"Jasper the Ghost" by Ani Terzian

"Hey, what are you doing over there?!" Bill asked.

Jasper was quietly sitting in front of the television, waching Ghostbusters for the millionth time, his pale fingers covered with crumbs. The enormous plate full of cookies was now empty. He put the movie on mute. "Nothing!" he called.

"Are you coming with us or not?"

Jasper looked over at the direction Bill's voice was coming from. There was nothing there.

"No, I think I'll just sit this one out again," he said dully.

Bill huffed. Jasper could imagine the annoyed glare his brother was giving him, even though he couldn't see Bill -- or indeed any members of his family.

"You've been so boring ever since the accident, Jasper. You're a ghost, you can't just sit around all day at home with all these helpless humans running around." A few moments later Jasper heard the door slam.

Jasper had a problem. Everyone called it a curse. He was starting to believe them. Unlike the rest of his family, he wasn't invisible. If he went outside, people would see him. This kept him from fulfilling his destiny as a ghost -- to scare people.

But as the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man appearaed in front of him in his silent house, Jasper decided was tired of being teased by all the neighborhood ghosts. He was finally going to get out and engage in some ghostly business.

He put on his hat and coat, a weak attempt for a disguise, and left the apartment. Walking down the alley, he suddenly heard footsteps. It was the first sign of life he had seen in weeks (his technically dead family didn't count): a tall man dressed in thick clothes, slowly walking towards him.

The man's shiny leather boots caught Jasper's eye. Clickety clack. Clickety clack. The winter snow was still on the ground; there was no way to get around secretly. As the man came closer to him, Jasper jumped out of the corner.

"Gaaaaah!"

The man fell over. He was trembling and hyperventilating. "Who are you? What do you want?"

Jasper hesitated. It had been a long time since he scared a person. It didn't feel good the way it used to. But his feet were freezing from walking out in the cold. So he told the man, "I want your boots."

The man took them off and gave them to Jasper. Jasper put them on, left his own shoes for the man, and continued walking down the cold alley. He didn't feel like being a ghost anymore.

From a workshop about ???? (I'm not sure), Glendale, CA, June 2011. - Ned

"An Unusual Lunch" by Estefania Zavala

The screeches woke her up as they did every morning. They were screams of purest fear and abject terror. Her little brother, Henry, was having a tough time adjusting to kindergarten.

She scurried out of bed, hoping against hope that a bowl of Honey Nut Cheerios swimming with orange juice (his favorite) would quiet him down. For once, the endeavor was successful and she helped her harried mother mangle him into a car seat.

She arrived at school early, tripping on the bike rack -- as she always did. The cut on her knee re-opened and she cursed/limped all the way to the office where she obtained a band-aid that was very grudgingly given.

She thought about the stinginess of the office aides and composed cutting speeches aimed at them for the rest of the morning.

For lunch, she chose the same kind of grilled cheese sandwich as always and thought the same kind of thoughts as always: she considered dyeing her hair; she dismissed the idea.

There was a silence within the cafeteria. The lull caused her to look up.

It was the most bizarre thing she had ever seen. It was some sort of a man, as near as she could tell. He was walking on his hind legs, at least. He appeared to have the head of a cat -- and the body of a bear. But he was a soft shade of purple. He had two giant black discs for eyes and no other facial features.

As extraordinary as this creature, however, was what he cradled in his giant lavender arms. Her little brother, Henry.

"Hello, Natalie," said her brother with imperial coolness not usually displayed by five-year-olds.

"Hello," she replied faintly.

"Please inform Mother that I won't be home for dinner tonight," he said. Natalie wondered where his lisp had gone. "I won't be home for quite some time, in fact. I enjoy your company and Honey Nut Cheerios but I have found the indignities of kindergarten too foul to suffer."

She nodded -- as though this was the sort of thing her brother said all the time. The monster's black discs glittered curiously.

"Well, I'm afraid Mr. Garrison and I must be leaving," Henry said. She realized "Mr. Garrison" was the monster clutching him. With a swift command from her brother, he began to lumber out of the cafeteria.

Her brother turned back to see all the panicking people and sent her a look of utmost pity. "I'll come back for you when I can," he said.

"Wanted"

by Molly Buffington

The town was just like every other in the West: tumbleweeds, a saloon with a couple drunks staggering around a barmaid, a poorly guarded bank, horses, a sheriff nailing "Wanted" signs to a board, women in bonnets buying groceries... the works. None of them saw what the man surveying the town did.

Women turned their heads and batted their eyelashes at him. He seemed to walk aimlessly, just a clean-cut cowhand, still retaining some youth, with swaying light red hair and icy blue eyes. The sheriff nodded his head to him.

"Howdy, stranger."

The man, a little surprised, tipped his stetson. "Howdy."

He tried to walk on but the sheriff, an older man with gristle-y, grey-tinged hair, grabbed his arm and pulled him back.

"You new to the Lone Star State?"

"Yes sir," the man lied.

"I'm Lawrence, local law enforcement."

"Joseph Robertson, sir. Here on business with my family's farm. Be gone in a few days."

That seemed to satisfy the sheriff. "Enjoy your stay, son," he said, smacking Joseph a little too hard on the back as he walked on.

Joseph wiped his brow. There was no way this Lawrence could have seen through him. No, it just wasn't possible. He continued walking and reached the board with the "Wanted" signs.

"Fast Jack," a man in his mid-40s with jet black hair and a gold tooth. Wanted for battery and defying law enforcement, $50 reward.

"Quick-Draw Stevens," white-blond with a crooked nose, train robbery and horse thieving. $150 reward.

