Pine Bush Press

News for the Students, by the Students -------------- Email [email protected] with comments!

[pbpress]

UP FOR DISCUSSION: Can Reducing The Amount of Tech Usage in School Create a Better Learning Environment?

By Brooklyn N. Dottin

Over the last few decades, there has been an increase in technology usage in the classroom. Whereas at least a century ago blackboards and chalk for the blackboards, pencil and paper were the main classroom ingredients, now we have things like whiteboards and markers for them, and usage of Chromebooks, Power Points, and Google Classroom. While there is really nothing wrong with these things, as they make getting things done faster, there is reason to worry about the extensive use of tech. Some think that it is just ironic that we are preaching the importance of less screen time to our kids while we are simultaneously pushing the tech onto them at school with online learning programs, sites like Google Classroom, and copying notes off a PowerPoint in class. 

    Now, I myself grew up without using tech in school--I went to a private Waldorf school for eight years--and I was one of the top students. We had blackboards, which, when we were younger, we’d always want to draw on and used notebooks a lot. In fact, I didn’t even learn to type fast until last year because we didn’t use Chromebooks in class, if at all. We also didn’t use calculators at all in school. Now, before you judge me and call me a dinosaur, this didn’t mean we never used technology at all. For our eighth-grade presentations, we used Power Points, and we even brought computers into class to show our progress to the class. But the point is, my experience was very fulfilling to me since we could actually digest the info without a screen in front of us.

    Arriving at Pine Bush for the first time, I had to adjust to the drastic level change in tech usage. Some of it was good, like Google Docs, but others were confusing, like calculators. I’m still trying to figure out how to use the thing. 

    My experience is one that many students transferring from a tech-free school to a high-tech school might go through, and it is understandable that it may be jarring. It may be just as jarring vice versa. We’ve grown so dependent on tech that we might be heading into the direction of where we literally can’t live without it, especially in the classroom. But could reducing the tech usage in school be beneficial to students’ learning? 

    Some may say, yes, like Justin Parmenter, a seventh-grade language arts teacher at Waddell Language Academy. “(At the same time), the move toward a mostly digital educational experience has dramatically reduced the amount of class time students spend physically interacting and speaking with each other – at an age where they need to be developing crucial social skills,” he says. Some believe that when we use tech in the class, it hinders the students’ ability to actually interact with fellow students and basically the ability to ask fellow students for help. “In adolescence and young adulthood, the presence of technology in learning environments has also been associated with negative variables such as attention deficits or hyperactivity, feeling lonely, and lower grades,” writes Saro Mohammed, PhD, founder and principal of Ed Research Works, a founding board member of Capacity Catalyst, and a co-founder of the Teaching and Learning Research Community.

    Others say otherwise, like Aaron S. Richmond, a professor of educational psychology and human development at Metropolitan State University of Denver, and Jordan D. Troisi, a psychology professor at a liberal arts college and director of numerous teaching initiatives, who write, “One reason not to ban laptops is that some students may have learning disabilities or other accommodations that allow them to take notes much more effectively by computer.” It is true that there are many students who can’t take effective notes or do assignments by hand, so laptops may help them out a lot in the classroom. For them, tech is perfectly acceptable. But in the case of students who don’t need such accommodations, this tech may be doing more harm than good. “The purpose [of the ban on technology] is to allow children space to grow. So instead of turning them into consumers of technology and television, they have to learn to create their own activities. It is about encouraging creativity so that the children are active creators rather than passive consumers,” says Andrew Thorne, a founding director of the London Acorn School, on banning technology at this school. It’s been shown that students, particularly young ones, who are being taught through technology, actually lack the ability to think creatively and for themselves because the information is being constantly shoved in their faces by way of a screen. Reducing tech in school benefits the brain a lot in terms of independent thinking, creativity, and overall mental well-being and concentration.

    In this era of technology, reducing our usage of it in school could be a welcome break. We’re already stressed out enough, so why add to it by bombarding our students with constant tech usage in school? The classroom could be a healthy, rewarding environment, and students would be able to relax a little bit more and think creatively in the classroom and enrich the learning experience. On the other hand, however, tech in schools does help with efficiency and getting things done faster, and students who need it can take notes better. But what do you think? Do you think that tech reduction in schools is better for learning?

[pbpress]

Fire and Ice: Chapter 7

by Brooklyn N. Dottin

AUSTIN JULIUS

  Well, it was the week before the day of the dance. I drove over to Alessandra’s house on Wednesday afternoon, because she wanted me to help her find some jewelry to go with her outfit. She wouldn’t let me see the outfit, though, which I didn’t get. I mean, if I’m gonna help her pick out matching jewelry, I gotta see the outfit to know what to look for. But when I pointed this out to her, she just shrugged and said, “You’ll know,” then climbed on the motorcycle behind me, wrapping her arms around my waist. Taking off, the wind blowing in our face, I suddenly had a somewhat disloyal-at least to Alessandra-thought. It was at the corner of my brain for weeks, gathering dust, but I never realized it until that moment. 

    I wish Blanchard were riding behind me instead of Alessandra.

    As we pulled into the mall parking lot, Alessandra hooked her chin over my shoulder. “Let’s go, baby.” 

    I squirmed inwardly when she said that. Never has anyone ever called me “baby” like that. It made me very uncomfortable. And made me half-wish it were Blanchard calling me that, not Alessandra. I shook my head of such disloyal thoughts and said, “Alrighty, off we go.”

    Shuffling my feet, I followed Alessandra into Pandora. I hate to shop, especially if it’s for jewelry. All the gems, bracelets, and such sending off their blinding reflections into your eyes, and making you a little cross-eyed by the time you exit. Alessandra didn’t seem to have any problem with it, though. She spent the better part of our time in the shop looking at the amethysts and emeralds. Pretending to be way into it, I enthusiastically said, “How about this one?” pointing to an amethyst amulet in a glass case. Alessandra took one look at it, frowned, and said, “Too simple. How about this?” pointing to an overly intricate diamond-rose-gold necklace. 

    “Way too expensive.” I found a simple silver locket. “This?”

    “Hell no. I wouldn’t be caught dead in that!” she exclaimed.

    Maybe Ben was right, I thought. Maybe she is quite shallow and cold.    

    Finally, after two painful hours of searching and browsing, we settled on a rose-gold choker that wasn’t too expensive. Alessandra tried it on, and loved it. I was just glad she found one she liked, so I could get out of there.

After paying for it, we headed to my bike. I planned to drop Alessandra off at her house quick, then go straight home. 

    Alessandra, however, had other plans.

    As soon as we mounted my bike, she leaned over my shoulder and said, “Can we drive to the park?” I said sure, ‘cause a bit of fresh air was exactly what I needed. After getting there, I parked my bike by some trees that sort of sheltered us from the rest of the park. But before I could climb off my bike, Alessandra literally yanked my head around and, with no warning, crashed her lips into my own. My mind immediately went into flight-or-fight mode. I quickly flipped through every outcome of any possible reaction: Push her away, risk her getting mad at me, perhaps wanting to hurt me later. Let the kiss continue, and risk not being able to-dare I think so?- get together  with Blanchard, who, until around then, I hadn’t realized was the only one I actually loved. But now here was Alessandra, on my lips, with me not knowing what to do. I decided I didn’t want to continue this kiss any longer. I pushed her off me. She looked at me, a little confused, and for a split second, I wished I’d just sucked it up and let the kiss continue, but that second passed, and I said to her, “I’m taking you back to your house now.”

    I half expected Alessandra to be all mad and stuff, but she just went, “Sure thing, Austin. Let’s go.”

    Huh.

    As we coasted towards Alessandra’s house, I began thinking of what I should do about the dance situation. It was too late to refund the tickets, and I’m not the type of guy to stand people up. I was seriously thinking of just faking a cold or whatever and telling Alessandra I couldn’t go. I was so wrapped up in my planning that I didn’t realize we’d passed Alessandra’s house until a couple minutes later. 

    “Um, hey, Austin? Are you forgetting someone?” she asked. I snapped out of it quick and realized where we were. 

    “Oh, my gosh, so sorry!” I gasped, making a sharp U-turn in the road, Alessandra gripping my waist as I did so. I almost exceeded the speed limit racing toward Alessandra’s house. 

    Dropping her off, I said, “Well, that was an interesting afternoon.” 

    “And rather hot,” said Alessandra.

    What? Hot? On what basis was this boring-as-hell afternoon hot? 

    “I mean, hot as in it was hot outside, y’know?” she said quickly. 

    Now, I knew for a fact that it wasn’t even 60 degrees outside, and even she was wearing an autumn jacket. Something told me that she meant “hot” as in “sexy”, which made even less sense.

    Waving to her as I drove off, I blasted over to Blanchard’s. I was gonna ask her if she were going to the Masquerade, in the hopes that we could go together, unbeknownst to Alessandra. Yeah, I know. Totally cheap. But at this point I was willing to do anything to avoid having to go to the Masquerade with Alessandra. But I also needed to talk with someone less provocative at that moment. 

    Turning into the driveway, I saw Blanchard on her front porch. She saw me and immediately got up from the chair in which she was sitting. I parked my bike-without any fancy maneuver this time-yanked my helmet off, and smiled at Blanchard. She didn’t smile back. Instead, she bolted for the front door.

    “Hey, wait, what’s wrong?” I shouted after her. But she was already inside. I ran up and knocked on the door. But Blanchard’s mom answered the door.

    “Oh, hi Austin! What a nice surprise,” she said. She looked rather frazzled, with more No. 2 pencils in her messy, unkempt bun  and behind her ears than I cared to count. 

    “No good material, huh?” I asked. 

    “No,” she responded. “Can I help you?”

    “Uh, yeah. Well, Blanchard acted a little weird when I pulled up, and she seemed a little nervous when I smiled at her,” I said. “Do you happen to know what’s going on with her?”  

    Ms. Schwartz gave a teasing smile and shook her head. 

    “Well, she seems to fancy you, rather,” she said.

    “Huh?”

    “She won’t stop talking about you. She’s always going on about “Austin” this and “Austin” that. I even heard her mutter your name in her sleep a couple nights ago.”

    “But then, why doesn’t she want to see me?”

    “Perhaps she’s nervous, or she thinks you don’t like her back, or she’s just trying to figure out how to talk to you.”

    I was rather flattered at the idea of her saying my name in her sleep, that would imply she’s been dreaming about me. I suddenly remembered that she’d been dropping subtle hints the whole time. I just hadn’t noticed, mostly thanks to Alessandra’s seduction. 

    “You should try to talk to her,” said Ms. Schwartz. “You guys clearly like each other. She’s just a little nervous now. She’ll soon warm up to you.”

    I blushed at the term, “warm up to”.  I shook my head before any dirty thoughts dared to creep their way into my head. Looking up at Blanchard’s window, I smiled at the dark-haired personage, who I realized was looking out the window at us. She quickly shrank back out of sight. In the split second before she was out of sight, I could swear I saw her face turn red. I inwardly smirked. 

    “I guess I should go now,” I said to Ms. Schwartz, turning towards my motorcycle. 

    “Alright,” she responded. “I should get back to my writing anyway.”

    “Bye, Ms. Schwartz,” I called back as I revved up the motor. 

    “Bye, Austin,” she responded, turning back to her house.

[pbpress]

Midnight Coma

By Ruqayyah Pickel

My parents always said I was a resilient child. 

So they weren’t surprised when I took a bowling ball to the head when a fight broke out at our local arcade a couple of months ago--and seemed to be just fine, save for the massive bruise that formed on my head. 

I did still end up in the hospital for about a week, but other than that I was fine. I still felt lightheaded at times, and I passed out quite a bit, so my parents decided to homeschool me to limit the risk of my head trauma getting worse. There were too many things at school that would pose as a hazard to me...especially the stairs. 

Being an only child, spending a lot of time at home was…rather boring. Sure, there were the huge stacks of RPGs and fighting games I got for Christmas, but the bright lights and flashing would probably make my frequent headaches even worse. So I mostly took to reading mystery novels and drawing when I wasn’t doing schoolwork. Most days, though, I preferred to read. Drawing was fun too, of course--I used to love to come up with strange characters, or just drawing cool landscapes I found online when I was out of ideas, but the last thing I needed was for my parents to come and check on me and see the more recent pages of my sketchbook.

Anyone who looked at my sketchbook nowadays would think something was wrong with me. They wouldn’t exactly be lying, though: recently, my pages were filled with stuff that had been happening in my dreams. Shadowy figures standing over my bed, running down dark alleyways, fearing for my life, drawings of me being chained to my bed by spectral shackles…drawing these for the first time used to unnerve me, and I barely ever finished the first ones. However, I gradually came to find it more therapeutic, like I could put a face to the otherwise enigmatic forces that haunted me each night. 

Getting a good night’s rest was nearly impossible nowadays; I was tormented endlessly by sleep paralysis and recurring dreams. I couldn’t go a single night without dealing with either of them, or both. Some nights, I’d find myself frozen in bed, trying to will myself to move with no avail. I couldn’t scream, I couldn’t cry out for help, but I just struggled endlessly to free myself from whatever was holding me down, feeling the warm tears falling down my face as I wept in silence. Sometimes my sleep paralysis lasted for over an hour. Before my parents homeschooled me, I ended up missing the bus because of it. 

Other nights, I actually could move...and I kind of had to. I’d find myself in that same dark alleyway, knowing what was to come and dreading it every time. I would walk around aimlessly, waiting, until *he* finally showed up. 

Those heavy footsteps, the chill in the air that my dream tormentor always carried with him. Those black, tattered clothes, his black gloves, his huge hood that held an empty void where his face was supposed to be. He would just stay there for about a minute or so—I counted—before bursting into a sprint towards me. I couldn’t fight him, I couldn’t reason with him, all I could do was run as fast as I could and scream, hoping some dream god could hear me. This faceless killer always carried with him a razor edged knife that was curved just slightly, and though I’ve yet to feel it pierce my skin, just thinking about how it would feel sent shivers down my spine. 

Before long, I started seeing this maniac in real life, too. No, not on the street wandering the waking world, luring other innocent victims to their death. I started seeing him in my room, while I lay there, motionless, helpless. He stood over my bed, the knife in hand at his side. I saw it, he knew I saw it. But he did nothing. Not for a while, at least. 

Then, he started to take action. 

He would raise the knife up, slowly; sometimes it wouldn’t even fully reach the top before I had managed to blink him out of existence. Sometimes, though, the knife would go higher, sometimes reaching the very top. Some nights, the knife would already be fully raised when he showed up. Then, like a roller coaster car at the top of the hill, it would plunge straight down. Only then was I finally jolted out of my sleep paralysis.

Too many times have I seen his nonexistent face.

Too many times have I pleaded with him to leave me alone.

Too many times have I screamed in silence, felt my heart thunder against my chest in real life as I tried to outrun this shadowy killer. 

Too many times have I laid in my bed, frozen, my face drenched with cold sweat as I woke up with a comatose start after my relentless tormentor was inches away, always just inches away from finishing the job. 

And too many times have I broken free from his chase, thinking I was safe, only to find him just inches away in the real world. 

When I did eventually wake up, I found myself in tears. I just wanted it to be over. I just wanted to go to sleep. Whenever I asked my parents for help, they just told me to “look up a solution, ”or “just try to sleep.”

And I did.

I always did.

I never stopped trying.

And I never stopped failing.

But I had enough. There had to be something I could do. Fortunately, I did have one person to confide in: my good friend Quinn, who claimed to be a witch. One morning, after yet another run-in with the shadowy killer, I sent him a text:

“Can you come over?” 

Immediately, I saw that he read my message. And so I waited. Two minutes later, I heard a knocking on my window. I turned to see the wild-haired, freckled witch boy crouched on my windowsill. He had on his signature necklace with a metallic feather on it. His brown shirt was torn a bit, creating a slight v-neck, and his “lucky witch hat” was tied on his back with the string. He stumbled through the window as I opened it, and he landed on my floor.

“I see you’ve called on my services once again,” the witch boy said, putting his hat on as he sat cross-legged. 

I nodded. “It’s gotten worse. He’s started showing up in real life, too.” 

“Like, you’ve seen him around?” Quinn asked. 

