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The children were always told to stay out of the forest. The reason why changed

from family to family: witches, werewolves, faeries, any kind of monster really. No matter

the culprit, the point was clear. Children who entered the forest never returned. Jack’s

mother never bothered making up a creature. He was simply told to stay out of the forest

“or else.” He had learned long ago not to ask what “or else” meant. That was enough to

scare him into obedience, for the most part. Nights like tonight however, made even the

terrifying forest seem like a safe place.

His mother had locked him out of the cottage, punishment for some fault she had

conceived. This wasn’t the first time she had done this, and Jack had gotten used to

leaving blankets and food hidden in the cellar behind the cottage. He walked quietly, not

wanting to risk alerting her to his hiding spot. As he got closer though, he saw the cellar

doors were firmly held together by a sturdy lock. Kneeling in front of the doors, he

tugged on the lock several times in vain. He groaned and dropped his head against the

door in despair. It was going to be a long, cold, hungry night.

Sighing, he stood up and looked around for somewhere to sleep. There weren’t

any great places around the cottage for shelter, and the neighbors would never listen if

he tried to go to them. He’d seen it happen to other children in the past. They were

scolded for lying and returned to their parents; and the wrath of the parents was never

worth trying to break free of their grasp. Jack shivered as a cold breeze blew past him. It

would only get colder as the night went on.

He glanced over to the forest, considering. It was thickly wooded, enough to

protect him from the chilling wind, and there was a chance he could forage something

edible to fill his aching stomach. His mother’s threat of “or else” rang through his head.

But he thought that if he was careful and returned before dawn, she would never know.

And if he stayed near the edge, he should be safe from any monsters rumored to live

among the trees.

Gathering his courage, he made up his mind and strode quickly into the woods.

As he passed over the perimeter, a shiver went through him. He rubbed the back of his

neck nervously, considering turning around and just waiting by the front door. But the

wind picked up at that moment, roaring by him with no sign of letting down anytime soon.

It seemed to be pushing him further into the forest, but he brushed the though off as

paranoia. Luck seemed to be on his side, as he quickly found a blackberry bush

overflowing with ripe berries. After he ate his fill, his luck continued; he found a tree

nearby with roots that curled out of the ground to create a perfectly sized nook that Jack

could fit inside of, protected from the wind.

He spared a glance at his mother’s cottage, watching as she put out the candles

one by one. He let out a breath of relief, and crawled into the nook. His knees hugged to

his chest, he closed his eyes tightly and tried to think of what he did today that caused

him to be locked out. It was pointless, once she got in these moods there was nothing

that could be done right in her eyes. He hated living here, hated her; but he had no

where else he could go, no way out. Tears slid down his face as he muttered a quiet

prayer.

“I wish I could leave.”

A bright flash illuminated from within the forest, and he quickly jolted upward to

look for the source. A young girl was standing between two trees, her bright white dress

contrasting sharply with the shadows around her. She stared directly at Jack, her eyes

boring in and making him feel exposed. Yet something about her felt safe, even familiar.

It reminded him of the hugs his mother used to give him, before his father died and she

began taking her grief out on Jack. He hadn’t felt that feeling of warmth and security in a

long time. He was so caught up in reminiscing that he didn’t notice the girl moving, until

she was suddenly right in front of him. He jumped to his feet quickly.

“You can, you know?” she spoke softly.

“Who-what are you? What are you talking about?” Jack put on a brave face,

trying not to let his panic show.

The girl frowned slightly. “You can leave. You have no obligation to stay. You

owe her nothing,” she whispered, just loud enough for him to hear.

He took a beat to process her words. “You’re talking about my mother? I’d love to

leave, but I have nowhere to go. She’s all I have.”

She looked at him curiously. “She does not have to be. You can join us,” she

gestured behind her to the depths of the forest. “We can help you. We can keep you

safe from her.”

Jack swallowed nervously, remembering the stories of creatures in the forest.

“What, you mean you and all your monster buddies? I bet you’d love to keep me safe, in

your stomachs,” he scoffed.

At that the girl chuckled, “Monsters! I had forgotten those silly tales our parents

would tell us. I promise you, there are no monsters here in the woods.” The mirth

dropped from her face and she looked gravely serious. “They live out there instead,” she

pointed towards the village. Jack knew exactly who she meant.

“Then who are you? Who do you mean when you say us?” he questioned. She

stared into his eyes again, that same feeling of warmth and safety returning.

