Lit/Pub #IV - The Wake Up Issue - Spring2024

Table of Contents
Editor's Note
iii
Sidetracks
Shirtless on the Corso by Joey Colianni
Home Bred by Tommy Camp
Miss France by Hope Kan
Tango at the Jey by Gian Carbone
1
3
5
9
Prose
The Infinite Boredom of a Dreamless Night by Liliana Zimberg
Pink Cat, Pink Cat by Grace Stathatos
Brownie's Watering Hole by Hanna Hadrick
Buddy in Ink by Kyra Berg
13
16
19
23
Poetry
Three poems by Madelyn Ferber
25
Fiction
Hanging Rock Dream Clinic by Antonio Fronterrè
Backstroke by Lucia Guerrieri
Failure to Notice by Natalie Cooper
35
40
43
Guest Essay
I Am Doing Well, Objectively Speaking by Autumn McIntyre
45
Cover by Isabella Klepikoff
Assistant Editor
Emma Curran
Art Direction
Isabella Klepikoff
Daria Sukhishvili
i
Production Editor
Marco Parolin

Special thanks to Harry Greiner. This magazine is a product of
ENG305 - Literary Editing and Publishing taught by Andrea di Robilant
at the American University of Rome.
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Editor's Note
Last year’s issue of Lit/Pub was about the slow return to a post-Covid world. This year the initial
theme was dreams – time to get on with it and think about the future. But the more we discussed
what to put in the issue, the more it became apparent that a lingering wariness was still in the air, even
a certain complacency. Hence the exhortatory title – The Wake Up Issue – which Isabella Klepikoff
has deftly captured in the design of this year’s cover: a wolf resting by a Roman fountain. He looks to
be resting but his lively green eyes tell us he is stirring back to action.
In her wry and humorous essay, Liliana Zimberg writes about her congenital inability to
dream. Grace Stathatos is afflicted by the opposite ailment: she lives in a state of confusion because her
dreams never leave her – literally. Strange dreams are also at the center of Antonio Fronterrè’s fictional
piece in which a man hopes to improve his dreams with a little brain surgery.
There is still a yearning to keep the past close at hand. Hanna Hadrick lives in Rome but
evokes with bittersweet fondness her hometown watering hole. Kyra Berg deals with the grief for
the loss of her Chihuahua by having a tattoo etched on her wrist. In her poignant short story, Lucia
Guerrieri transforms a past tragedy into myth. And Natalie Cooper tells a funny story about not being
enough in the present.
For this year’s poetry section we turned to Madelyn Ferber’s vibrant, rough-edged poems
about fitting and mostly not fitting in this world.
And this year’s issue has a new section called Sidetracks. It includes four short, lighthearted
sketches from the neighborhood and beyond: Joey Colianni enjoys buying shirts and boxers in a
storied shop near the Corso; Tommy Camp takes us on a homesick lunch-break at Homebaked; Hope
Kan meets the eccentric Miss France; and Gian Carbone takes us out for an evening of Tango.
In the Guest Essay section, Lit/Pub alum Autumn McIntyre gives us a sobering account
about life in the real world. She’s doing well “objectively speaking.” Hmm…
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Sidetracks
Shirtless on the Corso
By Joey Colianni
Cold and tired, I pause and peep into the shop window. I had been tacking back and forth
aimlessly on Via del Corso for three days looking for a new wardrobe. An array of colorful shirts are
hanging in the display. Tidily written descriptions are pinned to them. I recognize the same style of
Italian handwriting that I’ve seen on old family recipes. The store feels familiar. The subtle white
lettering on the entrance reads ‘SCHOSTAL.’ I push open the glass door and go inside.
The soft glow draws me into a new world of fineries. The lively chatter and charm perk me
up as shoppers and sales ladies casually buzz about. Some with armfuls of pajamas, others inspecting
the textiles’ fine weave. Large globular pendants hang from the tall ceiling. Like a rich honeycomb, the
shelves are filled with shirts in every cut, cloth, and color.
It is warm in the store. Not warm with the sweaty hustle-and-bustle of other stores in the
centro storico – warm in a cozy way. A dog about the size of a bread loaf is napping in the corner. A
well-dressed Italian woman lists an extensive order of shirts for her husband. I’m asked if I need help,
and I recite the sentence that I’ve been practicing: “Cercando per camicie.” In an instant, I’m being
fitted for shirts.
“Did the airline lose your luggage?” the bespectacled head shopkeeper asks.
“No, I’m just really bad at packing.”
Weeks ago, everything I owned was spread across tables, countertops, and chairs in my basement
as I packed for Rome. Carefully, I chose a few items from every stack and tucked them away in
my luggage. “Pared down, minimalist,” my sister said. “I’m impressed.”
There was even room to spare; enough for a box of Milk Duds and the granola bars that my
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mother insisted I bring. “I’ve done a damn fine job of packing,” I thought.
Turned out I had not, in fact, done a ‘damn fine’ job of packing. I had brought a threadbare
denim button-down, a Kappa Kappa Gamma tee shirt with spaghetti stains, and shoes that gave me
blisters while I limped around Rome, but no proper shirts.
Now in this welcoming oasis, Charline, one of the shopkeepers, assists me in selecting fabrics
and colors. I browse shirts in oxford, flannel, poplin, and fil-a-fil. There is a selection of solids, stripes,
tartans, and checkers. Collars with buttons or collars without. Pajamas, night shirts, boxer shorts, and
socks. Wools, silks, wool-silk blends, crewnecks, v-necks, or cardigans.
“What would you like to see next?” Charline asks after each item I select. We move from shirts
to sweaters to boxers, with friendly exchanges.
In between the various cabinets, counters, and shelves, the walls are covered with photos –
new and old. Since 1870, Schostal has been the atelier of choice for shoppers of discerning taste.
“You’ve supplied shirts for celebrities and royalty,” I say, pointing to the portraits.
“Dukes, authors, celebrities. This one is of Alfredo Casella, the composer. He shopped here,
and so did Luigi Pirandello, the Italian playwright. I am not that old,” Shirley, the head shopkeeper,
laughs, “I did not work here back then.” The contemporary clientele is impressive. “Anne Hathaway,
Wes Anderson, Harry Styles – and you. You all get your shirts here.” She shows me an Instagram DM
box full of messages from celebrities and influencers.
I try on some shirts and ask the ladies in the store how they look. I like one with olive green
and white stripes; I think it will be nice in the Spring. “It goes well with your eyes,” they say. We move
on to socks. Shirley, Queen Bee, peers over her round glasses – perfectly perched at the end of her
nose. She wraps the length of a Cardinal red sock around my fist to find the perfect size. She stands
straight in her blazer, printed silk scarf, and Schostal shirt, recommending another shop nearby where
I can find matching pants. “Don’t be shy – tell them I sent you, and ask for the pants on sale. Tell
them you’re a student.”
It wasn’t always easy for Schostal. After the Jewish laws were enacted in 1938, the firm narrowly
avoided closure by the Fascist regime by claiming that the family was not of Jewish origin and
that the name of the store was an acronym for ‘Società Commerciale Hongroise Objets Soie Toile
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Articles Lainage.’ But the firm was forced to close anyway during the war because manufacture and
prices collapsed.
On the wall is a framed newspaper clipping describing the jubilant reopening. An old blacand-white
photograph shows a packed crowd in front of the store. A sign says: “We open Jan. 2. All
goods at prewar prices until we are sold out. Please buy as little as you can – think of others.” The mob
of shoppers in the photograph bought the entire stock within hours.
“Do you want your shirt monogrammed?” Shirley asks, pointing to the other side of the store,
where a woman with a needle and thread is expertly branding a set of shirts. We sift through several
dozen colors of thread in a small box and settle on deep red.
I walk over to Caffè Ciampini to eat a sandwich while I wait for my shirt to be ready. An hour
later I return to the store and pick up my purchases: the monogrammed shirt, a flannel shirt, a sweater,
boxer shorts, and socks.
On the way home, I think of the red initials on the chest pocket of my new shirt, set against
the olive green and white stripes. The combination of colors reminds me of the Italian flag.
Home Bred
By Tommy Camp
My first week in Rome I was a nervous wreck. Nothing here is the same as it is in South Carolina,
where I grew up. Nothing could have prepared me for the chaos, the traffic, the hustle and bustle
of the Eternal City. Here I was in this foreign land where they speak a foreign language, living with
random people I had just met. I missed my normal life back home. My stomach was always in a knot.
School started and I made a vow to myself to try all the lunch spots near the American University
campus, where I would be spending the next few months. After trying a couple of cafes and
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sandwich shops that were nothing special, I followed a lead that led me to a small American-style
breakfast and lunch joint just a few blocks away from campus. “You’ll find great sandwiches and excellent
service,” I was told.
