As an adult, whose life includes experiences, I know perfectly well that there is no stack of letters idyllically accumulating beneath the threshold of my doorway. I know that there is no comforting mid-century stereotype of a mailman, cocking and shaking his head, shoving said letters into the inaugural square foot of my apartment, privately wishing me well. I am well aware that every card I’ve received that’s not from Papyrus was the result of someone who sort of knows me standing in the candy/holiday/clearance aisle of a Safeway and congratulating himself/herself on selecting a card with exactly the right amount of condolences and a trendy-but-muted envelope color without all the cursive and religious stuff for less than $6.95. I am entirely conscious of the fact that their half-baked grievances are stacked and rubber-banded at the Devon Avenue Post Office, waiting to be retrieved by yours truly from an extremely condescending postal clerk at a time and date of my choosing.

But the joke’s on them, because I am not coming. I am halfway down the gangplank of a 747 (or whatever nondescript commercial airliner) and I am knee-deep in Everclear and Welsh Corgi, the two most notable purchases I’ve made in the past six hours. The latter is masquerading as a service dog, although what service an animal with six-inch legs could possibly perform is a glaring mystery, while the former represents a strategy to end my miserable life aboard the aircraft. It bears noting that the former is strapped inside the adorable service vest of the latter, and that sloshing vials of pure alcohol are best transported under the veil of sheer fucking cuteness, which has yet to be corrupted by the assiduity of airport security.

Halfway to my seat, I am presumed to be blind. It’s an incidental but logical development, brought on by a perfect storm of general clumsiness, an indoor animal, and Ray-Bans. I wade through a sea of crime novels embossed with their half-cooked, punny titles, and locate my seat, absolutely no one perplexed that I didn’t need Braille to identify the seat number. They’re too busy congratulating themselves on the idea that they’ll speak elegantly and helpfully hand me something, should the occasion arise.

I open a bottle, cagily unscrewing and sipping, feeling the flashbacky shame of a junior high hayride, wondering if I should have sprung for first class. I find myself desperate to hold something. I pick up my dog, this heavy, warm, shivering creature. Obliviously content, he licks my hand. The damp fur around his neck suggests that I’ve been crying, silently, onto the top of his head for hours. I detach the remainder of the quarter-bottles of Everclear from my little dog’s vest - I have just now decided to name him ‘Yes,’ like the hero of a never-to-be-made festival film - and load them into the seatback pocket like ammunition.

With a rush of acute regret I realize, for the first time and with sinking dread, that someone will be seated next to me. That my endeavor to suck down grain alcohol until I convert to a corpse may not be apropos. On the heels of my anxiety, this someone presents herself in the shape of a modest, earnest-looking brunette who obliquely introduces herself via a pandering hello to my dog. “Small for a guide dog,” she says, to me. This woman - let's call her Elle - is fully on board with the impression that I am completely and definitely blind. I cannot look her in the eye; not doing so is easy - all I can think of sincerely is what happens to a dead body aboard an international flight: whether its seatmate is spared from the carnage via some rare protocol involving a stilted announcement and a well-meaning set of waifish flight attendants demurely hauling the corpse to the rear coffee station beneath a clean white sheet from the forward cabin, striving to conjure some makeshift dignity, scrambling for whatever wisdom the employee handbook might have to offer on the subject - and it is this brutish melange of panic and pity that Elle mistakes for romantic interest.

Yes in my lap, Elle stroking his paws, her fingertips trailing mock-absently to my knee, I look through my purportedly blind eyes to these objects I’ve named, feeling gut-sick. Elle is kind, ripe, oblivious - she is a sudden perfect ten, dripping with the unleashed confidence of a woman addressing a blind man, to whom all women are equally beautiful.

We converse for an hour, of which I remember virtually nothing. I register that she is a real person, obviously – someone’s daughter, someone’s sister, very likely someone’s wife. I memorize everything with rigor and forget it immediately. We are flying to Colombia for our own plausible, unremarkable reasons, which we mutually pretend to find fascinating. For my part, I am a farmer, a sudden and alacritous liar; the season has been favorable; eggplant is tricky, but rewarding.

My mind is on white white white white lilies. Beautiful, hackneyed, no-prefix standard fucking lilies. I am wondering whether they’ll use my wife’s flowers for me too, or if the timing will be off. I'm forgivably hazy on the longevity of lilies. I think of wanting to be buried inside her casket, of the way that our bodies fit - do I have any crazy allies on the ground who might pitch this idea? is there a precedent? - and feel a sudden wash of nausea and ridiculousness at being so far away from her. I wonder if I've left anything out of the will, handwritten, on the island table, the way one wonders about leaving the oven on.

