By Lou-Ellen Barkan

“Guess what?” My sister Lois’s voice was up an octave, so I guessed good news. 

“You won the lottery?” 

“You’re close. We got a reservation at Premise!”

“You’re kidding” I laughed. “How did you pull that off?”

Premise, New York City’s trendiest restaurant, had just received a five-star review.  Instantly, the foodies reached for their phones, looking to score a reservation before the place was old news. 

“You guys in?” Lois asked. ” Charlie’s client pulled this off.” 

“We’re in. Do we need a bank loan?”

“It’s a freebee. Paid for by the grateful client. Just show up super chic. And, Julia,” she said, dropping to her normal alto. “The client is joining us, so be on your best behavior.”

“I’m devastated,” I said, with a deep sob. “Why would you think I won’t be a perfect lady?”

My cellphone light flashed off.

Ten minutes later, I was deep in the bowels of my closet, also known affectionately as Julia’s Suit Museum.  Over thirty years in corporate jobs,  I had assembled a world-class  collection of suits, pants and skirts, all in my favorite color. 

Black. 

But the search for the Premise outfit was challenging.  If only I had leather. Even faux leather. Unfortunately, the only leather in my closet was my son’s seventh grade bike jacket. He was thirty-five and, fortunately, he had aged better than the jacket.  Maybe I should go movie star style. Faded jeans with a hole in the knee, a starchy white shirt and long black cashmere cardigan. Hoopy diamond earrings.  A fur coat draped over my shoulders.  Sadly, I didn’t own fur or diamonds. And the last time I tried on my jeans, they had shrunk two sizes. My white shirts waiting for someone to iron them before the decade ended. 

  I kept digging, hopeful that something would spill out. Then I hit paydirt. A black wool skirt clingy enough to be modern and loose enough to allow me to eat. I paired it with a black cashmere turtle neck, added my mother’s triple strand pearl necklace and knee-high suede boots. I added my vintage Burberry trench. 

On dinner night, I added Spanx to hold in my middle-aged bulge, checked myself in the mirror and saw a sixty-year-old woman making an effort. 

“How do I look?” I asked Michael. “Do I look fat?”

“You look like a sexy nun.” He laughed. 

Our Uber driver saw our destination and gave Michael a high five. “You guys won the dinner sweepstakes. Hope someone else is paying.”  

  

At Premise, we were greeted by a beefy, armed guard who checked us in and held the heavy oak doors.  As we swept into the sacred space, we were instantly members of the city’s elite.  It was intoxicating. 

I left my Burberry with a woman whose outfit was worth five times mine and joined Lois and Charlie at the bar where they were talking with another couple, sipping what looked like champagne. 

“My sister, Julia,” Lois said, kissing me on both cheeks. “And her husband, Michael. Please meet Alan and Stephanie Leon.” 

I looked up at middle aged, bald Alan smiling at me.  Stephanie nodded and picked up her drink. Her steel grey hair was cut soccer mom style, short on the sides, long in the back.  Her muscular heft implied years of slow weight gain, bulk accentuated by an unfortunate knit dress that highlighted every bulge. Diamond earrings with stones almost as big as her world class boobs were a clever distraction.  

 

After one glass of champagne, I was feeling rather jolly. My Spanx ensured that I looked my size ten personal best, the black sweater set off my mother’s pearls and my haircut was Vogue’s highest rated bob. And, since it wasn’t my party, all I had to do was enjoy the food and take notes to gossip with my BFFs. 

“Don’t I know you?” Stephanie looked closely at me. ‘Haven’t we met before?”

“I don’t believe so,” I smiled.  

“No,” She said, gripping my arm. “I’m positive we’ve met before. I would recognize that voice anywhere.”

It’s true. I have a distinctive voice, the outcome of a chronic sinus problem. I was debating if I should share this when I noticed my sister’s frightened rabbit look. She was ready to scamper if I said anything to send the evening south. I blinked twice, our private signal that she could relax.

“Of course,” I said. “It’s possible. We’ve lived in the city forever.”

“No,” she shook her head. “We’re suburban. Where did you go to school?”

What followed was the New York geography game. Rapid fire listing of schools, friends, clubs, relatives, friends of relatives, relatives of friends and then finally, the key that opened the door. 

“Did you go to camp?” Stephanie asked.  

“Camp Bliss.” I said. 

“When were you there?” 

“Mid-fifties,” No reason to give away my actual age.

“Well, that’s it,” she said with a triumphant snort. “I was there at the same time. You remember me? Stephanie Grassley?”

I put my glass down and stared at her. Oh yes. I definitely remembered Stephanie Grassley, the Second-Place winner in the 1955 Camp Bliss Beauty Pageant. 

I was at an uncharacteristic loss for words.

Bliss was my mother’s choice, selected after she interrogated a dozen camp directors on facilities and amenities. Proper bathrooms, mattress quality. A fully staffed infirmary.  Counselor to camper ratios.  Mandatory buddy system for swimming. Bliss checked all the boxes. Plus, they had a cabin set aside for a beauty parlor with hair dryers. It was indicative of Mom’s priorities that she never asked about athletics.

