Fiction

SORRY GIRL, NO PHONE MEMORY LEFT, the truck’s hand-painted license plate read in a sideways flirt. Two rainbow bunches of streamers bounced from the sides of the jalopying vehicle. A bundle of sugarcane sticks fell out of the open back. One side of the truck read I LOVE GANDHI, the other, LIFE IS BEAUTIFUL. Our car looked like a toy in comparison. I pretended not to be afraid of it toppling over onto us. I pretended we weren’t stuck in traffic in the middle of India, on our way to the hills.

The driver of our car glimpsed backwards every so often with his clean fatherly eyes. His face was ruddy, stubbled from going without shaving for a few days, and patchy from old pimple bruises. When we would ask him how much longer or to stop for a bathroom, he’d reply in a low obedient mumble. When we would stop for tea, he’d put one arm behind his back in a servile stance and drink from the hot steel cup in long thirstful sips—staring at the Indian sun. He had small children and got nervous when my grandfather told him we were going to the hills. How many days? he asked. I don’t know! my grandfather would say. Nobody tells you how many hairs on your head you’re gonna be born with!

I was a sardine—jammed with six sleeping souls bouncing up and down as the car continued through the rock-laden roads. Time became a big blur of jet lag— since we’d flown from the U.S. to my grandparents’ house in a quaint, forgotten town. I tried to wriggle my phone out of my pocket to listen to music, but my sister’s heavy resting head jerked when I made the slightest move. I sighed and wiped the fog off the window with a spare unicorn-speckled sock.

My cousin, Charlie, woke up and yelled, “I’M SO HUNGRY!!!” She rolled the window down all the way and stuck her head out, searching for food like an impatient animal. A cold breeze and smell of something fried and crunchy, mint and spices, and piping hot cardamom tea blew into the car. The rest of the troupe slowly awakened and shook the siesta from their eyes.

“We can’t get off anywhere now,” said my aunt, yawning. The cars in the jam were motionless like a bad Salvador Dali painting.

My other cousin, Alicia, poked the back of my head. “How’s life?”

“Cheeky,” I replied.

“Cheeky?” she questioned.

Outside, there was a man clad in orange garb wandering with a walking stick. He looked like a wise man of some sort—a turban wrapped around his head, clay beads hanging from his neck, holding an iPhone up to his foggy eyes. Maybe he was Socrates. Maybe he was a social sage. I imagined him sitting criss-cross on a great mountain—the high sun illuminating his wrinkled face—maybe taking a selfie. He tripped over a stone and howled in silent pain. Why didn’t he just cry it out loud? He felt around the ground frantically, feeling for his walking stick. The people that came and went passed him. Some gave him a sorry glance; some perhaps debated with their own conscience if they should drop everything and help him. In the end, he wiped the blood off his knees and picked himself back up alone.

Everybody in the car began talking about everything under the sun—loudly. It was as if the pressure building in our ears from going up was making us hard of hearing. My mom and aunts talked about cleaning up our poop when we were little babies, my older cousins talked to each other about their friends getting engaged, my sister and younger cousin argued about YouTubers, and my grandfather ranted to the driver about there being no phone service now. The noises clashed and tripped over each other and the honking cars passing by sounded in a cacophony. The driver shot a tense glance in the rear-view mirror, distracted and confused how to switch lanes.

A beggar quietly palmed my window like a ghost. “Give. Please give, madam. I am hungry.” I looked at the woman’s rough hands, then at her dirty face and dark eyes half covered by a scarf. She could’ve been known as beautiful if it were raining—if the water washed away all the dirt and suffering.

My grandfather rolled down the window and barked at her in the same Hindi tongue. “GET AWAY! BREAD IS ONLY BUILT BY HARD AND HONEST WORK…THE HILLS HAVE EYES!” He rolled up the window, angry. The woman palmed at his window. My grandpa cursed and the car jumped forward.