And how could he not notice? "Billy The Kid," a cocky choice for an alias, brown-haired, baby-faced, wanted from the Grand Canyon to the Mississippi for everything from cattle rustling to armed robbery to murder. $500 reward, dead or alive.

Joseph's eyes grew wide at the last charge. "I didn't commit murder," he mumbled.

The town looked like a good enough place to settle down. He had money, freedom, power. A great deal of power. He would always have that.

He looked behind his shoulder to see if anyone spotted him staring at the posters and then shook off the fear, swaggering over to the saloon. He subconsciously checked his gun: still there, still loaded. He pushed the door and glanced around. Friendly barmaid, a few poker games, several ladies dolled up for business. He nodded to himself. He liked it here.

He sat at the bar and stared at himself in the mirror. Over his ear, a tuft of his hair was brown instead of red. How had he missed that? He concentrated, digging deep into his guts and willing himself to change. Shifting was never easy, always painful. Anyone passing by would think he had terrible indigestion. It took a good 30 seconds of focusing and chanting under his breath. But when he looked up his hair was all red, his eyes were all blue, and he looked nothing like the man in the poster.

"The Dried Tomato"

Vaqueros in Brooklyn, NY

by Angela Pailevanian

Six in the morning, Ruben woke up for his shift at The Dried Tomato, a sandwich shop in the Lower East Side. Ate breakfast, brushed his teeth, put on the weird-looking hat, and off he went to ride the subway to work.

"Ruben, you're late!" Alice said. She was like the veteran of the place. Eighty years old and still working. With at least 20 grandchildren.

Ruben apologized and ran into the back to get his apron. Conversation continued amongst the workers.

"Hey Riley! Have you caught the kid that threw a baseball through your window?"

"No! I can't even fix it, I'm two months behind on rent. I swear that kid's gonna get a beating when I find out who it is!"

It was noon. People were pouring in. The orders were accumultaing quickly.

"I want a turkey bacon sandwich, hold the mayo."

"I want a chicken sandwich on wheat bread, and fries on the side."

"I want a large coke, with a bacon sandwich, no tomatoes though."

Around 2pm, a boy walked in. He had on a Led Zeppelin shirt. Green eyes. Dark skin. Looked like he was ready to kill somebody.

"Welcome, what do you want to eat?" Ruben asked.

"You want to know what I want? I want to know why my father left. But you can't tell me that, can you? Nobody can. Not even my momma. Now she's three months behind rent, he aint paying a dime and we're gonna get evicted."

"Oh. Well I'm--"

"You have any idea what it's like to grow up without a dad? Watchin' my momma struggle every day, not comign home. She's got five kids. Six including me. I'm the youngest."

"How long has he been gone?" Ruben asked.

"Oh, he was gone before I was even born. Momma said she met him at a bar out in Buswick years ago."

"What's your momma's name, son?"

"Ayleen."

Could it be? The Ayleen he met in Vaqueros 15 years ago? The boy had Ruben's eyes, Ruben's nose, Ruben's slick straight hair. But she never told him anything, never called him. They broke up just as soon as they had gotten together.

Ruben stayed silent for a moment. Then he said: "Man, if I found my father now, he gon' wish he never left my momma."

Ruben shook his head and tried to stay focused on the food: "What do you want to eat, son?"

"Chick Chick"

by Oscar Guerrero

I ate some questionable fried chicken from a questionable restaurant, in a questionable street in a questionable area east of LAX. My uncle is a steward at the airport, or something along those lines, so we picked him up from Terminal 20. He greeted us with a "Look how big you've gotten?" and a "Did you lose weight?" and the question we were all waiting for, "Are you hunrgy?"

He stuffed us in the car, took the wheel, and jammed his foot on the pedal until we were going 40 in a 15. "I know a place!"

Before we knew it, it was past nine and we had driven for two hours. "I think we missed it. It was supposed to me fifteen minutes from the airport." We gazed at him but bit our tongues, as we couldn't refuse his hospitality for offering to pay.

Then we spied a place: "Chicky Chicky," with bright flickering neon lights that, as Simon & Garfunkel put it, "split the night."

The menu varied from fried chicked to spicy fried chicken. Everyone ordered the spicy fried chicken but I, being the weakest of stomach of the family, couldn't help but be weak and submissive so as to stand out and get the chicken that was lacking in the spicy area.

So the cashier, this plump Hispanic woman with a Jennifer Aniston haircut and too many rings to count, followed our commands. In a matter of seconds, the food was ready. We had drinks, the chicken of spicy and non-spicy variety, and a little container overflowing with ranch sauce.

I ever-so-cautiously clenched my teeth on the ever-so-salty chicken. I chewed slowly. Save for a few bones it wasn't bad. The feast had officially begun, as everyone was grabbing for a leg, or a nugget, or a wing, and chewing, and savoring, and swallowing, and gulping, and of course digesting.

We finished the meal, payed a surprisingly large bill, and got in the car to say, "This wasn't so bad."

My dad drove tmie, going 25mph under the speed limit. But even at that speed, I felt a pressure in the center of my torso, building up, slowly, but surely.

Then there was rumbling, and sweating, and the next thing I knew, my mouth was erupting white chunks of legs, nuggets, wings and other body parts of the fowl type.

And it was everywhere.

My shoes, my jeans, my Revolver shirt (which I had so carefully and lovingly preserved), and even my mother's dress (which she had carefully and lovingly preserved)... Not to mention two car seats, a bit of the window, and even some of the steering wheel.

Everyone gave me the stare they had previously given my uncle, but they bit their tongues, and kept driving, and driving and driving, and just ignoring the smell.

