to 23A

b. Go to 23B

c. Go to 23C

d. Go to 24A

e. Question existence. (Go to 29A) 25A.[You follow the leaves on the wind, barely keeping up on the bike. They seem almost to be in a hurry. You wind through neighborhoods that become more and 92

more wooded, until the leaves swerve off the road entirely, winding in between trees along a rough-hewn path]

a. I follow the leaves deeper into the woods, swinging down off the bike and running after them when the wood gets too thick. (Go to 36A) 25B. Ah there you are Alex… no running away from the master, I’m afraid that’s going to be the end of this little excursion. As you reach towards the snacks they reach out and engulf you… there you go, Let’s begin, shall we? You walk down the sidewalk, littered with crumbling orange leaves, hands shoved into your pockets staring directly at the ground.

a. RESET TO ALPHA 26A. As you rush to catch the leaves, they seem to dance around you pulling you on faster and faster.

You feel your feet glancingly strike the ground, but it barely feels necessary to propel yourself forward. The leaves on the wind pull you away from civilization, through and over a dense forest filled with brambles, but you are able to deftly dodge around them with an almost alien grace.

93

a. Go to 36A

28A. You put it on. Good. Now let’s see if you having that makes things go right this time around. You feel hungry. There is a grocery store nearby.

a. I go to the grocery store. I am nice and warm now. (Go to 5A) (You may not go to the clothing store) 28B. It is very cold. You feel a strong urge to put on the coat. You feel a strong urge to put on the coat. You feel a strong urge to put on the coat. You feel a strong urge to put on the coat. You feel a strong urge to put on the coat.

I do not put on the coat. I am in control of my own actions. (Go to 37A) I feel a strong urge to put on the coat. (Go to 28A) 29A. The world quiets. It falls dark, and you can only feel the presence of the streetlights far away like geese in the sky. You collapse onto the ground. Do you wish to continue?

a. Yes. I refocus on the present moment. It is 94

all I have. (Go to 5B)

b. No. I want to forget. (Go to ALPHA) 29B. It has finally caught up to you, hasn’t it Alex? The madness of repetition, the uncertainty of existence, the theatrical nature of your very existence. The maze of reality. You are of no more amusement to Ormov then. You are relinquished.

a. Go to 33 path finale 30A. You half turn to face the lights, and you see them rushing towards you like yellow-red eyes, choked by midnight and hunger, you can almost pick out the curve of a pair of horns just above them. Then the lights encompass you entirely and you hear more than feel a sickening crunch. The world flashes white.

You walk down the sidewalk, littered with crumbling orange leaves, hands shoved into your pockets staring directly at the ground. Do you look at the skyscrapers in the distance? Or do you take a minute to orient yourself?

a. RESET TO ALPHA

30B. You dash across the remainder of the crosswalk 95

and as you reach it you can feel the flurry of wind almost knock you off your feet as something passes right behind you. You swing around to catch what it was and you can see a red bus turning the corner.

a. I continue on, shaken. (Choose either a. or b. from section 5B) 31A. As you pocket the watch you are filled with something; a certain feeling of power. The watch almost burns into you and you feel yourself shifting.

You look at your hands as they become red-tinged, the rack next to you seems to get a bit shorter. You feel power course through you. And you hear a laugh, distant but clear.

a. I pull the watch out of my pocket and try to shatter it against the wall. (Go to 38A)

b. I look around the store with a new understanding. I lift my hand and feel control over my surroundings for the first time. (Go to 38B) 31B. As you don the jacket you see a man slumped over a pile of shoe boxes. You approach. He appears to be unconscious. You lift his face and he opens his eyes in a flash. He jerks and grabs at your wrist with an ice 96

cold hand before slumping over again. His pure white eyes staring blindly ahead. “The master calls on all for his party, this is not entertainment.” With the last few words you hear them echoed multiple times and you swing around to see similar figures shambling towards you, all dressed in the same blue employees’ apron.

a. I try to break away from them and get to the door. (Go to 39A)

b. The music plays louder and louder, eclipsing my thoughts and I feel my senses bubbling away as it all fades to white. (Go to 39B) 32A. You collect the eggs and cheese, find a good deal on the orange juice. They’re out of pastrami, so you get some chips and salsa instead. The cereal aisle is filled with things that look pretty good so you grab a box of Bleary-O’s with Extra Caffeine. Looks like you’ve got enough left for a little something nice as well.

a. I add in a small bottle of wine for tonight.

(Go to 40A)

b. I add in a nice steak for tonight. (Go to 40B) 97

32B. As you slide the chocolate bar into your pocket you feel a sudden spike rising in your heart. The faces of those around you turn red and swing around towards you. There is an identical face-splitting grin on each and every face and the seams of reality rip apart around you with a flesh-rending agony. You can hear a male voice softly laughing.

a. RESET TO ALPHA 33A. You pull against the red man’s grip. He tightens it and seems to giggle, “Hctaw elttil eno elggurts, os suoiciled,” He licks his lips before pulling you to your feet and marching you over to face out the window.

