Megan’s Journey Through the Labyrinth

She’d searched for Ford that day and met Benedikt instead; at the end of the afternoon they shook hands…

—It was nice meeting you—

…but it didn’t end as Megan had hoped, because the following week she met Benedikt again. She’d been on her way to a quiet, empty table at Café Nikotín. She’d held a small stack of post-cards: for Mom and Dad and for a whole gaggle of friends. One significant postcard was going to Chris: she loved him, but didn’t know if she wanted to go on with the relationship. A trip into the cockles of Europe, she’d thought, might have clarified something.

“Hi,” Ford had said smiling from his seat at a buffed aluminum table centered with the pole of a green umbrella. “Care to join us?”

“It is good to see you again,” Benedikt said.

“You’ve met?” Ford asked.

“Last weekend,” Benedikt offered.

“Then you should join us.” Ford smiled. “We’re old friends it seems.”

And later, midway through her white coffee, Ford had turned the course of their halting, polite small-talk. “Have you been to the Labyrinth?” he’d asked. “We were heading there in a bit.”

She’d never been to the old stone-work maze, but it stared up at her from the face of a postcard: it was as ancient as medieval bloodshed, and as dark as this city’s history of alchemists and syphilitic, absinthe-addled poets. Romantic and spooky: it was just the kind of place that might shadow her nightmares for any long stretch of future decades, but she liked Ford’s eyes and the way his skin made her think of buffed pecans, so when he’d asked if she wanted to come along, she’d said yes against every bone-deep desire to avoid that part of the city. But it couldn’t have been such a great risk—could it?—with Ford’s skin color, and Benedikt’s off-kilter jokes and the invitation to drink škóy with him and with Ford. Though she couldn’t fathom the depths of Benedikt’s uncanny glacial gaze, she’d considered the invitation, because it would be a chance to be with Ford, to watch the movement of his hands, and imagine them touching her. If the Labyrinth was in a dicey part of the city, neither of them seemed especially worried about going there.

“You know the story of the Labyrinth?” Ford had asked

“No.”

He’d shrugged. “It’s simple, really. Once you enter the Labyrinth, the only way back out is the way home.”

She’d scoffed the idea of stepping into that maze and stepping back out in Cincinnati.

But nothing was ever as simple as it seemed: reality and symbol were different things in this part of Europe.

The Labyrinth was ancient stone and mortar cemented in patterns that only a mason might have understood. Now, she picked her way—alone—through narrow, switchback corridors of stone-work walls and flagstone footpaths. Last week, Ford had told her it was best to walk through the Labyrinth with bare feet, but she’d kept her shoes on. She cringed through the memory of Benedikt stooping down and unstrapping his sandals. Though lean, there was something stocky in his manner, as if he spent his days at work, strangling bulls with his naked hands. His toes were blunt, rounded, and dusted with scant, bronze hairs. Ford, beside him, had kicked out of his shoes and pulled off his socks and for just an instant, she couldn’t tell them apart.

She was alone, now, following the path they’d taken—together—one weekend ago.

The walls of the Labyrinth were stone and mortar, but the square heart of the warren was heavy with grapevines and earwigs. Here, she saw last Saturday in her mind’s eye: Ford and Benedikt standing together and laughing at some small joke. Though they’d done their best to be nice and to include her, the Labyrinth—as Ford had said—showed her something else. And maybe the Labyrinth remembered her this evening, because it was showing her Benedikt’s gray gaze with shimmers of blue in it.

Benedikts’s eyes, last weekend, had been spooky and unreadable; she couldn’t find the personality at home in them. Now, some unnerving phantom of Benedikt held her attention with a subtle smile tugging the corners of his lips. A breeze fondled his ragamuffin hair and he raked it back with splayed, pale fingers. She flinched, glimpsing Ford at home inside of Benedikt’s eyes, staring out at her. Benedikt smiled and reached forward, touching her face with the warmth of his fingertips.

“Ford’s your boyfriend.” She felt the words spilling before she could bite them back. “And you followed me here to tell me that.”

Saddened understanding flared in Benedikt’s gaze. “I’m not here. I’m at home with Ford. But you’re here looking for something….”

“I’m not—” but she stopped.

“Home isn’t a place,” Benedikt said. “It’s the one right person who’ll miss you when you leave.”

“I don’t even know if I want to stay with Chris.”

