Volume 10 Issue 1

- Molly Pefley, Desolate Encounters, Page 47

The Echo

“He could feel the eyes of the menacing children burning holes into the side of his painted white face.”

“Hi. My name is Jamie, I’m 18 years old,and I’m possessed by a demon.”

- Noah Alewel, My Demon and Me, Page 75

- Jordyn Dees, Erase My History, Page 17

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Volume X, Issue 1

GSHSECHO

10th Anniversary Edition

“Too radical for your mantra of success and unity, better to erase, erase, erase, craft a story so sweetly simple, it makes my teethache.”

Table of Contents Art and Features

10th Anniversary Cover Letter from the Advisor 2020-2021 Staff From A Club to a Class In the Land of Giants Poetry Jam Aria Prince of the Fancy Pants Pollutive Predators Stitchez Vibez Wishful Thinking Hyperawareness Satirecho Krypoknife Funky Frog Gale, dragon of the wind A Stranger in Perspective Playing Faces Poetry Cafe Tiger

3 4 5 10 13 20 25 32 37 38 43 44 45 50 53 54 58 60 61 74

Elke Stelter John Eric Vona The Echo Ally O’Connor Lexi Velte Ally O’Connor Cassidy Hale Lexi Velte Gianna Taravella Cassidy Hale Cassidy Hale Marlee Wittner Marlee Wittner Hannah Levy Sam Berger Elke Stelter Alexandra Gerges Marlee Wittner Emily Chmielewski Grace Beilman Stasi Gerges

Non-Fiction There is Learning 7 Anna Moye Involved in Love Into the Fog, Out of the Fog 11 Cela Sosa 1 Contents

Poetry

A Girl is a Gun claire de noon Erase My History Her Ode to Whitman A Walk With Prose Story Without Resolution Queen Medusa Twenty Guitar Lesson For days as rare as your smile Carnival in Paris The Sun’s Shine Ramblings of a melodramatic daydreamer Memory Lane

15 16 17 21 22 23 27 28 31 33

Emily Pedone Emily Pedone Jordyn Dees Veronica DaSilva Miranda Cornell Marlee Wittner Sophia McGregor Bella Cruz O’Grady Justin White Jaeda Solon

35 Julianna Mauro 36 Anna Corral Gavilan 39 Rachel Madden 41 Grace Beilman

Fiction

Desolate Encounters One Minute White Out Seeking entry-level analyst: An epic catalogue to the class of 2020

47 51 55 59

Molly Pefley Cara Lynn Albert Ally O’Connor Matt Gerasimovich

Scripts The Pitch: Noah4HSM 63 Noah Alewel My Demon and Me 75 Noah Alewel Contents 2

Table of Contents Art and Features

10th Anniversary Cover Letter from the Advisor 2020-2021 Staff From A Club to a Class In the Land of Giants Poetry Jam Aria Prince of the Fancy Pants Pollutive Predators Stitchez Vibez Wishful Thinking Hyperawareness Satirecho Krypoknife Funky Frog Gale, dragon of the wind A Stranger in Perspective Playing Faces Poetry Cafe Tiger

3 4 5 10 13 20 25 32 37 38 43 44 45 50 53 54 58 60 61 74

Elke Stelter John Eric Vona The Echo Ally O’Connor Lexi Velte Ally O’Connor Cassidy Hale Lexi Velte Gianna Taravella Cassidy Hale Cassidy Hale Marlee Wittner Marlee Wittner Hannah Levy Sam Berger Elke Stelter Alexandra Gerges Marlee Wittner Emily Chmielewski Grace Beilman Stasi Gerges

Non-Fiction There is Learning 7 Anna Moye Involved in Love Into the Fog, Out of the Fog 11 Cela Sosa 1 Contents

Poetry

A Girl is a Gun claire de noon Erase My History Her Ode to Whitman A Walk With Prose Story Without Resolution Queen Medusa Twenty Guitar Lesson For days as rare as your smile Carnival in Paris The Sun’s Shine Ramblings of a melodramatic daydreamer Memory Lane

15 16 17 21 22 23 27 28 31 33

Emily Pedone Emily Pedone Jordyn Dees Veronica DaSilva Miranda Cornell Marlee Wittner Sophia McGregor Bella Cruz O’Grady Justin White Jaeda Solon

35 Julianna Mauro 36 Anna Corral Gavilan 39 Rachel Madden 41 Grace Beilman

Fiction

Desolate Encounters One Minute White Out Seeking entry-level analyst: An epic catalogue to the class of 2020

47 51 55 59

Molly Pefley Cara Lynn Albert Ally O’Connor Matt Gerasimovich

Scripts The Pitch: Noah4HSM 63 Noah Alewel My Demon and Me 75 Noah Alewel Contents 2

A Letter from the Advisor “Be yourself.” The cliché of the after-school special.

Ten years ago, I started a job with a lot of wrong ideas. I vowed not to be the crusading teacher who adopts his students or even the teacher who stays after work, unpaid, to help with clubs. For the first year at least, I did my best impression of a teacher. I had rules, I gave quizzes on Fridays, I followed curriculum guides, and I didn’t get close with my students.

But it’s hard to live with a mask on.

My second year at Steinbrenner, I got a creative writing class, and I found that I could loosen up. For awhile, I was two teachers in one: the traditional teacher in English and the irreverent man-child in creative writing.

It turns out, people connected with the latter. All those Boy Meets World episodes were right. Go figure. Students flocked to creative writing. I became the teacher who stayed after school to put on elaborate poetry cafes, the teacher kids confided in. The club became a class. Students opened up to each other, sharing more than just a classroom. The class became a family.

Eventually, I stopped wearing that mask in English, too.

But the lesson runs deeper than be yourself. The lesson is that I am enough. I have value as I am, and being myself lets my students do the same. The people whose work fills these pages have told me in letters and in hugs, in smiles and in tears of the impact I’ve had on their lives. The feeling is mutual.

Thank you, all of you, from the first class to the current, from Bittle to Beilman, for teaching me.

John Eric Vona Advisor

3 Vona

2020-2021 Staff

The Echo, Volume X, is a production of The Echo staff at Steinbrenner High School.

The writing and artwork featured in this issue were submitted by current and past Echo staff members and were anonymously reviewed by The Echo staff members.

The layout was designed in Adobe InDesign 2020 by The Echo layout team.

This magazine was sold for $5.00. Additional funds to publish this magazine were raised through our poetry readings.

Visit us online at steinbrennerecho.com to see more content written and created by members of The Echo and other Steinbrenner students.

Steinbrenner High School 5575 W. Lutz Lake Fern Rd, Lutz, FL, 33558

Editors

Grace Beilman Editor-In-Chief

Madeleine James Community/Ads Manager

Amelia Miller Special Projects Manager

Ally O’Connor Content Manager

Elke Stelter Website Editor

Staff Alexandra Gerges Anastasia Gerges Dylon Martin Sophia McGregor Jaeda Solon Charlese Thybulle Emma Bunkley Nathan Pray Evan Sizemore Alison Spier Hannah Levy Jaden Patel Staff 4

A Letter from the Advisor “Be yourself.” The cliché of the after-school special.

Ten years ago, I started a job with a lot of wrong ideas. I vowed not to be the crusading teacher who adopts his students or even the teacher who stays after work, unpaid, to help with clubs. For the first year at least, I did my best impression of a teacher. I had rules, I gave quizzes on Fridays, I followed curriculum guides, and I didn’t get close with my students.

But it’s hard to live with a mask on.

My second year at Steinbrenner, I got a creative writing class, and I found that I could loosen up. For awhile, I was two teachers in one: the traditional teacher in English and the irreverent man-child in creative writing.

It turns out, people connected with the latter. All those Boy Meets World episodes were right. Go figure. Students flocked to creative writing. I became the teacher who stayed after school to put on elaborate poetry cafes, the teacher kids confided in. The club became a class. Students opened up to each other, sharing more than just a classroom. The class became a family.

Eventually, I stopped wearing that mask in English, too.

But the lesson runs deeper than be yourself. The lesson is that I am enough. I have value as I am, and being myself lets my students do the same. The people whose work fills these pages have told me in letters and in hugs, in smiles and in tears of the impact I’ve had on their lives. The feeling is mutual.

Thank you, all of you, from the first class to the current, from Bittle to Beilman, for teaching me.

John Eric Vona Advisor

3 Vona

2020-2021 Staff

The Echo, Volume X, is a production of The Echo staff at Steinbrenner High School.

The writing and artwork featured in this issue were submitted by current and past Echo staff members and were anonymously reviewed by The Echo staff members.

The layout was designed in Adobe InDesign 2020 by The Echo layout team.

This magazine was sold for $5.00. Additional funds to publish this magazine were raised through our poetry readings.

Visit us online at steinbrennerecho.com to see more content written and created by members of The Echo and other Steinbrenner students.

Steinbrenner High School 5575 W. Lutz Lake Fern Rd, Lutz, FL, 33558

Editors

Grace Beilman Editor-In-Chief

Madeleine James Community/Ads Manager

Amelia Miller Special Projects Manager

Ally O’Connor Content Manager

Elke Stelter Website Editor

Staff Alexandra Gerges Anastasia Gerges Dylon Martin Sophia McGregor Jaeda Solon Charlese Thybulle Emma Bunkley Nathan Pray Evan Sizemore Alison Spier Hannah Levy Jaden Patel Staff 4

From a Club to a Class Originally, The Echo was simply a minor club here at Steinbrenner, named after the Greek myth about Narcissus and the nymph who loved him, Echo. In 2015, The Echo transitioned from a club into the full two semester class it is now. Since this transition, The Echo has taken on more projects than ever before such as establishing its website (steinbrennerecho.com), producing two magazines per year, and yearly special projects that the whole class works on as a team, such as podcasts, flash comics, comedy skits, and poetry cafes. The Echo has now become the most exciting, successful, (and only) cult Steinbrenner has to offer.

Left The Echo staff

of 2013-2014 celebrates a successful planning meeting.

This photo contains editor Cara Lynn Albert, future editors Wendy and Melissa, and future-future editor Matt.

Right The Echo

class of 2015-2016 poses for a photo at the district FSPA convention.

The “Obey” shirts with Vona’s face were designed the year before and were later found circulating through various Goodwills across the country.

Below Behold! The cover of the first ever magazine created as a class. It was a small magazine published in 2015, but it signified a lot of growth as a publication.

Below The Echo class of 2014-2015 poses with the last magazine ever created as a club. The signature face design was used on several magazines and became an iconic symbol of The Echo.

Above To celebrate the end of

the first year as a class, The Echo had an amazing idea: human sized hungry hungry hippos.

To this day Vona asks if we can set aside a day to do this again.

5 Club to Class

Club to class 6

From a Club to a Class Originally, The Echo was simply a minor club here at Steinbrenner, named after the Greek myth about Narcissus and the nymph who loved him, Echo. In 2015, The Echo transitioned from a club into the full two semester class it is now. Since this transition, The Echo has taken on more projects than ever before such as establishing its website (steinbrennerecho.com), producing two magazines per year, and yearly special projects that the whole class works on as a team, such as podcasts, flash comics, comedy skits, and poetry cafes. The Echo has now become the most exciting, successful, (and only) cult Steinbrenner has to offer.

Left The Echo staff

of 2013-2014 celebrates a successful planning meeting.

This photo contains editor Cara Lynn Albert, future editors Wendy and Melissa, and future-future editor Matt.

Right The Echo

class of 2015-2016 poses for a photo at the district FSPA convention.

The “Obey” shirts with Vona’s face were designed the year before and were later found circulating through various Goodwills across the country.

Below Behold! The cover of the first ever magazine created as a class. It was a small magazine published in 2015, but it signified a lot of growth as a publication.

Below The Echo class of 2014-2015 poses with the last magazine ever created as a club. The signature face design was used on several magazines and became an iconic symbol of The Echo.

Above To celebrate the end of

the first year as a class, The Echo had an amazing idea: human sized hungry hungry hippos.

To this day Vona asks if we can set aside a day to do this again.

5 Club to Class

Club to class 6

Anna Moye graduated in 2019 after being in the Echo for 3 years. She served as Editor-In-Chief alongside Kaitlin Burkhart and was the State Representative for Florida State Thespians. She currently attends the University of Florida and is pursuing a bachelor’s degree in Behavioral and Cognitive Neuroscience and Innovation. In her latest memoir, she teaches us that...

There’s Learning Involved in Love

By: Anna Moye

When I was a kid, I loved that my mom was a teacher. My older sister and I would ride with her to school, and get there before all the other students. I would go to my teacher’s class early every day and read books out of milk crates until everyone else wandered in and took their seats; then after school, I would stay in my mom’s classroom helping her grade papers or doing my homework. I feel like all teachers’ kids that attend the school where their parents teach have that holier-than-thou feeling towards all the other kids, always knowing the inner workings of the school and the staff’s first names, but it was more than that for me. All the teachers knew me, even the ones I didn’t have, the principal made an effort to see my outfits every day (I once showed up to first grade in a royal blue, floor length, velvet ball gown), and I picked apples from the trees out front; when anyone else would get in trouble, I was praised and any infractions were laughed over, I had built an audience out of student affairs.

Around the time my sister and I grew out of the school where my mom taught, my younger sister was born, and my mom came home on maternity leave. She would pack us lunches and make snacks for when we came home from school, always wanting to hear about our days while we wanted to play outside with our neighboring cousins. And then, she opened an in-home preschool for the neighborhood kids, so there would be eight to ten children running around whenever I came home from school, prompting me to play by myself in my room or go outside. This was the way for a while. Our whole family was content in the only home I’ve ever known, from the names etched into the front walk, to the clubhouse in the backyard, to the abundance of frogs I would catch with all my friends in

7 Moye

the summer, to the illegal fireworks for Fourth of July that we always had to drive to South Carolina to buy.

And then my dad’s job was relocated to D.C.. So, we moved out of our house and North a few hours, leaving behind literally everything I had ever known. We moved into a house that was way too small for five people and all their things, and everyone began to bicker and fight about everything. It was my third year of three different schools in a row, I failed a class and stopped going by my middle name (without communicating this to my parents), I started to get in trouble and argue with my mom like oil and water, and then we moved again. To Florida this time, because my mom wanted to be closer after a death in the family; so we spent the summer packing and loading and driving and then doing it all again in reverse. It felt different this time, having only been there for two years, but it also felt normal, like I could only stay in one place for so long before I knew I would have to leave.

I started my fourth new school in a row for 8th grade that year, having no background with the people or the culture, and definitely not knowing mosquitos could be so large. This was the year my mom decided she wanted to be a real estate agent. I never saw her anymore; she had constant meetings and showings, always making herself available to her clients in the after-school hours and on weekends. The conflict between my mom and I had only grown larger because of the move, and it didn’t get any better from there. For about two years I never saw her because she was working, and all was well when we weren’t together, but when we were, it was like someone shoved opposing political candidates in the same room.

Then, she decided to go back to teaching, and it wound up being almost the same deal. She left for work earlier than I was awake, and came home for dinnertime, but she never ate with us; always too tired to do anything else, she would take dinner to her room and go to sleep, then leave again the next morning before I woke up.

I started college over a year ago, and since then, my parents have moved again, and my mom and I have not become best friends like everyone always said we would. I could count the times she has called me since I moved out on one hand, and I

Moye 8

Anna Moye graduated in 2019 after being in the Echo for 3 years. She served as Editor-In-Chief alongside Kaitlin Burkhart and was the State Representative for Florida State Thespians. She currently attends the University of Florida and is pursuing a bachelor’s degree in Behavioral and Cognitive Neuroscience and Innovation. In her latest memoir, she teaches us that...

There’s Learning Involved in Love

By: Anna Moye

When I was a kid, I loved that my mom was a teacher. My older sister and I would ride with her to school, and get there before all the other students. I would go to my teacher’s class early every day and read books out of milk crates until everyone else wandered in and took their seats; then after school, I would stay in my mom’s classroom helping her grade papers or doing my homework. I feel like all teachers’ kids that attend the school where their parents teach have that holier-than-thou feeling towards all the other kids, always knowing the inner workings of the school and the staff’s first names, but it was more than that for me. All the teachers knew me, even the ones I didn’t have, the principal made an effort to see my outfits every day (I once showed up to first grade in a royal blue, floor length, velvet ball gown), and I picked apples from the trees out front; when anyone else would get in trouble, I was praised and any infractions were laughed over, I had built an audience out of student affairs.

Around the time my sister and I grew out of the school where my mom taught, my younger sister was born, and my mom came home on maternity leave. She would pack us lunches and make snacks for when we came home from school, always wanting to hear about our days while we wanted to play outside with our neighboring cousins. And then, she opened an in-home preschool for the neighborhood kids, so there would be eight to ten children running around whenever I came home from school, prompting me to play by myself in my room or go outside. This was the way for a while. Our whole family was content in the only home I’ve ever known, from the names etched into the front walk, to the clubhouse in the backyard, to the abundance of frogs I would catch with all my friends in

7 Moye

the summer, to the illegal fireworks for Fourth of July that we always had to drive to South Carolina to buy.

And then my dad’s job was relocated to D.C.. So, we moved out of our house and North a few hours, leaving behind literally everything I had ever known. We moved into a house that was way too small for five people and all their things, and everyone began to bicker and fight about everything. It was my third year of three different schools in a row, I failed a class and stopped going by my middle name (without communicating this to my parents), I started to get in trouble and argue with my mom like oil and water, and then we moved again. To Florida this time, because my mom wanted to be closer after a death in the family; so we spent the summer packing and loading and driving and then doing it all again in reverse. It felt different this time, having only been there for two years, but it also felt normal, like I could only stay in one place for so long before I knew I would have to leave.

I started my fourth new school in a row for 8th grade that year, having no background with the people or the culture, and definitely not knowing mosquitos could be so large. This was the year my mom decided she wanted to be a real estate agent. I never saw her anymore; she had constant meetings and showings, always making herself available to her clients in the after-school hours and on weekends. The conflict between my mom and I had only grown larger because of the move, and it didn’t get any better from there. For about two years I never saw her because she was working, and all was well when we weren’t together, but when we were, it was like someone shoved opposing political candidates in the same room.