Among the bright hollow sound effects communicating the urgency of fastening one’s seatbelt, I hear Elle say, “I'm going to use the ladies’ room,” her mouth fondling the words in a bout of unmistakable over-articulation.

I aurally register the metallic click of her seatbelt, like an actual blind person. Looking out the window, I feel her sympathy warm on the back of my neck, her flushed remorse for the blue sky she thinks I can’t see.

There is no romantic drinking oneself to death, only scientific drinking oneself to death.

Mentally logging my bouncing baby aphorism, I pluck a bottle from the seatback pocket, liberating it from its niche behind a neglected safety manual featuring cartoon people at an airplane crash-themed waterpark. In the 90 seconds I estimate it will take my seatmate to compose herself, I drink the entire bottle. Feeling my esophagus shed its internal fascia like a snake, I appreciate what those fellows at carnivals must feel, swallowing the sword.

With a swift kiss delivered to the top of Yes’s head, the gentle directive to ‘Stay,’ I wade through four meters of air that has become molasses. I wonder (sort of, not caring) whether this inching forward by gripping strangers’ seatbacks, alternating footsteps with the lax confidence of hoping for the best, loosely resembles the behavior of a blind person.

I knock on the bathroom door, like an amateur. And then, by magic, I am inside and hearing the door latch, Elle’s hands guiding mine the way you would pilot a blind man’s hands. Everything is pure, extravagant texture, clawing its way through eviscerating numbness.

I try to remember if this is the first time I’ve ever had sex with sunglasses on, and decide that it probably is. Elle is biting my mouth; grappling with my belt; likening me, for some indiscernible reason, to a bloodhound. I don’t understand what this means, so I stay silent. With the sensation of having swallowed a nail salon, I pick her up and shove her against the mirror, positioning her on the narrow counter beside the sink. I am forgetting everything.

And then, unlocked, she is breathing all the wetness of her lungs into my ear. She is whispering whatever name I told her was mine, her long, slender legs tangled like vines around a condemned building.

She comes in an elaborately silent scream against my neck, and I wonder, fleetingly, how such an indisputably uncomfortable thing has become a cultural phenomenon. I bite her collarbone, lift her gently from the countertop, then come in the sink, like an old pro.

Her kiss lands and evaporates on the corner of my mouth, and I hear the plastic door click open, then shut. I turn and vomit instantly: 600 milliliters of pure alcohol spill over my lips into the most translucent bodily fluid any human has ever produced. A bright, courteous ding requisitions one to return to one’s seat with one’s seatbelt fastened. I finish undoing my suicidal handiwork, flushing the short-lived attempt into oblivion. I wash my hands, shaking, staring into the streaky mirror. The ding, again, the polite command to remain in one’s seat, with one’s seatbelt fastened, until the captain has turned off the Fasten Seatbelt sign.

I take off my sunglasses, rub my temples. I begin to cry violently. My body racks and aches, primally confused. I put the sunglasses back on. To my surprise and disappointment, I look great. I look blind.

I open the door to the little bathroom, stepping back into the stiff, cagey air of the cabin. To the right, toward the coffee station, a pert flight attendant looks back at me in horror. Mentally, I gather the frayed threads of an extemporaneous defense of my bathroom tryst, but soon realize that this is not why she looks horrified. At her feet, near her uniform blue pumps, a body lies covered in a white sheet, stretched out straight, with makeshift dignity, beneath the coffee station.

I cannot believe it. I was right.

“I’m sorry,” I say.

“Thank you,” she says.

We look at each other, our eyes glazed with the weirdly mistaken, grateful sadness of not being this fellow beneath the sheet.

I return to my seat, stepping over Elle, making no further pretense of being blind. Yes bounds onto my knees with a kind of blithe, directionless urgency, a history of present moments coiled in his small limbs. My mind is generating names, hundreds of names, none of them permanent, none of them mine. The taste of bile and Everclear fresh in my mouth, I order a cup of coffee and survey the slick blue-green ocean, punctuated by boats like divots in glass. With the bright, doomed hope of a hundred little impending deaths, I begin to wonder what Colombia will look like.

Widely considered to be the “choose-your-own-adventure novel of syntax,” poetry comes from the Greek poiein - “to make” - which is (scholastically speaking) useless. Etymological frustrations aside, poetry is a bit like porn, in that one knows it when one sees it, and also like porn in that almost anyone can make some and post it online.

If words are weapons (as poet Eminem suggests), poetry is an exquisitely complex surgical instrument that can be used to perform exquisitely complex surgeries, or as a doorstop. It is at once less tactically constrained by and more indebted to the power of language, and is, at its best, dialogical (every self-respecting assailant requires a victim).

