we had one of those talks

i packed up his shirt

his shoes, his socks

i packed up his hurt...

and put it in a cardboard box

he’ll go for one of those walks

it’s only a couple of blocks

pretty soon i’ll hear his knocks

because i changed the locks

until then, i’ll keep looking at these clocks...

i packed up his shirt

his shoes, his socks

i packed up his hurt...

and put it in a cardboard box

“One of you…” I glared at my suspects. “Committed murder.”

My lightning and thunder sound effect flashed and crackled outside the window. All my guests cranked their heads in suspense at it.

Together, the three of us were all huddled around a wooden table in a castle I inherited from my recently deceased uncle. Mold bloomed from each and every crack, making it a HHS nightmare. That’s right, I know acronyms.

“This is ridiculous!” Professor NutsWorth declared, slamming his hands down on the table. “I have an alibi!”

“Okay, first off. This is hand carved mahogany, don’t slam your filthy paws on it. Second off, I didn’t say when yet.”

He sunk back in his chair. “I’ve just always out with friends.” He mumbled to himself. “I’m popular, people like me. That’s more than I can say for your lonely ass. Oh, look at me! I’m Inspector Manta! I solve crimes for a living.” He mocked. “And my wife divorced me because I spent too many hours at the office! Well sorry, Martha, your knitting isn’t going to pay the bills so someone has to!”

“Professor, you’re confusing your life with mine. I’m ace. And your wife divorced you because you slept with a student. Also, because your last name is NutsWorth, and let’s face it: no one can live like that.”

“I live like that.”

“Yeah but, do you really think you should be used as an example on how others should live their lives? Your wife just left you.”

The professor sunk even deeper into his chair.

“Moving on… to the murder!” The thunder boomed again.

“Inspector Manta,” Clarisse spoke up. “If you’re going to accuse one of these losers, can you hurry up and do it already? I’m an appointment at the nail salon.”

“Well, sorry Clarissa—”

“It’s Clarisse.”

“Well, sorry, Clarissa. Yeah, that’s right, I didn’t correct myself. Don’t tell me how to live my life. Now, you and your Starbucks-loving, basic white butt are just going to have to sit themselves down until the murderer sings like the yellow canary I had in second grade before it was, coincidentally, murdered.”

Thunder clapped outside.

“Is that synced up to go off every time you say murder?” Clarisse asked.

Lightning flashed a yes. Literally. I anticipated this question and programmed it so that if anyone other than me says ‘murder’ it will spell out yes. My genius, it’s boundless.

“So, why are we suspects of this murder to begin with?” Martha inquired as she stepped inside from the pouring rain outside. As I saw the lightning illuminate the outside world in the letters “yes”, I realized the mistake in my coding. Manta! You fool! No wonder your parents named you after a sea pancake! Or was it a flounder?

“Sorry I’m late, I was just making a big...Ah...knitting sale.” Martha apologized.

“Martha?!” Professor NutsWorth cried out. His face turned a deep red. “Wha—what are you doing here?”

She pointed at me. “This bimbo thinks I actually killed someone.” Scoffing, she added. “Like I would actually get caught.”

“Martha, I know you strangled my uncle to death with that insanely strong knitted scarf.”

She shrugged. “But can you prove it?”

I turned back to the table. “No, I cannot. Doesn’t matter anyway, he forgot to get me a gift card for my tenth birthday so I never loved him anyway. He’s not why we’re all gathered here now.”

“So why don’t you tell us instead already!” Clarisse exclaimed. “Who died?”

“My feelings!” I exclaimed.

Clarisse stared at me for a second, trying to tell if I was actually being serious. Realizing I was being as serious as Santa is real—because he is—then stood up. “Yeah, I’m out.”

“No!” I shouted. “No one is leaving until I find out who the murderer is!”

“There is no murderer since there was no murder!” Clarisse argued.

“Not one that can be proved at least.” Martha mumbled under her breath.

Clarisse continued to head to the door. “I said stop!” I bellowed with about as much authority as the student council has.

