Halfway - Hannah Karim

John and I descend the steps of the old church stairs. As we open the basement door, the familiar scent of mildew greets us. In the past, we’d attempted suppressing the scent with various candles and room fresheners, but nothing worked. We stopped trying, deciding it best not to deny our circumstance anyways. We had arranged the seats to face each other in a circle, a configuration made for AA meetings, group therapy, and our book club meetings, held on Tuesday evenings underneath the Madison Street Church. Posters advertising our book club were hung around our town’s library, diner, and convenience stores. Locals joked that we facilitated a halfway house more than we did a literary discussion, but we didn’t mind. To us, it was home.

An anonymous donor from the community provided the funding needed to supply each of our members with a copy of the book we were reading. We read a book a month and as our membership expanded, we could only afford second hand copies. Sam expressed increased comfortability with writing in the margins of something already worn down. Heather inspired an admiration for the handwritten notes that were sometimes found on the title pages. And it wasn’t long before everyone was writing their own with intent of giving the book away after reading it.

Harold was our first member and our next door neighbor in the first apartment that John and I rented together. He used to tell us we were too young to know what love is. If John and I were to ask him about it now, he’d claim he supported us from the start. Harold liked books and loved having an audience. He liked telling people that he was a soulful jazz singer in another life, convinced he’d been reincarnated as a male Billie Holiday.

We missed the presence of Gertrude, an 80 year-old woman, who frequently talked about her past as a substitute for her inability to live as she once had. She was a regular at our meetings for years until she wasn’t. She slept frequently, saying today was an “I can’t get out of bed type of day” and that she would try tomorrow. When life got too heavy, my mother stepped outside to smoke a cigarette. Tomorrow was Gertrude’s cigarette. Despite the proven emptiness of such a promise, Gertrude called every morning at 8 a.m. and every morning, John and I listened. We felt for her, John and I, never pretending our own debilitation was less than inevitable.

Caroline was the embodiment of honey and men knew it. Her door seemed ever-revolving, always welcoming the next man eager to release himself in her. I worried for her, though John assured me this was natural for people in their twenties, that she was in the process of finding herself. John became less convinced as the years went on. He never admitted it though, even after we were having Caroline over every Sunday night for dinner and sending her home with a week’s worth of groceries. John and I had noticed that the bruising on her arm only became more frequent, but we pretended not to, afraid of scaring her off.

The meetings themselves often ran for around two hours. We always began with discussing Fitzgerald and Orwell and Baldwin and Tolstoy. But it was never long before Clara discussed her mother’s latest disappointment with her or Camille shared the latest impulsive purchase that she was hiding from her girlfriend or Patrick asked for advice to stay clean or Steven expressed sadness that his cat, Sisyphus was ignoring him. A few minutes before the meeting’s conclusion, Patrick mentioned something about a crazy disease spreading on the other side of the world. We didn’t think anything of it.

Untitled - Juliette Humphreys

I watch him fail to light a cigarette against the wind.

Little sparks erupting than disappearing in an instant like dying fireflies kept in a jar. His back is hunched over. Through his light tee shirt I can see every vertebrae of his spine and I have the strange desire to rub my knuckle down them to see if they knock at different frequencies.

Please don't look at me like that, he says. We are standing outside of his garage. The ring camera his mom watches close to us. He is beautiful the type of way that ice is beautiful when it melts. He is beautiful like a piece of toast.

Like what I ask.

Like I'm stupid.

He clicks the lighter on again but the fire vanishes before it can even touch the cigarette.

He asks me if he should quit smoking and I tell him no.

Every morning, he sprays tobacco vanille by Tom Fford on the soft parts of his neck -- wrists -- chest peaks but after he smokes Newports, he smells stale and I feel guilty about how much it stokes the fire in the pit of my stomach.

This lighter is fucking dead he says and drops it on the ground. He removes the cigarette from his mouth and places it behind his ear,

I'm gonna go to sleep.

I watch him walk away.

I worry that the only thing I will ever be good for in life is to watch people walk away.