And I did. Homebaked is a busy little place that immediately reminded me of my life back
home. The atmosphere is friendly, the young staff greets you warmly. The room is filled with natural
light. The walls are painted a bright yellow. On one of them hangs a large map of the United States;
colorful ballpoint pins mark the spots where customers have visited from. Another wall is covered
with sticky thank-you notes, handwritten by students and tourists grateful for the familiar atmosphere
and good American food they found thousands of miles away from home.
A glass case in the corner is full of freshly baked desserts. The room is filled with the fragrant
aroma of muffins, cookies, and brownies. One customer is pouring maple syrup on a stack of pancakes,
another one is eating a bagel with cream cheese. In the back, the staff is preparing Buffalo chicken
wraps and frying real American bacon. Jake, the Maltese dog, is sniffing for scraps and students go
over to pet him.
It did not take long for this quaint little spot to become my home away from home. But
Homebaked would not be Homebaked without Jesse Smeal, the owner, who is often there to welcome
you from behind the counter. After my third visit he was calling me by my first name and asking
me if I wanted my usual order.
Jesse, who is 49, opened Homebaked in 2015. He had been working for the Penn State Study
Abroad Program, and when they closed their Rome office he knew exactly what he wanted to do next:
open a place where American students who were only in Rome for a few months could hang out and
eat good American food without having to worry about language and cultural barriers – the sort of
place he yearned for when he was a student abroad.
Jesse left his hometown, Buffalo, in the mid-1990s, to study in Ireland. He was 19 years old.
He had a wonderful time and made many friends with whom he is still in touch today. It was in
Ireland that he fell in love with the idea of living abroad for the rest of his life. He has spent time in
Vietnam, Cambodia, and Thailand. He also lived in Brazil for a while, studied in France and the UK,
and eventually came to Rome. Jesse lives in Rome with his wife, Carolina, and their two sons, Daniel
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and Michael, who are 17 and 15.
On my latest lunch stop, Jesse was making sandwiches when he saw me come in.
“Hey brother, got any plans for the weekend?” he asked.
“Yes sir, my mom is coming to Europe and we are meeting up in Paris!” I answered.
“That sounds like fun! I hope you enjoy your time with her,” he said as more AUR students
came through the door. It was lunch rush at Homebaked, where homesick American students feel at
home “and where I,” Jesse once told me, “get to hang out with my people.”
Miss France
By Hope Kan
I was walking with my roommate, lost between the Pantheon and Starbucks, when a pink
mannequin looked down at me from the window of a store. It wore a turquoise tutu. The name of the
store was spelled out in curly red, blue, and white candy-striped letters: “Miss France”.
“This looks like a great place to stop,” I tried to say, but my feet moved faster than my mouth
as I gestured to my roommate to follow me. There were piles of clothing in the window display and
past the mannequin I could see walls of denim, linen, and cloth. But it was a small glass box of multicolored
beads and charms that called me. I rushed to it until my nose was pressed against the window
glass.
It took me a while to notice the woman standing by the entrance. She was petite and had gray
hair with silvery bangs clasped to the side with a plastic pink hair clip. She wore a mauve dress with
embroidered cats over rainbow tights. She had a wool coat on, and a thin black ribbon was tied around
her neck. She was mumbling to herself while she rummaged inside a beaded purple coin bag. My
roommate grabbed my arm to pull me away but it was too late, and I stepped towards the woman.
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Sidetracks
“Ciao, come stai?” I said in my poor Italian. She looked up at me, with her gray eyes, and rattled
off in Italian.
“Uh,” my roommate interjected.
“Oh, English?”
“Yes, please, I’m sorry,” I said sheepishly.
“English is easier for me anyway. I learned English in primary school, I didn’t learn Italian until
I came here; it’s really not easy at all for me to speak it.” She talked as if she was short of breath and
on the verge of either laughing or yelling at you. Her accent sounded Italian to me.
“How perfect! Are you open? My roommate and I are trying to find some pants.”
She tilted her head, looked up to the sky and sighed. “No, no, no I am very very busy. I have
lots to do everyday and I am an old woman. Can you believe I am 82 years old?”
“You don’t look a day over 81,” I said jokingly.
The woman didn’t laugh. “Yes, I am 82 years old. Much too old to be working but I am a bee,
I am always busy. This store isn’t my work, it is my passion. I don’t open it most of the time. People
come by and see my prices and say, ‘Wow, when are you open?’ But I don’t open it most days. I don’t
open it on rainy days and on days when I don’t want to.”
“Oh. Fair enough. Thank you anyway!”
I started to turn away rather confused when I heard her sigh again.
“Wait, I am open! I am open! Come inside bella, please.”
I laughed, not knowing what else to do. I looked over to my roommate, who was still standing
outside. She shrugged and was about to step in when the woman leapt forward and closed the door,
trapping me inside and jamming my roommate’s foot.
“NO! NO!” the woman yelled. Then, after taking a few deep breaths to calm herself: “Sorry,
scuzi, please no, only one at a time, there is no room. This is a small shop, and I can only give my attention
to one person at a time. What if you don’t know what you want? How can I help two people at
once? One at a time please, one at a time.”
She grabbed my arm again, and pulled me into her shop.
The place looked like a hurricane had blown through. It was a jumble of shirts with strange
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letterings, dresses with animal prints and polka dots, plenty of paisley everywhere, and knotted scarves
hanging here and there. It was impossible to tell what color the walls were, or where the floor ended
and the walls began because clothes were scattered everywhere. The only empty space was a twofeet-wide
square in the center of the room, but it was so small that instead of providing a tiny bit of
wiggle-room it only enhanced the feeling of claustrophobia. The stench of mothballs made me gag.
“What do you need?” Miss France asked me.
The top of her hair tickled my nose.
“Pants,” I said.
“Ahh, pants, perfect, I have lots of pants. I have pants from England and France, I have pants
from Turkey and also Italian pants. Mainly from France though, where I am from. What type of pants
do you need, what type do you like?”
Her manner of speaking, her random interjections, even her accent were giving me a headache.
“I’m not sure. I seem to keep running out of clean ones. I guess any is fine.”
As she pointed to a full dresser on one side of the room, I heard a loud “EXCUSE ME?” Miss
France screeched again, tossing her hands in the air. “NO NO NO! No! I am very busy please! There is
no room!” She hurried over to the door, where another customer was holding a shirt and looking very
alarmed.
The pants were tiny. I cursed myself for falling for the colorful sign at the entrance and I
cursed Miss France for the spell she cast on me. The smell, the clutter, and the yelling were making me
panic. Her eyes terrified me. I wanted to get out as fast as I could, but I was afraid of leaving without
purchasing anything.
I scanned the cluttered room, desperately searching for my ticket out of that crazy store, until
I saw the shirt I would buy: a purple thermal long sleeve, decorated with multicolored pearlescent
buttons down the middle, and red sequin lettering on the collar.
“I tell her I am busy, I have a customer, but no,” I heard Miss France muttering, “So she gives
me 5 euros and I tell her ‘leave me.’”
I couldn’t tell if she was talking to me or herself or some unseen third party. But I no longer
cared. Quickly, the shirt, the shirt, the shirt.
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Sidetracks
“What were we doing? Ah, the pants, yes. A very nice brand, hard to find.”
“I’m sorry I don’t think these will fit me,” I interrupted. “But I do see a shirt over there!”
Miss France tilted her head like an owl, and her crazy eyes stared deep into mine.
“Oh. Do you not need pants anymore?”
I thought of my roommate waiting outside, confused and scared. I pressed on.
“Pants, who needs them! But shirts, that I need!”
Her strange way of speaking had infected my own, and I found myself speaking in nonsense
and Wonderland riddles. I cleared my throat and shook the fuzz out of my head. “How much for that
purple shirt on the wall?”
“Ahhhh,” Miss France said, “That is a good one. Very cute.” She pulled down the shirt with a
stick. The shirt was even uglier up close; a button was missing and she had replaced it with a palm tree
sequined pin. I touched the pin – an unexpected taste of Arizona, my home state, had found its way
deep into Miss France’s store.
“Yes, the pin, I will give that to you as a gift. Normally, it would be 5 euro for the pin alone,
but I will give it to you. And I will give you another gift at the end, don’t worry. I am here for you, as
you are here for me. The shirt is 15 euro.”
I winced. That was my budget for the whole day, and I hadn’t yet eaten. But I needed to get
out of there.
“Amazing,” I said, and as I opened my bag to pull out my wallet, I saw a plastic heart charm
that my mother had given me for Christmas. It said “I LOVE LONDON” in thick white letters. I
pulled the charm off the strap and heard myself saying, “I have a gift for you too.”
“Ah, I see. I see.” She took the charm from me and smiled. “Perfect for the window.”
We were both quiet for a moment, and I heard the street bustle outside, the whir of the fan in
the corner, and my roommate on the phone outside. I handed her 20 euros and she pulled out a metal
Hello Kitty tin full of cash and trinkets and hairpins, and gave me back my change.