"Chapter 1—I am Born"

by Cassy Sarnell

Jennifer Louise Boyle was born on September 27, 1992. She had stunning blue eyes and little ringlet curls. Her mother, Karen Celia Boyle, had been at the hospital for 6 hours, counting the hour of doctors sticking needles in her to numb the pain. Her father, Matthew Louis Boyle, didn’t see either the mother or the child for exactly 24 hours after the baby’s birth, at which point he exclaimed, “Well thank god all the right parts are in all the right places,” which I resent.

It never occurred to a young Jennifer that there was anything wrong with her. She was not especially “girly,” but not especially “tomboyish,” a term I resent.

The first clue she had that she was less-than-perfect was while watching Motocrossed with her now-ex-best friend. She was sitting there, watching, when I spoke up for the first time.

“I want to marry her.”

Jennifer, not one to keep anything to herself, shared this with her now-ex-best friend: “I want to marry her.”

“Ew. Are you gay?”

Neither of us knew what the term meant, so Jennifer looked it up.

“I’m straight,” I told her.

“I know… Are you my imaginary friend?”

“No.”

“Are you… me?”

“Yes.”

“What’s your name?”

“What?”

“Well, I thought I was Jennifer. But you’re me. So whatever your name is is also my name.”

I thought about it. “James. I’m James.”

I was born 8 years later, on June 15, 2008. James Louis Boyle. I had hair cut too short to form ringlets, and dreary blue eyes. My mother, Karen Celia Boyle, wouldn’t look at me. My father, Matthew Louis Boyle, wavered between joking that now he had the son he’d always wanted, and staring at me with a look that said, "How did this get so wrong? How did you get so wrong?”

"Thumbs Down, Bro"

by Christina McCarthy



The line went on for hours. Hundreds of children lined up side by side as their skin boiled from the summer sun.

Anthony was getting anxious as they approached the top of the mount. Super Speed. The most outrageous water slide in the state of Arizona. It took you down faster than any loopy slide in the park, with the sharpest turns and steepest drops.

"Hey, Chubbs, relax," Greg said to Anthony.

"I can't help it; we've been waiting all week for this, and it's so hot I want to be in the pool already," Anthony said.

"I am actually a bit nervous about it."

"Why? You're retarded. It's going to be sick."

"Well, hate to be the one to share this with you, but I am quite a bit more aerodynamic than you," said Greg. Anthony rolled his eyes and moved ahead in line.

Greg continued, "Maybe I will just wait until you go and when you land in the water you can give me a thumbs up or down so I can decide if I want to go through with it."

"Yeah, okay, whatever you want."

Before long, Anthony was next up. Greg gave him a quick reminder to give him a signal before Anthony jumped into the tube slide head-first. Greg took a few moments to look around. He hadn't realized how high up he was. The view unnerved him.

"Holy shit!" he heard a girl scream from below. He leaned over the rail to see the pool filling with blood and he went into panic mode. He ran down the metal spiral staircase past the crowded line feeling nauseous from the speed and fear. His heart was beating in his throat and he thought he was going to puke. Ever since he was little he was known to be a nervous vomiter.

When he finally go to the pool, Anthony had been taken out but there was a crowd around him filled with panic. He must have hit his head on the bottom. The paramedics tended to him and Greg couldn't see his body. The entire water park seemed to freeze around the scene. Once you drowned out the shaky voices crying for help, the park was silent.

The seconds seemed like hours. A voice yelled out, "He's breathing!" Then there was a loud splash in the bloody pool. Greg looked over to see... Anthony, naked, bringing his head out from under the red pool water.

"What the fuck!" Anthony yelled. "First my trunks get stuck on base bolt in a turn, now the water is like toxic?"

Anthony climbed out of the pool, reaching for a towel, as Greg's stomach turned in shock at the red and relief at his friend. Anthony wrapped the towel around himself.

"Thumbs down bro, all the way."

"The Skirt Incident"

by Alana Mohamed

It was morning-ish. I say morning-ish because the things you'd usually connect to morning -- sun, people, bumper-to-bumper traffic -- weren't present at 6am on the BQE. Dad had a meeting and was dropping me off to school a bit early. Three hours of wandering around Brooklyn wouldn't be that bad. The half-dead Toyota Camry warmth was all I could ask for this monring.

Then the car stopped.

It stopped nowhere near my school. We were at the corner of Dekalb Avenue and some street that definitely was not anywhere near my school. I looked at my father. He looked at me. He clicked the door unlocked.

"I'm late for work."

"Uh... okay."

"Just head to school yourself; I'll see you at home tonight."

And out the car I went in my skirt and boots and leather jacket. It was a cute outfit, but it wasn't hiking-through-Brooklyn approved. I had barely made it a block before fantasizing about the school's gym sweatpants. They were large, unflattering, unsightly, and very warm. By the seventh block I had been followed by a man in a van who insisted that the back of said van was the safest place in the world -- and another on foot who thought it was perfectly acceptable to stroke my leg.

Ten blocks later I decided I deserved breakfast. That part was okay. Rejuvenated, I strolled outside and took my time getting to school. I had all the time in the world.

I got to school and swiped in my ID card, but then --

"Young lady!"

The scratchy smoker's voice pierced the lazy quiet of the school lobby. I knew that "young lady." It's the "young lady" you get when a teacher decides she doens't like your attire for the day. Don't turn around just keep walking --

"Excuse me!"

I turned around. I smiled. My skirt fell just above my knees, perfectly acceptable. There's nothing she can do to me, I thought. Oh, how naive I was.

"You," the teacher spat. "Your ass is practically hanging out of that skirt. Dean's office now."