But on first blush, Bliss wasn’t a bad choice. The owners had matched the inner spring mattresses with professional grade tennis courts and a spectacular lakefront for swimming and diving. We had volleyball, softball, field hockey, riflery, horseback riding, archery and color war. Athletic and competitive by nature,  I was picked first for teams and often for captain. Sports was not the problem. On the field, I was a star.

But at dances with the boys’ camp across the lake, not so much. 

At twelve, I was at the apogee of an awkward social stage. And notwithstanding my mother’s reassurance that I would soon be the belle of the ball, there was nothing she could do to improve my resemblance to my idols Sandra Dee and Carol Lynley. Unlike me, their body parts aligned, and they were blessed with shiny blond hair and clear skin. Unfortunately, I was always on acne alert. My brown hair and brown eyes were an indeterminate shade. I was convinced that I was a lost cause. 

My mother stood firm. “You will grow into your looks,” she said. “Be patient.” 

Getting through camp dances was hard enough, but the morning our counselors passed out Beauty Pageant nominating forms, I was furious. The last thing I needed was a contest to compare my looks with the lucky gene crowd.  I tore the form up, pushed it into my half-eaten oatmeal, excused myself and went to practice my forehand.  

The other campers obediently selected six contestants. One of these was Stephanie Grassley. 

 

On Pageant night, ninety-eight girls, ranging in age from eight to fifteen, met at the steps of the outdoor theater. Two campers were missing. precocious Pageant haters, they stayed behind to run a betting pool. One was a math prodigy who had calculated the odds for each contestant and  posted them on her bathroom mirror. By the time the curtain rose, the majority of campers had exhausted their canteen accounts, and the odds did not favor Stephanie.

Campers sat in awe as candidates arrived on the stage, powdered and primped in Pageant style, with bright lipstick and stiff hairdos. Three rounds of competition included bathing suit and ballgown and a personal question. 

No one clapped.  Envy formed a palpable cloud over the proceeding.  

And Stephanie. Oh yes.  I remembered her. Long blond hair, clear skin, perfect body, even in the shapeless camp bathing suit. Blue ballgown to match her blue eyes. She came in second. 

A moment forever etched in my mind. 

After my brief trip down memory lane, I looked in mirror behind the bar and saw Stephanie had aged like a bottle of sour milk. Her skin had curdled into deep ridges, her body shifted to accommodate growing inventory. 

And I laughed. 

In my size ten, trendy black outfit, I looked, if not like a teenager, definitely like a sexy nun. If Bliss held the Pageant tonight, there is no question who the winner would be. 

Mom would have been pleased.

“Of course,” I smiled. “I remember you.” 

And right on cue, our table was ready.

“What was that about?” Lois whispered. 

“Water under the bridge,” I said.

After the Pageant debacle, Mom found a camp that featured sports, hiking and girls who sang dirty songs around the campfire.

It was heaven.

*     *    *

Lou-Ellen Barkan, a native New Yorker, lives in the Berkshires where she teaches writing classes, runs a writer’s group and writes short stories for her pleasure and, hopefully, for others. Her two children, six grandchildren, four dogs and three careers have produced enough material for a lifetime of stories, some of which are available at  https://www.clippings.me/lebarkan. She holds a BA from Hunter College and an MA from Columbia University. 

 

By Polly Hansen

Agnus wants her daughter to like the leotard. It’s the only one in her size that’s on sale–navy blue with gathering at the shoulders that makes them puffy and lumpy, but the rest of it looks fine. At least it will fit, she thinks. This is how she buys her own clothes, ugly but affordable. Like that brown, gingham blouse with the frilly fringe. The first time she wore it someone said she looked like a teddy bear. She never wore it again. Maybe this leotard won’t be so bad, she thinks.

Agnus is hot and sweaty in her ankle-length, winter coat. Her daughter calls it, “The Green Monster.” It’s hunter green with genuine green fur on the hood and made of real down feathers that keep her toasty warm even when it’s overcast and bitter outside like today. She got it for a bargain on sale. It’s too much to carry over her arm inside the shop, so she shoves the coat off her shoulders and lets the hem drag on the floor. Surrounding her are regularly priced, sparkly, feathered, and sequined leotards she knows her daughter would love, but she won’t even look at them.

Agnus holds the odd leotard in front of her, squinting at it one more time, willing the sleeves to look better, then takes it to the counter. The shop is like a glass box that sits apart from the other shops in the small strip mall. From this distance, her old minivan in the parking lot looks forlorn and small amongst the shiny SUV’s. Over her right shoulder is the Chinese restaurant she’s heard so much about, the all-you-can-eat, specially-priced, lunchtime buffet, and wishes she could go there but even that is out of the question on her tight budget. 

The shop owner has perfectly manicured nails and a huge rock of an engagement ring fitting snuggly next a wedding band on her finger. Probably owns this shop as a hobby, Agnus thinks. Something to keep her entertained while her husband is at work earning six hefty figures. 

The woman smiles at Agnus. “Sale items are not returnable,” she says, “except for store credit.”

But Agnus doesn’t listen. If Sally doesn’t like it, I’ll return it and get my money back. Agnus has been watching motivational DVDs about being assertive and speaking up for yourself. People won’t know what you want if you don’t tell them, the speaker on her DVD says. Take a stand! Use your voice!

But when she gets home and shows it to her daughter, her daughter hates it. 

“Just see if it fits.”

