OBJECTIVE: TAKE HER

ATTEMPT: 1

they sit in the center of a roller-skating rink,

underneath a cracked and bleeding disco ball.

in the corner, three pixelated arcade games hum with static,

their faded lights blinking every so often to throw the room into full relief.

the carpet surrounding the rink, once a glowing neon in the black light,

is now covered in dirt and debris from years of neglect;

the smell of mold lingers over the space,

replacing the familiar scent of cheaply baked pizza.

nothing is as it was, anymore.

they get to their feet, upsetting the film of dust already gathering on their trousers,

and walk through the door into the rest of the building,

passing the booth where kids used to cash in tickets to buy feather hair extensions and finger skateboards.

cobwebs cover the graying figurines left on the shelves, smiles frozen eerily in time.

the door opens, and they squint in expectation of a bright white light,

but all that greets them is the darkness of everything forgotten.

the light on their iphone leads them to the peeling white road traveled on by kick-scooters (only now used by bugs);

in the center is the primary-colored climbing structure,

all the plastic coverings shredded to reveal the flattened foam underneath.

to the left is the deflated remains of a bounce house,

and in front of that is the main arcade center,

the whack-a-mole ducks looking towards the light with unseeing eyes.

a low hum comes from the pac-man game.

where is she?

they pick up their pace, running along the track and past the broken skateboard jumps.

the ball pit is deserted, only two or three balls remaining,

as are the party rooms,

their purple lights fizzling ominously.

finally, they come to a stop in front of the pink-clothed tables.

there you are.

a young girl sits at the table in the middle table among a sea of unwrapped and discolored birthday presents.

she has face-paint on in the shape of a butterfly that matches the one on the sour-smelling cake in front of her,

the candles long burned down to nubs.

in her hand is a bunch of once-yellow balloons, the only legible letters etched onto them being

ic fun cente.

they kneel down in front of her, their hand coming to rest on her teal leggings.

her voice is so small and faint that they have to lean in to hear her, her pigtails tickling their nose.

-why is nobody coming to my party?

i don't know. maybe they just haven't arrived yet.

nobody would arrive. they know that.

the girl nods slowly, kicking her sparkly shoes in impatience. 

-why are you here?

i wanted to find you. i needed to find you. it's been too long.

-who even are you?

i'm you. well, an older version of you. and i need to take you with me, now. life's been too difficult without you around.

-but i can't leave. i'm waiting for my friends. i even put on my birthday dress, see?

this is super important. don't you want to go somewhere brighter? this place is kind of scary, isn't it?

-mommy's bringing ice cream and she told me to stay right here. you can wait with me, though.

no, i can't wait any longer! life's going by, and i need you by my side! come with me now, before it's too late!

-i want to stay here.

they feel tears stinging in their eyes.

please! PLEASE!

-no!

in desperation, they grab her hand and start pulling her up, ignoring her screams.

she kicks at them once, twice, and then everything goes black.

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OBJECTIVE: TAKE HER

ATTEMPT: 2

they sit in the center of a roller-skating rink,

underneath a cracked and bleeding disco ball.

everything is heady and bright and hot and you’re in your room with the cat trying to consume mary shelley’s frankenstein and thinking about sex on your mother’s grave and you think about the form slumbering at your feet and how it’s strange that there is another living breathing thing with you in the room that has millions of complex processes going on and it’s almost too much to think about your own body not the outside but the inside- and then you think how strange it is that we walk and talk with each other while our hearts beat unsure unsure of themselves and we all have veins and they’re all working at the same time while we walk and talk and think with each other and maybe it’s just the heatwave but a little patience and all will be over but you have to think quickly quickly on your deathbed unless you’re like me and have had your last words picked out for ages and the books on hold at the library will be ready soon and you’re spending every moment thinking about them and you realize it’s not a hunger not like the one richard wright described it’s a lust for books not knowledge but books the pages paper letters ink all of it because wow those oxford commas taste amazing on your tongue so you never stop and the electric current makes you shiver and everything is hyperfocused the heat beneath your skirt the hairs on your skin the way your foot is curled unceremoniously underneath the way your heel digs into your thigh the way the sun hits the window the way your breath comes shallowly so you finally spread out and rest your head down and try to sleep and forget everything but your mind won’t be ignored for long so you turn over and draw your knees together and stretch without stretching and it satiates you, if only for a little while.

