A Short Story by Elizabeth Powers

Mirabel had known Joseph for all of three hours, and already she knew that she wanted to bash in his head. Or lick his face. She couldn’t really decide which, and the line between destruction and desire was maddening. He had introduced himself as Joseph K, and she had immediately known two things about him: that he thought very little of her intelligence and thought a lot of his own. Still, she was intrigued by his quick wit, the way the word “narcissism” rolled off his tongue when he told her about its Greek origins, all honey and olive oil and red wine.

She saw him standing at the reflection pool, blue-eyed and dark locked, his cheeks sallow, his muscles wasted away. She wasn’t sure why he had started talking to her about the book she was reading, why she had let him sit across from her, black coffee in hand, leaning over the table like a lover, whispering words of acumen and self-interest that sounded like songs. But the way his lips curved around the word “nymph” was why she let him continue the conversation over dinner. She insisted on briám and baklava and he took her to a restaurant on the lower east side, where they sat on overstuffed purple pillows in a dimly lighted room and he tried to make her eat everything with her hands because he said it was more sensual.

His apartment was not exactly what she expected, but it was close. Instead of the upstairs of an old house or an old-fashioned brick structure that was converted from a brothel, he lived in a basic grey building with stain-resistant carpeting lining the halls. But the inside more than made up for the nondescript outside. Bookcases lined the walls, filled with collections of Joyce and Kafka, a copy of Chekov on his coffee table opened to The Lady with the Dog. A stool cluttered with plants stood next to the front window. A painting of a naked woman hung across from the kitchen.

“A drink?” he asked. “I have a cabernet or a bottle of whisky.”

“The wine,” she said. “Straight from the bottle.”

He chuckled and brought back two mismatched goblets filled with dark liquid from the kitchen. Hers was blue and etched with globes of fruit that she tenderly ran her thumb over as they toasted. They sat on his couch and drank the entire bottle, him talking about his work as a graduate student, how mythology and literature went hand and hand, how Persephone was the unsung beauty of the underworld, her moods as dangerous and changing as any other heroine, her skin as ivory soft as the spring, as the feather of a swan, as Mirabel herself. When he touched her for the first time, his palm on her bare knee, lightly feeling out her geography and the effect of the wine, her skin raised, goosebumps peppering the tender flesh underneath her skirt.

“You see?” he said, his hand making circles upward, “they are all the same stories.”

They had sex on his gray sofa, her body contorted, back uncomfortably bent at different angles. A welt, she was sure, to form across the side where she had been pressed into the metal bars, too distracted to stop him while he pounded into her madly, pulling on her hair.

Afterward, sticky and sore, she stretched her long limbs out against the fabric and he stood up with his back to her. She followed him to the bathroom where he smoked a cigarette out the third story window while she cleaned herself up. She washed her face in the mirror and noticed that the bottoms of her eyes were rimmed with thick black mascara lines that looked like pieces of seaweed and that her hair was knotted. She took comfort when she realized that they both looked ridiculous. It wasn’t so much his physical appearance as it was the stance he was currently taking. His cigarette dangled from his hand, propped against the open glass, his other hand resting on his hip. He wore only his dark grey boxer briefs, slung low on his hips. He would have looked like a Calvin Klein ad, all sex and indifference, if he hadn’t been standing inside a white porcelain bathtub. He flicked ashes out the window and smirked at her still naked body

“Seconds?”

Mirabel pretended to doze off after a cup of lukewarm coffee, no cream, and slipped out the door a little after three. She walked four blocks and then sat on the curb in front of a Dairy Mart and called for an Uber. She contemplated Joseph momentarily. Mostly she contemplated the empty bagel box that sat on the side of the road, half crushed and wholly dirty from the recent downpour, which had covered everything from waist level down in a thin grime of loose gravel and dirt clods. She felt a vague kinship to this box, and when the driver dropped her at her building she took a shower and made herself a piece of toast and watched an infomercial for a new kind of vegetable chopper.

She did not expect to see Joseph a week later, while she was perusing tomatoes at the farmers market. Actually, she had all but forgotten about him until he appeared behind her, bag of apples in hand, and told her she should wait a few more weeks if she wanted her tomatoes to be really ripe.   

“Red and juicy,” he said. “These aren’t there yet.”

She asked about his school and he followed her from bunches of kale to heads of cabbage talking about his latest paper on modern perceptions of Aphrodite. He asked if she knew that the goddess of love was actually born from the remnants of the ruler of the universe’s castrated testis, thrown into the sea. She said no and put down the head of garlic she had been considering. He asked her to dinner but she politely declined, claiming she was meeting a group of girlfriends for sushi. She went home and heated up a cup of ramen noodle soup instead.

---

“Some would call this fate,” Joseph said two weeks later, sideling up very closely next to her in a used book store.

“Some would call it stalking,” Mirabel said.

Joseph chuckled and held a tattered book out in front of him.

“Research.”

“So fate, literally.”

He told her about Athena as they perused shelves of horror stories and misspent poetry. Strategist and virgin. Motherless and cut out of her father’s forehead.

She did not deny him when he asked her to dinner. They ate pancakes and bacon at a 24 hour diner, cup after cup of black coffee keeping them there into the night.

“Why Greek mythology?” she asked.

“Because, they got it right.”

She laughed at him and shook her head. He just smirked, his cup of coffee held up between them.  

Mirabel declined the offer to spend the night at his place, but did agree to see him on purpose the following weekend.

---

When she got to the coffee shop that they had agreed upon, Joseph was not there yet. The night was rainy and cold, a clear sign that the summer was ebbing away, and her hair was stuck down to her forehead. She found the restroom, slicked her hair back into a high ponytail and fluffed her bangs back into place.

When she returned to the main room, Joseph was waiting, a glass of wine for her in one hand, a latte for him in the other.

“Presumptuous of you.”

“I aim to please.”

They talked about poetry and music and Joseph asked her if she knew that the name Mirabel comes from the Latin word for “of wondrous beauty.”

“Ah, so it’s not Greek then,” she said, smirking.

“Joseph means ‘he will add’ in Hebrew. We can’t all be perfect.”

---

After their drinks, they walked, his breath puffing in front of him in small white clouds. Her hands were cold, and she shoved them in her pockets.  Joseph stopped outside his building around the corner and asked her if she would like to come up again. The rain had stopped, but the cold was still there, and so she followed him up the steps.

He did not have wine, and the tea he poured her was hot and smelled like lemon. She picked up a book that was sitting on the table, a title she didn’t recognize. She pretended to read the back cover, but mostly her mind kept drifting back to the first night she had been in his apartment, the couch and the wine and the feel of metal against her bare back. But now, he was sitting on a chair on the opposite side of the room, not next to her. And she remembered her initial impulse upon meeting him. Pleasure and pain and destruction.

“It’s not an accident, you know. You and me.”