Miss France walked to the corner of her shop and came back with a ring. It was wooden and
didn’t fit any of my fingers, but when she placed it in my palm, I nearly cried.
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Sidetracks
Tango at the Jey
By Gian Carbone
The interior of the Jey Jazz club was in the shape of a tilted hourglass. The front room – a barand-lounge
with red and black walls, and scattered seats and couches – was filling up quickly when I
arrived; the space led to an even more crowded hall where people were craning their necks to catch a
glimpse of the musicians who were getting ready to play.
Veronica Bigliani was at the piano chatting with friends; when strangers came up to her to say
hello she smiled politely. I recognized Edgar Dutary on the other side of the small concert room; he
was wearing a black harness for his tuba which contrasted with his brown vest.
I had met Edgar and Veronica at the Panamanian embassy in Rome while visiting my aunt
who works there. They had told me they were jazz musicians and had invited me to one of their upcoming
concerts. They went by the name Contrast Duo.
Edgar, who plays the tuba, is from Panama City – he was at the embassy that day to get some
travel papers. He is a burly, jovial fellow with brown eyes and close-cropped curly hair. Veronica, an
accomplished pianist, is Italian but was born in San Francisco and has spent much of her life in Asia
(her father is a diplomat). She has a warm smile, blue-gray eyes, and a rich cascade of auburn hair that
turns blond towards the ends.
I told friends about the concert, and a few actually showed up. I spoke to them briefly, and
then wiggled through the choke point, into the hall where Veronica and Edgar were about to start
playing. Half a dozen portraits of jazz musicians holding their trumpets and saxophones hung on the
walls. I made eye contact with Edgar and his face lit up. I started to move in his direction; he swung
through the crowded space with ease, shook my hand, and then guided me back towards his position.
Veronica, who was wearing a white shirt with fringes, was still surrounded by friends; but now
she sat stalwart behind her instrument – an island in the room’s turbulent sea. She smiled and shook
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my hand but looked a little confused.
“He’s the one from the embassy,” Edgar said.
Her lips parted. I couldn’t blame her for not remembering who I was.
We went back and forth in a mix of Spanish and Italian.
“Where are you sitting?” she asked suddenly.
I told her I’d be taking notes to write a piece about them, so she turned to a nearby table and
asked the customers if I could sit with them. I went to tell my friends I’d be up front and quickly
returned. I felt a little out of place at the table. Everyone was holding hands, drinking together, and
talking about music in Italian.
Edgar hooked his tuba onto his harness and held it in one hand like one would a baby and said
a few words about Astor Piazzolla, the great Argentinian composer of Italian descent. I had expected
an evening of jazz but now realized it was going to be New Tango with only some elements of jazz.
While Edgar talked about Piazzolla, small beads of sweat formed on his brow and forehead. He was
smiling, and I could feel his confidence rising along with the pressure to perform.
Meanwhile, Veronica sifted through her music. She is the more reserved one of the two, she
later told me, adding that it might have something to do with growing up in Japan and other places in
Asia.
Suddenly, Edgar’s fingers positioned themselves on the tuba’s valves and he pressed his lips
to the mouthpiece as if whispering a secret to it. Veronica quit her polite smiles to concentrate on the
moment. She was perfectly still until she started playing, and then she seemed to be in a trance as her
fingers pressed the ivory keys of the piano. With each stroke she laid a brick on a musical path, and
the sound of the tuba ran along it. The piano notes were building a city and the tuba was guiding me
through it. I was drawn deeper into a hurried chase as I watched them go back and forth in a crescendo.
Then Edgar and Veronica looked at each other, and with a slow nod brought the first piece to an
end.
Edgar explained that the city we had been traversing was Buenos Aires. I’ve never been there
and I have no idea what it looks like, yet, like everyone else in the room, I felt I had been transported
there.
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Edgar and Veronica played several more pieces by Piazzolla with great intensity. The audience
was captivated and cheered loudly at the end of each song.
“We will now play ‘Las Cuatro Estaciones porteñas’,” Edgar announced. He had mostly been
speaking in Italian, but he switched to Spanish to introduce Piazzolla’s classic piece on the four seasons
of Buenos Aires.
The blast of the tuba introduced Spring, and the audience was rushing through the city once
more on the hurried, rhythmic notes of the piano. Summer came with a slower, more lonesome beat
that reminded me of the crushing humidity we have in Rome in August – the piano notes raining
down heavily on us. Autumn brought a sense of relief and sweet nostalgia. With Winter, the tempo
slowed down and the two musicians brought the music smoothly to a rest. I marveled at the versatility
of the two instruments and the bravura of the two musicians in expressing such disparate moods: a
frustrated cry, a lonely murmur, a tempest in a violently hot summer.
The audience rose from the seats and clapped. Jey's small concert space quickly filled with
spectators crowding around the musicians to offer their congratulations.
A few days later, I met Edgar and Veronica at a diner-style restaurant in Prati. Music from the
‘50s and ‘60s played in the background during dinner.
Edgar told me Piazzolla’s music found them more than the other way around. “The first piece
we ever did together was by Piazzolla. It brought us together, it told us ‘this group works.’”
“And we hadn’t even been thinking of forming a group,” Veronica added. “We played together
because playing together came so easily.” They played together for four years before their relationship
changed and they became a couple.
The conversation drifted from music to more general topics and back to music. We expressed
our frustration at the direction the world was taking, and complained about the pressure of money
over artistic expression. But we also shared an appreciation for having the chance to see the world, to
pursue our dreams.
“I think we are all united by dreams,” Edgar said, “We all have dreams.”
“It’s not that I have a dream,” Veronica added, “We have a dream.”
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She paused and then said she felt she had to express herself through music “at any cost.” Edgar
added that in these uncertain times music spoke to him more than ever. “It heals me.”
After some more talking, Edgar and Veronica looked at each other, nodding as if they’d just
finished a song.
The two are engaged to be married in June.
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Prose
The Infinite Boredom of a Dreamless Night
By Liliana Zimberg
I don’t dream. I don’t, I can’t, I won’t…
A natural process can’t be forced.
But I like to hear about other people's dreams. They can sound very pleasant! Of course sometimes
they don’t make any sense to me and sometimes they are frankly boring.
My friends will tell me when I appear in their dreams, and it feels strange. At times I wish they
wouldn't but then I’m always eager to hear every detail. It’s like when a friend tells you about your
drunken behavior during a night you can’t remember.
I want to know how I behave in other people’s dreams – “What did I say?” I ask. “What was
I wearing?” – and I cling to their descriptions in the hope of seeing something about me that I recognize.
But then they tell me things like: “I had a dream about you and you were insulting me.” In one
dream I was a terrorist. In another dream I put a bomb in a children’s hospital – I was told a little too
casually about that for my liking. Sometimes I am just there, hanging out in someone else’s dream. A
friend in highschool once said to me, “I dreamt about you, you were wearing a red hoodie.” And that
was it. Does any of this mean anything? I have to think it doesn’t, or where would I be?
In any case, I choose not to be offended. After all, dreams are the product of the unconscious
mind. They say the brain mashes up the events of the day while digesting emotions and stress, and
then the dream director puts together a private little show for no one else but the dreamer, who also
gets to interpret the dream. Sounds like fun. Though I wonder what it’s like to have people from one’s
everyday life cast as actors in one’s dreams, and then having to face them in the morning. I pray they
don’t think too much about my spotty appearances.
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Prose
Of course I’ve searched the internet. Every medical website I’ve consulted claims that my inability
to dream should be cause for concern. It could be linked to anxiety, depression, or psychological
stress of some kind. Dreamless nights – listen to this – may be an indicator of neurological damage.
One website suggested they were the result of “poor sleep hygiene,” whatever that means. The internet
suggests all sorts of dream-related health issues: some people dream too much, some never dream
because they never sleep, some wake up trapped in a sleeping body – which sounds more like a nightmare
to me.
Then I found this: “Charcot-Wilbrand Syndrome (CWS) is dream loss following focal brain
damage specifically characterized by visual agnosia and loss of ability to mentally recall or visualize
images.” The condition apparently dates back to a case study by two 19th century neurologists, Jean
Martin Charcot and Hermann Wilbrand, and was first described by one Otto Potzl as “mind blindness
with disturbance of optic imagination.”
That didn’t sound too good. But then I found a more current definition that describes CWS
as “the association of loss of the ability to conjure up visual images or memories and the loss of dreaming.”
Now I have plenty of memories and I also day-dream a good deal so I figure I am not afflicted by
CWS. At least not yet. Besides, it’s not that I have stopped dreaming: I never have.