Of course, poetry needn’t be poetic (and often isn’t). Ultimately, one thing is certain: poetry may not always be better than prose, but that which is poetic is always better than that which is prosaic. 

Writers,  

     Seattle Refined did a remarkable spot on us. From a bar in West Seattle to the downtown offices of Prose., this three-minute piece came out nice and clean. Link is below.

     We hope your sentences are hitting the page lean and mean, and to see more of your work across this spectrum words. Thanks for being here. 

Go to minute 14:00. 

https://youtube.com/watch?v=fm-uquSrxSI&

[Literarily, journals are problematic. Unless you’re an astronaut, a war reporter, or an arctic explorer (and sometimes even then), there are profound limitations on the narrative merit of real life. But what about surreal life? The following is an excerpt from a collection of my dreams, recorded over the course of a year.]

Sight

The first thing is that it’s grey, sloping woods, like in every Russian war movie from the past century – a tangle of thin, gnarled grey trees stretching from grey upward into lighter grey.

The second thing is that everyone is blind.

There’s a room where people go, in ones and twos, to tell one another secrets. To pray. Whatever. It’s a few degrees cooler in this room. I’m not sure whether people take the sacredness of this room seriously, but the fact that almost no one’s ever here, even in the crushing heat, is a good indication. There’s a dartboard along one of the far walls, which seems silly. To get to this room, you cross from a wooden platform via zipline, which is really just a chunky metal chain stretching upward into oblivion, swinging downward like a very unsafe version of a Discovery Zone rope swing. Or you can just stretch and scramble your way upward onto the far platform, but this is frowned upon. The room is long, and very dark, which I suppose doesn’t matter. There’s an off-white box of a vintage PC centered against one wall, near the entrance – one of various instances of obsolesced technology as ignored decor. As I pass it, I think: This is what I’m doing here. We have to write all of this down.

This is where I go to tell Stacy I’m not blind.

“You already know what I’m going to tell you,” I say.

“Say it,” she says.

Stacy has suspected for some time. My not being blind anymore. First when I noticed one of her tattoos. Second, when she was throwing things at me to see if I could see and I sort of forgot she was doing it and dodged a little bit, something sharp probably. Third, when I was getting my own tattoo, and lodged a minor complaint, ostensibly based on having felt the error, but of course Stacy knew that was bullshit.

I didn’t want anyone to know I wasn’t blind, so I started practicing what people call one’s “beggar face.” It just means looking blind. Stacy doesn’t seem to care, but still, I don’t want anyone here to know that I can see. I haven’t been here long enough to know whether or not they kill their gods.

Purportedly, there are two other people who have sight. I haven’t met them yet. Or maybe I have, and they just have better beggar face than I do.

Road Trip/Mayflower/The Squirrels

Thomas Middleditch and I are going to repeat this vaguely coastal road trip as many times as it takes. Which is at least three.

Each time it's only slightly different, like a historical glitch, circling back on itself in fits of interruption and resumption.

And one last thing that bears noting: the squirrels in this world (Tom explains) are malicious. They're essentially what the birds are to Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds.

Later, we will hang glide over the Mayflower, the historical site where it famously crashed off the coast of the Pacific Northwest. After all, Tom remarks, there’s no safer place from squirrels than a hang glider.

Cornfield Cult Film Festival

I sit in the low-topped muscle car, just sweating, for what feels like forever. I am feeling things out, pretending to be her daughter, at this weird, cult-film-inspired festival in the middle of nowhere that appears to 100% share a guest list with the nearest comic-con.

Why her daughter? Am I that much younger looking? No; this is swiftly confirmed by the fact that people start mistaking me for her almost instantly. Is it because I’m embarrassed? Because knowing so little about a full blood sister is head-cockingly weird, whereas being a daughter implies distance, estrangement, adoption, switched babies at birth… any number of good reasons to not have known this person who shares my genes almost exactly? Yes, that’s the one.

I finally do extricate myself from that suffocating little car, picking my way across the defunct cornfield to one of a slew of concrete warehouse buildings, gutted and shelled for this momentous occasion. Inside, throngs of people who parked on the field are milling about – discussing, theorizing, arguing, reliving – this horrible little movie whose tangential excitement should have died down, culturally, about one week after it came out.

Some plaid-clad showrunner arrives and sticks me in a pair of enormous, clunky platform shoes with treaded soles, and I don’t question why (this is not necessarily weirder than other things happening concurrently). The reason becomes clear when I am led out to a slab of wet concrete in the field, evidently to execute some impoverished version of the Mann’s Chinese Theater nonsense. I am flanked by others in weird shoes, apparently from the film, who eye me with a mixture of excitement and suspicion.