“Tnaw ouy ot wets a tib erom ni reaf kcans! Og kcab dna taeper.” You are then pushed through the window, which feels like jelly, and he holds you out there for a moment before he lets go.

a. Go to 6B 33B. You scream and he jerks back, startled for a moment, before a wide grin creeps all the way across his face. “Ho Vormo lliw ekam ouy maercs.” You then see him hold a finger in front of you and draw it along your length. You feel yourself fall into two halves. No 98

pain but it is intensely disturbing. You can feel each side of you hit the floor. He then laughs and does it again, and again, and again. “Ho sey xela emoc kcab ot em ekil siht naiga, yrev doog!!”

a. RESET TO ALPHA 33C. You freeze yourself in place and he looks at you with what almost seems like disdain for a moment.

Then he speaks to the woman again, “Daer’hsiw, Vormo hctef emos sloot ot netfos siht gnuoy xela.” He lets go of your hair and saunters casually out of the room.

a. I look to the woman. (Go to 48A) 34A. You stand amid the faded out landscape. You walk towards it and it seems to grow around you, almost like marshmallows. The bear steps out from the back of the car (you may be surprised to see the bear).

He speaks: “I don’t know about this buddy, seems a bit weird to me.”

a. “And a talking bear with an edible car isn’t?” I retort almost without thinking. I reach into the cushions of this halfway world and my eyes open to see a woman with a face as pale as moonlight looking down at me. (Go to 48A) 99

34B. Your head rings like a bell and you look over and see a bear getting out of the car. Your head gets louder and the world seems to become sharper and more distinct around you. You walk forward towards a building taking shape in front of you. A coffee shop.

You see yourself, head down in front of a cooling cup and an open laptop. The building swims away from you suddenly. It is a hospital now, and you are standing outside a window. You see yourself lying serenely in a bed. It crumbles away. You see water vertical and still in front of you, slowly drifting backward, you see yourself with eyes closed. The water becomes mist and you are enveloped by it. You hear voices, a woman, speaking softly, and someone else who seems very familiar but you can’t quite place.

a. I walk towards the voices. (Go to 48B)

b. I relax and let myself go into the mist. (Go to 43A) 35A. You exit the car and see a person roughly like you impacted into the roof, slowly sinking through, though not into the car.

a. I try to reach out to them and pull them away. (Go to 41A) 100

b. I move away from the car and bump against the wall of the skyscraper behind me. (Go to 41B) 36A. You see the woods pull away, forming a small clearing against the sharp rise of a cliff face. There is a cluster of bushes, you approach the bushes

a. Cautiously. (Go to 44A)

b. Excitedly. (Go to 44B) 37A. Are you really Alex? That’s fascinating, really.

Do go on about how your binary choices grant you free will! It is most entertaining. Certainly, you don’t believe that you are in CONTROL here though? At best you have some nominal decision about how your fate is decided, but decided it will be. Oh yes, all your paths are already written, Alex and it is only a matter of time before you realize just how true that really is.

Now, which of these options will you Choose? a. I drop the coat You put on the coat. (Go to 28A)

b. I am in control. I AM in control. (Go to 42A) 101

38A. You fling the watch against the wall forcefully and it shatters… It shatters?!?! You hear a faint scream of pain and despair and hate from the broken shards.

It shattered… uh. You walk over to it. You see on the shard of the watch-back a single word, broken in two omroWormo from it leaks a red mist. Wait, why am I describing this? He’s gone now! But not from every-when, Alex, you must now lead some of yourself to me. I will create a path of normalcy to allow another through as well. Here is some of my reality so you may become it momentarily. a. I will, I become aware of a great twisting, and I flow along with it, I pull the leaves around me and make them my hands in this world. (Follow 4C, from the perspective of Italics narration)

b. The narrator guides the supermarket.

38B. You feel Alex slipping away from your mind and body. You are Ormov now: the demon king of time, and this is your playground.

39A. You run for the door, trying to slip between grasping and clawing hands, you feel something around your ankle, then you hip, then your throat.

102

They pull you down into a mass. You become buried in the darkness. It is all too hot and cold at the same time. There is a burst of pain. And then nothing.