He lets himself back into the furnished basement without saying goodbye. He doesn't have to. He knows that around midnight I will tiptoe down the creaking staircase and he will be half awake and we will say no words and we will sleep together and in the morning I will ask him if I can wear his socks and he will say no and I will want to cry.

I pick up the lighter from the ground once he disappears. I click it on and let myself feel the heat of it against my forearm.

He once told me that to have asthma is to breathe fire. He also told me that the only thing humans are capable of feeling is lost, but he also said that this lighter was fucking dead and as I finally start to smell my skin burn I realize that it is not.

Jimmy Cooper - Victor Max Valentine aka David Alan Mors

A broad smile spread across Rory’s elfin face. The weather had subsided leaving only the somber sky behind. His mum had finally given him permission to go out and explore. She regularly reminded him he had been a very small baby and always susceptible to sickness. While drying the lunch dishes she recounted, for the hundredth time, the story of poor little James Ccooper who had run about in the snow for too long one day the year before last and wound up dying of pneumonia.

Mrs. Cooper claimed there was another boy playing with him. She could not tell who it was from the living room window.

“Don’t stay out too long, icy winds are coming back.” His mother warned.

Rory’s willowy limbs took him flying across the backyard. The cold damp air glazed his face. The squish, splot of his elastic boots hit the ground liberating the scent of wet earth. Remnants of the late autumn storm soaked the bare branches and tiny drops clung to the tips like crystal beads carefully placed by a pixy jeweler. He stopped just at the edge of the forest behind the house. A gathering of blackbirds bounced and traded places in the trees above him.

“Hallo, you” he said, wondering at the game they might be playing.

He could hear the stirring of a creature, perhaps a squirrel, scampering from bole to bole in the wood. He looked down at his wet galoshes to see a worm labouring through the fallen pine and

broken leaves. Its head tested the air for the best way to go next. Then a sinister noise came from farther in. He squinted his eyes and moved closer.

“Hallo.” he called again, cautiously.

The response was whispers from an unknown thing.

The ash trees surrounded him now.

Behind him, a presence moved up to his shoulder. His rusty lashes fluttered as he looked toward his left yet he did not turn.

The shock of hair at the back of his head fluttered in the wind.

Something rounded his right side and dead things shifted and crackled. Though the day was still drab, a deeper shadow fell across his face. He turned and looked up.

“You again,” he said tonelessly. “ I thought you might come ‘round today. That is why I begged mother to let me out to play.”

There was a harsh hissing and the wind whipped around him upsetting things that then clung to his clothing and hair.

“Your shadow is taller every time I see you.”

Something shuddered, a sound that might have been the groaning of ancient limbs in the wind.

There was a low boom that traveled through the wood. It reached the house where his mother continued her cleaning. She looked up and listened for a moment.

“I know,” the boy said in response to something silent and still. “We can go for our walk again if you like. Shall I soon become part of the wood as you promised? I shan't tell mother, she would not let me go. But I would so like to be a thing of the copse like you.”

“Yes, mother worries about me all the time.”

“The winter is coming and I should never get sick again, mother would like that part.”

You woke me up that day in the snow. I was very grateful but sad for you, Jimmy. Now we can disappear into the shadows together.”

“Oh, she won’t be surprised. She knows strange things happen here.”

A Small Service - Birdy Brunner

A seagull squawked in the distance. As far as the eye could see was a vast, unforgiving water. The harsh sun seared the sea; the water too warm to be of comfort. This view was tainted by a small speck on the horizon.  A boat swayed up and down with the currents of the ocean. Two bodies sat in a sickening boat ride. Both were stripped of almost all of their clothes, save for shorts. At the sound of a bird gawking, one of the bodies twitched. The moving man looked across to his companion. 

“Captain”, the moving man said hoarsely. 

A low moan emanated from the Captain. 

Despite the stifling heat, this noise chilled the moving man to the bones. The moan sounded like a ghost; a ghost not yet dead, but already haunting the living. All sailors feared drowning, but no one thought to fear what might happen if you managed to survive. At least a watery grave seemed quick. Fighting the heavy fatigue, the moving sailor crawled forward. 

“My Captain”, he whispered. 