The only person who leaves me alone at this thing, who doesn’t buy for a moment that that I am ¡her!, is a gal who turns out to actually be her daughter. She is round and frank and ingenuous, a sharp crop of black hair framing her pale face. She looks exactly like her. Well, like half of her.

The reason this girl (my niece/a stranger) chats me up but never supposes that I am her is because she knows that her mother is dead.

Well, of course she’s dead. I should have known that.

Heroin

Speeding down the side of a forested mountain, I should be questioning the safety of my companions, but mostly I'm kicking myself for not doing heroin before.

Within moments I am an old pro. Toggling back and forth between the two types, ingeniously labeled “brown sugar” and “white sugar,” it becomes clear that we are smuggling this shit. The police arrive, and everyone debates in hushed caws what to do.

But the answer is obvious: more heroin.

Obits

Near the border, a small, bespectacled man makes his way past hot, unruly clusters of people. He is going to the office to meet his partner. Although they could not look more physically dissimilar (the man’s partner is heavy, towering, untucked, shaped as though poured into the warped jug of his button-down shirt), they each look 100% their part. They are obit writers, a task they approach with the wry dedication befitting their profession. Through a clerical error – an intentional one, coming definitely from someone and somewhere – the small man learns that his own mother is dead. That she has been dead for three months.

Tornado Drill

As tornadoes dance in the distance, like so many snakes being charmed, the sky beneath them slurs from a rich peach to a drained antique yellow. This is the color of greyish gold that makes everything around it look greener, and there is plenty of green. For miles around, there is nothing and no one, only my friend and I as we look from newly planted tree to newly planted tree, some roadside project, for the fattest trunk or the deepest roots, something we can hug in a crisis. I am poised to make a very funny tree hugging joke, but she’s busy tugging at thick strands of grass. Thinking? Hard to say. She’s an idiot, but I’m still going to save her life if I can.

The other part of this is that we’re rehearsing a play. Today is our first rehearsal, and it’s a pro bono gig in a ramshackle little cabin, about fourteen meters from where we’re standing now. Totally senseless, no pay, and it’s the middle of nowhere, but we all love the author. You can get people to do just about anything if they love the author.

A spiral of stone-black clouds whirs overhead and moves on. We decide to head into the cabin, to check on the boys and to see if they have a basement.

Inside, the mood is best described as picnic-like, and the director is keen on rehearsing lines. The stage manager is tossing me my lines, handwritten, one at a time on ripped fragments of notebook paper. The director, lying on his side, propped on one elbow, looking like an embarrassing antique doll, questions my lack of commitment to the production. I assure him of it.

Once the director has stormed off or supernaturally vanished (who cares which), I wander to the porch and look out over this great idyllic nowhere paradise. The danger seems to have retreated, reduced to an overdramatic wind with harmless tendrils of tornadoes in the deep background. My friend suggests “running lines” but really taking cover in the closet – which she assures me is the safest place during a storm (it is not) – to make out with the boys. She’s making sense, and anyway, she likes the one I’m not crazy about, so I figure what the hell.

As we head back inside, someone announces that the storm has so completely cleared, the danger so completely passed, that there is no need to take shelter in the closet at all. Everyone is laidback and bored, passively resentful but accepting of having their time so elaborately wasted. I am quietly angry. No one is making out.

I bitterly gather my scraps of lines from the wood floor and listlessly put them in order. This tornado was a total fucking wash.

Apartment Hunting/Tree of Life

Looking from the windows to the north and south, there’s nothing but interstate wasteland, grey on grey, billboards for hundred-year-old products. But to the east and west, the windows reveal an exotic playground of green and tangled trees. Returning with the landlord to the courtyard of the apartment complex, apparently located along I-95, south of some dystopian future New York, there grows a giant, gnarled tree. Low-hanging elements that can’t quite be called fruit dip low and at odd angles. It looks as though it would be fun to climb, but you find yourself wondering: would the tree like to be climbed? I try to choose between the superior view of the second floor and the convenience of the first, for when the baby comes.

Some time later and for no reason, we cut the tree open, and inside is a gnarled wilderness of cerulean blue and vivid green, a little liquid civilization. People talk about the sensation of peaceful, maddening irrelevance beneath a star-filled sky, the individual against the universe. But they have it backward. Staring into the colorful veins of this tree, descending into some better, smaller universe, how much closer it must be to the perfection of the atom.

Capture the Flag

There’s a kind of dead that’s almost dead, but not quite. That’s the kind of dead I am when the boys come running up the hill, playing some soon-to-be-abandoned variation of Capture the Flag.

They are covering me, a noble investment in my modesty, but in covering me, they are burying me.