“No. He’s shown up right beside my bed, sometimes even stabbing me.” 

“Well, not really stabbing you, now, right?” 

“No…at least I don’t think so.” My hand instinctively moved toward my abdomen, where I would often find the blade just inches from me before I woke up. “But during these nights, when I woke up…I could feel a slight stinging sensation right here.” I gestured toward my abdomen. “I...also found a bruise there earlier today.”

“How strange…” Quinn said. “I suppose he’s finally caught up to you.” 

“Caught up to me? How?” I asked, worried.

He gave me a solemn smile. 

“It’s as I suspected. He’s a dream demon.” He opened his purse and flipped open to a page in his homemade spell book, then showed it to me. “Creatures of the night that only attack a victim while they’re sleeping. Yours just happened to be strong enough to reach the waking world…and I can only think of a few that can do that.”

I felt the color drain from my face. Did I really have a dream demon?

“Is there any way to get rid of one?” I asked Quinn. 

He thought for a second, examining his book, then looked up at me. 

“Standard exorcism—though not like you’re any good at that—won’t work on this particular nasty,” he explained. 

Ignoring his hurtful comment, I urged him to go on. 

“Fighting a dream demon,” he continued, “requires one to arm themselves mentally, and, to an extent, physically. The way I see it, you’re at an advantage and disadvantage simultaneously. Your greatest weakness is your greatest strength. And you may fear it, but the truth is, you will have to accept it eventually. Especially in a case like this, you don’t have much of a choice.”

I felt my face contort into an expression of confusion. As always, Quinn’s riddles had caught me off guard. I read his own expression, hoping he would give me some kind of clue, but that slight smile stayed on his face. 

Finally, I had come to realize what he meant. Quinn and I had talked for so long that I was somewhat accustomed to the kind of magic that he gets up to. I was then, at least, familiar with the “solution” he had in mind.   

Astral projection…

Quinn first told me about it a little while ago. I won’t lie, the ability to project one’s soul out of their body sounded awesome...except it required the body being completely still in order to pull it off. 

In other words, I would have to enter sleep paralysis. 

In other words, I had to do the exact thing that led me straight to my supposed dream demon. 

“If you’re suggesting what I think you’re suggesting…” I said, “Then absolutely not. Astral projection is way too risky for me. Look what damage he’s done to me already! I might as well just slap a sign on me that says ‘hey! I’m helpless! Come kill me!’ This plan is completely counterproductive! Are you out of your mind?!” 

Quinn let out an exasperated sigh. 

“Oh come on,” he said. “I promise you, it won’t be so bad. You just have to trust me. Besides, I’ve been doing this longer than you have. Your whole sleep paralysis problem is going to make astral projection a lot easier. Like I said--your greatest weakness is your greatest strength.”

It was my turn to let out a shaky sigh, one heavy with anxiety. 

“Very well.” I sat on the floor in front of him, legs crossed, ready to listen, like a kindergartener. “What do I need to do?” 

“Finally come to your senses, hm?” Quinn gave me another sly smile. “Lovely. Now, listen closely. I don’t have much time, so I can only say this once. The instructions are as follows...”

—————

Quinn’s instructions stuck with me that whole night.

Step 1. 

I got in bed, lying flat on my back and throwing my covers over me to where only my head was exposed. I stared at the dreamcatcher on my ceiling; more specifically, the very center of it. I focused on my breathing, and tried to clear my mind of everything. Slowly, the thoughts of everything, save for Quinn’s instructions, slipped out of my mind…that fateful day at the arcade…the shadow killer that pursued me every night…the adrenaline from the other night as he chased me down in the dreamworld…

Step 2. 

That’s when I began to feel…strange. Like my body was shaking, vibrating, but as far as I was aware I wasn’t moving a muscle. As Quinn had instructed, I was to leave these feelings alone and stay completely still. 

Step 3. 

I thought about moving my right hand, but kept it still. Then I moved up my arm, willing myself to move it up and fight against the physical restrictions I had placed on it. This went on for several, unsuccessful minutes, until finally…I felt my arm move, as if it actually was. But my physical arm lay still. Then, I moved on to my left hand and repeated the process. Then my head, both legs, and gradually…I lifted myself up from my bed, leaving my body behind. 

For a moment, it felt like I was still in bed, then I looked back—or down, rather—to find myself lying in bed, eyes shut. It reminded me all too much of an open casket funeral, and my stomach dropped just looking at me.

My stomach dropped even further when I realized I was floating.

The very air around me felt like an ocean, and I frantically flailed around trying to find any sort of ground. When I tried to hang onto the edge of my bed, my hand phased right through. 

Just fly over to the ground! I thought to myself. This should be easy!

But it wasn’t. The weightlessness was jarring; I flailed around desperately in the darkness looking for something to cling onto. It didn’t help that I felt so vulnerable without the fleshy cocoon that was my body. The sensation of someone—something—trying to pull me away, was ceaseless. The room around me felt larger as I continued my desperate flailing, like any sort of anchor I could use—my bookshelves, the foot of my bed, my chair, the windowsill—just got further and further away. 

I kicked my legs out, trying to force my body to go upright, until I finally managed to jerk myself upright. Confident in my position, I landed my feet on the ground, praying I wouldn’t slip under the floor. 

To my surprise, my feet landed on the floor without slipping through. 

I didn’t begin to question how I managed to stay on the second floor; I was too busy reeling from the probably-too-long process of trying to steady myself. Now all I had to do was wait and see if that faceless terror decided to come for me again. 

And so I waited.

And waited. 

And waited. 

It’s been several minutes and nothing was happening. Surely some outside force was causing my sleep paralysis…right? So where was it? If I had managed to pull off a feat like, oh, I dunno, forcing my spirit out of my body, then nothing was impossible at this point…

Right? 

Finally, I gave up and decided that I was probably better off getting myself out of this state of paralysis. I stood on the edge of the bed, right where my feet were, turned around, and fell back on top of my body, hoping to be jolted awake by the sudden return of my spirit—

And fell through the bed instead, stopping myself just in time before I fell through the first floor, too. I looked around and, after taking a minute to process everything in the dark, came to the conclusion that I was in my living room. Annoyed, I drifted back towards my staircase, intending to go back and try again—when I felt something grab me as I turned the corner. I was pulled back into the living room, and found myself face-to-face with an eerily familiar figure…

…the same black-clad, faceless, knife-wielding killer from my dreams. Grabbing my wrist, he held the knife behind my neck, as if to draw me closer. I was almost forced to look at the empty void where his face should have been. 

You know how some people say that if you stare into the void long enough, the void stares back at you? That’s kind of what happened to me…but worse.

No, the void didn’t just stare back at me. It smiled at me, a cruel, triumphant smile that only grew as it saw the absolute terror on my face as I felt the cold steel against my neck; as if it could just feel the overwhelming despair within me that only continued to eat at any hope of me getting out of this situation alive. 

“Who...are you?” I whimpered. “What the hell do you want from me?”

My dream demon gave no response. It didn’t do anything, in fact. As panicked as I was, I started to at least regain my senses when I noticed that this thing was almost completely still. It didn’t even look like it was breathing. 

Was it actually frozen? Or was it toying with me?

Either way, I wouldn’t let this be the end. 

One last chase, I decided. One last chase. I’ve already outran it several times. What was one more?

I immediately broke off into a sprint, pushing my hooded tormentor’s arm that held the knife away as I stumbled on my way out the door. Being incorporeal, I at least had the advantage of being able to phase through the locked door instead of opening it. The feeling of phasing through solid was much more jarring than I could handle, and I continued to stumble a bit as I ran far, far away from the house. I could barely feel my transparent feet hitting the concrete, or the tree branch that would’ve smacked me right in the face after I ran into it. I couldn’t even feel the wind on my face, though I’m not sure if this came from being too overwhelmed with terror or a side effect of being incorporeal. 

The only thing I did feel, however, was the constant, incessant dread of my accursed stalker barely even a foot away from me. I didn’t want to turn around, I begged myself not to look, trying and failing to comfort myself with the lie that the killer wasn’t as close as I thought it was, there was no way, no human can run that fast. The even more obvious lie, of course, was that this was another dream, and even if it does catch up and strike me, I would wake up back in my bed, back in my body.

Finally, I caved and turned around, only to find myself facing that sinister void once more. I screamed, tripping and collapsing to the floor face-down. I turned back up to face my attacker, who was innocently holding its knife behind its back--no, that wasn’t a knife anymore, I noted. It had somehow grown longer than the razor-edged knife it had before, and I could now see the end of the blade from behind the void-faced freak’s back. It had now reached the length of a dagger, or maybe just bordering on the edge of being the length of a shortsword. 

I could only crawl away from my tormentor as I struggled to stand back up. As I pushed myself off the ground and back on my feet, my stomach dropped when I realized my feet were no longer touching the floor. Though I tried desperately to get myself back on the ground, remembering how jarring the feeling of floating had been the first time, I realized that my would-be killer was only a few feet away from me at best, and I should take advantage of this new ability. I willed myself forward, pushing through the air like a swimmer pushes through water, and then did the same going upwards, up past a nearby three-story house. 

I was flying, I realized with awe and wonder, which was quickly cut short when I saw my tormentor climbing up the same house. Part of me wanted to warn the neighbors inside, but every other bit of me just wanted to make sure I actually survived this nightmare. 

I flew back to my house, phasing through trees and powerlines and a bit of scaffolding, until at last I nearly missed my own home. Spotting my room on the second story, I phased through the window and back into my bedroom. It was still dark in my room, but I made out the shape of a body in the darkness. 

But...it wasn’t my body. 

At least, I didn’t think it was. It looked too weak; some bits of hair had fallen out, I looked like I lost a small, yet noticeable amount of weight, and when I looked closer at my face, it didn’t look like me at all. I looked much more pale, my lips were extremely dry, and I could make out the color of an old and large bruise that covered over a third of my forehead. Suddenly, I felt my stomach drop when I realized what was so familiar about how I looked.

I looked dead. 

That’s when I felt a cold breeze come in through the same window, and turned around to find my void-faced, black-clad killer raising a giant onyx scythe towards me. I found myself unable to move, unable to fly away. I just stood there, paralyzed with terror, looking dead in the eyes at the same monster that faced every soul at the end of their lives, no matter how much they begged for mercy.

Its giant scythe, its black clothing…this wasn’t a demon, was it? 

No. It was something worse. People dealt with this thing more frequently than demons, yet this walking void carried with it more terror, more despair, more ruin than any demonic creature could even dream of. My parents always said I was a resilient child, yet my resolve shattered in the face of this monster. I stood in front of it, weeping silently as the sheer dread of my tormentor filled me from head to toe. 

“Please,” I begged. “I held on for so long…please don’t take me away.” 

But it didn’t listen. It never listened. My “resilience” may have made me feel special, but right now I was no different from everyone else—standing in front of this monster, pleading for their lives, never receiving an answer.

And so, like everyone else, all I did was stand there as its onyx scythe tore through my soul, letting out one final silent scream as I felt my very being, and the remnants of my resolve, fall apart. 

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[pbpress]

Sander Lysander and the Tomb Raiders: Chapter 1

By Brooklyn N. Dottin

This is a script for a comic I plan to draw at some point. Sander Lysander is an eighteen-year-old journalist, reporter, and a bit of a supersleuth who hails from the village of Cassioville, Maine. She lives in a little apartment/house with her miniature Border collie, Asterix, after one of her favorite cartoon characters (yes, she’s a cartoon fanatic as well). This is the first in a series that follows Sandy and Asterix’s adventures nationwide and worldwide, covering major news stories and inevitably and usually inadvertently getting into danger and then solving mysteries that are bound to be behind them. Sandy is a very straightforward person with what would be considered “Boy Scout” ideals. She hardly takes no for an answer, and has unwavering beliefs and a strong sense of what’s right. She is also a caring and compassionate person, and is quick to help out a friend. She can also be impulsive, which gets her into trouble a few times. She is quick and clever, too, and somehow always seems to find her way out of a jam. She also possesses quite a few impressive skills, like parkour, hiding, and the ability to use several weapons, like guns, tasers, and even swords. She is also a master of disguise. Since she’s not a minor, criminals actually take her seriously, and so do most people in general. Sandy’s only weakness is Asterix, who she considers her best friend.

________________________________________________________________Newsstand

(It’s a sunny afternoon in the village of Cassioville, Maine, 2018. Sander, aka Sandy, an 18-year-old, short-haired girl, is at the newsstand, looking through the papers. Asterix, her miniature Border collie, is dozing at her feet.)

SANDY: Hmm. Interesting. (flips to a page in the Cassioville Bugle and reads it aloud to Asterix, who takes no interest in the article.) “Archeologists To Explore Possible Location for Ancient City in Egypt” I always like a good archeology article. “World-renowned archeologists, Nicholas North and Saandri Alexis, are scheduled to leave Augustus for Egypt in one week to explore and possibly uncover the site of an ancient city. Alexis tells Bugle reporters that she and North have found out about this after returning from an earlier excavation trip from a colleague who has found a possible tip-off that there was another city to be discovered within two-and-a-half miles of the site they’d excavated just months earlier. ‘We are very excited at the possibility of uncovering another ancient city. There is so much of Egypt we have yet to discover, and we can’t wait to find another piece of the puzzle that is ancient Egyptian history,’ North says. 

    “The pair will leave by plane next Sunday. Accompanying them are Egyptologist Zoe Edelta, scientist Monte Pelier, and two excavators who will assist with the excavation, Weller Max and Thomas Cutter.” Well, this is rather big. (folds the paper and tucks it under her arm) Don’t you think, old boy?

(Asterix gives her a look that says he couldn’t care less)

SANDY: Well, suit yourself. 

NEWSPERSON: Hey, kid. You gonna buy that paper or what?

SANDY: Oh, sorry! (digs some change out of her pocket and hands it to the newsperson) Have a good rest of your day! Come along, Asterix!

(they walk to Sandy’s house. Once inside, Sandy heads for her study, Asterix trotting in after. Sandy gets a pair of scissors and cuts the article out, then tacks it up on her bulletin board, which is practically full already)

SANDY: Imagine: another Egyptian city being uncovered. That is a major event. Too bad Andron beat me to writing a huge article about it. Oh, well. I can still write about the excavation itself, that’s got to be far more exciting. Hopefully I can go to the site and write about it from my perspective. That’ll be very interesting and exciting! I should ask my boss if she can send me to Egypt with the archeologists and cover the story there. Yes, that’s what I’ll do. (races for her front door) Let’s go, Asterix! This could be my big chance!

ASTERIX (aside) Don’t get your hopes up.

SANDY: Come on, Asterix!

ASTERIX: (aside) You definitely don’t give up on anything, do you? 

(they both race to the office of the Bugle. As soon as they arrive, Sandy races to her boss’s office) 

SANDY: (practically busting the door down) Leslie! Leslie! I’ve gotta ask you something!

(Leslie Roper, a strongly-built, sturdy woman of around twenty-six, rises up from her desk quickly)

LESLIE: Slow down, speedy! Calm down, then tell me what happened.

SANDY: (panting) I’ve just had the most fantastic idea! You know about the archeological dig Nicholas North and Saandri Alexis are going on? 

LESLIE: Yes, I know. Andron wrote about it, remember?

SANDY: (regaining composure) I know. But he only wrote about what is going to happen. Would it be okay if I actually went with them to Egypt and wrote about the actual dig from my viewpoint? You know, from a reporter who was actually there?

LESLIE: You can’t be going along on these expeditions as a reporter without special permission from the archeologists. Not to mention that you’re a minor-

SANDY: No, I’m not. I’m eighteen, remember? Nineteen in two months.

LESLIE: Even so, these could be dangerous! We don’t need anyone getting injured, or worse, killed, on these expeditions. It is possible, you know. 

SANDY: But what about the big-name journalists and reporters? They come to harm all the time and get great stories.

LESLIE: But they’ve had decades of experience under their belts. You’ve only had about four years.

SANDY: So, let me become as experienced as they are by letting me go along with them to Egypt. I can’t get any better just writing local news. 

