ISSUE 20 - Fall 2025

Creative Nonfiction

The 1st Sunlit Day, Ending with Adrianne Lenker’s “Zombie Girl”

It occurs to me, when I’m halfway down Broadway, emerging from the clutches of stifling downtown traffic caused by distracted teenagers fleeing the schools’ parking lots (try not to wreck your car: impossible) that my heater is scorching me and I can feel my face being warmed and bronzed, rather, by the rays reflecting through my window. My skin aches for the sunshine, my limbs unravel themselves in the light. I nearly swerve off the road.

My window takes a moment to unstick itself from its crevice, frozen just last week, and jolts down and down. It’s intimate, choosing to allow the first feeling of spring into my orbit, ready for its wreckage and blooms tagging along. And I forget how winter felt for this second. All I see before me: the open road, sunlight, my memory outside every day for months. The brisk wind breezes in, waving to me for the first time since October. I haven’t worn shorts since the storm and I wonder what metaphor I could make of this, so I plan out my outfits in this heat-wave: shorts in the line-up. Unfortunately, I haven’t been as immersed into songs by Adrianne Lenker as I promised myself I would be, but I let “anything” pour from my speakers and tickle my small fly-away hairs. I join the masses bothering anyone daring to mingle nearby with my yallternative (a word I’ve learned as of yesterday) songs. It filters out of my windows, even on the highway because it is 50 degrees and January, so who cares about the wind? 

My melodies interlace with a stranger’s, spiraling into the sunlit sky, mashing genres entirely. We are two rebels pushing our agendas onto I-26 (and to be honest the traffic is so bad I can’t justify closing my window, anyways.) I feel so hometown–we are so hometown–that I realize I’m out of my mind to be car-less and city-more in this coming fall, once the colleges ring their dinner bells to tell us to come in from playing in our street. But for now it is warm (the mountains!) and I love it here. For now, I’m pretty sure the stranger’s song is one of my favorites, but it has morphed into a new paradigm echoing across the atmosphere and I can’t tell where mine begins and hers ends. I look into her window and I see a life.

Soon, I turn into my neighborhood. Another window down! Maybe every day we are more human. One day I will be so changed and, my friend, you will be so changed, and we will no longer recognize ourselves as the kids in that photo last summer. I could take off now and be back there tomorrow; but this town has upended itself and, at the very least, I’ve learned empathy struggles to cross state lines. But from a glance through this window, I think the driver’s dog’s hair blends with his own head. It’s liminal and weird and the guy sort of looks like Santa Claus so this weather is probably refreshing for him. I want to tell him that he is more hopeful than the real Santa (no, this is not an oxymoron); that what a joy it is to be a man who looks like Santa Claus in January when nothing else seems to be joyful; that that beard must be hot come July.

Then I’m alone on the road, but the trees are bending their branches into my nostrils and I embrace them right back. I understand Jack Kerouac now, but maybe with a few more suburbs. Guitar comes as a strange ping into my ears, so I turn the dial up and Adrianne’s “zombie girl” is on. I’ve never heard it before. Her voice is a presence I never knew was absent. She is the wide ocean swallowing me whole; she is the Valentine love letter sitting in my closet from eight years back; she is the chirping birds making me cry with their screams of spring. It’s in my bloodstream and I can only hear the soft spaces of breath between the words so I sit in my driveway ‘til the song is done and I wonder what I could ever say to an apology.

Sophie Houck is an 18-year-old writer from Asheville, North Carolina attending Harvard College. Sophie has previously won the Taylor Hunt Creative Writing Award and the Ross Gay: Small Joys in a Big World contest from her high school, as well as the Western Carolina University’s High School Creative Writing Contest in nonfiction. This is her first publication.

My Mother’s Teacup

Julia Snrubs

I broke my mother’s teacup tonight.

It’s Monday, and I’ve come home from work, eaten tortilla soup cold from the stove, and gotten started on dishes.

With a family of seven it’s usually an hour-long affair but there are fewer than usual today, so I put in my earbuds, do my usual half-hour of doomscrolling in the room adjacent to the kitchen, and get to work. Once I get started, it goes by quickly and I decide to make myself a little hot chocolate to enjoy after. I’m looking for my favorite cup– a rosy pink mug I found at Goodwill for three dollars and is the perfect shape for holding– when the teacup tips from the shelf above as if it had been standing on the edge of the roof for ages working up the nerve to jump.

