Silhouette Spring 2014

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LITERARY AND ARTWORK SUBMISSIONS FROM SHAWNEE STUDENTS

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COMPETITION

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ART SHOW

WINNERS I S S U E

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MYRNA STONE

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COVER ART "THE ELECTRICIAN" - RIKKI CORNETT PHOTOGRAPHY OF UNDERGRAD WORK CHELSEA TACKETT

-------------------SILHOUETTE STAFF -------------------NEIL CARPA TH/OS - ADVISOR ZACK BURTON - POETRY ANO PROSE EDITOR JESSICA MARTIN - LAYOUT EDITOR ALYSON HOWARD - ART EDITOR DON LOUGHRY - PUBLIC RELATIONS COORD. ABIGAIL FUHRMANN - STAFF

-------------------BY: DORIAN MONROE -------------------I'm a ship inside a liquor bottle.

Manned by the ghost deck hands, of the skeletons in my closet.

Long since wrecked and abandoned, by the currents of my past.

Led here by the trade winds of your sweet, strawberry breath.

Deceived by the lying Polaris of your entrancing smile.

Your gifted spyglass neglected to tell of rocky shores.

Capsized, overturned, sunken, forced down, shipwrecked, into the lonely grave of my fragile glass prison.

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SON OF NATURE

-------------------BY: ALYSON HOWARD

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ROYAL

-------------------BY: BRANDON CALLIHAN --------------------

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PENN STATION

-------------------BY· MARK AUSTIN & JESSICA MARTIN -------------------I I\

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HUPE AND MUN~TER~

-------------------BY: HOLLY BROWN -----------------r----,

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There was once a young girl with an effortless life. She'd grown up in a home full of love and family, her friends were true and she always had good food in her tummy. She enjoyed school and made good grades, got to say a speech during her high school graduation and went to college with a scholarship. There was nothing in her life to produce any melancholy, any hardship, any enmity. The only things she had to fear were the monsters in her dreams, but they weren't even real fears. As she slept between her blankets, the monsters never lingered past the threshold of her nightmares, always leaving her unscathed when she rejoined reality. All she knew, and had ever known, was peace.

And then the young girl fell ill. Food poisoning, she thought. A common cold. A virus. But as her legs grew weak and her mind slow, her instincts told her otherwise.

Her family's robotic wishes for healing seemed automated and insincere . She'd never felt this way before . Something deep inside begged her not to ignore it, and she challenged her family's apathy. Before long, the hospital loomed like a nightmare before her, and as she stepped hesitantly inside, her ancient barriers of sanctu-

ary peeled away. She'd never had to test her Love before.

She wasn't prepared.

Despite the constant company surrounding her, the young girl felt surprisingly alone. The nurse plugged some foreign object into a fat, purple vein in the bend of her arm, bringing with it an uncomfortable throbbing feeling.

She listened quietly to a husband attempting to soothe his ailing wife. A nurse cast aside their curtain and told them they'd done all they could to help, and sent the couple on their way.

Perhaps, thought the young girl, I'm only overreacting. Perhaps I can just make this sickness go away. I can will it back inside and go home. Nothing is wrong.

I'm not going to suffer.

The doctor arrived with his diagnosis. The girl fidgeted nervously as the serious sounding word assailed her psyche. Even as she forced down her fear, her family could sense her anxiety.

They looked at her, and she at them, and there was fear. As a worshiper trusting her deity, she would have to trust these doctors.

They will make me well, she repeated to herself as she wandered through alien corridors in her wheelchair. I will be fine.

As the days passed, the young girl grew more feeble. An endless strand of nurses cycled in and out

and in and out. A blur of family and friends took turns sitting in the chairs encircling the room, exchanging worried glances and head shakes. All of the heat had left her cheeks, the color had drained from her body, and when they spoke to her, she was always slow to answer. When she had entered this place, the day was warm. Now her company shuffled in in heavy coats, their skin dry and their noses cold. She fell in and out of sleep spontaneously, her dreams the only alleviation from the nightmare of reality.

Her once firm grip on optimism trickled away with each drip

wasting away in the indention of her hospital bed. She stopped trying to stay conscious between morphine drips, the awning of her eyelids offering her a brief sanctuary from her demons. The doctors were still unclear on the nature of her condition. She hardly cared. Food that was once delicious turned to sand in her mouth. Steps that were once easy to take now seemed like uphill marathons. Jokes that were once funny fizzled away as dust motes caught in the fibers of her ear canals. The young girl was totally devoid of what she had once held so dear; Hope.

And then it happened. She drifted away into a light slumber, erratic flickers of television light cutting through the darkness

ed. And though her body felt fragile, she was stronger than she'd ever been before.

There was once a young girl with an effortless life. Her story had ended. The months that followed were plagued with weakness and challenges, but she remained undaunted.

A new fire had been kindled in her soul, and she loved life more than she ever had-ever could have. She loved the serenity of leaning against her grandmother, rocking gently on a wooden porch swing. The weather beyond the window pane, changing daily and

-------------------"And then it happened. " -------------------of IV fluid. Bruises and needle pricks dotted her withering arms like litter on a highway. The hope that was once strong and whole and prominent had wilted along with her collection of dying getwell-soon flowers. She lost count of the days as they turned into weeks, and the strength of her family seemed to deplete along with her. She was a lame, molting bird stuck on the floor of her cage.

As the constant tests and probing continued, the young girl fell more out of touch with her body. The weight peeled away and left her as a pile of bones,

of the room. Suddenly, she was looking at herself. She saw a gaunt, pale figure lying there, motionless between its stark white blankets. It was still. It would never run again, or feel the yellow sun, or turn to face its lover and laugh or cry or sing. It was dead. It was in some different land now-a land the young girl wasn't quite ready to visit.

She opened her eyes, the sounds of her family's conversation snapping into existence like the sudden schism of a guitar string.

I mean, if they don't do something soon, she'll die.

The girl felt heat rush from her cheeks to her toes, and her cracked lips parted with urgency. I want to walk, she said. Give me food, she plead-

amazingly. A box in the kitchen missing a panel, with white kittens balled up inside. The creaks in the floor as she shuffled slowly along, her bare feet telling secrets to the smooth wooden panels. The giggle of a child left to play with his sibling. The soft tweets of birds lit in the trees, or the distant howls of hunting dogs, wandering through a nearby forest.

She had gained a love for all the things she had nearly lost, and never knew what love she had for all those things. Even the monsters in her dreams.

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BUNE l,\JLLEl, TIUN #2 -------------------BY: JOSH KILGALLION --------------------- - ' ART SHOW

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MY CANCER

-------------------BY: SHANNON WHITE

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---MENTION ---HONORABLE

These gifts that bring the milk of life Also bear the seed of death It sickens me To know each breath of mine Keeps it alive Every beat of my heart Pumps into it; anew My flesh is it's flesh My DNA made it It is mine Yet I wish it was not!

It feeds on me I am starving It is living on me I am dying I must kill it, It must kill me Only fate can decide And she has better things to do For now

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BLINDS

-------------------BY: CIARA WILLIAMS -------------------Blinds, always had a thing for blinds.