Benedikt shrugged and touched her shoulder, softly. “I see how you look at Ford, but you can’t live in his eyes. You have no choice but to return to the one you sent that postcard to. You are not finished back there. An affair with Ford cannot make you happy, but Ford and I can be good memories for you, if you want us to be.”

She closed her eyes.

Benedikt leaned close and planted a kiss on her forehead. “It is nice that you came back to our Labyrinth, but now, you should leave. If you want company before you go, you can come to our apartment; we’re not so drunk yet. You know the way there and we’ll hear you at our buzzer.”

“I don’t want to intrude.”

“You won’t.” Benedikt smiled.

“Okay.” Megan blinked; Benedikt was gone.

As quietly as she came, she turned around and fumbled her way out of the silent, ancient maze.

All the way to Cincinnati, she thought, hesitating before stepping out of the Labyrinth completely. 

Written by: J.C. Howell
Photograph by: Victoria Ostrzenski

East

Read the rest of the "West" saga: Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9

Chris reached the top of the peak and looked east. He saw clouds passing, obscuring his view, then clearing away. Trees, wild and unfettered, without the usual corridors for cell phone towers. The lake down below, for which the mountain had been named.

This was almost everything he’d had in mind.

He wished he could distract himself, think of anything but his original vision of being here with Dena. But he’d cut himself off. His usual distractions--the scrolling pictures, the flashing lights, the texts--were gone. He’d called his father from the AT&T customer service desk after having his cell phone shut off.

“I just wanted to let you know my phone got stolen,” he lied. “I know...yeah, I’ll be reachable soon, but we’re going to be in a national park in a couple of days, and I doubt there will be any service anyway...I just didn’t want you to worry…”

Lex, the AT&T employee who’d disconnected his phone, grinned at him when he hung up.

“Going off the grid, dude?”

“Just...taking a break,” Chris had said.

At first, he’d hoped that taking a break would be enough for him and Dena, too. Getting out of town. Reinventing themselves on the road. Dena had been through a lot. She’d suffered more in the past six months than he had in his life. What bad thing had ever happened to him?

His parents’ divorce, after which they both became better, happier people? Getting busted for carrying drugs one, isolated time--then getting off with a stern warning?

When your life diverges from another person’s--theirs into misery, yours into happiness--what do you have? Dena sat right beside him as they drove, but she was still miles away. He couldn’t change her. He couldn’t even heal her.

He retrieved the Chinook keys from the pocket of his corduroy jacket. Dena had given him the keychain--a flat rubber raccoon advertising Ricky’s Recycling Service, Macon, Georgia.

“Sorry, pal,” Chris said.

He hurled the keys over the side of the mountain, closing his eyes as they flew through the air so he couldn’t see where they landed.

“That was dramatic,” a voice said.

“Huh?”

Chris turned around to see a man standing behind him. He was older than Chris, maybe mid-forties, and wearing a backpack.

“How are you going to get home?” the man asked.

“I’m kind of in transition right now.”

“Oh, one of those.”

“What do you mean?”

The man unclipped a water bottle from his pack.

“You know. Finding yourself in the great outdoors, or whatever. Quarter-life crisis. I get it, I really do.”

“I don’t need to be patronized right now, okay?” Chris said.

“Nah, I didn’t mean it like that. Just--I’ve been there.”

“Are all the people in your life shit?” Chris muttered.

“We’re all shit, man,” he said.

Chris and the hiker stood in silence, looking at the lake, until the hiker’s phone buzzed. Chris reached for his pocket out of habit, then laughed as a wave of lightness washed over him.

“Sorry,” the man said. “It’s my store.”

As the hiker stepped away to talk on the phone, Chris tried to burn an image of this place into his memory.

Skinny pines. Grey rocks. Algae and reflections creeping around the borders of the lake, making it look like the flecked iris of a human eye. This place was made for Instagram. Or maybe it wasn’t. Maybe it was made for this moment only--for Chris’s deliberate efforts to really see it.

Maybe Lake Peak didn’t need the likes. Mountains are above validation. Mountains don’t give a fuck.

“I have got to get someone who can make a decision,” the hiker laughed, sliding his phone back into his pocket.

“So you have a store?” Chris asked.

“Camping supplies. Over on the other side of the National Forest. A new shipment just came in, and my assistant manager is brain dead.”

“You need a new one?”

“A brain? God, yes. Please.”