LESLIE: Even if I said yes, you’d have to have the archeologists’ permission, and it is highly unlikely that they will let an eighteen-year-old come with them to cover the dig from the site.

SANDY: Is it really their decision? 

LESLIE: Yes.

SANDY: I’ll just ask them. Augusta isn’t too far from here-an hour at most. I can get there by car.

LESLIE: Alright. But don’t count on them letting you go along. You are eighteen, after all-you’ve still got a huge career and life ahead of you.

SANDY: Aw, Leslie, don’t worry about me. I can take care of myself.

LESLIE: Good luck, Sandy!

SANDY: Let’s go, Asterix! (races to the exit, then slams into someone coming in. Sandy and the person both yell)

SANDY: Oh, sorry-why, it’s you, Jannis!

(Jannis Mullin, the post carrier, eyes Sandy)

JANNIS: Yes, it’s me.

SANDY: What brings you here?

JANNIS: To see what old Lysander the Thrillseeker was up to.

SANDY: I’m driving up to Augusta tomorrow and asking Nicholas North and Saandri Alexis if I can come along with them as a reporter covering the dig.

JANNIS: The world-renowned archeologists? Good luck! They probably won’t let a teenager go along with them with how dangerous these expeditions can be.

SANDY: I’ve got to try.

JANNIS: Besides, what if something happens to you?

SANDY: Nothing will. I’ve got a wicked punch.

JANNIS: But it could still be dangerous.

SANDY: Danger is where you find the good stuff!

JANNIS: Alright. I can see that even I can’t change your mind. 

SANDY: My beliefs are unwavering.

JANNIS: I can see that. Well, see ya.

SANDY: Watch for an amazing article of mine about the dig! (she and Asterix race out the door.)

JANNIS: (to himself) What a determined girl. (turns toward the front door) And a cute one at that! 

[pbpress]

Scarecrow

By Emma Bonita

There once was a boy 

Whose life, a toy 

To deaths delight

A horrible fight

Adduce his life, with terrible strife

He wont survive the night

[pbpress]

Fire and Ice: Chapter 6

By Brooklyn N. Dottin BLANCHARD SCHWARTZ

“What do you mean, you’re not going to the Masquerade? It’s only the biggest dance of the whole school year,” said Martin over the phone. I’d called Martin on Saturday because I didn’t know what better thing to do at the moment. Plus, I felt like telling him that I wouldn’t be going to the Masquerade. I mean, no one asked me, and dances are loud places anyway.

    “Sorry, but there are three factors as to why I’m not going. First off, I don’t want to. Second, Mom needs me to help her with her story”-that one was a total bluff-“ And third, even if the above weren’t the case, I don’t have a date.” 

    “You know you can just go stag, right?” he informed me. 

    “I know, but I don’t want to, alright? Besides, I know you just want your date to have some sort of diversion for when things get awkward for you two.”

    “Dude, I didn’t even ask anyone out yet!” he said defensively. “I don’t even want to!”

    “Yeah, sure. We all know you’re just dying to ask out Jas. Get real, man. She’s a college kid. You’re a junior in high school. Like, come on. That’s a little weird right there.”

    “Is not! Besides, Jas and I’ve known each other since we were kids! You can’t tell me there can’t be any chemistry between us!”

    “I’m not saying there can’t be any chemistry, period,” I said. “I’m saying there can’t be any sexual chemistry between the two of you.”

    Silence at the other end of the line. Then a neutral, “Maybe not. But I still like her. Got a right to that, y’know.”

    “I know, I know, sorry. I just, um, well-GAHH! Sorry! I’m not supposed to judge people, it’s none of my business, I know!”

    “Dude, cool down! It’s fine! You worry too much about others.”

    My face burned red. “Yeah, I know!” I said, breaking into a short fit of nervous laughter. Martin laughed along with me. 

    After our laughter subsided, I needed to ask Martin a question. “Hey, man, I got a question to ask you.”

    “Oh cool! What about?”

    “I need some advice on boys. Austin, to be exact.”

    “Lemme guess: that ‘auburn hottie who rides a motorcycle?’”

    “That would be correct,” I said. 

    “So you wanna know how to nab the kid? I can show you the ropes, easy.”

    “Really?” I said. 

    “Sure, I can. Why, you look like a younger version of Colbie Calliat, you are kind to a fault, and you are smart as a whip. Austin would literally be an idiot to reject you.”

    “But I wanna ask him to the dance, and he’s already taken by Alessandra. I don’t want to steal him from her, or cheat on anybody. Yet, he never escapes my mind day after day, and I cannot stop thinking about him-” 

    “Alright, don’t get all 1860s on me, Blanche. Yes, we all get it: he’s hot, alright?”

    “True. That’s exactly why I need your help.”

    “I already said I would help!” Martin laughed.

    “Yay!” I exclaimed euphorically.

    “Hey, Blanche? Come off the phone now, please,” said my mom from downstairs. 

    “Oh, I gotta go, Martin,” I said.

    “Come over to my house later?” he asked. 

    “Sure thing,” I replied.

                    xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

        “Hey, Austin, so how ya doin man-yuck, that was horrible!” I said four hours later. We were in Martin’s bedroom, doing a bit of role-play. Martin said that practice would improve my proficiency in my interaction with Austin. But so far, I’d done a horrible job.

    “No, that was a good start! Just try to sound less, um, informal.” I nodded.

    “Hello, Austin Julius, it is a pleasure to see you, and-”

    ‘No, no, no, no, now you just sound like you took a time machine from the 1700s,” said Martin, laughing. “Find a balance between the two.”

    “Heeeeyyyy, Auuuus-TEEEEN! Hoooow have ya beeaan!”

    “NO! Now you just sound drunk!” Martin laughed hysterically. I couldn’t stop-I burst out laughing. I laughed so hard I actually fell on the floor and rolled and rolled around.

    “Okay, now we should get serious,” gasped Martin between gales of laughter. 

    “I know!” I screeched before breaking into another fit of laughter. I swear, I might’ve died from laughter if Martin hadn’t kicked me in the side. 

    “Owww! Okay, okay, I get your point!” I said, getting up.    “At least now I know what NOT to do in front of Austin!”

    “Now you just need to know what to actually DO in his presence,” said Martin, back to normal. 

    “And that is….?” I asked.

    Martin took a while to consider his answer, then said, “Has he ever commented on your wardrobe?” 

    “Well, yeah, he said my sweater the other day was cool.” I replied.

     “OK, no offense, but he was just being nice. That sweater looked horrific,” referring to my favorite Metallica sweater. Call me insane, but I LOVE Metallica. Unfortunately, nobody really listens to Metallica anymore, or any heavy metal, for that matter. So I suppose that Austin wouldn’t be so hot on the idea of me wearing such a sweater. 

    “Yeah, maybe,” I said resignedly. “Then what should I swap it out for?”

    “Maybe something less….metal?” 

    “Or….polyester….?” I joked.

    “Or….modern….?”

    “Or….just let me wear what I want….?” I said.

    “Okay, fine, you win. Just don’t say I didn’t warn you,” he said.

    “Warn me about what?” I inquired.

    “Look, if you’re gonna wear a shirt with rock band logos on them, at least make it Green Day,” Martin said wearily.

    Green Day? You have got to be kidding me. 

    “Erm, okay….?” I said with uncertainty.

    “I got a few you can borrow,” he offered. 

    “Sure,” I said.

    But I wasn’t so sure when he pulled three Green Day T-shirts from his closet. They looked pretty worn. And unwashed. Mental note to self: Never borrow a boy’s clothes to impress another boy. Especially if the clothes are Green Day T-shirts. Gosh, how I hate Green Day.

    “There we are,” said Austin, dumping them into my arms.

    “Erm, thanks?” I said.

    “Anytime, man,” he said. 

             xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

             The first chance I get, I’m gonna throw these shirts in the trash. They not only didn’t help me with the Austin situation, they possibly made it worse. Today I approached Austin in the hall, and tried to say hi to him, but either it was the smell of unwashed shirt, or the fact it was worn, or the fact it was Green Day, because he didn’t return the greeting, and seemed a little revolted and grossed out, and he said, “Um, I gotta get to class,” then left in a hurry. I stood there, looking down at my shirt, wondering why the hell did I even agree to wearing this piece of garbage.

    Martin may have good intentions, but that doesn’t always mean he’s a genius at carrying them out.

[pbpress]

Blood Candy: Chapter 11 and 12 --Conclusion

By Ruqayyah Pickel

[Chapter 11]

But first, both of us had to tend to our wounds.

Raiding the closets for bandages of any kind, I wrapped them around my injured shoulder as I kept walking, in search of Jasper’s office. Kaveri seemed a little more than annoyed that I didn’t stop to help her, but I didn’t care. I just kept counting the room numbers as I went along.

0129, 0130, 0131, 0132, 0133--

0134. Jasper’s office. This was it. I quietly motioned for Kaveri to pick up the pace. 

I then rammed into the door, ignoring the pain in my arms and shoulders as I pressed my full body weight onto the door. I heard Oliver scream and Akira cry for help, their fear only fueling me to ram even harder.

“JASPER!” I shouted. “Let them go NOW!” 

I kicked at the door. Suddenly, Jasper slammed hard on the other side, causing me to fall on the floor. 

“You’ve been enough of a nuisance!” Jasper cried. “Just sit tight for once!”

“You want me to just sit here and watch you murder my friends?! I’ve already lost one friend because of you!” 

Kaveri pulled a knife out of her sheath. 

“This will be a lot less painful if you just open the door--” she started. 

Jasper growled and slammed the door open, his own knife in hand. Akira and Oliver were tied up in two chairs back-to-back, tape over their mouths. 

“I’ve had enough of you, y’know…” he hissed. “Especially you, Vigil. This is your last chance--get out of here now while you still have every ounce of blood in you, and don’t say a word to anyone else about what happened, or I will kill them both right before your eyes.”

“Neither of them had anything to do with this!” Kaveri cried. “They’re innocent people. To think you vampires would go as low as to rope in just anyone into your schemes--”

“Innocent?” Jasper laughed mirthlessly. “Really now? Then why did they even come here in the first place? Why did they break into my lab looking for a plan to stop me from saving my entire species? And don’t even get me started on all the fledgling vamps that your kind has killed--”  

“I had nothing to do with that, human leech,” Kaveri hissed with just as much venom in her voice as Akira had when they met earlier today. “I don’t know about those other hunters, but I am here to save my kind from people like you who take advantage of us and act like you’re above consequences! I don’t care about your experiments, or your grand scheme to ‘save your entire species.’ I’m sure there are other ways to fix your little starvation problem than experimenting on your sick patients, kidnapping a random student and your BROTHER, or tricking another random kid into eating his best friend’s blood!” 

I froze. 

“What are you talking about, Kaveri?” I asked, my voice shaking. 

“That candy Jasper gave you?” she said. “When he finished your blood drawing, your blood went straight into that piece of candy. When you gave it to Seb, he basically ate your blood, and whatever other chemicals that altered Seb’s mind to give him bloodlust.”

I...had no clue how to process this information. 

That candy...it was made out of my BLOOD?!

I felt myself going nauseous at the thought. That, at least, explained why his teeth and tongue were dark red after eating it…

“You…” I said to Jasper, “you REVOLTING piece of trash!”

Jasper stayed silent, with nothing but a glare to defend himself against our words.

“Got that out of your system?” He folded his arms. “Congrats. You found me out. But that changes nothing. Fact of the matter is, your best friend is still staked through the heart for the crime of simply being a vampire. And a fledgling, at that.” 

Kaveri’s knife shook a little in her hand. 

“Well, if it makes you feel any better,” Jasper said, giving a small smile, “there are still some fledgling vampires that your kind hasn’t gone after yet...though you may find that to be a mistake.”

“We can deal with them later,” Kaveri said, still determined on killing Jasper. 

“Really?” He gestured to me. “Take a look at your friend’s neck. Notice anything...different?” 

To my surprise, Kaveri listened to him, and her eyes were fixated on the bite wounds on my neck from Seb. Her eyes widened with horror. 

“Seb passed on the vampire virus from himself to Dakota before you staked him,” he explained, then turned to me. “Just look at her face, kid,” he said. “She’s terrified. Of you. You think that stake isn’t gonna turn on you the second she yanks it out of my heart? Well…y’know, if you guys ‘win.’ You should probably save yourself now while you still can.” He held out his bandaged hand to me. “I can help you. I can train you to control your bloodlust, use it to help your kind, save you from these merciless hunters…you won’t have to worry about being in any sort of danger ever again.”  

If I’m being honest, Kaveri was probably gonna come for me once--if--she was done with Jasper. But she’s human, with a...decent...moral compass. Seb did try to kill me. She had a good motive for staking him. That being said, what would stop me from doing the same to her? After all, I had a motive too; she killed my best friend. 

Maybe...I could join him...just play along for a bit...get some intel...work as a double agent…

I found myself slowly reaching out for his hand as a smug grin crossed his face. 

With my other hand, I aimed a punch at his face. 

He blocked it with the same hand he had held out, letting out another joyless laugh. 

“I will never stoop so low as to associate myself with living scum like you,” I hissed. 

“Figured as much,” he said simply.

His smug facade quickly gave way to raw fury as he aimed a strike at my neck with his other hand, still holding the knife. Kaveri grabbed his hand just before the knife reached my neck, pulling him away from me and onto the floor. He kicked at Kaveri’s ankles, sending her on the floor as he got up to go after me. Pocketing the knife, he landed several punches on me, the side of my face and chest stinging with pain. I backed against the wall, praying for any remaining strength that the fight against Seb robbed me of. 

When I came to, I watched as he and Kaveri fought. It was clear that Kaveri was much more experienced in fighting than me; her movements were more coordinated and graceful--or as graceful as a fight for one’s life can get--and she handled her knife with ease. She blocked each of Jasper’s hits, blow for blow, and if she didn’t, she took them like a champ. All the while, an expression of focused tranquility stayed on her face, not even remotely phased by the events that transpired, nor by the immortal human leech who hissed and raged as he tried to strike her down. It was here, of course, that I realized the now-obvious truth. 

The reason she even bothered to associate with us this morning, the reason she was so willing to help with our supernatural problem, the reason that she remained cool under all this pressure…

...was likely because she’s been doing this for a long time.

Unfortunately, even years of combat experience likely didn’t prepare her for what Jasper was going to do next. 

He looked up at Kaveri with a furious look in his eyes, his red eyes appearing to glow in the dim hallway, and I silently commended Kaveri’s insane resolve to not quake in the presence of such a terrifying glare. 

“You…” he hissed at the young vampire hunter as he unwrapped the bloodied bandage. “You’ve bothered my clan, FOR THE LAST TIME!”

Suddenly, he pulled out a syringe filled with a strange red liquid--fortunately, it didn’t look thick enough to be blood--and plunged it into his left arm. 

What was happening…? I thought. I tried to regain my strength; I had to stop him before whatever weird vampire-voodoo magic was finished. I stood up, balling up my fist as I ran over to Jasper, trying to ram him into the wall. I realized I was too late when his entire left forearm transformed into a dark red claw. I was only inches away when he sucker-punched Kaveri with his new arm upgrade and sent her flying down the hallway. He then turned around and grabbed my neck with the same arm, slamming me against the wall. His claws dug into my neck, and I noticed that there seemed to be blood flowing into the claw the longer he held on. 

“The reason I’m doing this are far beyond your feeble understanding,” Jasper said in a low, furious voice. “Your measly human existence means nothing compared to our immortal legacy. That’s just how things are here--the weak serve as stepping stones for the strong. You humans are our prey. Now act like it.” 

“Shut up,” I snapped, kicking him in the stomach just I had done to Seb. “I don’t care what you vampires think of us humans. Our existence is just as important as yours, be it limited or not. You’re all a bunch of parasites that feed on those you think are inferior!” 

“What other choice do we have, Dakota?! Feast on animal blood? What happens when they revolt, huh?! How are we going to survive then? Do you want us to just die? Do you think you mortals are above us, after we’ve lasted for thousands of years? We are the superior species, and we are the ones that deserve to LIVE!”

Just then I saw Kaveri ram into Jasper. His grip was iron, though, and I fell to the floor right alongside him, my scarred neck still in his mutated arm. The two of them struggled on the floor for a while, though Jasper only fought with his other hand. 