The cheaper and grayer- the better.

More dust, I like that.

Like squirrels, blinds are my spirit animal, Just yank the cord/tail hard and just-so Watch them tear upwards, climbing.

Like slivers of glass, You have to tiptoe around their hostile feelings.

Nothing is more gratifying Than watching the zip-lining, the jacking up of their skirt.

The diagonal incline that they exert, Like a mini-skirt askew, legs, they exhibit so much.

Blinds, the neurosis of the window.

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SIT STILL -------------------BY: JESSICA MARTIN -------------------I I \

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THE ~U~\IBUY ------------------- BY: PAMELA VEST -------------------I I \

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PORTSMOUTH

-------------------BY: KORTNEY JEWELL

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We are going to get out, We all scream loud in unison, We are going to be, Different, Better, Stronger, More determined, Than the ones that came before us.

We are not going to be stuck in the town surrounded by a floodwall, a wall that shows how the city used to be something great.

We make escape plans that lead to nowhere, But we stay optimistic, We tell ourselves in a lower volume: One day I am going to break free.

One day I am going to go beyond this river city, and I am going to go someplace new.

A place where you can find, Opportunities, Happiness, Beauty, More life We wait for something, and nothing happens.

Days turn into weeks, weeks turn into months, and months turn into years.

And still we stay right here, Drowning, suffocating, dying, Our escape plans never go as planned, and we walk around not knowing where we are going, and we search for an exit sign that we never find.

We let the Appalachian Mountains close in on us, and keep us forever.

We become Statues, Moving perfectly still, As we watch the next generations do the same.

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~UN NE~TIUN!:,

-------------------BY: ANNA STEVENS --- ---------------,-----,

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As a child my shyness kept me from making connections.

Writing poetry became a means of communication. It helped me make connections to family and friends. I was referred to as the "quiet child" and there were questions in hushed tones of me being developmentally delayed. I rarely spoke. Meetings between my parents and teachers occurred frequently. I was pushed into playgroups and inner circles by well-meaning teachers. They all thought they could unlock the enigma that was my elementary self. I read, read, read to escape.

I am young. I am apart. I am set aside. I see my cousins making connections with my ailing Grandmother. She makes them tea and invites them to soar on the porch swing with her as she tells them dirty jokes and loves their freckles and pats their heads. She feeds them old Christmas cookies from her blue tin. I hide in the flower garden when I visit and pull petals off roses, imagining I am her favorite.

I start 5th grade in that same anti-social haze. Puberty starts.

My body and my mind are at war. Mrs. Altman comes into my life. She is a reader. I am a reader. As she reads aloud to our class, she gives us a blank piece of paper. She wants us to draw ourselves as part of the story. I write instead. She wants us to

imagine we are Bilbo Baggins on a treasure hunt or imagine we are Thorin Oakenshield as he leads his Dwarven company. I imagine I am Gollum instead. He and I are alike. I turn my paper in and when she sees written words instead of a hasty crayon drawing, she smiles. Perhaps she saw herself in me in that moment.

She takes me under her wing and she gives me private instruction.

I turn my scribbling into the patterned speech that is poetry. She submits my Gollum poem to the Evening with the Arts council. I am astounded that you can speak with pen and paper, without oral explosion, and people will still listen. For the first time, I have a voice. I am selected and pulled out from the masses. I win a yellow ribbon with the words "Superior Author" on it. In my head, the connections start.

I spend a sleepless night writing all the things I ever wanted to say about my Grandma Kate. I talk about her red-framed bifocals and how the color reminds me of the roses I pull the petals off of. I talk about the smell of her tea and her laugh when she tells her grandkids a naughty joke. I talk about the brown spots on her skin that remind me of landmarks on a treasure map. When I give her the poem, everything changes. She cries.

She frames it. She puts it on her

bedside table. When I visit, I still want to hide in the flower garden but I have made a connection now. I walk toward Grandma Kate as she rocks in her swing.

The poet in me makes this a tangible thing and I imagine a sea captain's rope that I use to pull myself to her. I sit by her and she grabs my hand and kisses it. I munch on stale cookies from that blue tin and sip overly-sweetened tea. We have no need for words in this moment. We are connected by the poem.

I begin writing poems with furious passion. I have a voice.

I have a way of communicating.

an Olympic gold medal. Words are my nourishment and I have never felt more alive. I win award after award for my poems.

They are published in the school anthology and I feel the pride of accomplishment.

I start high school. Using poetry as a means of communication has made me outgoing. I audition for Mixed Chorus and make it. I try out for the Quiz Bowl team and I make it. I write in the night time. I write in the day. I write poetry until my Dad tells me he has cancer. Then I can't write anymore. I hold a pen. Nothing comes out. I have writer's block in its worst form. When an assignment is due for poetry class, I write silly rhyming nonsense about nothing

exist. There is no joy in the black hole that has become my life. I revert to my elementary selÂŁ I withdraw and begin to speak less.

No one has the right words and although they try, they only succeed in fueling the anger ofloss. My friends move on and leave me. My old liberators, pencil and paper are still there but are just ornaments of the past full of memories that I simply can't revisit.

Three months after my Dad dies, my niece Peyton is born. In her I find what I've been seeking. The void that pen and paper use to fill is overflowing with her innocence. She finds all the

-------------------"I am young. I am apart. I am set aside. " -------------------Everyone reads Grandma Kate's poem and everyone asks me to write something for them. I have an outlet for all the words I've always wanted to say. Nanny gets a poem about her Indian heritage. The seasons get a poem about their beauty. My mother gets something more than a card with a generic message. I write a poem about myself. My teachers have found a way to connect with me. I start answering questions.

I am relatable. I am significant.

I find the courage to enter the spelling bee. I come in second and win a dictionary engraved with my name and feel like I won

because I feel nothing. It takes me 6 years to start writing again.

That's when my Dad tells me that he has only 6 months to live and I have to have an outlet for all the emotion before it boils me from the inside out. Words turn to poems and life turns to shit. I write out my inner most thoughts. I write about devastation. I write about what my Dad looks like as the cancer morphs him into a hairless skeleton. I write about secret tears in the night. I write about what if feels like to see someone you love be in incurable pain. I am connecting to death.

He is a terrible master.

My Dad dies two months before I turn 21 and I murder my pen and bury my paper. I find that I can no longer do anything but simply

pieces of my heart and she glues them back in place. I find that I want to write about all the things that make her amazing. I pick up my pen but only find the time to scratch a few words before she cries for a bottle.

Fourteen months later her sister Willow is born. Spending time with my nieces solidifies my heart. I create elaborate poems in my head about the world they exist in, magic turtles and imaginary dinosaurs that they leave animal crackers for in the windowsill. I want to write that the light of their existence is my favorite type of warmth and

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about how their eyes are the same blue as my Dad's. They run here and there and I have to race to catch up. There's just no time to write it down.

Years fly by in a whirlwind and I forget the way a pen feels in my hands. I tell Peyton and Willow that I love them but those words aren't sufficient to express exactly what I feel. I want to write the feelings behind the words down. I want to capture what it was like to be their aunt when we they held my hands and stepped into the Atlantic Ocean for the first time. I want to write down how they look with ice cream smeared on their faces which seems to be the purest form of joy for a 7 and 5 year old.

