FLIGHT — JILLIAN MERRIFIELD

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I take my wine out onto the terrace. The boyfriend sits there, next to the leering telescope. “It’s so quiet,” I say. “Where are all the birds?”
             The boyfriend turns to look at me. “They’re up there.  Just…way up there.”
             “Where?” I say. “Why can’t I hear them?”
             “Way up there. Since the sky fell, there’s nothing to hold them down by the world.” He smiles. “They’ve just been drifting higher and higher all day.”
             Mr. Beakers takes up a song in his cage by the chair. His song is loud in the darkness. “You couldn’t send him with?” I ask. I notice that there’s a feather on the eyepiece of the telescope.
             “Just think, that’s what every other sad sap with a bird is doing right now. ‘Be free! Go join your friends!’ And their birds are going up.” He smiles. “Pretty soon, Beakers will be the only bird left on earth.” There’s a pinion feather between his fingers.
             I don’t mention penguins and cassowaries. I look into the tall steel cage. I notice that there are feathers in the cage. There are feathers on the ground. Without his emerald robe, Mr. Beakers looks disgusting. He flaps his wings at me.

Jillian Merrifield has an MA in Writing and Publishing from DePaul University and is currently pursuing her PhD in English Studies at Illinois State University. Her work has previously appeared in Curbside Splendor, Midwestern Gothic, Eclectica and NEAT.

FITTING — MARVIN SHACKELFORD

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Jay wanted to know if I thought he was the right fit for Abby. I guess because I’d known her longer. I’d known Abby since fourth grade or so. I still have a picture she drew of a castle, some mountains, pine tree, and two very happy-looking pigs. She tried to show me how to draw those pigs, once, all sorts of animals. Abby saw the shapes of bodies and knew how they joined together to make a whole. I never could catch on to it.
             Jay was also a Junior. He’d been a JJ and just J for a while right out of high school. Never went on a date with a girl more than twice. Then his dad left his mom and moved to New Jersey, and he was just Jay again. Those were awful long roads for him to travel. I thought of Jay shooting pool in the community college’s rec room. I’d seen him fistfight a guy who stole the 8 ball one day to make a knob for the gearshift of his pickup. Jay fought and had been through women, guess sums it up. We didn’t have conversations about fitting.
             We had driven to the river, and we were drinking beer while boats turned rich and pretty out on the wide part of the water. I watched the clouds, sometimes thought I caught things in them. I started to point shapes to him, images, but then decided against it. He didn’t say anything else.
             Earlier that morning we’d stood outside the middle-school gymnasium and listened to Abby’s choir sing to old folks bussed in from churches, homes, I didn’t know where. They sang of altitude, the high and the low, and how wings picked a body up and set it down both. Abby had joined not too long ago, didn’t have a solo or anything but said she enjoyed it. I couldn’t pick her voice out, standing and smoking outside the big double doors, but Jay said he could.
             “Right there, when they all come together,” he said. “They’re pretty.”
             Yeah, they were pretty.

Marvin Shackelford is author of a poetry collection, Endless Building (Urban Farmhouse). His stories and poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Epiphany, NANO Fiction, Southern Humanities Review, Folio, FiveChapters, and elsewhere. He resides in the Texas Panhandle with his wife, Shea, and earns a living in agriculture.

A CURE FOR MY HANGOVER IS YOUR HANGOVER — SHANNON McLEOD

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At the concert I felt out of place, so I stood at the periphery and watched the audience like a movie. A girl with long red hair and glasses held herself up by clutching the sleeves of a young man, a boy really. She swayed to the electronic beat, the operatic voices. Her eyes appeared to be filled with tears, but it could have been the glare of spotlights against her glasses. Though the boy had clearly brought her here, their paths must have parted somewhere along the bar. He might have been her boyfriend. She might have only thought he was her boyfriend. The musicians onstage, sisters wearing painted mustaches, began my favorite song. I turned to the girl beside me. She was still attached to the boy and yelling, “yesss!” Her head lurched forward. The boy took a step toward the stage. The girl’s body buckled. She pulled herself up by his forearm. He bobbed his head as if there weren't a human-sized barnacle seizing beside him. She sang along, “I just want to be your housewife.” She grabbed both of his biceps and tried turning him towards her, “I’ll iron your clothes,” but he kept looking at the stage. I wanted him to love her because she felt so strongly that she needed it. She continued singing, “I’ll make your bed.” She ignored the musicians’ sad sarcasm and swapped it for melodic shouting. She was looking up to where she thought his eyes were gazing at her own. But she couldn’t make out his line of vision because of her tears. Or her glasses-glare. I imagined the next morning she might wake up alone in her own bed, and, later, beside a mug filled with coffee, or smoothie, or raw eggs, compose an email to her best friend about her boyfriend and their amazing night together.

