The Girl with the Ponytail

I didn’t want to be with Vick. But it was only temporary and it's not like I had a choice, what with the “below living wage” from the cafe. Mom was gone now, so it would have been Vick or some other guy. The old apartment was being fumigated, so I just left all my stuff there. It had always been an iffy place because of the bugs, but bed bugs don’t kill you, and neither do cockroaches. Other things might kill you, but not those things.

I still had my coat and bought some new underwear from Giant Tiger. Vick’s mom said I could stay, as long as “I knew this wasn’t a free ride or anything.” That’s how I got a mother-in-law who lived in the front of the house, and how I found myself frying things on the stove top like I was a short-order cook. I had only just met Vick, and it didn’t take long for the whole mother-in-law and son thing to get old. I was stuck pretending I was so damn thankful, because I had no-where else to go.

I thought I only had a week, maybe a month at most to put up with them. But now, because I’d lost my money, I was years away from not having to fuck when told, or scrape broken eggs off their chipped, Teflon pan. And why was it my job to answer the door? Letting in all those ugly, cooked people. Drug-poor and broken and without a lick of hope but for what Vick would hand them in small bags.

When I thought about my money, my stomach hurt. It had been from Grandma’s estate, the amount paid off on her mortgage. It was that lawyer’s fault. The lawyer had listened to Dad about me being too young and he was the only other person with access to the bank account. It had to be Dad who stole my money. He probably took it to pay off a debt. Dad wasn’t a drunk or a druggie, but he was a frivolous type.

The teller at the bank wore a posh suit, and she looked at me, her eyes full of a pretty sort of pity. I must have been a sight for her to see, with dark bags under my eyes and a homemade hair cut. I had to used a rubber kitchen elastic because my hair was too short to hold back properly. The elastic pulled out hairs, but it gripped tighter, held harder. The teller had to say it to me again, clear and even: “The money was withdrawn last week, the day after it was transferred from the estate account. There has been no more activity on the account since then.”

I stepped outside and threw up on on their grey, concrete steps. There was greed and then there was greed. Grandma had always been nice to me, and I had been touched by her intention to leave me that money. I’d never liked her all that much, but I respected her. She’d always told me to stop eating whatever I was eating so that I wouldn't lose my figure, and it was decent advice.

“You gotta get away from these people, your mom, your dad. This part of town is full of their types.”

With the money gone, my get away plan was ruined. I woke up on that mattress on the floor, beside the spiny beast that was Vick, not able to get up. I had a weight pressing on my sternum. A fist of anger and disappointment. I have never expected anyone to give me a break, but that didn’t stop me from wanting one. I worked hard at the cafe, refilling coffees and bringing people their orders and ketchup. But it would never be enough. I wanted to go to school, to be a nurse or something like that, where if you kept your mouth shut, you’d get paid and good. They said at the employment office that maybe in a year or two I’d be moved up from part-time to full-time, and in a few more years I’d have enough to save up for school. That is, if I kept myself in the clear.

Because of Vick’s business, there was always money lying around the house, tucked away in drawers or behind bottles in the medicine cabinet, sometimes for a few hours or just overnight. Stored until it was passed on to the next person. Vick told me he trusted me. But that morning, there was $3,000 in one hundred dollar bills in the cabinet above the toilet. Karma-wise, I knew it wasn’t meant to be replacement for the $5,000 my Dad stole. I also knew that the money didn’t belong to Vick. He likely had dibs on a percentage of it and would be in trouble if I took it, but it was almost enough money to get my plan back and start new like Grandma had intended. I slipped the envelope into the back waist of my jeans and flushed the toilet to hide the creak of the cabinet closing. I bent over and tied up my laces by the door so I didn’t see Vick in the hall. I flinched when he grabbed the envelope out of my pants. I’d never really seen him mad before, at least not at me. He looked at me with his eyes drug-red rimmed.

“Who do you think you are? I let you sleep in my fucking bed. You think you should steal from me?”

He shoved me hard, and I lost my balance. On the ground, he kicked me in the face a few times, and I almost didn’t feel the pain. Instead, I thought about Grandma because she’d never been the type of woman a guy would shove around. Each time I tried to get up, he hoofed me back down again. If this happens to you, you’ll worry about the blood in your eyes and the bones in your fingers, and all the things everyone else wrecks of yours or takes from you. Until you learn how to take, too.