There's just not any time.

They are just 10 and 9 when they have childhood snatched away from them. My sister becomes addicted to drugs and abandons them. I fight hard for 2 years to make them mine. What other choice do I have? Some days are hard. Some days are worse than that. My old self comes back to haunt me. I feel inadequate. I worry about connecting to them. I forget about poetry. I have nightmares but in the stillness I feel that I am doing the right thing. I am rescuing them. They are rescuing me.

A year passes. Routines are established. We rush back and forth between softball, soccer, volleyball, and basketball. I work

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60 hour weeks to pay for the children that aren't biologically mine.

I have all the responsibilities of motherhood with none of the accolades. There are no Mother's Day cards to praise me for the job I do day in and day out. It feels just like drowning and that makes me feel so very alone. I am forced out of my job because my boss can't understand that I am striving to be everything at the same time.

I am trying to make our lives better. I want to set an example of what they should strive to.

I want them to want more, do better and be better than the example set by their mother. I start college with the same nervous ideology that I have when I try something new. I begin to write for college. I start on papers in August that are due in December that have to be 10 pages long. I start weeks early on a History paper. A parent would understand. It's hard to find time. The pen feels good in my hand and inside me stirs the beast. It likes being fed even if is just a steady diet of facts.

I start to play with words again. I speak them into patterns as I drive to college each day.

When I have free time I jot those words down and suddenly I'm writing poetry again. I write for Peyton. I describe her stubborn nature and her brutal honesty. I talk about her ability to see the good in everyone. I talk about how she makes me laugh. I write for Willow. I describe how she's a friend to everyone. I talk about her love of animals and her dreams about riding unicorns. I write about how she worries me the most because she is so like

her mother they could have been poured from the same mold. I tell them how they make me feel about being a parent. I pour out my feelings about game winning homeruns and first ever goals and what's it's like to be the only true thing they have in the world.

I write about the responsibility I have been entrusted with and about how even when it is hard, it is so very worth it.

I take these poems as I write them and put them on cardstock that I spent a careful hour selecting at Hobby Lobby. I put each poem in an envelope and seal it. I write their name on it and I pack it away as a future investment. When I am gone, in the cold lonely hours, they will be able to open each one and read that I loved them more than anything. I hope the words breathe for them. I hope I painted an adequate picture of my love. I can't express my feelings in spoken word in the here and now, because I've never been good with emotion.

Writing opened that door for me.

They will read the words and feel their impact as my poetry spells out just how I felt about them.

They will know me.

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--- - ---------------Myrna Stone is the author of four books of poetry and the winner of several awards, including the 2001 Ohio Poet of the Year Award from the Ohio Poetry Association, the 2002 Dr. 0. Marvin Lewis Poetry Award from Weber--The Contemporary West, two Ohio Arts Council Fellowships in Poetry, and a Full Fellowship to Vermont Studio Center. Her poems have appeared in numerous journals and nine anthologies. On April 16, Stone came to Shawnee State, gave a reading, and discussed the craft of poetry with students in Professor Neil Carpathios ' creative writing course.

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MYRNA ST01\JE

FEATURED POET INTERVIEW ------------------CONDUCTED BY: ZACK BURTON -------------------What, if you can remember, was your first experience writing poetry?

I don't remember the act of writing my first poem since it happened so early. What I do remember is discovering the high of reading poetry sho,rtly before I began writing it.

When I was twelve, my father brought home a book he'd received as a gift entitled One Hundred and One Famous Poems . Since he was already familiar with most of the poems, he gave the book to me.

I was excited by what I read, particularly a poem by Alfred Noyes entitled "The Highwayman," which I felt compelled to read aloud to everyone in my household, even if they didn't want to hear it! When one of my brothers asked me why I liked "that kind of stuff;' I remember saying to him

"because it's beautiful, because I like the way the words sound when I say them, because I'm going to write poems like that!" By the time I was fourteen, I had a little packet of poems that I had indeed written, which, unfortun ately, or perhaps fortunately, were lo st when we moved to our new house in 1958.

What is publishing a poem like?

Well, there are few thrills that compare to seeing your own work in a journal. Somehow--no matter how long you've worked on the poem, how difficult it was to write it, how many revisions it went through, or how you've discounted it because it doesn't match in quality the poem you thought you were writing--when you see it in print your estimation of its value goes up. And if

your poem appears in a major journal, you castigate yourself for ever having thought that it was anything less than wonderful--at least for a while. If you go back to the poem at some point later, you see that although it may be done well, it's imperfect.

The best I can say about any of my poems is that it was the best I could produce at the points at which I wrote it and revised it. Still, I repeat, it's a thrill to get your poems accepted and published. When I read, in my first acceptance letter from Poetry, that they wanted three of my poems, I literally jumped up and down in my kitchen until my daughter yelled at her father, "Come quick! Mom's gone crazy.. :' Yet, in fact, it probably matters less where a poem is accepted than that it IS accepted.

An acceptance legitimizes us in our own eyes.

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What advice do you have for writers who are interested in publishing their poetry?

First, don't send your poems out until you've put them away for a little while. After you've given them a rest, go back and read them again and you should find it's easier to see what needs to be fixed.

kind of poems they're looking for--traditional, or free verse, or both--and what you can expect in terms of response time, publication time (if they accept your work) and what they pay ( often this is not money, but instead a free copy, or copies, of the issue in which your work appears.) Whether you're sending poems by snail mail, email, or using a journal's online submission manager,

ularly if you're submitting to some of the better journals. Be patient, for it routinely takes anywhere between three and six or more months to receive a response to your submission. Most of all, just keep at it. You'll get published only if you haven't given up trying to get published.

-------------------''/ was excited by what I read, particularly a poem by Alfred Noyes entitled "The Highwayman," which I felt compelled to read aloud to everyone in my household, even if they didn't want to hear it!''

-------------------After you've revised them yet again, research the journal market and choose those that appear to be publishing poems that are similar in style and content to yours. Nearly all journals have a presence online with a page that offers submission guidelines. This normally tells you, as a prospective contributor, what

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make sure that you follow to the letter the instructions for submitting, which may vary from journal to journal. If they request three to five po ems, send th em three to five-not two, not six. Always read the poems in their archives to see if your work fits in . Always send your most-finished work.

And don't get discouraged if you're not published quickly.

It is likely to take time, partic -

Personally, I'm a fiction writer. Poetry strikes me as a completely alien topic, even when I'm makingforays into writing it. As a poet, how would you de.fine ''poetry?"