“Why would I do that if I hate it? I won’t wear it. It’s ugly. I don’t know why you bought it.”

Agnus barely pleads with her daughter, knowing she’s right. The leotard is ugly. But it was so affordable! 

She returns to the shop the next day while Sally is at school. The sun is shining so bright it hurts. She squints as she turns away from the windows at the sun glaring on the windshield of her car as she waits in line with her receipt. She smiles at the owner, noticing the slight frown when the woman seems to recognize Agnus. 

“I want to return this,” Agnus says, placing the offending leotard on the counter. The tag is slashed with a red X. 

“This is a closeout item,” the store owner says. “No returns. I explained that when you purchased it.”

“But it doesn’t fit my daughter. She’s unusually tall.” She says this as if her daughter’s size is a handicap for which she should be compensated or pitied. 

The store owner’s polite smile disappears. “You can exchange it for store credit.”

Agnus turns and surveys the inventory. “But there’s nothing here that will fit her. All your items are for little girls.” 

Agnus watches the store owner’s pinched mouth, her eyes trying to remain civil. “I’m sure there’s something. I have a lot of inventory,” the woman says. “Why don’t you bring your daughter with you next time?”

But Agnus thinks, no. She doesn’t want Sally to see all the pretty items she can’t afford. She plants her feet firmly in front of the counter, recalling the instructions from her DVD mentor. Direct eye contact. No flinching. Say it like you mean it. She takes a deep breath, holds her head high, and lifts her chin. 

“I looked. There is nothing here. You expect me to buy something my daughter can’t squeeze into? This is the largest leotard here and it’s too small. I want my money back.” 

She is lying left and right but by god she has her rights. How could this woman sell something so ugly and then put it on sale, enticing people to buy it? And whoever heard of store credit only? How absurd. It was a stupid shop anyway. Agnus can’t think what made her stop in to look around. 

“I want my money back,” she says again, feeling her voice square in the center of her chest. 

The store owner’s face goes sour, her eyes unfriendly. “This is my store. I set the policy here.”

“And I’m the customer. The customer is always right.”

 “Fine,” says the proprietor, spitting out the word as she opens the cash register. “I’ll change my policy this one time, but don’t ever set foot in my store again.”

Agnus stuffs the bills and change into her wallet and walks out feeling slightly off kilter, as if she might slip on the perfectly dry asphalt. She drives home all abuzz, reliving every word she and the shop owner exchanged. Too excited to return home just yet, she stops at her best friend’s house, one who is a little better off financially than she and her husband are, but not by much. Her friend is home and invites her in. Over tea, Agnus relates the story.

“You did what?” 

They are sitting in her friend’s yellow kitchen at the round breakfast table with a view of the treehouse in the backyard and a wooden swing set that is much nicer than the cheap metal swing set that sits in her own backyard. 

“You say yourself that I’m always letting people walk all over me. I’m sticking up for myself.” Agnus doesn’t tell her friend about the motivational DVDs.

Her friend’s face rearranges itself like a jigsaw puzzle coming loose. One minute it was open and receptive, and the next, disjointed. “But you were just being rude. There’s a difference, you know, between standing up for yourself and being rude.”

Agnus is shaken. She’s always admired her friend’s forthrightness. She had thought she was doing something right for once, that her friend would be proud of her, but now she’s embarrassed and confused.

“That was her store,” her best friend says. “She can set any policy she wants to, and she told you that was the case before you bought the leotard. I think you owe that woman an apology.” 

Agnus stands, unable to look her friend in the face and drives home feeling shaky and small. She realizes what she left behind as she walked out of the store wanting to feel triumphant but feeling instead as if something was missing. 

Wandering from room to room, she looks out the windows at the bleak gray sky as if searching for a different answer. Apologize? If she didn’t like her friend so much and trust her judgement, she’d say she was mistaken. But she loves her friend, wants to be more like her. She sits at the dining room table with a box of note cards she takes from the drawer by the telephone. At first, her handwriting looks wild and unstable. She slows down and makes her cursive as neat as possible. Agnus signs with her first name and last initial only. She looks up the store’s address online and doesn’t put a return address on the envelope. She wonders what the store owner will think of her when she reads the letter. 

When Agnus finds herself in the same strip mall a few weeks later she parks the car far away at the opposite end of the lot and walks towards the hardware store. She hopes the leotard shop owner is busy waiting on customers and won’t recognize the Green Monster if she happens to look out the store windows. Holding her head high, Agnus wishes she could apologize in person and demonstrate how she can be a polite and decent customer. But she’s been forbidden to enter the shop. It’s like wearing a scarlet letter, as if she is damned. She hopes the hardware store clerks haven’t been told about the lady in the green coat. 

*   *   *

Polly Hansen’s unpublished memoir “A Minor, Unaccompanied: Memoir of a Teen Musician’s Odyssey,” won Memoir Magazine’s 2022 coming-of-age Memoir Prize for Books. Her work is published in Newsweek, The Sun and numerous other journals. She was a finalist in the 2023 Doris Betts Fiction Prize and lives in Asheville, NC with her husband and two black dogs often mistaken for small black bears on leashes. You can find her at pollyhansen.com and @9ofPentacles.