Kaveri then let out a cry of pure fury, and stabbed him through the heart with the stake. 

Jasper gave a weak laugh as he stared at the stake. He looked up at Kaveri, who now had at least two vampire kills I had witnessed under her belt. 

“Okay…” Jasper said wearily. “Maybe...maybe I...was wrong…” 

“About what?” Kaveri snapped. 

“You humans…” he chuckled, “aren’t...j-just some...worthless prey…” 

Kaveri knelt down to his level. 

“I don’t care what you think of our species,” she said. “I just care if you leave us alone.”

Jasper only continued to laugh.

“That’s the thing, see?” he said with a sly grin on his face. “You can...take out one of us...but our number...remains the same…”

His dying eyes looked directly at me. 

“Vampires...are immortal…” he said, “be it...the individual...the clan...or the c-curse…” 

Kaveri simply scoffed and stood up, walking over to Akira and Oliver to cut them loose. 

I wanted to be relieved that the man who took away my sense of security and my best friend finally got what he deserved. 

At the same time, I wanted to break down into tears, as this was the second casualty I was forced to witness. 

“Dakota!” Akira cried, now free. “I...oh my god, I have so much to tell you…”

Oliver, after greeting the rest of us, walked over to his older brother’s body, just barely clinging to life. 

“Come...to say goodbye?” Jasper asked weakly.

I expected Oliver to break down and cry at the sight of his dying brother. The two probably spent at least some time together, and I figured that there had to be at least one point in time where Oliver actually cared for Jasper...and hopefully Jasper, at some point, felt the same way.

However, that theory shattered into pieces as I watched Oli look down at him with an expression of pure contempt, and spit in his brother’s face.

Jasper only gave a somber smile in response.

“Th-that’s fair, I guess…” he said, his voice trailing off. “I...I’d hate me, too…”

And with that, the once-immortal Jasper Kermit went limp on the floor before me. 

“Serves him right,” Akira hissed. “Now with that out of the way...how did things with Seb go, Dakota?” 

Tears began to fill my eyes. I dropped to my knees. 

“...what happened?” she asked. “Where’s Seb?”

I couldn’t bring myself to say anything. 

“Dakota! Answer me!” she yelled. “Where is he?!” 

“...she killed him…” I mumbled. 

“Who killed…?” Akira turned to the only other female in the room.

“Listen, I didn’t want to do it,” Kaveri snapped. “Seb seemed like a nice kid. I didn’t want to kill him. But it was either that, or Dakota becomes a vampire...well...I suppose he already is…”

“I don’t care what my friends are!” Akira cried. “I just wanted Sebs back! That’s how it was supposed to be! You promised to help us!” 

“Akira, please! I swear, I didn’t want to hurt anyone! I never meant to hurt any of you! I didn’t mean for any of this to happen! I didn’t even want to get you involved, but...it appears I had no other choice. I...just wanted to keep you safe.” Kaveri sighed. “But it seems I can’t even do that anymore.” 

“Kaveri…”

“Just...just go,” Kaveri ordered. “Take Dakota, get out of here. I’m finishing what I started. Just know...I really am sorry. For everything.” 

Kaveri gave Akira a quick, tight, hug that was never returned. She pulled the stake out of her sheath and stormed down the hall quickly. 

My eyes immediately focused on the stake. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t look away. I ran towards her, and grabbed the stake, but Kaveri refused to let go. The stake slid out of my hands, leaving Seb’s blood on my hands. 

I stared at my bloodstained hands.

It shouldn’t have ended like this.

She lied to me. 

His blood is on--m̷̥̩̭͗́̍ý̶̜̪̊́ --her hands. 

She promised to save him. 

My attention turned to a bandage on her arm—no; the red seeping through the bandage. An odd red hue seemed to fill the room gradually, like a camera filter. 

She lied to me, I thought, trying to focus on what was really important here. She had betrayed me, she’d killed Seb. She was a liar, and that’s what really mattered. Not whatever stupid apology she was trying to give me now, not the wound on her arm, not the wound that I knew was underneath her bandage. Kaveri murdered Seb, his blood was on her hands, and that’s what was important.

His blood is on her hands, I reminded myself. But then I looked at my own hands, stained from the blood on her stake. I felt my heart race, and my mouth go dry.

His blood is on my hands. 

I looked up at Kaveri, toward the bandage on her arm. I suddenly felt a pain in my mouth, like something just bit me from the inside. I put my hand to my mouth and felt my teeth--and noticed that fangs had been growing.

Her blood is on her arm. 

Kaveri pushed me back, trying to get me to leave her alone, and I fell to the floor. My head started to ache as the red light in the room became more vibrant. As I stood up and brought my hands up from the floor, I saw red handprints where my hands had been.

His blood is on my hands. 

Her blood is on her arm. 

There was red leaking under the doors, stained on the walls. 

Her blood is on her arm. 

I took one step forward. Then two. Then three. I shot forward towards Kaveri—towards the red on her arm. 

Then the world went black. 

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[Chapter 12]

I don’t know how long I was out for. 

But when I woke up, I found myself lying on an old bed, surrounded by what looked to be a garage of some sorts. There were shelves full of what looked to be tools--some of which I never recognized, and did not appear to be for any sort of construction--several bookshelves, and a mother computer with at least six screens. 

“Wh-where am I…?” I asked Akira when I woke up. “What happened?”

“Well, let’s see…” Akira explained, “you tried to attack Kaveri, she knocked you out, and told me to take you far, far away. So now we’re in some old warehouse my dad used to work in.” She turned away from me and towards her desk, appearing to be working on or reading something. “My dad was a paranormal investigator, and this is where he and his team would work. Why else do you think I agreed to work with Seb so quickly?” 

I...attacked Kaveri?

“Why did I attack her?” I asked. 

She shrugged, and I suddenly felt like I was missing something important--very important. But I couldn’t figure out what...it felt like it had been at least a day since I last spoke to Seb. I pulled out my phone and tried to call him. 

“Hello?” I cried into the phone. “Seb? Where are you?”

No answer.

Akira whirled around. 

“What are you doing?” she asked me.

“What does it look like?!” I snapped. “I’m trying to call Seb!” 

She stood up and walked over to me, a solemn look on her face.

“How much do you remember from last night?” she asked me. 

“U-uh…” I struggled to recall. “Not much. Why? What’s wrong?”

Her eyes shifted elsewhere. 

“I...um...I’m gonna go try to find us a place to eat,” she said. “I-if you don’t remember anything by the time I’m finished, I’ll explain over lunch, okay?” 

I shrugged, and desperately searched my memory for what happened--and where Seb could possibly be. All I remembered was taking care of him when he was sick and working on my essay…

And Seb attacking me…twice.

And fighting Jasper. 

Suddenly, everything came back to me in a flood of information. I remembered my heart pounding in my chest as Seb’s maniacal giggling rang throughout my house that first night. I remembered hauling his unconscious body into the closet and locking him in. I remembered the coarse, thick rope constricting around my neck when Seb jumped me the next day. But those only came to me in blips. What stood out the most was...red. 

The red on Seb’s and Jasper’s shirts and the stake through their hearts. 

The red light that filled the medical center suddenly. 

The red on Kaveri’s arm.

I suddenly started to feel parched, like I haven’t had water in ages. My mind raced and raved, trying to process everything that happened as one, final memory slithered its way into the timeline of events I was repairing. In fact, I could almost feel Seb’s fangs sinking into my neck as I finally remembered his parting “gift.” 

I turned to Akira, choking back tears. I had a million questions, but only worked up the courage to ask one.

“Am…am I a vampire?” 

Akira paused whatever she was working on, but still didn’t face me. 

“Yes.” She opened up a drawer, took something out of it quickly, and turned to face me with a smile on her face. “But it’s okay. I’ll keep you safe. We can live here until the coast is clear and we can move you to somewhere safer. I heard there’s a city where the living and the dead can coexist. I believe it was called...Vita...Vitamorta! Yep...it was...one of the articles that Seb and I wrote together…”

I felt the area on my neck where he bit me. It still stung a little, though it may have just been the memory.

“Akira,” I said, “are you okay?” 

She gave an empty chuckle.

“Okay as I can be, I guess,” she replied with a somber smile. “But…please don’t worry about me.” 

She pulled me into a tight hug with her free arm. I hugged her back—and then froze. 

Behind Akira’s back, in her other hand, was a stake. 

The same stake, in fact, that took the life of my best friend. 

[pbpress]

OUR SCHOOL SYSTEM       AND WHY IT’S FLAWED

BY BROOKLYN N. DOTTIN

School is a significant factor in our lives. It’s supposed to prepare you for the big world out there. Students study diligently to prepare for tests like the Regents, and teachers stress about the importance of studying hard to succeed in school and thus succeed in life. If we are working so hard to educate our students, then why aren’t we number one in the world in standardized tests? Why do students dislike school so much? Let us dive into the history of our school system first.

    Our current school system was developed during the Industrial Age, when the main concern was to work in a factory, a job with very little need for any brainpower. Seth Godin, an American author and former dot com business executive, says, “The sole intent of the education system was to train people to be willing to work in a factory.” Ken Robinson would agree. A British author, speaker, and international advisor on education, he says, “Education is modeled in the interests of the Industrial Age and in the image of it.” The basic idea is that the sole purpose of schools in that age were to turn out factory workers. That may have worked out in an age where there was high demand for factory workers, but as the world and workforce changes rapidly through the ages, it becomes less and less relevant, and in this century, it is practically nonexistent. There is more demand for innovative, creative minds in the world and workforce. Unfortunately, our current school system hasn’t really changed much with the world. Its Industrial Age ideal still runs deep in its education style. Rules and rule-following are much valued in this school system. In this day and age, we don’t value minds that just follow the rules all the time as much as we value minds that can bend, or even break the rules, as they lead to great societal advancements. Like Suffrage or the Civil Rights Movement, these pioneers did not like the current rules in society, as they held them back and oppressed them. Think about it: would they have won their rights if they’d just followed the rules? Would society be how it is today if we just stuck with obedience all the time? 

    Our system has this “one size fits all” ideal, that one type of education is good enough for every student. But that’s just not the case. Every student learns and grows in different manners, and some may be fast in one subject and slow in another. This ideal would’ve been perfectly acceptable during the Industrial Age, but not so much today. So what can we do? Well, we can begin individualized teaching in our schools. Finland’s public school system is very relaxed, and guide, rather than push, their students towards excellence. They have less emphasis on homework and tests, and give their students plenty of recess time. Because of this, their student’s brains are more focused and absorb and process information better. But there are lots of schools that have similar education styles in this country as well. Take Waldorf schools, for example. Instead of having the students try to learn in a uniform way, they tailor their education to fit each student’s mindset and way of absorbing information. Or Montessori schools. Their style of education is mostly student-led, encouraging their students to direct their own studies, while the teacher acts as more of a guide to help them along the way. A vast majority of these students go on to go to excellent colleges or training schools, and most have great careers in life. But most of all, they are not pushed harder than necessary in their education, and they thrive on the psychological freedom in their classrooms. 

    Another characteristic of these schools is the looping they do in the elementary and middle schools. In Waldorf schools, the teacher typically stays with the same class for eight years, from first through eighth grade, before looping back and starting with a new class. Some public schools are adopting the looping system with two to three-year loops. This allows the students and teachers to establish a certain relationship, which lets the teacher really know how each of their students think and learn.We can adopt some of these ideals and improve our school system. 

    School is supposed to prepare us for the big world out there. Why not do it in an effective way? If we want to get far in this world, let’s improve this flawed system and rise up from the bottom. Let’s start being more effective in our teachings. Let’s evolve our system with the constantly evolving and changing world.

[pbpress]

Haunting of a Fifteen Year Old Girl

By Amanda Senor

All of a sudden we were just playing music and cleaning and the speaker(it was fully charged)kept on turning off and when it was when the song was cursing. Then we played somewhere over the rainbow and she had told me it was her grandma's favorite song. So we played it and the speaker just kept turning off. Then just recently we saw claw marks on her wall(photo 5)which made us wonder if it is still the little boy or not.Also we live by a graveyard so that means something could have came in the house because we had gone a lot over there when we were bored.So far this is what has happened for now.

On a normal day I was hanging out with my friend and we noticed some strange markings on the wall next to her bed(shown in photos 1 and 2). We thought it was one of us playing a prank or her cousin who lived there at the time. But it wasn't because there were dirty fingerprints on the walls (photo 3 and 4). They looked like a baby had done them and no baby could reach there. But then Her cousin told us something we will always remember she said she wanted to learn about witchcraft. (All Pictures will be on the last page).We had been using this app was called Ghost Radar and we thought it was fake until we had researched up the app and found out it is used by professionals in ghost hunting.Then we just messed around with it. Then it was saying some strange things so we wrote each word down and found out it was a young child.So that explains the baby finger marks.So then we just stopped and looked at each other. Then we had forgotten about it and just didn't think about it anymore. 

[pbpress]

Fire and Ice: Chapter 5

by Brooklyn N. Dottin CHAPTER 5

ALESSANDRA FIREBRAND

    I’d seen them. I’d seen them see me, then panic and blindly run into a lingerie shop. Did they think I was stupid? I’ve got eyes and ears in areas you do not want to think about. But I decided to downplay it and stroll casually into the shop, pretend I didn’t see them, and make them feel stupid, as well as they should. I mean, boys in a lingerie shop? Come on.

    Hitching my bag higher up on my shoulder, I strolled casually into the shop and pretended to be particularly interested in some Victoria’s Secret bras while spying on the two goons out of the corner of my eye. They were trying to hide behind a couple mannequins wearing lacy gray underwear. Austin’s bright yellow Nirvana shirt was very conspicuous. If you’re gonna hide, at least do a good job of it, I thought. I walked nonchalantly toward the mannequins. The two boys, thinking they were well-hidden, didn’t try to escape. I rounded the mannequins, and stopped in mock surprise.

    “Well, hello, Austin, Ben!” I said brightly, flashing a smile at them. 

    “Er….hi….?” said Austin awkwardly.

    “Um….nice to see ya,” said Ben, equally uncomfortable.

    “What are you guys doing here? Picking out underwear? You know that is a little weird for a guy to do that in a lingerie store,” I said, laying a hand on Austin’s chest. Austin didn’t seem to hate it, but he did look a little uncomfortable. I didn’t care.

    “Maybe you guys should go before everyone sees you,” I said rather slyly, running my hand across his chest again. Now Austin looked a bit nauseated. Ben just buried his face in his hands. 

    I didn’t care.

    “Erm, I’d like to, except you’re kind of….well, you know.”

    “I know,” I said.

    Ben quickly stepped in and detached me from Austin. “We should be going now, so excuse us while we get by.” Ben pulled Austin by the shirt sleeve out of the shop. I gave Austin a smile and a sly wink. Austin flashed a smile back at me, a bit weakly, I thought.

     After they were out of sight, I smiled and chuckled to myself. How silly of them. 

    I walked out of the shop and headed into Marshalls. I needed to find a cool costume for the Masquerade, one that would get Austin’s attention for sure, one that would turn heads, maybe. I chuckled to myself again, then took a blue-green high-low dress into the dressing room. As I removed my cerulean crop top and denim shorts, I thought of how I should act towards Austin at the dance, definitely smoothly, maybe flirtatiously, probably in a hot manner. I put on the dress, looked at myself in the mirror, and frowned. Too high-cut. It wasn’t the 1800s. 

    I found a pumpkin-colored sparkly jumpsuit that was in the Halloween sale aisle. When I tried it on, I groaned-so itchy! And absolutely zero mobility. 

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Two hours later, a heap of clothes lay messily on the dressing room bench. I’d went completely insane, pulled off a bunch of random clothes off a rack, and decided to try them all on. Each time I was frustrated-they were all either too tight, too baggy, too plain, too fancy, too itchy, too-well, feeling like a bathrobe I should be wearing at home. I just wearily stood there, feeling too tired to try anything else on. 