The moving sailor grabbed his Captain’s face and cradled it in his hands. The Captain’s old strength shriveled away and his once familiar face has become foreign. The moving sailor shacked his Captain, but he remained as dull and lifeless as a doll.  He felt his Captain’s pulse fading. The moving sailor’s expression morphed from defeat to determination. 

“Eat me,” the moving sailor demanded.  No response. 

The moving sailor took off his belt and wrapped it around his right leg. He squeezed the belt, as he attempted to cut off the blood circulation. 

“Eat me,” he repeated.  Still nothing. 

Gently, he grabbed his captain’s head and guided it downward. 

For a brief moment, both the Captain and the sailor held their breath in silence. Then, a bite. A tear. Unfathomable pain. Blood rushed out of the moving sailor’s leg, warm, too warm.  Both the moving sailor and the Captain emitted harsh, guttural noises. The sound of slurping and crunching filled the air. The moving sailor tightly gripped his Captain’s head. Blood pooled in the boat and overflowed out into the sea. Too much blood; the belt was not strong enough to match the Captain’s might. 

Time ceased to exist. The Captain devoured and devoured until he was gagging. As suddenly as it began, it was over. Face bloody, the Captain looked up into the moving sailor’s eyes.  Hunger transformed into terror, as the Captain processed what he had done. 

“Oh God, oh please, don’t leave me”, the Captain begged. 

The Captain pleaded to the heavens and he gripped the moving sailor’s head to his chest. The Captain’s voice grew less feeble, and soon, he was screaming with the power denied from the dying.  

The moving sailor laid back onto the Captain’s ribcage. All else faded, as the moving sailor listened to his Captain’s erratic heartbeat. The moving man moved no more. Motionlessly, the sailor looked up into the sky. A solitary seagull circled overhead.  The sailor stared up at the bird and at the sun until his vision went black. He then closed his eyes and smiled.

Pool Party - Morgan Lynn

Strands of my hair stuck to my face, creating drawn out black veins. I let them be, and

stared straight up to the clouds through mirrored Ray Bans. I had been floating for at least an

hour, long enough for the clouds to suck away any last drop of glitter in the sky, and leave me

basking in gray. Wind acted like mosquitos buzzing past my ear, and giving rise to a layer of

goosebumps over my body. I broke my silent agreement with the surface tension, and sank

below disturbing the calm surface. My body sighs as I sink to the bottom. My skin, thin as filo

dough and I hold the pale flaky surface of my feet as a child in the warmth of her mother’s

womb, just before shooting into a world where she will never feel the same warmth. Addicted to

a feeling she can't even remember.

Around me I'm no longer on earth, I'm inside your mind, deep within the dream scheme

that lays dormant in reality. My lungs don't beg for air, they remain complacent and I tilt my head

towards the new distorted sky. I’d stay here forever, in jello that halts time, and allows me to

float weightlessly in a blue concrete pit. Where my sky is a kaleidoscope distortion of the blue

gray I've seen since birth. Maybe If I hadn't been so infatuated with the silence which held me, I

may have heard the noise. A pair of hands came tearing through the water, and were followed

by bubbles pouring out of a midlife crisis aged man's mouth. I bounced to the surface, my nose

twitched to the breeze, and I allowed my lungs their wish of air. The man had already begun

yelling at me, in what I can only assume to be Greek.

“Sorry sir!” I hoisted myself out of the water, and stared into the big eyes of a confused

family. “Must have the wrong house... I thought this was Tony's place!” I grabbed my towel,

slipped on my shoes, and took off into the deep woods that guarded their house.

All These H0llow Things - Mackenzie Bennett

The quiet town of Springport, Michigan had been hit with heavy rain every day the week prior. The streets were flooded with water, streams of it rushing into drainpipes, struggling to deal with the overflow. The twin lakes—more like ponds—also saw a significant rise in water levels. And several rivers, like Ashhill river up in the mountains, have become mere torrents coursing through the land, swallowing anything in its path. This level of flooding occurs every year during this time. When summer starts to give way to fall and a chill slithers in to take its place.

Storms are likely to brew.