My own simple explanation is that I don’t dream because I don’t sleep. My mother will tell
you what an ordeal it was raising a tiny insomniac. My parents tried all the tricks: they told me to
count sheep, to go over the events of the day, to make lists, and so on. Eventually they came up with
their own idea: close your eyes and pretend to sleep until morning, they told me. It was like watching
paint dry.
On the worst nights, my mother would climb into the pull-out couch we used as my bed and
turn on the TV. I can’t even count how many times I watched the sun rise to the sound of the George
Lopez show.
Today I take my melatonin, my gaba, and my fish oils hoping to induce sleep. I’ve tried CBD
and essential oils. I've tried relaxing before bed with a sleepy-time tea. But each night is still a battle,
and I toss and turn and thrash around in my bed. I still try some of my old childhood tricks. I lay
down like a mummy and close my eyes pretending I am Tutenkamen (I was fascinated by him when I
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was a kid). I wait for sleep to come and take me to dreamland. But nothing ever happens behind those
closed eyelids. It is like staring at a dark wall, like taking a wrong turn into a dark alley… I’ve made a list
of such similes just waiting to fall asleep.
I suspect dreaming is the reason why people love to sleep so much. Every evening I watch my
roommates eagerly get into their pajamas, with their monogrammed pillows and their dream journals
nearby. I even listen to them as they make up their own dream-scenarios which they hope to take with
them in their sleep.
I have my own perfect script: I tuck myself into bed, the covers fluffy like clouds. I wear a blue
and white striped pajama set with a little night cap, like I’ve seen in picture books. I have my favorite
blend of tea on my nightstand, one that doesn’t burn my tongue, and a good book to read. Then I
blow out the candle and fall asleep instantly with a smile on my face. I dream about the ocean, rolling
hills, and sheep farms. I dream about my friends and revisit my fondest memories. I dream about people
I haven’t even met yet.
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Prose
Pink Cat, Pink Cat
By Grace Stathatos
I wake up sweating and face away from the mirror as I peel up my shirt, terrified to look at
my back. My eyes are shut tight but images of huge, horrible, hot, infected red sores sloughing off my
shoulder blades still poison my mind. Finally I turn and open my eyes.
Nothing.
My back looks like a back. Besides a regrettable tramp stamp in the middle of my rear side, my
skin is smooth. I furrow my brows, close my eyes again, and drop my shirt. I can breathe again.
“Why are you up so late?” my dad asks from the couch.
“I had a dream that I had Monkeypox,” I mumble, thermometer under my tongue. 98.1.
Healthy.
“Oh boy…” he says.
I crawl back to bed, still shaken from the hideous nightmare, and I wonder if I’ll ever have a
night like everyone else has; a night followed by the sun rising and dreams fading away. With me, it's
not only Monkeypox nightmares that refuse to go away; it’s also romantic dreams, school dreams, fun
dreams, boring dreams that remain stuck in my brain like static and make my daily life so confusing.
There are days when my dreams cling so stubbornly that I can hardly differentiate between reality and
my own made-up world. I worry endlessly about a text I never sent, about friends I never snubbed,
about not having caught a bus I didn’t need to catch. I went through a period, when I was 16, when I
was terrified to speak to my mother because I thought she was mad at me for getting arrested. All these
lingering dreams I have take up so much space within my brain that they seep into the space reserved
for real memories and real thinking.
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Prose
Since my earliest youth I have tried to understand why I dream so much and so vividly, and
why I can’t get my dreams to fade away after the alarm clock rings. Even in grade school, I knew this
was a “condition” that I shouldn’t simply ignore. When I was six, I searched up “who studies dreams?”
during my allotted time at the computer. I soon decided I wanted to be a somnologist when I grew
up, an expert that studies sleep. I figured that maybe I could tame my hippocampus. If I put in a true
effort to understand my brain, it would let me have some peace.
Then, in my teenage years, I learned about Freud. That was no consolation. I was quite upset
when I first heard of his theories about how our repressed sexual desires come to fruition through our
dreams. I’m not a Catholic. I don’t have repressed desires. I rarely dream of anything edgy, violent,
or sexual. Even back then, the dreams I had were simply a heightened version of my reality – which
was exactly why they were so troubling. I chalked Freud up to some old sexist guy and continued my
quest.
Now, in my early adult years, I still search the internet for some explanation but it’s been
about as helpful as Freud. In the endless pages of links that I have clicked, I have never found a recognized
condition related to REMEMBERING TOO MANY OF YOUR DREAMS. All I found was
a lot of useless verbiage on the workings of memory. One day I did land on a promising term: “Hyperthymesia.”
It’s a condition of the mind that causes a “highly superior autobiographical memory.” Or
as Wikipedia puts it more ominously, a disorder that causes individuals to remember an abnormally
large amount of memories in vivid detail. But that’s not me! I forget things that happen in my life all
the time; largely because my dreams take up so much space in the memory campus of my brain!
Every time I type “Why do I always remember my dreams?” in the search bar, all types of
articles pop up, and they are titled “Why you forget your dreams: an explanation,” or something of the
sort. I’ve searched Google and Reddit, I’ve looked at subreddits like r/sleepdisorders, r/luciddreaming,
r/dreams. I’ve checked medical websites like mayoclinic.com, WebMD. There is no answer waiting
for me at the psychiatrist’s office. The shrinks tell me it doesn’t really matter if I feel that my dreams
are taking up too much space in my brain. They say that if I’m not having night terrors and if I’m not
walking around the park in my sleep, they have no pills for me. But I’m not looking for pills. They tell
me not to worry, and usually I don’t. I have learned to live with my nameless condition, mixing up real
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reality and my dream reality.
At one point I thought I would hone this special ‘double awareness’ of mine into a skill that
would let me bathe in my own created sunlight. My reasoning was that if my dreams were truly a second
world, a whole different plane of existence, I may as well become fully in control of it.
That’s when I seriously looked into lucid dreams. I have been trying to lucid dream – i.e. to
dream knowing that you are dreaming – for as long as I can remember. But now I was energized. I
flipped feverishly through books; I searched the internet for “lucid dream methods”; I badgered old
school friends who claimed to have that special ability to tell me their secret. The answer was always
the same: “Reality check! Look at a clock, look at your finger, look into a mirror TEN TIMES
THROUGHOUT THE DAY, and eventually, one day, you’ll be checking reality and you’ll realize
you’re in a dream.” Easy. But it never worked for me.
As I got older, my brain awash with dreams, I decided to reality check myself with my own
method. Since time checks, hand checks, and mirror checks hadn’t worked for me, I said to myself,
let’s try with a pink cat.
So I looked for pink cats around me, ten or more times a day, waiting and hoping that one
night I would see one in my dream and I would know I was dreaming. I never saw a pink cat, not in
this world nor in any other.
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Prose
Brownie’s Watering Hole
By Hanna Hadrick
I grew up running across red and white checkered floors, giggling at the grumpy old men who
smiled over the tops of their beer bottles just for me. Old, dusty signs were scattered all around the
smoke ruined walls of grandpa’s dive bar in Papillion, Nebraska: ‘No Whining,’ ‘Boulevard Wheat,’
‘This Tavern is Recommended by Al Capone.’ Stuff like that. Plaques with the names of customers
who had been coming to Brownie’s since my grandpa bought the bar in 1983 decorated the place like
memories in a person’s mind. The smell of old leather and brew mixed with the stench of cigarettes
and chewing tobacco. The regular drunks – sailors and blue-collar workers – had, through time and
dedication, earned their very own Brownie’s bar stool. The new construction crews who came in for
the legendary Brownie’s Big Burger, drooled over them with envy. Young twenty-something kids came
to Brownie’s saying, ‘Omg! This is such a cute bar!’; the old patrons would spin in their bar stools and
give the bartender a side eye, as if to say, ‘There is no way in hell these kids can legally drink.’
The day I saw my first ever drunk was the day I was old enough to distinguish my house from
Brownie’s, and to comprehend the effects of the liquid in the random shaped glass bottles had on men
and women alike. Up until that point in my life, I had believed each patron to be closer to God than
to the devil. My grandparents' fiftieth wedding anniversary, my high school graduation party, birthday
parties for my family’s friends – all were held at Brownie’s. It was the backdrop for most of my memories
growing up. And it is still a place where I can walk in the door and be reunited with the grumpy
old men of my childhood, my family members, and new friends. I was brought up surrounded by
happy drunks, who would give me ‘just because’ trinkets and knick-knacks from back in the day; and
say stuff like, ‘I remember you when you were this big’ as they held their hand out to the height of
the wooden, stress-worn bartop. I was often told that a drunk could not be a good person. But when
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Prose
I looked into the eyes of retired veterans, men who had done enough manual labor for two, patrons
with no family, all I saw was the kindness they showed me. When I looked into their eyes, I saw my
family.
