West

They sold Dena's car, Chris's bike, their used textbooks. They sold the dresser Dena's father had given her before he died, the one that belonged to Aunt Elizabeth. The one she swore she'd keep in the family.

"You Craigslisted the dresser?" she squawked at Chris.

"Chill! We got a hundred bucks for it!"

Dena felt a little catch in her lungs, or maybe in her heart. She remembered her father’s body, the sticky tape sealing tubes and needles to his skin, pushing and pumping, trying.

Her father was dead. Aunt Elizabeth was dead. A dresser wouldn't fit in an RV anyway.

Kimbra came over to buy the last of the pot.

"It's not the good stuff. I won't lie to you," Chris told Kimbra. "But we really need the money right now."

"I think what you're doing is totally rad," Kimbra said. "It's just like On the Road, right?"

Dena watched Chris fold the money into their thick stack of cash.

"Yeah. Just like On the Road."

She knew Chris hadn't read Kerouac. Couldn't speak to the tradition. Couldn't know to be afraid of it.

"Don't eat any poison plants, 'kay?" Kimbra said.

Into the Wild, not On the Road. Is everybody I know full of bullshit?

Kimbra gave them a ride to the used car lot and wished them luck, already pawing in the marijuana baggie as she waited for them to climb out.

The day was hot. The last crisp cool of Kimbra's AC deserted Dena's skin. She could feel the back of her neck begin to sweat, her baby hairs curling into insistent ringlets.

"You ready?" Chris asked. He didn't wait for her to answer.

Louie barely looked up when they entered the shack that housed the dealership’s office.

"Still want the Chinook?" Louie asked.

Chris handed over the money. Louie counted it, licking his fingertips to separate the bills.

"Now, she's definitely your vintage model, but I added some freon for you this morning. You should be good to go. Where y'all going, anyway?"

"West," Chris said.

That was all he ever said when people asked, as if the answer was meant to evoke the spirit of adventure. Lewis and Clark. The gold rush. More likely, Chris was thinking Oregon Trail. Living off the land. Hunting and gathering. Dying of dysentery after attempting to caulk the wagon and float.

Dena climbed into the RV first. It smelled of cat urine and mildew and something worse—a lingering cloud of lavender Febreeze. At least Louie had tried.

"Fucking home sweet home," Chris said, pumping his fists above his head.

Dena climbed into the bed tucked over the cab. The mattress cover had a hole in it, and underneath, she could see that the foam was dried and rotten. She thought of her father’s hospital bed, starched and sanitized, even the railings coated in copper to kill germs.

"Are you thinking about how sweet it's going to be to sleep up here, in the middle of a national park, listening to the wolves howl?" Chris asked, climbing up beside her.

“Yeah,” Dena said. “That’s pretty much exactly what I’m thinking.”

                                                                                              ***

They spent their first night parked at a rest stop in Mississippi. The RV had made slow time, groaning when Chris pushed it over sixty miles an hour.

“It’s not about the destination anyway,” he said.

In the bed over the cab, Dena tossed and turned as Chris snored. The radio had only been able to pick up country music through Alabama, then finally a dubious R&B station. Chris had hummed along to a song in which a guy croons that he doesn’t mind if his girlfriend’s a stripper as long as she makes money. They’d eaten McDonald’s for breakfast, Burger King for lunch, and Waffle House for dinner.

“We are human grease,” she’d said to Chris.

“The body is an amazing thing. It can get used to almost anything, after a while.”

“Yeah. Like cancer,” Dena muttered.

He’d rambled on about accumulating callouses, about sun-tanned skin, about a new awareness of nature. But now the rambling was replaced by snoring.

And then, a howl.

At first, Dena rolled her eyes. It was too much. There were no wolves on I-22. She heard it again. A high-pitched howl. Definitely not her imagination.

She rolled out of the bed and guided herself to the floor, sneaking towards the door. She slid on her flip flops and went outside. The air was still hot, even in the middle of the night. Lights washed the rest stop in an orange glow.

She heard the howl again and moved towards the noise.