“An assistant manager.”

“Now that’s a thought,” the man said.

                                                                                                      ***

In the final montage of their story, a Bob Dylan song would play on the radio station for the brief moment before the three cars passed out of range. The first car, Drew’s old Toyota, would be the only one still headed west. He would pour a package of peanuts into a plastic bottle of Coke, and dream of a place where he could play ping-pong on his lunch break. Where his desk chair would be a stability ball.

In the second car: Chris, riding shotgun, his new boss driving east as they wound their way out of the Santa Fe National Forest.

“Let me get your number, and I’ll call to let you know what time to come in,” the hiker would say. Chris would just smile.

The last car would be the hot-wired Chinook re-routing its path back to Austin. Dena would reach for Jennifer’s hand, but she’d pull away.

“Let’s go slow, okay?”

Dena would nod.

“Yeah,” she’d say. “We’ll go slow.”

In the last moments of the story, the chorus of the Dylan song would swell, guitars jangling as the radio flickered in and out. The invisible triangle connecting the three vehicles would grow larger and larger, stretching until it was too faint to imagine, until everyone had landed on a different frequency. The sun would drop away in the west, headed for the ocean.

But this was not a story. Truly, there is no such thing.


Written by: Dot Dannenberg
Photograph by: Luke Pamer

Dear Lydia

I had you too young. I wasn't meant to be a mother so soon, but I chose it for myself. Don't ask your father about this, he wouldn't understand. He says he does now, but he didn't then. It's the "then" that I want to talk to you about.

Yes, I'm a coward because I can't do this face-to-face. It means driving out to see you, and to see California again, and I just can't do that. They're right when they say some wounds haven't healed. This is one of them. Don't get me wrong -- it's a great state, and I'm glad you went out there. I'm glad you and Carlos are happy and possibly settling down. (Possibly. I promised I wouldn't rush you and I won't.)
California's where I went after your dad left. It's where I went after I found out I was going to have you because Aunt Jo wouldn't let me stay in the house, and I didn't know where else I could turn. Uncle Sid took me in, even though he didn't have to. He was mad at your father for a lot of things back then, but mostly for leaving when he knew you were coming.

Granted, Sid was mad at me, too. I was pushing your father at a time when he wasn't pushing himself, and when you push someone who doesn't want to change, whether they know if it's good for them or not, they strike back. So he walked away. I didn't follow, and I didn't beg him to stay. Maybe I should've. I know you're angry at him, too, right now.
Instead, I left with you and found a new home...in California, as you know. Marin City. We made new friends -- you remember Kendall and Leo, from the pictures -- but they couldn't do much for us. They weren't even able to help themselves, with almost six jobs between them and barely making more than I was. I guess that's what happens when you run into people in situations as sticky as ours was. They had a baby right before I had you. Did you know that? I’m sure I told you. A baby girl: Merry. Probably named her that to help change their luck around, or lift their attitudes, or something.

I'm not even sure how I took care of us during those years. You're going to roll your eyes at me because this sounds like an excuse, but it's not. I blanked out most of that time. No, it wasn't long ago, but a year feels like seven when you're in dire straits.
We had a very hard time getting by. We were -- are -- lucky to have Sid and Ty in our lives, though. They never asked many questions, but you know that. How much stuff have you hidden from me in their pockets? You're the writer, you'll get that metaphor, or whatever you call it. They take things on without knowing what they're getting into. It used to get them into trouble, but I think you coming into our lives stopped them doing that for everything, and started limiting it to some things.
I remember the day your father came back to us like it was yesterday. He was finally admitting to being wrong. He'd been crying, and his cheeks were pink. He saw you first, and then me, outside Sid's house -- that dinky place you always see in the early photos in your baby books. He went to you first, and you weren't that old at all, only six months, maybe. He didn't stop saying sorry the rest of the day.

No, it didn't fix anything. Aunt Jo was still mad and his family was still mad. Everyone was mad at me, just like you are now. They all loved you, though. There wasn't a time that they didn't love you.