Everybody continued talking, but a loudspeaker on top of a small church ahead suddenly overtook all of the noise in my mind. There was chanting—verses, hymns, a maybe truth. I say maybe because I couldn’t understand all of it. I looked around the car to see if anybody else was hearing what I heard. Nobody. I looked out the window to see if anybody else in the city was hearing what I heard. It was impossible to tell.

~

I’d heard the chant before, upstairs in my grandparent’s house—when I locked myself in the bathroom and sat on the toilet seat to cry. I was wearing my winter jacket then, and my butt was frozen from the cold seat even though I was wearing two pairs of pajamas. I held my head in my hands and wiped the frustration out of each burning eye. Why are you so serious? asked my aunt. You’re not fun anymore! complained my cousin. You’re too sober, said my uncle. I could hear my younger sister and cousins laughing loudly in the room next door—they were watching a scary movie and eating spicy potato chips.

I stood up and went over to where the noise was coming from. I looked up at the window that was too high to see out of and continued listening to the chant. After each verse, a small congregation echoed a response back. I imagined them sitting in a small circle in the temple two blocks away. What kind of people would sit in that little temple on a Tuesday night? I wondered. Don’t they have anything better to do? What were they saying? They sounded like holy ghosts.

            Pain and suffering are the remedies; pleasure and comforts are the diseases. 

What did this mean?

~

My grandfather cussed out a toll guy and told him to fear the hills. My mother fell asleep again, probably praying. The last time we came here, the priest gave us flowers. She had been wanting us to come back here for years. She was running to the hills in full speed, and my father—he couldn’t wait to run back to my grandparents’ home. He was in the other car and was nauseous. He had been acting strange and childlike since we landed, running to my grandparents’ home with an open embrace, like he was going to hug the giant house, jumping up and down on the terrace when he saw kites flying, requesting a cup of warm milk only from the hand of my grandmother. Milk, milk, milk, he would always sing. I loveeeeeeeee milk.

There were patches of fog and smoke then. The cars and people that passed by were apparitions. There was a woman in a fancy car, staring at me with her pierced nose turned up. She looked like she’d been royal or something in a past life. She looked like she used to have smiling old woman’s eyes. But now, she had the eyes of a politician’s wife. There were men with horses decorated in flowers and garlands lined up on the sides of the road—waiting to take the next pilgrims up the hills. There was a woman in a yellow lehenga dress sleeping on a cot—flies settling on her unconscious face. There were two men crouched by a fire that ran only on dead grass and straw—no shoes, thin hats, both sharing a rough blanket, tapping at their iPhones in one hand. There was an infant and a mother with half her breast out—the milk dripping down to the ground—an injured wild dog lapping up the tiny puddle. Animal or human, out on the street or in the quiet of a hidden bathroom, there must’ve been some meaning in our suffering. Our living was incomplete without it.

I could’ve sworn these hills had eyes. How could they be blind to this all? No, the hills understood. The hills saw all.

“We are hereeeee!” my grandfather sang. We were at the bottom of the mountains. The tall giants loomed over us like bright green gods in the cold air. The driver was tired now. Everybody huddled their stuff together, took their phones off the chargers, and fumbled to put back on their shoes. My mother got out fast; ready to run to the hills at full speed. I got out of the car and tilted my head up high again at the wonders. My father came out last, eager to get the pilgrimage over with and run back to my grandparent’s house. The lights of the hotel went out.

“Uhh the light will be back shortly. Please come in,” said the doorman.

I don’t think we needed that artificial light anyway. A flock of black birds cawed over the burning orange Indian sun. It didn’t matter to me; I was running to wherever the sun was.

Arja Kumar is a human, writer, and nineteen-year-old college student from Illinois. Her work has appeared in literary magazines including KAIROS, Sweet Tree Review, Literary Orphans, Portage, Blink-Ink, and Bop Dead City. When she is not writing, she likes to cook, paint, and stargaze.

Three minutes before I picked up my medicine from the pharmacy, I stopped by the cereal aisle. The rows of colorful boxes seemed endless under the bright CVS lighting. Who in the world needs this much cereal?