Shannon McLeod teaches high school English in Southeast Michigan. Her writing has appeared in Hobart, NEAT, Gawker, The Billfold, Cheap Pop, and Word Riot. You can find her on twitter @OcqueocSAM or on her website at www.shannon-mcleod.com.

CIRCLE YES OR NO — LIZ BREEN

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Be my boyfriend?

Circle Yes** or No.

**There’s a few things you should know. For starters, I’m an irregular person. I have an irregular heartbeat—which isn’t really a problem most of the time—and an irregular menstrual cycle—which also isn’t a problem unless you consider thinking you’re pregnant all the time a problem. I buy a lot of pregnancy tests. The Walgreens lady knows me, probably thinks I’m a giant slut, but joke’s on her because I’ve never had sex. I was just raised Catholic so I know all about Immaculate Conception. I also have a job working at my uncle’s bait shop, which is how I pay for all the pregnancy tests. It’s pretty much selling worms to old, toothless guys, but it defies gender stereotypes, and that’s important. It’s not like I don’t shave my pits or anything; I just hate when people tell me what to do. Besides, Victoria’s Secret bras don’t fit me right because I have a broad back, so there’s no point in working there anyway. If you like fishing, I can get you a discount on bait is basically what I’m saying. Something I will never say, though, is the word ‘moist.’ And I don’t want you to say it either. Ever. Other words you can’t say around me include: kumquat, fiddle-faddle, phlegm and Halloween. I won’t tell you why you can’t say that last one until I know you a little better, but let’s just say I pretty much have PTSD when it comes to Halloween. I looked up the symptoms for PTSD online, and I have at least six-and a-half out of ten. I like the Internet, which isn’t too strange, I guess. Lots of people like the Internet. My favorite thing to do is look up different kinds of dating websites—UglyBugBall.com, STDmatch.net, AmputeeDate.com. Those are all real, by the way. I’m not a liar. I’m really honest, super duper honest. Probably because of my Catholic upbringing, which I think I already mentioned. But back to the dating sites, I like looking at them because I like knowing that there’s someone out there for everyone, even if you’re an absolute freakazoid.  Which I’m not. I’m just a little irregular. I think I already mentioned that, too. Long story short, I like that you don’t pretend to hate Shakespeare when all the other boys in Mr. Hoffacker’s class do, and I remember we had cupcakes for your birthday on May 3rd, which makes you a Taurus. I’m a Cancer. If you don’t know anything about zodiac signs, that means we’re compatible. I’m not sure I’ve listed every reason why we should date, but I think I’ve hit all the important ones. I hope you say yes, but if you say no, I’ll still give you a one-time discount at the bait shop for liking Shakespeare. It’s the one on Laurel Ave. Even if you don’t fish, it’s kind of fun to have a cup full of worms.

Liz Breen is a writer living in Boston whose work has appeared on such shows as Sesame Street, WordGirl and Phantom Gourmet and in magazines including Columbia's Catch & Release and Cleaver Magazine. She holds an MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts. You can find her online at lizbreen.com. 

ON A PARK BENCH IN BROOKLYN — TIMOTHY SCHIRMER

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Michael said, “Do you know that when you read your mouth moves.” And I said, “Yes, I know.  Other people have mentioned that I do that.”  He had just handed me his cell phone and he had asked me to read a text his boss had sent him.  He wanted to know if I thought he was going to get fired.  Michael put his hand on my shoulder and I thought he was going to say or ask something about his boss or his job, but instead he said, “You can’t read like that, it’s a sign of low intelligence.” He looked scared or embarrassed for me.  It was just us sitting on a park bench in Brooklyn.  “Says who?  Who says it’s a sign of low intelligence?” I asked.  “Trust me,” he said, “it is.”  And I said, “I think you’re going to get fired.”
             I had always read that way.  I could not not read that way.  My sister had pointed it out years ago.  She would laugh and say, “You look stupid!” and I always thought she meant silly, but now I wondered if she meant dumb.  When I tried to read without moving my mouth, it was like nothing got in, the words were like birds flying into closed windows.  Or the sentences were like sinks that didn’t have drainpipes and the water just poured through the basin and splashed onto the floor.  I told Michael I hadn’t learned how to read until the third grade.  I had had a string of bad teachers and the result was that I read slowly and I had to mouth the words, but I didn’t mind it, and it didn’t mean I was stupid.  I told him it wasn’t something that would end, and he said it was something I should work on, and I said I wouldn’t know where to start. 

Timothy Schirmer currently lives in New York City, where he sleeps through all the sunrises. His writing has recently appeared or is forthcoming in Passages North, Hobart, Crab Creek Review, Rattle, Word Riot, JMWW, FRiGG, The Monarch Review, The Adirondack Review, Rust + Moth, Bluestem, and in other fine places. He lives online at: timothyschirmer.com

CHILDHOOD — XENIA TAIGA

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Me:
five, six; frozen stiff in my chair. My heart is a beating, the eyes are big and then I'm blinded. The images burned, branded in my head. The fist. The angry face. Blood spraying from cracked lips. The torn skin, the ripped-eye socket. The skin shredding. The skin still shredding.