On instinct I manage to catch it, to keep it from shattering on the counter below into thousands of china shards by pinning it against the shelf. Its partner in suicide, a green metal thermos, isn’t so lucky. The thermos clatters across the counter and the stove, making a tremendous noise that unsurprisingly draws no one to the kitchen to investigate. 

My mother has always been particular about her teacups. As a little girl I would see them high up on the shelf above the spice rack and long to touch something so pretty and delicate, but she always explained to me that her grandmother had given them to her and they were very special. This I understood, and respected.

When I got a little older she would break out the fine china for special guests, and I got the privilege of drinking from one of the delicate little cups and eating a cookie or two off the thin, matching plate. I also received the honor of washing the teapot, the sugar bowl, the teacups, the plates, begrudgingly handling them with the utmost precision to avoid knocking the ceramic butterfly off the teapot lid, even though it had been broken and glued back on at least three times by now. I never understood why some of the dishes were more special than others.

Now I am an adult, and my mother hosts tea parties for my little brothers on a biweekly basis. They sit at the kitchen table and take turns choosing the tea of the week, enjoying little wafers and pastries bought just for them while they read the Bible. The boys have teacups of their own, but my mother always uses the same one– white and simple, decorated with little strawberry leaves and gold accents. That teacup I hold now, split near-perfectly into two large pieces.

I apologize of course, carrying the broken pieces into the living room where my mother sits in her nest watching skincare videos on her phone. She doesn’t even take out an earbud, just glances at the two pieces and tells me with a straight face: “That was one of the teacups given to me by my grandmother and is probably one of my most prized possessions. Throw it away, I guess, it’s broken.”

“I’m sorry,” I say again, not knowing how else to respond. She continues looking me in the eyes, her expression neutral– blank even. Not a trace of tears or anger or upset.

“I’m not even being sarcastic,” she says. “It was special, and now it’s trash.”

I turn and walk back towards the kitchen while she hits play on her YouTube video. I make it halfway before I turn around and try again.

“Are you sure? Look, the two pieces fit together. You could use it to hold rings or something.”

It’s true. When you hold the pieces together the line between them is invisible, only a tiny chip or two indicating anything was amiss.

“I’m sure,” she says, probably annoyed I made her pause her video again. “That’s the teacup I used to drink out of and now it’s ruined, so just throw it away.”

I return to the kitchen and open the trash, but the two pieces of the teacup reflect the warm kitchen lights and wink back at me. It seems a shame to throw away something so beautiful and delicate, even if it is broken. Somehow I can’t bring myself to drop it into the garbage, to hear it chip as it makes contact with itself and breaks into even more pieces. I can hear my mother on the other end of the house, snapping at the little boys more than usual while they get ready for bed. I set the broken teacup on the counter and pick up my phone.

I’ve seen a video once of how they use gold to repair broken pottery. It had struck me how much work goes into something I thought had been so simple. Dip the broken pieces into melted gold and stick them together, right? Wrong. There were too many steps, none of which I could remember now. Sanders and epoxy and specialized tools and tiny paint brushes and layers upon layers of intense precision. But Simone is artsy and Emma has always been a do-it-yourself kind of gal. If anyone could fix it, it was my girls.

I leave the teacup on the counter and wash the rest of the dishes. I am careful not to knock over any other cups as I find my favorite pink mug pushed in the very back of the cabinet. It’s covered by all of the mugs my mother always claimed were special just for her– a narwhal, a forest of tiny foxes, a magenta Starbucks mug older than half my siblings. I drink my hot chocolate, which has since cooled almost to room temperature, in my bedroom while I text the girls. One of them says she can fix it. The other knows the exact word for the process– Kintsugi. Both agree this is a poem that writes itself. On the other side of the door, my mother yells at my brothers to stop talking to each other and go to sleep.

I return to the kitchen where the lights are dark and the countertop is empty, though it can’t have been more than five minutes since I left. Mom was missing from her spot on the couch, so I know she’s been here. I open the trash and sure enough there it is, both pieces lying next to each other and maybe a little more chipped than before, though perhaps it’s my imagination. I smuggle it back to my room, walking quickly and hiding it with my hands, but there is no one around to notice my contraband but my sister, noise-cancelling headphones on as she scrolls through memes, oblivious.

