Don't go there, because you'll never return. That's what they always said about the place. That's what they called it, too. Always "the place" this and "the place" that, never a proper name. You'd think that if a location was so terrifying, they’d give it a name. Perhaps a scary one, too. “Human Shredder”, “Shrine of Heros”, something like that. Now, that’s a place kids will never try to go in. Unless they’re stupid.

I guess I shouldn’t say that, because I’d be calling myself stupid too. Yes, Mom. Yes, Dad. I’m writing this letter in case I don’t come back. I’m hoping you’re not too upset, though I actually don’t care that much. Sorry if that sounds really cold hearted, but I’ve been trying to talk to you guys for the past month, and neither of you bothered to reply. It’s okay, I’m not that mad. I know you guys love me, and you probably just expected the other parent to do the hard-lifting. At this point you’ll know why I’m angry. It’s okay to be busy with your work, but I have been paying for my own food, electricity, internet, and all that. For a few months now, actually. You guys keep forgetting to do it, and I still live here.

Getting a job at 13 is hard, but not impossible if you have a few skills under your belt (and you know how to use the internet). I know you guys are busy so I didn’t bother you two about any of it. But I just wanted to ask about where my passport was, so I could register for my school’s scholarship, and neither of you would talk to me. You all kept brushing me off, thinking I was just being disruptive. But I wouldn’t be bothering you if it was super important, and I hoped you’d know that.

It doesn’t matter anymore, I don’t know why I’m getting so worked up anyways. I’m going to the place now. I’ve packed my bags, and I’ve been getting ready for a long time. School ended back in June (in case you didn’t know), and neither would the neighbors talk. I told them I had a great summer camp to attend. They told me I was lucky to have great parents.

Whatever you have to say, don’t. You won’t get a chance. Even if I live, I’m not coming back. Call it petty, or call it stupid. It doesn’t make a difference to me anyways. Only no one will tell me to shut up because “the adults are talking”, which is a welcomed change.

-Signed, Your Daughter.

Greetings there, family and friends.

Come on down to the deep end.

I'm here to welcome you,

Into our great nation.

I'm just a guide to help you out,

On your vacation.

Melting pot of cultures,

Anti-destruction structures,

Living the suburbs just to stem more literature.

Abanon news, mostly obtuse.

Only use is fliping fuse, just focus on your own dues.

Changing hues, learning cues.

"What do you think of the debate?"

"Sorry, I don't read the news."

Things to do, nothing's few.

Brand new shoes, scared to use.

Comes in twos? Prepare abuse.

Get those girls, you looking cute.

Have your fun, you won't be done.

Meet new dudes, or beat them too.

Whatever it is, whatever you want,

It's the land of the free.

(Condoms are tax free.) But!

Before you leave the airport,

There's some questions here at the door,

Careful how you answer there,

I think you need some support.

....

So you're not straight, cis, Christian and Caucasian.

Let me switch up my advice,

Grab a drink and add some ice.

Listen carefully or you will see the ICE.

The country of the free,

Learn to beg and plead.

The country of the free,

The greed will start to seep.

To country of the free,

Feel ashamed to sleep.

The country of the free,

Guilt is yours to keep.

Crimes are fine, you won't get fined (you'll just die),

It's free for all, all you can dine.

First to shine, first to sign,

First to sigh, first to reisgn.

Profit over human lives,

But first to post on black lives.

Matter's undestroyable,

Your cooperation's descipable.

Burned with flames,

You won't change.

Heinous things just for a dime,

Whatever happened to "choose kind".

Yeah, I'd drop my suitcase and dip too.

The beast-like being stood about thrice the size of the skinny teenager, with its oral cavity wide open. Within, a curled tongue unravelled itself. It quickly enveloped around the squirming human and tugged. Its outside skin remains covered in thorns, which gleamed with a metallic shine. A crimson plaque surrounds the bottom of the spikes.