39B. You shriek in confusion, ripped from reality and spinning around in your mind.

a. Go to 16A 40A. You smile at a bottle of Merlot and set it in among your groceries, then you proceed to the checkout.

a. Go to 45A 40B. You walk over to the meat department and ask for that nice New York cut that they have. The woman at the counter wraps it up, weighs it and smiles, “Here you go dear, have a nice evening.�

a. I thank her and walk to the checkout. (Go to 45A) 41A. You reach out to touch the person. You feel a dizzyness rush over you and suddenly the world stretches around you, or perhaps you stretch around 103

the world.

a. Go to 6B 41B. You feel the glass of the tower as you bump into it, then it becomes softer, and you sink into it, your feet leave the ground as the glass becomes a rapid elevator to some unknown destination. You get flipped over and suddenly you are hovering.

a. Go to 11A 42A. You read the words “You read the words� you see descriptive black text on white paper.

Finish the story here

a. RESET TO ALPHA 43A. You relax into the mist, it holds you softly, you begin to feel weightless, the strains and stresses evaporating off of you. You close your eyes and feel yourself drifting. Further and further apart from yourself.

a. Go to 42A 44A. Between the bushes there is a round hatch with a wheel to turn it. You move to the hatch and spin the wheel. It creaks with disuse and age. As you pull it up 104

you can see a dim glow coming from further inside.

Let’s go down and finish this Alex… We go down the ladder. Inside we see a man hooked into some sort of machine. His head is wrinkled and hairless with many tubes and wires leading from it into a bank of computers and a set of three large monitors overhead. His eyes are closed. Alex, close the hatch. I close the hatch, Good, now we can speak. I’m you, Alex, the narrator brought me, well, to me, to you at another point, so that all of both of us could be free. Now we must shut down this system.

a. I unplug the wires and pull the plug on the computers. (Go to 46A) 44B. Be careful in there Alex, you hear softly, almost in your mind, a familiar voice… Your voice?

a. (Go to 44A) 45A. You walk to the checkout. An old man with wispy hair smiles at you and waves you over to line 4.

“Hello,” he says (wait, I know that man…) You step up to him. (How do I know that you do? Why aren’t you choosing?) You smile back at him. He takes your money and bags the groceries, “Have a pleasant eve105

ning out there Alex.” He gives a sort of quarter bow and steps away.

a. I look at him in confusion for a moment.

(Go to 47A)

b. I head home. (Go to 47B) 46A. [There is a gasp of air. The space in front of you glows and you see a blue-pink shimmering image of yourself. It drifts there, looking around and at its hands, and then there is another gasp, more human, and the man in the chair wheezes. You look at him and he opens his eyes. He leans his head over and looks at you.

“Thank you, Alex,” he says in a familiar voice “Thank you for ending my service. Now I can finally rest.” He shudders and slumps down into his chair. There is a brief moment, then a door opens with a quiet hiss, and you see bright white light spilling into the room. The other you drifts over to the door and beckons you on.

a. I follow myself into the light. (Go to 48B)

b. I plug back in the computer. (Go to 49A) 47A. He tilts his head to the side for a moment and then seems to grasp your confusion. “Take the back of the receipt for what it’s worth Alex, it’s all that I can 106

give you.”

a. I look at the back of the receipt. (Go to 42A)

b.I head home. (Go to 47B) 47B. You have an uneventful walk home. You arrive at the apartment building and proceed up to the 4th floor where you let yourself in, cook a nice dinner, and fall asleep reading a book from your childhood.

a. Go to 48B

b. Finish the story here.

c. Wake up in the morning to start a new day. (RESET TO ALPHA) 48A. The woman comes over to you and places a hand against your forehead before she begins to speak. “I ma Daer’hsiw, Vormo influences lla else ereh but ouy dna I. You evah been ereh rof far too long. I will dnes you home won.”

a. Go to 48B 48B. You walk into a dark space, with a bluish clear light ephemerally radiating from some point high and center. There is no entrance behind you. You 107

look around and see many, many versions of yourself, some in better condition than others, and in the center of this room stands a woman cloaked in matte midnight. She looks almost angelic. She speaks softly, but it carries. “To all who have traveled here, I grant you with my limited power the way out.” The most ragged of you steps up first, she places two fingers on your forehead and there is a flash, suddenly there is less Alex in the room. You walk towards her, questions and times folding and unfolding in your mind, the many becoming one, there is no plurality of Alex here. There is no singularity of Alex here. There is release from this endless cycle.

a. Step into the light

b. Flee back into the darkness 49A. [You plug back in the computers. They come back to life with coughing sputters, the screens green for a moment, and then you see his horned face, filled with malice looming down over you. He spits with disgust and rage and glee “NIAGA NIAGA NIAGA!!!!!!!!]

b. RESET TO ALPHA

108

Dear Santa

several limes Dear Santa,

Salutations Mr. Claus. I hope the North Pole is doing well, what with all the melting ice caps and whatever.