I doubt my mother will notice the teacup missing from the trash. She has not said a word about it since, and I suspect she won’t again until Thursday, when the disruption to her routine reminds her of its absence. I know how she will wait until I come home from work and walk past to tell my brothers that somebody broke her teacup so this is the new cup she’s drinking out of, and how a mug is not as fancy as a teacup, and can you really call it a tea party if everyone is drinking from a regular old ceramic mug, and how much she misses the teacup she always used to have.

And that will be the last anyone hears of my mother’s most “prized possession.”

Julia Snrubs is an autistic, ADHD writer in San Diego, California. She published her first novel, a young adult fantasy novel called Rialta, in 2024.

speak, baachan

Aika Adamson

Do you have a boyfriend yet? baachan asks. Do you still work at the library? When will you come visit?

My answers never change: No. Yes. Soon.

It wouldn't matter if my answers changed. The questions remain, always new in baachan's mind, and my voice a record I play without thought. Distance grows.

When I am seven, baachan is steady and warm. She piles plate after plate in front of me. She feeds all her grandchildren, takes care to perfect each dish, makes sure we go to sleep with stomachs close to bursting. I don't know then, but she still carries the war in her body. Explosions ring in her ears and out there on a mountain is younger version of her hiding in a cave with her big sister. Her stomach is too empty to growl and though the trees outside are heavy with fruit, the poison they carry is too bitter to swallow. Her sister takes her by the hand and leads her outside at night. They crawl through the jungle, eyes fixed on the lights of a camp where U.S. soldiers put the day's fighting to rest. Two men set down canned food, the tops already peeled open, and talk loudly before walking away. Their backs are purposefully turned as baachan and her sister dart in like minnows and steal the only meal they'll have for the next two days. She will never put down that hunger.

You've grown up so much! baachan says. There is a smile in her voice. Tell me, do you have a boyfriend yet?

No, I answer. No boyfriend. I'm too busy to look for one.

At twelve years old, I spend my summer catching insects with my cousin and jumping into the ocean with the rest of my family. From the shore, baachan sits with the other adults, watching us play. I wonder if she sees in us her first children, now all grown up, carefree and unworried as Okinawa goes from American territory to Japanese. The humid heat is a comfort and cicada song fill our ears. We all tell stories, bits and pieces of our lives collected to be shared into the family's memory scrapbook during the summer. I notice now what I didn't notice then: baachan stays quiet, takes it all in, keeps her heavy stories close to her chest. The regret has come late; her memories have escaped her and there is no one now who can return them to her. The words are gone. What she carries is silence.

Do you still work at the library? Is it the one with your mom? baachan's mind twists things into knots. One connection to another until it twists and frays and snaps and we patiently tie it back together.

Yes, I'm working at the library, but at the university. Not the school my mom works. You work at a univeristy! That's wonderful. Does your mom work there too?

I bite back a sound; a laugh or a sigh, something that isn't tears because the time to cry is yet to come. No, I answer patiently. Mom works at an elementary school.

I am eighteen and I get the news that baachan is in the hospital. It was just a fall that hurt her hip. She will be fine and back on her feet in no time, but that doesn't change the fact that she has changed. Time is no longer gentle to her. Age wears down her mind. She got lost walking to the small shopping center down the street. She used to walk me down to the grocery store on the lower level, hand in hand, to buy me all my favorite foods. It hurts to know that the baachan who once went shopping with me is one I will never see again. The decline is fast after that; she regresses to a childlike state and forgets our faces, our names, the colorful life she lived, how her hands cooked and cared and carried a warmth no one can recreate.

She is slipping away too fast for anyone to catch. Still, I reach out for her.

When will you come visit? baachan asks. She has already asked this six times in this phone call.

The lie repeats itself again: Soon. I'll visit you soon.

The truth is this: I am scared of coming face to face with baachan and being confronted with a stranger. My mom goes in my stead, lets me hide behind her again, as if I never stopped by a small child. It's selfish of me, but I want the keep the baachan I remember alive in my head. I can't do that if I see her as she is now. The guilt eats at me just as much as the relief does. I let the oceans keep us apart and rely on short phone calls to let baachan know I still think of her. The same conversation goes on and on in circles, a man-made time loop I willingly place myself in. Same questions, same answers. Same baachan, for now.

It doesn't end. It doesn't end.

I am terrified for when it does.

Come to Okinawa soon! I will, baachan. I will.