When he stepped on my neck, I was praying that it wasn’t a serious injury. I couldn’t move, and Vick was pacing around the room, yelling at his mom who was talking loudly, trying to decide what to do with me. That was when I remembered Grandma saying that the world was a hard place. I wouldn’t make it unless I was the type to get lucky. I guess I was a different type.

Written by: Elisha Stam

Photograph by: Hannah Chertock

Like There's No Tomorrow

I hold her close, feeling her breathing change gears; downshifting from the revved-up respirations of post-coital bliss all the way down to the content, languid yawns as her body slips into neutral. Utterly exhausted, her legs give a little twitch, kicking off the last of her tension like an unseen blanket. And then, right before going completely limp in my arms, I swear she murmurs something that sounds like “I love you”.

My pulse quickens. I want to shake her, rouse her from her peaceful slumber and find out for sure that her sleepy declaration wasn’t just some sort of auditory illusion or a figment of my overeager imagination. I want to wake her and find out that for once, maybe, just maybe, my love is not unrequited, that she didn’t turn to me out of loneliness, or even worse, out of desperation.

I long for her to open her eyes, those sparkling sapphires that bewitched me and reeled me in from across the crowded room. I want to hear her laugh, a sound so honest, so pure, that it renders me powerless, and to hear the melodic singsong of her voice. And more than anything I desperately yearn to hear the other sounds, the low guttural moans she made as I traced the contours of her body with my tongue, or the hushed whispers she used when she begged, “Fuck me. Fuck me like there’s no tomorrow.”

And I want her to wake because we had a vow, a promise to not waste the precious few hours we have together with something as humdrum as sleep.

But I can’t do it. I can’t bring myself to shatter her tranquility. Instead I slip my arm out from under her and slide in a pillow as a surrogate for her to nuzzle against.

I turn on the TV and scan the channels, but nothing is on, and I don’t mean in a how-can-you-watch-this-shit reality TV kind of way. Nothing but test patterns and white snow flash upon the screen. Where the hell are Dan Rather and Tom Brokaw when you need them? They would have kept it going. These new journalists don’t have any heart. Sure, they’ll put their posterior on the line for posterity’s sake, but when the end is nigh and there is no hope for fame or fortune, they cut and run like everybody else.

At least the power is still on. Somewhere out there, someone still has a little pride left and isn’t shirking away from their duty. Or maybe not—who knows, in this digital age it’s probably just some computer running it all, a computer that can’t comprehend the utter destruction that an asteroid with the innocuous name of XC17LR3 (or “Jesus” as my born-again uncle calls it) is going to unleash on good old planet Earth in T minus two hours; give or take fifteen minutes.

I pull on some shorts, slide open the glass door and step out onto the balcony to get a breath of fresh air. I scan the heavens for any sign of the approaching asteroid, but see nothing but clear, blue sky.

                                                                                                   ***

I didn’t believe it at first. Nobody did. The first reports came across as crazy conspiracy theories. In this day and age, internet rumors of a doomsday asteroid don’t make many folks bat so much as an eye. It wasn’t until the European Space Agency made an official announcement that people started paying attention. Even then, some scoffed at the notion. I guess it takes a little while to wrap your head around the fact that everything, from Nebuchadnezzar to Nirvana, Shakespeare to the Shawshank Redemption, all of it, the entirety of human existence, will be gone in a mere three days.

The first day was pure unadulterated chaos. Half of the population of the Earth didn’t have to wait for the asteroid. A few countries, sworn enemies from time immemorial, decided that the impending apocalypse was a good enough reason to go ahead and do a little smiting of their foes. And the suicides—apparently a lot of people decided they would rather go out on their own terms. Those that survived the first twenty four hours divided into three camps; those that huddled with their families, those that flocked to a church, and those that went full tilt boogie, running amok and raging all night at the end-of-the-world parties that were springing up everywhere.