“Look at me closely Jack. You know who I am. Who we all are.”

He pondered her words, trying to place her face. He realized that he had come

across her several years ago in the market. She was much thinner then, her skin mottled

with bruises. The girl he saw back then didn’t carry herself with the same confidence as

the girl in front of him. When she disappeared, her father screamed in rage for weeks

before drinking himself to death in the tavern. Jack considered all the others that had

vanished, seemingly taken by the forest: Aiden, whose brother used him as a personal

punching bag; Sally, whose parent’s never even noticed her disappearance; Tom, who

was beaten with words in place of fists, and countless others from before Jack’s time. All

abused, all disregarded in favor of the adults who failed them.

“If you are who you say you are, why did you take so long to reach out to me?

Why haven’t you helped the others out there that are still suffering?” Jack accused.

“Our power only stretches as far as the forest, and we can only help those that

wish it. It is an unfortunate caveat.” She looked downtrodden as she spoke, her head

hanging to her chest.

“Powers?! You said you were human!”

She quirked an eyebrow at him. “I only said we are not monsters. I never claimed

we were entirely human.”

“But what-”

“I am sure you have many questions, and I am willing to answer what I can. But

first you must decide. Will you join us or not?”

Jack glanced back at the cottage that he was raised in, the only home he had

ever known. He remembered the good times when he was very little, and his father was

around. He knew in his heart though that things would never be like that again. Nothing

of this earth could bring back his father, or erase the way his mother had treated him for

so long. He turned back to the girl, who waited with her hand outstretched. He

considered her, whether or not she was telling the truth. It was entirely possible that she

was leading him into the waiting arms of hungry monsters. If she was being honest

though, this could be his only chance to escape. He inhaled a deep breath, then sighed

out all his reservations, and took her hand. As they walked deeper into the forest Jack

realized that he didn’t care what happened next; he had finally found the courage to

leave. For the first time in a long time, he felt at peace.

Gathering the painting tools to my reach, I observe the canvas reflected through the mirror in front of me. My face, this tranquil, angular visage, is a canvas__ a blank, colorless sheet of paper. The first tool of choice to paint this countenance is a flat top bluffing brush. Three pumps from my Mac liquid foundation should suffice and I even out the product across the surface of the brush using the back of my hand. And with my right hand, I begin the process of exhausted ritual that began in the 4th year of my high school career when I first started to become self-conscious of my appearance.

The soft bristles glide over my right cheek then across my chin towards the other cheek, and finally, a couple swirls across the forehead and down my t-zone. My pale skin that indicates an origin story of Eastern European, Romanian background looks even paler after evening out the skin tone with foundation. “white and pure as snow; white, white lies of innocence,” as said by an acquaintance from my ballet academy named Jan.

Jan seemed to dislike me as if it was often that she would make me such backhanded remarks. T was later that I found out that she was angry that that I had only been in the academy since I started middle school while she had started out much younger, but I was given more of the prominent roles than her. I fiddle with two mascaras in my hand and decide to go with the ultra-lengthening one. Somewhere within me, I hated myself for wanting to hear those words that drip with poison. With great precision, I stagger the bristles of my mascara to life and curl my lashes from base to tip. I am painfully aware of myself, and just as she said, I knew that the innocence that I portrayed on the outside was just an excuse to hide the monsters that I did not want to accept within me. Having thin and shorter than average eyelashes, I used to be fascinated by the ability to give the appearance of naturally open eyes by a couple of these swift applications. “you are so lucky you have such feminine eyelashes!” people used to say to me as I silently thought to myself, “But they are not real. Like nothing is anymore.”

After repeating the process on my right eyes, I move onto the next step of ritual: applying eye liner.  I hold my hands steady as if I’m standing in position waiting for the music to start. And then it begins: the jet-black color glides over my waterline from one corner to the next like the invisible line that I once traced with my tip-toed feet to Johann Sebastian Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No. 3 in G major. It was an incredibly difficult piece; the high-speed galloping of the violins and energetic staccatos were hard to keep up with and perhaps it was the exhaustion that resulted in my injury that day. It’s true what they say about athletic injuries. It happens so quickly and when you take time to recover you find that there was something even faster than the injury: dance had kept moving and left me behind.

I open the drawers to my large, rectangular makeup kit and rummage through the container. A gold shimmery eye-shadow that was said to reflect the image of sunny rays and an oak-colored shadow, I think back to my first dance recital in 8th grade.