Then, she decided to go back to teaching, and it wound up being almost the same deal. She left for work earlier than I was awake, and came home for dinnertime, but she never ate with us; always too tired to do anything else, she would take dinner to her room and go to sleep, then leave again the next morning before I woke up.

I started college over a year ago, and since then, my parents have moved again, and my mom and I have not become best friends like everyone always said we would. I could count the times she has called me since I moved out on one hand, and I

Moye 8

By: Lexi Velte

In the Land of Giants

constantly am in a state of wondering if she even cares that it’s been two months since she even bothered to breathe my name. There has been nothing but abrasion from both ends and I know I am guilty too, but on a quiet Sunday, when I’m sitting in my room, all I want is to see an incoming call from my mom.

To those of you who may not live at home anymore and miss your parents: call them, because no matter how much resenment you may think they hold for you, it’s probably not as bad as you think, and they miss you too.

To those of you who may have questionable relationships with your parents, and are still living at home: fix it now. If you don’t, you will feel a short burst of freedom at the very beginning, but as the months go by, and they don’t call, no matter how much resentment you hold for them, you will miss them.

9 Moye

Velte 10

By: Lexi Velte

In the Land of Giants

constantly am in a state of wondering if she even cares that it’s been two months since she even bothered to breathe my name. There has been nothing but abrasion from both ends and I know I am guilty too, but on a quiet Sunday, when I’m sitting in my room, all I want is to see an incoming call from my mom.

To those of you who may not live at home anymore and miss your parents: call them, because no matter how much resenment you may think they hold for you, it’s probably not as bad as you think, and they miss you too.

To those of you who may have questionable relationships with your parents, and are still living at home: fix it now. If you don’t, you will feel a short burst of freedom at the very beginning, but as the months go by, and they don’t call, no matter how much resentment you hold for them, you will miss them.

9 Moye

Velte 10

Cela Sosa was a part of the year 7 Echo staff. Since graduating, she’s been pursuing an interest in science through college and work. She continues to write for fun, often exploring her background and how her ancestors moved...

Into the Fog, Out of the Fog By: Cela Sosa Two women sit across from each other at a scratched and scuffed wooden table in South Florida. The young woman watches her Cuban grandmother, seventy-two years her senior, wave her old knotted and torn hands around her cup of dark black coffee. While they banter back and forth in Spanish, the only language her grandmother had ever or would ever speak, she notices the light frizzy bounce of her white hair, and the pale Slavic slope of her nose. As Ma’s stories of a childhood on a Caribbean Island came to an end, the fair complexion, hazel eyes, and tall slender frame they shared became starkly obvious to the granddaughter.

She pulled her long staticky mess of light brown hair into a bun and wandered into the kitchen. There she observed the gourd set out to foretell the family’s fortune, the shot of espresso left out for visiting spirits, and the dried branches tacked to the wall in the shape of a broom to shoo away bad entities. Hugging her grandmother goodbye, her mind had already strayed far away from the house and its kitchen. The entire drive home she could not help wondering where she came from, or where her faith came from. Just as they did not look like the indigenous or Afro-Caribbean people from Cuba, their traditions and beliefs did not appear in any Catholic or set Neo-Pagan faiths. The suspicions were there, but the mysteries remained.

Later that night, she laid next to her partner and whispered all the curiosities that plagued her mind. Where her family originated, whether the stories of fleeing from Spain and Ireland were true, if she came from as many sailors as she’d been told, how many generations before her great-great-grandfather made

11 Sosa

their living on a ship, and the list went on and on. Instead of responding with a blank stare, he glanced down with dirty blond hair, light blue eyes, and a reddish beard and replied with questions of his own mysteries. He stared into the dark and pondered the origins of his family name, if it started with that clan of mercenaries and highlanders, whether it was truly Scottish or Irish or if his relatives arrived there from somewhere else. They traded rumors of the different folk they came from, dancing around the possibility they both hoped was true.

The chance that the sturdy farmers and mercenaries that gave him broad shoulders, a muscular build, and iron grit were the Northmen of legends. The chance that the seafaring fighters that gave her strong legs, a witch’s wit, and mind of steel were the Norsemen of sagas. They dreamt of men and women that sailed and stormed out of the fog and towards their fates, unwavering. In their visions, they met the ancestors whose spirits still lived in their bones. When the sun pulled the night apart, they awoke and walked hand in hand into the fog after their barking dogs. The fog was not that of icy mists and barren fjords, it was that of humid swamps and swelteing marshes, but it carried the same chilling glimpses into a more spiritual world.

Sosa 12

Cela Sosa was a part of the year 7 Echo staff. Since graduating, she’s been pursuing an interest in science through college and work. She continues to write for fun, often exploring her background and how her ancestors moved...

Into the Fog, Out of the Fog By: Cela Sosa Two women sit across from each other at a scratched and scuffed wooden table in South Florida. The young woman watches her Cuban grandmother, seventy-two years her senior, wave her old knotted and torn hands around her cup of dark black coffee. While they banter back and forth in Spanish, the only language her grandmother had ever or would ever speak, she notices the light frizzy bounce of her white hair, and the pale Slavic slope of her nose. As Ma’s stories of a childhood on a Caribbean Island came to an end, the fair complexion, hazel eyes, and tall slender frame they shared became starkly obvious to the granddaughter.

She pulled her long staticky mess of light brown hair into a bun and wandered into the kitchen. There she observed the gourd set out to foretell the family’s fortune, the shot of espresso left out for visiting spirits, and the dried branches tacked to the wall in the shape of a broom to shoo away bad entities. Hugging her grandmother goodbye, her mind had already strayed far away from the house and its kitchen. The entire drive home she could not help wondering where she came from, or where her faith came from. Just as they did not look like the indigenous or Afro-Caribbean people from Cuba, their traditions and beliefs did not appear in any Catholic or set Neo-Pagan faiths. The suspicions were there, but the mysteries remained.

Later that night, she laid next to her partner and whispered all the curiosities that plagued her mind. Where her family originated, whether the stories of fleeing from Spain and Ireland were true, if she came from as many sailors as she’d been told, how many generations before her great-great-grandfather made

11 Sosa

their living on a ship, and the list went on and on. Instead of responding with a blank stare, he glanced down with dirty blond hair, light blue eyes, and a reddish beard and replied with questions of his own mysteries. He stared into the dark and pondered the origins of his family name, if it started with that clan of mercenaries and highlanders, whether it was truly Scottish or Irish or if his relatives arrived there from somewhere else. They traded rumors of the different folk they came from, dancing around the possibility they both hoped was true.

The chance that the sturdy farmers and mercenaries that gave him broad shoulders, a muscular build, and iron grit were the Northmen of legends. The chance that the seafaring fighters that gave her strong legs, a witch’s wit, and mind of steel were the Norsemen of sagas. They dreamt of men and women that sailed and stormed out of the fog and towards their fates, unwavering. In their visions, they met the ancestors whose spirits still lived in their bones. When the sun pulled the night apart, they awoke and walked hand in hand into the fog after their barking dogs. The fog was not that of icy mists and barren fjords, it was that of humid swamps and swelteing marshes, but it carried the same chilling glimpses into a more spiritual world.

Sosa 12

Poetry Jam Poetry Jam is a high energy poetry workshop and judged competition where the first place winner gets to go to the District Poetry Jam. Dr. Dillon, Steinbrenner’s media specialist, first brought Poetry Jam to Steinbrenner in 2009. Every year, there is a guest speaker slam poet that guides us with a gentle hand after punching us with their amazing slam poetry. These guests have included Wally B (Tampa Spoken Word Artist), Liz Pressley (Heard ‘Em Say), and Dennis Amadeus (Tampa Poet). The Jam ends with the slam competition, fun improv games, and lots of pizza.

Right Bella Cruz O’Grady

throws up peace signs at a March For Our Lives protest in 2018 where she represented Steinbrenner’s spoken word community. She secured 3rd place at Districts with her piece, “It’s Hard To Be a Patriot”, a poem on the struggle of being a female queer minority and a teenager in America.

Above Jaeda Solon (left), third place winner of 2020, Maya

Farooq (center), second place, and Sophia McGregor (right), first place, stand with their winnings. Sophia McGregor went on to perform her winning piece on her struggle with prejudice in society at the District Poetry Jam!

Left Salvatore “Bean” Tejeda

and Ally Carlin share a congragulatory hug at the District Poetry Jam after winning 3rd place! They were part of the first Echo class from 20152016.

Left The 2019 poetry jam win-

ners, 3rd place Sophia McGregor (right), 2nd Juan “Manny” Diaz (center left), and 1st place winner and three time poetry jam champion Jordyn Dees (center right) with her piece on women’s independence! The winners were taught by guest poet Liz Pressley at an eventful day of poetry, prose, and fun.

13 Poetry Jam

Above Right The amazing Anna Moye, Lexa Mosher, and Jordyn Dees

show off after winning the Steinbrenner literary community’s very first District Poetry Jam first place trophy! Their piece, Said and Heard, was written on the powerful topic of familial abuse.

Poetry Jam 14

Poetry Jam Poetry Jam is a high energy poetry workshop and judged competition where the first place winner gets to go to the District Poetry Jam. Dr. Dillon, Steinbrenner’s media specialist, first brought Poetry Jam to Steinbrenner in 2009. Every year, there is a guest speaker slam poet that guides us with a gentle hand after punching us with their amazing slam poetry. These guests have included Wally B (Tampa Spoken Word Artist), Liz Pressley (Heard ‘Em Say), and Dennis Amadeus (Tampa Poet). The Jam ends with the slam competition, fun improv games, and lots of pizza.

Right Bella Cruz O’Grady

throws up peace signs at a March For Our Lives protest in 2018 where she represented Steinbrenner’s spoken word community. She secured 3rd place at Districts with her piece, “It’s Hard To Be a Patriot”, a poem on the struggle of being a female queer minority and a teenager in America.

Above Jaeda Solon (left), third place winner of 2020, Maya

Farooq (center), second place, and Sophia McGregor (right), first place, stand with their winnings. Sophia McGregor went on to perform her winning piece on her struggle with prejudice in society at the District Poetry Jam!

Left Salvatore “Bean” Tejeda

and Ally Carlin share a congragulatory hug at the District Poetry Jam after winning 3rd place! They were part of the first Echo class from 20152016.

Left The 2019 poetry jam win-

ners, 3rd place Sophia McGregor (right), 2nd Juan “Manny” Diaz (center left), and 1st place winner and three time poetry jam champion Jordyn Dees (center right) with her piece on women’s independence! The winners were taught by guest poet Liz Pressley at an eventful day of poetry, prose, and fun.

13 Poetry Jam

Above Right The amazing Anna Moye, Lexa Mosher, and Jordyn Dees

show off after winning the Steinbrenner literary community’s very first District Poetry Jam first place trophy! Their piece, Said and Heard, was written on the powerful topic of familial abuse.

Poetry Jam 14

Emily Pedone graduated from USF with a Bachelor’s in English & Political Science. She’s since become involved in mental health activism. She’s continued her writing career through a Patreon page, as well as attempting to publish a poetry manuscript she’s completed. She tackles gender roles using the metaphor...

A Girl is a Gun

By: Emily Pedone

How is it that you hold me? Protect, protect; You are dangerous to me. I am not a belt-buckle accessory, a toy pre-packaged and shiny to show your mates but you treat me as such.

How is it that you use me? Gentle, gentle; I am dangerous to you.

You only see me as a witch, a weapon, a womb and you treat me as such.

Men: this ignorance is deadly.

It matters not what I am to you. It matters not what you think.

Whether or not man shoots, I already am all my parts.

15 Pedone

claire de noon

By: Emily Pedone

i can sleep until noon or be up ‘til early mornings, bracing to suffer soon and seeking trauma forewarnings. lovelorn, caustic, and hope -lessly drunk on dramatic tunes, dancing on a tightrope just to get through afternoons. a day in my life is to wait for it to fall apart. it’s when i most flourish and can make my best art. why is it this way? i get through each day dancing in the night with moon, but finding darkness in the light of noon.

Pedone 16

Emily Pedone graduated from USF with a Bachelor’s in English & Political Science. She’s since become involved in mental health activism. She’s continued her writing career through a Patreon page, as well as attempting to publish a poetry manuscript she’s completed. She tackles gender roles using the metaphor...

A Girl is a Gun

By: Emily Pedone

How is it that you hold me? Protect, protect; You are dangerous to me. I am not a belt-buckle accessory, a toy pre-packaged and shiny to show your mates but you treat me as such.

How is it that you use me? Gentle, gentle; I am dangerous to you.

You only see me as a witch, a weapon, a womb and you treat me as such.

Men: this ignorance is deadly.

It matters not what I am to you. It matters not what you think.

Whether or not man shoots, I already am all my parts.

15 Pedone

claire de noon

By: Emily Pedone

i can sleep until noon or be up ‘til early mornings, bracing to suffer soon and seeking trauma forewarnings. lovelorn, caustic, and hope -lessly drunk on dramatic tunes, dancing on a tightrope just to get through afternoons. a day in my life is to wait for it to fall apart. it’s when i most flourish and can make my best art. why is it this way? i get through each day dancing in the night with moon, but finding darkness in the light of noon.

Pedone 16

Jordyn Dees was a three time poetry jam winner and member of the Echo for 2 years. She currently attends FSU, where she is on the staff of Her Campus and the Kudzu Review. She likes to speak about social issues in her slam, where she often talks about how it’s important that schools don’t...

Erase my History

By: Jordyn Dees

History hovers at the edge of all hopes and dreams.

For some that’s a reassuring thought, easy enough to live by, peaceful enough to sleep to.

For others, that reminder is more of a nightmare.

To know that not all villains are so easily spotted, no, half the time they’ve been armed with a suit or a gavel, the scariest costumes are masked smiles and dismissive words.

In my U.S. history class I have learned that independence has often been achieved through exclusion.

Women of color are too taboo for your suffragette journey, the Black Panthers, too messy for your neat stories of civil rights.

The rainbow flag, mental health, Americans with disabilities, all too irrelevant for this curriculum.

Too radical for your mantra of success and unity, better to erase erase erase,

17 Dees

craft a story so sweetly simple, it makes my teeth ache.

Maybe it’s easier.

To put the Founding Fathers up on a pedestal of our own making.

To have us read about your white heroes and their brown servants.

To suggest that the Civil War was about the states, not the slavery.

To keep textbooks white and explanations even paler.

United we stand, but together we tumble into fitful dreams, stories soaked in the blood of the forgotten, in the tears of the lost.

You can’t expunge those stories.

We’re standing right here, primary sources, if you try to erase my history, I’ll make sure you never forget it.

You gave me these rights, you opened the floodgates and you can’t stop the surge, the voices of the disrespected, the disavowed, the disenfranchised.

Black, brown, native, gay, trans, disabled, the buck stops here.

We’re calling you out.

If there’s anything history has taught me, it’s that there is such thing as fact.

But what happens when that truth is spun around enough times, poked and prodded and molded, into something I can’t even recognize?

Dees 18

Jordyn Dees was a three time poetry jam winner and member of the Echo for 2 years. She currently attends FSU, where she is on the staff of Her Campus and the Kudzu Review. She likes to speak about social issues in her slam, where she often talks about how it’s important that schools don’t...

Erase my History

By: Jordyn Dees

History hovers at the edge of all hopes and dreams.

For some that’s a reassuring thought, easy enough to live by, peaceful enough to sleep to.

For others, that reminder is more of a nightmare.

To know that not all villains are so easily spotted, no, half the time they’ve been armed with a suit or a gavel, the scariest costumes are masked smiles and dismissive words.

In my U.S. history class I have learned that independence has often been achieved through exclusion.

Women of color are too taboo for your suffragette journey, the Black Panthers, too messy for your neat stories of civil rights.

The rainbow flag, mental health, Americans with disabilities, all too irrelevant for this curriculum.

Too radical for your mantra of success and unity, better to erase erase erase,

17 Dees

craft a story so sweetly simple, it makes my teeth ache.

Maybe it’s easier.

To put the Founding Fathers up on a pedestal of our own making.

To have us read about your white heroes and their brown servants.

To suggest that the Civil War was about the states, not the slavery.

To keep textbooks white and explanations even paler.

United we stand, but together we tumble into fitful dreams, stories soaked in the blood of the forgotten, in the tears of the lost.

You can’t expunge those stories.

We’re standing right here, primary sources, if you try to erase my history, I’ll make sure you never forget it.

You gave me these rights, you opened the floodgates and you can’t stop the surge, the voices of the disrespected, the disavowed, the disenfranchised.

Black, brown, native, gay, trans, disabled, the buck stops here.

We’re calling you out.

If there’s anything history has taught me, it’s that there is such thing as fact.

But what happens when that truth is spun around enough times, poked and prodded and molded, into something I can’t even recognize?

Dees 18

Will you demonize Colin Kaepernick, too?

Find a way to blame Alan Sterling?

Twist their motivations and their messages into a bedtime story for white America to sleep to?

To sleep through?

We won’t be surprised.

You’ve done it before.

Cassidy Hale was one of the editors of the Echo in 2019. She currently goes to college and works. She likes to paint in her spare time, which has become an increasingly space consuming hobby over quarantine. She loves to paint unique women, just like...

Aria

By: Cassidy Hale

Which of us is worthy of your sanitization?

What message will be the one you teach this generation, the truth?

Or the lies that protect your lullabies from the horrors of my history?

Do me a favor.

If I ever manage to do something that earns me a spot in your textbook, write me as I am.

In all my flaws and controversy.

Or don’t put me in there at all.

19 Dees

Hale 20

Will you demonize Colin Kaepernick, too?

Find a way to blame Alan Sterling?