    I sloppily and slowly pulled on my own clothes, not caring that the tag was in front, and made my way to the front of the store. And that’s when something caught my eye. I almost didn’t notice it at first, but I forced myself to look again. It was a purple-and-orange jumpsuit, with  holographic stripes. It looked absolutely fantastic, and I snatched it up and hurried to the dressing room. 

    It was a perfect fit! 

    No limited mobility, hugging my body just right, not itchy, sleeveless-perfect. I made like lightning to the checkout, paid for the jumpsuit in a hurry, and flew out of Marshalls and straight for my car, totally excited and elated. I tossed the bag with the jumpsuit into the car, hopped in after, and blasted straight home, anxious to try it on with my purple high tops. 

    Fantastical!

    I just stood there, admiring my reflection in the mirror. Austin just cannot refuse me in this thing. He just can’t.

[pbpress]

Have Hate Symbols Lost Their Importance?

by Aidan Trusz

A hate symbol is a piece of art or a sign used by a group of people to symbolize a hateful or racist cause, or directly attack a minority group. Well known hate symbols, as listed in the ADL Hate Systems Database, are the Confederate Flag, the Swastika, and the Ku Klux Klan robes. These symbols all represent deadly ideals, signs originating from decades of cruelty. White Supremacist groups use them today as a means to promote their cruel causes. Often, the symbols are worn by racist geoup members to identify each other, and hung on signs to strike fear in the minority groups being targeted. A hate symbol utilized in both these ways is the swastika, which was worn on armbands and hung on buildings. The goal of these hate symbols is the same no matter what situation they are used in: To intimidate, scare, and drive people away. 

Not all hate symbols are conventional. 

Next to swastikas and white robes in the Hate Symbols Database are numbers like 14, the “ok” hand gesture, and internet meme Pepe the Frog. These symbols are blatantly false, and only used to instill fear in others in very slim circumstances. The number 14 is in every basic times table and elementary school, an age most people have reached and a ‘hate symbol’ most people won’t ever know. The ‘ok’ hand gesture is commonly used by divers, and is a shortcut to say ‘yes’ in the American Sign Language. This and Pepe the Frog, a cute internet meme, have been labelled hate symbols just because a small group of people said they were. Without looking at their context, the history of them being used to inspire hate, and their actual usage in the real world, all these normal signs have been labelled on the same level of century old symbols whose only real purpose has been to scare people. 

The new, nonsensical additions to the ADL Database are taking away from real hate symbols. The lighter, barely used signs like the ‘ok’ hand gesture are taking the power away from brutal, hateful ones like the swastika, but not in a good way. The idea that hate symbols are so case-by-case and uninspired can cause people to use the true and traditional ones more often, believing them to be non important. While the symbols may be nothing to some, they have the same effect against targeted minority groups that they had when they were first created: bullying, horrifying, and ostracizing them.

Not only are newer, less used hate symbols causing actual hate symbols to lose their importance, but they are giving them more power. In 2018, there were 835 recorded incidents of Jewish hate crimes in the United States. This is over 200 incidents above 625 recorded hate crimes in 2013. Similar trends are found with both anti-Islamic and anti-Black crime statistics, where 2017 is the fourth straight year hate crime rates have been increasing.

The “ok” hand gesture is not on the same level as the swastika. Pepe the Frog is not as harmful as the confederate flag. The number 14 has not hurt nearly as many people as KKK robes. This mindset is extremely detrimental and harmful to the groups who are targeted by hate symbols. As time goes on and Americans become more comfortable with using hate symbols, because they’re on the same level as internet jokes, a new wave of unintentional hate is rising against groups who have been attacked by serious hate symbols for decades. Hate symbols are losing their importance, history is forgetting their meanings, but minority groups are still being attacked by them.

[pbpress]

WHAT THE….?Why do women typically give up their last name after they’re married?

By Brooklyn N. Dottin

Getting married is one of the biggest life decisions you’ll ever make. You have to commit yourself to the person you’re marrying, and vice versa. You have to give up lots of things, like your total freedom to do whatever, make all your own life decisions independently, and usually, for women, your last name. Typically, women are expected to give up their last name and replace it with their husband’s last name. Now, why is this? What was wrong with their original last name? First, let’s delve into the history of this tradition. 

    The practice of women having their names changed at marriage dates back to primitive times, when brides were bought as property. The changing of the last name is probably a by-product of when brides’ last names were switched from their dad’s to their husband’s as an indication of property swapping. Before the 14th century, women didn’t have any last names, as women were considered property back then (and you don’t give property last names, do you?). 

    As then married couples were considered “one flesh”, the wife was required to acquire her husband’s last name, as proof that she was the man’s “property”. This practice also prevented women from entering the workforce, entering law, contracts, claiming ownership of anything, and generally having the same rights as men.

    Today, more and more women are opting to keep their original last name, whether professionally or personally. If I ever marry (which I probably won’t), I’m keeping my last name. I personally don’t see what’s wrong with my current last name, and many women would wonder if there is a reasonable reason to this change of name. Men are still getting fully used to this notion, as the wife changing her name is something we’re all used to. 

    It can get a bit messy when it comes to last names for their kids. But some couples are hyphenating last names for their kids, or merging both their last names together. Like, say, if one guy’s last name was Morganstern, and his wife’s last name was Brownstein, they could combine the two and turn it into Sternstein, or Morganbrown, or Morganstein, or Brownstern, to name a few. Hyphenated last names are the ones we’re more familiar with. We’ve got names like Scott-Smith, or Avery-Johnson, and stuff like that. 

    But of course, as same-sex marriages are gaining popularity and a place in society, there is the issue with which of the couple would keep their last name. It’s more concrete with heterosexual couples, but with homosexual couples, it’s still being worked out. Some homosexual couples are combining their last names, usually symbolic for their lives intertwining, so they want to intertwine their names as well. As most of society’s still wrapping their heads around same-sex relationships, homosexual couples usualy have to work out their own solutions to this last-name issue.

    This topic is becoming a heated one, and one that is debated about a lot. Many people think that changing your last name is un-feminist, but some believe that keeping your last name is better because it stays with tradition, and they don’t want to break tradition. What do you think?

[pbpress]

Blood Candy: Chapters 9 and 10

By Ruqayyah Pickel

Blood Candy Chapter 9: 

I have to admit I was a bit worried about Dakota. Seb was...a bit of a weakling, but now that he was a vampire I feared that Dakota may be at a disadvantage. 

I wasn’t really sure what Seb’s next plan was after he was finished with him--I assumed he would just follow Jasper’s orders--but something tells me I wasn’t entirely safe either. We were close, yes, but so were Seb and Dakota, yet here we were. 

Oliver took me downstairs to a computer lab, turning on the light. 

“Akira, look,” he said to me. “This is where all the files are kept.” 

“How do you know all this?” I asked the younger Kermit sibling.

“I spy on Jasper. A lot.” 

I shrugged.

“With a brother like that, I can’t blame you.” 

Oli sat down at one of the computers and logged into Jasper’s account. I decided not to ask how he knew his password, as I already probably knew the answer. He spent the next few minutes rummaging through his computer, looking for anything on ‘candy.’ 

“So,” I said, “When did you find out your brother was a vampire?” 

“Only recently, actually,” Oli said. “Like a month ago. He doesn’t know yet.”

“He doesn’t know that you know?” 

Oli nodded. 

Suddenly, I heard the door swing open, and a battle-scarred Kaveri entered the room. She had bruises on her arms, one around her eye, a few tears in her jacket and several scratches on her face and on her arms. 

“Oh my God, are you alright?!” I asked her. “You look terrible.” 

“Is Jasper dead?!” Oli cried.

“I’m surprised you care, Akira,” Kaveri snapped. “I thought I was dead to you.”

I froze. She thought she was dead to me…but that just wasn’t true. She wasn’t...okay, that was a lie. She was dead to me, but the fact that she was willing to go out of her way and risk her own life for us...

“I...I wouldn’t say that...” I told her.

“Well, you did a year ago,” she reminded me.

I stayed silent. 

“And no, Oliver,” Kaveri continued, turning to our adversary’s younger brother. “He’s not dead, but I knocked him out briefly. I’ll be alright though.” 

Oli’s expression was unreadable.

“How’s the search going, Oli?” I asked him.

“O-oh, right…” he said, perking up. 

He entered ‘candy’ into the search bar, causing only one folder to pop up:

‘Project:Blood_Candy.pdf’.

He clicked on it. 

About ten or so documents were in the folder, but we only had access to four: ‘Entry 1,’ ‘Failure,’ ‘Success’ and ‘Dakota.’

-------

file_Entry 1: 

*We’ve lost far too many units to monster and vampire hunters across the country. Just recently, an X-Caliber hunter took down one of our best vampires yet—Morgan ‘Morgue’ Caligari. Without her guidance, many of the younger vamps have been unable to last a day without a hunter—or worse, nature—getting to them. Thorne says we gotta purge the city of these hunters, but we can’t afford to sacrifice more units.*

*I proposed a solution. What if we could somehow control humans to get all the blood for us, then we can drain them once their work is complete? This would not only exponentially increase our blood collection, but also keep our top vampires safe. Harriet, being a skeptic, as per usual, asked me how in the world I’d be able to come up with this. Fortunately, I did come up with a plan later that evening: if I could infuse some sort of substance into candy that would brainwash my patients after I gave it to them, then I could have an entire army in no time.*

*Project Blood Candy commences tomorrow night.* 

-------

“So they used this ‘blood candy’ to get humans to do the dirty work for them…” Kaveri said. “How disgusting.”

“Wait,” Oliver said. “Let’s check the next one.” 

file_Failure:

*I’m at a loss.*

*This project is going to be a failure.*

*I tried everything to make it work. But the results from every single one of my test subjects failed.* 

*The first time, nothing happened, and my patient that day said that she could clearly taste blood, as she slowly pulled out something—a phone, maybe—from her pocket.*

*I had to get rid of her quickly.*

*The second time, after a modification to hide the taste of blood, the patient threw up. Unfortunately I had to get rid of him, too.* 

*The third time, I had to modify the formula and substitute what I had used to hide the taste of blood. But the substitute was even worse. The next patient doubled over, clutching his stomach as he violently coughed. His eyes were bloodshot, and his tears were...red. It took a while, but I quickly—and painlessly—got rid of him, too.* 

*Somehow, modification after modification, it kept getting worse and worse. Patients violently falling ill, their symptoms worse than the person before them, and several patients even dying before I could get rid of them myself.*

*The others were right. I am too ambitious for my own good.* 

-----

Kaveri looked at the file in disgust.

“So many casualties…” Oliver said, equally as horrified. “So many casualties, just for a botched experiment…” Tears filled his eyes as he balled up his fists in anger. “My brother is a horrible person.”

“Well, clearly,” I said. “How did he even manage to complete this in the first place?” 

——

file_Success:

*After countless days and countless appointments and countless modifications….I did it.* 

*I finally created the Blood Candy.* 

*Turns out, the first few ingredients I had substituted just needed to be combined. Though, now I’m kind of annoyed that we lost around forty potential meals because I didn’t think of that the first time. But that’s not my concern. Forty lost meals will be nothing in comparison to what this new invention will bring us. We’ll make all of it up and then some.*

*Now, to test it out.*

------

We were out of words at this point, staring at the computer in horror. I’m not sure what it was or how it happened or why I was only just now realizing what was happening, but then it dawned on me the situation I was truly in.

I was facing a real vampire, an actual person that literally consumes blood for a living. This man was nothing more than a demon that dared to wrap itself in human skin. 

And now my best friend had just been turned into one. 

My best friend, my conspiracy partner-in-crime willingly turned himself into a bloodsucking demon to feed an ambition he was forced into. 

But it wasn’t fear I felt...if I just play my cards right, I could avoid any real danger. Hell, I took a reflex hammer to Jasper’s head. That alone gave me enough confidence to face whatever I had to in order to save my friends. 

Whatever fear I felt was immediately overtaken by anger. This monster had made a monster out of my friend, and I was getting sick of seeing people get screwed over by Jasper. 

We just skipped straight to Dakota’s file. 

——

file_Dakota:

*A kid came into my office today. His name was Dakota Foster, and he goes to North Clueham High—the same school Kaveri goes to.*

*With Dakota under my control, I could easily have him find Kaveri and bring her to Thorne, who’s absolutely hellbent on seeing her dead. Every time I tried to ask him why, he shot me a bone-chilling glare...though I think it may have something to do with his younger brother, Wendigo--again.*

*Some days, I envy Thorne and the lengths he will go to defend his younger brother.*

*I wish that I could feel the same way about my own.* 

*Unfortunately, when I offered Dakota the candy…he didn’t take it. At least, not at first. Apparently he ‘hates sweets’ or whatever, which sounds like total bull, but I guess that’s the case for some people. But who wouldn’t willingly take candy, and free candy at that? No matter…the kid said he’d give it to his friend Sebastian, who likes sweets more than he does.*

*Hopefully this ‘Sebastian’ character will be useful to us.*

*For the sake of Thorne not killing me on sight, he better be.*

----

“Funny,” I said, “at the end of the day, this is just about protecting their own kind.”

“That doesn’t make it right!” Kaveri cried. “They’re still hurting people! 

“They’re hurting me!” Oli cried. “They’re hurting Seb! They’re hurting Dakota! They even hurt Kaveri! And they might hurt you, too!” 

“I told you, kid, I’m fine. Don’t worry about me.”

“You clearly aren’t!” I cried. “Why are you putting yourself at risk for us? For me?”

Kaveri sighed.

“Because I have to,” she said. “You and Dakota wouldn’t be able to last without me, no matter how many conspiracies you and your now-bloodthirsty friend crank out.”

I turned away from her. Not that I didn’t appreciate her help, but I knew this was probably going to be the last time we ever talked. Like she said, she was going to go back to shutting herself out once this was all over. This was out of obligation, and that was it. 

But then I realized...what made her more qualified than us to deal with Jasper and Seb? 

“Kaveri,” I said. “Why did you leave? Tell me the truth.”

“Why does it matter?” she asked. “We need to stay focused on the task at hand.”

“If...if this doesn’t go as planned...I just wanna know. Why did you leave?”

Kaveri tried to ignore me, but I knew her better than that.

“Family emergency,” she lied. “I already told you.” 

“But there’s more. What happened? Did someone die?!” I cried. 

“Just can it already!” she finally shouted. “I can’t tell you...I can’t get you involved.”

“If it’s about...this,” I said, shaking with rage, “then I’m already involved.”

“Can’t we just talk later?!”

“There probably won’t be a later!”

“I told you, we’re gonna be fine! I can take him!”

“How do I even know I can trust you?! How do I know I can count on you to keep us safe?!”

“Because I spent a year learning to defend the human race!” she finally admitted.

I stood in stunned silence. I almost forgot Oli was with us, only remembering when I turned to find him equally as shocked, yet...hopeful. 

“Kaveri--” I started, before she cut me off.

“Don’t.” She didn’t face me.

“Let’s be honest,” I said. “I was gonna find out anyways. Kaveri, you can’t keep hiding from me. I’m…or…I was…your friend. Whatever this is, I’m willing to go through it with you. Especially if it means saving my friends. So please. Stop pushing me away.” 

I swear that I saw tears well up in her eyes, but she wiped them off. 

“I shouldn’t have let you come with me,” she sighed. “I should’ve just did this myself. Arthur Thorne is...a very powerful person. My family’s been trying to hunt down him and his younger brother Wendigo for ages. And now I’m next in line to do what they failed to do for generations. That’s why I had to leave school, though it’s also because they found out I went to North Clueham. This entire project...I think they’ve been aiming to kill me, and take whoever they can in the school.” 

Again, I found myself in stunned silence, tears forming in my eyes, too. All this time, I resented Kaveri for leaving me. Truth be told, she just wanted to protect me. 

I owed her big-time. 

“Kaveri, this is my friend--no--my friends we’re talking about. If they’re in danger, I’m getting myself involved, and I don’t care what anyone else has to say about it. I can help you! Seb and I can use our skills to blow the lid off this entire Blood Candy project!”

“I’ve been fighting these things for around a year,” she retorted, “I think I know what I’m talking about when I say you should’ve stayed back.” 

“Well, sucks to be you...no pun intended...Because here I am.” 

I turned to Oliver, ignoring whatever hateful look she shot at me. 