This day, however, was dryer than others. The torrential surge of rain lessened to a mere drizzle. Dark gray clouds blanketed the sky, blocking the light of the sun. Dense fog lingered in the air and the smell of rain enveloped every inch of the town.

This wouldn’t sway Marnie. She took this lapse in rain as an opportunity and decided to trek her favorite hiking trails found on Grove Mountain. Her boyfriend, Noah and their beloved golden lab, Bentley, accompanied her. While walking, Marnie heard the soft pattering of rain on the leaves. With a deep breath, she inhaled the rich earthy scents of mud and moss. The decay of leaves and fallen, hollowed logs. Marnie exhaled just as a smile spread across her lips.

Noah’s voice snapped her out of her reverie. “Feels good to be back?”

Marnie hummed in response. The same warm smile brightened her face. During the hours that she spends on this mountain, she could simply breathe.

The pair continued along the trail and were swiftly swept in conversation. Their hiking boots squelching through the mud. Ahead of them, Bentley wandered the trail. His tail wagging merrily as he bent his head, sniffing the ground as he went. The dog took a particular interest in a fallen log covered in moss. The inside completely hollow. The wood a deep, rotting brown. A few mushrooms lining one side.

Bentley’s head shot up—brown eyes bright and alert. He strayed from the path, past the log as if beckoned by something. Noah called him back. Bentley hesitated, whining. He obeyed, then wandered ahead once more.

They diverged from the main trail and headed down a fork in the path. On this path, they happened upon a patch of thicket. Noah drew some of the bushes back with his arm, allowing Marnie and Bentley to squeeze through. Bentley bounded down easily. His mouth hung open with his tongue lolling to the side. Noah followed. Only he wasn’t as graceful as his furry companion and nearly slipped in the mud. Marnie watched him, stifling a laugh.

“Careful, you might pull something.” Marnie teased. Her hazel eyes alight with amusement.

Noah righted himself and stepped down onto the stones littering the riverbed. He smiled as he wiped his hands together, trying to rid them of the mud and grit. “Careful or I’ll toss you in the mud next.”

Marnie laughed. She turned away from him, looking behind her.

Ahead, just meters away, Ashhill river stood. Marnie watched the surge of murky, silt-ridden water as it rippled and bubbled, how it swirled and churned as it lapped at the rocks. Marnie didn’t want to test the power of that current.

Bentley wandered ahead once more while Marnie and Noah hung back. They were lost in conversation, laughing and teasing one another as they walked.

A chorus of barking erupted, snagging their attention. Marnie halted in her tracks. Noah followed. They looked ahead to find Bentley yards away. Dangerously close to the river’s edge.

“Bentley, get over here!” Noah demanded. The dog never budged. Never turned his head. He went on barking. Then he began to whine.

What’s got him so worked up? Marnie wondered.

Noah hurried over to the dog. Marnie not far behind. Noah grabbed Bentley’s collar, nudging him away.

“What’s going on with you?” Noah asked, patting the dog’s head. Bentley’s whines rang in Marnie’s ears. His barks vibrating in her chest. Marnie followed the dog's gaze.

There—wedged in between two boulders—a small body lay face down in the murky water. The body of eleven-year-old Ava Chamberlin.

***

Ava Chamberlin was announced missing over a year ago. October 27th to be exact. She was out with her mother running errands. At some point between 4:35 and 4:46pm, the mother, Katherine grabbed a cup of coffee and jug of milk from a convenience store. Ava was said to have been sitting in the car while she played with her favorite doll, alone. When the mother returned, Ava was nowhere to be found.

No one saw anything.

Katherine wailed. Her cries echoed as her entire world crumbled.

The convenience store clerk and several others looked on, helpless. One of Katherine’s neighbors had gone to the poor woman and held her as she sobbed uncontrollably.

The police were called. They were quick to conduct a search for the missing child. They scanned the perimeter of the store, then spread out in a mile radius. Then three. Then five.

No trace of Ava Chamberlin was found.

The officers promised to keep looking. They promised to find Ava. But despite these assurances, Katherine retreated home and stayed there; overcome with grief and worry, she couldn’t bear to face the world.