 

 

By Ally Campanozzi

The final days of summer weren’t supposed to trickle into our last days together. Here I am again, folding like origami, back into Troubled Tessa mode. I’m lingering in the grey space where subconscious impulses overlap with reality, longing to force time’s hands to screech still and rewind.

We climbed the ladder, crawled out of the lake, and sat down beside each other on the dock. I worried about wood splinters getting stuck in my thigh, but I tried to keep anxiety muted to a quiet croak.

The smell of charcoal and brisket wafted through the air while your dad got busy cooking on the grill. You handed me a bright yellow beach towel. Waiting for you to say something, I almost giggled at how you tried dyeing your curly hair a shocking blue. Instead, it turned an awful shade of murky teal. 

The faux paus of your hair held great symbolism. Lately, we’d been in an awkward place.

“It’s not you, Tessa.” You didn’t look at me while speaking the words no girlfriend wants to hear. “It’s me.”

My brows raised. “So, it’s over?” I reached up and swept my braids behind my shoulders. They were still damp with lake water. “Chase, I need to know if you’re for real this time.”

We’d been loop-talking, going around in contradicting circles.

You fiddled with the silver ring on the chain around your neck. “I’m really not sure. It sucks being so confused.” The promise ring disappeared behind your T-shirt.

“No kidding.”

“We have to make up our minds.” You stood up and walked over the creaky boards. “But—not today.”

Not today, I thought, reaching for my beige swim skirt cover up. But sometime soon. 

Life throws curveballs at you. Even if you’re standing at home plate ready to crack one out of the park, you can still strike out. We’d been dating for two years. Our shy eighth grade slow dances morphed into a map for the rest of our lives. A beach wedding. At dawn. All the perfect love stories craved sunsets. We didn’t want to be cliché. There’d be rose petals, candle lit paths, and we’d wear kick back clothes. Formalities and traditions weren’t our vibe.

Junior year lurked on the horizon, cinching another notch in the belt of high school accolades. It’d be one of the first things I’d tackle without you. Instead of a quick jaunt down the road, a thirty-minute drive, you acted like you were moving to Mars. It didn’t have to pack the punch of an asteroid collision. But you changed as soon as your parents dropped the Atomic Divorce Bombshell.

Trying to act peppy, I followed you to the picnic tables. I’m not good at masking feelings. You like packing them away, vacation luggage totes stowed somewhere in your brain. Instead, I face them, letting them be train headlights surging down the tracks at full speed. I felt an uptick in my nerves, cheeks turning blazed red. It didn’t happen because I avoided sunscreen, hoping to bronze my paste pale complexion. Once I sat down at the table, the cicadas and crickets chirped their awkward serenade. After we filled our plastic plates with brisket meat, Wonder bread buns, pickles, onions, and all the fixings, I stirred some coleslaw around with a fork. 

My ears perked up, listing to your mom and dad. Their pending divorce would be final by the time you left. You pulled your black hoodie over your head, leaned down, and started typing a text. Your fingers clacked away at more texts, making me grow suspicious. Had you already met new girls? Did you want to drag this out to avoid crushing me a little longer?

A shiver crawled down my spine when my phone vibrated on the table. 

You blinked, then I read the text: “I’d be single forever, before I ever ended up like them.”

I wanted to ask what made you compare. Couldn’t we be Tessa and Chase, instead of being stapled to their shadow?  I reacted with a single red heart emoji, then drifted along the bubbling riptide of my mind. Time rippled, flashing me back. Memories took over, revealing vivid glimpses of our better summer moments. 

*

We’d ridden six rollercoasters by the middle of the afternoon. Sticky heat and vertical drops left my hair limping. You didn’t seem to mind. An afternoon rain shower gave me streaks of Emo mascara tears. I looked like an accidental clown. We laughed until our ribs hurt, making memory mementos, stocking up on summer souvenirs. We’d chased so many black holes, we’d lost count. They led us to the center of our universes.

After a while, we wandered into an arcade. Stupid, sweet smiles made my knees wobble while we played air hockey underneath pink and green neon lights. A little later, we sipped on Virgin Piña Coladas with pineapples, cherries and paper umbrellas poking out of the Vanilla-colored slush. 

Yin and yang. We had no idea what we were doing, but we played along as best as we knew how.

I thought back to our first kiss, taking risks to skip seventh period. We snuck into the empty parking lot, while you started up a nerdy rant about me calling cumulus clouds cotton balls. Even if it wouldn’t be forever and a day, maybe I’d learn to be okay again. After the storm settled, I’d be forced to find pieces of myself to love, instead of fixating on the flaws.

*

I’d dazed off—sunken—mind warped. When a horsefly buzzed beside my ear, I jumped.

“I’m sorry, I just got freaked out.” From the other side of the table, you reached over and took my hand. “I wanna make it work.”

We’d give it another shot. Somehow, dropping the anchor down one more time, sinking to the bottom of our complicated ocean. I smiled back at you, then gazed at the pastel pink, lavender, and tangerine clouds creating a picturesque sunset over the lake.