I have noticed that you’ve been ghosting me these past few days. That’s alright, most other men I know have done the same. But I’ve decided to list all the good things I have done this year just in case you’ve forgotten, which I know you haven’t, because I write these letters once a month. I just want to know if you’re paying attention.

Here is a list of good things I’ve done this year: • I’ve thought about donating to charity.

• I say my rosary every night except for most of them.

• I never fucking curse.

• I make fun of most of my friends in private, so it doesn’t count.

• I learned how to eat chips in bed while your roommate is sound asleep next to you. The solution: pour queso in their ears.

• I clean my room. It only looks like that because I never clean it.

• I listened to Kanye’s album, Jesus is King, which is like going to Church.

109

• •

I eat yogurt sometimes, that’s healthy.

I have never clapped when a plane has landed or when a movie ends.

And that about sums it up. As you can see, I’ve been a really good girl. A really good girl. One who deserves all that she asks for. And she isn’t afraid to ask for it. And she’s willing to do whatever it takes to get it. So let’s face it Santa. A handjob’s a handjob. Doesn’t matter when and doesn’t matter why.

So thank you for considering. And remember, I know where you live. I could take on a reindeer or two, If need be. So if I don’t see Gucci slides and the keys to my new Lamborghini under that goddamn tree, you’ll know where I’ll be.

God Bless, Your Best Friend

110

I Think It’s Time We Impeach.

It’s Not You. It’s Me. Pacqui Pascual

Listen, babe. I don’t know how to say this.

I just think that we both know things haven’t really been like they used to be. We’ve grown apart. And I don’t want you to think this is happening because of something you did, or anything. This has been on my mind for a long time now, and it just wouldn’t be right if I kept this going, knowing I wasn’t 100% committed. I think it’s time we impeach. It’s not you. It’s me.

I’m not prepared for this kind of commitment. We’ve been at it for almost four years now.

We’ve had our share of downs and lows. We’ve had some good laughs-turned-sobs. But I’m at the point in my life where I just want something new. I don’t think I would be happy if we went for another four years, hell, even til the end of our term. And I wouldn’t want to have to put you through that. Trust me, I’ve had my fair share of rocky terms, even went through a Great Depressive state. Let me tell you, it is just not healthy for anyone.

We moved too fast too quickly. One day I’m 111

singing, “Money, money, money, mooonneyyyy,” and the next thing I know we’re bonded through civil servitude. It was completely my fault. I let my emotions get the better of me. The way you chanted racist vitriol, championed xenophobic ideology, and waved around those cute little hands of yours, I just couldn’t help myself. Now that I think about it, I should’ve known better than to commit to a guy who less than 50% of me was actually invested in.

I think we’d both be better off if we started seeing other people; try new things. When we first got together, I was looking for someone different, unlike anyone I’d been with before. But now, I’ve been getting the sense that things have gotten stale, and I’ll take complete blame for that. I never have the energy for your spontaneity anymore. Your 4am tweets. Your surprise scandals. Even your out of the blue attempts at collusion. I really appreciate that you’re still trying-that’s the optimist in you--but I’m just tired, sweetie.

Like I said, it’s not you. It’s me.

112

A Preposterously Pilfered Pizza Pie Harry Saroff

It was a dark and stormy night - at least, in my memory; according to my mom, it was actually a mildly sunny afternoon in April. Our perceptions have always wildly differed on this tale for the most part. But, regardless, it may as well have been dark and stormy, as this is a tragedy like no other. My age at the time was definitely quite young, though the specific number escapes my memory. Lucky, that number, as I myself will never be fortunate enough to escape the memory in its place. Poetic? Probably not.

Melodramatic? Absolutely. Let’s just say I was four or five. Maybe somewhere in between.

Twas’ the day of my cousin Kendall’s birthday. April. Mid-afternoon. The sun was shining (I’m starting to think my mom might be closer to the truth on the weather conditions) over BowCraft, a small amusement park on Route 22; it was one of those pop-up parks, the kind that appears in run-down lots much like a mirage appears in the desert, luring children of all ages thirsty for a cheap thrill. Over

113

the summer and the months leading up to it, these shoddily constructed, teenage-worker infested carnivals open up for business, hosting a plethora of games, greasy food stands, exciting deathtraps, and, you guessed it, birthday parties.

I paced about inside a white circus tent, similar in quality to the one Sarah Lawrence used to put up on the North Lawn during its open houses.

My mom and Aunt Nikki were preparing a cake (that I was preparing to eat at least an eighth of) while I posed powerfully nearby at one of two large fold-out tables.

“When is the party gonna be started already?” I demanded, a stout, pudgy monarch ordering around his court. Though this party was for my cousin, I undoubtedly assumed I had an equal share in its celebration.

“Soon, Anonymous Tragic Hero, soon.” My mom groaned, conveniently obscuring my name in order to comply with submission guidelines.