On the other side of the parking lot, a man in a baseball hat was dragging a dog towards a green pickup truck. The dog, some kind of hound mix, howled and struggled, lurching towards the rest station building.

“That your dog?” Dena called.

“Yeah,” said the man in the hat. “Sorry—it’s just—he’s after the raccoons.”

“Raccoons?”

“They’re smart. They’ve figured out how to rob the vending machines.”

Near the entrance to the women’s bathroom, two raccoons were scuttling near the snack machine. One had snaked its arm inside and was grabbing at the food trapped in the black metal coils. The other paced behind its companion in obvious anticipation.

“Shit,” Dena said.

“Resourceful little critters,” the man said. “Get in, Riley.”

The dog resisted.

“Want a hand, there?”

Dena helped the man hoist Riley into the cab of the truck.

“Thanks,” he said. “Can’t blame him, right? Hey, is that your camper over there?”

“It’s my—friend’s.”

“Where you heading?”

Dena paused. Her lips had almost formed the word West, but instead she said, “Away.”

“Great American adventure?”

“Something like that.”

The man in the hat grinned at her. In the great American adventure story, he’d say his name was Bill. He’d offer her a beer or maybe some ill-advised hallucinogens. They’d stay up all night as Riley slept in the cab of the truck, as Chris snored in the Chinook. Maybe he’d try to kiss her. Maybe she’d tell him all about her father, about feeling so lonely you’d sell everything you owned to ride across the country with an unlovable optimist. They’d watch the sun rise. Maybe she’d leave with him, drive north, slip another untraceable layer between who she was and who she could become.

But this was not a story. There was no such thing as real reinvention.

“Your front tire there looks a little flat,” the man in the baseball hat said as he climbed into the truck. “Might want to find someone to take a look at that before you hit the road.”

The truck pulled onto the interstate. The light by the rest station flickered. As Dena crossed the parking lot towards the Chinook, the two raccoons ran across her path. Each one carried a bag of honey mustard pretzels in its whiskered mouth.

Written by: Dot Dannenberg
Photograph by: Daniel Vidal

The Imperialist

Like any old man, I was young once. Each morning I attacked the day. Down the stairs to the subway platform, slipping through the doors like a bandit, I rode the rails and got my fill. Then one day I realized I could no longer move fast enough. Like any old fool, I waited. But the train passed me by, one car after the other, until I found myself alone and used up. I had collected many years, and eventually that was the only part of myself that made sense anymore; I had always been a collector.

In my youth, before I collected all these years, I collected flags; flags from the women I slept with. This is not a euphemism. Let me explain.

I was a handsome young man, strong-jawed, stout, standing nearly six foot with wavy brown hair. I had an easy-going smile and nice teeth. More importantly perhaps, I possessed a quiet confidence. I didn’t speak often, but never gave off the scent that I had nothing to say. I found out early enough that this package was appealing to most women, and as long as I didn’t find myself saddled by too much commitment I could move freely from one sexual encounter to the next. I never believed that this made me a bad person.

I was eighteen when I slept with Miyu, and for the first time, I fell in love. She was from Japan, and had black hair and porcelain skin, not unlike many other Japanese girls. She was petite and not altogether handsome, but I loved her smile, and the love of a smile can go a long way for an eighteen year old. My favorite part of her was her hip bones, which jutted out like cliffs from her thin body, and I found myself enamored, clutching on to them as if I could somehow fall off those cliffs.

And then one day, out of the blue, she decided it was over. I was heartbroken. It was like she had burrowed herself into me, into my deepest recesses, and planted a bomb. Pulling herself out of me on a day in the summer, she triggered the remote and watched as I imploded from the inside out. In retrospect, though I believe she did this intentionally; I do not think she understood the magnitude of her actions. She had destroyed a part of me, an innocence, and the repercussions would be felt for years to come like clouds of ash following a volcanic eruption.

There was a convenience store down the street from where I lived, and upon first entering it, I was taken aback by the collection of flags available for purchase. They were folded tightly and packaged in plastic, hanging alphabetically. Why the store sold flags I’ll never know. I never saw another soul purchase one. There were never any empty racks, they were never sold out of a flag, and I never thought to ask the clerk.