"Please stop. It's gross." She stated with a sigh. "I know it's fun for you, but I have to shower all over again." For some strange reason, the girl felt like the monster was somehow pouting. It was the watery eyes, she guessed.

"Put me down." Eila repeated herself firmly, looking straight at the eyes, trying to ignore the tears that were going to pour down. After a few seconds of silence, the slick red tongue retracted into its mouth. It whined gently and nudged the girl with its tail, the only place on its body without scales or thorns.

She stared at her soaked through clothes and held back her puke. It was not the first time this had happened. When she puked the first time, the monster had almost destroyed all the buildings around them from emotion. Today, the only nearby structure was the farm. Well, if you include the stack of hay and the barn, three. But better safe than sorry. Elia had learned her lesson babysitting Godzilla.

I walked into the room to stare into a pair of reluctant eyes. There were two chairs placed in opposite directions. The one closer to the door had a pile of paperwork on top. The other one sat a teenage boy, whose stare quickly darted away as the boy drooped his head, looking at the floor instead.

The door shut behind me, making a loud bang. I didn't care much, as I specifically asked for a private room in this hall. I picked up the papers and sat down.

"Wasn't expecting somebody like me, huh?" The boy muttered. "I know you probably don't want me, the infant and toddler section is on the right, down the hall."

I squinted my eyes. "Down the hall to the right is the toilet section, Mister. "

His face flushed, but he didn't say anything else.

"Plus," I added, "I am expecting someone like you. I asked for teens specifically."

"Why?" He head propped up. "You're gonna use us to flex how kind you are or something like that. We don't need your pity and sympathy." He finally took a good look at me and huffed. "You literally look younger than me."

"And I literally have a PhD, smartass." I retorted. He recoiled in shock. I mean, I know I do look like another teenager with my makeup and hair. The frontdesk lady took her time with my ID.

He went silent.

"I noticed you said us and we." I leaned back in my chair. "You got friends here? I thought skinny boys got bullied in orphanages."

A glare shot in my direction, yet I continued, "You know, this attitude of yours is probably what's keeping you here.." I checked the papers. "..Timothy. 16 years, eh?"

His eyes seemed like they were going to water, before another girl bursted through the door I came through. She panted, with fiery red hair and redder cheeks, she looked pissed off.

"Fuck off!" She shouted at me. "He doesn't need you to insult him! He's happy here with us!" Timothy visibly relaxed as she entered, yet his feet began shaking as soon as she raised her voice.

I didn't reply, but simply looked at her curiously instead. The silence seemed to shake her as she quickly realized what she had done. Her lips trembled.

"...I'm sorry." She whispered. "Please don't be mad at Timmy."

I remained silent. The girl interpreted the silence as fury, as she continued to ramble.

"..He's been here the longest, it's almost 10 years. We heard someone was looking to adopt a teenager, we all decided Timmy deserved it the most. But we were worried-" She took a deep breath and continued, while Timothy sat stunned. He probably didn't know about this, I noted.

"-worried whoever was coming would be looking to do charity or do bad things. I'm sorry for eavesdropping and shouting, please. I'm sorry. He had nothing to do with it." She pleaded, her previously flushed face now looking closer to pale. "Please give him a home. I know you can afford it. You have a PhD and you work for--" She shut up, her face now free of colour.

I listened as she talked, barely reacting. As she finally let loose of what she knew, I smiled. She looked terrified, and Timothy was looking near tears.

"You've went through my information." I stated it as a fact. She stuttered out a yes. I smiled again. "You said "we", like little Timmy, hm? The rest of you, come on in." I gestured towards the door.

A minute later, I was sitting opposite from 5 teenagers. They either fidgeted with their fingers or hoodie string, whispering quickly to one another. Timothy stood out as the only seated one, but his legs bounced faster and faster. I sighed.

"So." I began, as their faces all turned towards me. "The four of you," I pointed to those standing, "all wanted to get out, but gave the chance to Timmy." Before they could finish their nod, I continued, "and you four also went through my information, along with evesdropping on us."