* * *

And so I found myself victim to another teacher's PMS, sitting in the dean's office, being told I'd need to trade in my brand new shiny iPhone for a pair of those aforementioned sweatpants. They no longer looked appealing though. They looked about 10 years old, smelled of mothballs, and probably had some elderly love juices sprayed on them.

I refused. They yelled; I yelled; they yelled some more. "Could I just pull the skirt down at little so it covers my knees?!" I'm not sure how sane I would seem if I had to explain to them my whole hike to Brooklyn Technical High School, how my father had abandoned me on the street. I pulled down my skirt to shor Mr. Dean and Ms. Teacher. More outrage. More yelling. What was said wasn't quite impertinent, because most of it was unintelligible. I'm not sure if they understood it. They were very excited and excitable.

Because of this "skirt incident" as it's come to be known among a close circle of friends and now you, I spent a good hour and forty-three minutes in the dean's office, waiting for my mother to pick me up from school.

I feel a bit wimpy that my first altercation with school officials was over a skirt -- and not something as ridiculously bad as, like, drugs or sex or injuring someone, But it's a start.

"The Great Four Guardians"

by Christopher K.

[Circa 2009. End punctuation by Christopher K. -- ed. ]

Everyone thinks gods are a myth but...

They would be wrong.

When God created the World via the Big Bang Effect and the first Act of Evil took place, with Adam and Eve eating the Forbidden Fruit placed by a Fallen Angel named Lucifer who wanted all the power to himself: God created men known as Guardians.

Crafted to assist him in the defeat of Lucifer, they each carried one of the elements that made God who He was: Earth, Air, Fire, Water, Light, Darkness, Chaos, Twilight, Balance, Nature, Existence, Cosmos, and Ultima.

Each person had a mate to reproduce with so with every new child the element would pass to the kid as well. What was the point? To keep Lucifer and his minions in check and the world safe. Back to the main issue...

These four kids were children of Guardians and soon figured out they were needed to carry on their father's work: Zane Eison Hatake of Fire, Blaze Eison Hatake of Fire, Alister Rizon of Light, and Getsu Fuhuma of Existence.

These four would one day be known as The Great Four. In 1583 they discovered that they each had a symbolic relationship with one another. The great war in Japan in the early Edo period took place in the year 1611 and ended in 1614.

The Great Four fought in that war to prevent an evil Warlord named Kazwki Ino-moto and his 10,000 troops from taking over Kyoto. The Great Four only had 500 in total to help the cause. Even though outnumbered severely.... They still had their powers which they mastered but unfortunatly the Warlord also had a gift. Power of Darkness he had.

The result? Total destruction... of the Warlord's men!!! As for the Great Four against Kaz.. A dead draw.

But legend says Guardians permanently never die.. will they return? If so, is this still a myth?! or True? you choose! end?

[300 film is released in 2007; Last Airbender film is released in 2010. -- ed.]

"Dugie's Teeth"

by Lucy Snyder

I rubbed the sleep from my eyes and reached far -- for the snooze button. I touched down to lay flat on the bed and stretched every muscle. I opened up my eyes really wide, smiled big and moved my eyebrows up and down. Finally I had the energy to swing my legs over the side of the bed and stand up.

I walked to the bathroom, examined my tired face in the mirror, and filled the sink up with cold water. I opened the cabinet door, grabbed the face wash, and squeezed the soap-smelling solution into my hand. Then, as I was applying the stuff to my face, I remembered something. I remembered yesterday afternoon.

I was lying in that uncomfortable chain covered in uncomfortable plastic. The air conditioner was blasting in an uncomfortable way. The way they kept my mouth propped open with pieces of plastic was so uncomfortable. But it was all worth it because I was going to look so good.

It had been about 16 hours since they finished. I slowly washed the scrub off my face, keeping myself in suspense. It was a Friday morning and I hadn't checked the clock. I assume I was running late. I put the tube back into the cabinet and pulled out my same old Crest "Vivid White" toothpaste --


-- that toothpaste with false claims. I had been using that toothpaste ever since that day five years ago that I had realized that my brushing habits had left my teeth a great amazing yellow color under my braces. I would look in the mirror and smile every night before I stuck the toothbrush in my mouth and think horrible things. My yellow teeth were disgusting, unattractive, horrible, gross, unattractive and repulsive.


No one said one word to me about them but I knew what they thought in their heads. At every checkup, Dr. Moskowitz would say, "These teeth are beautiful! Beautiful, Dugie!" But they weren't. Five years of whitening toothpaste and nothing was different. Until today.

I looked at that clean face in the mirror and smiled at it. My lips were still touching and my heart was beating fast. I looked down into the sink. I smiled more, more, so that my teeth could meet the air. Breathing faster and faster and faster. I looked up and I was beautiful.

I had almost expected one of those trite moments from cartoons when a rock star smiles and the audience is blinded. But no, this was much different. I was no sleazy long-haired celebrity who only wanted fame and fortune. I had a pretty face and I was a nice girl. But now I was someone new. When I parted those lips, I didn't just have a new confidence, I had the confidence of someone else. I didn't look different. I looked amazing.

I wasn't going to eat breakfast so I put the toothbrush away. I put on one of my favorite outfits and complementary makeup. I could not wait to get to school. I hated school. My best friends weren't from school; they were from the neighborhood. I did have many acquaintances at school and these were the people I guess I wanted to see. I just wanted to see people. I just wanted people to see me. "The new me."

"Elevator"

by Katie Waldron

The elevator doors opened.

"A little elaborate," Luke thought as they closed quickly behind him. Why couldn't the interview be in the lobby? Or on the tenth floor, even... It had to be on the goddamned 35th floor of the building.