Hours turned into days. As time stretched on, the hope of finding little Ava dwindled. It appeared the police weren’t searching for her anymore; they were looking for a body.

Katherine and her husband, Richard, received a bit of hope that coming spring once the snow melted. The police had discovered Ava’s favorite doll that looked just like her. It had the same mouse-brown hair and clear brown eyes. Its cheeks dusted with freckles like hers. The doll was found in a ditch near a drainpipe, covered in grime. It was the one and only trace they found of little Ava. That had been months ago. Not long after the case grew cold.

Now, here Ava was.

Devotion - Birdy Brunner

The sun loomed overhead of a dismal gray church. On the outside, there is nothing worth remarking upon, save for its intricate stained-glass windows. A mosaic image of a long dead saint dominated those hallowed halls. The blistering sun shone violently shone through the glass, as the insulated world of the church was tinged blood red. Cloistered within this sacred site, a lone figure was drenched under the oppressive light. Cloaked in black, a solitary young woman kneeled at the altar. A nun. Her hands are clasped in prayer; eyes vigorously closed. She clutched a rosary in desperate hands, with the fervor like that of disbelieving dying.

Rocking back and forth, the young woman rambled to the heavens. She was murmuring in Latin, repeating the same words over and over again, until her sentences bled together into a jumbled mess. The regulated rules of the church resulted in nonsense, as this paragon of virtue rejected the traditional systems in exchange for passion. The words of man no longer hold any meaning for a beacon of devout love.

Out of her darkness, a white light clouded the world. In shock, the young nun opened her eyes, but a painful, bleached nothingness embraced her. Tears streamed down her face. Her watery eyes slid out of her skull and down towards her hands—bathing her rosary in an unholy baptism. As the vision seeped away from the young woman, a velvety voice rang in her ears.

“Be not afraid”, the voice demanded. The young woman froze, unable to process what she was hearing. For a moment, it was quiet. A vibrating boom coursed through her veins—the only noise she perceived was her own heart beating in her chest. In this horrifying calmness, a feeling of longing overwhelmed the young woman. She realized that all of her worship, all of her adoration was pointless. There was a hole in her soul that she denied. Up until now, her sacraments have rebuked her—her spirit was starving. Her famished mind never delighted in the splendor of an appetite satisfied.

“Be not afraid”, the voice repeated, louder. What a silly statement—how could anyone fear nourishment? What was terrifying about righteous deliverance? Is a father providing for his child frighting? In mere seconds, an intense craving filled the young nun. An inescapable hunger was etched into her very soul—it was consuming whatever existed before and after.

Her sight was gone, but she has never been so enlightened. She needed more. She was empty and this being, this glorious, amazing being could fulfill her in ways that she never imagined.

She reached out her hands and felt warmth. The heat penetrated her skin and reached into her bones. She was suffocating—drowning in her own lungs.

The young nun screamed. She screamed. She screamed. In ecstasy. And then the world was silent.

Devoured - Birdy Brunner

Buildings are alive; you swear this to be true. They have their own soul—emotions that human beings are incapable of understanding. Although you recognize that comprehending such an unfathomable creature is futile, you must try. You must, because you are being consumed by a building.

It happened so slowly, so inconspicuously, that it’s difficult for you to remember when it first began. Your office building was mundane—it was so boring looking that it bordered on mind-numbing. This mundanity turned out to be deceitful. After several weeks of going to the exact same building, you noticed something.

Red spindly lines would often appear on the outside of your office.

They looked like dead tree branches or the veins in a human body. All the buildings were painted a sterile white, and so the red veins boldly stood out—glaring at everyone who would dare to look up and notice them. At least once a month, you could see people on top of massive ladders, attempting to paint over the ominous red lines—but to no avail. They always returned.

It’s labyrinthian structure is designed to be as confusing as possible. Everything looks so similar—which way is north, which way is east. It’s easy to mindlessly wonder into the wrong spot. It becomes normal for you, to be lost and distorted. You frantically try to map out the endless white void of cubicles; you physically cling to whatever you can grasps, hoping to relieve your confusion.