I picked up a box. Cheesy Pops! “A slow drift into disassociation,” the mascot promised. Serving size: one whole box. I put it in my cart.

I moseyed over to the pharmacy in the back. It was five o’clock on a Sunday. The only people there were me and a little old lady. She reminded me of my grandmother, but not quite.

I nodded at her and she nodded at me. Polite, but no more than what was necessary. We both looked ahead towards the desk. A woman in a white doctor’s coat was puttering around in the back.

I don’t like doctor’s coats, or pharmacies really. They remind me of why I’m here.

Every time I refill my prescription at a new pharmacy, the pharmacists ask “Dilaxoiantrone? What’s that?” and I have to tell them, “It’s new. It’s an experimental drug for retrograde amnesia.” And then they say “Dilaxoiantrone? What’s that?”

And then I finally get my stupid pill bottle, and then I walk home, and then I go to the medicine cabinet and put it next to all of the other bottles of Dilaxoiantrone, and I put my Cheesy Pops! next to all of the other boxes of Cheesy Pops!, and then I remember that I have to go refill my prescription at the pharmacy before it closes.

Alex is in ninth grade, and  was born and raised in New York City, where the inspiration is endless. When she is not out running (preferably in the rain), she can usually be found drawing, writing, or reading, with a cup of tea in her hand and a cat in her lap.

A glob of water slams against the living room window when my dad declares we’ll be eating out tonight.

“What for?” I say, staring at the downpour. “We have more than enough ramen to go around.”

“No. We’re going to Sichuan Bistro.” he says. Before I can protest, he tosses me a large umbrella from the closet and my raincoat. “Zip up. You can stand a few raindrops.”

As he drives towards our destination, I’m still mystified about the source of his newfound resolve. He didn’t demonstrate any peculiar interest in dining nor seem mindful of my activities in the prior days. After sharing a nightly meal, we would head towards our usual activities. I recall recent evenings in my bedroom, packing for college and chatting with my classmates over social media, while my dad sat in his office, engrossed in a meeting. I rack my brain for out of the ordinary events, but nothing warrants his adamant gaze, fixed on the clear space between the windshield wipers and rain.

The restaurant is tucked between a DMV facility and a tiny convenience store. After we rush inside, shoes splashing through puddles in a largely empty parking lot, my dad’s troubled expression melts into the yellow light. A young waitress a few years older than I am, seats us and hands us our menus. Around us, a few other diners, who probably arrived before the rain started, peer at us curiously.

My dad seems oblivious to this. He folds his arms and asks me excitedly, “Remember this place? We used to come here all the time with mom.” Of course I do. When I was in middle school, we frequented the place for authentic Chinese cuisine, a rarity in my suburban town. Our usual order was a large bowl of Dan Dan noodles, an aromatic dish with minced pork, chili oil, herbs, and onions. Sichuan Bistro was my favorite restaurant at the time.

“Yeah, it’s been a long time since we’ve come back.” When my parents’ work ramped up and a relative became sick after my eighth-grade graduation, it became more difficult for us to dine as a family. When we did, we usually visited fast food places, and Sichuan Bistro eventually fell off our radar. The situation with our relative has been resolved since, but work still carves off ample time from my parents’ schedules. Currently, mom is overseas on a business trip, leaving me to spend my last days at home with my dad. I wonder how Sichuan Bistro resurfaced in his mind.

“Too long,” says my dad, shaking his head. He grabs a menu, and his eyebrows furrow. “They changed owners,” he says, as he flips through the pages. “Ah, at least they still have the classic noodles. What a relief.”

He waves the waitress over and orders the item, then adds magnolia tea for us to share.

When she leaves, he turns to me. “Terrible weather, huh? Hopefully it’s not this way when we leave for the airport.”

I suddenly become conscious of water soaking into my socks. “Why are we here?”

“What do you mean? You’re leaving for college soon and we haven’t visited one of your favorite childhood sites in years. You’re never going to come back, you know. Might as well make the best of the little time we have left.”