He flew solo until the fifth floor. Then, a balding businessman entered the elevator, followed by three pencil-skirted women. One of the skirts glanced at the balding man and Luke's especially plump partner, the man who was accompanying him to his interview: Mike. The woman then glanced nervously at the "maximum capacity" sign.



By the 17th floor, an entire new cast of similar-looking characters had replaced the fifth-floor folk. Luke couldn't help but wonder if a couple of, ahem, robust people would meet the capacity of 700 lbs. They had to be at least 200 each.

Mike, the guy who had suggested him for the job, elbowed Luke in a "there's something witty coming" sort of way.

"You'd think they'd make the capacity bigger in the KFC headquarters, right?"



Luke forced a "ha" out. If he had to be subjected to Mike's humor for another two floors, he hoped that the elevator would drop.

It did. Pummeling fast to the ground, shaking violently with a faint burning smell in the back.

The passengers yelled various colorful unmentionables as the burning smell became more of a reek and Luke suggested everyone jump with the aid of the handrails. When he was 12 and he found out elevators weren't floating boxes, his grandmother told him, "If they drop, you can jump, that's what the bars are for."

As they careened toward the bottom, faster and faster and faster -- the screams got louder and louder and louder --



-- everyone began jumping.

His grandma lied.

Luke laid there on the bottom of the shaft, his skull reeking out of the top of his head. The elaborate doors fell and crushed the butchered remnants of the bodies. Some passerby lost his lunch when he peeked in past the "do not cross" yellow tape.



The nervous pencil-skirt walked back from a successful interview and looked down at her competition with a brief, grimy superiority. She thought: "Take the stairs if you want the job," like her grandma said.

Then she lost her lunch too.

"4:00pm Date"

by Marilyn Carlin

I call her my 4:00pm date.

It's the perfect relationship -- I'm walking my dog, she's kicking up dust on her way home from school, all shiny black pigtails of irony and scuffed Docs.

Always pigtails. Always Docs. Always that Barney-purple backpack stamped with the initials "JMR." That was as much of her name as I knew.

At first, we would just walk past each other, heads turned, eyes down, protecting our egos. But we couldn't help noticing each other -- I coughed; she sidestepped. Acknowledgments of each other's presence. Teenager speak.

After a few weeks, she started asking to pet Beauregard. Her voice was rasped, lower than the voice you'd think she would have. It fit. We got to talking about school. I started calling her Punky Brewster, you know, because of the pigtails. I mean, also because she had these giant gazoombas, for her size at least -- a lot of people don't know this, but that chick who played Punky's were so big she had to get them removed partially.

My sister Amy really liked Punky -- the real one I'm talking about, not JMR who I started calling Punky. I didn't mind watching it when I was growing up because I wanted to hang out with her; that's how it is when you're younger. Meanwhile, Punky/JMR started calling me "Mike," even though my name's not Mike. She said I looked like a "Mike."

If she were a dude I would punch her for aligning me with the name of the kid who stole my markers and my lunch money every day in elementary school, but it was okay because she was a chick, plus with her the name had a different feel. It got to the point where I would wait by the front door, leash in hand, head turned, until I saw her coming up the grass-lined suburban beige cement path. I timed it perfectly so that I wouldn't miss her. Miss our date.

The other day I saw her talking with a friend, waiting for the bus. She saw me and smiled and waved and her friend tapped her shoulder (too hard!) and squawked something about me and called her Jen. Jen. Jennifer. I needed to know if it was her real name.

* * *

So now it's 4:00pm, Bo's scratching at the door and the leash is in my hand. I don't see her so I wait. Five minutes. Ten. Twenty. Now Bo is lying down, whining, and my homework is remaining undone and I'm about to leave anyway when I catch a glimpse of shining dark pigtails and a flash of purple. She's here and everything makes sense. I clip Bo's leash on and push out the door.

I would run, but I don't want to seem to eager. Nobody likes an eager beaver. I catch up to her two houses down.

She waves, smiles, and throws a dazzlingly mundane: "Hey Mike, what's kickin'?"

The atmosphere is charged with hormonal goop.

"Hey Jen," I smile as she bends down to pet Bo, who is already nuzzling his nose into the denim at her knee.

"Jen?"

"I thought we could try real names for once. Like, 'Hi, I'm Jake Harper, and you're Jen Something-or-Other--'"

"Jen isn't my name."

I stare down at the hand I've extended, in mock jest, ready to shake just like I'd been taught in the "Professionalism in the Workplace" seminar my mom had made me go to when I got my first job at Subway.

"But the initials on your backpack, you know, 'JMR?' It fits."

She stares at me, squinting at the sun. She suddenly looks very tiny, like she's going to break.

"JMR: 'Joseph Mitchell Ryan.'"

I mull it over -- I mean, I've heard of gender-androgyny but this is kind of ridiculous.

"Your name is Joseph?"

"He was my brother. He was killed. Car accident. It was three years ago. Some asshole driver plowed into the side of my mom's minivan going ninety-five in a thirty-five."

She stars crying. I don't know what to do. Punky Brewster never cried.

"We walked away with cuts and bruises. He died on impact."

She's inches away from me. I can smell her strawberry lip-gloss and shampoo and all I can think about is the awkwardness radiating off of me in big, Barney-colored waves. I put my hand on her shoulder.

We stand like that for a few seconds. I whisper an apology, knowing it changes nothing but hoping that it'll make everything better anyway. Like my "sorry," my words, will un-kill her brother and un-drunk the driver like a magic trick.

"I'll see you tomorrow?" I try.

She hedges: "Yeah, yeah, oh, definitely, yeah."

"Same time same place?"

She half-nods and walks away. My 4:00pm date, over.

"Hey, wait!" I call out. "If it's not Jen, what is your name?"