Twist their motivations and their messages into a bedtime story for white America to sleep to?

To sleep through?

We won’t be surprised.

You’ve done it before.

Cassidy Hale was one of the editors of the Echo in 2019. She currently goes to college and works. She likes to paint in her spare time, which has become an increasingly space consuming hobby over quarantine. She loves to paint unique women, just like...

Aria

By: Cassidy Hale

Which of us is worthy of your sanitization?

What message will be the one you teach this generation, the truth?

Or the lies that protect your lullabies from the horrors of my history?

Do me a favor.

If I ever manage to do something that earns me a spot in your textbook, write me as I am.

In all my flaws and controversy.

Or don’t put me in there at all.

19 Dees

Hale 20

Veronica DaSilva is currently a senior in high school who was a year 8 staff member of The Echo in 2018-2019 before she moved from Florida to Texas. She recently finished the first draft of her very first novel. In an homage to one of her favorite authors, she writes...

Her Ode to Whitman

By: Veronica DaSilva

She lived in Whitman’s world Where the words that etched her lips and caught her ferocious heart made the world shiver In the woods was where she lived Just as he had freely before It was an act of gratitude For the father of free words Her breaths in sync with the winter winds Barefeet, pillowed by the snows And all that was heard Was her contributing verse As she released her yawp for him The winds whistled to join And one could swear he was there too in the depth of the snows A witness to his own creation.

21 DaSilva

Miranda Cornell graduated from Steinbrenner in 2016 after serving as submissions manager for 3 years. She graduated from USF in 2019 with a degree in Secondary English Education and is a teacher at Wesley Chapel High School where she currently teaches English. And now she takes...

A Walk with Prose

By: Miranda Cornell

I have experienced the world with Prose.

A faithful friend by my side whose adventure knows no bounds.

A mental passport full of stamps and ink from enchanting journeys.

A recollection of morals and messages.

I have fiddled with the tie of Alfred Prufrock.

Licked the coffee spoon he measures his days with.

Disturb the Universe and danced in black smoke, Listening to some far off out-of-tune haunting music.

I have eaten the plums from the ice box.

Scowled at the bitter taste, scrunched my nose, Threw a glare at the man who dared To say “so sweet, so cold” as if there was a metaphor.

I have met Victor’s cobbled creation from afar.

Heard it’s wails and groans of excess misery.

Vaguely wondered if society hadn’t rejected it, Would the monster have been more like God’s Adam?

I have mocked Mr. Darcy’s haughty pride. Repulsive.

Stuck out my tongue at his posh, lofty, contradictions.

Knew with every fiber that I could never forgive his pride, For “Angry people are not always wise” or deserve forgiveness.

I have felt the fire and ice from the end of the world.

Heard the scythe of harvest and death whispering.

Sat with Robert on a concrete curb to feel the night’s tears.

Took the road not taken to experience the scenic view.

All of these journeys and more to come, I languish and yearn for striking surrounding silent moments So, that I may reach for a new stamp for my passport Until I’m nothing more than a memory

Cornell 22

Veronica DaSilva is currently a senior in high school who was a year 8 staff member of The Echo in 2018-2019 before she moved from Florida to Texas. She recently finished the first draft of her very first novel. In an homage to one of her favorite authors, she writes...

Her Ode to Whitman

By: Veronica DaSilva

She lived in Whitman’s world Where the words that etched her lips and caught her ferocious heart made the world shiver In the woods was where she lived Just as he had freely before It was an act of gratitude For the father of free words Her breaths in sync with the winter winds Barefeet, pillowed by the snows And all that was heard Was her contributing verse As she released her yawp for him The winds whistled to join And one could swear he was there too in the depth of the snows A witness to his own creation.

21 DaSilva

Miranda Cornell graduated from Steinbrenner in 2016 after serving as submissions manager for 3 years. She graduated from USF in 2019 with a degree in Secondary English Education and is a teacher at Wesley Chapel High School where she currently teaches English. And now she takes...

A Walk with Prose

By: Miranda Cornell

I have experienced the world with Prose.

A faithful friend by my side whose adventure knows no bounds.

A mental passport full of stamps and ink from enchanting journeys.

A recollection of morals and messages.

I have fiddled with the tie of Alfred Prufrock.

Licked the coffee spoon he measures his days with.

Disturb the Universe and danced in black smoke, Listening to some far off out-of-tune haunting music.

I have eaten the plums from the ice box.

Scowled at the bitter taste, scrunched my nose, Threw a glare at the man who dared To say “so sweet, so cold” as if there was a metaphor.

I have met Victor’s cobbled creation from afar.

Heard it’s wails and groans of excess misery.

Vaguely wondered if society hadn’t rejected it, Would the monster have been more like God’s Adam?

I have mocked Mr. Darcy’s haughty pride. Repulsive.

Stuck out my tongue at his posh, lofty, contradictions.

Knew with every fiber that I could never forgive his pride, For “Angry people are not always wise” or deserve forgiveness.

I have felt the fire and ice from the end of the world.

Heard the scythe of harvest and death whispering.

Sat with Robert on a concrete curb to feel the night’s tears.

Took the road not taken to experience the scenic view.

All of these journeys and more to come, I languish and yearn for striking surrounding silent moments So, that I may reach for a new stamp for my passport Until I’m nothing more than a memory

Cornell 22

Marlee Wittner graduated in 2020 after being in The Echo for 2 years. She is currently a journalism major at the University of Florida and is a student photographer for Dance Marathon. She still does creative writing, but not all turn out perfect. Sometimes it turns out to be a...

Story Without Resolution By: Marlee Wittner

I love to read novels.

I drink lots of water I listen to full albums without pause I eat my whole pieces of cake And I read the novel in one sitting.

So the pages of us are blank.

Painfully unscorched and unwritten.

I wish I could finish it.

It wouldn’t matter if the ending was uplifting or crushing, I don’t care if I’m left feeling melancholy or morose.

I yearn to write the end.

To scratch the final pen stroke, To turn to the final page and know That when I close the back cover, I was daring enough to finish the story.

I don’t like pieces.

Half of an apology.

50 pieces of a 100 piece puzzle The chorus without the verses.

A few chapters of the book.

We left things in pieces.

In half-truths.

In one-way glances.

I’m still in half worked-through emotions.

Our book on a cliffhanger.

I’ll never reach the last page.

Because we are in a cold war Of avoidance and buried aggravation, A million questions on my lips, too afraid to escape knowing I will never reach toward yours again.

Though I itch to understand, To ask would be too daunting Because I could light your match, Restart the fire, And you would burn me to the ground.

23 Wittner

Wittner 24

Marlee Wittner graduated in 2020 after being in The Echo for 2 years. She is currently a journalism major at the University of Florida and is a student photographer for Dance Marathon. She still does creative writing, but not all turn out perfect. Sometimes it turns out to be a...

Story Without Resolution By: Marlee Wittner

I love to read novels.

I drink lots of water I listen to full albums without pause I eat my whole pieces of cake And I read the novel in one sitting.

So the pages of us are blank.

Painfully unscorched and unwritten.

I wish I could finish it.

It wouldn’t matter if the ending was uplifting or crushing, I don’t care if I’m left feeling melancholy or morose.

I yearn to write the end.

To scratch the final pen stroke, To turn to the final page and know That when I close the back cover, I was daring enough to finish the story.

I don’t like pieces.

Half of an apology.

50 pieces of a 100 piece puzzle The chorus without the verses.

A few chapters of the book.

We left things in pieces.

In half-truths.

In one-way glances.

I’m still in half worked-through emotions.

Our book on a cliffhanger.

I’ll never reach the last page.

Because we are in a cold war Of avoidance and buried aggravation, A million questions on my lips, too afraid to escape knowing I will never reach toward yours again.

Though I itch to understand, To ask would be too daunting Because I could light your match, Restart the fire, And you would burn me to the ground.

23 Wittner

Wittner 24

Lexi Velte served as editor for 2 years. Since graduating, she’s taken Mr. Vona and Ms. Kelley's engagement photos, gotten a job in the Writing Lab, got published in her school's lit mag, The Mangrove Review, and still has her 211 tattoo. She is attending FGCU and working on her bachelor's and master's degrees in English and a minor in Creative Writing. Lexi can be found with her cat...

Prince of the Fancy Pants

By: Lexi Velte

25 Velte

Velte 26

Lexi Velte served as editor for 2 years. Since graduating, she’s taken Mr. Vona and Ms. Kelley's engagement photos, gotten a job in the Writing Lab, got published in her school's lit mag, The Mangrove Review, and still has her 211 tattoo. She is attending FGCU and working on her bachelor's and master's degrees in English and a minor in Creative Writing. Lexi can be found with her cat...

Prince of the Fancy Pants

By: Lexi Velte

25 Velte

Velte 26

Sophia McGregor is in her first year of the Echo and currently serves as the Instagram manager. She is this year’s winner of Poetry Jam, and will go on to perform at the District Poetry Jam. She loves to explore well-known ideas from new perspectives, such as in her poem...

Queen Medusa

By: Sophia McGregor

There is no scale strong enough to measure the agony he has put me through. The only scales are crusted upon his flesh, in lieu of skin. And oh, he scaled skyscrapers of trust, only to catapult off in a malicious thrust, he is a wicked creature. When his pupils, bearing serpent-contacts, contact mine, I contract back in fear of attack, for he can turn me to stone with his soul of black. He is the reptile commiting crime atop your head, but you don’t seem to care about the people he’s misled.

Because you Are Medusa And you tend to your plentiful garden of snakes, if it is your hair you are the Rapunzel of fakes. How painfully passionate you are about propagating poison people, praising them like they are your worship cathedral. You host them, even as they turn your friends to rock, because they are yours and your objections you lock to your lock of hair.

Queen Medusa You carry the ophidian on your scalp.

For him a human plane, snake transportation easy to obtain, he introduced me to a whole other plane of pain, but you don’t seem to care as he drives me insane. No, you support him, hold his hand like a subway pole railing as you send me flailing just by keeping him in your life. Just by keeping him on your head and letting him get in your head, I see his manipulation twist you until you’re the queen of a kingdom of dread.

But I ask you, as his venomous stares turn your friends into stone, what will it be like once he messes up again and you’re alone?

27 McGregor

Bella Cruz O’Grady was in the Echo for 4 years, during which she won the District Poetry Jam. She is currently a Psychology major at the SUNY Polytechnic Institute, but when she gets her degree says she will “probably just change paths completely and go to a vet school because why not- life is meaningless and education is a scam.” She has experienced so much in her life so far, even though she is only...

Twenty

By: Bella Cruz O’Grady

In one week, I will be twenty.

I have watched the sun rise and set, The heaving of the galaxy’s lungs Breathing a lifeforce that cascades through our atmosphere.

I have seen the green horizon Where the murky Florida ocean And the heavy humid sky Press against one another Panting lovers, sharing their embrace shamelessly.

I have held a tiny beating heart With cupped hands as it slowed to a halt, And sheer minutes after, I have welcomed new little fires into the world.

I’ve lived in three states, In six different houses, Where I attended six different schools, Across dimensional rifts Where war becomes peace and vice versa.

Where men kill for sport and women kill for life.

Where no one’s grass is green And we all suffer through accusations of a brighter future, Somewhere, Just out of reach.

I’ve lived the white woman’s poverty, And the brown man’s middle class,

O’Grady 28

Sophia McGregor is in her first year of the Echo and currently serves as the Instagram manager. She is this year’s winner of Poetry Jam, and will go on to perform at the District Poetry Jam. She loves to explore well-known ideas from new perspectives, such as in her poem...

Queen Medusa

By: Sophia McGregor

There is no scale strong enough to measure the agony he has put me through. The only scales are crusted upon his flesh, in lieu of skin. And oh, he scaled skyscrapers of trust, only to catapult off in a malicious thrust, he is a wicked creature. When his pupils, bearing serpent-contacts, contact mine, I contract back in fear of attack, for he can turn me to stone with his soul of black. He is the reptile commiting crime atop your head, but you don’t seem to care about the people he’s misled.

Because you Are Medusa And you tend to your plentiful garden of snakes, if it is your hair you are the Rapunzel of fakes. How painfully passionate you are about propagating poison people, praising them like they are your worship cathedral. You host them, even as they turn your friends to rock, because they are yours and your objections you lock to your lock of hair.

Queen Medusa You carry the ophidian on your scalp.

For him a human plane, snake transportation easy to obtain, he introduced me to a whole other plane of pain, but you don’t seem to care as he drives me insane. No, you support him, hold his hand like a subway pole railing as you send me flailing just by keeping him in your life. Just by keeping him on your head and letting him get in your head, I see his manipulation twist you until you’re the queen of a kingdom of dread.

But I ask you, as his venomous stares turn your friends into stone, what will it be like once he messes up again and you’re alone?

27 McGregor

Bella Cruz O’Grady was in the Echo for 4 years, during which she won the District Poetry Jam. She is currently a Psychology major at the SUNY Polytechnic Institute, but when she gets her degree says she will “probably just change paths completely and go to a vet school because why not- life is meaningless and education is a scam.” She has experienced so much in her life so far, even though she is only...

Twenty

By: Bella Cruz O’Grady

In one week, I will be twenty.

I have watched the sun rise and set, The heaving of the galaxy’s lungs Breathing a lifeforce that cascades through our atmosphere.

I have seen the green horizon Where the murky Florida ocean And the heavy humid sky Press against one another Panting lovers, sharing their embrace shamelessly.

I have held a tiny beating heart With cupped hands as it slowed to a halt, And sheer minutes after, I have welcomed new little fires into the world.

I’ve lived in three states, In six different houses, Where I attended six different schools, Across dimensional rifts Where war becomes peace and vice versa.

Where men kill for sport and women kill for life.

Where no one’s grass is green And we all suffer through accusations of a brighter future, Somewhere, Just out of reach.

I’ve lived the white woman’s poverty, And the brown man’s middle class,

O’Grady 28

And learned that there really is no difference between them.

I’ve been scarred And scarred others, Scorched Earth beneath my feet as I’ve stood A flame before millions of droplets of gasoline.

But never before had I seen Division Infect so many tainted souls as it has recently.

Never before had I witnessed with my own eyes, My family, As colorful, vibrant, large, and small as we are, Place a price tag on their hearts, And sell into a life of willful mental slavery.

They tear with gnashing teeth and hungry hands At the throats of the different.

I had never cried as hard as I have this year, Last year, The year before, And the year before.

I had never screamed until my throat ached Over the voices of women who once cradled me in their arms When I was most vulnerable.

I had never decided to put a cap on my supply of love.

Until now.

There comes a time when respect must take its leave, And war fills the void it left.

And that time began the moment my family, My friends, my peers, my country, Decided that money is worth more than life.

That a big mouth is worth more than harmony.

And that blind patriotism is worth more than light, And love, And acceptance, And morality, Combined.

29 O’Grady

We welcomed into our homes a monster named Greed.

He is a sickly salmon-painted mound of rotten flesh, Who reeks from the head of the table, Spoiling Thanksgiving dinner And Christmas eve With braindead proclamations like “all lives” And “Adam and Eve” And he is unmoving, unwavering, unabashed.

He has no shame, And neither do the husks of people I once knew, We all once knew, I wish I never knew.

In a week, I will be twenty.

I will have gritted my teeth And agreed to disagree far too many times.

I will have swallowed the bile rising in my throat As the deterioration of what was once a core value Decimated everyone it’s touched, Everyone I once loved.

And I will wonder, What is the point of being worldly Of dropping everything and moving six times Of watching the sun rise and set And the ocean kiss the sky And smiling over new lives If in the span of two months The humanity in every action we make Can be taken away and we are proud of our loss?

O’Grady 30

And learned that there really is no difference between them.

I’ve been scarred And scarred others, Scorched Earth beneath my feet as I’ve stood A flame before millions of droplets of gasoline.

But never before had I seen Division Infect so many tainted souls as it has recently.

Never before had I witnessed with my own eyes, My family, As colorful, vibrant, large, and small as we are, Place a price tag on their hearts, And sell into a life of willful mental slavery.

They tear with gnashing teeth and hungry hands At the throats of the different.

I had never cried as hard as I have this year, Last year, The year before, And the year before.

I had never screamed until my throat ached Over the voices of women who once cradled me in their arms When I was most vulnerable.

I had never decided to put a cap on my supply of love.

Until now.

There comes a time when respect must take its leave, And war fills the void it left.

And that time began the moment my family, My friends, my peers, my country, Decided that money is worth more than life.

That a big mouth is worth more than harmony.

And that blind patriotism is worth more than light, And love, And acceptance, And morality, Combined.

29 O’Grady

We welcomed into our homes a monster named Greed.

He is a sickly salmon-painted mound of rotten flesh, Who reeks from the head of the table, Spoiling Thanksgiving dinner And Christmas eve With braindead proclamations like “all lives” And “Adam and Eve” And he is unmoving, unwavering, unabashed.

He has no shame, And neither do the husks of people I once knew, We all once knew, I wish I never knew.

In a week, I will be twenty.

I will have gritted my teeth And agreed to disagree far too many times.

I will have swallowed the bile rising in my throat As the deterioration of what was once a core value Decimated everyone it’s touched, Everyone I once loved.

And I will wonder, What is the point of being worldly Of dropping everything and moving six times Of watching the sun rise and set And the ocean kiss the sky And smiling over new lives If in the span of two months The humanity in every action we make Can be taken away and we are proud of our loss?

O’Grady 30

Justin White was part of the 2019-2020 staff of the Echo in which he worked as part of the web and graphics team. He currently attends Florida Gulf Coast University where he majors in communications. He also has a love for music, which he reflects on through his poem...

Guitar Lesson

By: Justin White

The rush you give is intoxicating, The mix of blonde and green Is a dream that I never want To wake up from.

Gianna Taravella spent three years (13’-16’) in the Echo club and was in the first ever Echo class her senior year. She has graduated college with a B.A. in a double major: Communication and Advertising & Public Relations. She says many of the skills earned from her years working with Mr. Vona helped her to get to where she is today. She advocates for the environment and the mass use of plastic, otherwise known as...