From underneath the table, I flipped a switch and initiated total lock down of the building. Sheets of metal slammed down and sealed every window, door, and mouse hole in the joint. No one was getting in or out.

“No one is leaving until I find out who the murderer is!”

“But,” Clarisse whined. “My nail appointment!”

“Sit back down!” I ordered.

She trudged back over to her seat.

Dramatically, I slapped a piece of paper onto the table and raised a curious eyebrow. “Well, that was certainly dramatic.” Martha remarked.

“Thank you. I went to drama camp as a kid. I think it really paid off.”

“Hey, was it the one in River Deli?”

“Yeah, with infected kidney shaped pool and flesh-eating algae?”

“Oh, I went there as a kid! Man, in my day, they had twice has much flesh-eating algae before you kids got spoiled with your ‘health codes’.”

“Would you two stop talking about glorified daycares for teens and explain why the frick that paper is so important!”

“Easy,” I flipped over the paper to reveal the words ‘KICK ME’ on the other side. “Someone taped this to my back yesterday and I wanna know who!”

“Are you kidding me?” Clarisse demanded. “This is why you’re still keeping us here?”

“It really hurt my feelings!”

“Oh, stuff them in a jar and get over it already!”

“That’s toxic masculinity!” I cried. “Guys are allowed to cry at the end of rom-coms now! It’s a revolution!”

I folded my hands and stared dead across the table. “Moving on, you all have the means and motive to plant this ‘KICK ME’ sign.” I turned my head to the side and dramatically gazed out the window like I was in the sad part of a rom-com. “Yesterday, we were all attending Devin’s ‘Totally Awesome End of the Year, If You Don’t Go I’ll Sleep with Your Mother’ Party.”

Clarisse nodded. “Yeah, it was totally awesome.”

Professor NutsWorth lowered his head. “I think he still slept with my mother anyway.”

“Anyway, each of you has a motive. Professor NutsWorth, I wore your shirt without asking. Clarissa, I stopped you from making another one of your nail appointments.”

“And I’d cut you if my nails were fine enough to cut skin. But, unfortunately, I couldn’t make it to that appointment!” She added.

“And Martha, I know you murdered my uncle.” I clapped my hands. “Then! All of you each approached me last night—and gave me a pat on the back.” I stood up and paced around the table. “Perhaps to tell me I was doing a good job managing my professional and personal lives, a balance not many can accomplish—”

“Yeah, there was a spider on your back.” Clarisse corrected.

“He just kept coming back.” Professor NutsWorth tacked on.

“Someone might have put spider bait on the sign.”

“Wait.” I paused. “Why would you say they put spider bait on the sign?”

“Because the sign was already on you when we hit the spider.” Clarisse and the professor answered in sync.

I stroked my chin. “That could only leave one person! Martha!” I spun around to face her. “Did you—”

Martha held up a hand. “Imma stop you right there. I’m the one who put that sign on you. However, I didn’t do it to hurt your feelings.”

“Then why Martha?” My eyes brimmed with tears as I whispered. “Why?”

“It wasn’t intentional. I simply mistook you for Professor Nutty over there. You were wearing his shirt.”

“Well, Martha, I hate to do this, but you are uninvited to my birthday party!”

“Oh, I doubt you will make it to your next birthday.”

“What? Why?”

“Because the poison will have killed you by then.”

“Wha.”

“I mean it was a good to honest mistake really. I put some poison the tape. When you took it off, it seeped their your skin. Judging my the growing blue-ness of your neck, I’d say you have about a minute before you drop dead.”

I placed my hand on my hips. “Well, Martha, I hate to do this even more than before, but you are uninvited to my funeral!”

That was the last thing I said before my body hit the floor.

“So, does anyone know how to get out of here?”

I walked with my wife down the boardwalk by the river. After thirty years, we can bask in the comfort of the quiet of just enjoying each other's company. "Hey, hon?" she asks. "Hmm?" I respond, watching a flock of birds fly overhead. I hear her hesitation, "Who was Billy?" My world grinds to a halt at this seemingly innocent question. How did she know? How long has she known? Why ask me now? My mind is flooded with memories of that day.