*    *   *

Ally Campanozzi started writing in middle school and has been expanding her passion since. Her background includes a BA in Psychology and an MA in Creative Writing from SNHU. She is currently pursuing an MFA in Fiction Writing. Her poetry has been featured in a few literary magazines and anthologies, including publications by Kelp Journal, The Closed Eye Open, Dream Noire Magazine, Please See Me, and others. Her writing explores psychology, mental health, magical realism, and dream worlds. She lives in Colorado. Follow her work on Instagram: @allycampanozziwriting

By Pam Avoledo

Because Douglas likes to try different specialty beers, we go to breweries when we travel. Because Douglas likes baseball, we attend six games a year. Because Douglas retches in my father’s boat, we no longer sail on Sunday afternoons. Because Douglas likes being over me, moaning, his sweat dripping onto my breasts. I stay underneath him. Because Douglas says marriage is only when we are very, very serious. Because Douglas leaves his shit-stained towels on the floor. Because Douglas won’t flush his vomit in the bowl.  Because Douglas sneaks off into the kitchen, his phone in hand, typing when a notification goes off. Because Douglas kisses me on the cheek and says he loves me. Because Douglas talks only when needs to – can you hand me the cup, I’m going to be late tonight, what did my mom have to say? Because Douglas sleeps in the guest bedroom every other night. Because Douglas keeps liking another girl’s posts. Because Douglas says not to worry. Because Douglas won’t let me finish my own sentences.  Because. Because. Because. Because it shouldn’t be like this. Because I shouldn’t live like this. I don’t want this. I don’t think I ever have. I need a key. I need a plan. I need to go.

*   *   *

Pam Avoledo’s work can be found at pamavoledo.com

By John Swartz

It was after his doctor gave the old man bad news that he and his wife started sharing their dream over morning coffee. His dreams, then, were even darker than they had been before his diagnosis, full of dead relatives and obscure threats. Hers were of dolphins leaping into her arms and dancing with old friends. The sharing brought a new intimacy. Perhaps it was just pseudo-intimacy, since it was based on dreams and a dream, is after all not real. But real or not, pseudo or not, he would take what he could get.

He toned down the terror of his dreams in the telling, so as not to disturb her. And she, he was sure, made her dreams seem a bit less enchanting than they actually were. They each modified the truth – if a dream can be called a truth – just a bit, just enough to make it a little easier on the other.  

The sharing was one of the little things that connected him to a life that was ebbing away. It was a time when lasts were looming: the last encounter with the obnoxious brother-in-law, the last doctor’s visit, the last whiff of cinnamon toast. And he expected that all too soon she would be giving him their last kiss.

The morning he threatened to survive the winter just to annoy her, she laughed him off and went out to Walgreens to get his meds. When she was late returning, he guessed she was in some long conversation with a total stranger on the street; the kind of thing that had made her late before. Then he got the call: a stroke. 

On the way to her room in the hospital his feet seemed to sink into the floor tiles; it was all so unreal, but it really was her on the bed, the sunken eyes were the very ones that had rolled at him when he teased her, the lips were the very ones that smiled her forgiveness the times he wronged her.  

It wasn’t supposed to be like this, but he was the one who gave the last kiss.The shock almost did him in – and he almost wanted to be done in — but arrangements had to be made, his daughters’ flights for the service had to be coordinated. . . 

After a while the neighbors stopped bringing over casseroles and people stopped calling.       

Spring arrived, and much to his surprise, and not entirely to his liking, he found himself still alive. One morning he woke up feeling surprisingly well. He took his first walk in months. He went to MacDonalds and got a greasy, salty meal, the kind she would have forbidden him to eat. He could practically hear her scolding and laughing, bringing happy memories with her. How was it possible, with his missing her so much, he could feel anything remotely like joy? But he did. It must have been last night’s dream that put him in such a good mood. He tried hard to recall it and after a while it came to him, vividly. But it was not his dream. He recognized it as one of hers: they were ice skating on a summer night so close to a carousel that they could hear the music.

*   *   *

John Swartz grew up in a large boisterous Irish Catholic family in Philadelphia and spent summers with a Mennonite family in Lancaster County, PA. This experience led to his ongoing fascination with the humor and pain associated with culture clashes. He joined the Navy as a journalist seaman and wrote many articles for newspapers around the country. A long-time lover of theater, John worked briefly as an actor in San Francisco, but discovered he preferred writing plays to acting in them. After settling in Vermont, John wrote reports for criminal and family court that gave him an intimate view of the human drama behind every case. He currently writes decisions as an independent arbitrator for the Vermont Commissioner of Family Services. John’s most recent published work was a feature article in the Valley News of Lebanon NH, and a piece in The Sun magazine. He has completed a novel that is searching for an agent and another under development. 

By Jaclyn Griffith

You see it as a gilded cage but really it’s more like a fishbowl. I’m outside, tapping on the glass until you come up for air. It’s a Tuesday.

You, a goldfish, swim to the surface to lounge in a beach chair on the sand. You peer at me over your bright red sunglasses, eyebrows raised, chin pointed toward your chest. You’ve got a margarita in your left hand and screenshots in your right. You’re talking shit again.

You tell me about the fight. Can you believe punctuates our conversation and your closing statements. Men are a problem, you say, and I agree out of habit. Don’t I know it! Do I know it?

You tell me all the costs then you tell me not to settle for anyone but you do not tell me what to do instead. Instead, I get a pedicure. Instead, I feel guilty about paying extra for the 10-minute massage.