“So, what now?” he asked me.

Suddenly, we heard a banging on the door. 

“They’re in here!” an older woman said. 

“There’s more?!” a male voice complained.

“Probably!” a younger male voice said, “unless Vigil is a really good voice actress.”

“Shut up and open the door!” the woman yelled. 

“Hide!” Kaveri whispered, and slipped into a nearby closet with a much faster speed than normal. 

Unfortunately, Oliver and I weren’t so lucky. In our panic, we spent far too much time searching for a hiding spot. Kaveri had taken the only good one in sight.

A trio of hooded vampires barged in and immediately caught sight of us. They had mysterious tattoos on their palm, and it looked like it was supposed to be the fangs of a beast. They went behind us and placed their marked palms on our necks, sending a sharp pain through me that soon subsided as the world around me turned black. 

[Chapter 10]

I walked down the empty, dim hall, catching my breath as I silently thanked Kaveri for saving my life. Akira and Oliver should be okay, I figured, but then I remembered something...

“This hospital is one of the main headquarters of Clueham’s top vampire guild,” Kaveri explained earlier. How did she know all of this? If I hadn’t known any better, I would’ve said she was a conspiracy theorist, too, and that’s the real reason Akira and Kaveri stopped talking. Rival conspiracy theorists were a thing, right?

Focus, Dakota! I thought to myself. You have a raging redhead vampire to find. But...where even was Seb?

The video Oli showed us had Seb in Jasper’s office...but I didn’t know where that was. 

As I ran down the hall looking for Seb, I saw two “doctors” wearing surgical masks wheeling two patients on stretchers past me on both sides. Though the patients’ bodies were mostly covered, I still had enough information as to just how screwed I actually was. 

In the precious few seconds I had to look at the two patients, I noticed only two things—the bite marks on their sickly pale necks, and the police caps resting over their faces. For a moment I was confused--then I drew my attention back to the police caps as the “patients” were wheeled away. 

It can’t be...I thought. I wasn’t certain, but I did have a very bad feeling as to who those cops were. 

“I called the police station for updates on the investigation,” my mom messaged me earlier. “They said that they’re gonna have to put it on hold for right now; they haven’t heard back from the officers that came by the house last night, so they’re trying to get in touch with them.”

Of course it was, I thought. It had to be. Like Jasper said, he couldn’t let anything happen to his new ‘colleague.’ 

This can’t go on like this. I have to snap Sebs out of this...trance...as soon as possible.

Against my better judgement, I aimed for the risky--yet probably more efficient--solution:

“SEBS!” I yelled, my voice bouncing off the walls. “WHERE ARE YOU?!” 

I peered inside the glass windows of some of the rooms, thinking Seb must be hiding in there. Finally, I came to one of the rooms towards the end of the hall. The lights were shut off, but there appeared to be a figure sitting down--presumably dead or asleep--in one of the chairs. I narrowed my eyes, trying to see into the dark past my own reflection...when a blade was suddenly held to my throat. 

I froze. 

I turned around slowly, to find Seb with his black jacket, spiraling eyes, and the most malicious grin I have ever seen on his face.

“Look, buddy,” I said with feigned confidence, “you really don’t have to do this. I’m your friend. We know how this goes, we’ve both seen movies--you actually do try to kill me, then some rousing heartfelt speech or lovely memories of the time we spent together suddenly pops into your head and then you revert back to normal, then we can all go home and--”

Seb buried the knife into my shoulder. I cried out in pain, clutching my shoulder as I fell on my knees.

“...guess that’s out of the question…” I said. I watched in disgust as he went to lick the knife again, looking me square in the eyes as if to say, “this is who I am now.” 

Then he stopped himself, shaking his head, and pocketing the knife into a sheath. The sheath had red, glowing markings when the knife was inserted in, and when he pulled it back out, the markings faded and the blades were completely clean.

What weird alien technology were these vampires using? I thought. If all of us manage to live through this experience somehow, then AkiSeb is gonna have one hell of a conspiracy.

I stood up, holding onto my bleeding shoulder.

“Why are you doing this, dude?” I asked. “You don’t have to listen to them. We’ve been friends for ages.”

Seb just gave me a blank stare, then smiled. He started to giggle, then gave me a chilling answer—or a question, rather:

“You believe me now...don’t you?”

And with that, he struck me with the blade again.

Or he would have, had I not grabbed the blade with my hand itself. 

Counterproductive, yes, and my hand hurt like the devil, but it was either this or the blade goes into my neck. 

“You know what?” I hissed, “fine. If you don’t want to listen, then I’ll make you listen.” 

I punched Seb across the face. He let go of the knife and held on to his face. I took this opportunity to go for the knife--but Seb stomped on my hand without looking, bruising my ring and pinky fingers. 

Fortunately, that wasn’t even my good hand. 

As I recoiled away from the blow, Seb grabbed the knife. I rammed him into the opposite wall, but he kicked me backwards. My head banged into the glass, leaving cracks in it. He then threw the knife at me, but I managed to move out of the way in time, just as the knife landed right in the center of where I had banged my head on the glass. I stared at the knife in horror, thanking every god in the pantheon that I was even alive right now.

My prayers were interrupted when Seb grabbed my neck and threw me to the floor, pressing my head against the ground as he prepared to sink his small fangs in the exposed area of my neck. I kicked at Seb, punched him with my good arm, spat in his face, whatever I could do to get him off of me. But he was relentless. His bloodlust had consumed him completely. And with each time I tried to resist, his small grew closer and closer to my neck.

I almost wanted to give in. I almost wanted him to just get it over with already. I was human; he was a vampire. I was weaker than him. 

Suddenly, I heard footsteps storming down the hall. I fought against Seb harder, but he seemed to gain a sudden boost in strength. He even risked a temporary glance in the direction of the storming footsteps--which I could only pray belonged to a potential savior. 

Finally, he head-butted me, then took the opening I had left to sink his fangs into my neck. I screamed in pain, pushing Seb backwards—and into a sharp, wooden rod. 

Kaveri had just come up behind him and staked him through the heart. 

“SEBASTIAN!” I cried as he rolled off of me. “Kaveri, what the hell?!” 

Kaveri looked up at me with furious eyes. 

“He was trying to hurt you,” she said in a broken voice. “I had to.”

I had so many words I wanted to say to her…to Seb…but my words got caught in my throat. I collapsed to my knees near Seb, searching in his eyes for any signs of life. The peppermint swirl in his eyes slowed to a halt. His mouth gaped open slightly, just wide enough so I could see that his fangs had retracted. 

His vampire side was gone. 

But so was his human side. 

I only came to this realization after spending who-knows-how-long screaming and crying and shaking my friend’s lifeless body, begging for him to wake up. Kaveri pulled me upwards, telling me to let go, he was gone, there’s nothing we can do, I had to, I’m sorry, please forgive me…

But I couldn’t. I had to, but I couldn’t. She saved me...and ruined my life. I turned around to face her, still on my knees. 

Through my clouded vision, I could see nothing but the indigo mass of Kaveri’s sweater and the blood stained on her stake.

Seb’s blood. 

I wiped my eyes, looking back at my fallen friend’s body. I stared into his lifeless eyes, the peppermint spiral fading. My breath quickened, my heart raced, as I realized…

“You lied to me,” I said, looking up at my best friend’s murderer.

“How?” she asked. 

“You said you would help me.” 

“I also said that if you didn’t want him to be a vampire, you’d have to kill him. Pretty sure the first thing you’d wish for in that kind of situation is for him not to be a vampire.”

“I don’t care if he’s a vampire,” I hissed, standing up. “I care if he’s my friend.”

“He tried to kill you!” Kaveri cried. 

“You said you would save him!” 

“I had no CHOICE, Dakota!”

“You did and you chose to KILL HIM.” I found myself storming towards her. 

“Get a hold of yourself,” Kaveri said, pointing the bloody stake at me. 

I knocked the stake out of her hand. 

“I’m gonna need that, y’know,” she said. She picked it up and put it in her sheath. “Please...I know you hate me right now, but you unfortunately kind of need me to defeat Jasper.” She gestured to the bloody stake. “Unless you want it, of course.”

I shot a glare at her. 

“Fine,” I said. “After this, I never want to see you again.” 

Kaveri just shrugged. 

“Deal,” she said. “Let’s just get this over with.” 

[pbpress]

Untitled

By Katie Langlitz

It was a regular weekday school night.  Mom was on the couch, watching whatever reality TV show or true crime documentary that had her attention at the moment, waiting for dinner to finish, and I was pacing the kitchen tiles, without much intent, my attention bouncing from her show, to my phone, back to her show.  This particular program followed the lives of rich Southern millenials—and the scandals that come with a precious family legacy to preserve.   As the cast idled around their mansion’s halls, the camera panned over a portrait of a man, most likely some ancestor of theirs.  It held my attention.  I had seen it before.  I knew I had, but I didn’t have time to deliberate.

My mom switches the program, flickering through until she lands on a news channel.  She lingers for a moment.

“Hey, have you heard about this?” My mother waves the remote at the screen: a water crisis in Flint, Michigan.  Apparently, children throughout the city were suffering from mysterious illnesses and rashes, possibly linked to untreated tap water.  No, I hadn’t.

The portrait forgotten, moments later I was on my laptop, beginning my descent into the tragedy in Flint:

In April of 2014, Flint switched from water purchased from Detroit to water pumped through the Flint River that runs through the city to save money while officials waited for a new pipeline from Lake Huron.  Law-mandated chemicals controlling lead erosion had not been added to Flint’s pipes when the city switched to Flint River water, causing lead to break off, traveling through pipes into families’ homes.  The Michigan Department of Environmental Quality, as it was called at the time, told Flint officials that anti-corrosives were unnecessary, and a decision on whether the water was safe to drink could wait for another year.  In essence Flint residents could drink possibly unsafe water for a whole year before officials were even willing to evaluate the situation.  The result: in addition to disease-causing bacteria and carcinogens, which can cause cancer, Flint’s drinking water was flooded with lead.  Brown, filmy water smelling like sewer and mysterious rashes breaking out on children’s skin soon brought Flint residents to town hall meetings with grievance.  

Lead is an irreversible neurotoxin; no amount of it is safe.  There is a lead-crime hypothesis that argues lead exposure triggers impulsivity, social aggression and even attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in children and thus causes delinquency and violent crime.  Despite data collected by a concerned, local pediatrician revealing children in Flint were experiencing high levels of blood lead, authorities didn’t act.  They accused her of fabricating reports to create baseless hysteria.  It was not until outside researchers from Virginia Tech. conducted intensive research on the city’s water that the state admitted there was a problem, over a year later.  In early 2016 the then Governor of Michigan, Rick Snyder, announced 87 cases of Legionnaires Disease, a type of pneumonia caused by bacteria, and 10 deaths linked to the water crisis in Flint.

I was stunned.  This violation of human rights in Flint and the lethargy of government officials—it was comic book level villainy.  How did something like this happen, in America, with something as essential to life as water?  That seemed to be what everyone was asking.  The EPA, United States Environmental Protection Agency, blames state officials for not following protocol mandating anti-corrosives, and the state blames the EPA for not enforcing federal policy.  While politicians continue to point fingers at each other, a larger crisis sits at the center of the Flint water tragedy: racial bias, which is really a euphemism for systematic racism.  

Wait.  Before anyone rolls their eyes and pulls up their blinders, some historical context:  Flint shadows the place it used to be.  It used to bustle with a wealthy, urban core, booming with motor industries, but like many other Midwestern cities, was ravaged by abandonment.  During the 1960’s General Motors, which was worshiped like religion by locals, relocated, and the city suffered subsequent economic depressions.  Today, the population is lower than it has ever been since the 1920’s.  Flint is also 57% black, 4% Latino and only 37% white.  40% of residents live below the poverty line, and although Flint is not quite as segregated as other cities like Detroit or Chicago, the black and Latino population suffer this poverty disproportionately.  To compare, the United States is 77% white, 13% black and 18% Hispanic or Latino, and only 12% live in poverty, according to censuses from 2018.  

Now this crisis doesn’t seem so mysterious; the reason why I’d never heard of it isn’t as elusive.  The NAACP, or National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, spoke on this issue.  The NAACP is the civil rights organization that championed black empowerment throughout the 1900’s, accredited for winning the 1954 Supreme Court Case Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka that ruled racial segregation “inherently unequal” and overturned previous decisions disenfranchising blacks after the Civil War.  According to a CNN article, in 2016 the NAACP said of Flint, “Would more have been done, and at a much faster pace, if nearly 40 percent of Flint residents were not living below the poverty line? The answer is unequivocally yes.”  We all know it, too.  If the same lead-laced water threatened a predominantly white, above the poverty line—not even upper class—community, there wouldn’t have even been a crisis.  The issue would have been resolved before it reached the home of children, before it would kill innocent residents and sicken dozens more.

The injustice seen in Flint is occurring everywhere, everyday across America in less televised but just as obscene ways.  Look at death row statistics.  Account for variables like the number of victims, murder brutality, and we’re still more likely to convict someone for murdering a white person than a black person.  Young black, American males are at same risk for gun homicide as nations with the highest murder rates in the world.  Blacks with a college degree are more likely to be unemployed than similarly educated whites.  When they are employed, blacks with a college degree are more likely than their whites to be underemployed for their skill level.  Then, inflating these issues, Congress has decreased anti-discrimination agency funding over the years, such as the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which was established under the Civil Rights Act of 1964, one of the iconic civil rights bills Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. got passed through his nonviolent protests.  According to the US Census Bureau, “none of the 10 states with the highest percentage of Black residents provide these agencies with annual funding of more than 70 cents per resident per year… In some states… more taxpayer dollars are spent on the governor’s salary than on protecting millions of residents from employment discrimination.”  

After bingeing articles and documentaries on Flint, I felt slimy.  The violation of human rights in that city was perpetuated by racism.  Not the kind of racism we can see or hear; no N-words or confederate flags caused this.  (Though, ironically, Confederate flags are popular home decor amongst white residents of Flint.)  Systematic racism—the implicit and unconscious bias to value some people’s live more than others—did.  It’s a filthy realization to come to, full of shame and guilt, and we do all we can to blunt it.  Accepting systematic racism’s mere existence would admit our role—however small—in tragedies like Flint.  That’s why we’re defensive when we hear people talk of ideas like “systematic racism.”  Most of us pride ourselves on not being racist, on being better than our misguided ancestors so discovering we could be part of a system that perpetuates racism, being told we’re morally in the wrong, of course we want to deny it.  

And we do.  Even with disasters like Flint, we drown the guilt and hide behind those perky success stories, the ones you see on daytime talk shows and on college pamphlets, but they only dilute the truth.  Just because a youth choir from Detroit makes it to 2nd place on a national talent show doesn’t help the thousands—47%—of children who live in poverty in that same city, but it does sedate our conscience.  These stories tell us black poverty isn’t that bad: look at this one going to college, that one recovering from addiction.  

It’s the epitome of cognitive dissonance—the uncomfortable feeling when conflicting beliefs or behaviors collide.  In this case we are confronted with two realities of America: the one that upholds our founding fathers’ ideas of freedom and equality and the other that perpetuates injustice and hardship.  In true cognitive dissonant fashion we alter one of these realities to fit the other.  We ignore racial injustice—and deny ourselves a truly equal nation.  It’s ironic; to preserve the idea we have of America, we stop it from ever becoming that.  

However, the fact that TV programs exist solely to perpetuate these fairy tales of black empowerment reveal that this problem isn’t our fault.  Not entirely, anyways: “groups tend to be more immoral than individuals”—Martin Luther King Jr. writes in his “Letter from a Birmingham Jail”—, and this is a system, schemed with intent.  A system that encourages us to stay apathetic about racial injustice, that allows children to die from lead poisoning in the 21st century.  That’s the tricky thing about systematic racism: it’s perpetuated by apathy, by inaction.  That’s why it seems elusive.  Unlike with racism we can see or hear, we don’t know who to blame.  When someone slips the N-word or chuckles out a derogatory joke, we know who to point fingers at.  With systematic racism because it is not an individual person or isolated event, we have no one to attack.  It’s a system, and who do we blame for that?