The nonchalance of his language pains me. “I’ll come back to visit,” I protest.

He sighs. “Infrequently. As it will be, for a long time.”

I get the feeling that this visit to the restaurant is more for him than for me.

—

The waitress brings us a teapot and two teacups. “Enjoy,” she says. My dad pours the steamy liquid into cups and hands me one. I fan it with my hand, then take a sip.

The tea travels down my neck like a ball of warmth. I shudder, feeling it seep into my muscles and organs, filling my insides with its mellowness.

Simultaneously, my dad sets down his teacup, his forehead wrinkling in disgust. “They diluted this! This poor excuse for tea tastes more like water than magnolia. Probably used a few pinches of leaves to make a liter.”

“It’s nice though.”

“Really? I know you have higher standards than that. This is disappointing.”

I shrug and sip my tea again. When I drink, I forget the feeling of dampness on my feet.
___

“You’ll call us, right?” My dad is staring at the TV at the back of the restaurant, where a news anchor is discussing the damages of the storm to the nearby city. The words slip out indifferently.

“Of course I’ll keep in touch. It’s going to be a huge adjustment for me anyway, so I’ll probably call often in the initial days.”

“You’ll be fine. Don’t you already know quite a few of your classmates? Tell me about them.

“Well, there’s Kabir from Texas, as you know, who’s going to my roommate. We met over the Facebook group for admitted students. He shares a couple of the same interests as me, like computers and outdoorsy-stuff, so I think we’ll get along well. I also know a few people from the class Discord chat, like Fumiko, who’s from California and Alexander, who lives all the way in Great Britain. And of course, there’s Steffie and Manuel from my school, so I won’t be completely alone.”

“That’s good. Very good.”

“Dad, you know you’ll still be in my life, right?”

Thunder rumbles in the distance, and I pick up my teacup to avoid his gaze. Have I gone too far, bringing his emotions to the table?

“Yes.” he says softly. “You’re right. It probably won’t even make a difference.”

“What do you mean?”

He stares directly at me. “I haven’t been present in your life the past few years, have I? Always at work or taking care of someone else. You don’t demand much, but I haven’t been much of a father.”

I’m startled by his confession. When I was younger, I admit, I resented his prolonged absences. I returned from school everyday to an empty home, where I played video games, watched TV, and occasionally, worked on homework until my parents came back later at night. Often, my father would adapt a disciplinary role when he saw me, as he endeavored to limit my screen time and fit rigorous standardized test preparation into my schedule. His distant, authoritarian parenting did not sit well with my adolescent self. I yearned for caring company.

Yet as I see him now, with his salt-and-pepper hair, thick eye bags, and lined skin, I understand that he weathered through his own storm in the past years. He is a tired man, lifeblood diminshed by late nights and stress. When I realize he has aged, a rock drops into my throat, sending ripples throughout my body, then sinking into the deep end. I remember the scenes of my childhood: birthdays, playgrounds, skipping stones, bike rides, barbecues, fireworks, and restaurants. Each memory is imbued with love.

“You were never a bad father,” I say.

He blinks away something in his eyes. “Thank you, son.”

The waitress arrives with a large bowl of Dan Dan noodles. We thank her, and I split it between two bowls, passing one to my dad. When I inhale, I’m overwhelmed by an all-too familiar aroma of a decadent, spicy sauce. I pick up a large chunk with my chopsticks and devour it.

My mouth is aflame. “How do you like it?” my dad asks.

Desperately, I gulp my remaining tea and pour another cup from the teapot. “I think I chewed on some peppercorns.”

My dad laughs softly. “Yeah, they really added a lot more spice than usual in this dish. Quite opposite to the tea in terms of flavor.” He watches as I continue my ritual of drinking tea and refilling my cup. “Sorry for dragging you into this.”

The fire in my mouth subsides, but it leaves a lingering warmth. “No, this is the best experience at a restaurant that I’ve ever had.”