“No,” she said, setting down the book and looking at him. “Stalking, like I said before.”

He chuckled. His skin looked pale and his eyes looked wide. Mirabel felt like maybe she should be afraid of this man and his mythology, but she couldn’t make herself look away, couldn’t muster up the feeling of anxiety, the rush of adrenaline that she knew she should feel coursing through her. She wanted to ask him if she could lick across his ribcage, all muscle and taut skin. Instead she said, “When did you know?”

Joseph looked at her for a moment, his eyes traveling the length of her body, pausing on the soft curve of her neck, the swell of her breasts, the slit of skin visible between her thin sweater and her waist.

“I thought I knew the moment I saw you,” he said. “But I was sure the moment I touched your skin. So soft. So yielding. So unforgiving.”

She glared at him.

“I have time,” she said. “Before I return.”

“Oh my dear,” Joseph said, “you stopped following the rules ages ago.”

Mirabel shook her head.

“Times have changed, but the seasons stay the same.”

Joseph chuckled, lifting his tea to his perfect lips. Mirabel looked at him again, more closely than she had allowed herself when she first met him; his chiseled jaw, his muscled arms, the feature of his face perfectly symmetrical. It was no wonder she couldn’t stay away from him in the dark. But looks had been his downfall, hadn’t they? Hadn’t beauty destroyed most things in her world, including herself?

“He won’t be happy with you,” she said.

“I’d be more worried about your husband’s wrath if I thought you were going to tell him about our tryst. Besides, it’s only right that the two most beautiful people should end up with each other. It was as inevitable as the orbit of the sun. He should have known it when he sent me to look for you.”

“I’m surprised that he could pull you away from yourself long enough to go. I will admit, you were well named. The word ‘narcissism’ suits you.”

“At least the world has co-opted me. I live inside their minds, leaving their lips in moments of anger, in fiery passion. When does Persephone grace the thoughts of the world? You are all but forgotten. A distant memory. Your beauty buried and rotting.”

He stood, coming closer to her. She could see the look in his eyes, the same other men had given her millennia ago.

“He can make you a queen, but you are not immortal in this world. Here, you are nothing but flesh and bone.”

He pointed to the books that littered his walls.

“Where are you in all of them? A footnote to a greater god. A source of pain to your mother. Nothing more.”

He leaned in then, hovering over her.

“But I can change that,” he whispered. “I can make you infinite.” She felt his tongue dart out, making contact with the soft shell of her ear, and knew that she would give in to him again.

As Mirabel headed home, she raised her eyes to the sky and let the early morning sun sink into her skin. She would walk, she had decided, and enjoy the final moments of the summer. She could smell the scent of autumn in the air, knew the familiar dankness of the soil would soon beckon her home. She looked up once more at the open window where she knew the once beautiful boy was still sleeping, his cheeks sunken, his body all but bones in the light of day, and decided the encounter with Joseph had been a myth all of its own.

Elizabeth Powers has lived and wrote in many different places, but somehow always returns to the area of Cleveland, Ohio. She received her MFA from Eastern Washington University and works in electronic communications to pay the bills. You can normally find her bopping around coffee shops, binge-watching bad television with her significant other, or chasing after her young daughter.

A Short Story by Emily Guy Birken

Mrs. Bantry stood in the doorway of her richly appointed library and fumed. She turned her disapproving glare from the sprawled limbs and lifeless eyes cluttering up her Persian rug to her husband, whose mouth still gaped open.

“Well?!” she demanded.

Mr. Bantry immediately began sputtering. “My…my dear! I have no idea who…”

She cut him off. “Yes, yes. You’ve never seen him before in your life. I don’t care a fig about that!”

Mr. Bantry’s eyebrows shot up to where his hairline used to be. “M…Martha?”

Mrs. Bantry sighed. “Arthur, my book club will be here in three-quarters of an hour. I need everything to be perfect. Lionel will be here.”

Mr. Bantry knew that his wife’s rivalry with the local parson had gone to ridiculous lengths before. After Lionel Sedges’s strawberry rhubarb pie had been complimented by the other members of the book club, Martha had hired a pastry chef to create a masterful concoction for the following meeting, and then locked the poor woman in the basement for a full 24 hours after the book club guests all departed to ensure no one detected her deception in claiming the recipe as her own.

After Lionel won an award for his rose garden, Martha had dug out their own garden, added a hedge maze, over a dozen topiary animals, seven different varieties of flowering trees, and even built a decorative hermitage—although the unemployed actor she’d hired to be their hermit quit after two days to audition for a foot-cream commercial.

The library’s addition to their home was only the most recent in Mrs. Bantry’s campaign to one-up the diffident young clergyman. Apparently, Lionel had converted his study into a traditional country house library, having inherited a number of gorgeous old volumes from his father and wanting a suitable place to display them. The young man had spent his evenings and spare hours designing and building the shelves, paneling the walls, and staining all the wood to a bright, perfect walnut. He had debuted his beautiful new room at the book club meeting the month before, after two years of work on it.

Mrs. Bantry had come home seething and kept Mr. Bantry up half the night with her angry mutterings. It wasn’t until nearly 3 in the morning, when Mr. Bantry heard her suddenly exclaim, “Oh, yes!” in the tone he had learned to dread, that he was truly afraid. She slipped off to sleep soon after, and he watched her form in the other twin bed, wondering what she would do next.

The following morning, Mrs. Bantry shook him roughly awake to ask him where the rest of the newspapers were.

“M…my dear?” he’d asked her, blinking at the dressing-gown clad figure of his wife, her head held stiffly in her righteous rage.

“The newspapers, Arthur! The newspapers!” she huffed. “I can only find this week’s. I need something I read a fortnight ago. Perhaps as much as a month. Where are they?”

Mr. Bantry reached for his glasses on the night table. “Have you checked the kitchen, my dear? I often place them there.”

Mrs. Bantry’s smile was possibly the most terrifying thing about her—at least, to Mr. Bantry. She displayed it now, showing all her large white teeth, and leaned over to kiss her husband. “Thank you, Arthur!”

When he had finally dressed and sat down at the breakfast table, Mrs. Bantry was already on the phone. “I don’t care what it costs!” she shouted. “I need you here tomorrow morning.” And she slammed the phone down.

Mr. Bantry knew better than to ask about her plans, or inquire to whom she was speaking. He would find out soon enough.

He was not at all surprised the next morning when a lorry arrived with the name “Latham’s Libraries” emblazoned across the side. Mrs. Bantry jumped to meet the driver, who turned out to be Mr. Latham himself. A short, stocky man, his eyes shone with a glint of humour as he shook Mrs. Bantry’s hand.

“Rush job, eh?” Latham asked, pushing his dingy blue cap up off his head to scratch at his scalp. Though it was barely 8 o’clock in the morning, Latham was already glistening with a thin layer of sweat that darkened the brim of his cap. “Lucky fer you Miz Bantry, I specialize in quick work.”