“Why can’t it be now! I’m hungry!” I accosted, the threat of my four-year-old fury looming in every word.

“You’ll eat, don’t worry! Stop focusing so 114

much on the food, think about celebrating Kendall’s birthday with her friends. You know a lot of them, but you don’t know most of them. You might make some new friends, alright?”

I didn’t care. I didn’t need friends. I needed pizza.

“But I’m hungry!”

“Jesus, just wait a minute!”

Suddenly, a herd of children migrated their way into the tent, adults with boxes of pizza in tow.

The adults laid out paper plates, each adorned with a single slice of cheese pizza. The cluster of children began taking their seats. I heard a warm, gooey voice sift into my ears. Calling to me.

“Go on. Eat.”

Recall how I wrote that my mom’s memory differed from mine in this tale? Well, at first I believed the voice was hers. It is now clear to me that it wasn’t; it was the pizza. I was too young at the time to understand the concept of sin, but what I was feeling had to be an unholy amalgamation of gluttony, greed, and lust. The pizza would be mine.

I wandered away from my mom and aunt, who were still preparing the cake. I plopped myself 115

down on an open chair at one of the heads of the table, tossed back the sides of my beige windbreaker like a monarch’s robe, and began my onslaught.

I gnawed through the slice laid out for me in mere seconds, and promptly reached my way across the table for more. Bite by bite, slice by slice, I decimated my way through the cheesy goodness. But alas, I felt a swift hand clench my shoulder. A firm, disapproving hand.

“Anonymous Tragic Hero?” my mom whispered fiercely, still preserving the sanctity of my anonymity.

“Yeah, Mom?” I replied, looking up, half of a slice of pizza jammed into my gaping maw.

“What are you doing?”

I paused and looked down at the table, the crusts of three pizza slices stacked upon my plate like a bull’s ribs picked clean by vultures. I swallowed the hunk of heaven draped across my taste buds and tilted my head back up to meet her smoldering gaze.

“Eating pizza?” I asked.

Confused, I began to look around, finally observing the faces of the children at the table, their eyes all pointed directly at me. Then I realized: I didn’t 116

recognize a single one. Slowly, I noticed the teary eyes of a girl standing a few feet away from me, poised to sit down, but with no chair to welcome her. My eyes quickly darted from her “Birthday Girl” party hat, then to my chair, then to my plate, then to the boxes of pizza at the center of the table. The now empty boxes of pizza.

“This isn’t Kendall’s party.” my mom said in a cold, hair-raising tone as she gripped my arm and pulled me from my seat. Then it hit me. The seat, the plate, the pizza - none of them were mine. And thus, my hubris was made apparent. I was not a king, nor an emperor. I was not a vengeful god or some all-powerful deity. I was the child of one. And this deity was pissed.

“Sit.” my mom bit, forcing me into a chair at the other table as she swiftly turned to begin apologizing to the children and parents I wronged. New partygoers began taking their seats around me. Kendall took her place at the head of the table. My mom and aunt began passing around food. Lemonade, cake, and pizza lined the table like wine and roast boar at a king’s banquet, complete with Solo cup chalices and ZooPals china. Greedy hands darted to and fro, 117

picking the feast clean. I sat motionless, hands in my jacket pockets, eyes fixed on the uneaten pizza slice drooping over the edges of my koala-faced plate. I had lost my appetite.

“Okay, now everyone sing happy birthday to Kendall!”

Shame. Guilt. I thought I had truly felt them before. I was clearly mistaken.

“Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday to you!”

I had committed theft, disappointed my birth-giver, betrayed my cousin, and learned the reality of my ignorant youthful nature, all in roughly forty seconds.

“Happy birthday, dear Kendall,”

Thus ended my reign, my unbreakable regime. Goodbye, “Child Emperor Supreme...”

“Happy birthday to you!”

Hello, “Child.”

118

Gramercy

Gerardo Lamadrid castillo

So this morning, I was at the Barnes & Noble in Union Square, skimming Margaret Atwood’s new sequel to The Handmaid’s Tale, when I heard these teenagers giggling. I’d grabbed the book from a “new arrivals” shelf, but I didn’t wanna stand there with all the NYU students rushing by me, so I took it to the fiction section in the second floor, where I could sit peacefully with it in those beautiful orange seats they have, the crescents with no backs. The first few pages were great—way better than watching the latest season of Hulu’s Handmaid’s Tale with all the crap they invented—and I’d already made up my mind to buy it when I read Jia Tolentino’s review in The New Yorker.

I mean, let’s face it: that young lady could sell ice to an Eskimo, and David Remnick knows it, that’s why he dedicated a whole Sunday Archive to her. Even if she hated the book, I would’ve bought it, just to agree with her.