One of the first people I recall meeting is Jack Shu. At one point in his life, he had reached well
over 6’6’’, but the weight on his cane has increased as he has shortened into a man weathered by over
half a century of cigs and Miller Light. His flannels now hang loosely off his frail shoulders and his
jeans are held up by the smallest belt hole. But, his frail exterior, as thin as it is, protects the heart of a
poet. The day before I left for Italy, he reached in his back pocket, pulled out a folded note, and read
me the words in his truest American accent, “Cara mia.”
My papa, Lee Brown, acquired the nickname ‘Brownie’ back during his early hockey days.
The nickname stuck with him through college as a Cornhusker under Tom Osborne's reign, two kids,
and a career as a sprinkler fitter.
Grumpy old David was a man built for a different generation, one before advanced technology.
He was the last great bricklayer of our town and when he died a few years back, bricklaying seemed
to die as well. Occasionally, the daytime regulars will raise their Blackberry Brandy shots up in his
memory, taking a moment to just sit in their grief before throwing back their heads and swallowing
the liquid cough syrup.
Jimmy, who owns the barstool closest to the front door, used to walk in with David arm in
arm; now he walks in alone. He has looked upon my twin sister and me as his own, ever since his wife
miscarried their set of twins.
Mark has been coming in for four years, but it was only about a year ago that I came to know
him. On a quiet Tuesday, he told me about his 25-year long career in insurance. He described the
12-hour work days and sleepless nights that led to a massive heart attack. Maybe it’s because he hadn’t
had anyone to listen to him in a very long time, or because he held a lot of regrets; but on this night, he
gave me a big hug as tears slid down his face.
Bradley is an old friend of mine who started coming in because of me. He’s only a couple
of years older than me. He served in the Marine Corps. He is a jolly guy, but sometimes no amount
of drinks can repress memories from his deployment. Softly, he he talks about the friends whom he
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Prose
served with, about the ones who made it back home and especially about the ones who never did. The
saddest reminiscence is about the high school buddy with whom he enlisted and who didn’t reach
his twenty-third birthday. Hunched over the bar with his elbows resting on the smooth edge, Bradley
pauses only when he needs to tip his bottle back.
Brian owns a construction company down the road and stops in around 12:30 every weekday,
checking in on any other straggler over a shot of Blackberry Brandy and a few games of Keno. The
last time I saw him before I left for Rome, he joked about me meeting an Italian named Stefano and
having us blonde Italian babies. I laughed. “How does your wife put up with you?” I said.
Brian always seems to break out into a love-stricken smile when the subject of his wife and
three girls comes up. But then he’ll say something like, “Don’t settle down and have kids early; try and
live a little while longer.”
Eric runs a couple of Papa John’s pizzerias in neighboring towns. He can always be found buried
in Brownie’s underneath four jackets with the floor heater pointed his way. He likes to joke about
his toes freezing off because of my papa’s reluctance to turn up the heat. No matter what the weather
is like outside, the thermostat is set at exactly 62 degrees. Eric is one of the kindest souls; he promises
to visit me in Italy if his health allows it.
Barb is the bar's rabble rouser and one of my grandparents' oldest friends. She can always be
counted on to have a bottle of pinot grigio in hand. Her obsession with wine started a couple years ago
after her grandson, who is about my age, had three kids in two years. She had to take care of them all,
including the two baby mamas. The more grandkids she acquires the more she needs to drink wine.
Then there are the countless older ladies, with their pearl earrings and beaded necklaces, who
stare at me – is it awe or jealousy? – as my mom tells them about where I will go to college. I guess I
remind them of the dreams they never pursued and of the lives they now are stuck in.
And the twenty-something small town boys, who finally ask me for my number after weeks
and weeks hanging out at Brownie’s. Always coming up to the bar, sweet and boozy, to give me the
‘will you go on a date with me’ speech. No matter how many heifers they own, my grandpa, or one
of my grandpa’s friends, will pull them aside. They walk back to their seat, red in the face, with me
giggling in the background.
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Prose
There are plenty of wanderers who stumble through the door on a quiet night and I listen to
their stories as I slowly dry off beer glasses behind the bar. Some promise to come back and others just
walk out the door, never to be seen again; and yet I remember them, if only in the slightest of ways.
On one such night, a man stumbled in. He goes by CJ and now a pint of Coors Light with lime slices
waits for him at the bar every night.
The red and white checkered tiles have long been replaced by mock-wood linoleum floors. The
beer bellies have increased in size in the last fifteen years and the skin is more weathered. The kitchen
menu has changed and the ten-year-old girl in me is extremely pleased that we now serve Brownie’s
Sundaes.
When I left, Jimmy gave me an old Carhartt jacket and the warmth that came with it. I took
away plenty more with me. From Bradley, I learned to respect those who have served, and from David,
those who have worked their bodies like machines. Mark ruined my chances at pursuing a corporate
career, and Barb’s grandson dissuaded me from having children young. Jack, Jimmy, Mark, and just
about everyone else taught me never to judge a person based on the eye’s scrutiny.
Here in Rome I carry around with me a wooden drink chip, slightly larger than a silver dollar,
branded with the famous Brownie’s Watering Hole logo. Occasionally, I rub it between my thumb
and forefinger to remind myself of a lively little dive just north of the Platte River.
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Prose
Buddy in Ink
By Kyra Berg
There are countless reasons why I shouldn’t do it. I don’t commit. I don’t do needles. I don’t
do pain. My self-image doesn’t include “girl with a tattoo.” Yet here I am, in the tattoo parlor, prepping
for my first tattoo.
My parents gave me a dog when I turned five. It was a light brown Chihuahua mix, and I fell
in love with him right away. He was my buddy. So I called him Buddy even though my parents teased
me for choosing that name. He protected me for fifteen years. Even recently, when I came home sick
from college and needed an at-home IV, Buddy watched over me until the needle was removed. Once
he knew I was okay, he jumped into my lap and fell asleep.
For the last few years, it was my turn to take care of him. Buddy had cancer. He survived major
surgery and afterwards had to take more than ten pills a day. The last six months, he wore his diaper
and lion cone with pride. He could not go up and down the stairs, but he would look up at me and
give me permission to carry him. It was a miserable life, but God, he was so happy to be alive.
Even though Buddy fought hard to stay with us, my mom and I had to decide for him. His last
day was the worst day of my life. Thankfully, we were able to euthanize him at home and make it as
peaceful as possible.
I kept his collar, made a paw print (clay and framed), and even collected some of his fur in a
small bag. For days I did not leave the couch downstairs where we had said our last goodbye. I scrolled
endlessly through thousands of pictures of Buddy on my phone. Nothing consoled me.
Then I thought that if I could endure a few minutes of pain, I could have Buddy with me forever.
I searched for tattoo parlors near me and found a spot with good reviews and booked an appointment
before I could wimp out. I settled on a picture that perfectly captured him: Buddy would always
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Prose
tilt his head to the side and lift one ear up like he could understand everything I was saying. I sent my
picture to the tattoo artist and told him I wanted a fine-line tattoo of Buddy’s ears on my wrist.
The pain of losing Buddy was so intense I forgot all my fears until I walked into the parlor.
But now the tattoo artist has pulled out the needle, and the “oh shit” moment has finally caught up
with me. While waiting for the stencil to dry, I stand up from the chair and start pacing. Twenty times
I ask if it will hurt. “It feels like a cat is scratching you,” the tattoo artist says. Twenty times I ask how
long the procedure will take. “It should take only five minutes,” he says. I see he is exasperated. I ask
one more question, and he says enough is enough and tells me to sit down.
Reluctantly I sit back down and rest my arm on the table. He takes advantage of the opportunity,
and within seconds, I feel the first prick. The pain increases with every added layer of ink. It gets
to the point where I clench my teeth and hold my breath. I nearly pass out. By the time it is over, I am
shaking and dripping with sweat. But I look down at my wrist and I am finally at peace.
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Poetry
Three poems by Madelyn Ferber
Things I Know (Peach Trees)
I am only a woman
sitting and waiting for my husband.
For I am a young woman in a crowded room, I mustn't be alone.
Only I know that I am
truly here only to watch.
Every Tuesday,
when my husband,
the one with the empty eyes,
packs his briefcase to sit at his corporate desk, I leave
to sit at my temporary one.
I like to see how people interact.
I find it amusing – the naiveness in city people’s eyes.
How they can be so blissful when Nietzsche says that
capitalism causes depression,
and people are dying across seas, and children
are starving somewhere in Africa.
How they are all human,
all too human.
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Poetry
I seem the hypocrite
as I wear my silk gloves like armor.
My pearls and my mink coat to protect me from stares that leave
poison laced air to breathe.
But at least I have the decency to admit
my hypocrisy. I am a Kantian
ethical nightmare.
I contemplate the past and how I could change it. I would have
never married. I would have moved
to the Italian countryside. Somewhere far away.
It would only be me, my journal,
and peach trees.
That would be nice I think.
Maybe I would be happy there.
You know, without the burden
of marriage and motherhood.