Pollutive Predators

By: Gianna Taravella

I never want to forget the way You feel in my arms, The comfort you bring me Is softhearted resilience When you speak to me, It sounds like the most beautiful music, Being played as my finger tips dance across Your rosewood neck Stay with me forever, Just so I can look at you And imagine a world where I found happiness and the song never fades.

31 White

Taravella 32

Justin White was part of the 2019-2020 staff of the Echo in which he worked as part of the web and graphics team. He currently attends Florida Gulf Coast University where he majors in communications. He also has a love for music, which he reflects on through his poem...

Guitar Lesson

By: Justin White

The rush you give is intoxicating, The mix of blonde and green Is a dream that I never want To wake up from.

Gianna Taravella spent three years (13’-16’) in the Echo club and was in the first ever Echo class her senior year. She has graduated college with a B.A. in a double major: Communication and Advertising & Public Relations. She says many of the skills earned from her years working with Mr. Vona helped her to get to where she is today. She advocates for the environment and the mass use of plastic, otherwise known as...

Pollutive Predators

By: Gianna Taravella

I never want to forget the way You feel in my arms, The comfort you bring me Is softhearted resilience When you speak to me, It sounds like the most beautiful music, Being played as my finger tips dance across Your rosewood neck Stay with me forever, Just so I can look at you And imagine a world where I found happiness and the song never fades.

31 White

Taravella 32

Jaeda Solon is a part of the 2020-2021 staff of the Echo. Outside of the echo she is a film connoisseur and musician, who hopes to attend SCAD once she finishes high school. Jaeda is a romantic who lives..

For Days Rare as Your Smile

By: Jaeda Solon

I give you my stolen words.

For the days when you smile like you’ve never been hurt. Like you’ve never cried into wells, like whenever there’s a flash flood you aren’t the culprit caught with tear stained hands.

I give you stars in my eyes to keep on those wonderful days that I let my mouth fall open. Fall open and spill verses of poetry, verses of song, I let seconds and years fall out onto the floor, they tumble past my tongue and piece themselves apart against the tiles because you laughed.

I gift away the rhythms in my feet on the days when my jaw goes wide as the rivers and streams of the most peculiar strings of words flood into lakes to ocean. The monologues wretch themselves from my teeth like a beast tearing itself from the most clever of traps because your eyes shine.

It trades away all the melody memories that I save in my ears on those days when my lips form the perfect oh, like an ode to choirs of forgotten mothers and fading angels, like the shape of a lovers lips, like the shape of a starving child, like the shape of a dying breath. All constructed in the sound of unexpected things and your most unexpected embrace.

The syllables give way to gravity, going, falling, south and farther still. They do nothing but trip over themselves in haste to reach the bottom of this well. Nosediving down this rabbit hole trap for disappearing girls, all because you screamed, and for the first time it wasn’t out of terror.

And I let my mouth fall apart, I allow in ghosts, travellers, vaga-

33 Solon

bond strangers with sore feet. I let them make homes and stories in my teeth, plant gardens in my gums grow generations of daisies in my throat because; You. Because of you.

Because there are days that your body can’t survive the fall from your bed to the floor.

There are days you are too afraid to try.

There are days you become the fleeting bubbles thrown into the air, the dandlieon seeds sailing off on fickle winds, sailing to no where in particular.

On the days someone moved the shower light years away from possibility.

And when your paper skin is wet and saggy and can’t stand the stories littered on its flesh, the stories that bleed into eachother.

When you crawl so far up into yourself, that even the turtles mistake your bones for a corpse’s house and you can’t even find it in yourself to give a damn.

On those days.

I save you sunshine in soda bottles because I know they make you smile. I will try to paint the night sky because I know my lack of art skills will pry laughter from you. I will dance until your eyes gleam. My voice will give out from trying to sing my way into your arms.

So give me a smile, a laugh,. Look at me as I fold myself into your body.

Please.

For the sake of those days.

Solon 34

Jaeda Solon is a part of the 2020-2021 staff of the Echo. Outside of the echo she is a film connoisseur and musician, who hopes to attend SCAD once she finishes high school. Jaeda is a romantic who lives..

For Days Rare as Your Smile

By: Jaeda Solon

I give you my stolen words.

For the days when you smile like you’ve never been hurt. Like you’ve never cried into wells, like whenever there’s a flash flood you aren’t the culprit caught with tear stained hands.

I give you stars in my eyes to keep on those wonderful days that I let my mouth fall open. Fall open and spill verses of poetry, verses of song, I let seconds and years fall out onto the floor, they tumble past my tongue and piece themselves apart against the tiles because you laughed.

I gift away the rhythms in my feet on the days when my jaw goes wide as the rivers and streams of the most peculiar strings of words flood into lakes to ocean. The monologues wretch themselves from my teeth like a beast tearing itself from the most clever of traps because your eyes shine.

It trades away all the melody memories that I save in my ears on those days when my lips form the perfect oh, like an ode to choirs of forgotten mothers and fading angels, like the shape of a lovers lips, like the shape of a starving child, like the shape of a dying breath. All constructed in the sound of unexpected things and your most unexpected embrace.

The syllables give way to gravity, going, falling, south and farther still. They do nothing but trip over themselves in haste to reach the bottom of this well. Nosediving down this rabbit hole trap for disappearing girls, all because you screamed, and for the first time it wasn’t out of terror.

And I let my mouth fall apart, I allow in ghosts, travellers, vaga-

33 Solon

bond strangers with sore feet. I let them make homes and stories in my teeth, plant gardens in my gums grow generations of daisies in my throat because; You. Because of you.

Because there are days that your body can’t survive the fall from your bed to the floor.

There are days you are too afraid to try.

There are days you become the fleeting bubbles thrown into the air, the dandlieon seeds sailing off on fickle winds, sailing to no where in particular.

On the days someone moved the shower light years away from possibility.

And when your paper skin is wet and saggy and can’t stand the stories littered on its flesh, the stories that bleed into eachother.

When you crawl so far up into yourself, that even the turtles mistake your bones for a corpse’s house and you can’t even find it in yourself to give a damn.

On those days.

I save you sunshine in soda bottles because I know they make you smile. I will try to paint the night sky because I know my lack of art skills will pry laughter from you. I will dance until your eyes gleam. My voice will give out from trying to sing my way into your arms.

So give me a smile, a laugh,. Look at me as I fold myself into your body.

Please.

For the sake of those days.

Solon 34

Julianna Mauro graduated in 2020, after a year as The Echo’s historian and scripts editor. She has been taking a gap year to work and save up for college, and is working on writing music. In her newest poem, she goes far, far away to visit a...

Carnival in Paris

By: Julianna Mauro

Neon yellow, red, and blue light flood the Paris air half past midnight life may have stopped, but the celebration didn’t A poet with half a heart sits up in her flat, unsure what to make of the setting below.

Halted in time, she sits at her desk, scrutinizing through a pane of glass in her wall.

Distant wailing of a child bounce back and forth between eardrums.

The music of a dying merry go round swirl inside the window, almost shut.

Shock rings through her body, taking shelter between her bones and skin, When once upon a time, it was a melody.

She wasn’t insane, she was fine.

Only scared that the jars of blood on her shelf, would prove otherwise to the citizens who have lost their minds.

35 Mauro

Anna Corral-Gavilán graduated in 2019 after a year as The Echo’s instagram manager. She currently attends the University of Central Florida, where she wakes up every morning to...

The Sun’s Shine

By: Anna Corral-Gavilán

I remember that moment.

The heat of the sun drying our hair of soaked innocence.

Running around the sand burning blissful ignorance into our feet.

Hearing the seagulls squawking distant caws of curiousness.

Ice cream dripping with colorful creativity, sandcastles built of endless enthusiasm.

Covered, in a thick layer of adventure with our sunscreen.

The sun setting the tan on our unmarked bodies.

Soon, in the car, looking out the window seeing hope under our stars. Living with not a complex thought, but the one of going back to the sun.

Corral Gavilan 36

Julianna Mauro graduated in 2020, after a year as The Echo’s historian and scripts editor. She has been taking a gap year to work and save up for college, and is working on writing music. In her newest poem, she goes far, far away to visit a...

Carnival in Paris

By: Julianna Mauro

Neon yellow, red, and blue light flood the Paris air half past midnight life may have stopped, but the celebration didn’t A poet with half a heart sits up in her flat, unsure what to make of the setting below.

Halted in time, she sits at her desk, scrutinizing through a pane of glass in her wall.

Distant wailing of a child bounce back and forth between eardrums.

The music of a dying merry go round swirl inside the window, almost shut.

Shock rings through her body, taking shelter between her bones and skin, When once upon a time, it was a melody.

She wasn’t insane, she was fine.

Only scared that the jars of blood on her shelf, would prove otherwise to the citizens who have lost their minds.

35 Mauro

Anna Corral-Gavilán graduated in 2019 after a year as The Echo’s instagram manager. She currently attends the University of Central Florida, where she wakes up every morning to...

The Sun’s Shine

By: Anna Corral-Gavilán

I remember that moment.

The heat of the sun drying our hair of soaked innocence.

Running around the sand burning blissful ignorance into our feet.

Hearing the seagulls squawking distant caws of curiousness.

Ice cream dripping with colorful creativity, sandcastles built of endless enthusiasm.

Covered, in a thick layer of adventure with our sunscreen.

The sun setting the tan on our unmarked bodies.

Soon, in the car, looking out the window seeing hope under our stars. Living with not a complex thought, but the one of going back to the sun.

Corral Gavilan 36

Stitchez

By: Cassidy Hale

37 Hale

Vibez

By: Cassidy Hale

Hale 38

Stitchez

By: Cassidy Hale

37 Hale

Vibez

By: Cassidy Hale

Hale 38

Rachel Madden graduated from the University of Florida. She has attained six scuba certifications including her Master Diver certification. She has lived a full and crazy life, but still craves new experiences, evident in her...

Ramblings ofa Melodramatic Daydreamer By: Rachel Madden There’s people out there I no longer see who have no idea I still think about them.

How am I supposed to live without being certain everyone I’ve ever known knows how much I truly love them?

Doodles in the margins of my notes remind me of a boy I sat next to in biology who would fill his book with tiny scribbles.

I know I like Thai food because a girl made me try it when we visited her grandma who didn’t know how to cook.

I’m obsessed with certain tv shows because of people who begged me to watch them.

And I still have Pokémon Go downloaded on my phone because an old professor once asked me to show him how to play.

There’s girls I no longer talk to whose secrets I still carry.

And recipes and memories of old friends I still cherish.

I’m the culmination of every beautiful poem I’ve read, and every sad song I’ve heard, and a little bit of everyone I’ve ever met.

I’m sleepovers in the summer and campfires in the fall.

I’m the Coldplay song a boy showed me in highschool and the Kerouac novel a girl gave me before college.

I use mayonnaise on grilled cheese because a coworker showed me how it makes it crispy.

And a certain Taylor Swift song always reminds me of my old roommate who played it every morning getting ready.

Every sunset fills me with such lovely sadness and I’m again reminded of how much I feel and love.

And I care so deeply, still, for those who I may just be a passing thought for.

There’s a boy who once downloaded my favorite movie on a

39 Madden

flashdrive for me, just because I mentioned I liked it.

There’s a teacher who once tried to dub me Coach, because my last name made him smile.

And there’s a girl I used to dance with whose shirt I still use as pajamas.

Do they know how often I think of them?

Do they know I still care?

Do you think they remember our inside jokes and our text message chains and every time we laughed?

I still think about their dogs and I wonder about their mothers.

Do they still like Disney movies?

Do they get along now with their step dad?

Do they still put cinnamon on their popcorn and read travel magazines before bed?

Do they know I still remember their favorite color?

Do they even care?

And now I watch their lives in pictures and get glimpses of their days.

I hope they know I still love them.

That I’m still proud of them.

That even though we may not talk anymore, I’ll still always want the best for them.

I hope they’re happy.

I hope they’re safe.

I hope they’ve found a way to be who they want to be and they’re loved.

I hope they know they’re loved.

I hope they feel me thinking of them every year on their birthdays, even if just for a moment, and hoping they’re okay.

I hope they’re all okay.

Madden 40

Rachel Madden graduated from the University of Florida. She has attained six scuba certifications including her Master Diver certification. She has lived a full and crazy life, but still craves new experiences, evident in her...

Ramblings ofa Melodramatic Daydreamer By: Rachel Madden There’s people out there I no longer see who have no idea I still think about them.

How am I supposed to live without being certain everyone I’ve ever known knows how much I truly love them?

Doodles in the margins of my notes remind me of a boy I sat next to in biology who would fill his book with tiny scribbles.

I know I like Thai food because a girl made me try it when we visited her grandma who didn’t know how to cook.

I’m obsessed with certain tv shows because of people who begged me to watch them.

And I still have Pokémon Go downloaded on my phone because an old professor once asked me to show him how to play.

There’s girls I no longer talk to whose secrets I still carry.

And recipes and memories of old friends I still cherish.

I’m the culmination of every beautiful poem I’ve read, and every sad song I’ve heard, and a little bit of everyone I’ve ever met.

I’m sleepovers in the summer and campfires in the fall.

I’m the Coldplay song a boy showed me in highschool and the Kerouac novel a girl gave me before college.

I use mayonnaise on grilled cheese because a coworker showed me how it makes it crispy.

And a certain Taylor Swift song always reminds me of my old roommate who played it every morning getting ready.

Every sunset fills me with such lovely sadness and I’m again reminded of how much I feel and love.

And I care so deeply, still, for those who I may just be a passing thought for.

There’s a boy who once downloaded my favorite movie on a

39 Madden

flashdrive for me, just because I mentioned I liked it.

There’s a teacher who once tried to dub me Coach, because my last name made him smile.

And there’s a girl I used to dance with whose shirt I still use as pajamas.

Do they know how often I think of them?

Do they know I still care?

Do you think they remember our inside jokes and our text message chains and every time we laughed?

I still think about their dogs and I wonder about their mothers.

Do they still like Disney movies?

Do they get along now with their step dad?

Do they still put cinnamon on their popcorn and read travel magazines before bed?

Do they know I still remember their favorite color?

Do they even care?

And now I watch their lives in pictures and get glimpses of their days.

I hope they know I still love them.

That I’m still proud of them.

That even though we may not talk anymore, I’ll still always want the best for them.

I hope they’re happy.

I hope they’re safe.

I hope they’ve found a way to be who they want to be and they’re loved.

I hope they know they’re loved.

I hope they feel me thinking of them every year on their birthdays, even if just for a moment, and hoping they’re okay.

I hope they’re all okay.

Madden 40

Grace Beilman is the 2020-2021 Editor-In-Chief of The Echo This is her second year in The Echo, and she currently helps to produce magazines, like the one you’re reading now! In her poem, she takes a trip down...

Memory Lane

By: Grace Beilman

7502 Barry Road Her fingers tap to the tune of Again by Doris Day.

She harps over how she was a higher ranked officer than her husband And how she would’ve been the best nurse America had ever seen.

Their grandchildren hum the tune of something that wasn’t theirs trying to breathe in the endless stories through the suffocating glass that seems to separate decades.

Mimicking the beats, time passing between fragments of a life left behind.

Their fingers match in round gold Stitched together by wear lines of a wartime bond and a forgotten land where misplaced souls tend to linger.

A blossomed romance in war An enormous bandage over his heart Battle wounds hold nothing to their suburban scars.

She hums to the tune of a lifetime in pieces Duck and cover lovers The back of her husband’s head peeks through ashtray hair that changes with the seasons.

He knows the words, but doesn’t sing the song, looking at the lawn and the new owners trying to put back the blades of forgotten green, mowers humming like his plane in Vietnam.

41 Beilman

Beilman 42

Grace Beilman is the 2020-2021 Editor-In-Chief of The Echo This is her second year in The Echo, and she currently helps to produce magazines, like the one you’re reading now! In her poem, she takes a trip down...

Memory Lane

By: Grace Beilman

7502 Barry Road Her fingers tap to the tune of Again by Doris Day.

She harps over how she was a higher ranked officer than her husband And how she would’ve been the best nurse America had ever seen.

Their grandchildren hum the tune of something that wasn’t theirs trying to breathe in the endless stories through the suffocating glass that seems to separate decades.

Mimicking the beats, time passing between fragments of a life left behind.

Their fingers match in round gold Stitched together by wear lines of a wartime bond and a forgotten land where misplaced souls tend to linger.

A blossomed romance in war An enormous bandage over his heart Battle wounds hold nothing to their suburban scars.

She hums to the tune of a lifetime in pieces Duck and cover lovers The back of her husband’s head peeks through ashtray hair that changes with the seasons.

He knows the words, but doesn’t sing the song, looking at the lawn and the new owners trying to put back the blades of forgotten green, mowers humming like his plane in Vietnam.

41 Beilman

Beilman 42

By: Marlee Wittner

Hyperawareness

Wishful Thinking By: Marlee Wittner

Wittner 44 43 Wittner

By: Marlee Wittner

Hyperawareness

Wishful Thinking By: Marlee Wittner

Wittner 44 43 Wittner

SatirEcho

In the year 2016, a group of very dedicated individuals banded together to create SatirEcho! SatirEcho reigned for two years making every T.V. station cower in fear due to the epic news coverage. With a diverse group consisting of: Jabriela Gonson and Nat Knews as the Anchormen, Wyatt Raine as the Weatherman, the charismatic Boom Mic Mike who did sound stuff, the multi talented Unnamed Extra who did whatever was needed, and Air X the Field Reporter. This super serious devoted team brought the real news, unlike a certain group of Fox friends.

Left SatirEcho

anchors Nat Knews (left) and Jabriela Gonson A.K.A Watermelonisha (right).

In episode 2, Nat Knews was kidnapped by an evil twin.

Right Season 2

returns with Nat Knews (left) and new host Doreen Coreen (right).