"Punky Brewster," she smirks, tossing a pigtail over her shoulder.

"Alright, Punky. Cool!" I yell, my attempt to save face failing.

Punky freaking Brewster. What have I gotten myself into?

"Ridiculous Hero Journeys"

by Julia Rittenberg

Sam crinkled her nose as they walked.

"I still don't see why you like butterscotch."

"Come on, Sammie, I never say anything about that Zac Efron you love so much," chided Dave.

"Shut up! I dont even like his movies. Just him. I can just tell that he's a good person."

"Whatever you say, vanilla-eater."

"That's not even an insult."

"It could be."

They sat down at their curb. After a few minutes, an obnoxious SUV drove up. "Say hi to your boyfriend. I won't mind," assured Dave.

Sam hurried to her young love; Dave noticed a slight limp. He stored it for later.

When Sam returned, aglow with teenage hormones, he had decided on his opening question.

"So what is the redeeming qualify of the latest model?"

"He likes that I wear the same pants everyday. American Eagle is also his favorite store."

"What a winner."

"I will disregad the sarcasm and instead agree with you."

"Has he made you conservative, or something? Where the hell did you get that sweater?" Dave pulled at the neckline and saw a flash of discolored shoulder.

Sam pulled it up quickly, hoping to bypass the possible revelation. "I borrowed it from Mom. I didn't want to get cold."

"Why are you bruised?" The normal laughter in Dave's voice was replaced with concern. "Your skin is tougher than Mom's oatmeal cookies. What happened?"

"Nothing. Matthew's dog is a little too friendly sometimes. He jumped on me kind of violently."

"You're such a liar. There's no dog."

"Yes there is!"

"There might be, but it's not the dog."

"Yes it was."

He poked her shoulder. Sam winced. "Right. A dog did that. It was Matthew, wasn't it? Did that bastard rape you?"

Sam knew the look in her brother's eyes. If she didn't tell him the truth, Dave would concoct one of his ridiculous hero journeys.

"I'll tell you! Just don't interrupt. She braced herself. Why hadn't she called the police? Or told their parents?

"On our date last week, Matthew took me to the park where we first met to be romantic. It was really cute, don't you think?"

Dave looked furious.

"Moving on. Some guys came up and tried to mug us. When they found we had no money, they were all like, 'Oh, we'll just get our money's worth some other way,' looking me up and down all creepy-like. I guess instinct took over or something when they tried to grab me, because I totally freaked and beat the crap out of them. Obviously, one cannot leave battle without some scars, so I have a shoulder bruise and my foot hurts, so I'm limping."

They sat in silence.

"Are you mad?"

"I can't say I'm not a little incredulous, but awesome job! I'm really proud of you. Mom and Dad would be too."

"You don't think it was stupid?"

"Of course it was, but you held your own and came out great. This also makes me think better of Matthew. He's not intimidated by your bad-assery?"

"No. He said it was an excellent fight." She sighed. "I think I'll tell Mom and Dad tonight."

"Great. We'll put on some Sinatra to calm 'em down, and they'll be telling this at cocktail parties withing a month."

They got up from the curb and started walking.

Sam crinkled her nose. "I hate Sinatra."

"I love him. Tolerate it." He bumped her shoulder.

"Ouch!" she complained. "I may have skin as tough as bricks, but I am a dainty child."

"I said Mom's oatmeal cookies."

"Same thing, really."

"The Tool Shed"

by Lauren Garrett-Joly

Dad creeps slowly down the steps into our basement workshop, one of his and my favorite places to spend our time. This is where we can fully embrace our "manly man-ness" together. To prove it, Dad is wearing overalls, Timberlands, and has quite a bit of overgrown stubble on his chin that he has purposely chosen to ignore this Saturday morning.

Dad is an obvious country man at heart, though he chose to stop speaking like one since he met my mother. Growing up in New Jersey, he always naturally kept up that tuff-gruff, I'm-a-man persona. The beard thing was a part of this, of course, but he told me he really kept it up to look like Bruce Springsteen.

"So Dad, what exactly are we building today?" I ask as he makes his way down our rickety basement stairs. He grunts, ignoring my question as he acknowledges our surroundings. Our basement, unlike most, is not caked in cobwebs, dust and soot, but instead is generally pretty clean. You can even see the burgundy color of the wooden steps, which until I attended my friend Jimmy's bar-mitzvah (yes--in his basement), I didn't realize was an enviable feat.

But Dad isn't grunting at the shine of the wood, he's grunting at the very unorganized set of tools we've been collecting down here (since I was 7, which then I could only look at, not touch). I had always figured Dad appreciated this, being that this was the only quadrant of the house that wasn't constantly kept tidy. (We do live with 4 females after all.) So I took pride in the disheveled look of our tools and I thought Dad did as well. Apparently not.

"Could we not actually build anything today dad, and maybe just break things apart?" I ask.

I laugh quietly to myself at how impulsively destructive that idea sounds-0but we're initiating our inner man here, so why not?

"I've been really frustrated recently, Dad; mainly since I'm pretty sure I bombed all my finals. So I figured that would be a fun way to let off some steam, you know?"

Silence from Dad. He just kinda sways from his right to left foot, blankly staring into space, and barely listening to anything I say. I sigh. This, for some non-apparent reason, does catch his attention.

"You know, sport, why don't we just skip woodworking today? I'm just pretty worn out from the week, alright?"

"Uh, yeah, no problem, Dad," I reply, with a purposefully good amount of disappointment in my voice. He doesn't seem to notice this either as he walks back up the stairs, leaving our fortress of manly bonding behind. He must have other things on his mind.