Jodie Meng is a member of the Class of 2020 at the Illinois Math and Science Academy. This work is inspired by a restaurant she frequently visited in her childhood and her recent experiences with college admissions.

Rena had never felt so exhausted.

It wasn’t that she was doing much of anything–in fact, quite the opposite. She had grown listless counting the fissures in her stoic cement walls, grown weary as days blurred into weeks of hearing nothing but the voices in her head.

As the evening air drifted in through her cracked-open window, she found herself padding towards its sill, staring out into the frozen ghost of a metropolitan jungle.

Sure enough, that telltale wisp of steam snaked towards the twilit sky, a beacon in the growing night. Looked like the Underground was in full swing.

Hesitantly, Rena inched open the door as the murmur of the RoboScreen drifted up the hall, a ceaseless hubbub spewing its ugly message. “97 new plague deaths reported today,” it intoned. “This is a reminder to practice social distancing. Those attending public gatherings are subject to imprisonment under Emergency Order 1204.”

Social distancing. God, how she hated that phrase.

She had one foot out the door when a withering voice sprung from the walls. “Where do you think you’re going?”

Rena winced. “Sorry, Grandma.” She swallowed, throat thick with her lies. “I just wanted to get some air, walk outside. You know I’ve been cooped up all week.”

“Better cooped up than dead,” her grandmother muttered over the intercom. “Be careful, Rena. I’m getting weaker, and with this recession I can’t afford for you to get arrested.”

“I know,” was her only reply as she swept through the entryway and into the alley, her silhouette bleeding into the inky shadows.

To her relief, Rena only passed a few RoboCops as she navigated the labyrinthine streets, maintaining a cloak of darkness all around. As she approached the line of steam, she found herself in front of a series of nondescript garbage bins.

Left of the steam and down, Glenn had messaged her. Tinged with incredulity, she opened the rightmost bin, a rusted metal heap.

To her surprise, it had no bottom. A chute emptied straight into the earth, the ingenious work of teenagers with more of a rebellious streak than she could ever quite fathom.

After a brief fall, her landing was soft enough, cushioned by a wide net strung across the chasm. As Rena clambered up, a sweaty hand pulled her to safety.
“Welcome to the Underground,” came the raspy voice of a gangly man-child. “Behind those doors you’ll find the only party in the city.”

Rena nodded her thanks, quickly extricating herself from his slick grip, as she crossed the narrow strip of rock to the set of doors. Already, she could feel rather than hear the reverberations of earsplitting techno music pummeling the rock walls like a feral animal. Her own palms dampening, Rena pushed open the doors, and entered the pounding beast.

It wasn’t the pulsating music that hit her so much as the heat. It was like a furnace, a churning, angry inferno tingling with electricity. A massive throng of tangled bodies twisted in sync to the raging beat, a mess of limbs and lips and wildly thrown-about hair. While everything above was strict and contained, circular masks and shut curtains, the Underground was rugged. Dirty. It was a blur of movement cast in primary colors, a primitive scene of bold youth.

Rena’s heartbeat began to merge with the pulse, as a mad grin danced its way onto her face. Almost feverishly, she found herself edging into the crowd, when out of the heat came that decadent voice she’d been waiting for. “Rena!”

“Glenn!” He was as tragically handsome as ever, ruddy color brightening his devilish face. “It’s been too long.”

He smirked as he snaked an arm around her. “If you weren’t such a rule-follower, we could’ve been down here a lot earlier.” With one swift movement, he pulled them into the frenzy, dancing away amidst the circle of feral teenagers.

His hands on hers were like furnaces themselves, insatiably burning. Something within her had yearned for this for so many days shut up in her room, had clawed and screamed at her to venture out or risk suffocation. With bodies jostling them on all sides, she found herself pressing closer and closer to him, so much that their breath mingled as they talked.

“Do you think it’s safe to be down here, with all these people?” Rena’s eyes slid to his.