Me:
sitting in math class. My head empty, my stomach full of tatter tots and pink-slime chicken strips. The eyes drowsy. The classmates’ heads turning into little dots that I use to dot my papers and then those fists, that mouth, the angry face, the scream. I clasp my lips together. My muscles clench, my toes curl. Everything inside is pinching and strangling, till at the sound of the bell I release it all.

Me:
in the back yard looking at the dog. The white fluffy dog, the black and brown markings up and down his back. The silence of the hot afternoon. The dog whimpering. The adults laughing. The beating and beating till there is nothing left, but skin and some fur with mushy-red, pink stuff oozing like there is no tomorrow.

Me:
at the bank. Five ahead of us. The clock ticking. The time slipping. The anger growing and then the fists, the beatings, the ripped-eye socket, the bloody chains, the saws, the clanking and slashing. The hands tightening. The ideas. My mother looks at me, frowning. No, I wouldn’t do anything, mama. I’d just watch. I’d say it’s for fun and later ask her for a manicure, then I’ll ask dad to play paintball so we can go BAM! BOOM! You’re dead! Then I’ll tell YOU to wait because you’re next.

Xenia Taiga lives in southern China with a cockatiel and an Englishman. http://xeniataiga.com/

VACATIONS OF THE COUNTRY — JOE LUCIDO

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The neighbors have all gone.
             I can’t help but think they vacationed early because of what happened last week in the neighboring Historic District, when on that Sunday night the blood moon shone, and we were watching it rise and plump as if pumping with blood and readying Earth for a kiss. Wet branches yellowed everywhere, and we were out here, me alone but not isolated, in proximity of these neighbors, who leave their homes of the country every year to be more of the country themselves. We were barking at the blood moon, and the blood moon shone through the clouds, even, and the power lines and radio waves of the country were brimming with howls, our communicative arterial walls plaqued with our hoarding. We were making dinner and standing in our lawns, and on the other side of the streetlight, the Historic District was doing the same, except for one empty historic house, the one that flies the rebel flag, the house which was painted white and tinted red under the moon. Autumn had come, and we were full of something like awe, and then came the shattering of the windowpanes of the empty historic house.
             A girl not of this neighborhood was covered in blood. She said, This is my house.
             We said, Are you all right? Blood ran from her shoulders to her fingertips. She did not sound like anything, like the brokenhearted neighbor or his kenneled dogs. We met her eyes in which the blood moon shone as she walked around the corner of the house to try another window. Her eyes conveyed nothing. We said, Do you need help?
             She said, No. Her voice was not of any country. She turned back to the window and went through it like it was a gaseous, trans-dimensional gate, but it was not that. It was a sheet of glass in a historic house of the country, and then, dragging her blood soaked body to the couch, she clutched a yellow throw pillow and squeezed shut her eyes. She lay in the dark, her blood dappling the historic wood floor, and we stood stone still in the quiet of the country.
             The blood moon shone everywhere, even through the clouds. We called the police. The girl was taken away in an ambulance. The windows of the empty historic house were boarded up until the owners came back from their own vacation of the country, and then the girls who live across the street boarded one window of their own from the inside, then another, and maybe realized it wasn’t enough, couldn’t possibly be, and left, being there is only so much one can take and so much to take everywhere.
             The empty historic house was not the girl who bled there’s home. We do not know her name. We do not know where she is now, where she was before. We are not always where we think we are.

Joe Lucido is an MFA candidate at the University of Alabama. Some recent stories appear or are forthcoming in Passages North, Wigleaf, Booth, WhiskeyPaper, Hobart, and others. He grew up in the suburbs of St. Louis.

HAILSTONES — HANNAH HARLOW

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The hailstones, when they finally fell, looked more like the remains of an exploded ice planet, once large, decimated even more by flight and atmosphere, and now here were the comparatively tiny remains. Why did everyone always say golf balls? The hailstones came exactly when I needed to leave the house; you knew they would. You told me once you'd never seen hailstones and I reminded you of that summer when you were a baby and the hail came and destroyed our roof and the insurance company wouldn't pay for a new one because they said that's not the kind of insurance we had. We don't normally see weather like that here; how was I supposed to know what to get? I was so young and there was so little money, it’s lucky we had any insurance at all really. I moved your crib into the living room where it was too bright and you slept poorly, which meant I slept poorly, and I taught myself how to fix the roof in the nursery. It took more months than I care to say, more than nine.
             You reminded me you were just a baby, so how would you remember a thing like that? I still thought having once carried you in my womb meant we would always be able to read each other's minds.

Hannah Harlow has an MFA in fiction from the Bennington Writing Seminars. She promotes books for a living and lives near Boston.You can find her online at hannahharlow.com.