* * *

The next morning, our normal pancakes-for-Sunday-breakfast routine doesn't commence. Instead we (being my 3 sisters and I) are brought to the living room, with Mom and Dad sitting on the couch across from us.

Mom hesitates at first, but finally sighs and announces: "So, your father and I are getting a divorce."

I look over at my 3 younger sisters, hoping they don't burst into tears, because if they do, I definitely will. But they simply look confused, their blue eyes deep pools of unhappy surprise.

I stare angrily at Dad especially. I don't blame Mom for this; she's not the man of the family. But apparently neither is he.

"How, why, how could you do this? Why are you splitting our special little almost perfect family apart!?"

"Hey now, Michael, don't you dare go blaming this whole thing on me. This was all your mothers do-" Dad turns to my sisters, saying in a kinder tone of voice: "I mean, a decision made equally by both you mother and I."

"Oh now that's a load of bull!" I shout, angrily arising from the couch. "Last time I checked, divorce isn't the manly thing to do, Dad!"

"What is all this man talk about, son? What, are you trying to prove something to me? Look, if you're gay, you're gay. It doesn't make you any less of a man. I mean-"

Mom cuts in: "What? Michael, why didn't you tell me?"

"What, no, what are you talking about!? I'm not gay, alright? What are you, like trying to sway the accusations away from yourself now Dad?. 'Cause its not going to work. God."

I sit back down on the couch and let my hands sink into my waiting palms. I begin to feel the urge to grab a saw from the basement and carefully cut my heart out with it, but of course I don't because Dad would say: "Now son, thats no way to use a tool."

And I would reply "No Dad, your right. Instead you used it to slice apart your relationship with the mother of your children. Way to be a manly man."

"Untitled 2010"

by Silvan Carson Goodman

Fire leaps from one chair to the next. Rapidly devouring the last memories of checkerboard upholstery. The flames hungrily lick at the ceiling, and I can't think about anything except what's down the hallway. I run, slamming through a door with my shoulder. I run down the hallways faster than when me and him were young, and I would let him win the races.

I kick his door open and I am blasted in the face with a billowing cloud of smoke. I can hear his wheezing, raspy breaths.

"Mike!" I shout. No response. I run to his bed; it's empty. He is on the ground; he was trying to crawl to his wheelchair.

I hoist him into my arms and lurch out of the room. Flashes of doors and fire and smoke go by my eyes. I don't register any of it until I am out on the lawn.

I can't hear or see the flashing chaos around me; I can only see his face. I place the soot-covered hunk of flesh gently in the grass.

He doesn't move. I touch his hair. He doesn't make a sound. I grab his shirt and I shake him. He doesn't breathe... or cough... or do anything. My tears fall on his damned useless legs that finally finished the job.

* * *

"Tech Support"

by Grace Rittenberg

"...In the auditorium, Mr. Jobs stood onstage in that powerful stance of his..."

"Damn it."

I hit and cursed my work computer. Violence toward technology didn't help, of course, but it made me feel a lot better.

"What's wrong?" Nick asked.

"It's still not really working."

"Did you call the tech person?"

"Yeah, I don't know where he is." Secretly I believed that the tech person was late so he could pretend he was busy.

"Well," Nick said, "he is pretty busy."

***

Nick is one of those Steve-Jobs-worshipping Apple employees. I took this job because there wasn't anything else I could do -- and it pays well. You can make more money at Apple than anywhere else since Bill Gates died.

"You called?" said a male voice. Oh, great.

"Yeah, I'm having some problems with -- "

"Move!" he cut me off. The tech guy was thin and he instantly annoyed me. "Now, what are you having problems with?"

"Well, I don't know what printer to send this to, and I keep having to restart it because it freezes when I open Safari."

He let out an exasperated breath. "You're not supposed to use Safari."

"Then why is it there?"

"The printer on this floor is Z52720-Second-Floor. I don't know why your colleagues -- " he glared at Nick " -- didn't tell you. Please, only call me for important things."

This job has taught me one thing -- I hate tech people.

"Auditorium now, auditorium now," said a voice over the speaker system. "Director Jobs has an announcement. Auditorium now."

"If it's another new iPod, I'm going to be gutted, because I just got the new one," Nick said.


***
In the auditorium, Mr. Jobs stood onstage in that powerful stance of his.

When everybody sat down, he held something up and said, "This, everyone, is the first ever iPod!"

It was something we'd all seen before. It was pretty ancient -- only about 2 gigs, no touch screen, and it was huge.

"And these," he continued, "are all the iPods ever!"

He clicked his fingers and a curtain came down, uncovering a wall of iPods.

"I have called you all here today to tell you the news. Drum roll, please!"

He clicked his fingers again, and a drum roll started.

"Apple is the most powerful, influential, expensive and profitable company in the world!"

Everyone applauded. I joined in, because I'm pretty sure it was mandatory. But it made me wonder -- what would people ever do without technology? It could all crash in a second.

"And that is why!" Jobs said, "We are now entering... phase two."

The lights dimmed. A spotlight under his face turned on and lengthened his features. And then things started getting very evil...

"Morning News"

by Katie Waldron

Of course I had no idea. Plenty of people sit like that in this heat. Swinging your legs makes you slightly less hot, and any little bit is good… Her leg swinging did get faster and faster, but all I thought was: ‘Man, that girl has really fast legs.’"

I couldn’t see her whole face, but she was pretty--even from the side. I stared at her on the bench while everyone else stared at the empty train tracks.

A forced, comforting voice said, "The next--F--train has been delayed due to traffic ahead of us. Please be patient."

A voice in my head said, “Forget that message. You don't have much time. Talk to her."