Out of the four, some looked meekly to the side, some looked at me unapologetically, while others stood, nonchalant.

I asked. "At any point, did any of you have any doubts about this? You breached my privacy. There might be consequences." I looked dead in their eyes and continued. "Tell me now, were any of you hesitant about helping your friend, Timmy?"

Noises of groans and snickers scattered through the room. I glanced at the kid who previously looked as if she was near tears, and another who avoided any eye contact.

Neither said anything.

I nodded, satisfied. "Good. Good." I may have come off as sarcastic, as the tears held back by some of them came close to rolling down. The others stared at me angrily as they comforted their friend. The red hair girl finally spoke again, even more furious this time.

"If you didn't want him, why did you come? None of us would ever find parents now, you asshole!" I noticed that her freckles were more obvious with an angry flush. This time, she took my silence as submission. "Sue us for all I care! We ain't got nothing anyways! We got each other!" She got a few nods, and she looked satisfied.

I remained my silence and stood up with the papers.

"Get out of here!" The same girl sneered.

"Not yet, Ms. Kelsie." The meanness almost shrunk immediately as I called her name. "And you, Mr. Xin. Ms. Andesia, Mr. Ken." I looked at the kids, their demeanors all different. "Plus Timmy."

I shrugged under their doubting gaze. "Hey, you researched me. I can do a little digging too." They either shifted their feet or averted my eye contact. "I've seen exactly what I came to see."

"Our humiliation?" One of the taller, stone-faced boys broke their silence.

"Maybe." I replied teasingly, seeing his expression turn from detached to anger. Satisfied with what I've done, I turn towards the door. Before I left, I turned to the group of now collectively furious teenagers.

"I came here to see the group of kids I was adopting." I left without another word, knowing that was enough to make the impact I wanted.

The frontdesk lady went into the room shortly after I left. She gave them their first set of new laundry in years, and told them to all behave at their new home. "Dr. R is a kind woman, taking you problem children out of the system so late. Waste of her money, is what I think." She sighed loudly, her large body shuffling around the waiting room speedily. "Tomorrow you gotta go to her house. She gave some bus money. Should've made you guys walk with that attitude y'all got! You can just stay with her until the papers are done, we don't want you no more." The woman poked. "If she doesn't want you yet, to the motels you go."

Used to her harshness, they didn't reply. Instead, they cherished the fresh smell of new clothes and looked to each other, anxious. They were about to be all adopted into a home by someone with a heavy attitude and a decent wealth. What would become of them? They didn't have a clue. That night, Kelsie and Andesia flipped back and forth, moving their pillow around and picked on loose threads in their bedding. The room next door had Xin, who slept as soundly as ever, while Timmy lay in a bunker bed above Ken. The pair whispered to each other past midnight, wondering what tomorrow would be.

Rest assured, no motels were involved.

He was never the husband type. Our first date had ended with us face down in dirt, giggling our noses red. The first ring he ever gave me was made of twigs and leaves, intertwined with grass and specs of dirt. He slipped it on my finger, leaving traces of wilderness through my hair and clothes. Our meals were often wild berries and delicate leaves, which he picked off at sun rise with the morning dew still clinging on. Well, his meals. But sometimes I’d steal a fruit or two.

As I bite down on the berries, the juices would spill onto my lips. Almost like blood, it’d immediately stain my lips and trickle down my neck.

“You look sweet.” He’d say, a little awkwardly. As if to make up for the comment, he’d then lean in for a kiss. When he pulled away, I often wondered if my cheeks were the same rouge as his lips.

We met in spring, and summer soon followed. It was too hot in Wisconsin to play, so we’d doze off in the shades under the trees. Sunlight would flicker through the leaves, leaving spotted golden highlights on us. It was then I had started calling him a little nickname. Mister Rabbit.

Full of nature, innocence, and life. Whenever I called him so, he’d reply by tapping me on the nose. I had always secretly hoped he’d call me his Mrs Rabbit, but I had time. I could wait.