Without the burden of womanhood at all.
I could have simply existed.
And maybe someone
would have found my writings
in my home in the country,
after wisteria and ivy have consumed it.
Maybe they would have even wiped off the dust,
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Poetry
maybe even read it.
Maybe they would think the mystery author had been happy,
accomplished.
Maybe I could have become more
than a memory in the minds of my children. Maybe
I would have actually mattered in the world.
Although I know that I will die
with my pearls and gloves and the smog of
the city in my lungs.
*
I can imagine what I am in the confines of stories,
but I know what I truly am.
“Beloved wife and mother”
being the only words to say of my existence–
never having seen a peach tree.
I'm a taker. I've always been
a taker. I'll take your sadness and grievances,
then I'll explode my own onto the next person.
I’m a taker of information – an observer.
I'll remember everything about you.
I can recall the names of everyone that has left.
I take it all in
just to make them comfortable.
I can be their fool – a doll.
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Poetry
I am a creator. I craft the perfect versions
of people and get disappointed
when my masterpiece turns out to be a sham.
I’ll create a new version of myself
for their amusement.
I am the place where water covers green.
With Pisces and Cancer placements, I’ve mastered being a victim.
The storm sweeps away the rational and leaves me
alone with debris.
I’m a talker. I talk to the wind
when I get bored, only to find sense in the spirits
and senselessness in the church.
I’m a listener. My favorite noise is
nothing at all. The melody of silence is a lullaby
in a tragic sort of way. Especially in my bedroom,
where the familiarity of hearing nothing soothes my mind.
I’m a thinker above all else. I’ll reflect
on, for hours, the questions
that make the divine weep:
how do I stop being me?
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Poetry
the beast
i wish for all
the wrongdoings of the world to lay
at my fingertips.
to wait for my manipulation.
i will twist and pull until they are
what i wish them to be. for all
the mountainous damage
the world lays in my path,
i will make it small enough to tread
over.
i fear that one day,
when it comes to the great fall,
when i fall off the wall, no one will be able
to put me back together again.
maybe one day the world will
positively swallow me whole–
another victim
in the belly
of
the beast.
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Poetry
*
my mother worries i am wrong
in the head. my father wishes
to send me away.
my sister fears
my mind.
am i a monster?
am i the beast i fear so greatly?
the glimmer of terror in my family’s
eyes tells me i am,
but i must disagree.
why can’t they see i am
the product of stones piled on my back.
for those who carry
the same load,
some build muscle,
some bare bruises,
some backs break.
i fear i lay among those
who wear broken
backs.
with a tear-stained face only I can see,
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Poetry
i attempt again and again
to expose my snapped bones to the world.
crazy, they call me.
i am crazy. i am mad—
bonkers.
but i do find comfort in the presence
of other mental patients.
together we find a likeness.
together we stand as a wall.
as the beast, protected
with fur crafted by the blood of those like me,
stones us.
the warm blood
that traces my scalp
will soon find a home on its coat.
the crimson sigil, marked
in glory, of those cast aside
waves beside us. signaling
our social tragedy.
it waves for those with
biohazardous waste awaiting its time to ooze
from the skin.
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Poetry
those, with the purest embers
of emotion, turning evil inside their minds.
those like me. those like us.
those who bare a broken spine granted
by a gracious and unforgiving hand.
another cautionary tale to
tell the children.
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Poetry
Rabidy Clusters Around My Heart
Tame me with your iron
tongue, but do not
let it slip. I’ll thrash
in private places that drip
easily from the cracks of my lips.
Scour the liars
and dancers for the downfall
of my luck. Bathe me
clean of the body
you fuck. Danderly youth,
rinse your hands of me.
Search for sins in
the eyes of what
others perceive. Savor
the juice of my mighty
thrills. An intensity to shelter
the softness of joyless frills.
Lick the unbound
that seeks to sleep
with boys and girls,
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Poetry
and will end it to weep.
Like a silver
threaded teen
circling the drain,
only to pull it back
out with a maturely aged chain.
Let my flowers die
in my arms
to insult me with metallic charms
as they crucify me
for the sins of my son.
Who only did what he did
on the precipice of fun.
But beware of what happens
when I lay down my pennies.
They will not glisten
in the light of the many.
34

Fiction
Hanging Rock Dream Clinic
By Antonio Fronterrè
Every day I wake up feeling drowsy. It’s been years now. I get out of bed and drag my feet on
the dusty floor to the marble counter. I turn to the right, towards the mirror that my dear mother
bought me as a house-warming gift, and look at my reflection. My eyes stare back at me, and they look
confused.
My morning breakfast is always the same. Sometimes I search the internet for new recipes and
buy the ingredients, but after I store them in the fridge I forget about them and they sit in a remote
corner for months until they are covered with mold. So it’s always scrambled eggs on toast and some
podcast or other; today it was about the Bushmen in South Africa. It was interesting but by midday it
had all faded out of my memory.
On the drive to the office I realize that I have forgotten to give my face a morning wash. The
gunk in my eyes spreads across my sleepy face until I am swaying this way and that way, and nearly hit
a light pole. Had I hit the pole, I think the police would have found a body that looked like a cocoon
of gunk ready to hatch.
In the past my dreams were vivid. Lately, they have become dreary. I dream of offices, scrambled
eggs, and podcasts. I suspect some liquid device must have slipped out of my ear and on to the
pillow while I slept, and fallen on the floor, seeping through and dripping to lower floors and then
towards the center of the earth; my vivid dreams are gone and the ones that are still with me are like
the monotone static of a TV channel long discontinued.
After the light pole accident, or near accident, I reach the downtown area and read the big
billboards spread out between the high rise buildings: “LOVIN’ IT” … “JUST DO IT” … and other
meaningless sentences thought up by some marketing office in Boston or New York. I notice more tra-
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Fiction
ditional advertisements as well, like “MORNING COFFEE, PURE ITALIAN” or “100% COTTON
CLOTHING” – leftovers from a time when local shops had not yet been overrun by the expanding
metropolis. Then another meaningless billboard: “CALIFORNIA DREAMIN’, AT THE PALM
OF YOUR HAND”. I try to imagine the day when all of this will stop and the streets will turn to
desert again, and long roots will cover the remains of silent skyscrapers.
Today I wake up feeling hopeful. I fry some bacon and cook my eggs sunny side up. Last night
I didn’t dream about breakfast; I dreamt about blinding lights and distant stars. The words “California
Dreamin’” – the words from the billboard – kept ringing in my ears. It was vaguely nauseating.
The words sounded cheesy and unpleasant. Then the ring became a whisper, and the dream turned
pleasant, with images of a simpler life I seemed to have long forgotten. And in the background, those
gentle words: “California Dreamin’”.
Now that I am fully awake I bring the billboard ad back into focus. I remember, in the background,
behind the lettering, a lo-res picture of clouds floating in empty space. I cannot stop thinking
about that image. I also remember, on one side, a reference to a medical firm in Southern Ohio. I sense
a certain irony. What dreams of distant California can a firm in southern Ohio provide?
I search the internet. The firm gives out little information. But the reviews – the few that I can
find – rave about their innovative methods. One phrase appears again and again: Procedural dream
restabilization. It is apparently the most popular item on their menu. From what I understand it is
a brief, surgical procedure affecting the part of the brain that is responsible for our dreams. In other
words, a dream-enhancing intervention which, according to the site, can provide solutions for a myriad
problems: fatigue, anxiety, depression, diminished sex life, even back problems. Every ailment can
easily be resolved with healthy, satisfying dreaming.
“Ah!” I say to myself with a grin. I have never been one to fall for pseudoscientific scams, and
the signs are all there. They can fool a couple of midwestern retirees but not me. Still smiling, I turn to
the mirror over the gloomy marble; my eyes are staring right at me. They are so dark that, for a second,
I think I can fall into their abyss and never return.
I make an appointment for the following week.
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Fiction
Hanging Rock Dream Clinic is outside the city, in a semi-rural area where you can still breathe
the intoxicated monotony of suburban life as it spreads to the surrounding fields. It is composed of
two connected rectangular buildings and a parking lot that is twice the size of the compound. Inside
the halls are mostly deserted; a few dirty windows let in a grayish sunlight. Nothing in this medical
center suggests eccentricity or weirdness of any sort.
I am greeted by a middle-aged woman who stinks of cigarettes and coffee.
“Mr. Flores? Please take a seat. I will call you as soon as the doctor is available.”
The place seems empty. The waiting room is spanking clean. Long hallways extend their reach
in every direction. Some distant light bulbs must be out because the halls fade into darkness. I hear the
echo of water drops falling somewhere. There is a certain dampness in the air. In the waiting room, the
window looks out onto a road. A car passes by every few minutes. I try to catch a glimpse of the drivers.