“Yes, yes,” she said, with an airy wave. “I’ve read your advertisement. It’s why I hired you. Now get to work.”

And get to work he did. Within a week, he had built the addition onto their home, installed shelving, imported books, artwork, furniture, rugs, and aged brandy, and even a purring Siamese cat. The three weeks between the completion of the library and the day of Mrs. Bantry’s book club were the most excited Mr. Bantry had ever seen his wife. He caught her practicing her “this old library?” look and self-deprecating chuckle several times a day.

But now, there was a dead body in the center of her library, and the cat was sniffing at the corpse’s shoes—all on the very day of her triumphant reveal of the new room, and she was very cross about it, indeed.

Mr. Bantry swallowed hard before squaring his shoulders. “Martha,” he said, “We need to call the police.” His voice only wavered slightly.

Mrs. Bantry turned and walked decisively toward the phone table, and Mr. Bantry began to congratulate himself. He should put his foot down more often.

“I’m glad you agree with me, my dear,” he said. “I am sorry about your book club,” he added magnanimously, “I know you are desolated.”

Mrs. Bantry simply snorted, not even bothering to refute his suggestion. She looked up a number in the book beside the phone, and quickly dialed. “Mr. Latham!” she said peremptorily once connected, “we have a body!”

“My dear!” Mr. Bantry cried. “Why are you bringing Mr. Latham into this?”

Mrs. Bantry turned a cold glare on her husband, shooing him away with a wide gesture of her arm. Mr. Bantry was close enough, however, to hear Mr. Latham’s rough voice through the receiver: “Oh, I was afraid of that!”

“Well, really, Mr. Latham,” Mrs. Bantry responded. “You could have warned me!”

The tinny voice of the contractor replied, “I spell out the all the potential problems in the contract, Miz Bantry. Right there in subsection A, I explain that dead bodies often turn up unexpectedly in traditional English libraries. Not my fault if you don’t read all the fine print.”

Mr. Bantry’s legs felt like blancmange, and he sank to the floor. He was horrified to realize he had landed on the dead man’s outstretched hand and shuddered, jerking away so that he was no longer touching it. The cat ceased its investigation of the body’s feet and came to settle itself on Mr. Bantry’s lap.

Mrs. Bantry hadn’t noticed her husband’s pallor or change in altitude. She continued berating Mr. Latham. “And what am I supposed to do with this thing now? I have guests coming in…” she paused and glanced as the clock on the mantel “40 minutes.”

“Get rid of it,” advised Mr. Latham. “And quickly, too, before a detective shows up. No little foreign men or daffy old spinsters hanging about, are there? Once one of them arrives… well, let’s just say you’ll miss the peaceful time of just having a corpse to deal with.”

Mrs. Bantry turned to glance out the curtained windows. There was no way she could see anything through the tiny slit of window that showed, but she still pressed her lips together in a thin line, as if she spied amateur detectives coming up the street four abreast. “And where do you suggest I dispose of this body?” she asked Mr. Latham.

Mr. Bantry could not hear the man’s reply, but whatever it was did not satisfy his wife. She slammed the phone back in its cradle and turned to him.

“Come on then,” she said to Mr. Bantry. “You’ll have to get the shoulders.” She suited deed to word by moving to the corpse’s feet and neatly hoisting them up.

Mr. Bantry’s mouth opened and closed for several moments with no sound coming out. When he finally managed to stammer out his wife’s name, she let out an impatient breath.

“Arthur,” she said with the kind of exaggerated calmness that wives usually reserve for tense conversations with their husbands during dinner parties. “There are only 35 minutes remaining until my club arrives, and I still have not assembled all the food or mixed the punch. Please grab this dead gentleman’s shoulders and help me carry him into the hedge maze. We’ll figure out what to do with him after the party.”

And so a dazed Mr. Bantry stood and reached for the corpse’s shoulders. “Lift with your knees, darling,” Mrs. Bantry reminded him. “No sense putting out your back.”

What followed was an unpleasant several moments. Though the dead man was not particularly large, bodies are unwieldy things, and the Bantrys struggled to get him around corners and through doors. When they had finally laid him at the first turn of the hedge maze, Mr. Bantry pulled his handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his forehead, staring down at the prone body.

“Shouldn’t we say a few words or something?” he asked, fearing that his voice was on the verge of whining. He cleared his throat. “I mean…”

“Oh, for heaven’s sake, Arthur!” Mrs. Bantry exclaimed, turning her back on him and exiting the maze. He stood dumbly for a long moment. From across the garden, he heard his wife call “Are you coming?!”

Mr. Bantry was sitting at the kitchen table with his hands braced around a much-needed cup of tea an hour later, listening to the gentle murmur of discussion from the library, when he saw a stooped old woman with fluffy white hair and bright blue eyes and a little man with an enormous handlebar mustache and a meticulously tied cravat enter their garden and walk toward the maze.

Mr. Bantry squeezed his eyes shut and sipped his tea.

Emily Guy Birken is the author of four books on personal finance, including The Five Years Before You Retire, with a fifth under contract, and her byline has appeared in Forbes. She has been writing professionally since 2010. She lives in Milwaukee with her engineer husband, two sons who are determined to make her a Pokemon expert, a retired greyhound, and a cat that doubles as a throw pillow. You can follow Emily on Twitter @emilyguybirken. 

A Short Story by Sara P. Cullen

It went off at 3:05 in the morning, but he’d been awake hours before, just waiting for the shrill sounding alarm that would have most people groaning and curling back into their nook of blankets.

Not him. He’d been waiting impatiently. Barely creased, he pulled back the covers and pulled on his boots, still dressed from the day before.

They slid off the curve of his finger as he tried to yank them on, catching his hand. Cursing, he waved off the wound, sucking on it briefly, and grabbed his jacket that he’d folded over the back of his chair. He toyed with the idea of bringing his phone but decided he wouldn’t need it.

Laying it carefully on his bedside counter, he took a look around his room. It looked perfect, untouched but for the few things that lay around making the space his.

Tapping the side of the wall, he clicked the door closed quietly. Sound easily traveled.

Stepping out into the hall, he almost expected someone to be waiting there, ready to stop him, demand that he go back to bed and quit waking up the whole house. But there was no one there and, listening to the silence, he realized no one was coming.

His mum was sleeping gently, but his dad had woken up to the sound of the door. He heard him toss and turn before grumbling something intelligible under his breath, something that resembled, “Stupid, fuckin prick.”Realizing that standing on ceremony was pretty pointless, he strode down the hall purposefully and banged the door frame loud enough that the whole house rattled. He could imagine his mum waking up in a gasp of, “What was that?” And his dad, gently ushering her back into bed, eyeing his bedroom door with that scowl resting on his tight, overdrawn lips.