As you stroll through the hall, you firmly press your fingertips against a blank white wall—it’s always warm, uncomfortably so. It’s damp, like sweat. You can feel it vibrating. It’s pulsating. It reminds you of flesh, and of the blood vessels that travel under your skin at this very moment.

Something is wrong. You are being swallowed, driven into the depth of a bottomless stomach. This was a place that wanted to devour people. You saw those intricate red webs as bars on a prison cell. You felt like these buildings never wanted people to leave, that its insatiable appetite would never be satisfied.

And how could it ever be content? The building needs people to operate—without us, it would fall into despair. It’s a parasitic ecosystem—we both need each other to survive. This desperation, this terror of isolation can cause even the most loathed of enemies to bond.

This building has heard your deepest secrets. You have borne your soul within this confining space. It has listened as you sobbed in the bathroom. This is the most intimate relationship you’ve ever had. It knows you, and yet, you still fail to understand it as well.

Time wore on. You wondered if you were wrong. As you repeatedly saw office officials desperately try to suppress intrusive red veins, you realized how exhausting it must be—to be rejected for what you truly are and forced to be something else. You know how heartbreaking it is, to be hated for existing.

You thought that despite thousands of people inhabiting its walls, no one actually saw it. No one recognized the messages that it was constantly trying to send. How lonely it must be, you thought, to never been seen for what you are. Perhaps these buildings weren’t the stomach at all.

This building loves you—how could you have been so stupid to think otherwise? In the busiest moments, when the office was buzzing with thousands of people all walking at the same time, you would sometimes freeze in place. It was then, as you listened to the rumble of the workers’ footsteps, you would swear it sounded like a heart beating.

The Seductive and Lethal Effect of the Reflexive - Leticia Lekos

English lacks reflexive verbs. They are substituted with subjects and reflexive pronouns.

While this suffices to secure translations of most phrases from Spanish to English, it creates an

obstruction when understanding the relation between romance and death. A character’s passing,

a singular end with a multi-faceted journey, is a recognized trope of romantic literature.

However, the understanding of grief’s impact and drive to death is lost in English translations, as

it is an inherently romantic concept, furthered by a romantic languages’ diction and grammar.

Spanish suggests that apart from suicide, one can will themself to death. While the English

language fails to convey this possibility, it is found over and again in the entangling romances of

English Victorian literature. Several Victorian novelists created characters that agonize over the

results of their romantic pursuits. Yet, it is not the repeated shattering of their hearts that cuts

them from their final breath, but rather an autonomous outcome of their sorrows. Love inspires a

challenge that reigns its participants back after every failure, creating an addiction for round after

round. Victorian literature exemplifies this as heroes and heroines experience rape, heartbreak,

unrequited desires, and more, but always return for their next chance at love. It is only when

every option has been exhausted and there are no possibilities left to attempt, that the characters

give up on love. Rather than a narrative that follows life after love, Victorian literature terminates

the story when hopelessness persists. Love is what makes life worthwhile and when that dies, so

do the characters’ lives. This connects romance and death, as the dissipation of one produces the

other. The restraints of the English language can only demonstrate this phenomena through a

character’s story. Spanish reflects this romantic trope within its language. Death is categorized as

an action one can impose upon themself with the verb “morirse”. The pronoun is attached to the

verb, forcing every use of the word, to subjugate a pronoun as a part of its correct usage.

Reflexive verbs automatically dictate that it is an action being done to oneself. The correlation

between romance and death is disconnected in English literature, as a heart’s rupture is a

sentiment, and not a physical response. Grammatically, this is an overwhelming disparity

between translation and interpretation. The Spanish verb leaves no space to claim anything

besides an understanding that death can be self-afflicted. In English, since there is an opportunity

for the speaker to choose their pronoun, there is ambivalence when understanding how death

happens to a person. It can be the result of an intangible unlucky fate, or the pinnacle of human

emotion, depending on the chosen phrasing. The distinction between reflexive verbs and

pronouns is crucial when identifying the will to die as a romantic trope. The use of a pronoun,

when discussing death, lightens the gravity and comprehension of will in a human response,

rather than a human reaction. To properly describe a harrowing romance, in any language, a

writer must convey heartbreak’s position in relation to the will and power to die.