Nat Knews had a new Justin Bieber dye job, according to Doreen.

Above The cast of SatirEcho poses for a

family photo. The show went on for two seasons, with all episodes now on Youtube.

Left Wyatt Rain

spits out chocolate milk from his special shaker. Wyatt made his debut in Season 1 after learning that his wife Jenine left him and took the kids to Texas, aka the Wyoming of the South.

45 SatirEcho

Left Kerri (back

center), of Scary with Kerri, stresseats cheetos during Gabi’s murder investigation. Doreen Coreen was later revealed to be the murderer.

SatirEcho 46

SatirEcho

In the year 2016, a group of very dedicated individuals banded together to create SatirEcho! SatirEcho reigned for two years making every T.V. station cower in fear due to the epic news coverage. With a diverse group consisting of: Jabriela Gonson and Nat Knews as the Anchormen, Wyatt Raine as the Weatherman, the charismatic Boom Mic Mike who did sound stuff, the multi talented Unnamed Extra who did whatever was needed, and Air X the Field Reporter. This super serious devoted team brought the real news, unlike a certain group of Fox friends.

Left SatirEcho

anchors Nat Knews (left) and Jabriela Gonson A.K.A Watermelonisha (right).

In episode 2, Nat Knews was kidnapped by an evil twin.

Right Season 2

returns with Nat Knews (left) and new host Doreen Coreen (right).

Nat Knews had a new Justin Bieber dye job, according to Doreen.

Above The cast of SatirEcho poses for a

family photo. The show went on for two seasons, with all episodes now on Youtube.

Left Wyatt Rain

spits out chocolate milk from his special shaker. Wyatt made his debut in Season 1 after learning that his wife Jenine left him and took the kids to Texas, aka the Wyoming of the South.

45 SatirEcho

Left Kerri (back

center), of Scary with Kerri, stresseats cheetos during Gabi’s murder investigation. Doreen Coreen was later revealed to be the murderer.

SatirEcho 46

Molly Pefley graduated in 2020 after being in The Echo for 2 years and serving as the submissions manager. She currently attends FSU and spends every night "ruminat[ing] about The Echo and how dearly I miss the good ole days.” The queen of disturbing horror writing, Molly continues to write about the most horrifying of...

Desolate Encounters

By: Molly Pefley

Rob always hated his job at the fair. As he walked down the isles filled with tents and games, he could feel the eyes of the menacing children burning holes into the side of his painted white face. He would always get two reactions from his clientele: the evil eye and the ones with the crippling fear of circus clowns.

There was hardly a time when the children were happy to see him.

A young boy that couldn’t be more than six was sitting on one of the benches with one of those gigantic, overpriced turkey legs in his hands. Rob decided this was the perfect opportunity to see which kind of kid this little boy was. As he walked over to him, the backs of his ridiculous and oversized shoes kept falling off his feet, making him almost trip. Cheap asses, they can’t even care to spend the money on proper shoes for the job, Rob thought to himself rolling his eyes.

As Rob approached the little boy, a wide, fake smile spread across his face. He knew the little boy wasn’t paying much attention to his surroundings. In a froggy voice, Rob spoke, “Hello there little fellow, I’m Daffy the Clown.”

“Hi Daffy,” the boy said innocently.

“And you are?”

“Daniel.”

Rob looked around the environment, but no one in sight looked like they were worried about little Daniel’s whereabouts. No, no it’s too soon for another one. Rob plopped down next to the little boy, noticing the boy next to him tense up. I guess he was one of the ones who fear clowns.

“Who are you here with, Daniel?” he asked in his character voice.

47 Pefley

“My mommy,” Daniel said looking around. “I can’t seem to find her though.”

Rob shook his head. He couldn’t believe what kind of parent would leave their young child in harm’s way. Who knows how many creeps and killers are out here?

“How about I take you to find your mommy,” Rob suggested, sticking his hand out. “She must be out there somewhere. Come with me so we can find her.” Little Daniel shrugged his shoulders, still very timid around Rob and his job uniform. After a few moments of silence, Daniel stood up to walk around with Rob, but neglecting to hold his hand. “Great. There’s nothing to be afraid of.”

As the two walked around the fair together, Rob noticed all his coworkers glaring then turning around and whispering words of menace about him. None of the people he worked with seemed to like him, so his life on the road was extremely lonely. He thought it must just be the jealousy that he does so well with these trusting children.

Rob’s face was lifted into a smile and he pointed in front of him, toward the funhouse. “There Danny! I think I saw your mom go in the funhouse!” Daniel smiled a wide, innocent smile as he grabbed Rob’s hand and guided him into the funhouse.

It was much darker in the house than it was outside, though the sun had gone down hours ago. Rob was aware that the fair was shutting down soon and he and the little boy would be alone in the funhouse like he had planned other times with the other kids. As Daniel trotted around in the house, Rob stopped and looked at himself in a mirror that was supposed to warp your body in a bunch of different ways. This one in particular shrunk his body down and made him look like he weighed four hundred pounds.

He looked closer at his face and saw that his white paint that covered his entire face had begun to crack and fade. The sharp, red triangles on his eyes, however, remained fully intact. He didn’t know why he chose to look at himself in the mirror for that long because what he truly saw disgusted him. You are an absolute loser. You have nothing going for you. He felt is eyes

Pefley 48

Molly Pefley graduated in 2020 after being in The Echo for 2 years and serving as the submissions manager. She currently attends FSU and spends every night "ruminat[ing] about The Echo and how dearly I miss the good ole days.” The queen of disturbing horror writing, Molly continues to write about the most horrifying of...

Desolate Encounters

By: Molly Pefley

Rob always hated his job at the fair. As he walked down the isles filled with tents and games, he could feel the eyes of the menacing children burning holes into the side of his painted white face. He would always get two reactions from his clientele: the evil eye and the ones with the crippling fear of circus clowns.

There was hardly a time when the children were happy to see him.

A young boy that couldn’t be more than six was sitting on one of the benches with one of those gigantic, overpriced turkey legs in his hands. Rob decided this was the perfect opportunity to see which kind of kid this little boy was. As he walked over to him, the backs of his ridiculous and oversized shoes kept falling off his feet, making him almost trip. Cheap asses, they can’t even care to spend the money on proper shoes for the job, Rob thought to himself rolling his eyes.

As Rob approached the little boy, a wide, fake smile spread across his face. He knew the little boy wasn’t paying much attention to his surroundings. In a froggy voice, Rob spoke, “Hello there little fellow, I’m Daffy the Clown.”

“Hi Daffy,” the boy said innocently.

“And you are?”

“Daniel.”

Rob looked around the environment, but no one in sight looked like they were worried about little Daniel’s whereabouts. No, no it’s too soon for another one. Rob plopped down next to the little boy, noticing the boy next to him tense up. I guess he was one of the ones who fear clowns.

“Who are you here with, Daniel?” he asked in his character voice.

47 Pefley

“My mommy,” Daniel said looking around. “I can’t seem to find her though.”

Rob shook his head. He couldn’t believe what kind of parent would leave their young child in harm’s way. Who knows how many creeps and killers are out here?

“How about I take you to find your mommy,” Rob suggested, sticking his hand out. “She must be out there somewhere. Come with me so we can find her.” Little Daniel shrugged his shoulders, still very timid around Rob and his job uniform. After a few moments of silence, Daniel stood up to walk around with Rob, but neglecting to hold his hand. “Great. There’s nothing to be afraid of.”

As the two walked around the fair together, Rob noticed all his coworkers glaring then turning around and whispering words of menace about him. None of the people he worked with seemed to like him, so his life on the road was extremely lonely. He thought it must just be the jealousy that he does so well with these trusting children.

Rob’s face was lifted into a smile and he pointed in front of him, toward the funhouse. “There Danny! I think I saw your mom go in the funhouse!” Daniel smiled a wide, innocent smile as he grabbed Rob’s hand and guided him into the funhouse.

It was much darker in the house than it was outside, though the sun had gone down hours ago. Rob was aware that the fair was shutting down soon and he and the little boy would be alone in the funhouse like he had planned other times with the other kids. As Daniel trotted around in the house, Rob stopped and looked at himself in a mirror that was supposed to warp your body in a bunch of different ways. This one in particular shrunk his body down and made him look like he weighed four hundred pounds.

He looked closer at his face and saw that his white paint that covered his entire face had begun to crack and fade. The sharp, red triangles on his eyes, however, remained fully intact. He didn’t know why he chose to look at himself in the mirror for that long because what he truly saw disgusted him. You are an absolute loser. You have nothing going for you. He felt is eyes

Pefley 48

begin to water but quickly wiped the small volume from them.

There’s no time for tears quite yet.

Rob walked over to a catwalk where Daniel was standing and stood right next to him with his friendly, benevolent grin replaced with a more sinister one. He looked around and he could feel the moving spirals engulfing him and putting him in a trance.

“Are you sure my mom was in here? I looked all around, and I can’t find her anywhere.”

Rob looked down at the little boy with the turkey leg still in his hand. He pitied how weak and oblivious children could be sometimes. However, he didn’t feel bad for too long, for he held out his hand once more and Daniel took it.

“Come on, Danny. I saw your mom walk out but I lost you. I will take you to her.”

The two walked out of the funhouse together and were met by a screaming woman with tears in her eyes. “Oh my God! Daniel Lee, I thought I lost you!” his mother said pulling him in a tight hug. She looked up and gave Rob a look that said, ‘back off my son or it’s over for you.’

So, he did.

Rob walked back to his trailer with his head down and a frown on his face. Taking out his key from a secret pocket that his clown suit had, he unlocked and opened the door. Three blowflies flew into his mouth as he took in a breath as he stepped into his living area while he was a part of the fair. The stench of decay has never been pleasant to Rob, but he makes do just because he can’t live without his best friends. As he looked around and saw all the beautiful children’s limp bodies sitting in a circle, awaiting his arrival. He smiled and ran his fingers through each of their frail hair.

“It’s been a long day, my loves, I hope you didn’t start the tea party without me!” he said to his friends with grey, cloudy eyes.

He took his kettle off the stove and poured tea into four little teacups, then sat at the table with his lovely guests. “Drink up my children. We’ve got quite a day ahead of us tomorrow.”

49 Pefley

Sam Berger was a part of the Echo from 2019 to 2020. She currently attends an online art school called CG Spectrum where she’s been been furthering her studies in digital illustration and concept art. She loves to create in-depth fantasy worlds, with unique weapons like...

Krypoknife By: Sam Berger

Berger 50

begin to water but quickly wiped the small volume from them.

There’s no time for tears quite yet.

Rob walked over to a catwalk where Daniel was standing and stood right next to him with his friendly, benevolent grin replaced with a more sinister one. He looked around and he could feel the moving spirals engulfing him and putting him in a trance.

“Are you sure my mom was in here? I looked all around, and I can’t find her anywhere.”

Rob looked down at the little boy with the turkey leg still in his hand. He pitied how weak and oblivious children could be sometimes. However, he didn’t feel bad for too long, for he held out his hand once more and Daniel took it.

“Come on, Danny. I saw your mom walk out but I lost you. I will take you to her.”

The two walked out of the funhouse together and were met by a screaming woman with tears in her eyes. “Oh my God! Daniel Lee, I thought I lost you!” his mother said pulling him in a tight hug. She looked up and gave Rob a look that said, ‘back off my son or it’s over for you.’

So, he did.

Rob walked back to his trailer with his head down and a frown on his face. Taking out his key from a secret pocket that his clown suit had, he unlocked and opened the door. Three blowflies flew into his mouth as he took in a breath as he stepped into his living area while he was a part of the fair. The stench of decay has never been pleasant to Rob, but he makes do just because he can’t live without his best friends. As he looked around and saw all the beautiful children’s limp bodies sitting in a circle, awaiting his arrival. He smiled and ran his fingers through each of their frail hair.

“It’s been a long day, my loves, I hope you didn’t start the tea party without me!” he said to his friends with grey, cloudy eyes.

He took his kettle off the stove and poured tea into four little teacups, then sat at the table with his lovely guests. “Drink up my children. We’ve got quite a day ahead of us tomorrow.”

49 Pefley

Sam Berger was a part of the Echo from 2019 to 2020. She currently attends an online art school called CG Spectrum where she’s been been furthering her studies in digital illustration and concept art. She loves to create in-depth fantasy worlds, with unique weapons like...

Krypoknife By: Sam Berger

Berger 50

Cara Lynn Albert was in the Echo for 3 years, from 2011 to 2014. She earned a BA in Creative Writing at UCF and is pursuing an MFA at CU Boulder. She is the creative nonfiction editor at Timber Journal. She examines her worst fears in..

One Minute

By: Cara Lynn Albert The first knife my dad throws at me lands within a couple inches of my right ear. It comes as quite a shock. Not the “my dad’s trying to kill me” part. That’s what he paid fifty dollars to do, after all. It’s a shock because the knife lands so close to my head. Of course, I am making it rather easy for him being roped up, spread-eagle, on an erect slab of concrete. Even so, I would’ve never guessed my dad had any kind of talent for knife throwing.

The second one carves into my right bicep, and the third slices through my shoulder. Both of the knives fall from my body and hit the stage below. My skin and muscle cells regenerate until there’s not a mark left on either spot.

This isn’t an unusual Tuesday afternoon for me. I frequently find myself bound against some wall made of brick or concrete or cement, posed similarly to Da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man. It’s my main source of income, this one-man freak show. For fifty dollars you get one minute, no limitation on weapon or weapons of choice, anything goes! And people go crazy for it. They line up like ants for the chance to kill me, though they never can.

Witnessing my dad here, though? That’s what is so unusual. I haven’t heard from him since I left home when I turned eighteen.

When he first stepped onto the stage today, I thought it was a joke. Maybe someone had fashioned an eerily accurate mask of my father’s face and threw it on just to fuck with me. But I could tell by the way he moved that it was really him, with the mechanical manner in which he pulled out the three throwing knives from the duffle bag at his feet, as if each of his individual movements was thoroughly calculated before being executed by his body.

I’ve counted twenty-two seconds into my dad’s allotted turn, and now he pulls out a revolver from the duffle bag. I don’t see too many guns at these shows, people are usually more creative, but I

51 Albert

like this revolver. It looks older, like the kind the cowboys used in the westerns my mom used to watch with me. My dad steps a few feet closer and aims. He fires five shots with no pause in between them. The first two catch me in my lower abdomen. He misses with the third one. The fourth cuts through the edge of my neck, and the broken skin fastens itself back together like a zipper on a jacket. The fifth bullet glides through my brain, and I go numb for a moment before regaining full mobility. I know why he’s doing this.

He still blames me for killing her. The only moments I ever saw my dad’s robotic body loosen were when my mom wrapped her warm arms around him and kissed his eyelids, cheeks, and lips in that order.

With just eighteen seconds left, my dad pulls a gallon of something out of his bag. He walks closer, and a heavy, burning stench singes the hairs inside my nostrils. My father soaks me, head to foot, in gasoline. He backs away before taking out a set of old matches, also like the kind the cowboys used, and lights one. When he throws it, I catch fire and feel a familiar tickling sensation. The flames eat though the rope that’s keeping me upright against the concrete wall, and I fall to the ground. I simmer and wait until the fire consumes my clothes, and it finally dissipates when it realizes there’s nothing left to feed upon. I’m a naked mass of untouched skin, caked in ash.

He wants an apology. He stands there waiting for it while I rest crumpled at his feet. When he realizes he’s not going to get what he came for, he turns and walks away in the same defeated manner as the night he arrived at the hospital and saw me alive while she lay lifeless on a table.

I can only remember that night in fragments. The vinyl of the steering wheel beneath my fingers when I lost control. The screeching tires. The fire that tickled the surface of my skin. The way my mom crumpled like paper in the passenger seat. All in under one minute.

When he’s too far away to hear me, I tell him the same thing I said the night of the crash. It’s what I said when he made me leave our house on my eighteenth birthday, and what I said when he professed that it should’ve been me instead.

“I loved her too.”

Albert 52

Cara Lynn Albert was in the Echo for 3 years, from 2011 to 2014. She earned a BA in Creative Writing at UCF and is pursuing an MFA at CU Boulder. She is the creative nonfiction editor at Timber Journal. She examines her worst fears in..

One Minute

By: Cara Lynn Albert The first knife my dad throws at me lands within a couple inches of my right ear. It comes as quite a shock. Not the “my dad’s trying to kill me” part. That’s what he paid fifty dollars to do, after all. It’s a shock because the knife lands so close to my head. Of course, I am making it rather easy for him being roped up, spread-eagle, on an erect slab of concrete. Even so, I would’ve never guessed my dad had any kind of talent for knife throwing.

The second one carves into my right bicep, and the third slices through my shoulder. Both of the knives fall from my body and hit the stage below. My skin and muscle cells regenerate until there’s not a mark left on either spot.

This isn’t an unusual Tuesday afternoon for me. I frequently find myself bound against some wall made of brick or concrete or cement, posed similarly to Da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man. It’s my main source of income, this one-man freak show. For fifty dollars you get one minute, no limitation on weapon or weapons of choice, anything goes! And people go crazy for it. They line up like ants for the chance to kill me, though they never can.

Witnessing my dad here, though? That’s what is so unusual. I haven’t heard from him since I left home when I turned eighteen.

When he first stepped onto the stage today, I thought it was a joke. Maybe someone had fashioned an eerily accurate mask of my father’s face and threw it on just to fuck with me. But I could tell by the way he moved that it was really him, with the mechanical manner in which he pulled out the three throwing knives from the duffle bag at his feet, as if each of his individual movements was thoroughly calculated before being executed by his body.

I’ve counted twenty-two seconds into my dad’s allotted turn, and now he pulls out a revolver from the duffle bag. I don’t see too many guns at these shows, people are usually more creative, but I

51 Albert

like this revolver. It looks older, like the kind the cowboys used in the westerns my mom used to watch with me. My dad steps a few feet closer and aims. He fires five shots with no pause in between them. The first two catch me in my lower abdomen. He misses with the third one. The fourth cuts through the edge of my neck, and the broken skin fastens itself back together like a zipper on a jacket. The fifth bullet glides through my brain, and I go numb for a moment before regaining full mobility. I know why he’s doing this.