Shoe Shopping

We go “shoe shopping,” my new friend and I, which means filching the shoes from beneath the racks on the upper level of this nightclub in Paris. Why so many people have chosen to take their shoes off is beyond me.

I select a pair of seafoam green ankle booties, calfskin etched with delicate flowers. “You don’t know if it’s calfskin,” my friend says.

At dawn, I walk through the gardens with a small, glorified paper dixie cup of beer. We go into the museum, but there is nothing to see, except for a beautiful, subservient academic type standing watch. She doesn’t give me any trouble about the beer.

There are so many things I’ve forgotten, still knocking around just beneath the skin.

The water. The ocean or something.

Chapter Three: The Real Dom…?

Ancient Writing: Shalimar’s Reality

Chapter II:LXIX

Light can shine though misunderstanding sublime

But confusion rules when minds are blind

Truth betwixt realities confessed

In the darkness no glimmer can discern the distress

When thinking is locked in beliefs intertwined

Purity befuddled the lies subtle mimes

Onyxcity crossed her lavish apartment above her sprawling empire followed by a stern looking fellow.

Her bodyguard? Hum...—far to thin.

Luxury draped the walls in the finery of Asian tapestries and oil works by masters as her footfalls pressed light on the soft carpet of wool, padding and keeping warm each delicate step. Her sleek leather outfit appeared perfectly contoured to her shapely form augmented by stilettos under the heels of tight laced boots embracing her calves with the grace of a ballerina gliding across the floor on toes. She paused briefly at the wire formed bird cage and peered in at the small creature dancing like reflective crystals in the confines of the minimal space. “What do you presume she eats, Mead…?”

“Perhaps they drink blood just like vampires,” replied…

Lover?—— Rather ordinary looking.

“Nonsense,— everyone knows vampires aren’t real. We must head down to the archives and see if there is anything recorded about what fairies eat.”

“Madam,” He paused with a smile. “That doesn’t mean the little creature doesn’t drink blood.”

“What did you just call me?”

“Pardon,— Madam?”

“And just what are you implying?” She fumed, placing her hand on her hip while tapping a foot.

The Butler? Hum…

“It‘s just a polite address, Madam.”

Onyx… appeared doubtful.——”Well I don’t like it!”

The employee frowned, pulling a small leather booklet from his pocket. Thumbing through the pages he replied, “Longfellow’s Terms — states right here: ‘A polite term of address for a woman.’ See,— the respected expert reveals all, — knowing quite well what women want and deserve.”

“What would a guy named Longfellow know about what women deserve? Give me that,” grabbing the little book from Mead…’s hand.

He stepped closer and pointed to the words in the little black book; his head moving ever so slightly to take in the wafting fragrance of her perfumed hair.

Onyx… read quietly under her breath, “Used to address a woman politely.” But she read on: “Ah-ha, number two states: ‘a woman running a brothel.’— This is not a brothel!”

“I never said it was — Madam.”

“What are you implying? —— Stop calling me that!”

“Yes Mistress.”

“What do you mean by that!” She almost screamed.

“What?— my Mistress.”

She quickly paged through the little book; and then with a sneer of disgust, “I am not your extramarital lover! What subliminal messages is this pervert Longfellow teaching society?”

…That’s settled.

A faint snicker from the small cage broke the impact of …City’s declaration. The enraged woman in black-leather turned grabbing the small prison with her right hand. “You’re not so important I won’t crush you under my boot,” she growled, almost pulling the cage from its pedestal.

The crystalline light grew a little dimmer.

Mead… carefully took hold of the little book without taking it from Onyx…’s;— his hand —brushing slightly against her soft skin. He pointed within while keeping the tender contact present. “See, the second definition of Mistress is — ’owner or controller of something.”

…City let go of the cage and studied the words. “So what are you implying? I’m a controlling — Mistress or Madam— of a brothel?” she almost shouted.

“Why,— no Mistress,— you’re the owner of this establishment.”

“Stop calling me that!—— And what do you presume this establishment to be?”

Mead…’s head dipped and tipped forward as if questioning, “Saloon? Of course Mam.”

“Do I look like your mother?”

The little light in the cage snickered, “Well, you do employ Sirens.”

Both turned to the little prisoner. “It talks? my Goddess.”

She pause for a moment thinking,— then nodded with a slight curved lip of approval. “Yes,— it's like an annoying parrot mocking me.”

“Why don’t you ask it what it eats?”

Onyx put both hands on her shapely hips. “You don’t think I tried that?”

“What’s her name?”

She only speaks to annoy me.“

“Mnezz,” came the small voice, yet seemed to resonate everywhere.

“Hey little girl,— can I get you something to eat?” Mead… asked.