I'm sorry I wasn't old enough to have you when you came into my life. I'm sorry I used that as an excuse not to do better when it would've counted most. I'm sorry you needed to rely on Sid and Cousin Ty and all those people who weren't me and your dad. I'm sorry I took us so far away from home and then couldn't do much for you once I did. I'm sorry this made things harder.
I know it doesn't change anything. You're still hurting, and anyone would be, finding out like you did. No kid wants to find out that there might’ve been a time when their parents didn’t want them, and they really don’t want to find out by total accident. Those abortion forms got lost among the rest of my paperwork very early on and by the time I decided to keep you, I forgot about them. I promise I wasn't trying to hide them, or the letters to your father, or anything. They were stored away because I couldn't keep looking at them after the first two years I'd had them. I put them away to put it all behind me.
For a long time, you didn't seem to need any closure about where your father was in all those pregnancy pictures, or why he came back. You didn’t seem interested in why your first year of life went undocumented when it wasn’t a holiday. You didn't ask questions, didn't root around, nothing. You were a good kid, quiet, thoughtful, maybe too attentive around me. You did your work and had your friends and grew up really, really well.

You seemed to understand why your dad and I weren't around all that much, even after we got back together. I never expected you'd be so hurt when you finally found out. I was barely a month into the pregnancy when I went to the clinic...but I guess that’s not the point. Maybe I should’ve known you’d shut me out, but I didn't want to make that hundredth call and have you not pick up again. And hell if I was going to put all this in voice messages.

I know it's not enough. This doesn't tell the whole story by a long shot. I hope it answers some questions, though, and enough of them that you can finally pick up the phone when I call.

I'm going to call. You're my daughter and I love you, and I'm going to call to check in on you, just like I always have -- even when I wasn't a good mother. You can ask Sid about that, if you want. He'll tell you.

Love always,

Mom


Written by: Caitlin Mannarino
Photograph by: Garrett Carroll

The Story of Everything

                                                           Continued from West and This is It

The pump clunked. Dena fought the urge to top off the gas in the rental car. The nozzle trigger went slack in her hand.

The tank can overflow if you do that. Trust the machine to know what you need. It's not the apocalypse, or anything. You can always fill up again.

That's what her dad had said when she was sixteen, before he got sick. He’d taught her to drive, pump gas, check the oil, change a tire. Everything you’ll need to know, he’d said.

But he didn’t know everything. Dena gave the trigger one extra squeeze. She’d learned there was a lot of variety when it came to apocalypses.

On the other side of the gas station parking lot, in front of the KFC-Taco Bell hybrid, Chris paced with his phone pressed to his ear. Even from a distance, Dena could spot the big-eyed, scrunchy-eyebrowed look of irritation he always wore when he spoke to his father. Dena swiped Chris's debit card. She punched in the PIN--1991. The year Chris was born.

What an idiot.

Chris stomped towards Dena, his rage undercut by the squeak of his ratty Chuck Taylors.

"Arghghghgh."

"What did he say?"

"He makes me insane, I swear."

"Did you tell him the new RV fuel pump's going to be way cheaper than paying for this rental car all the way back?"

"Yeah. He knows. He's going to help us out."

"Then why are you all arghghgh?"

"It's just like--now we owe him. He even said so. 'I've invested in your journey, and I want to see you make something of it.' Fuuuuuuck," Chris said, splaying his body over the hood of the rented Ford Fiesta.

Dena’s stomach gave an angry twist. The tornado of emotional options set its whirring path straight for Dena's gut. She could say: At least you have a father. She could say: I realize that my father dying of cancer does not make your relationship with your father any less real or difficult. She could say: Your dad’s right. What the fuck are we doing with our lives?

Instead she said:

"I think we should get some Kentucky-Fried-Tacos now."

Dena had met Chris’s father a few months before when he invited them to dinner. Chris had spent the whole day brainstorming ways they could get out of it and complaining about his father’s expectations.

“What, are you afraid he won’t like me?” Dena asked as they pulled up in his father’s driveway.

"No. It’s not that. But Dad’s going to want the story of everything. Of how we met. Our first date. That kind of crap."

"Seriously?"

"Just--it's important to him. So we're going to say we met on the quad and then I asked you out on a coffee date to Blackbird, okay?"

Dena and Chris had not met on the quad. They had met when Dena's usual drug hookup was low on supply, and he'd referred her to Chris. She grumbled at the inconvenience of it--Chris lived on the other side of town--but she'd spent the afternoon at her dad's chemo appointment, and she just needed to bliss out in her dorm room and stop feeling things.

And there was Chris. He believed in try-before-you-buy. He told her she was beautiful and intriguing. She told him about the shit day she'd had. He didn't try to fix her. He didn't say it would all be okay. He just said, "I think you should maybe stay here," so she did. And then she never really left.