The first one I bought was astronaut white with a single, blood red dot in the middle. I used clothespins to clip it to a hangar in my closet, and my collection began.

After that they came in rapid succession. There was Cosita from Panama, whom I met while sitting on a bus. She was a few years older than me with brown hair, and dark skin that she constantly moisturized with an azul container of lotion, the name of which I cannot recall. She had a large birthmark in the shape of Florida on her left thigh. After two weeks, I made my way to the convenience store and purchased the Panamanian flag, hanging it next to Japan.

Through the years there were many of them, and now I only remember snapshots of our time together, like I’m flipping through polaroids with the names and dates scribbled on the back. There was Rosalita from Cuba, who liked to make love while listening to Bruce Springsteen. Katja was from Germany, quiet as a mouse until in the bedroom, who between her two front teeth had an endearing gap. Camille was one half of a Filipino twin-set, the other half going by Christian. He followed me after I left his sister crying on the steps of some university academic hall and gave me a black eye as I walked out of the convenience store holding the Philippines flag. I remember shouting at him that he wasn’t very Christian at all.

Su-Jin was from Korea, studying abroad, and loved Elvis Presley so much that she cried when I told her he had died on the toilet. She reminded me of Miyu and the affair was short-lived. There was America, from Mexico, who aside from the irony of her name also had a particular affinity for French fries and anal sex. Even now it’s sad that this is all I remember of her. Klara from Russia spelled her name with a “K” and would introduce herself as such, “Klara with a K,” in stunted Russian wherever she went. She too loved Elvis Presley.

Finally, there was Mariella from Cuba, with Cuban hips and Cuban lips, Cuban thighs that could wrap themselves around you like a boa constrictor. She sang lullabies in her native tongue while doing the dishes and was the most passionate woman I have ever known. She was the last of my conquests, if you want to put it that way. All of these women bookended by my two true loves, and still their flags hang in each end of my closet.

When they put me in this place - with it’s awful shag carpeting, it’s water-stained walls festooned with mawkish, gold-plated picture frames, it’s frozen lake home to ducks in the wintertime, it’s patios home to little concrete statutes of children in overalls and artificial plants, all imprisoned by steel bars and a locked gate - they told me I could bring one suitcase full of clothes. But clothes can be purchased, and the convenience store of flags closed down years ago, so my closet is home to my collection, my life-long pursuit, and perhaps one or two Hawaiian patterned shirts that they sometimes make me wear during the mandatory Friday socials.

“What are you writing?” asks the nurse. She is a big, black woman named Susan, who is kind and sometimes lets me sleep through bathtime.

“My history,” I reply.

“Our history?” she says, “Well, that’s nice.”

No, I think, not ours, but mine.

“I’m confused,” I mutter. “I don’t remember.”

I look at this page in front of me, at all these scribbles, and I don’t understand. I don’t know what they mean. I don’t remember writing them.

“Don’t fret,” she says, “Sometimes, it’s not so bad to forget the past. It lets you focus better on the future.”

Written by: Logan Theissen
Photograph by: Emily Blincoe

Small Things

“Where to?”

Emir’s passenger was dressed in a handsome light grey suit. It fit him well. Emir owned a suit too, but his jacket sat too broad on his shoulders and fell too far down his thighs. He only wore it on special occasions.

“Chase Manhattan Plaza,” the well-dressed man replied. “So, where are you from?”

Emir glanced at his rear-view mirror, smiled and replied, “Istanbul. Turkey.”

He enjoyed chatting with passengers, but never initiated conversations himself.

“I’ve never been to Turkey. Went to Israel a few years back, but that’s the closest I’ve ever been. You miss it?”

“Oh yes, of course.”

“I respect men like you. My grandfather came here from Italy without so much as a penny to his name, but managed to put my father through college and business school. Whenever I visited him as a kid, all he could ever talk about was how everything was better in Italy.” The man in the grey suit paused before continuing, “I can’t imagine having to leave New York City, let alone the States.”