He still blames me for killing her. The only moments I ever saw my dad’s robotic body loosen were when my mom wrapped her warm arms around him and kissed his eyelids, cheeks, and lips in that order.

With just eighteen seconds left, my dad pulls a gallon of something out of his bag. He walks closer, and a heavy, burning stench singes the hairs inside my nostrils. My father soaks me, head to foot, in gasoline. He backs away before taking out a set of old matches, also like the kind the cowboys used, and lights one. When he throws it, I catch fire and feel a familiar tickling sensation. The flames eat though the rope that’s keeping me upright against the concrete wall, and I fall to the ground. I simmer and wait until the fire consumes my clothes, and it finally dissipates when it realizes there’s nothing left to feed upon. I’m a naked mass of untouched skin, caked in ash.

He wants an apology. He stands there waiting for it while I rest crumpled at his feet. When he realizes he’s not going to get what he came for, he turns and walks away in the same defeated manner as the night he arrived at the hospital and saw me alive while she lay lifeless on a table.

I can only remember that night in fragments. The vinyl of the steering wheel beneath my fingers when I lost control. The screeching tires. The fire that tickled the surface of my skin. The way my mom crumpled like paper in the passenger seat. All in under one minute.

When he’s too far away to hear me, I tell him the same thing I said the night of the crash. It’s what I said when he made me leave our house on my eighteenth birthday, and what I said when he professed that it should’ve been me instead.

“I loved her too.”

Albert 52

Elke Stelter has been in the Echo for 2 years, and she is the current Website Editor. After high school, she plans to pursue a degree in Graphic Design. She enjoys creating art about her favorite animal, the...

Funky Frog

By: Elke Stelter

53 Stelter

Alexandra Gerges is in her first year of the Echo and is currently a member of the Ads team. She has been accepted into USF and wants to become a pediatrician. She is currently writing and illustrating a fantasy novel series about dragons. The main character of her upcoming novel is...

Gale, dragon of the wind

By: Alexandra Gerges

Gerges 54

Elke Stelter has been in the Echo for 2 years, and she is the current Website Editor. After high school, she plans to pursue a degree in Graphic Design. She enjoys creating art about her favorite animal, the...

Funky Frog

By: Elke Stelter

53 Stelter

Alexandra Gerges is in her first year of the Echo and is currently a member of the Ads team. She has been accepted into USF and wants to become a pediatrician. She is currently writing and illustrating a fantasy novel series about dragons. The main character of her upcoming novel is...

Gale, dragon of the wind

By: Alexandra Gerges

Gerges 54

Ally O’Connor is the 2020-2021 Content Manager of The Echo. Ally discovered her love for magical realism her sophomore year when she wrote the first draft of this story, she revised it her junior year and then finally named this her final draft; however, throughout the process she had to use a lot of...

White Out

By: Ally O’Connor

Thea’s life has always revolved around her business, she’s a “workaholic” and that has never bothered her. The interior design company Thea is CEO of takes up all her time, and by the time she walks into her New York penthouse every evening, she eats a quick dinner while finishing up some paperwork and falls into bed.

Though Thea never is able to spend time in her apartment, she loves it there. Every room is decorated a different theme with vibrant (yet organized) colors that always fulfill her, she lives alone and always has, but whenever she has guests, she loves to show it off.

However, one day when she was walking home from work, something felt off, so she double, and triple checked her calendar to be sure she wasn’t missing a meeting or a delivery of goods for decorating her next client’s apartment. She was putting her planner back into her bag when she unlocked the door to her penthouse, and saw that a painting that was once filled with brown wine bottles and a deep purple background was now white. Everything, down to the frame, was bleached.

Thea pulled out her phone to dial 911, but it felt pointless. As she looked around her apartment not one thing had moved an inch. All her valuables were still there and there was no sign that someone had climbed through a window or broken in through the door, so she went through her average nightly routine, and kept glancing at the white canvas that mocked her until she closed the door to her bedroom and fell into an uneasy sleep.

Thea knew the next morning when she woke up in her forest green sheets that the wine painting was going to be there, it all felt like an odd dream.

It wasn’t.

55 O’Connor

She opened her bedroom door and the blank canvas still hung there. Not only that, but the living room rug under the couch that was usually brown, was now drained of color making it look like her floor was coated in snow.

Thea jogged through her apartment. Every entrance was locked, all her valuables were still there and surely, she would’ve heard someone moving her couch in the middle of the night. It would’ve woken her up.

Her heart sped up as adrenaline coursed through her body, but it quickly turned to droopiness as she stared at the white accessories.

These feelings vanished when her assistant called, the ringtone stealing her attention.

“Good morning Nick.” Thea answers rubbing her forehead.

“Hey Thea, how are you this morning?”

“Fine, a little worried, is everything running on schedule, according to plan?”

“Of course, nothings up that I know of.” Nick responds, clearly confused by the conversation. With Thea and Nick’s organization skills things rarely run off track.

“Okay when I get to the office I’m going to compare calendars just to make sure I’m not forgetting anything... something is missing.”

“Of course, I called to tell you the order arrived this morning with all modern themed decorations and appliances, I’ve gone through everything but I know you like to double check quality.”

Thea rolls her eyes, “modern” these days means bland, white aesthetic, she’s never understood this new trend but business is business. Yet, she finds herself not wanting to look at more white décor. “I trust you, Nick.” She says, “Plus I’m going to be late today I might not have time.” And with that they ended the conversation with quick goodbyes yet Thea’s heart felt heavy as she hung up the phone, Nick is the only person she really talked to on a daily basis other her clients. Although their relationship was professional, Nick was a friend to her.

Annoyed, Thea throws on a maroon and gold pantsuit with heels, double checks her bag to make sure she has everything and then rushes to the door and notices that as she puts her hand on the door handle the glossy bronze trails from the handle drains out as

O’Connor 56

Ally O’Connor is the 2020-2021 Content Manager of The Echo. Ally discovered her love for magical realism her sophomore year when she wrote the first draft of this story, she revised it her junior year and then finally named this her final draft; however, throughout the process she had to use a lot of...

White Out

By: Ally O’Connor

Thea’s life has always revolved around her business, she’s a “workaholic” and that has never bothered her. The interior design company Thea is CEO of takes up all her time, and by the time she walks into her New York penthouse every evening, she eats a quick dinner while finishing up some paperwork and falls into bed.

Though Thea never is able to spend time in her apartment, she loves it there. Every room is decorated a different theme with vibrant (yet organized) colors that always fulfill her, she lives alone and always has, but whenever she has guests, she loves to show it off.

However, one day when she was walking home from work, something felt off, so she double, and triple checked her calendar to be sure she wasn’t missing a meeting or a delivery of goods for decorating her next client’s apartment. She was putting her planner back into her bag when she unlocked the door to her penthouse, and saw that a painting that was once filled with brown wine bottles and a deep purple background was now white. Everything, down to the frame, was bleached.

Thea pulled out her phone to dial 911, but it felt pointless. As she looked around her apartment not one thing had moved an inch. All her valuables were still there and there was no sign that someone had climbed through a window or broken in through the door, so she went through her average nightly routine, and kept glancing at the white canvas that mocked her until she closed the door to her bedroom and fell into an uneasy sleep.

Thea knew the next morning when she woke up in her forest green sheets that the wine painting was going to be there, it all felt like an odd dream.

It wasn’t.

55 O’Connor

She opened her bedroom door and the blank canvas still hung there. Not only that, but the living room rug under the couch that was usually brown, was now drained of color making it look like her floor was coated in snow.

Thea jogged through her apartment. Every entrance was locked, all her valuables were still there and surely, she would’ve heard someone moving her couch in the middle of the night. It would’ve woken her up.

Her heart sped up as adrenaline coursed through her body, but it quickly turned to droopiness as she stared at the white accessories.

These feelings vanished when her assistant called, the ringtone stealing her attention.

“Good morning Nick.” Thea answers rubbing her forehead.

“Hey Thea, how are you this morning?”

“Fine, a little worried, is everything running on schedule, according to plan?”

“Of course, nothings up that I know of.” Nick responds, clearly confused by the conversation. With Thea and Nick’s organization skills things rarely run off track.

“Okay when I get to the office I’m going to compare calendars just to make sure I’m not forgetting anything... something is missing.”

“Of course, I called to tell you the order arrived this morning with all modern themed decorations and appliances, I’ve gone through everything but I know you like to double check quality.”

Thea rolls her eyes, “modern” these days means bland, white aesthetic, she’s never understood this new trend but business is business. Yet, she finds herself not wanting to look at more white décor. “I trust you, Nick.” She says, “Plus I’m going to be late today I might not have time.” And with that they ended the conversation with quick goodbyes yet Thea’s heart felt heavy as she hung up the phone, Nick is the only person she really talked to on a daily basis other her clients. Although their relationship was professional, Nick was a friend to her.

Annoyed, Thea throws on a maroon and gold pantsuit with heels, double checks her bag to make sure she has everything and then rushes to the door and notices that as she puts her hand on the door handle the glossy bronze trails from the handle drains out as

O’Connor 56

white bleeds from her hand until it takes up its entirety.

Thea jumps back and holds her plagued hand in the other, panic threatening to sink in. She walks to the kitchen and grabs a wrench from the toolbox under the sink and returns, heels thundering on the floor, to the handle and starts chipping away at it. Even when Thea managed to get a chip off the handle, it was still white. Tears stung at her eyes as she threw the wrench across the room and exits her apartment, barely managing to keep composure to lock the door behind her.

She made it to work an hour late, unable to recall the last time that she was late to any extent. The confusion she felt showed on the faces of her employees as she walked into the lobby and into the elevator. Thea touched the button for the top floor and it jumped as it glowed white in recognition, as it would have before, she just never noticed it until now.

Thea went without an incident (or at least one she noticed, she was distracted by work) until a few hours later during her lunch break. She ate alone, as she’d always done. She usually works while she eats but Thea was struggling thus far to do work that she felt she deserved a quiet lunch, but her office felt so empty. When she reached for her chips, she found her lunchbox which was once a basic, brown paper bag, was no longer pigmented. Thea went back to work, her appetite gone.

By dinner time her once black-painted nails were now eggshell, and she couldn’t find the means to keep working. She called an Uber and went to the nail salon, picking the most vibrant, neon yellow she could find, and went home; but by the time she arrived her clothes and nails had also drained of color.

Tears biting at Thea’s eyes, grasping at hope she stormed into her home and to her supplies closet and poured forest green paint all over her body, except as it left the can its color drained leaving her with white paint all over her hair and skin. She dropped to her knees, sanity finally slipping and bawled.

Thea crawled on her hands and knees into her room leaving a snail-like trail of white behind her and climbed into bed, paint and all. And by the time she woke up, struggled out of bed and looked into her mirror, her skin, hair, eyes and all, were albino.

57 O’Connor

A Stranger In Perspective

By: Marlee Wittner

Wittner 58

white bleeds from her hand until it takes up its entirety.

Thea jumps back and holds her plagued hand in the other, panic threatening to sink in. She walks to the kitchen and grabs a wrench from the toolbox under the sink and returns, heels thundering on the floor, to the handle and starts chipping away at it. Even when Thea managed to get a chip off the handle, it was still white. Tears stung at her eyes as she threw the wrench across the room and exits her apartment, barely managing to keep composure to lock the door behind her.

She made it to work an hour late, unable to recall the last time that she was late to any extent. The confusion she felt showed on the faces of her employees as she walked into the lobby and into the elevator. Thea touched the button for the top floor and it jumped as it glowed white in recognition, as it would have before, she just never noticed it until now.

Thea went without an incident (or at least one she noticed, she was distracted by work) until a few hours later during her lunch break. She ate alone, as she’d always done. She usually works while she eats but Thea was struggling thus far to do work that she felt she deserved a quiet lunch, but her office felt so empty. When she reached for her chips, she found her lunchbox which was once a basic, brown paper bag, was no longer pigmented. Thea went back to work, her appetite gone.

By dinner time her once black-painted nails were now eggshell, and she couldn’t find the means to keep working. She called an Uber and went to the nail salon, picking the most vibrant, neon yellow she could find, and went home; but by the time she arrived her clothes and nails had also drained of color.

Tears biting at Thea’s eyes, grasping at hope she stormed into her home and to her supplies closet and poured forest green paint all over her body, except as it left the can its color drained leaving her with white paint all over her hair and skin. She dropped to her knees, sanity finally slipping and bawled.

Thea crawled on her hands and knees into her room leaving a snail-like trail of white behind her and climbed into bed, paint and all. And by the time she woke up, struggled out of bed and looked into her mirror, her skin, hair, eyes and all, were albino.

57 O’Connor

A Stranger In Perspective

By: Marlee Wittner

Wittner 58

Matt Gerasimovich was editor of The Echo from 2015 to 2016. Matt is

a PhD student in the Department of Slavic Language and Literatures at Northwestern University. He reflects on the losses the class of 2020 faced in...

SEEKING ENTRY-LEVEL ANALYST: AN EPIC CATALOGUE TO THE CLASS OF 2020

By: Matt Gerasimovich

Our team is looking for a passionate, hardworking, talented, and diverse (but not in a way that makes us think too critically) entry-level analyst to join our dynamic, transformative, and energetic family. Our prestigious firm is composed of only the best and the brightest who can look at problems with new perspectives. Our job postings regularly yield hundreds of applicants, so APPLY NOW! Core responsibilities include: faxing, filing, fabric fashioning, façade finishing, fajita filleting, and everything in between. You will have the unparalleled opportunity to work across departments, completing a wide variety of tasks previously thought to take a whole team of trained employees. We are truly seeking a jack of all trades, but also a master of all trades.

Most companies are operating virtually, but you could have the unique, exciting, and mandatory opportunity to work out of our collaborative Innovation Zone. Since we had to fire our secretaries due to budget cuts, someone needs to be there to answer our phones, and that someone could be you!

Applicants should hold a degree in economics or a related field.

Ideal applicants graduated as valedictorian of their class, or at the very least summa cum laude. Advanced degrees preferred. Applicants should be fluent in English, French, German, and their choice of Greek or Latin. Reading knowledge and chanting ability in Old Church Slavonic heavily encouraged.

Because of these trying times we can only offer this position as a temporary position with an hourly wage of $11 per hour. You may have the chance of being hired full time after a year, budget permitting. Until you are hired full time, this position does not offer benefits.

Pay will be capped at 40 hours per week, but successful employees will work closer to 80 hours per week.

After initial application, HR will contact you about scheduling a minimum of three rounds of interviews. Applicants making it past the interview rounds must complete a drug test, ballroom dancing test, and background check.

59 Gerasimovich

Emily Chmielewski was an editor of The Echo for two years, and hasn’t stopped creating since. Since graduating in 2018, she’s attended the Vocational Academy of Makeup Prosthetics and is working towards a career in film and tv makeup. She shares her funny little creations on Instagram and is excited for more covid safe projects. In her latest creation, she illustrates her passion for...

Playing Faces By: Emily Chmielewski

Chmielewski 60

Matt Gerasimovich was editor of The Echo from 2015 to 2016. Matt is

a PhD student in the Department of Slavic Language and Literatures at Northwestern University. He reflects on the losses the class of 2020 faced in...

SEEKING ENTRY-LEVEL ANALYST: AN EPIC CATALOGUE TO THE CLASS OF 2020

By: Matt Gerasimovich

Our team is looking for a passionate, hardworking, talented, and diverse (but not in a way that makes us think too critically) entry-level analyst to join our dynamic, transformative, and energetic family. Our prestigious firm is composed of only the best and the brightest who can look at problems with new perspectives. Our job postings regularly yield hundreds of applicants, so APPLY NOW! Core responsibilities include: faxing, filing, fabric fashioning, façade finishing, fajita filleting, and everything in between. You will have the unparalleled opportunity to work across departments, completing a wide variety of tasks previously thought to take a whole team of trained employees. We are truly seeking a jack of all trades, but also a master of all trades.

Most companies are operating virtually, but you could have the unique, exciting, and mandatory opportunity to work out of our collaborative Innovation Zone. Since we had to fire our secretaries due to budget cuts, someone needs to be there to answer our phones, and that someone could be you!

Applicants should hold a degree in economics or a related field.

Ideal applicants graduated as valedictorian of their class, or at the very least summa cum laude. Advanced degrees preferred. Applicants should be fluent in English, French, German, and their choice of Greek or Latin. Reading knowledge and chanting ability in Old Church Slavonic heavily encouraged.

Because of these trying times we can only offer this position as a temporary position with an hourly wage of $11 per hour. You may have the chance of being hired full time after a year, budget permitting. Until you are hired full time, this position does not offer benefits.

Pay will be capped at 40 hours per week, but successful employees will work closer to 80 hours per week.

After initial application, HR will contact you about scheduling a minimum of three rounds of interviews. Applicants making it past the interview rounds must complete a drug test, ballroom dancing test, and background check.

59 Gerasimovich

Emily Chmielewski was an editor of The Echo for two years, and hasn’t stopped creating since. Since graduating in 2018, she’s attended the Vocational Academy of Makeup Prosthetics and is working towards a career in film and tv makeup. She shares her funny little creations on Instagram and is excited for more covid safe projects. In her latest creation, she illustrates her passion for...

Playing Faces By: Emily Chmielewski

Chmielewski 60

Poetry Cafe Need a place to perform your words? Poetry Cafe is the place to be! During The Echo’s third year, editor-in-chief Cara Albert created Poetry Cafe as an open mic for students to express themselves and to help get donations for The Echo. Staff members choose a host for the special event, then spend hours after school transforming the media center into a big production. Poetry Cafe also featured The Reverts, a band consisting of current and former echo members. This event features prose, standup comedy, poetry, music, and recently, a student art gallery. Poetry Cafe is a fun event and welcoming to all.