We talk until you feel better and dive back into the bowl fins first. You have resolutions to reach, apologies to attend to. I am never part of the resolution but I am always part of the fight. I take in every story, story story story story about how he makes you angry. You go home and get to heal. I just get heavy.

I stay out in the sun, my skin roasting. Pink pig on a spit. I don’t tap now; you’re preoccupied. It’s a weekend after all.

I suppose no one has it all and I have things you might want. There is an apartment with only my name on it, maybe 300 square feet. Probably 250. It looks like me. I have a little more free time than you and a lot more friends. If I didn’t have them, I might just disappear. My apartment would not notice.

All of these friends have their own fishbowls, too, so I mix some more margaritas and rotate around their shores ready to listen, ready to work. A nobleman performing an important societal duty. A barback fetching tequila from the storage closet. Frozen, on the rocks, skinny, strawberry, mango, who wants a sugar rim? I already know just how you like it.

When you found him you bragged and boasted but pretended to be bashful for the day. When he picked you we bought you a set of steak knives. They live in a drawer you already shared. Babe, can these go in the dishwasher?

Now, when you make dinner at home with him you Have Plans. When you watch a movie on your couch you are Spending Time Together. When you put your phones on silent you are Practicing Self Care. You are Busy. You have a million sweet little weekend reasons not to answer my texts.

I know the fishbowl isn’t a utopia. I know you have other things you long for. I get it. I have those too. I’d kill for a coat closet and in-unit laundry and a dark wood dining table.

The sun sets and I’m up till four, writhing in my sheets again. An earthworm digging its way out the dirt. It is not because I do not have a washing machine. It is not because I do not have a dining table. I do not start to cry when I watch a movie about people who have coat closets. None of these longings are primal. None make me wonder if there is something fundamentally wrong with me.

I don’t mean to judge I know this is the human condition but up on the shore all weekend the sun is lighting my skin on fire, the margaritas are giving me a hangover. No one can escape the human condition but there’s something to be said for not having to face it alone.

It’s Friday night again so I leave you to it. You have motivated me to swim, to get back out there. I step into the sea but I sink with stone stories in my pockets. You’ll notice on Monday. 

*   *   *

Jaclyn is a writer, academic, and pop music aficionado from New York. Her writing has appeared in WordCity Literary Journal, Cathexis Northwest Press, and Lived In, among other publications. In 2018 she founded Witches Mag, a feminist literary magazine, and quickly cut her teeth in editing. You can read all her most intimate thoughts at jaclyngriffith.com, and in egregiously long Instagram captions: @jacgrifff.

By M.D. Smith

Betty lay awake next to her husband, George, because their only child, Emily, should have been home no later than 1:30 a.m. from her New Year’s Eve babysitting job. It was almost 2:30. 

With her exceptionally keen hearing, she heard the ‘tick, tick’ of the second hand on their bedside battery clock. The fireworks had died down hours ago, but now she heard the mournful bark of a hound dog and gradually a car engine growing louder in the cold, still night air. Her heart pumped harder. 

That must be Emily. What could have kept her?

As hoped, the engine sound grew louder, then stopped. She expected to hear the door chime ding as Emily entered with her key, the door close, and then the computer alarm voice would announce, “Armed to stay,” and her daughter would lock up. 

More seconds ticked and with her sensitive hearing, Betty thought she heard two voices whispering. She stilled her breathing to listen and, with wide eyes, stared at the ceiling shadows cast by the tiny night light. 

It might as well have been a fire alarm when the ‘ding-dong’ of the doorbell cut through the stillness like an explosion.

Oh, no.

“George!” she shouted as she snapped to a sitting position and shook her sleeping husband. “Get up. Someone’s at the door, and Emily’s overdue.”

He grumbled for a second, then looked at her. “What did you say?”

“Hurry, the doorbell just rang, and Emily’s got a key. Something’s wrong.”

The pair grabbed their robes on either side of the queen-size bed and headed downstairs, flicking on lights as they went, Betty in the lead. They saw parts of two figures under the porch light through the sheer curtains on the glass panels on either side of the door. She unlocked and eased it open with her husband behind, his hand on her shoulder. There stood a male and female police officer with somber looks on their faces.

The calm air still smelled like sulfur from the earlier fireworks, and a cloud of mist came from the officer’s mouth as he spoke in the frigid air.

“Are you Mr. and Mrs. George Bartley, with a daughter named Emily Ann Bartley living here?”

Hearing this from a uniform caused Betty’s knees to weaken, and she put her arm around her husband for stability. George nodded at the officer. “Yes. Has something happened?”

“I’m afraid so. She’s been involved in a serious three-car accident on the 55 Freeway.” Their grim expressions indicated more.

George’s voice quivered. “How is she?”

“I’m afraid she didn’t make it, sir. She died instantly in the high-speed collision.”

“No—no, it can’t be,” Betty screamed at the top of her voice, putting her free hand over her mouth and nose. “Not my only baby girl.”

If someone had hit George on the side of his head with a brick, he wouldn’t have been more stunned or gasping without words. Betty sobbed and collapsed on the floor.

They learned that as Emily drove home from her babysitting late-night job, a new Ford 150 supercharged truck was going over a hundred miles an hour on the wrong side of the divided highway and hit another car head-on occupied by a middle-aged couple, and sent it airborne into Emily’s car just behind it, crushing the roof and the girl underneath it. The combined impact speed totaled at least 160 miles an hour.