The sh ort answer: the "mother" of all literary arts (imagine our prehistoric

ancestors gathered around campfires where a storyteller, or a shaman, is reciting words and phrases in an incantatory manner as a means of persuasion.) The long answer: rhetoric that means to seduce and convince, to stun and sway, and to finally carry the listener, or the reader, to some higher level of personal or societal awareness. With the exclusion of prose poetry, nothing else looks like poetry on the page. And nothing else is quite as demanding to write because of poetry's compression, and because of its dictates to be both somehow new and fresh. A poem is an artifice from beginning to end: the white space between stanzas, the space that follows the last word in each line, the line that ends with one meaning that's then entirely subverted by the following line, the use of elevated language, the use of plain-spoken language, the use of fabrication to tell the truth, the use of met-

aphor and simile as devices to exaggerate and illustrate and elevate the ordinary into the extraordinary. Great poetry, I believe, can come from a poet only when he or she is willing to plumb his or her own deepest concerns, which are, by and large, concerns all of us share as humans. Great poems can make you weep, rattle you intellectually, and force you to see the familiar in a strange and new light--and all of this is often accomplished in abbreviated lines on a page or less.

What has been the most enjoyable experience you've had as a writer/poet?

Conversely, what was your greatest struggle?

I loved writing the persona poems that are included in my third book, The Casanova Chronicles. Researching the lives of Alba Ballard and her family, and Giacomo Casanova and those he interacted with, and getting into their heads was both fascinating and fun, and though confined as I was to the facts of their

lives, I found it pleasurable and enlightening to speak in their voices, particularly during their most outrageous and melancholy moments. On the other hand, it was often painful to write the poems about my father that appeared in my last book, In the Present Tense, as he slipped inexorably into age-related dementia. Yet, I had no choice but to write them since he, his decline, and my efforts to help him, occupied so much of my mind.

Are there any rituals or habits you engage in while writing?

Actually, there aren't. I'm pretty much ready to go when I sit down to write because I know what theme or obsession I'll be writing about. If there's research to be done, I've already done it. So, it's just a matter of putting my seat in the seat of the chair and getting on with it.

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-----------------MYRNA STONE -------------------YES Flatterer, little arbiter of assent and admission, you cross our lips with a sycophantic lisp that Eve heard first from the mouth of the trickster, that maw of tongue and jaw, of japery and spleen, into which she looked just once, perceiving nothing of consequence.

"Yes" was originally published in River Styx

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-------------------MYRNA STONE -------------------NO

That word which comes to us as an adjective from Old English pared from none, as in not one and no one, or from Middle English as a noun meaning without, or refusal and denial; endemic in the mouths of children, who parrot it early and late; in the mouths of mothers and fathers in their last dotage; in the sly mouths of friends and lovers where truth and deception mingle and marry; word of accusation, anger, argument, warning, heated and cooled, as human as the lips through which it passes, or the tongue that shapes it, fleshy lappet that rises on the n and falls on o, just as yours does now, clever and quick, declaring no, no, no one else, not now, not ever.

"No" was originally published in Quarterly West

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-------------------MYRNA STONE --------------------MAYBE Who first spoke you, word of ambiguity and whimsy?

You are loathe to commit, the very soul of supposition while escaping our tongues.

From you mayhap, mayhem, the buzz of be and the tonic of illusion that untethers us from our own lurid histories of befuddlement and failure.

And if we are your infatuates, gullible and fractious, finding farce and foolery irresistible, we are likewise your abettors plucking petals from daisies, your idlers, dreamers, lovers who never fail to hear in you, huckster, your whiff of hope.

"Maybe" was originally published in River Styx

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-------------------MYRNA STONE --------------------SWEET NOTHINGS You're lickerish, he whispers, my own lickspot, my slick licklog of love, confirming how I besot the man all over again, forty-one years into it, and prompt a whacked-out loquaciousness fit only for bedtime ears. "You know what you're saying, don't you?" I ask. Who cares? I adore every inch of you, he says, you're my bright spot, my nightspot, my crockpot oflove! What crackpot listens to this sort of drivel? Yet under his sexedup rhetoric is a tender psyche profoundly vexed by our communicational schism. You're taking on truly mythic proportions, he groans, making light of my thirty-pound weight gain, my droll ensemble, my dietary woes, let my lips patrol your perimeter, my tart little French kumquat!

What right-headed woman wouldn't take a swat at this twaddle? I'll tickle your fancy, I'll troll for you, he vows. Such plucky talk, such bull!

"What you need is a shrink, and a Rorschach;' I say, "before I capitulate:' Watch me, I'll knock it out, I'll nail it! Anything for you, my sugar pit, he spits, he jives, until the waiter puts a stop to it.

"Sweet Nothings" was originally published in Cimarron Review p.2i

HELIOTROPES

-----------------BY: ZACK BURTON -------------------r----, 1-- .,,

a:o

0 -I

:co

U>z ------HONORABLE

MENTION

).28

BLACK FRIDAY

Clay wakes up sometime around midnight- thirty and can see three silhouettes outside the window, all of them making the lax up-and-down arm movements that indicate smoking. He gets up and heads to the door, which is cracked. "You guys need something?"

"We're here to kill you:' He stops peering through the crack and opens the door wide. "You must be looking for my brother."

There are three of them, all tall, pale, and caked in muscle. They come bearing shadowy, looping tattoos, scarlet contacts, and dyed blonde hair, pacing on the balcony just outside the porch light's penumbra. Clay stands aside and reads the jagged, gothic script penciled in each of their backs as they file in : "Orlok," "Edward," "Lord Ruthve n." They drop down in the beanbags throughout the living room and kick their flip-flops across the floor.

Clay passes out four mugs and starts pouring coffee, but nobody drinks . He sits down at the table as Lord Ruthven removes his sunglasses, revealing two lava -red eyes. 'Tm not Garth;' Clay says, withdraw-

ing his wallet and flicking his ID at them. Orlok hands it to Ruthven and he holds it under the bare light bulb. "No glasses. No facia l hair;' Clay points at his head. "No sombrero."

Edward interjects. "Maybe you got contacts:' "I did. But that was in the fifth grade. And after that I got surgery." He puts the coffee up to his mouth to make sure it's not too hot, but it is and he puts it back down.

Ruthven stops looking at the license and puts his sunglasses back on. "Where you boys from?" Clay asks.

"Listen, we're here to see your brother." This is Edward, the biggest of the three. He's not scared. He's got his fin gers tight around the handle of his coffee mug. "We're not here for you to make conversation with us."

"You don't want to talk?" Clay crosses a leg and dumps another spoonful of sugar into his mug.

"Well, Garth isn't here:' The moment he says it, they stand up and draw glocks from their waist bands- perfect unison. He clears his throat. "But he will be. In a half-hour or so:' Ruthven pipes up. "You just buying yourself some time, white boy?"

"Of course not." He drinks from his mug and doesn't flinch

even though he's pretty sure it steams some of the skin off his lips. "Please sit down. Drink your coffee:' Orlok and Edward both make eye contact with him for at least a minute and finally lay off when Ruthven sits down.

Clay's thinking they're pretty new at this, so he goes ahead and asks how old they are.

"Where's he at?" This is Orlok, who looks and sounds the youngest.

"Getting some groceries;' Clay says. "Seriously, how old are you guys? Twenty? Nineteen, maybe?"

Edward gets up and turns on the TV. "Getting some groceries? At one in the morning? Come on, now.''

earth under a green night vi sion haze. Switch to an ad for Acqua di Gio by Ralph Lauren, "Personal Jesus" ringing out in the background.