Aika Adamson (she/her) is an Okinawan-American writer in the American southwest. She enjoys experimenting with media to bring to life her abundance of ideas. Her work has been previously published in The Heart Magazine, HoneyFire Lit, and Provenance.

Wife Beater Eulogy

Elizabeth Ellis

How are you gonna’ eulogize a wife beater? Obituaries claim that the deceased put up a “courageous fight.” Translation? “Don’t whine.” Battle death. Cowardice is not to “fight,” whatever that means. Homie don’t play. “Cancer don’t play,” a patient advocate said that. Cancer patients agree that using battle and courage terms are not helpful, realistic or appreciated. The schmaltz of excess sentimentality is not welcome.

A Mayo Clinic public service announcement claimed that blah-blah-blah has been linked to a greater risk of dying. Gee. News flash. That. Being born is a guaranteed risk of dying. Being. Death is a fact we act as if we can prevent. Death is a matter of when and how. Death is a Scratch-n-Go.

At the graveside I once yelled, “Be happy for her! It’s over! She was miserable. Unhappy!” Six years this dragged on, this trapped in the aegis of a stroke, unable to speak, walk, wipe herself, make meals, mosey out to the kitchen, live in her own home. As a teenager we worked in nursing homes and ran out the door at the end of our shift screaming, “I’m alive!” At his wife’s funeral a husband stood up and said four words, “She liked to shop.” He sat down. Do that to me and I’ll come back and bite you. I’ve had more fun in in the dentist chair. At one of these events the deceased’s son hoisted the urn above his head and walked it down aisle. I imagined it ending up in a back-yard garage sale someday. With cremation at least, we don’t have to hear, “He looked like himself.” (think Up in Smoke)

Obituaries read like a recipe for sainthood, but what to say when the town drunk dies? Recent obituaries suggest that only good people die, or that people are good when they die. Or that you have to die to be good, to relieve the people who hovered over you waiting for the anguish horror pain to be over.

For all the euphemisms there was one time I didn’t recognize the person I knew. Based on the eulogy hagiography is rampant. We eulogize in the terms we and apply to deceased persons. A list is handed over. “Choose some.” The words chosen reflect our values: kind hearted vs. cold, contributed vs. cheapskate, cultivated vs. simple, curious vs. apathetic.

We forgive in eulogies and obituaries. Someone once used the more apt word ‘salty’ to describe the deceased. That was honest, not denigrating. Whether the deceased was accomplished or defeated, successful or a failure, the survivors seek closure when the deceased can no longer speak for themself. The person is gone.

Was the deceased a hated ogre? a grumpy curmudgeon who alienated themself from everyone? Loved? Or hated? Cherished or despised? able to connect, or a poor sport. Associates will know the skinny, but choose not to say.

Assertive? or cowering. Stood his ground? or caved. Jealous and petty, kept to himself and veered off. Many things to all? or nothing to nobody. A mischievous tease or a pain to be around. Did they giggle or frown; find fun humor, and comfort. Spirited, or gloomy, a poor sport. Helper or never lent a hand; supportive or turn a blind eye, ran at the first sign of trouble. Treasured, or a relentless conniver who poked at the wound.

Hard-hearted and hot-headed, an irate lone wolf?    

A cold shouldered, moody, sour, penny pincher who scrimped to the extreme, or a friend. Faint of heart, a fearful fed up shallow gossip monger, or a mentor who never shriveled, a member who joined in, never squandering a chance to serve. Shared, or scrounged selfishly. Quiet? Or noisy, disruptive and vulgar. Humble? Or a smug conceited braggart. Impish and corny, or snooty. Intelligent, or dumb. Weak with cold feet.

Was the deceased a highly ethical pioneer who spearheaded projects for the greater good or a critical, rigid sap who squealed? An honest, honored someone to revere and remember, non-judgmental, or a minor leaguer? Never smug, spiteful, or spoilt, or Liar, liar pants on fire.

One of a kind, not plain, simple or ordinary, but unique who prided himself. His story worth remembering. Neither shabby nor reviled? Or sour breath and dirty fingernails, with mustard on his shirt whose motto was “What’s in it for me?”

How are you gonna’ eulogize a wife beater? Whatcha’ gonna’ say? Will sinners be missed? Please don’t eulogize me. No time for honesty.  

I went to a cemetery yesterday. No one spoke to me there. No one gets hurt.                     

Elizabeth Ellis’ essays are published in Lit Rvws.