Category: Uncategorized

“Ava,” was overly comfortable to the point where I tensed. “This is a hard time. There is no power and no phones and no electricity. I understand your mistrust and my mistrust. We can sit and warm for a bit and we don’t have to talk. Truthfully, I’ve been deluding myself thinking this would get better but it may not. I have limited supplies. I hope your cat is ok and you are welcome to stay the night.”
Begin.
“To be honest, I’m nervous. I miss my friends and family and no one has checked on me. I live alone with my cat and I became frightened immediately. There were riots near me, looting. I didn’t get as much as I needed and didn’t want to go outside. I’ve been slowly freezing. It’s been hard.’
I wasn’t crying so much as allowing tears to roll down my face. I didn’t want to cry or face reality. Not like this. Not with a stranger. Abruptly, I stopped, bit my lip, waited for the mood to pass. Don’t think about your family. We stayed in silence save the flicker of wood catching, staying on fire.
“We don’t have to talk about it. I have some supplies. I can take you home in the morning. Your cat has fur, right? She will be ok. Genevieve?”
“Yes,” I sniffled. “She hides when I leave.”
I laughed a little.
“I know because when I went out the first two times, I had to find her when I got back.”
I wiped my nose afraid to speak.
“You can walk me half way. I don’t want anyone to know where I live that I don’t know. No offense.”
“Understood.”
I twirled the straw and stared at it. How many did I have at home? And how many more would it take? I felt him staring but made no move to speak. He was waiting. I was angry.
“I have a favorite game,” I said.
“Yeah,” he shifted his body so he was taller but leaning forward,  arms crossed.
We held gaze. I am unafraid of you.
“It’s called thirteen stories.”
His eyes lit up. He held back the adorable knowing I was actually an adult, capable and mortified of my display of nerves. His eyes gave it away.
“It’s a guessing game.”
“Sounds like it could pass the time.”
“You have to figure out which ending is right. That means I tell each story and at the end you tell me which one is true. BUT,” I stuck my finger in the air and smiled, inviting him to participate, “the audience asks the question I am answering. So everyone can play.”
“What do you mean?”
“So… you can ask things like how did you get here or what’s the weirdest thing about you or what’s your biggest secret or…”
“I get it,” he interrupted.
“Ok.”
“Thirteen versions?”
“Yeah.”
“Long game.”
“I’m terse.”
“I can see that.”
He actually reached up and scratched his chin.
“What happens if I guess right?”
“I tell you a secret.”
“Oh yeah? So then I wouldn’t pick that for my question.
I bit my lip. I was warming, fed, becoming too excited. Temper.
“How about you tell me the weirdest thing about you.”
“For the stories or if you guess right?”
“If I guess right, and for the stories, you tell me how you got here tonight, generally, like to this area, past patrol, survived alone, the past eight days, where your friends are. I have a feeling you are well versed in the art of tales.”
I kept looking down.
“And you’re sure you will know the difference between the two?”
“Between a truth and a lie?”
“No.”
I did look up and for a moment prayed to be giant.
“Between the weirdest thing about me and how I got here.”
He smiled.
Begin, dear sweet forlorn child.