Clay realizes he might be grappling at air, but he snags something. Looking away from the TV, he makes eye contact with Orlok that is almost immediately broken.

"How old are you?" he asks, a bit softer, trying to reestablish a connection. Orlok's skin is almost transparent, and the blue veins hidden around his temple clench a bit as he turns and initiates eye contact again.

"Seventeen;' he says. "You got a problem, white boy?"

Ruthven glances at him from an adjacent beanbag.

together then brushing their teeth and then going to bed.

It's like some sort of old bored couple syndrome. There's the occasional murder or robbery or gunpoint incident, but that stuff's been happening since years ago and it's got to the point where the various ordnances hidden throughout the house-the shotgun in the mattress, the SMG in the toaster-are starting to collect dust.

The hills rise like black sine waves on both sides of the river.

The two of them walk down Cloister Avenue, where the sidewalks are still sidled up to

-------------------"We're here to kill you."

-------------------"We're out of to othp aste.

I was taking a nap and heard you guys." Clay goes to stand up, but they all flinch in the direction of their waistbands and he stays put. When he picks up his mug next, he drains it to the last drop without thinking, hand shaking.

Orlok watches him closely.

"We don't really sleep full nights anymore," Clay says.

"No fucking shit." After flipping through the channels for several minutes, Ruthven motions for Edward to keep it on Animal Planet. Naked mole rats are scurrying through the

"No, no problem," Clay says. W hat wo uld Garth say in a situation like this? This is unp recedented. He uncrosses his legs, takes a deep breath.

"Garth will be back in a couple minutes. You can kill him then. Where you from?"

THANKSGIVING

The two of them moved in about a year ago. Fourth ward-that's the bad part of town . Clay feels like the sirens and gunshots fulfill some sort of hunger in Garth, and while that used to be the case for both of them, the drama is starting to wear off and in all honesty every night is ending with them just playing rummy

puddles from last night's rain.

"You're my brother;' Garth says, circling around on the bike.

Buying a car's out of the question, so Clay walks in the center of the circle with a stuffed laun dry basket in his hands. "Brother, brother, brother:' "You should be carrying this;' Clay says. "I should be on the bike:' "Brother, brother, brother."

He repeats it with every revolution. "You know what we should do? We sho uld move into a better apartment. There are lofts around here with footthick cement walls and-hey, listen-up to two bedrooms."

p.2S

Clay has sat down the basket to put in earbuds and Garth rides in close to slap them out of his hands. Clay gives him an unflinching grimace. "We can't afford it;' he says, picking the laundry back up.

Their house is a one-bedroom one-bathroom closet down by the river. Slight balcony outside the front door.

Sometimes they take bets on whether or not the water will work-Clay always no and Garth always yes-and that's how most of the spending money ends up in Clay's pocket. When the faucets do man age to produce something, it's iron -smelling and ochre, and when the fridge stopped working, the two switched to a strict diet of Chinese takeout from Arcane Palace down the street.

Garth gets shrimp soup with onion; Clay, mandarin chicken and broccoli on white rice.

Garth lifts his hands off his bike as they approach the Laundromat. "We can't afford it. We have to get through college first;' he says, shouting out into the river.

Clay nods, staring at a pair of briefs. "We have to get through college first;' he says. "We have to make a career for ourselves:' From a distance, the two of them look exactly alike. Up close, however, Clay's gaunt frame comes out and you can see just how linear and pale his

p.30

body really is. Up close, you can see Garth's faint ridge of facial hair. He is vascular, alive, triangular. "We have a career;' he says, hopping off his bike and holding the door open.

Clay shakes his head.

Their towels spin in the dryer. Garth paces on the dirty, sock-ridden floors, gesticulating all over the place as he berates Clay, who has his head buried in a magazine and isn't responding to anything. This is their routine: Garth plays the preacher, Clay plays the choir.

"We have a career." Preach on.

"Where are two degrees in business administration going to get us? We administrate a business. We have all the experience we need."

"We're in debt;' Clay says.

"And if we up our prices we won't be in demand anymore:' "Up the prices . The Supplement will always be in demand." The door clicks open and the two of them turn to see a skinny, frighteningly tall youth enter, hunched and pale in a black hoodie. Garth nods at his brother and jumps on the washer. "The Supplement;' he says, "is more than just a drug. It's an idea . It's what the person who is not you needs to become you."

"This is how you sell it? " Clay asks. Garth fishes through several polo shirts to the bottom, grabbing a yellow prescription box. Hopping down from his perch, he sprints over to the kid and forces it into his hands, staring directly into those dead red eyes and yanking several fifties out from his fingers.

"Don't need to sell to repeat customers;' Garth says as the kid shuffles out. "Besides. Sells itself.

Right?" He smiles as big as his sombrero and Clay looks down at an article on greenhouses.

BLACK FRIDAY Orlok doesn't stop eying Clay from time to time. Clay keeps eying the toaster. A couple minutes down the road, Edward gets up and looks through the refrigerator, Lord Ruthven staring at him. "If this is going to take longer than an hour;' Edward says, 'Tm getting me something to eat:' He opens the door and no light clicks on. No cold oozes out.

"It doesn't work." Clay goes to stand up and get more coffee, but Ruthven and Edward still reach for their guns.

"Think you killed the landlord a couple months ago."

Orlok laughs. The two others look at him. There's a long, heavy pause where a man on the TV talks about the various minutiae involved in an underground-dwelling rodent's nightly routine. Then Orlok says: "We go to Northwest. You know about Northwest, white boy?"

Clay folds his hands in his lap.

"I went to Northwest:' "Oh ho ho;' Edward says. ''A white boy from Northwest.

How'd you make it out?"

Ruthven maintains a palpable silence over on the farthest beanbag. Clay clears his throat. "I had a wonderful older brother. And a lot of money." Edward is now scouring the cabinets for anything other than cobwebs, but Orlok appears to be listening. "I had many scholarships to private schools. My parents sent me to Northwest to toughen me up:' "And did it work?"

"I'll leave that judgment up to yoU:' The television and the various green things depicted on it are reflected as red in Lord Orlok's crimson contacts. Finally, he speaks. "Do you know how the Fourth Ward Vampires came to be? " he asks.

Edward returns to his beanbag and both he and Orlok silently watch the television. "It's secret knowledge, as far as I'm concerned;' Clay says.

"We were not nocturnal hunters. We were prey. Mice who scurried on the groun d ¡" Ruthven is also glued to the TV. "And we tried to bury ourselves in dirt in order to hide from the hunters. We bought their clothes, listened to their music, fucked their girls. But we were creatures of the light and they were creatures of the night, and it was impossible to truly cross the gap:' He adjusts his sunglasses. Commercials now.

"You're talking in metaphors;' Clay says.

Ruthven's never-ending ropes of muscle cinch up. "We couldn't become black, so we became big. Is that straightforc ward enough 1or you.?"

Everyone takes a sip from their cup, except for Clay, who's dry. When he makes his next attempt to stand up, he's surprised to find that they don't move, and he feels his heart turn waxy. Their secret is his; they are the guests now. He takes a final look at Orlok before getting to his feet and going over to the corner where the Mr. Coffee's plugged in. "Out of sheer irony, I'm guessing you take it black?" he asks.