Billy and I were walking down this same boardwalk over forty years ago. We laughed and playfully punched one another, just enjoying the summer sunshine. Billy pointed to a group of girls coming the opposite direct, "I bet you can't get that girl's number." I laugh, "Nice try. I fell for that last time. She was your cousin, and you paid her to embarrass me like that at the mall." Billy shook his head vigorously, "No, I mean it! She's really cute. Maybe you guys will click like my parents did." "What do you mean," I ask. Billy started in on his story.

Twenty years ago on this same boardwalk, Billy's parents had met for the first time. They locked eyes and immediately knew they were meant to be together. Of course, it would take them another five years to admit to one another how much they liked each other. You never admit to your crush how much you like them! His parents had kissed each other, and as they pulled away, Billy's mother had asked, "What changed you mind?" Billy's father hugged her close, "Do you remember me telling you about my grandfather?"

Fifty years ago, Billy's father's grandfather was fishing with a buddy of his on the shore that would one day be the boardwalk. There were no busy streets or bustling folk, so the area was nice and peaceful for an afternoon of fishing. His friend turned to him, "You know what. I have an idea." Billy's father's grandfather rolled his eyes, "Oh, yeah? What is it?" His friend told him, "I think we should make some kind of walkway here so that we don't have to sit in the dirt." Billy's father's grandfather laughed, "Why? That's just going to encourage people to come out here. Soon, you'll have a bunch of crap stories about people falling in love or remembering old times. Nobody like those stories."

“Take a right at the next stop sign”, Rosaline implied, looking down at the crumbled up map. I looked to my right at an old dirt road, the only lighting is the gleam of the moon.

“Are you sure?”, I questioned as a deep feeling rolled over my shoulders. I look over at Rosaline giving me the look to just do it. I take a right at the red sign.

This camping trip is exactly what I need, a time to get away and be free from school and work. My friends taking the journey with me also required a break from their lives. Sammi has been going crazy from listening to twelve kids screaming through her household. And Rosaline has been going through what I would wish on no one, cancer. She had been diagnosed a month ago. This is her last trip before she starts her treatments.

“This road doesn't look right,” Sammi comments. The small person in the back of the car, sitting on the window. With her blonde hair taken by the wind. She gives me a concerned face as we continue on the unsettling road.

Rosaline, fluttering around with the map in the passenger seat, starts pointing out every small rock or branch on the road. She is the ‘worrying’ one of the three of us. Every time we go anywhere, she is the one making sure all the ends meet. She is the organized one of us.

As Sammi is trying to direct us to the safest way to get through the road, she points out the window, “A bridge.” I pull over to look at the map. The map is guiding us through this little wooden bridge, that covers a small cliff into water. As far as I could see it looked stable. The map leads us straight through the bridge, onto a small road, that will lead us back to the correct path.

After a while of discussing, we decided instead of turning around and driving back another hour to the original road, we would just go through the bridge. I started the small car and pulled forward, passing the entrance of the bridge. The bridge was holding up for a while. But after a couple feet into the middle of the bridge, we started to hear cracking. I slowed down the car, now we are going about five miles per hour. I soon realized that I had made a big mistake.

The car began to sink through the wooden boards. We were all starting to get very uneasy. Then the back wheel broke through the bridge the car jerked back. Sammi still sitting in the window, was jerked along with the car. The force pulled her right from the car, off the bridge. She fell into the water. The stream took her past where I could see.

“How do we get out without falling?”, Rosaline yelled, “ Katelyn what do we do?”.

I could only reply with “How the fudge would I know?” I started looking around trying to figure out our escape plan. I couldn’t move the car because the back wheel is stuck through the bridge. The bridge is too narrow to just get out of the car and walk out. So we climbed on the roof of the car.

At this point we are trying to slide from the top of the car to the front, to run off the bridge. But before we could, it starts to rain. We are sliding and slipping everywhere, almost falling from the roof into the water. I work my way down onto the bridge. I reach my hand out to Rosaline.