I met her at the Church of the Resurrection. I had wandered in, not out of any sense of belief, but because it turns out I wasn’t cut out for unabashed hedonism, and I needed a respite from the chaos. The building was packed with parishioners, arms linked together, swaying back and forth and singing hymns. Off to the side was a group of people milling around a table full of food. I spotted my uncle snacking on a sandwich and started toward him, until she caught my eye.

She was manning the punch bowl, looking uncomfortable and out of place. She looked in my direction. Those eyes, my god, those eyes were incredible. She flashed a demure smile and quickly looked away. The nausea that had been churning my gut since I accepted the reality of my imminent death gave way to a new queasiness; a fluttering that I hadn’t experienced since I was thirteen. I knew that it was now or never. Literally.

                                                                                                   ***

Her arms snake around my waist and I let out a shout in surprise. She draws me in close, kissing my neck and nibbling on my earlobe.

“I’m so sorry I fell asleep,” she says in that low, seductive whisper. “I won’t let it happen again.”

I turn around to face her. I try to smile but my mouth won’t let me.

“How long was I asleep?” she asks, the playfulness gone from her voice.

“About two hours.”

She buries her face into my chest.

“I love you,” she says, and I know she means it.

“I love you too.”

We turn and look at the sky, still calm and perfectly blue, together.

Written by: Ben Cook
Photograph by: Hannah Chertock

Buggies

The word moves up and down the line of men, from one to the next. They might as well be playing the game Telephone.

“Gas,” they whisper.

At least, we believe it’s gas. We soldiers of the night, brave and not long for this world, look to the west and watch the gas bear down on us. It is thick and ominous. By now, we know not what we think, but this…this…thing; this thing is death. It has no smell, and it moves with the lethargic quality of a goddamn turtle. In this way, it is not at all like death. Death for us is not slow and deliberate. Death will sneak in the night, tiptoe behind you, hold It’s breath, and then slit your throat with a 12-inch bayonet blade.

Oh, those were the days. Simple hand-to-hand combat, is that too much to ask? Is it really too much to ask to look your murderer in the eyes?

As a boy I daydreamed of combat, of the historical battles of Napoleon and Normandy (For some reason my daydreams were tres French). I longed for the romantic wars of our elders. I desired masculinity, not in the homo-way, but in the Hemingway.

Pardon me, pardon me; it’s just a joke. A little play on words. Here, laughter is more valuable than water. More valuable than shit-pots or tissues you can stick up your nose to protect from the smell of decomposing flesh. Here, bodies are stacked on top of each other. We call them The Towers Of David. Or Freddy. Sammy. The Towers Of William. There are hundreds of them and we’re starting to run out of names.

“I think the wind is changing. It’s gonna…maybe it’ll blow over.”

Parsons barks when he talks. I thought it odd until I visited his family over leave last Christmas and his father barked, and his mother barked, and his sister, who must have been only twelve or thirteen, she barked. They had their Christmas card picture held to the refrigerator door by a magnet, so I stole it. It’s the four of them in matching sweaters looking rather dour, other than the sister who is all braces and freckles. It reminds me of home, any home, and since there aren’t many homes left I think we adopt the faces and families of others. Things disappear and we try to replace them. It’s only natural.

Anywho, I stole the magnet picture and in black marker wrote The Barking Parsons on it. Now, I keep it in my pocket and look at it when I’m feeling ill.

The gas continues to waft in our general direction. I don’t know where it’s coming from, as we haven’t seen hide nor hair of the Buggies for a few days. That’s what we call them, Buggies. It’s not very technical or anything, but it’s accurate. They are bug-like creatures from another planet. Fuck, from another solar system. I’m sure the big brass band up top has a more professional term for them, but for the guys on the ground, Buggies works just fine.

“Masks Up!”

There’s a shout from down the line and in unison we all dawn our demon masks. Really, they’re just gas masks, and they look pretty much the same as they’ve always looked, right on back to the days of WWI. I used to read stories about The Great War. Whoever termed that shit was way off, obviously, as there was another Greater War just down the pipeline and a handful of Not Great Wars not far off. Though, as someone once said, it’s no use crying over spilled milk.

Or blood. Whatever.