"But of course;' Ruthven says, part of the family now.

Clay gets the submachine gun from the toaster and shoots them all through the left temple within a second.

Orlok, last to go down , actually has time to react, looking away from the TV and getting hit in the eye instead. Clay imagines ruby shards of contact pressing into the hippocampus, feels something rising in his throat, and goes to grab the all-purpose cleaner.

THANKSGIVING It occurred to them to start selling the Supplement sometime around last year. In a place like the Fourth Ward, it was practically unattainable, like precious gems panned out of New York City sewers, and the FWV were like miner forty-niners. They started out pretty unique, the only harmonious aspect the~r skinny whiteness, but over time, other traits got set in stone: bleach-white hair, the red con-

tacts, tattoos set in Blackadder ITC. They stopped coming out during the day. When they did, they stayed in the shade until the sun set and then rose out of their underpass to go rob convenience stores and assert themselves as dominant members of the community.

Garth started out selling in hotel rooms. Days Inn off exit 5 was a favorite. He kept Clay behind a curtain on the opposite side of the room and only brought him out if things went south. "Let me just grab my purse." That was the code word. Clay would draw the curtain aside and before the poor kid vampire could even widen his red eyes he'd hit the floor, silenced shots whipping around the room. The bodies got blamed on the FWV. ,, "We should buy Ray-Bans, Garth says, pushing an orange-tinted Big Lots cart do~n the sidewalk. "Suits. Goodwill, you know? Dress sharp a~d act sharp." This is the business sector of town. Save-a-Lot, Aldi, Taco Bell, all under the shadow of the overpass and with various pop machines locked up in cages out in front. Here there be monsters.

Clay shakes his head. "You're such a tool:' 'Tll tell you who the tools are:' He points at a group of white figures shuffling around up ahead, never leaving the

p.31

shade. The overpass reaches up for at least five stories and stretches east and west for miles.

"They think their fake muscles make them stronger than us:' "Watch yourself, Garth:' He pushes the cart faster and eventually jumps on the back of it, flying downhill and under the overpass. Carrying the laundry basket, Clay jogs behind him as he lets out a long, sleep-penetrating wail at the dozing figures, red and bloodshot eyes blinking open.

"Wake up, everybody. What are your names?" Scooting along on the cart, he circles around them, reading tattoos. "'Mor bi us; 'Orlok' -the hell kind of name is that?-and 'Vlad' over here."

Clay sees Garth's expression darken and crosses over the sea of discarded cups and used condoms and syringes to the sunny side of the overpass.

The latter, tallest and veiniest, stands up and makes eye contact with Garth, who adjusts the sombrero. "Addressing us by our designations now.<" Vlad says, not blinking even in the sunlight.

"What are you gonna do? " Garth says, circling him on the cart. "Can't bite the hand that feeds you. You're still babies.

Stuck on our formula:' "We're going to shoot you:' At least a dozen white faces move in the highway's eclipse. Vlad's neck

p.32

rises and falls like a cobra's hood.

"And drink the Supplement out of your blood:' "Garth;' Clay says from over in the light as his brother goes to open his mouth. "Come on, Garth:' Inches apart, Garth and Vlad stare at each other for a few final moments, then separate, the FWV initiates settling back to sleep around them. Garth wheels into the light and resumes walking home. ''And look at that. We forgot toothpaste:'

BLACK FRIDAY "Of all the pieces of shit in the world, you are chief," Garth says when he walks in, sombrero askew, Dollar General bag of toothpaste in his hand.

"Can I not leave you for three minutes without you shooting like five people?"

Clay's down on the floor scrubbing at bloodstains. "We need a new career. You can't honestly expect to live like this forever:' "I feel like you give me this speech every day." Garth plops the bag of toothraste down into a beanbag. Brother, brother, brother. You can't tap the soil forever. One day the roots will dry up. You gotta know these things ."

"You're not making any sense.

You're just like them. Metap h ors."

"Live in a place like this and you start to pick up a bit of their disease ." Garth grabs another sponge and gets on his hands and knees to help his brother. Footsteps are cascading up and down the stairs outside. ''Are we really in trouble this time? "

"They were looking for you.

Surprised they didn't pick you up off the street:' 'Tm actually disappointed:' A couple figures start to mobilize outside the window and the doorbell rings. Garth stands up and goes over to the fridge, looking through it even though it doesn't wor~.

"Should we even answer that?

They won't come in."

"They'll just shoot off the doorknob:' Clay awakens with someone slurping blood out of his bullet wound. One of his bullet wounds. Garth is lying up against the refrigerator, his eyes all sclera, sombrero squashed behind his back.

Maybe he's dead. After further investigation, Clay realizes that the door has bullet wounds as well, porch light beams poking through and trickling over the various Fourth Ward Vampires standing around the room. A single yellow dash runs over Morbius, who is the one between Clay's legs.

"Who is Clare?'' This voice goes straight into Clay's ear. .

There's a gun poking right beside it, right on his temporal lobe.

"You shot me;' he says. "If you really wanted to know, you wouldn't have shot me:' "Is she yo ur supplier?" His sense of sight checks out and for a moment he can't see

THANKSGIVING

anything, but he can tell so~ebody's still down there slurpmg.

Somewhere around his upper thigh, almost at his crotch.

There's another bullet wound around his right shoulder, but the pain isn't as sharp.

He holds his breath and speaks. "You guys did y~~r r~search, then. Yeah, yeah. Bnefly, vision returns and he realizes that the owner of the voice is the same Vlad from yesterday.

"She's the supplier:' "Where is she now? Is she a nurse or something? " The gun moves out of Clay's field of vision and he begins to be afraid that they're going to shoot him in the crotch. There's laughter.

He tries to look up at Vlad but his vision swims away again and his shoulder tightens up.

He pukes a little.

"There's no supplement here" he tells them. "Clare has~'t been by in a long time."

His eyes are back on the refrigerator and Garth. Brother, brother, brother. "You guys probably came around after Ruthven and the kids didn't come back, I guess?"

"We'll ask the questions, white boY:' "Well, at least you know the routine." There's more light coming from the direction of the door and Clay tries to point a finger. "Sun's coming up.

Better hustle."

They call them "white boY:' but they're all white. Phenomenally white, in fact.

"It's a stereotyping thing," Garth explains, sitting across from his brother at the local Bob Evans. Garth orders coffee and shrugs away the offer of Splenda and creamer. Clay has the $3 cappucino. "They worship darkness, blackness, gangsta culture. So even though they fake the hair and act like the sun's gonna reduce them to ashes, they still drop that term. White boy."

"A metaphorical white boY:' "Creature of the sun. Look at grass, look at periwinkles, look at those little pink flowers that grow alongside the road: they're all things that people step on.

They all need sun:' Clay wipes some dribbled cappuccino off his smooth chin.