Somewhere,

between hellos and goodbyes,

your smile and my caution;

between the sheets and the floor,

your bruises and my bandaids;

between one drink and the next,

your roses and my grave;

between one day too many

and one breath not enough,

you learn to treasure the sunshine

that comes from the moon;

it is the only thing that will guide you

on nights like these.

girl in the butterfly wings,

why aren't you flying away from here?

girl in the butterfly wings,

do you ever want to disappear?

the world is broken and hurt,

shadows chasing light out of the sky;

bloodstains cover your pink skirt,

yet i never seem to hear you cry.

is there something i can't see?

how much pain do you bury inside?

you could be gone, even free,

yet you choose to stay, suffer, and die.

perhaps one day i'll fathom

why you accept the world as it is;

you'll teach me mind and atom

to let go, return to states of bliss.

for now, i'll just sit and stare

and admire your spirit from afar;

the way you dance without care,

though your shoes conceal a scar.

girl in the butterfly wings,

why aren't you flying away from here?

girl in the butterfly wings,

do you ever want to disappear?

queen elizabeth apparently wears faded sweatpants and a lighthouse nautical t-shirt. she has shoulder length hair that is kinda blond which she wears in the same style every single day. except in the evenings on weekdays when she has it in a tight bun. she has brown eyes that she doesn't like (which is dumb because they are nice) and she has a freckle under her eye that appeared out of nowhere one day. her eyebrows are feathery and natural looking, and she wears mascara sometimes. usually she has circles under her eyes because she stays up way too late doing work or calling a certain someone (i can't say who) but they are trendy right now so it's okay. she also has really nice ears. i mean it, they are the best ears i've ever seen. she could model earrings but her ears aren't pierced anymore because they got infected and she's too scared to pierce them again. so she mostly relies on simple gold necklaces in the shape of california or maybe the occasional butterfly pendant or ring. it's hard to believe that this is the woman in charge of a country but she does a pretty good job at keeping things in order. i heard one time that she banished someone for his choice in shoes but other than that she is a just and fair ruler. her favorite color is usually something like lavender or light blue, as this is the color of her room. despite finding time to rule a country, do homework, and take ballet classes, she never has the time (somehow) to write letters to her best friend, which is a sad but forgivable offense. another thing- she almost never wears dark clothing and she never takes her best friend's advice on which leotard to wear even though she always asks which one she should wear. when she bakes or cooks (which is not often) she always, without fail, spills something like flour or puts something in the wrong bowl, and inevitably takes about two hours to mix up a simple batter. her majesty's dog, bella, is constantly teased and picked up, although she has somehow managed to become spoiled and eats carrots on a daily basis. she has questionable taste in men and deliberates way too long over a text to someone who doesn't deserve her. she draws horrible looking pandas in the wrong color and used to wear her hair in a low ponytail every single day from first to fifth grade. her favorite show features horrible people and weird storylines and she tortures her best friend by making her watch it and refuses to watch anything else, even if she knows she'll like it. but she's straight so it makes sense. in conclusion i am best friends with queen elizabeth who has a lot of flaws which i won't list as they are apparent to the reader but she is still amazing so no one can criticize her except for me.

i discovered love in the kitchen sink on a tuesday. i discovered love while

slicing oranges and laying them out for you. i found god when i looked up

at the sky and realized i was lost, and all the pinpricks of stars felt like

holes that had been poked so that i could breathe. i discovered god

on the hottest day of the summer, and he looked like your house,

and his heart looked like a kitchen where popsicles sat melting

on the counter. i’d like to make something out of this. i’d like to

tell the world all the things i am discovering all the time. i’d like to

put on a backpack and travel the world or your heart or the laundromat

and come back empty-handed and full of sweetness. i’d like to drive down

the coastline. i think i could discover hope at the gas station on a sunday.

i think that hope is a thing that wears your clothes, and smells of oranges,

and hums along when mitski plays on the radio. i want to tell the world this.

i want to tell the world that there is so much to be found here. i want to keep hope

in the passenger seat and make sure that it gets enough air. i want to drive it home

and deliver it to you and roll down the windows on the way so that everyone sees.

i found this, giving off light in the dusk. i found it. i found hope in this place.

I don’t remember much of high school. The childhood summer mansion where we played out our fantasies for the future: this was where my life started, ended, and currently resides in a daydream.

What is the present moment, in what was our high school experience? I struggle for it. Is it the moment we die a million little deaths at the hands of our little minds? Are we constantly fighting internal battles that, if they don’t kill you, will cause so much damage as to render you useless?

I ask because high school was a battleground, a war against ourselves we didn’t survive.

I don’t think I ever apologized to her for it.

The endless doctor’s appointments, the medicine scripts, the forms that asked, on a scale of one to five, how much I wanted to die: this was all separate from her and her experience of high school. And yet there I was, in my hospital gown, and I will always be in and out of the institutions that push us further apart.

In there somewhere, in my swirling disaster of a brain, is hope that our relationship can be the future we had dreamed of.

I want her in it. I want a sister, and above all, a warrior to count on in the moments I go under.