I knew that the harsh life of modernity never suited him. Screens were strings, as concrete was obsolete; songs must come from birds, never CDs or record players. He had explained it to me with a twinkle in his eye. This was the same twinkle in his eye when he was at a loss for words, as he was awkward in the dorky way. The same twinkle when slang slips from my vocabulary. He was proud to be different. Being an outcast was never something he took shame in.

He would try and be romantic, recite the poems scribbled on rocks with charcoal, but fail as he could never place the right words in his sentences. My Mister Rabbit would then look at me and tell me to stay in school, to not be like him. It was summer, and I was in my twenties, I’d remind him. He’d make another joke or so, brush off the accident. I had realized then that he no longer understood anything of the life outside his forest.

We met through his mother, who I met at work. I had graduated for many years, but my Mister Rabbit didn’t understand that, and I had never cared to explain. The old woman, fragile and delicate, was always the tough ball in the care home. She wouldn’t stay still. Broken bones never swayed her climbing trees. She didn’t know how to read, and didn’t want to learn. I would climb up the branches with her, and she’d smile at me like we were childhood friends on the town’s playground, grinning about some prank we would pull soon. I liked her. She knew when to look, and when to look away. We were fast friends.

In the winter, she stopped climbing trees. It was cold, she said. But we both knew the real reason. Days later, she stopped breathing. Before she did, she had asked me to go see her son. When I asked for his whereabouts, shame flushed her voice. She stumbled over her words, like a little girl who had lied stealing the last piece of candy. She had lost him, she said. With my questioning gaze, she revealed that she was once married.

Marriage was just not for her. She wanted to do whatever it was she pleased, and a son and a husband tied her down. So she ran away. She thought that she would go back weeks later, and nothing would have changed. It obviously didn’t go that way, she said quite bitterly. The young one couldn’t sit still. He ran too. In her husband’s eyes, she was a cheating whore, and so he left too. And thus, she returned to an empty little hut, with the fireplace cold for a long, long, time.

I eventually tracked him down, near a camping site yards away from Main Street. When I saw the way his hair messily tumbled down his shoulders, I lost the words I had originally planned. “Do you want to go on a date?” I had asked, completely forgetting what I was there for. That was how I met my Mister Rabbit.

Fall came. When he had once again asked me about school, I made up my mind. I would bring him into my world. I was sick of parking tickets beside the river. The next time I saw him preparing logs, I stopped him.

“Winter is harsh.” He said, unsure of why I had interrupted an important routine. “We need them.”

I explained how heaters work. The impatience in his eyes were obvious. He clearly still rejected the idea of returning to society. I pleaded and begged, and even threatened to leave. He wouldn’t budge.

The leaves on the trees went from green to yellow, yellow to orange, orange to rouge, and rouge to dead. Like us, I’d think. I thought that was the end of us. The hut we stayed in were often filled with dreadful silence. He refused to talk to me, as anything I said would be about leaving the forest. The night before the first snow, I cried.

“I want to be your Mrs Rabbit.” I said.

Through my tears, I saw him sit beside the fire, expressionless. “I love you.” I said. I didn’t get a response.

The snow fell the morning after. When I woke up, I realized that he had left. No logs. No fire. How would he survive? Eventually, I left the hut and went back to my normal routine. I had fallen into a strange rabbit hole, I told the ones who asked. People have doubts when you disappear after work and never have time to visit. No one believed me, but I knew what had happened, that was enough.

Weeks later, I saw him at a dinner party. You can imagine my shock. His hair was shorter, with glasses and a suit. When I saw him, I think I had almost weeped tears of joy. Before I saw the woman beside him with matching rings, that was.

I was confused and very much heartbroken. If he was willing to leave his forest, why for her and not me? If he was willing to marry her and be tied down with bounds of marriage, why for her and not me? He had glanced over in my direction, then smiled at me.