After that, things got a little unruly and perverse in my brain and groin. I hate summer, but I like the look of it, and she wasn’t wearing much. I slid over to her so we could be on the same car at least.

Some suit looked at his watch. One would think the voice in my head telling me to talk would let me speak!

I plugged myself into some distracting music next to her and decided to look for the train, since I wouldn’t be able to hear it. It was the longest I’ve ever waited for a train.

When it finally came, she leaped up, rushed to the tracks, and jumped in front of it.


* * *

Later on, an MTA worker asked me, "Did you try to help?"

“No! I didn't even see her move! Then I looked, and…”

“Thank you for your assistance.”

I did have an instant with her, though. She did glance at me when I put my headphones in. And she was pretty. I wish I could say I saw the “light leave her eyes."

But she was alive, and then she wasn’t. She just became something else. They’d have to clean off the tracks.

Another woman, an old one who was trying to show that she was wise, said, “You’ll hear a follow up on the news.”

She was right. She was on the next morning.

It was the longest I’ve ever waited for the news.

"The Trees"

by Epifania Rita Gallina

That morning I woke up after a terrible nightmare, probably the worst nightmare I had ever had in my life.

In the nightmare there were trees around me, but they weren't normal big and green trees, they were terrifying, horrible trees that looked like they wanted to kill me.

You might ask, "How can trees kill you? They don't move!" But these trees had come to life and were chasing after me, until I fell into a big hole and died.

The moment I woke up, I felt like everything I had experienced throughout the nightmare was actually going to happen to me.

I felt my blood pressure rise and my heart fill with anxiety as I looked at my mirror, placed next to my head, and noticed the oddly pale color of my face.

I surely did look like a dead person, but thankfully I was still there, in my small, unspecial room, surrounded my silly belongings.

After I dressed, I came downstairs to the kitchen and saw my parents, who were usually drinking their coffee at that time, waiting for me in the living room, on the couch.

I faked a smile as I walked over to them, trying hard not to think about the trees, and sat next to them.

My mom, who was always readiant and beautiful, looked worried and fragile, and my dad looked like someone had totally offended him. He sat there in a state of shock with his eyes wide open.

As I sat next to them, they took synchronized deep breaths.

Then I saw them again. The trees. I saw them in my head as my parents faced me and started their conversations.

First, they asked me how I had slept, and I lied about that, and then they seemed to gather some fake courage to tell me the worst thing they could.

"Your blood test came back yesterday," my mother said. "There's something wrong."

My dad started crying. "You have lukemia," he said.

My mom turned to him and burst into tears with him.

But no one could have felt like I did. My heart raced worse than it had in any dream. Faster than a train. My head began to pound and my insides fell in on themselves. I was really going to die.

"Song"

by Jessie Baum

The playground was covered in children, all cutesy clothes that would have been tacky on anyone else but were unbearably adorable on tiny people on monkey bars. To the mothers (and occasionally fathers) that lived near 9th Street, the playground was a place to let their children off of their little leashes and chat with friends. Only one man didn't know anyone else at the 9th Street Playground. The dirty man lying on the bench.

He was technically breaking rule #45-A of Parks Service Public Conduct (“only guardians and their children may enter”) but he didn't care and the police weren't about to bother him. They weren't eager to encounter him again.

The parents, for the most part, ignored him, though occasionally they'd snatch their children away from his radius. He was tired, and wanted to sleep, but as soon as he drifted off, a child's shriek would rouse him. He was about to slouch off when a little girl, thin with slip-on-shoes and droopy socks, danced up to him.

“Are you his daddy?” She pointed at a little boy trying to do the monkey rings.

“Go away, kid.”

“'Cause he says he don't got a daddy and I said everyone has one and that's when I saw you, and you look like him.”

He squinted at the boy. He did look like him.

“What's your name, kid?”

“Song.”

“Song, if that's your real name, I don't got a son, okay? So leave me alone.”

She cocked her head. She actually looked a bit like a bird, with bright dark eyes and dark hair. He closed his eyes and prayed Caroline wasn't the child's mother.

“Why?”

“Why what? Go.”

“Why should I go?”

“Cause I don't like kids.” He did his best fierce homeless-guy face.

“Why? You were a kid too, right? And why don't Oliver got a daddy?”

“I don't know. Someone's not a daddy unless they're in a family.”

So I can't be the kid's father, he added silently.

“Why is your voice so scratchy?”

“'Cause I used to smoke. Don't smoke.”

“My mommy smokes. But I love her. She showed me how to cartwheel. Look!”

Song stepped back and ran a little and gave a jump, but tripped and skinned her knee.

“Oh no! Hey! You okay kid?!”

“Yeah.” She smiled bravely.

He smiled.

“Song!” A woman called form across the playground.

“I gotta go.” She looked at him almost wistfully.

“I'm here all the time,” he called to her as she skipped away.

"Dark, Lugubrious..."

by Silvan Carson-Goodman

"Embarrassment is a superfluous emotion. Given the choice, I would do without it. It's like fear in that respect, which is interesting considering that fear most often shows up when tied to embarrassment. Either through fear of shame or shame of fear."

The slightly round man sat down and after hearing his inspiring words I knew that I was in the right place.

I didn't want to be in the right place.

Being in the right place filled me with dark lugubrious shame. All these people looking at me, judging me with their distasteful eyes. Just by my being here they all knew what was wrong with me. Regardless of the fact that they were here for the same reason, deep down they knew that I was worse than them.

I am a lower being, something to be spit upon. Oh it all just made me feel so awful.

The slightly rounder man sitting next to the slightly round man looked at me and said:

"Harvey, would you like to share with the group?"

I reluctantly stood and said, "Hi, my name is Harvey and I'm a shameaholic."