“Ava,” was overly comfortable to the point where I tensed. “This is a hard time. There is no power and no phones and no electricity. I understand your mistrust and my mistrust. We can sit and warm for a bit and we don’t have to talk. Truthfully, I’ve been deluding myself thinking this would get better but it may not. I have limited supplies. I hope your cat is ok and you are welcome to stay the night.”
Begin.
“To be honest, I’m nervous. I miss my friends and family and no one has checked on me. I live alone with my cat and I became frightened immediately. There were riots near me, looting. I didn’t get as much as I needed and didn’t want to go outside. I’ve been slowly freezing. It’s been hard.’
I wasn’t crying so much as allowing tears to roll down my face. I didn’t want to cry or face reality. Not like this. Not with a stranger. Abruptly, I stopped, bit my lip, waited for the mood to pass. Don’t think about your family. We stayed in silence save the flicker of wood catching, staying on fire.
“We don’t have to talk about it. I have some supplies. I can take you home in the morning. Your cat has fur, right? She will be ok. Geneviece?”
“Yes,” I sniffled. “She hides when I leave.”
I laughed a little.
“I know because when I went out the first two times, I had to find her.”
I wiped my nose afraid to speak.
“You can walk me half way. I don’t want anyone to know where I live that I don’t know. No offense.”
“Understood.”
I twirled the straw and stared at it. How many did I have at home? And how many more would it take? I felt him staring but made no move to speak. He was waiting. I was angry.
“I have a favorite game,” I said.
“Yeah,” he shifted his body so he was taller but leaning forward,  arms crossed.
We held gaze. I am unafraid of you.
“It’s called thirteen stories.”
His eyes lit up. He held back the adorable knowing I was actually an adult, capable and mortified of my display of nerves. His eyes gave it away.
“It’s a guessing game.”
“Sounds like it could pass the time.”
“You have to figure out which ending is right. That means I tell each story and at the end you tell me which one is true. BUT,” I stuck my finger in the air and smiled, inviting him to participate, “the audience asks the question I am answering. So everyone can play.”
“What do you mean?”
“So… you can ask things like how did you get here or what’s the weirdest thing about you or what’s your biggest secret or…”
“I get it,” he interrupted.
“Ok.”
“Thirteen versions?”
“Yeah.”
“Long game.”
“I’m terse.”
“I can see that.”
He actually reached up and scratched his chin.
“What happens if I guess right?”
“I tell you a secret.”
“Oh yeah? So then I wouldn’t pick that for my question.
I bit my lip. I was warming, fed, becoming too excited. Temper.
“How about you tell me the weirdest thing about you.”
“For the stories or if you guess right?”
“If I guess right, and for the stories, you tell me how you got here tonight, generally, like to this area, past patrol, survived alone. I have a feeling you are well versed in the art of tales.”
I kept looking down.
“And you’re sure you will know the difference between the two?”
“Between a truth and a lie?”
“No.”
I did look up and for a moment prayed to be giant.
“Between the weirdest thing about me and how I got here.”
He smiled.
Begin, dear sweet forlorn child.

“Brevity is the soul of the witch, after all.”

–witches, sluts, feminists

“I’m dead.”

The mirror said nothing back but my face began melting slightly. This could be the weed,  I thought.

“No, this is purgatory.”

I was quite certain this was purgatory. My face slid outside of view, gray and drooping. Rearranging itself like that,  I tendentiously began my plight to prove I was in on it too. My phone sat on the dresser but soon you would hear from me and soon I would convince you of my death. My face melted like that and I watched it for minutes, ten at the least. In theory, ten minutes is nothing. Try it. Watch your face for ten minutes. In retrospect, everything is devastating. As a series of events, life is here to corrupt and kill you.

“This is purgatory,” I repeated to the mirror.

And then the laughter. It was the laughter that should have given it away.

“Yes, I am really dead.”

Prove it, Cat. Jump off the bridge, Cat.

“Yes.”

The first half of the time in line for the log flume, I kept reiterating how terrible it would have been if we’d gone on together.
“I mean, the minute you saw the family in the little log flume car, you would have freaked. You would have panicked.”
“Yeah, it would have been a real disaster.”
“I mean you would have honestly had a panic attack on a roller coaster; your worst fear.”
“Yep.”
“Can you imagine?”
That’s all I kept saying, enamored by this, enamored by all of this; the prospect of the nightmare coming to fruition so heavily like that. Her entire day was built around watching me get on roller coasters she felt unprepared for only to almost have the opportunity to be flung in the air unprepared, forced to face it and I was obsessed with this nightmare. We were hungry and this wasn’t helping.
“You don’t know where we are,” she had said to me.
I looked down. The hike should have been over soon but we were further than we ever were. We were weaving through trees. The evergreens were in the distant. Green meant car, I believed. I prided myself not on direction, but luck. We were not on a trail.
“Cat, it’s almost noon. You said this would take four hours tops. It’s three and a half and I haven’t seen people or anyone.”
“We accidentally got on the black trail.”
“Ok, but how long before we get off the black trail?”
She emphasized it liked that. The black trail. She did that only when she was angry.
“Probably another hour and a half.”
A crow called. Caught lying, kitty.
“It must be noon.”
She said nothing. We walked for another twenty minutes before she said.
“We are fucked, aren’t we?”