“I have to be free to eat.”

Mead… looked to Onyx… with pleading eyes, “Why don’t we just let her go?”

“I can’t. The sandflea… ordered her capture. I’m just holding her until she arrives.” Onyx… continued the few steps to the large picture window overlooking her successful business venture below. Bunny was taking the stage for the next act of musical excellence. …City took in a deep breath of satisfaction. — Then she noticed HIM. “What the hell is he doing here?”

Mead… stepped to the window and looked down. “You hired him.”

Just then the door burst open with two employees dragging in a tied up individual.

“AndyBetz, —— Andrometa, what is the meaning of this intrusion?”

The two bouncers looked at each other and then OnyxCity, “We caught this nefarious thief sneaking around the back of the store trying to climb in a window,” …in unison. “All we can get out of him is his name, — SalingerTwain.”

The prisoner looked up at his captors and then their boss. “Not true. I just heard the most beautiful music and it was calling to me. It was like I had no control.” He smiled as his eyes scanned the shapely form in tight leather.

Mead... looked to …City, “We do employ Sirens.”

“Nonsense,— sounds more like the actions of a spy trying to steal the secretes of my business.” Onyx… took a step toward the prisoner then stopped, looking at Mead… “Get down stairs and get rid of that meddling interloper.”

Mead… looked puzzled, “You mean the old fart? How am I suppose to do that? You hired him Ma…” The man stopped short. “Won‘t he become suspicious? Don‘t you want to know what he‘s found out?”

“I already know what he knows.” She peered down at the old man. “He’s wearing a stupid parrot on his shoulder. What does he think he is? A pirate? And he has a kitten right there. Tell him no animals are allowed in this place of business and toss him out. He’ll be none the wiser.”

“Ma… my Goddess,” stumbling,— Mead… frowning as he stared at the supposed pets. “That doesn’t look like a kitten to me. Hear tell, he’s a powerful wizard. Surely this is dangerous to poke the magic.”

“We have the sandflea… with us. What’s one old man?” …City gritted her teeth, “Now get down there and get rid of them.”

“But my Goddess, who is this sandflea… when it comes to magic?”

“She’s a sorceress of the most powerful kind. Rumor has it she’s heartless. She’s already killed 68 husbands to date. I got it straight from the horses mouth.”

All four men looked at Oxyx... with shock and suprise. Mead… spoke, “You’ve actually met with the sandflea… in person?— When?”

“Of course not.— She’s much too powerful. But I did bump into her magnificent horny stallion that revealed all to me.”

AndyBetz straightened as all the men’s expressions appeared distraught,— except for the spy who was grinning. “My Lady, you mean you had a liaison with sandflea…’s — gigolo?”

…City’s expression turned heated as she barked at Mead…. “Get down there this instant, and get rid of HIM.”

Mead… left reluctantly, appearing devastated.

Onyx… turned to Andy…”What are you talking about?”

“Your secret liaison with sandflea…’s stud.”

“Have you gone mad?” Her anger burned. “One of the messenger’s horses pulling her carriage talked to me. Beautiful animal with this amazing spiraled yet straight horn protruding from its forehead. It told me such stories.” She smiled, looking off as if mesmerized.

“My lady,” Andrometa interrupted. “That’s impossible. You’re describing a Unicorn; they were all killed in Noah’s flood.”

“Why would anybody kill such a magnificent creature,— and who is this Noah anyway,— some god?”

Andrometa cleared his throat. “He must be, the flood’s named after him…”

AndyBetz cut his friend off. “Apparently they weren’t on the menu?”

“Say what?” Onyx…'s right fingers closed lightly covering the side of her mouth as her left remained resting on hip.

“Noah gathered two of all different kinds of animals on his yacht and then a massive flood killed everything else.” AndyBetz answered with a smile.

“Why wouldn’t a god have saved these unicorns?”

Andrometa shrugged. “I guess they don’t tasted good.” The two bodyguards looked at each other, nodding in agreement.

…City looked appalled. “Someone would eat those glorious creatures?” She shook her head. “This is all nonsense, I just talked to MilesNowhere yesterday.”

“Who’s that? My Goddess,” all three men asked in unison.

Onyx… focused on the spy with a slight head tilt. “Why, the nonexistent unicorn of course.——When the fairy was delivered with instructions,” she said with a sneer of superiority. “And he said the sandflea… was the most powerful sorceress living!”

Laughter erupted from the little cage. All eyes turned to the fairy.”

“You have something to add Mnezz?” …City asked angrily as her foot began tapping impatiently.

Mnezz was rolling around on the bottom of her cage. “I can’t take it anymore.”

“Then tell us what you know.” …City ordered.