So when they rang the doorbell and Chris's father answered, a salt-and-pepper Chris with nicer clothes, she'd gone with the story.

"He bought me a cup of tea and a muffin, and we just connected."

Chris's father had smiled. He’d poured more wine and told endearing Chris-as-a-toddler tales that involved Chris trying to flush foreign objects down the toilet or dumping an entire bag of flour onto the kitchen floor to make snow angels. He’d told his own stories: backpacking in Europe. Dropping out of school and getting really lucky in the tech boom. Healing from his divorce from Chris’s mom by getting into meditation and bluegrass music.

As Dena bit into her crunchwrap supreme, she decided that his dad’s "make something of the journey" spiel was just more of the same. The importance of the narrative. The story of how we met, the story of how we fell in love, the story of how we drove into the unknown and changed our lives.

But that’s not how our generation does it, Dena thought. "Going steady" begat "dating" begat "going out" begat "talking," and now most of the relationships Dena knew had been formed through a few flirtatious text messages, then hanging out until both parties realized accidental exclusivity had set in. And, so far, the other stories in her life had been just as haphazard.

Chris was three-quarters of the way through a bowl of potatoes layered with Kentucky fried chicken, corn, cheese, and gravy. He stopped to blow a straw paper at her.

Some rules stayed the same through the generations, though: when a person supports you through the death of your father, through the funeral, through sitting on the floor with a lockbox of insurance papers way beyond your comprehension level, that person gets to stay.

"Dude, I think this chicken-bowl-of-death was supposed to come with a cookie," Chris said.

“Short-shifted by the man!” Dena said.

Her phone buzzed.

R we ordering the part, or nah?

“Should I tell Jennifer yes, then?” she asked Chris.

“Word,” he said. “Let’s do it. Long live the Chinook. My dad owns us either way.”

“Trust the machine to know what you need,” Dena murmured.

“Huh?”

“Nothing. Go get your cookie. Actually, make it two.”

Yup, order it, she texted Jennifer. She watched Chris approach the counter, then give his place in line to a woman with three little kids. His t-shirt was tucked into his ironic Pokemon-print boxers on one side. He talked to the cashier for a moment, then turned around and gave Dena a double thumbs up.

Long live everything. She gave a thumbs-up back.


Written by: Dot Dannenberg
Photograph by: Rob Gregory

1:1 - Mark Killian

Interviewed by Sam Chow

Over the next few weeks, 1:1000 will take you behind the scenes with our core writing and editorial team. We'll show you more about what makes these writers tick (or maybe twitch).

This week we sit down with Mark Killian, a copywriter by trade who not only writes for a living, but spends his free time gracing us with his eclectic collection of stories, such as “Go Deep,” “Golfonomics," and his most recent addition, "Put a Blue Ribbon on My Brain," which are as likely to make you laugh as they are to make you cry.

1:1000: Why writing?

MARK KILLIAN: There are many reasons, but I think Roger Federer summed it up best when he spoke to a bunch of bankers at the Credit Suisse headquarters. To paraphrase, he said the key to success is focusing on your strengths, not trying to overcome your weaknesses. Scholastically (and in other areas of my life) I have many weaknesses, but I've never had a problem completing a writing assignment. Damn the SATs for implementing the written portion AFTER my graduation.

1:1000: You clearly draw a great deal of inspiration from Roger Federer and Stephen Colbert, what is it about them that inspires you? Do you have any writer idols?

MK: Roger and Stephen (we're on a first name basis (in my dreams)) are blueprints for the man I hope to become. I'm not foolish enough to think I will ever come anywhere near their personal or professional successes, but as the 4th Earl of Chesterfield Philip Stanhope (thanks Google) once said, "Aim at perfection in everything, though in most things it is unattainable. However, they who aim at it, and persevere, will come much nearer to it than those whose laziness and despondency make them give it up as unattainable." I think Rog and Steph are about as close to perfection as humans can get. They love their jobs, their wives, their families, and they're surprisingly humble for people who have accomplished such greatness in their fields. Plus, Colbert's from coastal South Carolina. Before him, the only famous person I could relate to (geographically) was Vanna White. As far as writers are concerned, many of the greats have horrible personal lives. All of them seem to be divorced or mentally tormented or struggling to overcome some kind of addiction. There are many writers I admire for their style and accomplishments, but I reserve the word "idol" for people who embody the total package.