That’s when I remembered the portrait from my mother’s reality TV show, the one about the wealthy Southerners.  John C. Calhoun.  If we ever charged someone with systematic racism, it’d be him.  He was our 7th Vice President, second to the infamously tyrannical and racist Andrew Jackson.  Amidst rising momentum for abolitionism in antebellum America, Calhoun performed his infamous “positive good” speech.  Rejecting the previous justification for slavery as a “necessary evil,” Calhoun defended his “peculiar institution” as a morally righteous crusade rehabilitating the devolved black race.  For example, he wrote, “in the course of a few generations it [the black race] has grown up under the fostering care of our institutions… to its present comparative civilized condition.”  To Calhoun slavery, thus, was an honorable institution founded on good will and charity that Southerners should defend against the treasonous Northerners with pride and dignity.  

He is the embodiment of systematic racism—and shows us why apathy is so dangerous.  Calhoun’s descendants, the kids on that TV show, didn’t seem like racists.  Privileged, sure, but not inherently evil people.  No one was waving Confederate flags or marching for white pride, yet their very existence preserves the legacy—the wealth accumulated, the hierarchy instituted—of slavery.  Emancipating blacks, establishing legal equality, founding empowerment agencies, although great feats, didn’t eradicate centuries of racism.  It didn’t dethrone the Southern oligarch.  A little slap on the wrist, a few elections diverted, and Calhoun’s fortune was allowed to survive—no, to thrive.  His still-wealthy lineage are proof that there are people in this 21st century that, despite not being racist, benefit from slavery.  If that sounds harsh, that’s because it is.  They didn’t chose their ancestors, sure, but they also don’t seem too ashamed of it either.  The man’s portrait is displayed in their home on national television for everyone to see.  Not to mention that they actually kept the family name, “Calhoun,” despite its connotations; ask anyone who’s studied American history what they think of when they hear “Calhoun,” they’re going to tell you one of two things: states rights, slavery or both.  Thus, his ancestors are ignoring the filthy implications of their family name.  Either that, or they’re blatant, white supremacy level racists, which not too many people are nowadays.  They stay ignorant and apathetic, and it’s apathy that protects the legacy of slavery, not racism.  Well, not overt, N-word, confederate flag racism—rather, systematic racism.

Despite how nonexistent it may seem in our everyday lives, how elusive it makes itself, because this is a system, it doesn’t matter where you live; you exist as part of it, and within this system, like all systems, there are two forces: the force that drives and the force that resists—the engine and the friction—, and because of the nature of systematic racism, simple apathy and inaction qualify as driving forces.  By not being an active counter force, you surrender your choice to be anything but the driving force spurring this institution of injustice forward.

Your ancestors probably didn’t single-handedly marshal the defense for slavery.  You’re probably not an active member of the Aryan Brotherhood, but just because you don’t have an obvious connection to slavery, doesn’t mean you get a moral freebie.  Martin Luther King Jr. wrote a letter to a group of 8 clergymen who contested that the battle against racial injustice should be fought solely in the courts, not the streets, denouncing King’s nonviolent protest.  To this King was compelled to write his famous “Letter from a Birmingham Jail.”  Throughout the letter King necessitates direct action as a means to racial justice.  Paralleling fundamental beliefs our founding fathers built this nation on, King writes, “One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws… “An unjust law is no law at all.””  In the context of systematic racism, we are not necessarily talking about statues, however, this same principle applies.  We—as in, the ordinary people living in this country—must, with a diligent moral compass, sift through the status quo to determine what is just and what is unjust.  Once we find injustice, we have a moral obligation to resist it—actively.  However, we cannot resist a system without first knowing it exists; admitting our role in systematic racism is uncomfortable at best, but that’s okay.  To quote King again, “constructive, nonviolent tension which is necessary for growth,” which he says his protests aim to create, “will help men rise from the dark depths of prejudice and racism to the majestic heights of understanding and brotherhood.”   We need tension in our conscience to realize, sometimes, what is right and what is not.  To confront a situation as it is, not as we wish it to be—even if it’s a little uncomfortable.

In the 21st century to be this active counter force which King calls for doesn’t necessarily mean you’re launching the NAACP 2.0.  It can begin by owning up to our cognitive dissonance, by accepting systematic racism as it is, by educating ourselves, by not being silent and by no longer staying apathetic. 

[pbpress]

Fire and Ice: Chapter 4

By Brooklyn N. Dottin AUSTIN JULIUS

I felt slightly light-headed and rather giddy as I rode down the empty road on my motorcycle on my weekly motorcycle ride-’cause what could be better than a nice ride down an empty county road in autumn? Just think: the most popular girl in my class, Alessandra Firebrand, the well-known and popular Alessandra Firebrand, actually kissed me. Me. The motorcycle-riding, dusty leather-jacket-wearing, Austin Julius. I mean, that was kind of unexpected, am I right?

    I rode along the road, stirring up the early fall leaves in my wake. The warm breeze blew in my face, and so did a couple acorns (I do not know how that happened). I waved to a couple squirrels as they raced with acorns to store away for the winter, a few deer who immediately loped away as I approached, and a lone badger who was just lounging in the sun. The leaves were just beginning to show their autumn fire, and a few Canada geese strutted out into the road-I had to brake quickly to avoid hitting them. The geese didn’t seem to be in any hurry to cross the road, what with them stopping in the middle of the road to peck at who-knows-what, or just hanging out; I had to rev up my engine to keep them moving.

   After that was taken care of, I continued down the road again, just noticing the effects of the changing season all about. I rolled into town, stopping by a cafe, the same one I stop by every week for a cider or an iced decaf.

    Ting-a-ling-a-ling!

    Pushing open the door to the cafe, I set the little tiny bells jangling. A few heads turned curiously my way, then turned back to their drinks. I went to the counter and said hi to the guy working there.

    “Hey man!” I said cheerily.

     “How’s it going, dude?” responded Ben Scott, the guy at the counter. I met him a few years ago when I was in eighth grade, and I’d accidentally made a speeding car swerve into a pole (by riding my bike on the wrong side of the road). I’d run to find a phone to call 9-1-1, as the driver wasn’t conscious. I ended up at the cafe, as that was the only place open that time of day. I got the whole 9-1-1 thing taken care of , the person was taken care of , and he’s fine now, by the way. But I wanted to hide out in the cafe for a while, just in case the cops came looking for me. So Ben helped me hide myself in a cabinet where the coffee beans were being kept, which was just big enough for me to squeeze into. Fortunately, no police came looking. After helping me out of the cabinet, which, mind you, was very uncomfortable, as the pins-and-needles in my right foot revealed, he gave me a pumpkin spice latte-very popular in fall-on the house-”Just to be sure you don’t sue me for stuffing you in that cabinet,” he’d explained. 

    Sipping the spicy-sweet drink through a plastic straw, I said, “I wasn’t going to sue you. If anything, I’d probably be giving you a huge cash reward!” Then we both laughed.

    Today, I ordered a cinnamon cider, and leaned against the counter, sipping my drink. 

    “Hey, Ben, I got a question to ask you.”

    Ben adjusted his apron. “What about?”

    “Girls. Alessandra, to be exact-”

    “Oh my gosh, don’t even-That Alessandra character is such a fake.” 

    “Yeah….Thing is, er, she kind of kissed me on Thursday.”

    “She WHAT?”

    “Yeah. She did.”

    “Oh man, you gotta be careful. She may look hot, but she’s as cold as an iceberg. You can’t be going around with her or anything. One of these days she’s going to turn around and destroy you.” Ben shuddered.

    “Dude, relax! She’s really cool. I think. Anyway, I asked her to the Halloween masquerade-”

    “WHAT THE HELL, MAN! That could be your downfall! She’s probably gonna stand you up, or worse yet, set you up for something real dangerous.”

    “Just listen to my question, Ben,” I wearily said.

Ben calmed down and listened.

    “So, anyway, I asked her to that dance, except I’ve never been to one before, much less with a girl, much less Alessandra, and so I’m just wondering if you got any tips on how to impress, you know, be cool, charming, all that?” Ben was the logical choice because he’d been dating his girlfriend for at least ten years, and is one of the coolest guys I know. I mean, do not tell me that the fact he always wears his baseball cap backwards, knows pretty much everyone in town, young and old, is a human magnet, and is nice to everyone, sometimes unnecessarily, is not cool. So he could be my one-way ticket to coolness.

    “Well, I can’t hold you back from pursuing this Alessandra character, so I’ll show you a thing or two about charm and such. Just do not say I didn’t warn you.”

    “Oh man, thanks!” I exclaimed. “When do we start?”

    “Whoa, whoa, slow your roll. I never said I was definitely gonna give you lessons on that! I meant that I’d be the guy you came to for advice-”

    “Too late,” I said, hugging him across the counter. Ben sighed, then said, “Tomorrow I’m off. Meet me at the mall, alright?”

    “Alright!” I said.

         xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

The next day, as planned, we met up at the mall. This particular mall used to be a popular hangout spot back in the 90′s, but since it’s the 2010′s, nobody really hangs at the mall anymore. So we had the entire food court to ourselves. Yay.

    “So, what’s first?” I asked.

    “First we get you a suit,” said Ben. “You need to present yourself at the dance in a presentable way, and not wearing that”-gesturing towards my shirt- “Nirvana shirt.”

    “Give it a rest, would ya? It’s my favorite shirt,” I defended myself.

    “Maybe so, but a girl’s not gonna go for a guy who’s wearing a shirt with an X-ed-out-eyed, wobbly-smiled emoji.”

    “First off, it’s not an emoji, alright? I don’t do emojis. Second, Nirvana rules.”

    “What about Green Day? That’s way better than Nirvana. I mean, listen to American Idiot-that is the song!”

    “Really? Because Smells Like Teen Spirit sounds more like a rock song. American Idiot sounds like it came straight from the 50′s.”

    “Dude, you’re clearly out of your league here. Smells Like Teen Spirit-I mean, come on. And American Idiot does not sound 50′s.”

    Just then, Alessandra strolled into the food court during our calm battle of Nirvana versus Green Day. She went up to the counter and got herself a drink. She hadn’t noticed us, and I was relieved. No way was I gonna have her catch me being given cool-ology lessons by Ben at a mall! Then she began to turn to walk to a table. 

    “Oh no! Hide!” I whisper-shouted to Ben, hoping Alessandra didn’t hear me. We ran into the nearest shop. We both took a moment to catch our breaths. 

    “Phew! We just dodged a bullet there!” I breathed. Ben, however, looked at me like we’d just done anything but.

    “Erm….Take a look around….” said Ben.

    I slowly took a look around. The first thing I noticed was a mannequin wearing a pair of underpants. The more I looked, the more underwear I saw, folded, on mannequins, on display in the window, all of them laced. My heart sank.

    “Oh, no….” I said.

    Ben looked equally uncomfortable. “Yikes.”

    We’d just run full steam into a lingerie store.

[pbpress]

Blood Candy: Chapters 7 and 8

by Ruqayyah Pickel

Lunch time arrived, and I found a note in the spot I usually sat at. 

“Change of plans,” it said. “Meet me in the back of the school. Forget your lunch; we’ll get food before we go. -A” 

Assuming that “A” was Akira, I headed out to the back of the school building. I honestly never liked coming back here; it’s where all the…shady things happened. It always smelled faintly of drugs, and cigarette remains were littered across the floor. It also didn’t help that there was a long, dark, recessed area where I suspected the shadiest of the shady things happened. I heard several people had been beaten up in this area. One person was even murdered, according to rumors—but Akira and Seb insisted that they weren’t dead…or at least not forever. (You’d think they’d use their skills to figure out who had murdered that poor kid and why instead of whether or not they were actually alive...but considering what Seb almost did to me last night, I really was in no position to make fun of him anymore.)

I felt a vibration in my pocket, and took out my phone to see a message from my mom. 

“Hey there,” it read, “I know you’re at school right now, and again, I don’t mean to alarm you, but I called the police station for updates on the investigation. They said that they’re gonna have to put it on hold for right now; they haven’t heard back from the officers that came by the house last night, so they’re trying to get in touch with them. That’s all. We’ll talk more when you come home. Love you, stay safe.” 

I let out a nervous sigh. In all honesty, I was rather nervous about going into this myself, so I was kind of counting on the police to find Seb and figure out just what had gotten into him. That being said, the police force was kind of unreliable, so confronting Seb myself could be a good thing...but the last time I saw him, he literally tried to kill me. 

I couldn’t even begin to imagine what Jasper would do once I saw him again. 

Suddenly, I heard an odd sound. It sounded like…something opening. A bag, probably. Had it not been for the faint, muffled giggling that accompanied that sound, then my heart would not have been racing as much. I turned the corner and found…nothing.

So what was that—

The tight feeling around my neck and the prickly feeling of a rope around it quickly answered my question. 

I found myself struggling to breathe, forcing in and out every breath, trying my hardest not to suffocate. The thick, prickly rope had already been tied quickly around my neck. I was on one knee as I tried to stop myself from getting dragged back by whoever had bound me. I struggled to turn around, but by the time I did, my heart sank.

It was Seb. 

A demented smile crossed his face as his peppermint pattern in his eyes continued to swirl. I could barely see the bloodstains on his baseball tee covered by his new black long coat. 

“S-Sebs…” I choked out, “wh-what’re y-you…” 

Once Seb realized he had me bound, he tied the other end of the rope to a nearby dumpster. I made one last feeble attempt to escape, but the world was already going dark. Though I was already blacking out, Seb made sure to finish the job by taking out the baseball bat I had used to knock him out the night before, and bringing it down hard on my head. The last thing I felt was my head hitting the hard concrete before everything went black. 

          ———————

[Chapter 8]

When I came to, I found myself in a sickeningly familiar office. 

I was bound to the same chair I was in yesterday using the same thick rope Seb used to choke me. 

“Hope the ride wasn’t too bumpy,” Jasper Kermit’s voice said. He entered the room and crouched down to my level with an arrogant smile. “Took you long enough. Though…” He frowned. “You’re not nearly as bloody as I expected you to be.” Jasper’s smile suddenly returned, only more cheerful this time. “Good! Means your little friend Sebs is actually marginally obedient and isn’t a greedy little leech.”

“Let me go!” I demanded as Jasper got up to go to his syringe cabinet. “I’ve done nothing to you!”

“I don’t exactly care,” he said, “but thanks for reminding me.” 

“I hope you realize I only took your stupid vampire candy just to be polite,” I snapped at him. “I should’ve just turned it down and saved myself the trouble.” 

Jasper laughed, a cruel and condescending sound. He crouched down to my level, syringe in hand. 

“You really think I would’ve given you that choice?” he taunted. “God, you are so naive. It’s embarrassing, really.” 

My heart was thundering. I was gonna die here, I thought. I’ve been kidnapped, I can’t call anyone for help, he’s gonna drain all of my blood and feed it to his army of vampires, he’s gonna—

Suddenly, Jasper started poking needles in the back of both hands, then in both wrists, and in both arms. Though the pain of blood works didn’t affect me as much anymore, having six needles stuck in my veins at once, plus the knowledge that these six needles were going to drain me of all my blood and kill me, made the entire process much more painful. 

Finally, he hooked all six needles up to one longer-than-normal syringe, with several others on the sidelines. 

“Oh…hold on,” Jasper said with a smirk. “Before we start, there’s one last thing I need to do.” 

He grabbed a nearby roll of duct tape, ripped off a piece, and taped it over my mouth. 

“Wouldn’t want a noise complaint, now, would we?” Jasper taunted. He wore a sadistic grin on his face...revealing fangs in his mouth and confirming any remaining suspicions. “Now we can get started…” 

Suddenly, a fire alarm went off in the building. 

“Wh-what the hell…?” he said, then turned to me, an annoyed look on his face. “I’m gonna go check out the alarm. Fortunately, you can’t really escape, so I guess enjoy the last minutes of your life.” He stood up and walked out the door. 

I tried to ignore the pain in my arms and wrists as I tried to figure out a way out of the situation. 