The dance instructor who was also our coach, choreographer, and stage/performance coordinator was a strict rule-enforcing lady in her early 40s who had philosophical sentiments that belong more to a teacher of the humanities than performance art. For every performance, all the dancers were to have uniform hair-dos, makeup and outfits. The tightly gel-backed buns without a single strand of hair sticking out did not bother me as much as the way she insisted our eye-shadow to be done. Dark colors, black and grey had to cover our entire lids from the waterline all the way to the tip of our eyebrows.

The aim was to be dramatic, and as the girls (and boys) sat on the tile floors of the auditorium getting ready, our instructor would often yell, “Remember ladies and gentlemen, we are not only in the art of performance but the art of creating a narrative that the audience can believe. And what tool do we rely on to control the form that allows people to have a certain experience or feelings?” Among the restlessness and chaos, someone would always shout, “Personas!” to which she would say, “Yes. It is through personas __the cumulation of the self that is perceived and fabrications we create that are not our own. So, forget about expressing yourself, forget about the truth, put on your masks, darken your shadows, and become something not of this world!”

When engaged with any other aspect of life, one might say that I a highly obsessed with the exactness and perfection. Although mostly true, that is not the case with my brows. “Brows should be twins, not sisters,” is definitely not my motto as I hurriedly fill in just a couple empty patches. The action would usually conclude the ritual, but I open up the new lipstick package that was gifted to me as an early birthday present by my best friend. A red as deep as the color of blood; not a shade that I am usually comfortable wearing. Twisting the stick, unknowingly I glide the product over my bottom lip. I think about the truth behind this action. The fact that any mask placed over my dull face fits perfectly and allows me to play any character because its core being is vacant; I am empty. I smack my lips and observe myself for the last time. I think about the reflections in a person’s eyes are full of deception. Curling my lips, I force a smile. The mask speaks: Don’t be naïve__ things are never as they appear.

We dont know the story behind his blue stature.

His eyes, sunken behind the leathery cloak

Of a skin. The hackneyed clothing hangs down

By thread, beckoning for spare change.

He sits in destitute, his body cramped

And beaten down like the untuned guitar he holds close.

As you look deeper, the skeletal frame shows

Evidence of days without food.

And if he lifted his head, you would see the horrors of the world:

Your sister robbed

With a pistol to her head,

A family being torn apart by immigration,

An orphan, crying on the window sill

Waiting for a so-called parent who’s forgotten about

The child she’d left in the street.

Keep looking you might hear the sweet

Sounds of hope. No more despair,

No hunger,

No misery.

                                             Lightning sails sideways in sharp arrows.

                                        Heat has built all day, all summer inside

                                    the narrow R.V. we can’t peel our eyes

                               away from purple, yellow, pink bolts of 

                         electricity and the radio says nothing about an emergency but we listen

                      anyway as this is a delicious spectacle for us. We lick cherry popsicles

                  and my wide brown eyes lock on those bolts that should be scary, but

                                                             Dad’s face says It is what it is

                                                        and it really is, this thing that

                                                     izzes across clouds rumbling

                                                low growls slapping the very

                                           bowels of heaven leaving

                                       burnt shadows in the

                                   blackness, a trace

                               of light, like a

                           sharp knife
                      or a cat

                    of nine

               tails

Oh yes, I know it shows;

the scar on my leg from Osteo

            when I was five years old

I tend to forget it’s there,

until someone like you reminds me.

            I suppose you don’t have scars.

Hey, Hole Leg!

I wore my cheerleader skirt,

walking to the game with my friends. Yes, I had friends,

            even with my Hole Leg.

Hey, hey, we’re on a Roll! Hey, Hole Leg,

                     You’ve got to go!

Embarrassed, I paused; unsure.

Did you see me falter – the crack in my confidence?

           Is that what you need to feel more whole than me?

You can’t read the story on this stitch-scarred skin,

with your illiterate incapacity o care; frightened

            by flaw you can’t comprehend.

Hey, Hey, Hole Leg

                        Way to Go, Whole Egg!

This fragile armor offers little defense,

but beneath it, a strong, resilient sheath

            encases my expectant faith.

My heart will stay soft, like a yolk

unscathed; not hard boiled or spoiled

           by your words that aim to wound.

Though your insults spilt my surface,

you will not see me ooze, or lose my will

             to forgive and love, in spite of you.

You may have no flaws that I can see,

but you may also have no yolk;

           just an albumen scar on your memory.

I am a Whole Egg, a Mighty, Mighty Whole Egg!