Overcome with grief, Betty and George drove to the scene of the accident a mile from their house. The authorities would not let them approach the taped off area near their daughter’s car, but they witnessed the nearly demolished vehicles. Investigators scurried everywhere, taking pictures and recording details, until the rescue workers using the ‘jaws of life’ could pry Emily’s car roof enough to remove her mangled body. The woman passenger in the other car pronounced dead also, but her husband survived and taken by ambulance to the hospital in critical condition.

The next day, the Bartleys angrily discovered the pickup driver, seventeen-year-old Jimmy Johnston, with multiple DUIs, all dismissed, belonged to a wealthy owner of several automobile dealerships in the town. A bartender refused him alcohol, and he left the club at 1:10 a.m. Police found a shattered bottle of vodka in his truck—probably still drinking until the high-speed collision at 1:35 a.m. He had a gash on his forehead, found unconscious, and taken to the hospital.

Jimmy went home four days later, instead of jail. The DA said because of the pending severe charges, and they’d need to have a grand jury convene before they would arrest him and proceed. This nonsense angered Betty and George. They’d lost their only child to a drunk driver who killed two. That’s murder in this state, but he walked free. 

Meanwhile, they attended their child’s closed-casket funeral, burial, and wake—no daughter’s future college graduation, wedding, or grandchildren—ever.

Two years passed with no arrest. Gossip circulated that the Johnstons’ money and lawyers from New York caused multiple delays, even after the grand jury decided to prosecute. 

Betty couldn’t work, lost 45 pounds, lived primarily on tranquilizers and anti-depressants, rarely left the house, and because of her misery with only one topic she’d talk about, her friends stopped calling. 

George, trying to handle his own quiet grief, moved into the spare bedroom, lost his job, and his savings running low. His couple of beers on weekends before the accident became multiple bottles of Jack Daniels weekly. The couple frequently argued about minor things until they quit talking and merely existed.

Another year and George’s failing liver caused him to slow his drinking, and over a sack dinner one night, he whispered under his breath to himself. “Damn, our home’s in foreclosure, our daughter’s dead, our lives are basically over, and the murderer is free and enjoying his. It’s not right. I wish someone would help me kill that son-of-a-bitch?”

Betty, across the table staring at her hamburger, looked up. “I heard that, and nothing could make me happier. I’m all in,” she said.

*   *   *

 M.D. Smith lives in Huntsville, AL, and has written over 150 non-fiction short stories for Old Huntsville Magazine in the past eighteen years and over 300 short fiction stories in the past seven years. Nationally published in Good Old Days and Reminisce print magazines, Like Sunshine After Rain short story anthology, and digitally in Frontier Times, Flash Fiction Magazine, 101words.org, Bewilderingstories.com, and more. He’s published three romance novels and three flash fiction collections. His hobby is Ham Radio and talking to the world on voice and digital modes. Website: https://mdsmithiv.com/  

By Tinamarie Cox

I woke up old.

I leaned over the bathroom sink,  closer to the mirror, and blinked faded blue eyes at the unrecognizable image staring back at me. I pulled at her sagging cheeks. The lines on her face ran deep, ravines in dull, loose skin. Her pale lips parted as I studied the elderly woman I had transformed into overnight. 

What happened? How did my hair lose color and my skin droop and pucker overnight? I moved my head left and right searching for flaxen strands. The hair falling through my wrinkled fingers was gray and limp. Dry like straw.

My husband appeared in the reflection, youthful with his taut skin and dark hair tousled from sleep.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, rich brown eyes watching me in the mirror.

“I’m old!” I whirled around to answer him.

He laughed and took my chin between his thumb and forefinger. “You’re just as beautiful as the day I first put my eyes on you.” After a gentle kiss, his strong hands went to my shoulders and turned me back to the mirror. “The most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.”

My skin glowed, firm at my jawline and tight around my bright blue eyes. My hair caught the overhead light like shining waves of golden wheat. I sighed, then smiled at my renewed reflection. I always preferred seeing myself through his eyes.

*    *    *

Tinamarie Cox lives in an Arizona town with her family and felines. Her written and visual work has appeared in a number of online and print publications. You’ll find some of her flash fiction pieces in Corvus Review, Spare Parts Lit, 365tomorrows, and As Alive Journal. Explore more of her work at tinamariethinkstoomuch.weebly.com.

A Memoir by Diane Payne

In the summer, all of the neighbor kids gathered outside at night to play kick-the-can, until one by one the more concerned parents started calling their kids to come inside, while the rest of us kept kicking the can long past when it was light enough to see the can, knowing it was more fun being outside, free of whatever shit and grief was going on inside the house, stalling until the police arrived to remind us that it was too late  for kids to be outside.

When the neighbor girls and I moved on from kick-the-can to walking downtown on the nights the stores stayed open until nine, the evening air whirled with the smell of freedom, our sense of power strengthening as boys slowed down  in their crummy cars to offer us rides, and we’d get up close to the curb first giving their car a good look over, then their faces, and we’d pass, saying that we had more shopping to do. We’d laugh at our bravado and strut down the street as if we owned it, at least until the stores closed and we slowly trotted back home.