"I don't know;' he says. "I think it's just gangsta baloney:' "It probably is. But still:' This is Thanksgiving dinner and the two of them are almost the only ones in the restaurant. The waitress brings them country-fried steak, green beans, home fries, crepes stuffed with cream and blueberries, bacon, orange juice, a crock of homemade bean soup, refills for their coffee and cappuccino. The two of them clink mugs, indulge. No one meal can be said to be exclusively someone's or the other's; the feast is served like a banquet in a moldering castle, with the food spread out for all within range to eat. An old, probably

homeless man who gives them a lingering glance is offered a bite of crepe, which is withdrawn after he struggles to get up (later, Clay will buy him a whole pint of soup to go).

Garth bangs his mug on the table, demanding coffee by the pot. The waitress grants his wish, backing away as he takes the handle and pours hot liquid straight down his throat. ''Are we shopping tomorrowâ&#x20AC;˘;>" Garth asks.

"Black Friday;' Clay says, and there's toasting again, mug against pot. .

"Black Friday. The Vampires will be out in force:' BLACK FRIDAY

They drag him over to the kitchen table so he's facing the kitchen sink and Garth's slumped figure. This is the part where they break him. "Tell us about the supplier and we'll talk about getting you and Mr. Garth to the hospital:' He pauses and takes a breather. He can see again, but only slightly. "But the supplier's gone;' he says.

"Then we're gonna have a problem:' , . .

By this point hes thmkmg that Garth has bled to death; that is, if he was even alive from the first moment. "N o, no, no;' Clay says. "You misunderstood."

p.33

Looking at the sink, he remembers growing up in the suburbs in a house with a garage and having tax deductible funds, washing the dishes with Garth, who always dried.

The crushing perpetual burn of the water. Fork tines poking fingers. It was a good life: Clay and their mother would plant irises just outside the kitchen bay window and they would come up in spring, purple and yellow and on occasion a very pale peach. He would always question what made the pea~h so unnatural-looking, and his mother would tell him that it's because irises are usually purple or yellow. A two-color plant.

"Get to talking, white boY:' Vlad flicks long white-yellow locks out of his face, presses the gat deeper into Clay's temple.

"You misunderstood;' he tells the Fourth Ward Vampires.

"I used to be Clare. I changed my name after the surgery. I buy the supplement in bulk and then sell it back to you at a premium and no one asks any questions because of the surgery. Because of who I am:• He is panicking. Garth is dying.

"Male, white, whatever:• He coughs up blood.

There's a big long moment of silence as the FWV stand around and look at their endlessly roping, ivory muscles. "So:• Vlad says, "it's just testosterone? You're saying weve been shooting up testosterone.;>"

p.34

Clay nods.

Moments later, the sun rising in the east, clouds slowly acquiring pink and blue elements, Vlad and the FWV load Garth and clay into their van and take them down the highway. There's no rush. They put on a local pop station and one of them sings. With the hospital approaching, Garth starts to shift, blinking a little.

He looks at Clay, who's laying on his back with blood running out of him, probably in shock or thinking of the weight of the confession he's just made.

When they're rolled out at the emergency room door, Garth, despite his multifarious perforations, manages to speak.

"This reminds me of when mom kicked us out:' The automatic door slides open. "She kicked me out. Not you;' Clay says.

"She knew I'd go with you:' The door slides closed.

"She never knew. She almost had a heart attack when I said I wanted the surgery." There are people over them now, white sunflower lights gleaming above them.

"That was because of the bill:' There's coughing. "Did you honestly think she didn't hear about you getting kicked out of the pool for wearing my swim trunks? I think she knew by the time we were four. You would always beat me up:' "It was never about being tougher, or wearing your trunks." Even through the blizzard of beeps and frantic shouts, he can remember the Laundromat, Garth soliciting

the Supplement to some skinny initiate Vampire. "It was about the person who was not me becoming me:' "Sells itself' Clay opens his eyes. The doctors are all men, some wearing white coats that match their skin. Some wear green scrubs and look like Gerbera daisies . The nurses dance around them, handing them things, administering CPR. "I guess we really have to find a career now;' Clay says.

5MALL MAN'5 BUTTLE5

-------------------BY: TYLER BRADFORD -------------------;

ST I \

UNDERGRAD ART SHOW

,cEFIAM I SCULP /

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p.35

A&&E&&IN~ THE DAMA\:IE

-------------------BY: DANE PALLA

-------------------r----, 1-- .,,

a:o

0-1

:co (J)z -WINNER ------

p.36

Everywhere I go, I end up missing that place when I leave. It never fails, even if my experiences in there aren't laced with happy memories. It's just that everywhere I go, no matter if it's for a few hours, a day or a year, I always leave behind a piece of myself, and it's like I can only feel that part of me again ifl return to where I left it. Even then, I can't take it with me, I just have to leave it there, but I can visit it and feel the bittersweet essence of its memory just hanging there.

And so, I walk.

Those words resonate in my head daily, sometimes hourly. They were the parting words Tom said to me when I last saw him, almost six years ago. I can still hear his voice, as though I'm not remembering it, but he's saying it to me new every time, calling to me from somewhere I've never been. Maybe it's that same "bittersweet essence'' of a memory that's brought him back to Nebraska.

"It's good to hear from you again, Sidney,' he said over the phone. In six years, he'd never called. When I did hear from him, it was only a post card here or there, or maybe a letter with a few photographs of him cattle driving in Australia, mountain climbing in Thailand, backpacking the Ivory Coast or navigating the Amazon. This guy, Tom, he lived the dream-at least in his own eyes. He wasn't like you and me. "I'll be coming through Omaha in a few days, Icl like to see you again, catch up. You

can tell me about the family and tell me what I've missed!" He sounded excited. Sure, I thought to myself, I'll fill you in, and watch your critical squints, your wanderlust induced piety that makes you superior to boring conformists like me. I'll let you put me down, because that's what I'll feel when I hear your stories, Tom. "Sounds good. What day?"

"How about Saturday since you're off work?" I guess things haven't changed. "Is the old diner still open on the way out of town?"

"Sure is;' "Great! I'll be heading that way so whadaya say? Coffee at eight?"

"Eight a.m. Sounds good. See you there:' It was our regular spot back in the day. But he wanted other things. I stayed in Omaha. ****** I came to know Tom in my twenties. We were both selling insurance in Indiana and were simultaneously transferred out to the big leagues in Omaha. We didn't have the most experience, but we were confident and hard working. We both had MBAs; His from Georgia, mine from Cornell. Life was working out.

Things just fell into place, just as I was always told they would. My dad was an attorney and he paid for my education so to him, I was a success, and that mattered to me.

On the other hand, Tom was always looking ahead to new levels of success. He was redefin -

ing the word with each new day.

Success-it was never black and white with him. It was his nature to complicate things. He spent too much time thinking. His mind was always in strange places; like the literary works of Jack London and Thoreau. The last thing I wanted to do after graduation was stick my nose in a book, but Tom couldn't get enough of it. Reading was about all he did when he was at work. And the work itself for him was always just a phase-an obstacle he could chalk up to some enduring list of accomplishments. His mind moved from goal to idea, idea to goal, and ultimately to completion. He finished what he started and he started a lot.

We became close but, he always drained me. He had a hard time finding a girl to keep up with him as well.