I read stories about the mustard gas used in that not first, and certainly not last of global conflicts, and how the whole goddamned war was this giant clusterfuck of old and new technology and strategy. The part that stuck with me the most, and why I’m rehashing this shit now, was the instances of gas mask-wearing cavalry units unleashing holy hell on anything and everything. Just imagine it. You’re sitting there, minding your own business, trying to survive and not vomit your guts up (because of the gas), when all of the sudden this heaving beast of a horse bursts out of the fog like a fucking Dodge Charger, all bleeding eyes and spit. Its rider is staring down at you from behind this fucking steampunk mask, a wall of fire and gas behind him. I don’t care who are you, you’re losing your lunch. That shit is scary. That shit is demon-scary.

There’s some whooping and hollering down the line. And then…

WHISTLE. Whistlewhistlewhistle. WHISTLE.

Two hundred years removed from The Second Battle of Ypres (Belgium, 1915) and still with the fucking whistle. Still with the fucking gas masks.

Some things never change.

We rise as a mass of demons. Over the ledge and out of the pit, to grandmother’s house we go. We do not know what is on the other side of the field. We do not know where the Buggies are. You could fill an ocean with the amount of shit that we do not know. I think to my long-dead comrades, those of that Great War ilk, and the word Solidarity appears, etched in the mud at my boots.

I step over it.

The fog or gas (or whatever) is thick, though nothing compared to the cacophony of screams and shouts coming from my fellow soldiers. It would appear that there were not enough demon masks to go around.

Someone jumps on my back and I’m down to my knees. Sausage fingers pry at my mask and face, trying to rip them both off. If they must pull my head off with it, they will. This is friendly fire. War is Darwinistic in its pragmatism.

My attacker/comrade is too strong. He rips the mask off my face and falls down somewhere behind me. I am on my knees and I lift my head to the sky. I see the lights.

Not one light. Not one shining, blinding, comforting light. No, I said lights. Plural.

They are what they appear to be. Thank god for that.

The Buggy ship rises on top of us, bigger than a building, masked in a cloud of fog and smoke and night. Only the lights on the bottom of the ship are clearly visible.

There they are.

So much noise it feels like the world isn’t big enough to hold it all; like we’re going to blow a fuse.

As I fall forward, face to mud, grasping at my burning throat, the alien ship continues its ascent into the night sky.

It’s beautiful.

Written by: Logan Theissen
Photograph by: Hannah Chertock

Tequila Sunrise

“I am so goddamned hungover,” Nicole moans.

The thin queen mattress shudders from her restlessness, and Cheyenne groans in response. “Ohmigod, were you still asleep? I thought you were awake!”

“Mmmph,” Cheyenne manages.

She feels Nicole wiggle closer, her body heat radiating through a thin camisole. Nicole’s body brushes against hers and Cheyenne blushes. She wants to roll over and cup Nicole’s round face in her hands, kiss her and say, “I have been madly in love with you since orientation.”

Cheyenne swallows the words before they can escape. Along with their bitterness, she tastes stale tequila and beer. The room smells like old vomit and sweat, and Cheyenne concentrates on keeping her stomach settled. The fantasy yields to a more practical reality: sobriety.

Small miracle, Cheyenne thinks when she sees the dark shades drawn. The light might repel too many shadows and illuminate too many secrets, like desire, hunger, and lust.

“I think I’m still drunk,” Cheyenne croaks. The room spins around her and she closes her eyes.

“Lucky,” Nicole pokes Cheyenne in the ribs. “You can still fight it off.”

“Huh?”

“The hangover,” Cheyenne doesn’t need to open her eyes to know Nicole is rolling hers.

“I thought that was like, an urban legend.”

“Think of it as an experiment. When people ask us what we did on spring break, we can tell them we hypothesized some metabolic shit.”

Nicole doesn’t know a lot about science, but she does know booze.

Cheyenne rolls out of the thin bed they share and stumbles toward the dresser, decorated with carved initials and school slogans by previous budget-conscious occupants.

“I would drink a gallon of water if I could,” Nicole continues from the bed.

“Is it gallons here?” Cheyenne paws through the drawer until she finds the tiny plastic bottle. She shakes it, and the rattle comforts and torments.

“Why wouldn’t it be?” Nicole asks.

“Metric system, right?” Cheyenne shoves the chair away from the mini fridge. The door swings open, and the bottle of water in front of her seems to glow.