Above Echo member Ozi Lao per-

forms their poem, “Check Please,” for Poetry Cafe’s massive live audience. The poem was about the trials and tribulations of young love at first sight, drawing lots of emotion from the audience.

Above Top Fall 2018 Poetry Cafe

host Noah Alewel introduces the next performer.

Above Bottom Echo mascot Barry the Bee glows in the lights at Poetry Cafe.

61 Poetry Cafe

Above Echo member Angeli-

ca Reyes performs her stand up-routine, “Spongebob as a Husband”, at 2017’s holiday themed Poetry Cafe. She filled the audience with laughter.

Left Mr. Vona performs his poem “Or I Could Have Said, ‘I’m Okay’” at 2017’s holiday Poetry Cafe. The poem was written in class after a student asked Vona if he was okay, which he wasn’t.

Poetry Cafe 62

Poetry Cafe Need a place to perform your words? Poetry Cafe is the place to be! During The Echo’s third year, editor-in-chief Cara Albert created Poetry Cafe as an open mic for students to express themselves and to help get donations for The Echo. Staff members choose a host for the special event, then spend hours after school transforming the media center into a big production. Poetry Cafe also featured The Reverts, a band consisting of current and former echo members. This event features prose, standup comedy, poetry, music, and recently, a student art gallery. Poetry Cafe is a fun event and welcoming to all.

Above Echo member Ozi Lao per-

forms their poem, “Check Please,” for Poetry Cafe’s massive live audience. The poem was about the trials and tribulations of young love at first sight, drawing lots of emotion from the audience.

Above Top Fall 2018 Poetry Cafe

host Noah Alewel introduces the next performer.

Above Bottom Echo mascot Barry the Bee glows in the lights at Poetry Cafe.

61 Poetry Cafe

Above Echo member Angeli-

ca Reyes performs her stand up-routine, “Spongebob as a Husband”, at 2017’s holiday themed Poetry Cafe. She filled the audience with laughter.

Left Mr. Vona performs his poem “Or I Could Have Said, ‘I’m Okay’” at 2017’s holiday Poetry Cafe. The poem was written in class after a student asked Vona if he was okay, which he wasn’t.

Poetry Cafe 62

Noah Alewel graduated in 2019 after being the producer of Satirecho and What the Florida for 2 years. He currently attends FSU and is pursuing a career in film. Noah also runs a YouTube channel, where he is currently blowing up with his video...

Noah4HSM:The Pitch

By: Noah Alewel

2020 INT. COLLEGE BEDROOM - DAY Noah sits at his desk, facing the camera.

NOAH Picture this. It’s January of 2006, and five year old me is sitting down to watch some Suite Life of Zack and Cody when suddenly, a bumper comes down from the top of the screen.

The old High School Musical commercial comes down from the top of the screen as it did back in the day.

NOAH At first, I was a little confused, but then KABLAMO!!!

The classic Disney Channel Original Movie intro plays. Filled with kids jumping through the air as reels of film pass by.

NOAH I saw some kids doing some flips, dips, and splits. Which meant I was in for a... (singing along with the intro) Disney Channel Movie.

63 Alewel

Noah is now back at his desk.

NOAH Sorry, correction, this wasn’t just A Disney Channel Movie. NO! This was THE Disney Channel Movie: High School Musical.

A montage of the most iconic moments from the first film plays, set to the tune of We’re All in This Together.

NOAH And I don’t think it’s hyperbole to say that this was a life changing moment.

CUT TO: INT. HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL SHRINE - DAY Noah stands in front of a wall covered in all of the various High School Musical posters wearing a homemade High School Musical shirt.

NOAH No, like seriously, it’s a problem.

CUT TO: INT. COLLEGE BEDROOM - DAY Noah is seated back at his desk.

NOAH But I mean, come on, can you blame me? It had catchy songs and fun characters! I couldn’t help but fall in love with this movie...

Noah stops and thinks to himself for a moment.

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Noah Alewel graduated in 2019 after being the producer of Satirecho and What the Florida for 2 years. He currently attends FSU and is pursuing a career in film. Noah also runs a YouTube channel, where he is currently blowing up with his video...

Noah4HSM:The Pitch

By: Noah Alewel

2020 INT. COLLEGE BEDROOM - DAY Noah sits at his desk, facing the camera.

NOAH Picture this. It’s January of 2006, and five year old me is sitting down to watch some Suite Life of Zack and Cody when suddenly, a bumper comes down from the top of the screen.

The old High School Musical commercial comes down from the top of the screen as it did back in the day.

NOAH At first, I was a little confused, but then KABLAMO!!!

The classic Disney Channel Original Movie intro plays. Filled with kids jumping through the air as reels of film pass by.

NOAH I saw some kids doing some flips, dips, and splits. Which meant I was in for a... (singing along with the intro) Disney Channel Movie.

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Noah is now back at his desk.

NOAH Sorry, correction, this wasn’t just A Disney Channel Movie. NO! This was THE Disney Channel Movie: High School Musical.

A montage of the most iconic moments from the first film plays, set to the tune of We’re All in This Together.

NOAH And I don’t think it’s hyperbole to say that this was a life changing moment.

CUT TO: INT. HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL SHRINE - DAY Noah stands in front of a wall covered in all of the various High School Musical posters wearing a homemade High School Musical shirt.

NOAH No, like seriously, it’s a problem.

CUT TO: INT. COLLEGE BEDROOM - DAY Noah is seated back at his desk.

NOAH But I mean, come on, can you blame me? It had catchy songs and fun characters! I couldn’t help but fall in love with this movie...

Noah stops and thinks to himself for a moment.

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NOAH Okay, more specifically, I fell in love with Vanessa Hudgens, but y’know what? That little baby crush led to me learning the lyrics...

Videos of Noah poorly singing along to various High School Musical songs play.

NOAH ... and the dance moves...

Videos of Noah poorly dancing to various songs.

NOAH ... to every single song. I watched this film on repeat. It was literally everything I could have asked for. No possible way for it to be topped... but then High School Musical 2 came along and said, “Girl, hold my iced tea imported from England, and watch this.”

Another montage plays showcasing the iconic moments of High School Musical 2. We see Sharpay singing Fabulous at the pool, Troy running out his emotions during Bet On It, and the gang battling it out on the baseball field during Don’t Dance.

NOAH This movie took what I thought was my fairytale, my dream when I’m not sleeping, AND MADE IT COME TRUE!!!

I mean, talk about iconic songs: Bet On it, Gotta Go My Own Way, Don’t Dance, and HUMUHUMUNUKUNUKUAPUA’A. Which, yes, is technically a song

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from a deleted scene, but that doesn’t matter because it still counts in my heart! But it doesn’t just stop there! We get a Miley Cyrus cameo. We get the same recycled plot from the first film, but now it’s at a country club.

And, we get Vanessa Hudgens in a one piece swim suit! Which, ZOO WEE MAMA, even though I love High School Musical, V. Hudg is making a pretty good case that I might still be attracted to girls.

Vanessa Hudgens in her lifeguard outfit appears on screen.

NOAH If the first film made me fall in love with the series, then High School Musical 2 made me obsessed.

Because after that, I bought every DVD, book, and video game. I even saw the High School Musical: Ice Tour which is the plot of the first film, but...get this...on ice.

Images of Noah from childhood with his assortment of High School Musical merchandise flash on screen.

NOAH And, yet, my thirst for the series was not quenched. I started to develop a dream, but not just any dream. Move over MLK, my dream was to star in a High School Musical movie; and I was going to do what ever it would take to get cast. For example, when High School Musical 2 first aired on Disney Channel, they

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NOAH Okay, more specifically, I fell in love with Vanessa Hudgens, but y’know what? That little baby crush led to me learning the lyrics...

Videos of Noah poorly singing along to various High School Musical songs play.

NOAH ... and the dance moves...

Videos of Noah poorly dancing to various songs.

NOAH ... to every single song. I watched this film on repeat. It was literally everything I could have asked for. No possible way for it to be topped... but then High School Musical 2 came along and said, “Girl, hold my iced tea imported from England, and watch this.”

Another montage plays showcasing the iconic moments of High School Musical 2. We see Sharpay singing Fabulous at the pool, Troy running out his emotions during Bet On It, and the gang battling it out on the baseball field during Don’t Dance.

NOAH This movie took what I thought was my fairytale, my dream when I’m not sleeping, AND MADE IT COME TRUE!!!

I mean, talk about iconic songs: Bet On it, Gotta Go My Own Way, Don’t Dance, and HUMUHUMUNUKUNUKUAPUA’A. Which, yes, is technically a song

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from a deleted scene, but that doesn’t matter because it still counts in my heart! But it doesn’t just stop there! We get a Miley Cyrus cameo. We get the same recycled plot from the first film, but now it’s at a country club.

And, we get Vanessa Hudgens in a one piece swim suit! Which, ZOO WEE MAMA, even though I love High School Musical, V. Hudg is making a pretty good case that I might still be attracted to girls.

Vanessa Hudgens in her lifeguard outfit appears on screen.

NOAH If the first film made me fall in love with the series, then High School Musical 2 made me obsessed.

Because after that, I bought every DVD, book, and video game. I even saw the High School Musical: Ice Tour which is the plot of the first film, but...get this...on ice.

Images of Noah from childhood with his assortment of High School Musical merchandise flash on screen.

NOAH And, yet, my thirst for the series was not quenched. I started to develop a dream, but not just any dream. Move over MLK, my dream was to star in a High School Musical movie; and I was going to do what ever it would take to get cast. For example, when High School Musical 2 first aired on Disney Channel, they

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dedicated an entire section of their website to it.

Screenshots of the website are shown on screen.

NOAH It allowed you to go through the blog posts of characters, read through their yearbooks, and (most importantly) “e-mail” the characters. And you can BET ON first grade me going onto that website to send Troy and Gabriella my ACTUAL HOME ADDRESS AND PHONE NUMBER!!! Y’know, just in case either of them wanted to hang out with a six-year old. That’s right, I doxxed myself to get cast in High School Musical!

Did you!?!?!

Noah breaks character for a moment.

NOAH (chuckling to himself) It’s starting to make sense why they told us to ask for our parents’ permission before going on there.

Noah steps back into character.

NOAH Unfortunately, neither of them ever hit my line up and High School Musical 3: Senior Year went on without my cameo appearance. But that didn’t matter in the moment because this was a big deal. This was High School Musical as we had

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never seen it before: ON THE BIG SCREEN! It had better songs, it had better direction, it had Zac Efron’s armpit hair- wait, what?

An image of Zac’s hairy pits from the film flash on screen.

NOAH (gagging) Eeeewwwww, grooossss! Come on, Vanessa...

CUT TO: EXT. SUNSET BLVS. - DAY Noah sits with a photoshopped Vanessa Hudgens in a nice car.

NOAH You deserve to be with a REAL man who’s prepubsecent-like body doesn’t allow for any of that icky YICKY hair. Bleh!

CUT TO: INT. COLLEGE BEDROOM - DAY Noah is back at his desk again.

NOAH Of course, that’s not all High School Musical 3 had. No, true fans know that credits were where it was at because that is when we finally got to see the music video for Just Getting Started featuring Stan Carrizossa. Who, as we all know, won the hit ABC reality game show: High School Musical - Get in the Picture, where contestants would

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dedicated an entire section of their website to it.

Screenshots of the website are shown on screen.

NOAH It allowed you to go through the blog posts of characters, read through their yearbooks, and (most importantly) “e-mail” the characters. And you can BET ON first grade me going onto that website to send Troy and Gabriella my ACTUAL HOME ADDRESS AND PHONE NUMBER!!! Y’know, just in case either of them wanted to hang out with a six-year old. That’s right, I doxxed myself to get cast in High School Musical!

Did you!?!?!

Noah breaks character for a moment.

NOAH (chuckling to himself) It’s starting to make sense why they told us to ask for our parents’ permission before going on there.

Noah steps back into character.

NOAH Unfortunately, neither of them ever hit my line up and High School Musical 3: Senior Year went on without my cameo appearance. But that didn’t matter in the moment because this was a big deal. This was High School Musical as we had

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never seen it before: ON THE BIG SCREEN! It had better songs, it had better direction, it had Zac Efron’s armpit hair- wait, what?

An image of Zac’s hairy pits from the film flash on screen.

NOAH (gagging) Eeeewwwww, grooossss! Come on, Vanessa...

CUT TO: EXT. SUNSET BLVS. - DAY Noah sits with a photoshopped Vanessa Hudgens in a nice car.

NOAH You deserve to be with a REAL man who’s prepubsecent-like body doesn’t allow for any of that icky YICKY hair. Bleh!

CUT TO: INT. COLLEGE BEDROOM - DAY Noah is back at his desk again.

NOAH Of course, that’s not all High School Musical 3 had. No, true fans know that credits were where it was at because that is when we finally got to see the music video for Just Getting Started featuring Stan Carrizossa. Who, as we all know, won the hit ABC reality game show: High School Musical - Get in the Picture, where contestants would

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battle it out through song and dance to be featured in the next High School Musical film. You see, Stan here, was the solution to my dream. I was going to participate, and WIN, the next season. And all I needed to do now was wait for some news on the fourth High School Musical film to drop.

EXT. DESERT - DAY CUT TO: Noah stands alone in the middle of nowhere. A banner labeled, “High School Musical 4 Announcements” hangs at the top of the screen. A tumble weed rolls past his feet.

NOAH Yeah, so, they didn’t end up announcing anything.

CUT TO: INT. COLLEGE BEDROOM - DAY Noah sits somberly at his desk.

NOAH I search and waited for YEARS in hope of the return of my beloved film series. I would go to the farthest reaches of the internet, full of dumb rumors like: High School Musical 4 - The College Years starring Taylor Swift or something about a stupid series in the works.

Big text appears on screen saying, “FORESHADOWING!!!”

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NOAH But nothing concrete. The closest I ever came to success was when I found the fake trailer for Beverly Hills High School Chihuahua Road Trip Musical 3 Mash-Up Trailer on YouTube. Which, yes, I believed was real at the time. By 2015, I gave up on my search, but my love for High School Musical burned on. And, as I entered high school myself, I would bust out into song and dance any chance I got to make my dream a reality in the small ways I could.

A montage of Noah poorly singing and dancing around his high school plays on screen.

NOAH So, anyways, what’s the point of all this? Why am I telling you about what some may consider, “embarrasing aspects of my childhood that I should have kept with me to my grave,” and posting it online so that they haunt me for the rest of my life? Well, it’s quite simple actually. Six words: “High School Musical: The Musical: The Series.”

Noah stops and thinks to himself for a moment, recounting what he just said.

NOAH Okay, well actually, that’s seven words; but it doesn’t matter!

Because Disney did it! They brought back High School Musical on Disney+

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battle it out through song and dance to be featured in the next High School Musical film. You see, Stan here, was the solution to my dream. I was going to participate, and WIN, the next season. And all I needed to do now was wait for some news on the fourth High School Musical film to drop.

EXT. DESERT - DAY CUT TO: Noah stands alone in the middle of nowhere. A banner labeled, “High School Musical 4 Announcements” hangs at the top of the screen. A tumble weed rolls past his feet.

NOAH Yeah, so, they didn’t end up announcing anything.

CUT TO: INT. COLLEGE BEDROOM - DAY Noah sits somberly at his desk.

NOAH I search and waited for YEARS in hope of the return of my beloved film series. I would go to the farthest reaches of the internet, full of dumb rumors like: High School Musical 4 - The College Years starring Taylor Swift or something about a stupid series in the works.

Big text appears on screen saying, “FORESHADOWING!!!”

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NOAH But nothing concrete. The closest I ever came to success was when I found the fake trailer for Beverly Hills High School Chihuahua Road Trip Musical 3 Mash-Up Trailer on YouTube. Which, yes, I believed was real at the time. By 2015, I gave up on my search, but my love for High School Musical burned on. And, as I entered high school myself, I would bust out into song and dance any chance I got to make my dream a reality in the small ways I could.

A montage of Noah poorly singing and dancing around his high school plays on screen.

NOAH So, anyways, what’s the point of all this? Why am I telling you about what some may consider, “embarrasing aspects of my childhood that I should have kept with me to my grave,” and posting it online so that they haunt me for the rest of my life? Well, it’s quite simple actually. Six words: “High School Musical: The Musical: The Series.”

Noah stops and thinks to himself for a moment, recounting what he just said.

NOAH Okay, well actually, that’s seven words; but it doesn’t matter!

Because Disney did it! They brought back High School Musical on Disney+

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and it’s everything I could have asked for! It’s got great songs and awesome characters and GENUINELY GOOD WRITING!!! No, like, seriously. I cried genuine tears the first time I watched it.

A video of Noah crying from his first watch through of this show plays on screen.

NOAH And, best of all, it’s being brought back for a Season 2. Which means something to me... You see, I think this is it. This is the last chance I have to fulfill the dreams of dumbo-baby me from all those years ago.

An image of Noah from when he was a High School Musical obsessed child appears on screen.

NOAH This could be my last chance to star in an official High School Musical production. Don’t get me wrong, this show is great, and I genuinely believe it could go on for ten seasons. But if I learned one thing from the aftermath of High School Musical 3, it’s that I can’t take those chances. To top it all off, I’m getting older. I SHAVED FOR THE FIRST TIME IN NINETEEN YEARS THE OTHER DAY!!!

My ability to pass as a high schooler slims as the days go on.

So, this is it. I need to star in the next season of High School Musical: The Musical: The Series... and I need your help to do it. You see, I’m going to start a campaign.

A movement, if you will, to get me cast in the next season of the show. Here’s the plan: every day I’ll ask that you go onto the various Disney+ and HSMTMTS social media accounts to bombard them with messages to cast me in the next season. Now I know what you’re thinking, “Noah, you can’t sing...”

A montage of Noah’s horrible voice plays once more.