Alright,” the little crystalline light squeezed out between chuckles. “My sister, saltandink is sandflea…’s fairy godmother. Sandflea… is a beautiful princess from a faraway place called LA where they all worship the sun.”

“Ha,— I knew it!” …Twain Interrupted.

…City stepped over to the prisoner. “What do you know,—— spy?”

…Twain cleared his throat: “That the sandflea… is a sun-worshiping, dominatrix, goddess.” The spy’s grin increased as he stared at the woman in tight leather. “Who’s decided to run for office on the platform of better shipping.”

Onyx… turned her attention to her two men. “What’s wrong with my shipments?”

“We lost one yesterday, my Goddess,” Andrometa shrugged. “An infestation of plague forced the harbormaster to burn the ship.”

Onyx… looked devastated. Her attention returned to the spy. “Tell me what you know or I’ll have you racked.”

“Please,— rack me, — Goddess. In that fine leather,— have your will with me.” The spy’s tongue wetted between his tight lips in anticipation.

Onyx…leaned in. Her hot breath light upon his cheek. “Tell me everything you know and I’ll personally apply the draw.”

“Oh god yes!” And he began to spill, “She wants world domination, yet she has no political agenda.”

“What lies are you telling me?” Onyx… said infuriated. “You just told us she wants to fix shipping.”

“My goddess, the spy interrupted. “Agenda, — as in a personal underlying motivation.”

The two guards were nodding in agreement.

Salinger… eyes turned pleading. “Please, give me this chance. I will service you loyally. Do with me as you will. I am your slave.”

Mnezz couldn’t stop laughing. Her high pitched giggle resonated throughout the upper apartment disrupting the spy. All turned their attention again to the fairy.

…City took a step closer to the cage. “You have something to add.”

Through the laughing Mnezz squeezed out, “Sandflea…’s already been crowned queen on the night of her prince’s homecoming. She already rules her empire with her king at her side.”

Onyx… turned to the prisoner. “What do you have to say about that, spy?”

“Yes,” Salinger… replied. “She rules now in a distant land, but she seeks world domination.”

Onyx… focused back on Mnezz, “Tell me more of this rule in this foreign land. How did she come to power?”

“Oh, it’s a torrid tale of intrigue and war.”

All present voiced in unison, “Tell us.”

Mnezz stopped laughing. “It all started when some creature called a skank knifed the sandflea… in the back breaking her heart.”

Onyx… was riveted as she asked, “So she’s immortal? Is this how she became the Ice Queen? Is that why she has no love for men and has killed 68 husbands?”

Salinger…. Interrupted. “You could send me into her court. I could win her over and become her next husband. I will gladly take the position of 69 with the sandflea… and she will be none the wiser that you have a spy in her court.”

“Quite fool,” …City ordered. “Please continue Mnezz.”

“Let me go and I will tell all.”

Onyx… whispered into the little cage, “Tell me more.— If I like what I hear, I may consider your loyalty worthy of rewards.”

The tiny fairy thought as the three men glared, nodding-approval,— reassuringly.

“Fine,” Mnezz continued, “It all started the day of coronation. Sandflea…’s evil step mother had grounded her for getting involved in a maul, while shopping.

“Is that where she killed the 68 men? They weren’t her husbands?” …City asked concerned.

“No,—— no one died in the maul, but the wicked step mother’s carriage was damaged.”

AndyBetz interrupted. “So why is there a 68 in the sandflea…’s name?”

“Shhhh!” Onyx… ordered.

Mnezz smiled. “68 is the number,— I think,— was on the pennant her prince carried into battle.”

“What kind of battle?”

“I’m not completely sure, but from what I could gather there’s a lot of kicking and men’s genitals are involved.”

All three men leaned down slightly, cupping their privates with hands.

“The battle’s even called Football.” Mnezz spat as if angered.

“Sounds brutal.” Onyx… whispered. “Is this the land where the ridiculous codpiece was developed?”

“Mnezz nodded affirmatively.

“Oh’s,” sounded from all listening with understanding.

Mnezz continued, “So, the sand…”

Onyx… interrupted. “So why sandflea68? That’s a very unusual name.”

“OH, I know this one.” …Twain almost shouted. “She’s the leader of a cult of beach-loving sun-worshipers.”

All looked to Mnezz for confirmation. “This is true.” She nodded.— “Her given name, I think was something like Sandy Lee. But with her prince’s battle pennant and all her over nine thousand sun-worshiping followers, she was re-named something with real meaning.”