“I don’t remember any of that,” Nicole pauses, “but whatever. I would drink a metric fuckton of water if I could.”

“Let me take these and you can have some,” Cheyenne pops three Advil into her mouth and takes a huge swig of water.

The burn hits her tongue first. When the artificial cotton candy flavor registers, she coughs vodka everywhere.

“Was that the vodka?” Nicole laughs.

Cheyenne looks over and Nicole’s camisole has shifted. The neckline is low, too low, and Cheyenne sees more of her left breast, the shape and tint of a nipple. She no longer thinks of sobriety. Fantasies conquer her concentration.

The night before takes advantage of this lapse.

The cloying sweetness of the cotton candy and the burn of the vodka commingle with the stagnant taste of old alcohol. The rush of sickness overwhelms her, and Cheyenne scrambles over a haphazard tower of luggage and a pile of skintight dresses and heels.

After excavating water bottles from the luggage and binge-eating their granola bar stash, Nicole and Cheyenne clean up and escape the hotel room. The sun is too bright, and Cheyenne worries that she didn’t apply enough sunscreen. Her pale peach skin has a reddish tint to it. Nicole’s skin shimmers bronze, contrasting with a microscopic turquoise bikini and oversized white cotton shirt. Cheyenne risks a glance at her cleavage.

Nicole angles a floppy hat over straight dark hair. Paired with the shirt and an obnoxious scarf tied around her thin waist, Nicole looks like a sexy pirate.

“Beach or resort pool?” Nicole asks.

“Beach is cheaper,” Cheyenne says.

“And creepier. I bet those Sig guys we met last night will be at the resort.”

Cheyenne doesn’t want to ask. Admitting she blacked out is embarrassing. The thought of hearing about some hot dudes Nicole wants to flirt with makes Cheyenne cringe.

When they enter the lobby, Nicole glides over to a couple of guys sitting in wicker chairs next to a pink marble column. She perches on the arm of one chair. Its occupant strokes her thigh with disturbing familiarity.

“Feeling okay, Cheyenne?” The other man stands up and offers her his chair.

“Sure, I guess,” Cheyenne says. The guy has a face like a ferret and disproportionately small hands. Cheyenne remains where she is and stifles a laugh.

“Spring break, right?” The guy shrugs his shoulders. “I don’t want to assume anything, but just in case - I’m Adrian and this is Tyler.”

Tyler gives a thumbs-up without looking over. Nicole monopolizes his attention, and he hers.

“Nice to meet you - again,” Cheyenne runs a hand through her long black hair and offers Adrian a wan smile.

“We were gonna lounge by the pool for the afternoon,” Nicole chirps. “Wanna join?”

“We’ll get changed and meet you there,” Adrian responds. “There’s a bar in the pool. I’ll take a margarita if you’re up for splitting it, or cerveza if you aren’t.”

Adrian pronounces it “cerveeeza” and Cheyenne wants to punch him.

“Aren’t they great?” Nicole gushes at the pool. Cheyenne leaves Nicole with her tanning lotion, which smells like lighter fluid and cinnamon. Less sexy, more pirate, Cheyenne thinks.

“I’ll be at the bar,” Cheyenne gags. She adjusts the waistband of her bikini so the tiny Greek letters on her hipbone peek out.

Cheyenne wades into the lukewarm pool and orders a Dark & Stormy. She leans against the counter and brainstorms ways to salvage spring break with Nicole and ditch the frat boys.

“You’re in Kappa?” Slender fingers graze Cheyenne’s hip, then linger. A petite Asian girl with a choppy red bob inspects her tattoo. The girl raises her arm and displays an elaborate one of her own, complete with the same Greek letters. “Hurt like a bitch on my ribcage, but it makes me feel so badass. I’m Whitney.”

“Cheyenne,” Cheyenne traces the interwoven knots down Whitney’s side. They are linked by their sorority tattoos and their inability to stop touching them.

“Tequila sunrise, please,” Whitney’s fingers brush against the length of Cheyenne’s stomach as she turns to the bartender. Both women know it is not an accident.

“You know what? Make that two,” Cheyenne smiles.

Written by: Erin Justice
Photograph by: Hannah Chertock