Disappearing down the backfield, he listened for commotion, but there was nothing. He drew his jacket tighter on his shoulders and sucked in a sharp breath of the biting cold. The dawn started to make its way through the darkness, making the path just visible. He’d been walking this track for months, and he could feel it calling to him. He could hear the waves crashing against the edge of the mountain in one crackle of bristling thunder.

It calmed him. Not the water, peacefully waving in and out in one melodic motion, but the angry hurtle that sounded louder than him, angrier than him, was heaven.

Just as he came to a huddle of trees lining up the golden passageway, a fox ran by with no intention of stopping but, catching a glimpse of him, came to an abrupt halt.

The fox seemed to size him up. His heartbeat raced, and he thought for a second that the fox was going to jump at him. Foxes weren’t known to do that, but there was something in the translucent glare of the eyes and the snarl of the lips that made him think the fox was angry at him.

There was no reason to be frightened. He made his hands into fists and stepped forward.

The fox blinked sadly at him, almost disappointed, and raced away.

What the fuck.

Blinking in concession, he shook off the daze and stumbled onwards, raking a hand through his hair. It was just a fox. Just a fox. He laughed to himself.

Rounding the last arch of the bend where the trees leaned away back to the forest, leading an open break of light to the runway before him, he thought, I’m finally here.

Speeding up with a smile on his lips, he jogged on, catching sight of the precipice looking forward onto the sea. What he saw surprised him.

There was a girl there, her feet dangerously close to the edge. Her dusty blonde hair whipped around her pale face by the cutting wind as she stared forward.

She was messing up his plans. For a second, he thought about going home, trying it again another day. But he’d made his decision. This is the plan. This is the time. This is the day.

Tiptoeing forward, careful not to spook her, he moved within a breath of distance behind her and carefully placed a hand on her shoulder. Ready to pull her back if needed.

She felt odd, almost gelatinous.

A sharp breath escaped her, and she waved forward a circus performer riding a unicycle.

“I got you,” he said, steading her and moving her an inch away from the edge again.

She turned and slapped him. Hard, in the chest. She seemed dainty, but he could feel the burn into his lungs, and for a moment, it was hard to catch his breath.

“What are you doing here?” she spat, moving back to the edge. “I came to do this, and I won’t have anyone stop me.”

He was too stunned to speak as her gaze narrowed in on the jutting rocks, and for a moment, he thought she was going to soar right off the top.

Leaning forward, he grabbed her and yanked her back once again.

She slapped him harder this time. He doubled over, his stomach lurching.

“Just wait,” he said. “I’m not trying to stop you. I came here to do the same thing, alright?”

He laughed, but it came out oddly, and her face scrunched up in confusion. “Then why do you keep pulling me back?”

Scratching the edge of his jaw, he searched.

 “Cause I planned to do this now, and you’re fucking it up.” He sighed, “If I see you do it first, I mightn’t have the balls to jump.”

She eyed him warily as if he was trying to trick her. “I don’t care if you wanna die or not. Not really my problem.”

He held up his hands in surrender.

Studying him, she nodded and wordlessly held out her hand. It was cracked and uncared for.

He stepped away from her and looked from her outstretched hand to her imploring eyes.

“Take it,” she snapped, waving it at him.

“Why?”

“We can do it together.”

He supposed they could, but something about taking her hand scared him. It seemed wrong, and from the way she felt before, he could only imagine what it would feel like in his. He felt like he didn’t have a choice.

Nodding, he took her hand and fought back a dry heave.

It was coarse and grating, and he could almost feel it shaving pieces of his skin. Her palm dipped oddly. It was empty and not touching his.

“Your hand feels strange,” he said.

“So does yours.”

When he looked up, she was smiling playfully with a catch of light in her eyes. Closing his own eyes, he took a breath and stepped next to her.

The wind was strong at the edge. It almost sent him hurtling out. He gripped her hand tightly and planted his feet on the ground.

“Why are you scared?” she asked.

“I’m not…” he trembled out, “I’m-“

“Scared.” She finished raising a cocky brow at him.

There was something in her, humming like electricity, and it was the only thing that kept him holding on; it soothed his anxious heart.

“Why are you doing this?” he asked her.

Turning, she looked into him, and without a hint of doubt, she said, “Because I’m all alone.”

She spoke simply, and he couldn’t doubt for a second that it was true.

“I’m here,” he said, squeezing her sore hand tighter.

“And you’re about to leave, are you not?”

Testily looking over, he analyzed the drop. It would be long, he would go down fast, and he’d remember everything until his body finally was smashed apart by rocks and god knows what else.

He thought it would be nice, his family wouldn’t find him, and he’d be taken into the sea like a million more lives before him. He’d be just another young troubled man who’d disappeared, but he hadn’t expected a girl surer of herself than him and so ready to jump.

“Mhmm,” He managed.

“Alright, then. You ready?”

He nodded wordlessly, and without a second to think, she outstretched one leg, hovering there for a moment. Her weight, heavier and stronger than it looked, pulled at his shoulder. He seized up in a blind panic.

In fright, he pulled back with enough force for two people and sent them crashing to the ground in an entanglement of limbs.

The bang left him dazed for a second, and he didn’t realize she was hitting him, over and over again until he had to hold back her arms and push her spindly body away.

Spit curled up at her mouth as her skin shifted and tried to find its place inside her. The more he pushed, what was wrong with her?

“Why’d you pull us back? Why’d you pull us back!”

Slackening his hold, she grabbed at his throat in a fit. His eyes were rolling in her head as she found the right grip on his neck, and visibly shaking, she gritted out, “Why’d you do it?”

Beating her away and shoving his knee into her folding stomach, he pushed her off and got to his feet.

“Cause…”

“Cause what, eh?” She advanced towards him, hitting him again.

He hissed out a strangled breath. He didn’t have time to speak. His body was burning from the inside out and, with every push, he realized that she was stealthily guiding him closer and closer to the edge.

He could taste the crashing waves ready to eat him up, and he was afraid.

Whimpering as his heel caught the edge of crumbling rock, he grabbed her hand desperately with his own, “Please stop.”

“Why?”

Holding the strange form in his hands, he watched her calculating look and let out a relieving sigh, bowing his head at this strange, wonderful creature.

“Why?” she shouted.

“Cause I don’t wanna die!” he shouted back.

She dropped onto her knees and looked up at him.

“Fuck,” he said, running a frayed hand through his hair. “I get it, alright. I never really wanted to die. I’m just feeling sorry for myself. And you- you’re so sure, well you seem sure, but what if you aren’t and when you leap off the edge, you realize it’s too late to turn back? What’ll you do then?”

Smiling to herself, she got up and tilted her chin proudly up at him.

Moving in close, so her mouth was right beside his ear, she whispered, “I was never gonna jump.”

“…What…but…” he stumbled out.

“And I knew you wouldn’t either.” She winked, walking back towards the way he started, “Now you know.”