When they fade out of my line of vision beyond trees, I see my own reflection on the grimy glass. I
am melting too, into the green and dusty armchair, dissolving into the moldy air; my arms reach out to
all the walls in the room and they hug all there is, all that is unseen.
“Mr. Flores, the doctor is waiting for you,” a young receptionist says, taking in my tired face
with a slight smile.
“I’ll finish my coffee and come immediately,” I say impulsively. I haven’t had any coffee yet.
I look to my left and I see a cup of hot, black brewed coffee; the cup is full to the brim. When I turn
around the receptionist is already gone. I hear drilling noises upstairs.
There is one lit room on the second floor, on the other side of the building. As I get closer the
drilling noise stops but a pulsating reverberation grows stronger with every step. I feel its force travel
through my arms and into my stomach. Then it goes away as quickly as it appeared. But the feeling of
nausea remains.
I step into the well-lit room and I am greeted by a clean-shaven doctor in his thirties. He
invites me to lay down. His voice is calm and persuasive, but his breath stinks of gasoline. I sit up for
a blood test. The doctor gently sanitizes my arm and inserts the syringe. The pulsating comes back all
at once. Now it is thumping in my ears. I feel my body screaming through my bones. The more I try
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Fiction
to calm myself the more intense the pain becomes. I grind my teeth and close my eyes. I can see blood
vessels filling up my irises; my pupils are shrinking, retreating to the back of my head. Now I can’t see
anymore; I try to speak but only hot breath comes out; I try to turn around but I cannot move; I try to
hold on to a thought but the thumping scatters all thoughts away. I feel my warm blood slowly leaving
me. A growing chill comes over me; dizzy and weak, I slowly drift into a pool of quiet darkness. I
abandon my arm to the syringe, waiting for it to drain all the life within me.
I had fallen asleep on the green armchair. Now the wait is making me impatient, but I am still
feeling dazed from my nap. I cannot feel my hands. They seem glued to the old fabric of the armchair.
After a struggle I manage to move them to my coffee cup and I take a long sip. The middle-aged receptionist
who stinks of cigarettes and coffee comes back once again. She apologizes for the long wait and
tells me to follow her to a room on the second floor, down the hallway.
A certain anxiousness creeps in me. I have a cigarette left in my pack. I step outside of the
building and light up. The crackle of the burning tobacco, the warm smoke filling my lungs… Then a
coughing fit racks my body. It is dark and a mist covers the fields around me but keeps clear of me.
I go back into the building and the doctor appears.
“Mr. Smith, pleasure to meet you,” he says with a smirk as he hands me several sheets of paper.
“Could you please fill out these forms before the check-up?”
I look down and read: NAME, and then blank. I turn the pages, blank. I look back up. The
doctor is gone. I recognize the window of the waiting room. I am sitting in the armchair. Outside the
street is busy and cars are honking. The parking lot has burst like a festering wound. Electrodes are attached
to my arms, legs, chest, sending shocks to all my muscles. My heart is pounding like the drums
of the Bushmen. I can only look ahead. The cars are stuck in a jam now. The drivers honk and scream.
I close my eyes, and only hear the thump, thump, thump of my heart. In the back of my eyelids I see a
mirror, and in the mirror I see my brain gathering mold. I open my eyes again. The electrodes are now
only on my chest. Outside it is dark and empty. Everything seems to slow down, little by little. I close
my eyes, and I see my thoughts. I see my mind floating away. I am growing smaller by the second. A
puny little man: roots grow from his fingers and into the carpeted floor they go. The clinic soars into
the sky like a lighthouse headed to the stars.
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Fiction
Mr. Smith wakes up at 5 p.m. and looks around for his coffee. After thirty minutes he gets up
and leaves the room. Long hallways lead in many directions. No sign of an exit. He drags his feet to the
end of the corridor. A door shines back into his black eyes. His hands are trembling and sweating. He
turns the doorknob slowly and the door creaks open. He crosses to the other side.
A field of wheat under the disappearing clouds. The man can see, far off into the distance, a
young boy lying on the slope of a hill, electrode in his chest. The boy points up to the sky. The man
turns around and sees black clouds approaching; the boy shrieks and the sound reverberates in the
man’s ears. He walks back through the door once and he feels he is falling into the black clouds far
above the fields.
Inside the gloom, he sees himself. He is very young. Next to him is a woman – he has forgotten
her name – and she is holding his hand.
His feet touch the ground; he is now in a hospital, not the Dream Clinic though. He is in the
operating room and there is great commotion. Then the woman is lying in bed and this time he recognizes
her face: it is his mother. She is fatigued but relieved. To the left he sees the doctor holding up
something tiny and loud. It has a face too but it is blurry and unsettled. The doctor is holding sheets
of paper. There is only one word: NAME. What is his name? He feels like falling again but he remains
standing. The roof splits open and a gust of wind blows into the room and against the doctors. The
clouds are now falling, or perhaps they are ascending. It is difficult to tell.
He closes his eyes and hears the thump, thump, thump… he opens them and sees a misty
meadow and black pupils watching him. What is his name? He unbuttons his shirt. The electrode is
still there. He tears it off. His beating heart is now exposed. It cracks and out of the wound come cold
words. On the calm shores of Normandy, bloody skies come down with acid rain. He would like to be
reborn as a shrimp, and swim with multitudes in the currents.
He turns away and feels the pupils disappearing. In the streams of Hanging Rock he wakes
from his slumber and hears the passing cars headed to the Downtown high-rises; he closes his eyes, and
dreams of wheat, clouds and bloody skies.
39

Fiction
Backstroke
By Lucia Guerrieri
The ocean water was sweet, and Maria continuously licked her lips while she swam.
She began with freestyle, then flipped on her back, feeling the sun on her bare stomach. She
lay on her back for a while, wiggling her toes when the small fish came too close to her feet.
It was late afternoon and the sun was going down. Her mother was waiting for her to start
cooking dinner, but Maria lost track of time. It was not until she felt the warm hand of the sun slip off
her stomach that she flipped around and headed toward the shoreline. As her eyes adjusted to the line
of bright red and blue umbrellas, she noticed a woman standing alone on the beach.
The woman was facing Maria as she swam ashore. She was wearing a long white dress and
holding a cigarette in her right hand and a beer in the other. Maria could see her lips moving but could
not make out the stranger’s words until she felt the sand under her toes.
“Sorry, were you saying something?” Maria spoke with a strong Roman accent. The stranger
smiled.
“I said you swim like a professional.” The woman was beautiful in a classic way. She had long
brown hair that reached down her back and strong shoulders and arms. Her hands were slender and
she held her cigarette delicately.
Maria gave the stranger an appreciative smile.
“You swim five lengths freestyle, then switch and lie on your back for a few minutes. Then you
swim five lengths backstroke, and you repeat the cycle.” The woman spoke with confidence, but Maria
noticed the dark circles under her eyes and the bruises along her chest.
“I’ve been following the same routine since I was a little girl. My mother said it would teach
me to respect the water.”
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Fiction
“Your mother sounds strong,” the woman responded.
“She is.” Maria still remembered her mother’s hard grip around her wrist as she pulled her
away from the undertow when she was a little girl.
“Do you swim competitively?” The woman’s voice was calm, the words unrushed, like the
water flowing on the shore.
“I did when I was a kid. Do you?”
The woman gave a soft smile, “No, but my daughter does.”
The sun disappeared behind the ocean, and a dark shadow fell on the woman's face. “It was
nice meeting you sweetie,” the stranger said, suddenly looking tired. She turned away, signaling that
the conversation was over.
The walk back to the apartment was uphill and Maria felt dizzy as she looked over the glowing
lights of Ponza that reflected off the ocean’s smooth back. Her bikini felt cold when she reached for
her keys deep in her bag. She had goosebumps on her arms and stomach. She opened the door and
recognized the savory smell of a pesto sauce.
“You're late,” Maria’s mother said. She continued to stir the pasta without looking up. “You
know I don’t like you swimming past sunset.”
“I wasn’t,” Maria said, stepping into the bathroom. “I was talking to a woman on the beach.”
She untied her bathing suit and dropped it on the floor. The blue tiles felt cold under her bare feet as
she changed into a white dress.
In the kitchen her mother handed her a knife and a tomato. Maria cut the tomato into thin
slices as the juices bled onto the cutting board.
“Who was it?” Maria’s mother asked as she handed her another tomato.
“She never said.” Maria described the woman’s attractive features, and the worry lines that
covered her forehead.
“Hm, sounds like Katerina.” Maria’s mother knew everybody, from one end of the small
island to the other.
“Simone’s wife?”
Her mother nodded. “She has been staring at that damn ocean for years.”
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Fiction
Maria stopped cutting for a moment and looked out the kitchen window. There was still light
enough to get a view of the sea around Ponza and the big rocks jutting out of the darkening water.
She gave her mother an inquisitive glance.