Rosaline slips, she falls in the same manner as Sammi did, too fast to help. I just stand there in shock, trying to imagine what to do. I reach my hand towards my phone. Of course no service. I start running for the next five minutes down the road with my phone raised in the air.

After some time I finnaly get service, I call the police and tell them where I am and they send an ambulance. They spent the next couple of hours searching the river. They found them huddling about a mile down the river. They were brought to the hospital. Just a couple of scrapes and bruises. But for the car, it had fallen completely through the bridge. There was no hope left for that poor car.

The police officer asked, “How did you end up there?”. We all answered with the same words, “We took a right!”.

Douglas moped down the sidewalk; shoulders hung low, bouquet hung lower. Simone's harsh words tormented his soul-- until the sole of his shoe met a piece of pink chewing gum. It was still mushy, for a six-year-old pigtailed girl in blue dress had accidentally spat it out three minutes prior. She skipped along, holding her mum's hand singing 'ABC' when it slung from her glossy lips. Rolling his eyes, Douglas sighed depressingly and continued home.

Hear me—

I want a cigarette, so I grab a tootsie pop.

‘I want to write—’

“You’ve been on that all night.” I hear a voice, ahead, from the driver’s seat.

‘Who are you?’

I feel the car hit a speed bump, and a bulge works up through my throat. I gulp it down. Then, we stop.

‘You want one?’

“Cherry.”

My tongue flings the sweet core around, plunging it against my cheeks. I hear it grind against my braces.

‘Who are you?’

I hear a chuckle, and my back stiffens. A name. A crack of laughter. Something about a party. The tires’ groans. A cackle. An insult. A wheeze—a headache, then nausea.

The car accelerates, and my world blurs out of focus. I lean my head on a window and whimper.

‘I want to write.’

“… Have you been writing anything lately?”

‘I’ve been trying.’

A yellow beam zips by. Its engine, I heard, growled at me, deafened me.

“Damn, must be a supercar or something. You caught that?”

My back slouches back again. A familiar sore resumes its climb up this spine of mine.

‘2012 Ferrari 458 Italia Base. Tuned…. (maybe).’

Another chuckle.

“You got your car-smarts straight. I’ll give you that.”

Then silence.

“You know how much i—”

‘No.’

A chuckle, “Fair enough,” then silence.

I recognize a neon smudge creep across the window slate (familiar, but they all look the same). The sweet core breaks between my crooked teeth, its debris scraping my tongue. With it, the nausea crawls away. Only a sharp migraine remains, latched onto my skull. My surroundings regain definition, and I feel the rough asphalt below me make my car shiver.

I open my eyes wider and stare into the driver’s seat. A black leather jacket. A washed-down baseball cap. I see their reflection on the windshield too, but I meet no face. I see black leather gloves. I smell dead cigarettes.

“Almost there.”

I stare outside at the procession of yellow streetlights. I look up, looking for the limelight, or moon. I give up as the car screeches to a halt.

A strange face turns towards me from the driver’s seat. I can’t see its eyes in the shade of its cap, but I hear it mutter “out.” I spot a pair of lips shiver, a white stick protruding from between them.

‘It’s cold.’

“Get out.”

I stare back with my lips clasped, teeth grinding, and my back stiffens up again.

“Go home.”

‘…’

“Out.”

I comply, but I look back at the car door before it clacks shuts. There’s a scent of familiarity to it.

I see a window slide down. From it, pops out that shaded face.

“You really live here?”

I still can’t see its eyes.

‘I think so.’

A sigh. I see it vaporize. The window slides back up, and the car crawls away. Along with it, the familiar silhouette of my car.

Two hands crash into my pockets—empty. I feel a shiver crawl up my spine, but a pang cuts it off—an aged headache, then nausea.

This head droops down, and my eyes meet a dry, dark sidewalk. I turn my back against the asphalt as I pull the head back up, and we confront a familiar building.

This mouth is dry, and I feel the braces’ wires tear apart our softer cheeks.

‘I want a cigarette,’ but I’ve run out of tootsie pops, and the taste of iron coats our tongue and throat.