Her voice sang out from the trees, and he jogged after her. She’d only been a few steps in front of him, and the field was clear. There was nowhere to hide, but as he ran around the corner, she was gone.

Spinning around, he tried to spot any sign of her. There was nothing but the chirping of birds risen and determined to wake all sleeping things.

“How’d you know?” he asked the air.

“What the hell…”

After a few moments of disbelief, he kicked at the ground, alright, and headed back home.

Hands in his pockets and jacket zipped up to his neck, he raced back the way he came, and as he came to the field of his house, he saw a fox, paused and staring at him.

It tilted his head up at him and squared off its shoulders.

There was something familiar about its mouth, and for a moment, he thought he saw the curl of a smile. He found himself smiling back as the fox skipped through the long grass and disappeared into the woods.

Laughing still, he went back into the house, quiet as he could. Letting himself into his room, he fell onto his bed and went back to sleep in a matter of minutes. He hadn’t been to sleep so quickly in a long time.

Sara P Cullen co-runs an equestrian centre with her mother in the countryside of Ireland, spending most of her active lifestyle with her horses and many pets. Leaving not much time to pursue other hobbies. 

However, her love of books and movies plays a huge part in her life, running off to the cinema any chance she can get and staying up late at night to finish another string of books. 

Her sporty nature comes from her mother, but her father’s side comes from a family of show-people, funfair folk, and musicians who encouraged her to pursue a more creative past time. Sara had been writing stories since she was very young and has now taken creative writing courses to further her craft. 

Although she would describe herself as an avid animal lover and perceived less people friendly, her stories have a vivid and descriptive narrative of other people’s personalities and their relatable internal struggles. Showing a great interest in the people around her, usually from a witty first-person narrative.  

A Short Story by Philip Goldberg

Another night, and once again the Runner hugged the building walls, still damp from the rain that had stopped falling not long ago. The scrawled messages and spray-painted symbols glistened on the wet concrete. Water drops dripped from the barbed wire wrapped around every mailbox. She passed it all with fluid steps. Her gray eyes were alert for any Sentry who might be lurking in the darkness. The gun she gripped was prepared for any armed patrol that crossed her path, and there had been a few.

Her mother had taught her well. She’d had the wherewithal to take them underground after the Leader was elected President by a hair-thin margin, had understood the man’s words were more than rhetoric. When he started turning his insane notions into action, rounding up what he’d called “undesirables” and incarcerating them behind barbed wire in disused warehouses and abandoned buildings, she joined the Resistance and brought her young daughter with her.

How the Runner longed for her mother back in her life. But there was no time for tears. She couldn’t let this hope slow her down, stop her from finding her mother. So she continued.

Daybreak approached, and the Runner sought a place to hide. She came upon a boarded-up building. Experience had taught her how to find an entry. Around the back, she found a window where some boards had been pried off. Boards were scavenged as fast as they went up. Probably used for firewood, she thought.

Once inside, she pulled the small flashlight from her pack and shined its beam ahead. A narrow hallway appeared before her. Doorways, most open, ran along the right and left. She knew better than to go through the first ones. Stories had reached her of those captured or killed hiding in the first apartments by hunting Sentries. She approached the fourth door on the left. It was shut. Pressing her ear against it, she listened, holding her breath. Silence. The door opened with only a small squeak. She kept it ajar, having learned this made it easier to hear anyone approaching. The flashlight’s thin beam illuminated a bit of the apartment. Some furniture remained, scattered about. She clicked off the light, sat on the floor, and placed the gun near her hand and her pack against her leg. Only then did she lean against the wall.

Her mother’s face, a smile curling her lips, appeared in the darkened room. A ghost? A memory? A comfort? They had last been together over a year ago, right after she’d turned fifteen.

Floorboards creaked, and the image of her mother disappeared. She grew alert. The gun back in her hand, her finger tightened around the trigger, the barrel aimed at the doorway. Someone appeared in the narrow opening and peered into the apartment. Whoever it was must’ve seen her, for the person receded into the hall. A Sentry wouldn’t flee. Perhaps a snitch? The Runner jumped to her feet in pursuit. Once in the hall, she said: “Stop—or I’ll shoot.”

The slight body stopped. Two hands shot up, frozen in the air.

With gun cocked, the Runner stepped close. “Turn… slowly.”

Now facing her was a teen girl, not much older than her. The girl’s dark hair was cropped short, and her amber eyes appeared tired. “Sentry?” The girl asked—her voice edgy.

“If I were, you’d be lying on the floor, bleeding.” She motioned for the girl to lower her hands and watched them drop to her sides. She relaxed her grip on the gun and let her own hand down.

“You… Resistance?”

The Runner nodded. “You?”

“Me? I should be long gone with the rest.”

The runner gazed at this white girl and arched her eyebrows. But before she could ask the question on her mind, the girl answered it.

“I’m Queer… Lesbian, whatever you want to call me. A disgrace in the eyes of God, you recall, a threat to girls everywhere, and all that bullshit.”

“I remember his rants.”

The cropped-haired girl shuffled her feet and stared at the floor. “Word on the street was they were rounding us up with the idea of imprisoning us in large Conversion centers. After two of my friends… disappeared, I dropped out of sight.”

The Runner remembered going to her friend, Rosa’s house, seeing the door wide open, the place ransacked, and the girl gone with all the other Mexicans.  She had stood frozen there with a look of wild despair.

“You all right?”

She was unaware that she now wore that same look. “I’m okay.” She watched the girl run a hand over her sweatshirt and noticed it read, University of Pennsylvania. Her mother had been a professor at NYU. Julia had been her mother’s name then, and it seemed so long ago. “Come on.” The floorboards creaked under her footfalls, and she returned to the apartment, the girl’s steps echoing behind her, as the first streaks of morning light came through parts of the window where some boards had been pried away. “Stay out of view of those openings.” She sat on the floor by her pack in the room’s shadows and motioned for the girl to join her.

The girl took a similar darkened spot across from her. “Scarlet’s my name.”

“Destiny’s mine.” The name felt unfamiliar passing through her lips. Once underground, she had shed it. Now hearing it made her feel like it had belonged to someone else. “How long have you been on the run?”

“Two years give or take a few weeks.”

“You’ve eluded the Sentries that long. How?”  

“Same as you probably. Good people are out there. They hid me, fed me, clothed me…” She eyed her hands and rubbed them together. “But there are less and less of them. Fewer hiding places.”

“I know. Sentries have infiltrated our ranks. Imprisoned and killed many members. Eliminated a lot of our hiders…” She studied the run-down room. “Tonight I’m moving on.”

“Where to?”

“Free Boston.” Part of the Federation of Free City States, she knew, also including Philadelphia, Houston, Seattle, Oakland, and South Chicago, formed just before the Seven Month War had ended in the stalemate that had led to the fragile peace existing now, which each side expected the other to break.

“Free Boston,” the cropped-haired girl said it as if the City State was a planet in a distant galaxy. “That’s one dangerous trip.”