Her mother sighed. She stopped stirring the pot of pasta and for a long moment she just stared
into the boiling water.
“You probably don’t remember Giulia but you used to play with her when you were little.”
Maria’s mother paused and drained the pasta into a colander, the steam momentarily filling the silence
in the kitchen.
“Katerina had a drinking problem. I guess Simone was not at the beach that day, so Katerina
was alone with Giulia. The sun was setting but she still let her baby swim in the water. When the sun
disappeared, so did the child. Katerina cried out for Giulia and we all came out to help, but it was too
late. The ocean had taken her.” Maria’s mother shrugged to shake off the emotion.
“Is that why she stands by the water every evening?” Maria asked.
“Foolish woman, she believes her child grew a tail and is still swimming on the ocean floor
trying to find her way home.”
Maria breathed silently. She thought of Katerina’s expression when she had come out of the
water.
“But that is the past…Ok, dinner is ready.” Maria’s mother grabbed two plates from the cabinet
and began piling the steaming pasta onto them.
After dinner, Maria took a cold shower and went to her bedroom. She left the windows open,
letting the wind blow the curtains. Her hair was still dripping on the wood floor. She looked out to
the sea, and pictured monsters with scales, nymphs with blue skin, and a young girl with a tail swimming
just under the surface.
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Fiction
Failure to Notice
By Natalie Cooper
The art of noticing is the ability to see little things without getting nosy. A good practitioner
of this art does not assume or judge. Life is a lot easier when you only allow yourself to just notice
things. I call it “protecting your peace.” My sister, on the other hand, calls it “running from the truth.”
Yesterday, Richard lent me his coat on the walk home from his office’s Christmas party.
The December air burned my hand, so I let go of his to put it in the side pocket of his coat,
which I was now wearing.
I felt something. It was small and rectangular and unfamiliar.
I looked over at him, eyes turning to glass. Was this it? Was this really happening?
I should have just noticed something in his pocket and left it at that. Instead, I pulled out the
object and there I was with a singular lipstick in the palm of my hand. I took the cap off, and I saw red.
I hate red lipstick – I always have. It always reminded me of my old, cranky neighbor Etta and
her stupid dog who always used to shit in our yard. She put on fire engine red lipstick every day that
not only stained her teeth but also the fur on top of her yappy white Chihuahua’s head. Since then, I
vowed never to be the awful, red-lipped neighbor.
I hate red lipstick.
Through the tears in my eyes, I saw Richard quickly look away, his face turning from pale
white to red like that fucking ratdog. The rest of our walk was silent.
As we reached the door to my house, I slapped on a smile, handed back his coat, and took out
the lipstick.
“I’ve been looking for this!”
The look of relief on his face was nauseating. Not knowing what else to do or say, he kissed me
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Fiction
goodbye and walked home, no doubt feeling relieved and even a little impressed with himself. I cried
myself to sleep.
I know I sound pathetic for not ending it right then and there. But who wants to break up on
Christmas?
We had done Christmas with my family the year before, so now it was his turn.
Today the silence in the car ride was excruciating. He started yapping nervously to fill the void
while I fiddled with the corner of the wrapped gift in my lap.
After dinner, Richard and I received a hefty gift card for the new fancy restaurant in town.
Shit. I smile graciously as I hand his mother her small gift.
“Here, Mrs. O’Connell, this is from us.”
“Oh sweetie, you didn’t have to–” she began as she unwrapped the gift like a clumsy child.
“It’s perfect! Just in time for the holidays!”
Then, just as I had expected her to do, she twisted up that fucking red lipstick, lathered it on
her big fat lips, and turned to Richard. “How does it look?”
Richard shot a look at me. I looked straight back at him. Priceless.
“Looks… uh… great, Mom.” He didn’t even look at his mother but just continued staring at
me.
I loudly agreed she looked great and got up from the couch.
“Sorry to dine and dash, Mrs. O’Connell, but I have to run to my sister’s before it gets too
late.” I couldn’t even keep a straight face.
I went around the room and after many hugs and thank yous, I was stopped at the door by
Richard’s mother.
“Before you go,” she started, “I insist you try this color– it will look great with your undertones.”
“Well… if you insist.”
Richard sidled up and I never broke eye contact with him as his mother smeared that bloodstained
shit on my lips. Before walking away, I kissed him goodbye on the cheek. Hard.
Hard enough to leave a red stain on his burning skin.
Notice this ass, Dick.
44

Guest Essay
I am Doing Well, Objectively Speaking
By Autumn McIntyre
When I was 8, I wanted to be a weathercaster.
Every evening I watched Jackie Purcell of Anchorage’s Channel 2 news. I sat in front of the
television and imagined myself on the screen as she pointed at the map of Alaska and talked about
snow patterns.
When I was 10, my mom told me that I should be an accountant.
“They make a lot of money, Autumn. It’s a very stable job.”
When I was 13, I wanted be a writer.
I realized people actually made a living writing books. Books didn’t pop out of thin air! I told
my mom that I wanted to be a creative writing major, and she told me that I would make no money
and would be in debt for the rest of my life.
My mother emigrated from China to pursue the American Dream. The success of her children
became her dream. She didn’t want me to end up like her: working in retail, earning just enough
to make ends meet. She didn’t want me to end up like my father: hauling tractor trailers around the
country and harming my body to make a living.
I agreed with her. I couldn’t afford to fail.
I cycled through a lot of dreams over the following years: lawyer, politician, businesswoman.
Most of these were inspired by hyperfixations from different television shows. I watched Suits and
decided that I would be Jessica Pearson. I watched Scandal and thought that I would have a career in
D.C. like Olivia Pope. I didn’t really have a fictional role model for a businesswoman. That was always
really my mom’s idea.
My dreams eventually circled back to what I really wanted to be: a writer. Throughout the
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Guest Essay
phases and crazes, I was always writing. I wrote my first short story in third grade. It was about my cat
and me swapping lives (the title was ‘MY CAT AND I SWITCH LIVES’). I was so proud of my work
that I wrote another short story about two sisters with magical powers (the title was ‘POWERS’). I
wrote The Hunger Games fanfiction in fifth grade. I wrote Teen Wolf fanfiction in seventh grade. I
started writing original pieces in eighth grade.
I wrote urban fantasy, coming-of-age, and romantic comedy. Some short stories, some books.
My writing matured as I did. I discovered a talent for psychological horror and personal essays. I
turned out to be decent at journalism. But as I neared graduation, I grappled with the reality that
it would be difficult to have a career in writing. I was going into a poor job market. I only had a six
month grace period before I had to begin paying my loans. I needed a job. I applied to anything that I
was remotely qualified for– even if the careers didn’t match my degree let alone my dream.
Two weeks after graduating, I was hired.
Working in higher education was not among the jobs I had fantasized about. I’m an International
Student Support Assistant. I coordinate and run all of our events (orientation, Diwali, Holi,
job fairs). I monitor the WhatsApp chat our 1,000 students use. I manage our social media pages.
I communicate with all accepted students and track the status of their visa applications. I supervise
our student employees. I track down students who don’t attend class and who don’t pay their fees
on time. I’m the study abroad advisor for all undergraduate students. I answer doubts international
students have about everything (classes, obtaining a driver’s license, on campus work, getting a Social
Security Number denial letter, purchasing health insurance).
During events, I work from 7:30am to 10pm. I once worked thirteen days in a row. I have
students who get arrested and need immediate attention. I have students who could get dropped from
their class and fall out of their legal immigration status. I have a boss who emails me at three in the
morning and wants everything done by yesterday.
I know that I’m doing well, objectively speaking. I have thank-you gifts and letters from students.
I’m paying bills on time. I have a retirement fund, a health savings account, and a pretty decent
credit score. My life is stable. But I feel like I’m playing a losing game. I worry that there’s nothing
ahead of me except a 9-5. I can feel myself slipping away. My head hurts. Parts of my black hair are
turning gray. My jaw is constantly clenched.
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Guest Essay
I worry that my best years may have already happened. I think of when I was seven and I
ice-skated during recess. Or when I rollerbladed home after school while my grandfather walked behind
me. Or when I got in trouble for staying up too late to finish reading Percy Jackson.
Maybe my best years were when I was thirteen and was convinced that I would become a sensational
teen author. Maybe they were when I was eighteen and I had just arrived in Madrid, and my
friends and I watched the sunset at Temple de Debod.
I don’t ice-skate anymore. I got rid of my rollerblades when I moved. My grandfather died. I
don’t have time to read or write. I lost contact with my friends from Spain. I want to hit fast forward
and pray that in ten years I’m doing something better, somewhere better.
The only thing I can do is to write down the ideas in my head and pray they become something
worthwhile. To channel the young girl who got in trouble for writing in her notebook instead of
paying attention in math class. To forget the 9-5, the student loans, and the stress. To hold my dreams
close. To write.
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USER NOTES