The rest was a bit of a blur. I don’t quite remember much with all the blood and screaming. But when I brought him back to my apartment, I had realized my mistake. This wasn’t my Mister Rabbit. He didn’t smell of grass and berries, nor campfire and morning dew. He was afraid of me, too. My Mister Rabbit was never afraid of me. When I brought back game, he’d tell me I did a good job. Albeit he never shared my meals with me, but he understood the cruelty of nature and what I had to do.

I had the wrong person. But how did I mistake another man for my love? I was quite disappointed, and had my dinner resentfully.

Eventually, I found him. He was in the little hut his mother left him in. When I went inside, he was clearly glad to see me despite not showing it. He even put food in the freezer for me. The meat was frozen, but I wasn’t one to complain.

it’s been a while since i’ve visited you

so i head to my garden to pick

a handful of daisies

to bring to you.

i stand in the 12 o’clock moonlight

outside the window, confused

why does your bed sheets look so fresh

like they haven’t been touched

in more than 11 days?

my fingers close

tighter! tighter! and tighter!

around the 10 stems my hands crush the stems my anger stems

where are you? where did you go?

i thought

you would wait for me

but why are your sheets so crisp?

the daisies i picked were white,

to have with white wine at 9

like i heard you said you liked

so where are you?

oh god where did you go?

a hand on my shoulder pulls me out of my trance

comes a maiden of 8 not old to dance

says

she’s always loved the daisies on her nightstand

when she sees them at 7 in the morning it helps her withstand

the 6 mundane hours at work

and after she eats dinner at 5

she looks at them with a glass of white wine

but it’s time to leave them

on a marble slab instead

it’s been 4 years

since my beloved’s been dead

it’s the 3rd time i’ve forgotten

it’ll be the 2nd i try

to be the 1st to be by your side

at 00:00

i die

i lose motivations day by day

i can't do anything i'm afraid

what can save my judgement day

i can't help it but decay

the children outside they play

i leave my feelings on display

on a glass plate covered in clay

what mattered once begins its decay

i can't help it but say

things that breaks down the breaking bay

you can't tie knots that's been frayed

so day by day more i decay

i believe their ultimate betray

they comfort and insist it'll be ok

it might be fine later but not today

your words can't pause my decay

the shart stabbing of pain

the damned feeling of my shame

it hasn't stopped oh i'm afraid

how all i've done since my birth, is decay

Writing endings is hard, Patrick muses.

He's a published author, and has been for decades. Patrick wouldn't claim to be a bestseller author, but critics will tell you that the novel he publish a year ago did earn a few dimes that lead to a couple book tours and a movie. No biggie.

But that same novel got him into trouble. His publisher had requested for a happy ending, and he went with it, depsite it not fitting his plot. They said it would sell more.

Sitting amongst the hate mail, he writes his own ending with a gun.

My strawberry milkshake tipped and fell over.

How should I describe this mess?

Napkins upon tissues upon napkins.

I apply more pressure,

It keeps pouring!

The wound...

Help.

Help.

The wound...

It keeps pouring!

I apply more pressure,

Napkins upon tissues upon napkins.

How should I describe this mess?

My strawberry milkshake tipped and fell over.

she piqued my interest as she walked,

tightly coiled hair, defined black curls.

i peeked through the blinds to see more clearly,

rich dark skin, smoother than fine silk.

she piqued my interest as she cried,

clear pearls rolling, leaving trails glimmering.

i peeked through the blinds to see more clealy,

tightly held fists, tighter brows furrowed.

she piqued my interest as she screamed,

brown soft lips, white harsh words.

i peeked through the blinds to see more clearly,

gentle pastel clothes, wild edges unlaid.

she reminds me of the girl i saw on tv,

who faced accusations, discrimination, lack of recognition.

her career peaked when she was hated the most,

how ironic.

no, wait.

her career peak is actually now!

as she is falling,

falling from the edges.

falling like the stars,

in the sky in the tv in the rain.