“Sneaking through these streets is dangerous. Seeking a hider’s home’s dangerous. Searching for food and drink’s dangerous.”

“I didn’t mean to—”

“—It’s okay. I have to go there, that’s all.”

“Boston,” she said the name with great interest. “My aunt and cousins live there. Haven’t spoken to them since…”

“You should come with me then. Better than remaining here—no matter how dangerous it’ll be getting there. No one will be hunting you there like some animal. You can stop running.”

“I’m tired of running.”

“So am I.”

Scarlet’s eyes possessed the look that came with deep reflection. After a few moments, she focused on the Runner and said: “I’ll go with you.”

“Good. Get some sleep. You’ll need it.”

That day, the Runner’s troubling dreams returned. In this one, she kept to the alleys, and dark spaces of the patrolled streets bringing important news to those incarcerated in the Sectors. Her mother’s voice echoed in her head, repeating: “Imagine you’re walking on cats’ paws.” Soft step after soft step, she continued until coming to the barbed-wire fence. She cut a hole at its bottom and crawled through.

In the shadows beyond the reach of the spotlights stood Miguel, head of the Mexican sector. His face was bloodied. “Believing what you tell me…” He let loose a defiant laugh, loud and chilling. Blood ran from the wounds on his face, his hands. “This is what believing you has brought me.” 

A shot rang out from the darkness. Miguel fell.  

Before he hit the ground, the Runner woke. A scream choked in her throat. Her breaths, fast. She wrapped both hands around her chest, tightened her grip. Her mother’s determined face appeared, hovered in the air before her eyes. Only then did she loosen her grip and noticed the few bars of sunlight shining through where the wood slats had been removed from the window.

---

When darkness came, the Runner pulled from her pack a bag of black powder. She applied it to her face and hands. She eyed the girl. “It comes off with a little water.”

Scarlet took some and smeared it across the same places as the Runner had. And then they headed out.

The Runner had heard of a break in the fence off Conner Street in Northeastern Bronx. Maybe the Leader and his minions had gotten cocky or sloppy not guarding this area because there was the hole at the base of the fence wide enough for both of them to crawl through and not a Sentry in sight. Once on the Westchester side, she led the way, holding her gun steady and ready. In the other hand was a compass. She stared at it and headed northeast, the old interstate on the right, now only traveled by the Sentries, the Keepers of Power, and those with political connections. Scarlet kept pace with her on empty small streets and roads. When the woods appeared, they went into them. The Runner pulled out her flashlight and held it. She aimed the beam ahead and made out the winding path laden with fallen leaves, as well as the tree branches growing naked. The breeze blew, and memories rustled through her: leaves changing colors, snow falling, blossoms blooming, summer rainbows. None brought joy, only pain of what she desperately missed, what she so badly wanted to reclaim. But her mother’s defiant voice consumed her: “Keep moving, keep fighting.” These words, the last her mother had said to her, became the motivation for each step she took.

The inky blue lightened. They quickened their steps until coming to an old cabin the Runner had heard about through the rumor chain.

Inside everything felt damp to the touch. Both teens checked the kitchen cabinets and found a few cans of beans. In one drawer, Scarlet located a can opener. Each grabbed a can and ate the beans cold. Somewhat sated and thoroughly exhausted, each found a place on the wood-planked floor and lay there. The Runner kept the gun by her side, as always. Despite being so tired, the Runner fought sleep but knew it was a battle she’d lose and did. She was roused out of sleep by strange noises and grabbed the gun, pointing it—for it had become a reflex—around the room, at the window, at the door. But it was only Scarlet, spitting out garbled words, twitching all over. She crawled to the cropped-haired girl and shook her awake.

Scarlet stared with bewilderment, appearing unaware of where she was. Gradually, she figured it out and sat up. The Runner noticed the tears glistening on her cheeks, setting off a strange feeling in her, at how long it had been since she’d cried. Even after losing her mother, no tears had come. She struggled to recall when tears had last fallen from her eyes. And then it came to her: still known as Destiny, she discovered a friend had posted a nasty lie about her on Facebook. Betrayed and hurt, she cried. Remembering this, she expelled a tortured breath.

“My parents, sister, and brother visit me in my sleep,” Scarlet said, her voice tiny. “They call out my name. But they never hear me when I answer.”

“Ever gone home again? See if they’re still there.”

“I went back to where we lived…”

“And?”

Scarlet rubbed her cropped hair. “Gone.”

”Hopefully they fled, too.”

“You should know better.”  

Silence, awkward and angry, clutched the room until the Runner asked with hesitancy: “Miss them?”

“Some. You?”

“I miss my mother.”

“Where is she?”

“Don’t know. Haven’t seen her in over a year. That’s why I’m heading to Free Boston, to see if anyone there knows anything.”

“Do you think someone will?”

The sound of a distant car passing made both look in its direction before Destiny faced her and said: “Can’t say. But I must go and ask.” She glanced at the window. “Sun will set soon. Try to get a little more rest.”

“You too.” Scarlet lay down.

But the Runner remained seated, her mind sorting out their conversation. A thought came to her: What would she do if no one knew where her mother was? She gazed out the window watching the sky darken. No answer came, but a stinging remembrance did.

---

She had come home that night over a year ago, tired from disseminating information to the new crop of Runners. When she’d opened the door to the apartment where she and her mother were hiding, the sight made her heart pump harder. The place had been ransacked, looking like Rosa’s house had. She ran into the room where their closet living area was. Its door had been ripped off the hinges, the small space within a mess—her mother—like Rosa and her family—gone.

This harrowing memory haunted her, as she trekked beside Scarlet, their path aided by the full moon. With each step, she felt the weight of those bitter recollections pulling her back into them. But she fought those dark thoughts, fought hard.

Scarlet looked at her, sensed something gnawing at her and wanted to ask her what it was but didn’t say a word, concluding that it was best to leave someone alone at moments like these. That’s how she’d want to be treated. So she continued walking. Crunching dry leaves crushed under their footsteps produced  the only sound between them.

---

The tweeted ranting of the Leader followed the Runner on every street, down every alley. It was as if the typed words were his Sentries, prowling, pursuing her like prey. In one lightless corner, they found her, trapped her, wrapped their letters, hashtags, exclamation points around her throat and began choking the life from her.

Coughing, she bolted up from the floor of another deserted cabin in the woods. She grabbed the gun and dropped it, a shot rang out, the bullet lodging in the wood wall before her. She became aware of the cropped-haired girl sitting and staring at her with fearful eyes.  

“Nightmare?” Scarlet asked, again rubbing what was left of her cut hair.

“Just another one.”

“Me… I’ve lost count.” She giggled in a nervous attempt to lighten the atmosphere.