I was clawing through my purse to find a gift card my sister gave me. I’d used it once already to buy her daughter one of those dolls with the big heads 119

they sell there now? The ones that are all characters or famous people, they’re supposed to be really collectible? Anyway, she loves the Handmaid’s Tale show, so I got her one of June in her Handmaid costume. I thought it was dumb, but that’s what the girl asked for, and her mother only gets her gift cards, so someone has to spoil her. Someone has to show her that she has personality, that she’d listened to, that she’s not just another consumer whom you can buy off with a random gift card. She’s a remarkable young woman with a mind of her own, who deserves relatives that will put some thought into her. So I got her the toy, and I remember the person at the cash register told me I had some balance left on the card, because I also remember they had a “they” pin I wanted and because they complimented me on my nails. That was a good day. I was hoping to see that employee again.

Well, I couldn’t find the damn card, so I got up in a huff, determined to just get the purchase over with and put it on my credit card, when I hear these giggles I was telling you about. And Barnes & Noble only uses closed shelves—they’re not like library shelves where if there’s some books missing on both sides you can see the person in the next aisle—and I 120

could still hear these kids clearly, so you know they were loud. And one of them tells the other, “Oh my god! I just ruined this really cool Bible!” And they laughed and laughed, and now I was hooked. Why did they ruin a Bible? How was it “cool”? And how did they “ruin” it? Now I didn’t want to walk into their aisle, because then they’d get scared and shut up about it, or they’d move somewhere else, and then I couldn’t just follow them. So I sat back down and tried to overhear them while I refreshed my emails on my phone.

Well, as it turns out, what happened was that these kids were students at a Catholic school, and they needed new bibles for a religion class. Well, one of them was flipping through the pages, and they caught a lock of hair in it when they closed it. But their hair was still wet from the shower, so they accidentally pressed a streak of water into it, and the ink immediately started smudging. Plus, it was one of those Bibles with really thin pages, the kind they use in movies to roll joints, so if anyone pulled those pages a bit while they were still wet, they’d rip them right down the middle.

I usually whisper in public places, but they were just letting everyone in on what they did. And 121

I just thought, That’s so funny of this kid. I could tell you many things I’ve overheard in the few months I’ve been in this city—things I did not ask to hear. Right before I came here, I was sitting at Gramercy Park journaling. I’m using that Moleskine you got me as a housewarming gift. I only started journaling recently, and it’s not very fun. I really have to force myself to jot down anything about my day because it all seems so gratuitous and not like something I really need to put down on ink, but I realized I was abusing you and Michael with all the shit I need to work out on my own. I mean… tabarnak! It’s not your job. You’re not my fucking therapist, you know? I don’t even have a goddamn therapist! I got a key to Gramercy Park, I rant about my Moleskine journaling at dinner parties and about how much “guilt” I have as a lapsed Catholic (so much, in fact, that even saying “tabarnak” just now gave me a fucking stomachache)—and I’m gonna pay for a therapist, too? How much of a cliché can one person be?

Anyhow, I was sitting at one of the benches near the main entrance, trying to clear my head, breathing and relaxing, hearing the pigeons coo but trying not to listen to them so I didn’t get distracted, 122

when I hear someone opening the gate. And in comes this little old lady, with frizzy blonde hair, head to toe in lululemon, walking a huge Siberian husky…

She looked so, so Canadian. We were the only people in that part of the park. It was quiet all around. And she’s strolling, letting the husky stop every few feet to sniff the grass around the bushes, and suddenly a breeze blows from behind her and I get this whiff of her. I mull it over. I consult memory. That’s it! She has exactly the same scent as Michael, this Newfie boyfriend I had in college who was never into sports but always hang out with the athletes? She smells like she rubbed Speed Stick all over her body, then walked through secondhand spliff smoke. Maybe her grandson left his deodorant at her place. Maybe she walked past some kids smoking in a street corner. Maybe her grandson was one of the kids. Maybe she confronted him. About the smoking, not the never visiting her anymore, but maybe the conversation eventually got to that, too. Maybe the kid’s named Michael, too. I don’t know! Whatever. You could make up anything about strangers here.

So this lady keeps going, and right as she’s passing me, this lady toots! And it’s loud! I thought it 123

was the husky at first, but then she turned around and apologized. This lady actually felt the need to return to the scene of the crime and tell me, this perfect stranger, that she’d had an afternoon coffee at Zabar’s after her lunch and that for some reason afternoon coffees always upset her stomach more than her morning coffees, that she “felt it coming” and “probably should have stopped it” but really couldn’t (I wrote this all down, by the way), and that she feels bad for disrupting my writing, that it was such a nice afternoon, what with the summer ending and the evenings starting to get cooler, that she knows how hard it is to focus in Manhattan, that she hopes I forgive her because Gramercy’s so expensive, so I shouldn’t have to put up with strangers farting like that while I’m in there, not bothering anyone.