These legs walk towards the building and the head leans on its door. Fists bang on it twice, then squeeze out a voice:

A name, a familiar one

—as I collapse, once more.

The grass unrolled in front of us for miles and we couldn't see where it ended from where we sat. Her red umbrella shaded us under the angry and glaring sun. Looking at her I could see why everyone found her so beautiful. Her bronze skin and ombre hair spilled down her shoulders. It looked so soft.

"I wanted to do it here because of how peaceful it is here."

"It should end where it begins."

"I don't want to be here."

"Neither do I"

She wrapped her hand around the back of my neck and pulled me closer to her. My hood cushioned her hand I saw her eyes turn black. I felt nauseous and dizzy as she pulled me into her. A weight pressed into my chest and I felt my lungs close collapse. Piercing needles pressed into my ears and I was....

It was one of those times in February when it was way warmer than it should have been for that time of year. The kind of weather that pops out of nowhere for a day or two, you enjoy for a little, and then hope it goes away because global warming is a huge threat to humanity. That kind of weather.

It was nighttime, and we sat in her hot tub underneath the stars as I rambled on about my life dreams like I always do. She was always good at listening to me, regardless of how crazy I sounded or how long I talked about all the things I wanted to accomplish with my life.

“…and I’m gonna have to make sure that we can get done filming that by the second week of June, because that’s when a lot of people are going to start work and then we’d never have time to get everyone together to finish filming. If we don’t get it done then, we’re totally screwed.”

I fell silent for a moment as my mind jumped to all different places. Filming. Writing. A song that came on the radio on the way to her house that I thought she might like. A weird conversation I heard between two people at the coffee shop on Main Street the day before. I finally stuck a landing on a topic.

“I also really wanna release a music album one day.”

I took a moment to think about how ridiculous that must’ve been for her to hear. She’s known me for two years, and never once have I shown any interest in creating music. I was a writer. A filmmaker. I chuckled to myself.

“No, don’t laugh,” she said to me. “You can do that. You can do anything you want to do.”

And then I stopped, and I looked at her. The genuine sparkle hidden in those soft, brown eyes. The unfeigned confidence in her tone of voice. And that was when I had one of the greatest realizations I’ve ever had in my life.

I can.

Yelling, screaming, crying. Every inch of the room filled with sorrow and regret. Wishing they had dealt with problems earlier, hoped there was still time to clean the mess. The floor was damp with fresh tears. Every moment ticked by like it was the last. They would try to grasp each second before it vanished. Even though each moment tore their hearts to pieces, at least they were still together. In the end, they knew they wouldn’t be. So focused on each other, they failed to realize the small, youthful ears listening intently to the whimpers. The ears that captured the words, the noises, that would haunt their mind forever. The ears that in ten years from now will recall that moment when they were too young to comprehend what was occurring. The ears that will inflict an ever-lasting memory on the child, to whom those ears belong. 

Moving to a new town, knowing not a soul but her grandmother, the little girl was scared. She was scared of making new friends. Why did she have to leave her old ones? Were they mad at her? Was she a bad friend? Was she a bad daughter? The little girl was late to her first day. She was so panicked about finding the perfect shoes, the perfect outfit, to make her look as if she was a good friend. She met so many children that day. Second grade didn’t seem so bad. Until playdates began to exist. She was asked to play dolls at Veronica’s house, she was asked to play hide-n-seek at Joy’s house. She was begged to sleepover at Daniella’s house. The little girl had to think about the days she would be allowed to and when she wouldn’t. She never could give answers to her new friends because she just didn’t know what to say. Some days she was at her mom’s house. Some days she was at her dad’s. She was constantly on the move from one bedroom door to her other. Constant reminders of her abnormality existed everywhere. Television shows, movies, anything she loved had this image of a happy family, and it wasn’t hers. She felt out of place. She felt as if she had no true home despite having two. She felt alone. She was alone.

Looking back, she almost wished she could pinpoint it.

When she’d fallen in love.

If anything, she’d never even noticed until her teen years.

But as all things come to an end, the disaster struck only a few days later.

He can still remember meeting her for the first time outside that classroom.