He was looking out the window as he talked, watching Bleecker Street slowly pass by.

“What would you miss about it?” Emir asked.

“The City? Everything. The people, the sounds. But I think, most of all, I would miss having amazing pizza on every corner. I’m not even kidding. New Yorkers don’t realize how good they have it here. And believe me, I know. I’ve been all over the country and the world for business. No other city compares.”

“I think your Italian grandfather would disagree,” Emir joked.

The man laughed, “You’re right. He would’ve. What about you? What do you miss most about Turkey?”

Not a day passed that Emir didn’t think about his home country. He thought about Turkey because he was terrified of forgetting. It was only five years ago that he left Istanbul for New York City, but the haze of time was already setting in.

When is mother’s birthday? His little sister, Azra, was usually the one to remind him. What was the name of that sweets shop near his old school? He wasn’t even sure he ever knew the name of that shop, even though he had frequented it nearly every day.

Sometimes Emir closed his eyes and imagined his younger brother, Derin, working the family’s chestnut stand on the darkened, cobblestone streets of Istanbul. He imagined his father sitting by Derin’s side, reading his newspaper, making small talk with the patrons, and making sure Derin didn’t overstuff the small paper pouches that held the chestnuts.

Emir could hear their conversation.

“Go home father, I can handle the chestnut stand on my own,” Derin would plead.

His father would reply, “Home? And what will I do there? Listen to your mother scold me for leaving you here by yourself? At least here I can read my paper in peace.”

Emir would imagine this, and the sweet, nutty scent of the roasted chestnuts would fill the stale air of his apartment as if he were right there, cobblestones beneath his feet.

“Emir,” his father would say, looking up as he approached, “you know what I mean, tell your brother I would rather die than stop working.”

Derin would roll his eyes and ask, “This is working?” He’d point to his father seated next to him, newspaper open in hand. And Emir would laugh.

That’s how Emir reminded himself, “This is what life was like.”

Turkey was a part of his history now, and he often took the sadness of that fact out on his adopted city. He felt jaded by the people whom he thought too rude and the streets that he thought too crowded.

He shared a small studio apartment in Sunnyside with two others, cousins of cousins of cousins or something. They slept on mattresses strewn lazily about the studio floor and erected makeshift room dividers from salvaged garment racks and old curtains. They bonded over their shared longing for Turkey and lamented over the irony that, in a city so large, they could feel so lonely.

Emir already knew the answer to the man in the grey suit’s question, but he thought a moment before replying. “The smell of roasted chestnuts,” he responded. “My father owned a chestnut stand. I worked there with him until I was a teenager, but I never forgot the smell. My father came home smelling of it every night.”

The man chuckled, “Nostalgia’s devious isn’t it? We always long for the sweet honey of it, but we always forget about the sting of the bees. You’re here in the States for a reason right? I can’t imagine making a living off of chestnuts was easy.”

That evening, before returning home, Emir stopped at his favorite Turkish restaurant in Sunnyside.

“Emir!” Toprak, the owner, shouted as he walked in. “Where have you been my friend? Is it just you tonight? Where are your cousins?”

“I’ve already eaten, I just want to order some roasted chestnuts, to go.”

It was in Turkey that he had his last roasted chestnut. After eating them for years from his father’s stand, it felt unnatural to pay for them.

He didn’t go home right away and, instead, found an empty bench underneath the 7 train overpass just a few blocks from his apartment. As he peeled back the warm, woody shells of the chestnuts, the 7 train rumbling overhead, he took in the neighborhood. It was late, but the storefronts and food carts still illuminated the streets. The early autumn evening was still alive with activity, a chorus of traffic, conversation, and laughter hanging festively in the air. To Emir’s left, down the block, was Jeremy’s bodega where he bought coffee every morning. Just beyond that was a hookah bar where he often passed the time chatting with his two cousins, his friends, about nothing at all.

For the first time in five years, as Emir ate his roasted chestnuts, New York City was transformed. He was home.

Written by: Sam Chow
Photograph by: Becky Lee