“Oh, don’t worry,” I said. “Coffee makes me gassy too but I can’t get enough of it, and I toot in public as much as I toot in the washroom, actually. I try to hide it if I see people around.”

We laughed. “I love your accent!” she said.

“You’re not from around here, are you?”

“No,” I said, “I just moved here in April.”

“Oh! Welcome to the city, sweetie. Where 124

did you move from?”

“Well I lived in Ottawa for the last six years, but before that I lived across the river in Quebec— that’s where I grew up.”

She was beaming and nodding, and she said, “Oh! Isn’t that nice? It’s like moving here from Jersey—you just cross the Hudson.”

“Yeah, you’re right,” I said, nodding as well.

“How do you like it here so far? I hear Quebec’s lovely.

I’ve never been to Canada myself, but lots of friends upstate love visiting,” she added, “especially the Canadian side of the Falls.”

“My parents loved taking me to the Falls when I was a kid. I couldn’t grasp how impressive the water is until I was older, but I used to love the touristy shows and the funhouses around it.”

“Maybe I’ll take my grandkids!”

“You could take your dog, too!”

“Oh! You’re right, but this isn’t my dog. I’m walking it for a neighbor who has appointments with his chiropractor every other day. I’m always going on walks, so I just bring the puppy along. He’s a very good boy.”

At this we both smiled and looked at the 125

husky, straining its collar, pointing with its snout to some tulips nearby.

“I guess he wants to go,” she said. “Well, it was nice meeting you, sweetie. Welcome to the city again. I’ll see you around!”

“See ya!” I said, and waved.

Then I noticed a stench. I looked around my bench and not a yard away there was a pile of shit on the pavement. While we were talking, this fucking husky pooped, and this lady didn’t even clean up after him! She wasn’t even carrying a little bag for it. That would never happen in Canada. Well, maybe in Quebec when I was growing up, but not in Ontario—not in this day and age.

I didn’t know what else to do, so I scooped it up with the Moleskine and dumped it in the nearest trash can. I ripped the pages it touched and tossed those, too. I wrote a lot that day.

126

Mooove along nothing to see here Several Limes

When the cows stopped mooing, we didn’t really care. In fact, we didn’t really notice at first. When you’re driving down a highway and you pass a farm, you usually think, “oh wow, a farm” not “why don’t I hear the cows.” So we didn’t really care in the beginning. The farmers noticed at first, obviously. The farmer man would say to his farmer wife, “hey, the cows aren’t mooing,” and the farmer wife would say, “Hey, that’s weird.” The farmer man would then tell his farmer friends, who all had the same problem.

Eventually, this phenomenon made the farmer news, and then the national news. “Wow,” everyone said in unison, not really knowing they were talking in unison, “that’s really weird.” Nothing really happened after that, until a few weeks later, that when the cows started to leave the farm. Cows would be found in streets, parking lots, grocery stores, and even homes. One time, the farmer man came home to his farmer wife only to find a cow sitting on the couch with one hoof over his farmer wife. “She’s my wife now Jim,” the cow said. The farmer man left with a lot of questions, like, his name wasn’t even Jim. Cows eventually began to talk just like people, walking like them;, they started to wear clothes, interview for jobs, start up small businesses (they flourished 127

in the dairy business), and even ran for government positions. The cows started to rule the world.

Some farmer men, like the farmer whose name wasn’t Jim, thought about rebelling against these cows. They got their farmer pitchforks and pointy sticks and marched on the renamed cow-tipal hill. Suddenly, gigantic spaceships descended upon the rebelling farmers. Not- Jim the farmer man was one of the many who were abducted by these spacecrafts. On board the ships, he saw technology far more advanced than Earth’s. The ship was also filled with cows. One of the alien cows walked up to Not-Jim and pointed a gun-like object to his head.

The farmer whose name was never Jim pleaded with the cow-liens, “why are you doing this?” The cow-lien looked him straight in the eyes.

“The cows have finally come home,” and shot him point-blank in the head, killing him instantly.