“Sometimes I wake from them wishing I could go back to the way it was.” The faces of lost friends singing Happy Birthday, playgrounds filled with shrieks of laughter, going to the movies or ice-skating rinks hurtled through her mind. “But it always hits me that I can’t.”

Heavy sorrow weighed down the room.

“Is your father gone, too?”

His blank face replaced the memories of things she once prized. “Never knew him. Left my mom before I could remember. Little I know she told me… that I have his eyes, his chin, his smile… that he was one of her graduate students…”

“Do you miss him?”

“Miss not knowing him. At least wish I’d met him once.”

“I don’t know what’s worse.” Scarlet fidgeted with her fingers. “Knowing them and missing them… or not knowing them at all.”

“Wish I’d known him.”

“Funny, I wish I hadn’t known mine. He never took to what I was. Probably would’ve turned me in if I hadn’t fled.”

“You believe that?”

“I do.”

“Harsh.”

“So was he.”

---

Night’s thick black curtain descended, and the two teens left the cabin. The rain had fallen that afternoon. It had stopped, but the ground was still wet, and each step was sucked into the muddy earth, followed by an ongoing struggle to free the sunken boot. The wind had kicked up, blowing colder than the night before. Despite wearing coats, both girls steeled themselves against the frigid air. The gun felt heavy in the Runner’s hand, its grip like ice. Still, they trudged on.

A male voice cut through the cold woods. “Halt!”

She grabbed Scarlet’s hand and pulled her along, hoping to put some distance between them and their pursuer. Thudding footsteps, snaps of breaking branches came fast from behind. “Don’t look back,” she told the girl.

A shot rang out, a warning. “Stop now!”

Destiny wrapped her finger around the trigger. “Run!” She stopped, spun around and fired in the direction of her pursuer. Only then she saw there were two, not one, coming her way. Returned shots whizzed past her. She crouched, set herself and aimed at one, and fired. One Sentry dropped to the ground, but the other kept charging. She fired five shots. The last two hit and she watched the second Sentry fall. An uneasy quiet fell. She rose, surprised to see Scarlet standing a few feet away. Approaching the girl, she saw fear on her face, noticed her trembling.

“How do you kill?” The cropped haired girl’s voice, brittle.

The question wasn’t new. She’d asked it of herself. “I shoot to survive. Kill to keep going.”

The two teens came to a small town. Its streets were deserted. Still, the Runner remained vigilant, maintained her firm grip on the gun, and made sure they stayed close to the small facades that bordered the quiet, desolate main street. They passed stores long empty, their front windows grimy. When they came to an alley between two buildings, she led Scarlet down it. They wandered behind the buildings until she noticed a door ajar and stopped, looked at the cropped-haired girl, and whispered: “Stay here.”

Scarlet watched her step to the slightly open door and carefully push it open, squeaking as it did.

Pulling out her flashlight with one hand, aiming her gun in the other, she stepped inside. Floorboards groaned under her feet. The torch caught something in its beam: a mannequin of a woman, wearing a torn dress. She went to it, touched the fabric with a finger, and her eyes grew distant.

Destiny, all of nine, had come out of the department store’s fitting room, wearing the brightly colored spring dress.

Julia had stood before her, studying it. “Turn around.”

She spun around until facing her mother again. A smile graced the woman’s lips.

“You look pretty.”

She felt her cheeks grow warm. “Do I?”

The smile intensified. “You do.”

Then she ran her hand over the dress, felt the softness of it, and broke into an embarrassed smile.

The Runner released the piece of dress with heaviness in her heart. She took in the rest of the dusty room before returning to Scarlet, leaning against the building’s back brick wall. “We’ll stay here for the day.”

Inside, they opened a door that revealed stairs going down to the basement. The Runner took note and then looked at the cropped-haired girl. “I’m hungry. You?”

“Famished.”

“Stay here. I’ll find us food and drink. If anything spooks you, go down there and be still. Got it?”

“Don’t worry. I know what to do.”

And she realized this girl probably did.  

She prowled the main street, consumed by thoughts of how everything got this way. How someone so wrong convinced so many that he was their last hope, how they lapped up his lies like puppy dogs, and how they defended him when he was not defensible.

The rumbling of her stomach drowned out these thoughts. Before her stood a storefront and inside were shelves stacked with cans and packages of food. Her mouth watered. She wondered whether stores in a small town like this would be alarmed. Gazing up and down the street at the many empty storefronts, she suspected nothing around here would.  Still, hunger and thirst were worth the risk.

She found another alley, followed it to the back and came to the rear door of the grocery. Nearby, there was a rusted rod on the ground. She grabbed it and jimmied the door open. The silence that followed proved her suspicion right.

They ripped open the packages and cans, which the Runner had made sure had pull-tops, and feasted on cold Spaghetti-Os, fruit cocktails, and cookies. Each washed it down with warm water from bottles. Rare smiles graced their faces, and occasional giggles escaped their lips. Each ate like it was her last supper and when finished, prided herself on a full belly. Sweet sleepiness came over them, and soon both were snoring.

The Runner felt her body being shaken, and her eyes shot open. Her gun raised and aimed at someone hovering over her. That’s when she heard: “Wake up, wake up.” Her eyes focused and saw it was Scarlet. She lowered the gun. “We slept too late. It’s already dark.”

“Crap.” She jumped up and gathered her few belongings, making sure to stuff the remaining food cans and packages in her backpack.

They fled, leaving the mannequin to guard the storeroom, and soon came upon a narrow river and followed its curving path. Cloud cover obscured the moon from shining down on them. Their mouths expelled chilled breaths, white fogs that scattered in the breeze.

Only then did the Runner realize how lucky they had been. Her theft had gone undetected.  

Scarlet walked beside her and asked: “Ever been in love?”

The cropped-haired girl’s question bit her hard, and she replied in a somber tone: “No.”

“I have. Lara was her name.”

“She disappeared?”

Scarlet’s silence was answer enough.

The rush of the nearby river’s water seized the air. The Runner cast her curious look on the cropped-haired girl. “Have you ever…”

“Many times.”

The Runner’s steps picked up their pace. She moved ahead.

But Scarlet caught up and noticed the glum look on the Runner’s face. An awkward silence gripped them until Scarlet broke it. “You haven’t—

“—I’ve missed out on a lot of things.”

Scarlet gazed ahead without a word.

“Look, I shouldn’t be laying this on you. Things are what they are. That’s all.”

Scarlet peered at her. She placed a halting hand on her. “They don’t have to be. I mean, you and me, we could—”

The Runner stepped out of the crop-haired girl’s grasp. “Sorry, I’m not like you. Right now, I wish I was.”

“But—“

“—I’d be faking it, and I don’t want to do that. Not to you, not to me.”

“It’s okay. I get it. I really do.” Her voice, understanding.

“Believe me, I do wish—”

Scarlet placed a finger on the Runner’s lips, silencing her, and then she smiled.

---

Nightfall.