With my eyes closed, I could breathe. My limbs, fingers, lips, face; the entire body was numb. I had looked up once when the snow started to be greeted by black and white static. The branches were obscured by my body’s placement in the net and my neck was so tense I could barely move it. I closed my eyes to breathe. Breathe. I am breath. I was breathing, sleepy, going to sleep. It must be five fifteen by now when they all started howling.

We waited in line forty-five minutes at least.
“So I told the car salesman I was uncomfortable driving already and he was super pushy.”
“Oh yeah, they are always like that.”
“And so, like, he convinces me to get in the drivers’ seat, and Cat, you knooow I am already so anxious.”
“Definitely.”
“But I do it anyway.”
“You just have your permit? Your learner’s permit?”
“Yeah, just my permit.”
“Ok.”
We are in line for the log flume. The last water ride of the day. We haven’t eaten in hours.

“So,” she looks toward the right, “I ask him how far we are going to go. He reassures me it’s just around the block, like, maybe around the neighborhood. And so we start and everything is fine. We just go around the block and he’s doing his salesman thing, pointing out all the features, the airbags, the radio.”
She leans in close to me.
“I’m pretty sure it was a CD player at that time so he’s going on and on,” she is gesturing to the air, “about how the CD player is great.”
“And you’re fifteen?”
“Yeah, ummm,” she looks up at the rafters, “fifteen or sixteen.”
She gestures to the air and looks to the right, up, again.
“But a CD player would have been a selling factor for you then.”
“Yeah, yeah, of course and we are driving and it’s going great and I’m still nervous but it’s fine. “
“Is your dad in the car?”
“No, he isn’t. He’s back at the dealership talking to the other dealers, probably about paperwork.”
“Ah.”

I am looking to the left a lot. The TV screen keeps playing an ad for the new wooden roller coaster: invadr which is strange to me. The line begins moving again so we take a few steps forward as Leana continues her story.
“So we get back to the dealership, NO ISSUES, Cat and as we are pulling into the parking lot, I don’t know why, but instead of pressing the brake, I pressed the gas and all I remember seeing is someone’s computer like come at the window towards me. Their monitor.”
We both hear the announcement for Invader and move forward.
“HAHAHAHA. Oh my god! That must have been so scary.”
“It was so embarassing.”
“Did you go through like glass?”
“The wall, I went through the wall.”
“Hahaha. Wow! What happened? Was your dad pissed?
“I mean,” she shrugged, “I told everyone I was nervous and then did it anyway so I think they were feeling bad about it. I think they realized that they had talked me into something I didn’t want to do.”

“Well, also you were a minor with a learner’s permit.”
“Yeah exactly. I think my dad worked out a deal with them or something.”
The line moved steadily. It was hot. We were closer.
“Holy shit.”
“It was scary.”
The TV hung above us in the rafters near the fan. It showed a man dressed like a viking getting into the wooden coaster and pulling down his lap bar getting ready for the ride. We both watched it. We had seen it several times now.
“Why does it keep playing the Invadr preview?”
“Oh maybe cuz they are advertising the newest coaster. The log flume is so boring. No one cares about that. Do you want to ride the Invadr next?”
Leana looked at me, cocked head.
“Oh hell to the no.”
I laughed.

I was sobbing in the net actually. Finally a movement inside. There was no stopping it. I didn’t care how many wolves came, I wanted it done. Let me loud about it, dramatic, terrorized.  Two more had arrived, the betas, so the intermediary rushed back to get his portion. The four alphas licked their paws and sauntered over. No one moved in close to me.They sat surrounding me. They were not hungry. They did not need to rush. They sat surrounding me as I sobbed unsure of whether or not I longed for the sun or my friend more, or just a blanket, or just the sharpie on my skin. The snow had begun. Lightly it fell, making no sound at all.