Chances are, I thought to myself, that I wouldn’t be able to escape before Jasper gets back. And if he sees that I tried to, then he’s probably gonna kill me even faster. I could sit here and die, and if/whenever Sebs snaps outta this, then he’ll have to live with the knowledge that he’s the reason his ‘best friend in the whole wide world since kindergarten’ is now six feet under with empty blood vessels and ghostly white skin. And you know what? I’m okay with that. I hope Seb feels like the scum of the earth for this—

Wait. No. Why am I blaming him? This is Jasper’s fault. He was the one who spiked the candy—with what?—he probably enlisted Seb to choke the consciousness outta me, and he is the person draining my blood. Not Seb. He didn’t want this. He wants me alive, and every remaining conscious part of him is probably screaming at himself mentally for putting me in harm’s way—

“Dakota!” a familiar voice called. I looked up to find Akira, Kaveri, and the kid from the other day, Oliver. He had a bandage wrapped around his shoulder with a bloody spot in the middle. 

“Hey! Finally!” I cheered. “GET THESE THINGS OUTTA ME NOW.”

“Alright, alright, geez,” Akira said. “You act like you’re dying.” She and Oliver began gently taking the needles out of my veins. The two of them raided the desk for bandages, and put them on my wrists and arms. 

“How did you guys find me?” I asked. 

“This hospital is one of the main headquarters of Clueham’s top vampire guild,” Kaveri explained as she was cutting me loose. “It’s also the only local hospital--because the Clueham officials all share a single brain cell--so I figured you’d be trapped here.”

“Oliver—or Oli, for short—is Jasper’s younger brother,” Akira said. “He was in the waiting room crying, and I asked him what was up. He told me about his brother who caused both the small bleeding hole in his shoulder and Seb’s newfound insanity. I triggered the fire alarm to cause a distraction, and boom!” She pulled out the last needle as Kaveri finished freeing me. “Here we are.”

“Akira, you genius,” I said. “Let’s go.”

“Let’s,” Oliver said, “before Jasper gets back. Exit’s just upstairs—“

“No,” I said. “I need to face Jasper.”

Oliver’s eyes widened with fear. 

“A-are you crazy?!” he cried. “He’ll kill you! And if he doesn’t, then Sebastian will!” 

“Seb wouldn’t kill me,” I said with a smile. “Hurt me, probably, but he could never bring himself to actually kill me.”

“I’m not so sure about that.” He pulled out his phone. “Can you set up some barricades?” he asked Akira and Kaveri.

He closed and locked the door, then opened up a video. Both girls nodded as they pushed the two chairs in the room in front of the door. Then, Oliver pressed play. 

The video showed Jasper in his office, experimenting with what I assumed to be blood and a variety of chemicals. The camera was positions a little higher up, but not high enough to be security footage.

“All the vampires in the facility—Jasper included—busted the security cameras,” Oli explained, “so I set one up behind the books in his office.

“What if he pulled out a book from that shelf?” Akira asked. 

“Well, he didn’t. He doesn’t read anymore; they’re just for show.”

Suddenly, Seb stormed into the office in the video. Jasper whirled his head around, a confused expression on his face. However, it quickly turned into a smile. 

“Oh, you must be Sebastian Briggs,” Jasper said. “Yeah, you definitely came here before. I recognize you from our database. How’s it going?” 

Silence. We could only see the back view of Seb, so if he was smiling, we couldn’t tell. 

Seb pointed to his neck with a shaky finger. “…m-make me…one of you…”

“Ohhhh…” Jasper said, nodding. “I see.” Suddenly, he gave Seb a slight glare. “Wait…no, no no no. I just…I can’t really do that, see. I don’t exactly know if I trust you to not be a filthy leech like some of the other greedy…subjects from before.” Jasper stood up. “See, you’re just the errand boy. You get Dakota for me, and once you do, then you get to start your real job. Got it?

Seb nodded.

“…b-but…I must…feed…like you…” 

Jasper sighed.

“You made a candy that gives people bloodlust,” Jasper murmured to himself. “Of course this was gonna happen.” He let out a sigh, and leaned back in his chair. 

“You know what?” Jasper said. “Sure. I’m gonna have to convert you anyways.” He stood up and grabbed something from his drawer. “But biting’s just…so informal, y’know? You’re my colleague now, I can’t just bite you on the neck like you’re some random on the street. Don’t worry. I got just the thing for that.” 

Jasper pulled out a small dagger-like device. The blade resembled that of the tooth of a wild beast, and the metal handle had dark red markings on it. 

“This little thingy allows me to give people the vampiric curse without biting them. Originally made for a vampire who got her teeth knocked out. Gimme your neck.”

Seb did, obeying Jasper with such blindness that it caused my blood to boil. I watched as Jasper held the other side of his errand boy’s neck as he made a decent-sized slit along his throat. As he did, the dagger’s markings lit up. When he was done, Seb was on his knees, holding the area where he was cut. Finally, he stood up, as Jasper gave a triumphant smile.

“Perfect,” he said. “Sebastian, you work for me from now on.” He took out a black long coat from his closet. “Put this on. There’s a small mirror over there if you wanna check yourself out.”

Seb put on the coat, and went over to a nearby mirror—which just happened to be on the bookshelf. That’s when Seb noticed the camera. 

The video cut off just after he looked at it. 

“I was controlling the camera from my phone,” Oliver explained. “So I turned it off right as I saw Sebastian looking at me.” 

“…so, he’s a vampire now?” I said. 

Kaveri nodded solemnly. I looked over at her.

“Can we cure him?” I asked. 

“We can probably cure his bloodlust,” she said, “but if you want him to, well, not be a vampire…you’re gonna have to kill him.”

I sighed. 

“Guess I’ll just have a vampire for a friend,” I said.

“Once this is over,” Akira said, “I want at least 90% of the credit for this conspiracy.”

“You’re still gonna make a post about this?!” Kaveri cried. “This isn’t a game, y’know. This is an actual threat.”

Akira just shrugged. 

“Gotta keep the hustle goin’,” she replied simply. “Besides...best to keep the people informed, right? They might take it a bit less seriously since it’s a ‘conspiracy,’ but they’ll believe us. They always do.” 

“Let’s actually get this done first,” I reminded her. “But yeah, I can respect that. Don’t want anyone else going through what we’ve been through.”

Suddenly, a loud BANG came from outside the door. 

“DAKOTA!” Jasper yelled from the other side of the door. “I better not find you untied in there, or I will MURDER YOU.” 

Akira rummaged through the drawers and shelves, then finally found and grabbed a reflex hammer. She motioned for Oliver and I to open the door. Reluctantly, we both stood on the other side of the door, out of sight, and pulled down the barricades. Jasper stormed into the room, just as Akira threw the reflex hammer at his head with a sickening thud. Jasper stumbled backward as Kaveri rammed into him, shoving him out of the threshold and trying to stick a dagger in his arm. However, Jasper kicked her out of the way.

“You three go on ahead!” Kaveri yelled. “I’ll deal with this vampire.” 

“Can you handle him?” I asked. “You just have a knife; is that gonna--” 

That’s when I noticed the other sheath on her belt. It was shorter than a full sword, but longer than her knife. The hilt appeared to be dark and wooden, and I could only pray that it was a stake.

“Yes,” Kaveri called, holding Jasper back. “Yes it will.”

I nodded, and took off down the hallway with my friends.

“Alright,” Akira said as we ran down the hallway. “Here’s the plan: Oli knows where the secret files are...don’t ask me how, he just does. I was confused too. Anyway, he’ll take us there and we’ll figure out what this whole candy situation is about.”

“You guys do that,” I replied. “I’m gonna try and subdue Seb, then you guys come back up when you have a cure.” 

“You’ll be okay, right?” she asked. “Can you take Seb by yourself?”

“He and I used to play fight when we were younger,” I explained. “If I could take him then, I certainly can now.” 

Akira sighed. 

“Fine,” she said. “If there’s any trouble, find a hiding spot and text me ASAP. Worst comes to worst, we can abandon ship and find Seb another day. He’ll likely come to us, anyhow.”

“No. I’m ending this now.” We stopped at a stairwell.

“This is it,” Oli said, holding my hand. “Be safe, Dakota.”

“I will,” I said. “I have to be.” With that, we went our separate ways.

[pbpress]

The Ultimate Addiction

By Karina Martinez

“Goodbye,” he said abruptly. It was silent and although he said it, he wished he hadn’t. His eyes begging her to tell him to stay, to ask him to never leave her again. If only she would, he would listen, or maybe he wouldn’t. At that moment it’s unclear. 

“Bye,” she replied. The small, yet heavy word leaves a void behind as the shaky whisper exhales through her lips. He froze, expecting it, but is equally as disappointed. Although he said it, he wished he hadn’t. He leaned back, still facing her, his eyes filled with tears, and his chest tensed. To him, just the thought of living a life without her is no life at all. All of the moments they shared run a losing race through his mind at once. His breath becomes shallow, he wants more than anything to take it all back. His own relief stops him. You see, he has been at war with himself since the day he met her. He was fully aware of the lifetime of satisfaction he could never provide, but he pursued her anyway. Finally choosing her, instead of himself, he half-smiled. In this second, the deep sadness in him is ignored by the solace of his self-sacrificing decision. 

As he backed away, the voices in her head cried out. She put her hand over her mouth as if to stop herself from screaming after him. Although she said it, she wanted him to stay. 

Those telepathic powers they always talked about having didn’t seem to work this time, or maybe they did; the result is the same. They always shared moments together that could only be explained by their undying love for one another. Sometimes it was a look they gave each other, not needing to say anything but knowing what the other is thinking. Other times it was finishing each other's sentences, or knowing when the other person needing saving. When they would, and they almost always would have moments that they believed to be a sign of their soul tied connection, they were powerful. They were moments of reassurance, that they, in fact, were exactly where they needed to be, together. As time went on, the signs started to get all the more confusing. The constant pushing and pulling. The arguing started when needs remain unmet. It was clear they shared something special, but it wasn’t enough to make it right. 

She looked at him with the same eyes she always did when she wanted something desperately. He stared into her eyes and remembered. 

It wasn’t too long ago when he would stop at nothing to make her desires possible but now was different. She grew up in a place full of people left behind by society. They were once dreamers who had every idea of what they wanted in life but somewhere along the way, they lost sight of it all. She was always surrounded by people who settled for less than enough, people who decided their dreams could wait. Since a young age, she knew wanted more for herself.  She wanted a life worth remembering.  She was made for more than the stereotype of what a woman should be, and what a woman should have. She never saw herself being a mother, or having just one home. She wanted to travel, make the whole world her home. She wanted to make the kind of memories a person only read in books or saw in movies. More than that she wanted someone to share these things with. He could never live up to what she deserved in a lifelong partner. Her standards of life never matched his, and a part of him finally understood this. His plans for the future were simple. His only dreams were serving his country, marrying the love of his life, buying a home in the place where they both grew up, and having a family. This was something she could never really understand. All she could make up was that some people were made for the kind of life he wanted, but she knew she was never one of them. No matter how hard he tried their outlook on life was always different, and when it came to the things that mattered to them most they could never agree. He was willing to give up his dreams for hers. He was willing to give her his world. She would never let him. She would always say, “Who am I to keep you from your dreams?” His reply was always the same, “you are all I need” No words would ever change her mind on what she knew to be true. She knew at one point or another, he would resent her. He would hate her for never living up to his expectations of what he wanted her to be. She didn’t want to be a mother, she saw more for herself than just having children and dedicating her life to them. She didn’t want someone who was almost constantly away on duty. She wanted someone present and able, someone to share her extraordinary life with. This was her one true desire, to be free alongside someone else. She knew some people were made for the kind of life he wanted, but she was never one of them. 

  She blinked and a tear rolled down her cheek, although this didn’t ruin his train of thought. 

He could make all the right choices, say all the right things, but nothing could ever fix the broken foundation they stood on. It was never just one thing. It was a mountain of mistakes, she tried to ignore or forgive. 

In February, just months into their relationship their foundation cracked for the first time. They were on their way to a party for a mutual friend. The ride over was one of their favorite memories. They were in the best mood, nothing could ruin it. All they had to do was look at each other and there was an explosion of ugly laughter, the best kind. There's something vulnerable about an ugly laugh, something special. In those moments they didn’t care what they sounded like in front of each other because they were having fun. When they finally arrived, they began socializing and it went on like that for a few hours. Towards the end of the night, his secrets were spilled by a slightly too drunk nobody. 

When they met he had a girlfriend. Her name was Gabby. They were together for 4 years and he broke up with her when he was sure he could have another. He never told her about Gabby. He lied about everything and he did it well. This particular lie continued for 6 months. That night she demanded an explanation, and at her disappointment, he failed at providing one. “The past is in the past,” he said, “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. I didn’t want you to be upset and leave. She means nothing to me. She is the past” He didn’t see that to her it was all very new. What he let go of long ago was now presented in front of her and she was expected to just get over it and quit obsessing. The worst part wasn’t that he had someone before, even she had a past. It was the continuous lie, it was the intention to keep it hidden forever if it wasn’t for the drunken girl. It was the belief that she was building something strong with someone worthy only to hear it was all a lie. Their trust now broken, their foundation now cracked, the cycle begins and the lies never go away. 

The truth was, it was too late and he knew that. He knew that his want for her was more than love. It was something stronger, something more powerful. It was a need, an addiction. There was no escape. There was no letting go or moving on. What he has for her, it lives within him, pulsing through his veins waiting for the constant satisfaction of her presence. All he ever wanted to do was make her happy, and at times he even succeeded, but somewhere in him he always knew there was more for her, and it was never him. He always felt like he was the demon weighing down an angel. 

When they first met there was something about her that shined, but now was different. In her efforts to keep him and the weak foundation they so graciously built, he fought long and hard to fix the mistakes made by them both. Somewhere along the way, she began losing parts of herself in him. She was healthy once but he made her weak. It was the slow, gradual, seemingly natural dimming of strong, brimming light. He didn’t notice at first, but as time went on during the smallest of moments when he would look at her in awe and in love, his eyes full of gratitude, his expression would turn almost instantly into one of exploration. It was then when he didn’t see that light. She didn’t laugh or smile the same or even look at him the way she used to. She was slowly becoming unhappy with her choice to stay and forgive. She realized it wasn’t really what she wanted anymore and it showed. The more she forgave him the less she loved him and the more he loved her. So he knew, he almost always knew that it was something about him or something about her that would never fit. No matter how much he more than loved her, and no matter how much she loved him he knew he would never be the one. Whether it was lust, infatuation, or their unbeknownst need to heal their own brokenness through one another, one thing was for sure, they didn’t care. They stayed because they enjoyed feeding off of each other. It wasn’t love, it was a transaction. How it kills him to know. If it were true, if it were real, if it were the least bit pure, there would be no need for goodbye. When two people are truly, and utterly meant for each other, they are meant to be forever. Maybe that’s just what he tells himself or maybe there’s some truth behind the words he uses to ease his soul, whatever the case, he loved her and she loved him. 

He reached out his hand to wipe the tears away but then he remembered why it was there, so he stopped himself and sighed while looking down to the floor. 

If you asked him why he can’t let go, he’ll tell you it’s because he loves her. He won’t say it’s because a part of him has an addiction, but even the words that remain unspoken are proven to be true. He loved that she stayed despite his mistakes. He loved the way she loved him. She loved him honestly and purely but as the mistakes piled and truths were revealed her love for him became toxic. A part of him feeds off of the constant cycle of being with someone you know you weren’t meant for. It longs for her. He wishes it was something he could explain, but to the broken little boy inside of him, it’s all that’s certain. It seems the sick, broken part of him attracted her. It’s all his heart really knew and so, he can’t let go. She completed all of his broken pieces with hers. She stays because “I love you” but it’s more than that. A healthy kind of love would not stand for dysfunction. She is worth more than the pain he brings her. She deserves more than his sick version of love. 

They stand facing each other, now three feet apart. Once high on the love, they served one another, they stand sober, fully aware. 

Since they are broken they may only love from their broken place and it cannot let go. What are they together if not meant to be? Now, they are nothing, truly and utterly nothing. 

As he backed away he looked at her, the way he always did when he wanted something desperately. 

It wasn’t too long ago when she would stop at nothing to make his desires possible but now is goodbye.