Glenn’s face twisted into a frown. “No plague talk. We party to forget, to escape–not to discuss.”

Gripping her palms tightly, he spun her around him, a whirl of color and movement inundating her senses. By now the heat had seeped into her until it melded into a glowing core within her heart, keeping her moving, round and round. As Glenn dipped her back, she felt the world lurch before her, then come flying back, a delirious rush of vertigo coursing through her veins.

But not only did the ground come rushing back to her–so did his arm. And on it, a blistering splotch of decaying purple skin.

Suddenly, the cavernous room seemed cast in cold tones of blue and grey. The pulsating music, the voices around her, were lower, muffled, as the room swirled in slow motion.

“Rena? Rena, are you okay?”

Her voice was faint, weak, not at all her own. “Glenn–Glenn, look at your arm.”

His face blanched. He began to yell something, but her ears had stopped working. All around her, the dancing petered out into a growing mass of spectators, jostling each other to catch a glimpse, wide eyes blinking with trepidation.

And suddenly, the party was extinguished. Perhaps someone had called the authorities, because the disease control droids were swooping in from all sides, spraying a stinging mist into the humid air, their metal frames sinister and artificial against the wild color of the Underground.

“Please remain where you are,” came the droids’ nasal voices. “It is reported that Citizen 0368 is exhibiting signs of the plague. As we vacate him from this illegal gathering, all citizens present will be imprisoned in the Quarantine.”

The Quarantine.

“No, no, no,” Rena muttered, petrified.

And as she gazed around the room, every face mirrored her own. Terror mingled with outrage was etched across each tragically prideful youth, as murmurs gave way to a trembling fervor.

Group by group, the teenagers crept toward the exits, until huge droves were clambering madly up the ladders. The droids sprayed their mist, spouting frazzled reproaches, yet they were no match for the sheer number of youth struggling their way out.

Rena watched in growing horror as the cavern emptied around her.

They could all be infected. Every last one of them. Yet still they continued up into the city, real-life sewer rats wreaking invisible havoc on an unsuspecting population.

And as much as Rena hated to admit it, she ached to follow them. Ached to escape into blissful ignorance, that teenage drug of unadulterated self-absorption.

She couldn’t face being locked up, forced to acknowledge the truth of the increasing horrors around her. Couldn’t live in this constant nightmare of death and fear, without even the possibility of escape.

Rena took one last sweeping look around the cavern, and shoved down the voice of morality clawing up her throat. For a fleeting moment, her eyes met Glenn’s as the droids raised him onto a gurney, locked in a raw second of bitter loss. And then she turned, following the last of the partygoers up the ladder.

#

Rena awoke the next morning to the grossly cheerful chime of the RoboScreen’s news alert. For a brief second, normalcy reigned, before the memory of the night before slammed into her like a truck.

“Breaking news,” it recited. “425 new plague deaths reported last night.”

Rena moved to shut it off, but the RoboScreen wasn’t done. “There appears to be a new pattern. All deceased persons housed a teenager aged 15 to 19 in their dwelling.”

Drop by drop, Rena felt the color drain from her face, as a muffled cough echoed from downstairs.

She had known this would happen. And she’d left anyway.

Rena sank onto her bed, numb, as the tide washed in, wave upon wave of guilt crashing into her. Minutes bled into hours, a timeless, endless expanse as the rising water slowly pulled her under.

Eventually, Rena’s broken gaze drifted back to the window, and she stiffened, sick to her stomach.

After its brief respite, once more the tendril of steam curled ominously, tantalizingly, out from the Underground.

It was almost boastful. Shameless. A snake threading its way through the reddening sky.

Despite everything, the party continued.

Anna Kiesewetter is a high school junior from Issaquah, Washington. Her work has been recognized by the Scholastic Writing Awards and is published or forthcoming in Skipping Stones Literary Magazine, the Lumiere Review, and Kalopsia Literary Journal, among other magazines. When she’s not scribbling down stories, she plays the violin and enjoys eating anything matcha-flavored.