"Who needs her anyway?"

"Tom, one of these days you're gonna want someone there fo~ you. Someone to have your children and listen to all your crazy ideas. Don't you think long termâ&#x20AC;˘<" He was too big for this world.

"No one's been there for me, Sid:' He would argue. "Not my old man, not my mother, no woman'll be any different. I don't need people, I don't need dead weight:' That was over ten years ago. I kept up with him regularly at first. He couldn't say much about what he saw. He kept it inside-I could read it in his body language, like some old silent

film without breaks between each scene to keep you from getting lost. What he'd seen, what'd he'd done-there was no way he could tell me because there was no way I'd understand. That's when I started to hate him. ****** I'd been sitting there for twenty minutes when a pickup pulled into the parking lot.

Tom hopped out and grabbed a ratty military-style rucksack out of the bed-the essentials of his life. He gave the Good Samaritan driver a wave and walked in. He made the diner a little brighter in the early morning. The smudged windows and cracked lino leum didn't seem to stick out so much. He spotted me and smiled without showing his teeth. I waved him over and stood to shake his hand. He moved in for a hug.

"Sid!" he exclaimed, squeezing me so tightly it hurt my eyes.

"It's great to see you Tom;' I said, unsure of my sincerity. He smelled like distance, nature, time. Yesterday's journey still lingered on his skin.

It wasn't unpleasant, but my wife wouldn't prefer it over my aftershave.

He overpowered the scent of coffee and sausage gravy. He stood back, unleashed a broad smile and I looked him over-his black stubble, peppered with gray. His wavy hair th~t was due for a cut, his stained T-shirt and red bandanna-I imagine he was doing the same to me. Even though it was my day off, I still wore a blazer.

1 was comfortable in them. No doubt he saw my Audi in parking lot on his way in. Whatever he saw when he looked at me, I know it was exactly what he expected, and somehow that disappointed me.

"What'll it be, Sid?" the waitress asks me. Valerie Delgado. She's about nineteen and knows me pretty well.

Her long brown hair and dark eyes make the patrons perk up at first glance, and the way she talks out the side of her mouth, well, it's cute.

Tom interjects, "Dos cafe grande.

Negro, por favor'.' A smile and a wink.

"Cream for me, please:' She doesn't look at me.

"Gracias mujer:' "De nada:' she replies. She'll be smitten if he keeps this up.

Too bad he won't be staying. ****** When Tom spoke, he did so with modesty and humility. Yet, he spoke with an eloquence that conveyed the deepest happiness and sense of adventure, deeper than Io seen in anyone. But first, he sat there all morning listening to my life stories; the same life stories everyone gives him. He's heard it a thousand times before, I'm sure. He asked about my wife, children, jobs, places lo traveled, parents, you name it. We sat through breakfast, then when noon came around I said, "Do you need to get going?" He gave me puzzled look, then a chuckle that rubbed me the wrong way.

"Sid, I don't need anything'.' I get it; you're free and answer to no one.

"I don't even have a cell phone:' He took pride in such a proclamation.

"How do you make it? I couldn't do without mine. Anne's texted me about three times already'.'

"You need to go?" Yes, but I lie.

"Of course not:' So we talked

p.37

past lunch. It's his turn this ~ime_The stories gush out like a nver m spring- an exhilarating rush. ~et, other times tranquil and soothing.

"You don't live until you've slept on the hard ground somewhere, not knowing what's next In the Congo, that first night, I looked up and saw an indescribable display of stars that haunts me, Sid. I can't explain it Io never seen it like that. It was the most terrifying night, and yet. .. I can't explain if' You've already said that, ~om.

"It was incredible:' Please stop talking.

I could not care less ... but, keep going.

I'm gaining a vicarious satisfaction.

"Most people, like you;' Ouch. "they know exactly where they'll be ten years from now. Me, I couldn't tell you where I'll be in a week:'

******

It's dusk when Tom decides to start walking again. Time and time again he alluded to the fact that I should've walked with him, but I tell myself I chose what was best for me, and I'm the better person because I focused on long-term. He would say I'm a slave. He pulls out a book that 1 assume is Bartram's Travels, but he starts to write in it.

"Still soaking up the ancient fairytale?" I jab, but it doesn't intimidate him.

"No, I don't really read anymore, Sid'.' He says, putting the book in his bag, staring out towards the western horizon and the setting sun. I'm pleasantly surprised by this response.

"Well, I do, but not like I use to.

I write my own books now." The words cut to the quick. Like a big, fat

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"F" on my doctoral thesis I've slaved over my whole life. My head goes down to my coffee cup, and I see a reflection that doesn't impress me.

The question unfolds in my head: Who do you really hate?

"Sure you don't wanna walk with me?" Tom asks. A nice thought, but I've chosen my life ... remember?

"Sure you don't wanna ride somewhere?" I ask. He laughs.

"Thanks. I'll walk. I usually do'.' He smiles. "Sidney, thank you.

Send Anne my love ... the kids too'.'

That's a nice thing to say, but they're probably too young to remembe~ him. We embrace again. I walk hrm out the door and watch him walk toward the setting Nebraska sun. He doesn't look back at me.

Back inside, Valerie rings up the bill. She's working open to close and I can see she's "wearing the day'' like Tom. He let me pick up the check without hesitation. He appreciates all the hospitality he can find-it's his livelihood. He solely depends on God, nature and the kindness of others. What else is there?

"I like your friend," she tells m e. "He speaks Spanish."

"He does a lot of things:' "I can tell you two are pretty close to be spending the day in here just talking:' I just smile. She hands me my change and says, "See you around, Sid:' Maybe you will. Maybe I'll drop everything right now and follow Tom wes;; Could I do it? "Buenas noches.

"Yeah. Adios:' I walk out the diner to the edge of the highway and scan the horizon. He's already gone. I'm one month away from forty, and I feel as though nothing's changed since 1 got here. Can I really say that any one thing matters to me now-to my life? Should I feel shame in

asking a question like that?

Somehow I knew that would be the last time I saw or heard from Tom. He had no problem walking away from me and my complacent existence. Probably because he knew it would never change-I'm as predictable as the seasons o~ that setting sun. Or perhaps he believed in the possibility that our paths might cross again. I guess those kinds of things happen when you never know where you're heading from one year to the next.

I get back in the car and check my phone. Anne texts me a grocery list: her favorite coffee, paper towels, some strawberry scented shampoo.

It's time to come back. I pull up to the highway and think of what life would be like if I turned west. I imagine those adventures as if they were my own. It's only a small seed, but the danger of a dream is, if I don't~ it while it's young, it will grow. Still, some would say you can't kill a dream; they're the only immortal things we create. It was a dream that called Tom from his cubical in Omaha and clung to him, wouldn't let him go. It grew until it became, not just a part of him, but his core. I harbor regret for not taking that step with him, but I guess I just didn't have what it took. That's a tough pill to choke down. We each have callings and paths, so we choose the one we think is best, whether it's the one with the most security, or the most uncertainty.

1 focus, tighten my grip on the wheel, and turn east.

ROYAL

-------------------BY: BRANDON CALLIHAN

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