Though they were only children at the time (still are), but I think a part of him loved her then.

She had his favourite smile.

He realized he only smiled like that when he smiled back at her.

She got the call at 7:00. It was from his sister.

‘He was in an accident. They took him to the hospital, they told me to call you’

She’d left in a rush, nevermind she was clad in pajamas.

‘I’m on my way there’

He never believed in Meant To Be.

He believed in Chances.

The hope that things would work out, and if they didn’t, that you would fight for it yourself.

You would have to.

Otherwise you would have lost before you’d even begun.

She quickly parked, running into the hospital, taking the steps two at a time as she climbed them to the waiting room.

His family was sitting there.

His mother had puffy eyes.

His father watched the hallways distantly.

His sister looked broken.

They were still waiting when the first star appeared that night.

He can’t remember when he fell in love.

Maybe it had happened years before he’d realized.

Maybe it had come out of the blue and hit him - oh the irony.

He can only remember how suddenly,

it was different.

A drunk driver.

That’s what they’d been told.

She sat anxiously, gnawing on her thumbnail, until his mother stood from beside her.

The doctor was approaching them from down the hall.

He looked sorrowful.

‘Are you the family?’

Once realizing he loved her, he began to wonder.

Would it have been better to have never known her the way he did?

To spare himself the preconceived discretion to what he would have done differently?

If anything could have been done differently.

Or if his Chances would have won out.

He came to the conclusion a short while later.

How could you love someone you never knew?

She was the first to see him, with the bandages around his head and the tube protruding from his chest. Another tube was tucked into his nose and connected to a hanging oxygen concentrator. He smiled lazily when he saw her. She couldn’t help but cry.

His mother and sister followed her quickly, stroking his hair and kissing his head.

The fluctuation of the monitor was slower than average.

She found herself counting between the beats.

Who knew five seconds would last so long.

He saw her first when she came through the door.

Everything passed through him then.

Every late night.

Every exchange.

Every text.

Every touch.

Every dream.

Every hope.

And every Chance.

There was no Chance of anything now.

She left the room after the doctor spoke about why the surgery had failed.

He would die.

He was dying.

And it could take hours.

Minutes.

Seconds.

He just wanted to see her.

Tell her everything.

She just wanted to be with him.

Spare their Chances of forever.

He watched her finally come back in after his family had left to retrieve dinner from the cafeteria, though it was midnight.

Her hair was messy.

She was in her pajamas.

Her face red and puffy.

And he thought she’d never looked more beautiful.

She was hesitant.

Then he smiled, and she broke.

Every early morning.

Every glance.

Every call.

Every shame.

Every wake.

Every Chance.

He was dying.

His heart was failing, he knew that.

He would die, and there wouldn’t be any piece of him left.

But there would always be enough of him for her.

She didn’t sleep. Everyone else had.

But not her.

She watched him. That’s all.

Just waiting.

It’s all anyone could do.

He had been counting on the next time they would be alone.

It came the next morning. His family had gone home supposedly.

They were calling everyone.

Composing themselves.

He didn’t blame them.

People often look for compensation in places it isn’t there.

She was watching him.

Just like he was watching her.

‘I’m scared I’ll forget you’ She said

‘especially since you’ll never come back’

He was scared too.

He knew there was no Chance. Not this time.

He’d prayed for the first time. Hoping it would just maybe give him a miracle.

But he’d already said before; He never believed in Meant To Be.

She couldn’t cry.

Perhaps she had no tears left.

But she held his hand, and sat beside him, even though her throat burned with dry sobs.

It would be soon. They all could tell.

Finally, she whimpered.

‘I’m not ready to say goodbye’

His free hand had come to cup her face.

‘You never will be’

He passed within that hour.

He still hoped though, that even when he knew everything was fading, that maybe, just maybe, he’d have one more Chance.

But somehow, in his pea-sized teenage brain, he knew it was okay.

She would take the Chance for him.

She regretted it the most.

That she’d never said I love you

But somehow, in her crazy little teenage brain, she knew it was okay.

She counted on the Chance they both already knew.