1:1000: In addition to 1:1000, you make a living as a copywriter. Writing clearly takes up a lot of your time and your mind, so what inspires your writing? How do you avoid writer’s block?

MK: Talking to myself. I don't have "voices in my head" in a The Shining sense of the word, but my brain can sometimes feel like a crowded coffee shop. I hear all of my thoughts bouncing off one another as if I were reading my own mind, especially when I give my brain a topic to ruminate on. That's the beauty of the 1:1000 concept. I'll look at a picture, the "voices" will start chattering, and I'll follow the "voice" that I feel is saying the most interesting things. The same goes for a work assignment. As long as my head is talking, I'll continue to write down what it has to say. (Disclaimer: I've never been psychoanalyzed, so there is a chance that was just the rantings of a mad man.)

1:1000: Um…so what are the voices telling you now Mark?

MK: They are telling me I have the right to remain silent.

1:1000: You’ve written stories ranging from social commentary (e.g., “Roses”) to more humor-heavy tales (like “Pissed”), how would you describe your writing?

MK: Once again, it's the voices. Sometimes the funny ones are the loudest (“Pissed”), sometimes it's the sincere ones (“Roses”), and sometimes it's a mixture of both (“Hokey Pokey”). I'm just their stenographer.

1:1000: How do you choose the photographs for your stories?

MK: For the most part, I leave it up to the voices. And yes, I'm aware the voices thing is getting old, but I can't help it. It's the truth. Anyways, I usually go to our Stories to Be Pinterest board or Flickr and scroll through until the voices see something they like. However, there have been a few occasions (like with “Pissed”), when the story came first.

1:1000: What's a day in the life of Mark Killian look like?

MK: Monday through Friday, a day in the life of Mark Killian would bore you to tears. I am extremely dull and regimented. I eat the same three meals at the same times every day. I wake up, I go to work, I exercise, I Hangout (virtually) with my Lady, and I go to sleep. I am the personification of my favorite quote from The Picture of Dorian Gray, "Good artists exist in what they make, and consequently are perfectly uninteresting in what they are." On the weekends, I'm a little more willy nilly. I hang out (physically) with my girlfriend, watch movies, and eat nitrates. I'm a real daredevil.

1:1000: The protagonist of "Finding Faith at 10,000 Feet" also seems like he would be the type to avoid nitrates. Is that story, or are any of your stories, autobiographical?

MK: The most autobiographical story I've ever written was either “Pissed” or “Put a Blue Ribbon on My Brain," although, they were slightly embellished for comedic effect. “Finding Faith” was close, minus the decision to fly to New York for a second opinion. I find that humorous stories are easiest to draw from real-life experiences, because I've had a pretty plush life. The hardships I've faced would make anyone with real problems laugh, so I laugh along with them.

1:1000: What does a hypochondriac do for fun?

MK: What DOESN'T a hypochondriac do for fun!? (Most things.) Lately, I've been having a blast on this website/app called GoodGuide. They've taken over 200,000 consumer goods and rated them according to their impact on your health, the environment, and society. As a hypochondriac, I mostly use it for health. Fun fact: pretty much all hand soaps want to give you cancer. Don't believe me? Go to GoodGuide. Then, of course, there's always the WebMD Symptoms Checker. HOURS of fun. And by "fun" I mean crippling anxiety, but it's the kind of rush I used to get from haunted houses.

1:1000: Other than listening to voices inside their heads, do you have any advice for those out there who want to write, but are too afraid to take the plunge?

MK: Do it. Seriously. It's that simple. Writing, like all art, is subjective. I have read books that make me think, "How in the hell did this get published!?" But that's just one man's opinion. There's always going to be someone who thinks you suck. Like Federer said, focus on your strengths. Don't try to win over the people who think you suck. Just try to please the people who think you're talented, even if it's just one guy named Sam Chow who has read every piece of grammatically incorrect and misspelled crap you've typed since high school.

Sam: Aww! I get a shout out?

Mark: Of course! Anyone who read the "poetry" that came out of my first "heartbreak" deserves a humanitarian award.

Sam: You were painfully emo.

Mark: I will cause you pain the next time I see you.

Sam: Nothing can hurt worse than those poems.

Mark: Valid point.