After eating and drinking from all of the remaining cans and packages, they snuck out of another cabin and headed into the rain. Their steps sloshed. The air thick with dampness clung to their faces, hands, even went through their boots and socks to their feet. The unpleasant sensations it produced made the Runner recall a night like this.

She had gone out to run information that night. The sky had opened up; the rain had fallen hard, chilling her body and bones, icing any exposed skin. Everything ached. By the next morning, she felt so sick, so feverish. Hallucinations plagued her. In one, the Leader, now a giant, chased her down dark, deserted streets wanting to catch her and devour her. In another, fireballs shot from his flaming hair and exploded around her.

But her mother had nursed her back from the illness, from its hell. When she recovered, her mother helped her regain the lost weight, the missing strength.

The time came when she wanted to return to running information, but her mother forbade her. She would give no explanation as to why the Runner couldn’t go.

So when the opportunity presented itself, she defied her mother and went out into the night. And what she found were empty internment camps. Places where she’d gone before and met with Miguel, Abbad, Rasheed, and others. The Leader had lived up to his word. The shock hit her, and she ran like she never had before. She finally stopped and glared at the glittering lights across the river where the Keepers of Power lived. A new determination overcame her, to fight harder against the Leader and his followers who lived behind those lighted windows.

This had been her sole plan until they’d seized her mother.

---

Glimmering lights were visible. Flashlight beams. Seeing them, the Runner grabbed Scarlet’s hand and led her deeper into the woods. She stopped at a safe distance from the road, pulling the cropped-haired girl onto the wet ground with her. She shivered. Scarlet shuddered. She focused on the moving beams of light coming closer. Dark figures walking along the road became visible. They were of four different heights and shapes. She wrapped her finger around the trigger, rose to her knees, ready to fire.

“Don’t just see, hear,” her mother had told her in training.

She listened hard, until picking up faint voices. That’s when she heard it: the voice of a woman. There were no female Sentries. Under the Leader, a woman’s role was in the home, caring for her husband, having babies for growing the White race. She stood and motioned Scarlet to do the same. Looking at the cropped-haired girl next to her, she said: “They’re Resistance.”

“How do you know?”

She told her how.

“We’ve made it.”

“Not so fast. We’re not there yet.”

“But?“

“Let’s talk to them first.”

They headed to the road, where the Resistance fighters spun on their boot heels, their rifles aimed and ready. The Runner and Scarlet raised their hands. The four before them kept their firearms steady, their eyes locked on them.

“I’m Resistance,” she said. “Destiny Hartman. My mother’s Julia Hartman.”

The sole female in the patrol, not much older than her, stepped forward. A look of recognition filled her eyes. “I’ve heard of her. Wasn’t she—”

“—Over a year ago. Been searching for her since. Hoping someone in Free Boston can help me.”

She lowered her rifle and focused her eyes on Scarlet. “And you?”  

“I’m seeking sanctuary there. Been on the run since the Great Conversion.”

“Lost some friends then…” She motioned with her head for the other three to lower their rifles. Looking at the two teens before her, she told them to lower their hands. “Come with us.”

Everyone marched up the road until they came to a truck, its side panel advertising a favorite beer. In the cab sat an older man at the steering wheel.

“Get in the back,” the patrol leader said.

Both climbed up and entered the empty space. A member of the patrol slid the back door down, and the space became lightless. The Runner turned on her flashlight. Both Scarlet and she sat on burlap sacks scattered about the floor. The cropped-haired girl was smiling.

The truck’s engine rumbled, vibrating along the metal walls of the container, as the big rig drove the road creating a soothing sound and rhythmic motion.

“Told you we made it,” Scarlet said, her voice relieved and happy.

The Runner didn’t reply.

The back doors of the truck slid open, flooding the container with sunlight. The Runner awoke, blinking furiously at her sleep being interrupted. She shaded her eyes with a hand, as the sunlight bothered her. She noticed Scarlet, awake and sitting with her back against the wall. Each rose and stepped to the open end. The hand of a Resistance fighter helped them down.

The Runner’s eyes acclimated to the sunlight, which she hadn’t been out in for some time, and then gazed with wonder at the towering steel and glass buildings shimmering in the bright light of day. Free Boston encircled her in all its tarnished glory. She looked at Scarlet, who fell into her arms, and she stood awkwardly embracing the cropped-haired girl. Like crying, it had been quite a while since she had hugged or had been hugged by someone. The last person to do so was her mother. Slowly, the hug felt less of a distant memory and more real, and she gave into it, accepting the comfort provided by it— and only then did a slight smile appear. For the moment, she was Destiny again. But she knew the moment wouldn’t last.

Later, the Runner was brought to the office of General Wright, the head of Free Boston’s Resistance Army. The windowed wall behind the General afforded her a breathtaking view of the skyscrapers of Free Boston in the now diminishing daylight.

She greeted the General. An imposing woman: tall, broad-shouldered, heart-faced with blue eyes that could mesmerize someone looking at them for too long.

The General placed her large hand over the Runner’s smaller one, obscuring it. “I must say you getting here from New York is… quite impressive.”

She fought off rising embarrassment by staring at her muddied boots. “My mother was a good teacher.” 

“I know.”

Her eyes shot up. “You know her?”

“I met her in the early days… before everything changed.” The General’s eyes held more buried memories of Julia.

“Is she… alive?”

“From the intelligence, we’ve gathered… she is.”

The Runner gasped. “Where?”

“She’s being held in a former Federal Penitentiary in Northern Virginia.”

“I’ve got to go there. Find her—”

“—Impossible. The place is a fortress. Heavily guarded. Even if you made it there—and you seem capable of doing so, you’d never get inside. We’ve tried.“

Her expression turned downcast.

“He has done a good job of thinning our ranks… It’d be suicide sending anyone there.”  

She averted the woman’s stare and looked again at the skyscrapers cast in a pumpkin hue.

That night back in her room in a former hotel, the Runner sat on her bed and peered at the rain-splotched window. Beyond it, the skyline of Free Boston was barely illuminated and hard to see through the raindrops on the glass panes.  She thought about visiting Scarlet in the room next door and tell her everything she’d learned from General Wright. But she didn’t want to trouble the girl anymore with her burdens. So she stayed in her room and moved to the edge of the bed, staring out the window into the darkness. The face of her mother appeared there, a phantom floating before her, flashing fierce eyes. She became fixated on the eyes, growing certain of one absolute truth.

Her mother had trained her well.

Philip Goldberg’s short stories have appeared in both literary and small press publications including trampset, Junto, Thrice Fiction, Straylight, foliate oak, Borrowed Solace, The Chaffin Journal, and Twisted Vine Literary Art Journal. Two more of his stories have been accepted by The Halcyone/Black Mountain Press and by the Evening Street Review. Microfictions have appeared in Blink Ink and Starwheel. Three of his stories have been published in Best of collections and one was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. He is currently workshopping his novel.