NOAH “... you can’t dance...”

Another montage of Noah’s horrible dance skills.

NOAH “... why do you deserve to be cast in the show?” Well, if today’s video has proven anything it’s that I am the #1 High School Musical fan. It’s been a dream I’ve left unfulfilled since I was a kid, and I can’t do it alone. So please...

The video changes to be in a style more reminiscent of the classic, sad ASPCA commercials.

Noah pulls at the peach fuzz on his face.

NOAH

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NOAH All it takes is one like, post, and

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and it’s everything I could have asked for! It’s got great songs and awesome characters and GENUINELY GOOD WRITING!!! No, like, seriously. I cried genuine tears the first time I watched it.

A video of Noah crying from his first watch through of this show plays on screen.

NOAH And, best of all, it’s being brought back for a Season 2. Which means something to me... You see, I think this is it. This is the last chance I have to fulfill the dreams of dumbo-baby me from all those years ago.

An image of Noah from when he was a High School Musical obsessed child appears on screen.

NOAH This could be my last chance to star in an official High School Musical production. Don’t get me wrong, this show is great, and I genuinely believe it could go on for ten seasons. But if I learned one thing from the aftermath of High School Musical 3, it’s that I can’t take those chances. To top it all off, I’m getting older. I SHAVED FOR THE FIRST TIME IN NINETEEN YEARS THE OTHER DAY!!!

My ability to pass as a high schooler slims as the days go on.

So, this is it. I need to star in the next season of High School Musical: The Musical: The Series... and I need your help to do it. You see, I’m going to start a campaign.

A movement, if you will, to get me cast in the next season of the show. Here’s the plan: every day I’ll ask that you go onto the various Disney+ and HSMTMTS social media accounts to bombard them with messages to cast me in the next season. Now I know what you’re thinking, “Noah, you can’t sing...”

A montage of Noah’s horrible voice plays once more.

NOAH “... you can’t dance...”

Another montage of Noah’s horrible dance skills.

NOAH “... why do you deserve to be cast in the show?” Well, if today’s video has proven anything it’s that I am the #1 High School Musical fan. It’s been a dream I’ve left unfulfilled since I was a kid, and I can’t do it alone. So please...

The video changes to be in a style more reminiscent of the classic, sad ASPCA commercials.

Noah pulls at the peach fuzz on his face.

NOAH

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NOAH All it takes is one like, post, and

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73 Alewel By: Stasi Gerges

Tiger

Stasi Gerges is a senior in the Echo’s 10th year who works as an artist for the Echo’s Advertising Department. After she graduates she plans on attending USF with the goal of becoming an attorney, writing a book, and a webcomic on the side. Animals are among her favorite things to draw, such as in her piece...

comment of your own to make this stupid kid’s dream come true. So get out there, and start campaigning with the hashtag: #NOAH4HSM. Alone, I won’t be able to make this happen; but if We’re All In This Together, I think we might be able to Work This Out.

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73 Alewel By: Stasi Gerges

Tiger

Stasi Gerges is a senior in the Echo’s 10th year who works as an artist for the Echo’s Advertising Department. After she graduates she plans on attending USF with the goal of becoming an attorney, writing a book, and a webcomic on the side. Animals are among her favorite things to draw, such as in her piece...

comment of your own to make this stupid kid’s dream come true. So get out there, and start campaigning with the hashtag: #NOAH4HSM. Alone, I won’t be able to make this happen; but if We’re All In This Together, I think we might be able to Work This Out.

Gerges 74

My Demon and Me

By: Noah Alewel

INT. INTERVIEW ROOM Jamie sits in front of an interview backdrop, he is casual.

INT. INTERVIEW ROOM

CUT TO: EXT. PARK - DAY Jamie hangs from a tree and snarles at people who pass by.

CUT TO: INT. INTERVIEW ROOM

JAMIE ... But after looking at the pamplet they gave me, I’m starting to think that might not be true.

Jamie holds up a pamphlet that looks like a timeshare. It clearly shows a ginger boy having demons swirl through the air and put into his body.

JAMIE Honestly, it wasn’t a huge deal at first, but it’s starting to prevent me from being able to have a normal life.

JAMIE It all started out pretty casual, but everything started to move really fast. You see, I... uh.. I wanted a soul, because, well...

CUT TO: EXT. SIDEWALK - DAY

Jamie points to his red hair and gives a shrug.

Jamie walks down the street.

JAMIE So, that led me to the cult club here at FSU. They used me as a vessel, and actually ended up putting a demon in me instead.

JAMIE (VOICE OVER) Churches are a no-go.

Jamie walks by a church, hissing and cowering in pain.

CUT TO:

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JAMIE (VOICE OVER) They said it was by accident...

He grabs a broom and starts shooing them away.

CUT TO:

JAMIE (nonchalant) Hi. My name is Jamie, I’m 18 years old, and I’m possessed by a demon.

INT. JAMIE’S DORM ROOM - EARLY MORNING

Jamie lays in bed. He starts to wake up, only to see cloaked figures humming and pointing at him from the foot of his bed.

CUT TO: INT. RESTRAUNT - NIGHT

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My Demon and Me

By: Noah Alewel

INT. INTERVIEW ROOM Jamie sits in front of an interview backdrop, he is casual.

INT. INTERVIEW ROOM

CUT TO: EXT. PARK - DAY Jamie hangs from a tree and snarles at people who pass by.

CUT TO: INT. INTERVIEW ROOM

JAMIE ... But after looking at the pamplet they gave me, I’m starting to think that might not be true.

Jamie holds up a pamphlet that looks like a timeshare. It clearly shows a ginger boy having demons swirl through the air and put into his body.

JAMIE Honestly, it wasn’t a huge deal at first, but it’s starting to prevent me from being able to have a normal life.

JAMIE It all started out pretty casual, but everything started to move really fast. You see, I... uh.. I wanted a soul, because, well...

CUT TO: EXT. SIDEWALK - DAY

Jamie points to his red hair and gives a shrug.

Jamie walks down the street.

JAMIE So, that led me to the cult club here at FSU. They used me as a vessel, and actually ended up putting a demon in me instead.

JAMIE (VOICE OVER) Churches are a no-go.

Jamie walks by a church, hissing and cowering in pain.

CUT TO:

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JAMIE (VOICE OVER) They said it was by accident...

He grabs a broom and starts shooing them away.

CUT TO:

JAMIE (nonchalant) Hi. My name is Jamie, I’m 18 years old, and I’m possessed by a demon.

INT. JAMIE’S DORM ROOM - EARLY MORNING

Jamie lays in bed. He starts to wake up, only to see cloaked figures humming and pointing at him from the foot of his bed.

CUT TO: INT. RESTRAUNT - NIGHT

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JAMIE So, yeah, now I’m just kind of over it all and I’m ready to move on.

I’ve been doing a lot of research on how to get rid of this thing.

Jamie sits across from a girl, both dressed nicely.

JAMIE (VOICE OVER) Dates are... unpredictable.

He starts to twitch and convulse into a demonic pose and voice.

CUT TO: INT. JAMIE’S DORM ROOM - DAY

JAMIE LISTEN HERE YOU STUPID $@*$%@!!! I AM THE SECOND COMING!!!

Jamie reads through a WikiHow on “How To Get Rid of a Demon.” It reads, “Sternly tell the demon to leave.”

Jamie sits back a bit confused, but silently reassures himself.

The girl screams and runs away as Jamie starts to return to normal.

JAMIE Wait, come back! I’m sorry!!!

JAMIE Demon, leave my body!

Jamie’s hand immediately lifts up involuntarily and slaps himself across the face and falls onto the floor.

CUT TO: INT. POST OFFICE - DAY

CUT TO: INT. INTERVIEW ROOM

Jamie patiently waits in line at a bland, slow post office.

JAMIE Unfortunatley, nothing I’ve tried has really been working, but I recently got an idea while reading some classic literature that I think might finally work.

JAMIE (VOICE OVER) One weird thing it’s been doing is ordering stuff in the mail while I’m asleep.

Jamie walks up and grabs a package. He opens it and pulls out a MAGA hat.

JAMIE What the hell?

Jamie slowly lifts up a copy of “Diary of a Wimpy Kid.” JAMIE Have you ever heard of a thing called... “The Cheese Touch?”

CUT TO:

CUT TO:

INT. INTERVIEW ROOM

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JAMIE So, yeah, now I’m just kind of over it all and I’m ready to move on.

I’ve been doing a lot of research on how to get rid of this thing.

Jamie sits across from a girl, both dressed nicely.

JAMIE (VOICE OVER) Dates are... unpredictable.

He starts to twitch and convulse into a demonic pose and voice.

CUT TO: INT. JAMIE’S DORM ROOM - DAY

JAMIE LISTEN HERE YOU STUPID $@*$%@!!! I AM THE SECOND COMING!!!

Jamie reads through a WikiHow on “How To Get Rid of a Demon.” It reads, “Sternly tell the demon to leave.”

Jamie sits back a bit confused, but silently reassures himself.

The girl screams and runs away as Jamie starts to return to normal.

JAMIE Wait, come back! I’m sorry!!!

JAMIE Demon, leave my body!

Jamie’s hand immediately lifts up involuntarily and slaps himself across the face and falls onto the floor.

CUT TO: INT. POST OFFICE - DAY

CUT TO: INT. INTERVIEW ROOM

Jamie patiently waits in line at a bland, slow post office.

JAMIE Unfortunatley, nothing I’ve tried has really been working, but I recently got an idea while reading some classic literature that I think might finally work.

JAMIE (VOICE OVER) One weird thing it’s been doing is ordering stuff in the mail while I’m asleep.

Jamie walks up and grabs a package. He opens it and pulls out a MAGA hat.

JAMIE What the hell?

Jamie slowly lifts up a copy of “Diary of a Wimpy Kid.” JAMIE Have you ever heard of a thing called... “The Cheese Touch?”

CUT TO:

CUT TO:

INT. INTERVIEW ROOM

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EXT. PARK - DAY Jamie sneaks up behind two people having a conversation. He places a finger on one of their shoulders.

JAMIE DEMON TOUCH! DEMON TOUCH! The person he touches collapses to the ground and starts convulsing. Black spirits swirl through the air and into their body.

People in the surrounding area scream in horror as chaos breaks loose. Jamie just stands their and crosses his fingers.

79 Alewel

THANK YOU FOR TEN YEARS OF THE ECHO

Kathy Syron, John Eric Vona, Emily Vona-Kelley, Jennifer Dillon, Mallory Steffes, Amir Ahmadiavin, Jake Bittle, Natalie Barman, Kristina Santana, Melissa Ferrin, Shannon Stich, Keith Palmer, Luis Llano, Ashylen Spector, Tyler Hatcher, Hava Goldstein, Audry Kervin, Cata Cheng, Cara Lynn Albert, Robbie Gordon, Abby Chisolm, Tessa Childress, Macey Sidlasky, Jenn Heveran, Matt Gerasimovich, Emily Holley, John “Scooter” Maurer, Arielle Segovia-Best, Wendy Smith, Sam Szatyari, Darin Bell, Jessie Bryant, Taylor Masut, Matthew Perror, Daniel Krasnove, Lara Anid, Kristen Barry, Anthony Campbell, Logan Conrad, Miranda Cornell, Michael Dailey, Mariela Deynes, Cassidy Doyle, Dev Landry, Janelle Lockhart, Rachel Madden, Cierra Martinez, Beth Mason, Alyssa Mills, Eric Nieves, Emily Nott, Emily Pedone, Kyia Seo, Lilly Schaffer, Gabby Shusterman, Emma Stevens, Chris Tanberg, Gianna Taravella, Caitlin Toland, Mokshitha Ashoka, Nicolette Bauermeister, Ally Carlin, Emily Chmielewski, Mell Amber Finefrock, Haleigh Gaw, Jessica Herz, Stefan Hromalik, Jessica Krasnove, Thais Jacomassi, Sam Lee, Analise Marrow, Chase Martello, Nicholas Ocasio, Nicholas Petruccelli, Christina Ramazzotto, Jordan Reineke, Lauren Rivera, Stephanie Sutter, Aliya Talbani, Emily Terrill, Gabrielle Tinsley, Giselle Tinsley, Lexi Velte, Salvatore “Bean” Tejeda, Justen Vargas, Sage Whitney, Bella Cruz-O’Grady, Madison Maha, Kayla Halls, Perdita Samuel-Lopez, Kaitlin Burkhart, Gabby Johnson, Rumaysa Sweilem, Nat Mannino, Marcus Smith, Anna Moye, Samuel Ake, Andrew Bianchet, Rayanne Anid, Kat Swartz, Erix Pizano, Angelica Reyes, Mitchell Miller, Kayla Wittyngham, Noah Alewel, Kurt Cochran, Doreen Coreen, Aidan Sullivan, Gianna “Scooby” DeMalteris, Emily LaLiberte, Hailey Plumb, Samantha Sanchez, Cela Sosa, Marlee Wittner, Lexa Mosher, Sadie Testa-Secca, Renee Fleet, Jordyn Dees, Sanika Kende, Rachel Capote, Molly Pefley, Micheal Pemberton, Brooke Alewel, Veronica Da Silva, Cassidy Hale, Jack Leist, Oz Lao, Anna CorralGavilan, Andrea Burgess, Julianna Mauro, Justin White, Sam Berger, Grace Beilman, Ally O’Connor, Madeleine James, Amelia Miller, Elke Stelter, Jaeda Solon, Alison Spier, Evan Sizemore, Sophia McGregor, Nathan Pray, Hannah Levy, Char Thybulle, Alexandra Gerges, Stasi Gerges, Jaden Patel, Dylon Martin, and Emma Bunkley.

The Echo 80

EXT. PARK - DAY Jamie sneaks up behind two people having a conversation. He places a finger on one of their shoulders.

JAMIE DEMON TOUCH! DEMON TOUCH! The person he touches collapses to the ground and starts convulsing. Black spirits swirl through the air and into their body.

People in the surrounding area scream in horror as chaos breaks loose. Jamie just stands their and crosses his fingers.

79 Alewel

THANK YOU FOR TEN YEARS OF THE ECHO

Kathy Syron, John Eric Vona, Emily Vona-Kelley, Jennifer Dillon, Mallory Steffes, Amir Ahmadiavin, Jake Bittle, Natalie Barman, Kristina Santana, Melissa Ferrin, Shannon Stich, Keith Palmer, Luis Llano, Ashylen Spector, Tyler Hatcher, Hava Goldstein, Audry Kervin, Cata Cheng, Cara Lynn Albert, Robbie Gordon, Abby Chisolm, Tessa Childress, Macey Sidlasky, Jenn Heveran, Matt Gerasimovich, Emily Holley, John “Scooter” Maurer, Arielle Segovia-Best, Wendy Smith, Sam Szatyari, Darin Bell, Jessie Bryant, Taylor Masut, Matthew Perror, Daniel Krasnove, Lara Anid, Kristen Barry, Anthony Campbell, Logan Conrad, Miranda Cornell, Michael Dailey, Mariela Deynes, Cassidy Doyle, Dev Landry, Janelle Lockhart, Rachel Madden, Cierra Martinez, Beth Mason, Alyssa Mills, Eric Nieves, Emily Nott, Emily Pedone, Kyia Seo, Lilly Schaffer, Gabby Shusterman, Emma Stevens, Chris Tanberg, Gianna Taravella, Caitlin Toland, Mokshitha Ashoka, Nicolette Bauermeister, Ally Carlin, Emily Chmielewski, Mell Amber Finefrock, Haleigh Gaw, Jessica Herz, Stefan Hromalik, Jessica Krasnove, Thais Jacomassi, Sam Lee, Analise Marrow, Chase Martello, Nicholas Ocasio, Nicholas Petruccelli, Christina Ramazzotto, Jordan Reineke, Lauren Rivera, Stephanie Sutter, Aliya Talbani, Emily Terrill, Gabrielle Tinsley, Giselle Tinsley, Lexi Velte, Salvatore “Bean” Tejeda, Justen Vargas, Sage Whitney, Bella Cruz-O’Grady, Madison Maha, Kayla Halls, Perdita Samuel-Lopez, Kaitlin Burkhart, Gabby Johnson, Rumaysa Sweilem, Nat Mannino, Marcus Smith, Anna Moye, Samuel Ake, Andrew Bianchet, Rayanne Anid, Kat Swartz, Erix Pizano, Angelica Reyes, Mitchell Miller, Kayla Wittyngham, Noah Alewel, Kurt Cochran, Doreen Coreen, Aidan Sullivan, Gianna “Scooby” DeMalteris, Emily LaLiberte, Hailey Plumb, Samantha Sanchez, Cela Sosa, Marlee Wittner, Lexa Mosher, Sadie Testa-Secca, Renee Fleet, Jordyn Dees, Sanika Kende, Rachel Capote, Molly Pefley, Micheal Pemberton, Brooke Alewel, Veronica Da Silva, Cassidy Hale, Jack Leist, Oz Lao, Anna CorralGavilan, Andrea Burgess, Julianna Mauro, Justin White, Sam Berger, Grace Beilman, Ally O’Connor, Madeleine James, Amelia Miller, Elke Stelter, Jaeda Solon, Alison Spier, Evan Sizemore, Sophia McGregor, Nathan Pray, Hannah Levy, Char Thybulle, Alexandra Gerges, Stasi Gerges, Jaden Patel, Dylon Martin, and Emma Bunkley.

The Echo 80

- Molly Pefley, Desolate Encounters, Page 47

The Echo

“He could feel the eyes of the menacing children burning holes into the side of his painted white face.”

“Hi. My name is Jamie, I’m 18 years old,and I’m possessed by a demon.”

- Noah Alewel, My Demon and Me, Page 75

- Jordyn Dees, Erase My History, Page 17

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Volume X, Issue 1

GSHSECHO

10th Anniversary Edition

“Too radical for your mantra of success and unity, better to erase, erase, erase, craft a story so sweetly simple, it makes my teethache.”