Suddenly, a commotion erupted down stairs…

****

Chapter 1:

https://theprose.com/post/167803/castle-prose

Chapter 2:

https://theprose.com/post/168268/castle-prose-prose-universe-challenge-by-salingertwain-continuation

The Simon & Schuster challenge was one of our greatest accomplishments, and one of our most difficult undertakings to date. It was our first time working with a big publisher and taking challenges to a larger scale. Given the number and quality of entries, determining the top 50 was extraordinarily difficult. Having never done something like this before, we had to really bootstrap our selection criteria. 

We spent weeks reading through every single one of the entries as a team. The first criterion we used was grammar. Repetitive grammatical mistakes, and a lack of respect for English syntax in general, were grounds for disqualification. The second criterion was creativity. We looked for storytelling excellence, moving characters, inventive plots. We looked for content that captivated us, that we thought would enthrall others as well. After narrowing the list of entries by these two criteria, 166 remained. 

For each of these 166 entries, each team member assigned a subjective "quality rating" from one to five. We considered likes to break ties when the average quality score was too close to call. We wanted to include some democratic element in determining the winners, rather than solely rely upon our own subjective judgment. When all was said and done, we had found our 50 entries.

In reflection, our process was imperfect and we intend to do a better job in the near future. Here are some of the ideas we are considering:

1) Limited Voting. When the challenge ends, everyone gets a limited number of votes, and cannot use these votes on their own entry. We would use these votes to distill the pool of potential winners more democratically.

2) Electoral College. A panel of judges is either elected deliberately or selected randomly to read through the entries and determine the winners.

3) Gauntlet Tournaments. We select a few factors, a combination of judging panel, spell check, democratic votes, and other creative criteria, to advance the best content round-by-round, tournament-style.

We would love to hear your suggestions and ideas for improving our challenges.

Once again, congratulations to the winners and entrants alike. 

We are working hard to bring you more publishing opportunities.

I have the feeling if a dragon wasn't raging through the building, I would have in big trouble. Well, I probably will be, but who knows! 

After my sarcastic saying that there is a dragon on the loose, chaos broke out, Lonely and Bunny screamed and got out of the room like a roadrunner, as they were probably the closest to the dragon(besides me). Zikeda didn't even look up from her work. PhynneBelle and MilesNowhere turned and promptly ran out of the room, followed by PaulDChambers and JamesMByers with a look of pure terror on their faces. Mnezz grabbed Zikeda and Herman20 and went with CreativeChaos. Jumotki, Chained in Shadow, and SelfTitled were standing in the doorway staring in awe. RubyPond was behind them, looking like she wants to rip someone's head off. 

Snowshoerabbit was standing, no, jumping in place next to me. OnyxCity seems to have disappeared. Harry_Situation was quickly talking with Sandflea68 as they were slowly backing away from the lumbering figure that was rapidly growing in size. 

The dragon had crawled out of the broken Machine room and totaled the library, and quite a few desks and computers. I could see its bright green eyes stare into my blue-gray ones. 

Sandflea68 and Harry_Situation turned to me. "How in the world did this happen?" Sandflea68 whispered to me, so the creature wouldn't hear.

"Um, well, I tried to make mini dragons, but apparently the Machine didn't read it right?" I ended in my usual shrug. Sandflea68 and Harry_Situation looked utterly confused. 

"Didn't read it right? How is that even possible? It always reads the paper right!" Harry_Situation somewhat screeched. I was about to reply, but was interrupted by a raven haired woman rushing through the door.

"Don't worry. They are on the way," OnyxCity panted, obviously tired from sprinting a great distance.

"Who are they?" Sandflea68 and I asked her in unison. 

"They as in the heroes of our city. I know one. I won't tell you which though, but I called them, and they are on the way." I looked her up and over, never expecting her to know one of the famous superheroes of our city. We stood in silence for a few moments, while  backing up from the fiery beast. The desks and books were aflame, and heat was radiating strongly from the source. 

Quickly, a few flames went out, and a small grunt came from behind us. We whipped our heads and bodies around to see what it was. 

Four figures had descended from a broken window of the large room. The one who was crouched was dressed in a deep red, nearly black cloak, and I couldn't see their face. There was a teen with shoulder length, wavy black hair dressed in a blue sweater with black leggings and a blue beanie. Standing next to her, the teen, was a child. He had a goofy grin with missing teeth and messy brown hair. Dressed in a bright, sunny yellow shirt and cape, he was a polar opposite of the cloaked one. Behind them, a man with gray hair was floating. His face creased and hardened from seeing too much war and bloodshed. A black suit with a green tie that matched his emerald green eyes encased his body. 

"I am A," the cloaked person grunted, standing up. 

"17," the teen spoke.

The young child's smile grew, "I'm YoungWriter."

"And I," the oldest one said clearly. "I, people, am SalingerTwain."