One downtown friend got tired of being penniless and told me to wait in front of the store while she took off to the parking lot out back, for what seemed like a long time, and then she returned with cash in her hands, laughing about how she just  made easy money giving someone a hand job, and I had no idea what a hand job involved,  until she mimicked rubbing her hand up and down,  boasting how boys were losers and would pay a girl to do anything as lame as a hand job. 

A couple other neighbor friends, who were sisters, and I walked to town. The older sister flirted with all the boys while we watched in awe.  Then we’d ride the elevator at the priciest store and try on clothes, clothes I’d never be able to buy. Walking home, the older sister pulled out the expensive sweater she stole while we were trying on clothes in front of the mirror, laughing as we wiggled our asses and shoved our puny breasts upward to make them look larger,  until the clerk came to tell us to move on if we weren’t going to buy anything, while  the older sister was piling new clothes beneath her own clothes, rolling her eyes at the clerk, muttering that she was stuck taking her younger sister and  her friend to the store, and this is how we behave.

Eventually downtown shopping was replaced with drinking Boone’s Farm cheap ass wine, teasing boys, dancing to records all night long, then collapsing in bed when the sun started emerging, parents never questioning our whereabouts, as we pushed our fifteen-year-old freedoms to the limit, the limits we didn’t even know were possibilities, the limits we could no longer remember the next day.

Eventually everything seemed to be spiraling in all the wrong directions, and I started going on long solo runs in the middle of the night, dated boys who were serious about school and not getting drunk, and their mothers were horrified when they asked me what time did I need to be home in the evening, their way of using me to remind their sons they had to be home by ten on a school night, and I said, “Don’t worry, I don’t have a curfew,” while the mothers shook their heads with remorse and their sons looked gravely embarrassed. Boy after boy. Mother after mother. I knew these boys would not be allowed to date me again. 

During my middle of the night runs, I ran farther away from boys who had curfews and past all- night coffee shops, dark laundrymats, entered unknown neighborhoods, endless running into a world free of curfews and unexplored possibilities. 

*   *   *

Some of Diane’s most recent publications include:  Cutleaf Journal, Mukoli, Miracle Monacle, Hairstreak Butterfly, Invisible City,  Best of Microfiction 2022, Another Chicago Magazine, Whale Road Review, Fourth River, Tiny Spoon, Bending Genres, Your Impossible Voice,  Book of Matches , Watershed Review, Superstition Review, Windmill Review, Qyarterly West,,Table Feast Literary Magazine Lunch Ticket, Miramichi Flash, Spry Split Lip Review, The Offing, Elk, and McNeese Review. Her chapbook Things That Happen in the Rain is available at Bottlecap Press.   More can be found here: dianepayne.wordpress.com

By Benedict J. Amato

“Sweet peas.”  Mr. DiMelli’s shoe kicked the dirt and he poked his cane into the ground.  With a wavering line he drew out where he was going to plant them.

Though it was a November morning, the temperature was in the mid 70’s with a deep blue sky.  Mr. DiMelli could remember few days like this, but then again, he couldn’t remember much lately.  But he could reminisce the many harvests of his 81 years.  Some were grand, some meager, but lately his garden offered failing legs, a sore back and fading health.  But this morning he awoke to sunshine so he decided to walk in his garden and dream of spring.   

“Sweet peas,” he repeated again, as if to pledge to harvest them next year.

The noise of a screen door opening startled him.  His neighbor Mrs. Markum was at her backdoor.  She was putting on a light coat over a black cocktail dress.  DiMelli checked his watch.  He was sure he just saw the school buses drive by.  For a brief instant he could see the way her dress clung tight to her thighs.  The neckline plunged, highlighting her fair white skin.  She turned in the doorway and pulled her coat closed.   

“Tomatoes,” he whispered to himself.  “Ripe, plump tomatoes.”  With his cane he drew another line in the earth, this one a bit more rigid than one for the peas.  

Mrs. Markum walked swiftly through her yard.  His eyes followed her as she crossed the empty lot behind their homes.  She quickly reached the next street.  A car was parked with a man in it.  The passenger door swung open and she quickly slipped inside.  He saw her move close to the driver and then the two forms merged behind the car’s tinted windows.

“Hot peppers,” DiMelli signed.  The tip of his cane dug deep into the rich, dark earth.  He cut a gash, deep and straight across the rear of his garden.

The car’s motor raced and DiMelli’s watched it speed down the street.  He turned back to his garden.  The cold, barren dirt had a maze of first wavering then long rigid lines.  He looked up to his home and his wife Edna standing by the kitchen window.  She was washing the morning dishes, her white dressing gown aglow with the morning sun.  A smile crossed his face.

“Zucchini,” he said, driving his cane deep into the ground.  He left it there and hurried in to his bride, before this fertile moment had a chance to pass.

*   *   *

Benedict J. Amato is a retired educator, writer and journalist. He participated in educational collaborations with a Long Island, NY newspaper and has written articles and columns for various Long Island magazines. An avid sailor and reader, Ben has gained insights into the boundaries between today’s fiction and tomorrow’s facts. He and his wife live in the Hudson Valley of NY and Southwest Florida. His facebook address is: https://www.facebook.com/ben.amato.1