We got to the front before we realized this was not the log flume which looking back made complete sense. We were moving up in line, and remember I hadn’t been to this park in years, and we could see the cars now. There was only a dad and his son in front of us.
“Cat,” she started. “This is NOT the log flume.”
The cars were wooden and green. I don’t remember any of this.
I turned immediately to the man to the left of me, “Is this the log flume?”
“No, that’s the log flume,” he pointed to the right, where Leana had been looking but it was covered by the infrastructure of the shelter for the line. “This is Invadr.”
“Oh, hell fucking no, Cat. I am not riding this. No way. No way.”
Leana was flustered and I was laughing. Hysterically actually.
“Oh shit! Can you imagine if you got on this with your fear of accidentally being trapped on a roller coaster?”
“Oh my god, no, Cat, no.”
I was laughing.
“Can you even imagine?”
The next car rolled up. I looked at her, huge smile.
“I didn’t know. I thought this was the log flume.”
“Yeah.”
“I really didn’t.”
We hadn’t eaten in hours.
“I really didn’t. I thought this was the log flume.”
“I knew,” she began, “I knew it was weird they kept playing the advertisement for the Invader as we waited in line. That never made sense to me. I’m getting off.’
I stifled another laugh but it was hard.
“I’m gonna ride it.”
“Of course you are.”
When it was our turn, she stepped over the car to wait for me at the exit and I shuffled in, anxious feeling very unprepared for this ride. I beamed, she shook her head at me.
“I really didn’t know!”
She smiled at me, kind of smirking.
“I’ll let you know how it goes.”

I hate wooden roller coasters. They are rickety, hurt my head and feel less structurally sound than steel ones but I enjoy adrenaline. Leana had said to me earlier, as I looked up at Griffon,you’re not like me, you want to ride these rides. The coaster rounded the bend and began moving up so where I was positioned, to the left of me, was the log flume going right underneaththe tracks. A happy family smiled at me. I smiled back.

“I just have fears that, like, the coaster will go off the track and you’re stuck there, the whole ride. You can’t get off.”
“Yeah,” I had nodded, admiring the Grifffon’s height.
“You should go on it,” she said. “You’re not like me. You want to ride these rides. You always like this stuff.”

Leana and I had known each other since we were five. That’s what I thought as the coaster began. I kept laughing. She would have never gotten on. She would have figured it out like she did. We even left line to go get her hat from the locker and got back in and both times didn’t notice the sign said “Invadr.” Both times she let me lead her. Both times we missed the sign. I was laughing. She was right. I want to ride these rides.
She was there when I pulled up, hair fucked up, messy. I began laughing immediately.
“How was it?”
I shrugged.
“Honestly, I don’t really like wooden coasters but we had waited this whole time. Can you imagine?”
“No, oh my god,” she looked down at her shoe, kind of leaned over with light laughter. “I would have freaked out.”
“If you had gotten on,” I led her down the ramp, turning around slightly to tell her, “you would have realized this wasn’t the log flume immediately. The log flume goes right underneath Invadr.”

“Really?”
“Yeah,” I gestured my arm to show her, kind of rolled it like a wave.
“You would have panicked.”
We stopped to admire the photo booth searching for my picture.
“There,” I pointed.
Beaming and filtered, I looked young.
“Wanna ride the log flume, now? It’s right there.”
She shrugged, kind of sighed.
“Sure.”
We had not eaten in hours and had been on our way to dinner for two.

“Suffering ennobles the sufferer and edifies the observer; it doesn’t have to kill you and is not so disabling that you cannot recover from it, find compensation for it, restore the rhythm of your life despite the full stop you came to.”

–Repair, Elizabeth Spelman

painters paint, writers write, filmers film.

if you do it, you are it. that’s it. live in the liminal.

“How long is it?”
I was driving. There was no music on. I was too tired and needed to focus.  Leana leaned her head against the window. It was seven am. The drive was two hours. We had been up since five.
“About four hours if we take the red trail. The blue trail is much lighter, only an hour and a half total. Not worth it.”
I sipped water from the aluminum bottle. Craving coffee, I submitted to self care. I knew the hike was long and it was cold but it was beautiful. Worth it.
“What’s the other one, you said?”
She perked her head up to look at me and then quickly covered a yawn.
“The black trail,” I turned my head to glance at her. “But I think it’s too long for us.”
“The black trail? Why would they name it something so ominous?”
“To scare tourists from trying it.”
We were in Canada for a long weekend. It was five pm and the black wolf hit my back once more just to watch the little net twirl, just to hear the branch squeak, just to wonder how long it’s gonna take before the whole thing collapses. And me, my sharpie tucked neatly away in my pants, unreachable, I for once had some leisure. Looked like I had the pleasure of letting an hour pass without documenting it somewhere and watching the sky turn black, as promised, without any true sunset or portrait.