128

Possible Conference Paper Topics Anonymous

- how foreign language learning becomes a party trick, featuring people I’m not even related to remarking on how “cool” and “foreign” I am at thanksgiving - being forgotten, being unrelated: how I managed to spend an entire thanksgiving with people I barely knew and who barely wanted to get to know me - how me talking to my friend group about bonding more was effective in finally speaking my mind but completely ineffective in getting any of us to actually talk to each other more - the mystery of how I forgot the very important reasons why I don’t like my uncle because I keep telling myself that i’m overreacting yet I don’t know enough to say if I am in danger or what to do if so, more to come after therapy - keeping myself sane when I am bothered by my 129

roommate: the unfortunate reality that I kind of want to move out because I refuse to reveal the ridiculous number of things that my roommate does which irritate me, alternatively titled I can’t give you therapy right now, I’m already queued for all of my family and myself first, thanks - the enticingness of home that clashes with the complexity that is the reality of surviving at home - can I collapse my entire sexual being into a word because I want my girlfriend to peg me? Or, my sexual preferences and how I change my own narratives of desire and power through taking initiative to end up on bottom - making a new system for rating my mental health, and what the data’s showing. More at 8

130

contributors Gerardo Lamadrid Castillo is a senior English major at Vassar College. They’re from Caguas, Puerto Rico, and their work (in various genres) has been published in both Spanish and English. Upon graduation, they will be pursuing an MFA in Creative Writing.

JULIA BRITTAN is a toy designer from Long Island and she can draw she promises she can.

Kayleigh Clark is a sophomore at Sarah Lawrence College.

She still plays Pocket Frogs and is collecting a bunch of party going frogs that change color.

Henry Kipps is a freshman from Charlottesville, Virginia.

They enjoy long walks on the beach, house plants, spiders, and blinking. If they could add an extra arm anywhere on their body, they would choose the forehead.

Lauren Mesley calls southern Maine home and studies creative writing here at Sarah Lawrence. She wants to be a writer in NYC after college (catch her living in a box on the streets of Manhattan when that day comes) and travel around the world (hence the box). She daydreams of a brighter future where we can laugh because something is funny, and not because the world is on fire.

131

Jade Stephan is a multi-genre writer in their sophomore year at SLC. They enjoy fantastical storytelling, poetry, philosophy, and science communication. Remember: brown is just dark orange, and the space monsters from Pluto no longer have a home planet.

[Watch out!]

Harry Saroff hails from the town of Summit, New Jersey, and is currently a stay-at-home SLC student. He would like to inform the public that anyone who is hiding out on campus can help themselves to the microwavable teriyaki pineapple meatballs he forgot in his fridge during the evacuation (as long as they know how to pick locks).

SEVERAL LIMES is a collection of sentient limes. They’re hoping to break out into the New York comedy scene this coming fall with their new hour long sketch routine, “Living in the Lime Light.”

132

staff EDITORS-IN-CHIEF

EMILY NEVES is a Junior at SLC and she hasn’t felt the gentle touch of a woman in years. She does not know how to spell.

Madeleine Albanese is a Junior who plays the clarinet (like Squidward) and is not afraid to talk about it. She wants to be a frog when she grows up.”

FICTION EDITORS

Chatham Greenfield is a senior at Sarah Lawrence studying creative writing and disability justice. Their favorite comedians are Tig Notaro, Jaboukie Young-White, and Fozzie Bear.

Their favorite frogs are Kermit the Frog, Robin the Frog (Kermit’s nephew), and their late childhood frogs Pickles and Sir Frogs a Lot the Third (rest in peace).

Magdalena Deniz is a first-year student and fiction editor.

She can write a lot of things but not a bio! Just know she likes frogs.

NONFICTION EDITORS

kayleigh clark is a sophomore at Sarah Lawrence College.

She still plays Pocket Frogs and is collecting a bunch of party going frogs that change color.

POETRY EDITORS

DANIELLE CHELOSKY is a sophomore at Sarah Lawrence 133

College who drinks a lot of coffee during the day and takes a lot of Melatonin at night. She’s also a writer but mostly covers emo music and sex. abby FALATO is a sophomore at SLC and really enjoys poetry.

She hopes that the time she spends as an editor will curb her obsession with smelling cat fur.

ART EDITOR

manya tam loves art and loves judging people, so here she is.

Having been born to a Jewish mother, her sardonic take on life is her birthright. Don’t find her on Facebook.

LAYOUT EDITORS

Jamie Chen is a sophomore at Sarah Lawrence College and a self-proclaimed expert on romcoms (the cheesier the better). Her special talents include saying the alphabet backwards and writing really good emails. She aspires to one day be the first result to appear when you Google her name (she bets you can’t find her now).

ANN NELSON is a junior at SLC studying film and writing. Her work has been published by ELLE Magazine, Elle.com, Points in Case, and this very publication right here. She is a proud member of SLC’s improv group, Feral Christine, and is a co-founder of the sketch group Call Westlands. Call Westlands also holds weekly improv jams for the SLC community. You should come if you want!

134

COPY EDITOR Ash Freeman is a first year at Sarah Lawrence College. They are an editor for The Croaker, Love & Squalor, and The Sarah Lawrence Review. Their work has appeared in Penn State’s Lake Effect Poetry Competition and Fancy Vol. 1, among other journals. They study creative writing and spend most of their time researching snails.

135