Prose

Mee-ok

Buried Alive in Cymru

In the land of crop circles, the logic of time spirals out, spinning like the globe itself. Everywhere is geometry. Here, in the quarries in the Preseli Mountains, dotted with ancient settlements of the long departed, Stonehenge’s igneous rocks were sourced. And here, where the Welsh coastline meets the civil parish of Nevern, Pembrokeshire, stands Pentre Ifan, a portalled Dolmen, a megalithic mystery. Composed of seven Neolithic pillars, it stands erect, like the abandoned remains of a sister-Stonehenge—with a flat stone ceiling.

The view from its frame: a volcano sleeping in the westward distance, so deep in its slumber it is mistaken by visitors for dead. Its peak emerges majestic along the skyline like a grace note. Thought to be a burial chamber for centuries, there is curiously no sign of the perished. But make a wish under the shade of its 16-ton capstone, and you might wonder if you have died and gone to Pentre Ifan.

On a nearby hilltop sits an archaeological site spotted with Celtic huts currently under reconstruction, all shaped like volcanoes. Built in the Iron Age they are closer in time to us than they are to Pentre Ifan, the Neolithic Age being ancient history to the world of metallic savagery. The bare, circular bases of the huts stand like henges made of wood, with dung, clay, and oak fleshing out their walls and straw crowning their conical roofs. These structures, dark as a chimney swift borne out of pillars of smoke, breathe like volcanoes brought back to life by a fire in their hearth-stoned bellies. And outside they are surrounded by the lush countryside. This island waxes amphibious, its waves of leaves floating in the breeze, reminding us that the plant-life here evolved underwater.

When we go back far enough to the time of long ago, there is only one place. It is all flour and rice mills, tepees and yurts, open fires, bent wood, antlers, coracles, oracles, and wool wool wool. There are gods, the same gods, borrowed from neighbors like a cup of sugar and renamed—Horus, Shiva, Dionysus. Everyone playing Adam in the world-Eden of our forgotten yesterday. These same taper-roofed huts can be found seven time-zones east on Jeju Island in Korea, a country with its own volcanic islands and oppressed indigenous peoples. Where they bury their ancestors in the mountains, haunting the land and seascape.

But at Pentre Ifan the volcano has itself been buried by the invention of time, now hidden under stones masked by lichens and a carpet of wild Welsh vegetation. It is almost as though this cratered mountain, in its geologic prescience and Victorian redolence, agreed to be buried alive, its body springing forth life as quickly as it entered the throes of death. And today from the plains surrounding Pentre Ifan, we sense that, soon, this slumberous volcano may wake.

*Cymru is the endonym for Wales

Mee-ok is the winner of the 2019 Construction Literary Magazine Contest for Nonfiction and was selected as a finalist for the 2019 Annie Dillard Award for Creative Nonfiction. She has also been featured in the LA Times, Boston Globe Magazine, American Journal of Poetry, Passengers Journal, Korean Quarterly, and Michael Pollan’s anthology for Medium, where her piece was named Editor’s Pick. She is the recipient of the 2021 Voices of Color Fellowship at the Martha’s Vineyard Institute of Creative Writing and has been a visiting lecturer and Writer in Residence at the Frank Lloyd Wright estate, Taliesin. More at mee-ok.com.

Paul Llewellan

Swedish Accordion Queen

Linnie’s serenade began with three polkas: “Svi Per Jerkers Polska,” “Vals Efter Farfadern,” and “Lapp Nils-Polska.” Her deficits in virtuosity and subtlety were offset by her beauty and enthusiasm. Her booking agent billed her as Lovely Linnea Lundvall, The
Swedish Accordion Queen. The energy she thrust into the accordion medley warmed her naked body on this crisp fall morning.

Linnie had chosen the pocket park that abutted my home as the concert venue. Regrettably, authentic Scandinavian folk music is an acquired taste, especially when played so emphatically at 3:37 a.m. on a September Sunday. Even if my neighbors had been ardent music lovers, the timing and the tune selection would have guaranteed a 911 call.

I hurried out with a fleece Green Bay Packers blanket and covered her. Linnea reluctantly accompanied me home, but she refused to give up her instrument. Earlier the Swedish Accordion Queen had performed at a 50th wedding anniversary party. After the liquor ran out, she’d shed her traditional embroidered costume and found her way to my neighborhood.

Ms. Lundvall and I have a troubled past. We’d met as undergrads at a private liberal arts college founded by Swedish immigrants. Our conventionally bland relationship began with a series of coffee dates after our Intro to the Swedish Language class. Hand holding and chaste kisses quickly escalated into more robust sexual explorations, culminating in an invitation to join Linnea’s family for Thanksgiving dinner at their home in Shaumburg, Illinois.

I was initially welcomed with open arms. Two days later they put me on a bus home after they found me in her bedroom after midnight engaged in oral sex.

Once back on campus Linnea refused to answer my phone calls and convinced our instructor to transfer her to the other section of Swedish 102. Eventually she attracted the attention of Bartholomew “Bart” Babcock with her rousing rendition of the college fight song, “Vikings Do or Die.” The star offensive lineman of the undefeated football team was a potential third-round NFL draft choice and needed a trophy wife. Linnea was willing to be bronzed.

They married after graduation and spent five uninspired seasons following his NFL pro football dream (Jacksonville, Buffalo, and Tampa Bay). A concussion while playing on the Carolina Panthers practice squad forced his retirement. He joined his father’s sprawling North Dakota auto franchise, serving as the figurehead manager at the flagship dealership.

Linnea and Bart settled into a humdrum fifteen-year marriage punctuated by three children in rapid succession. When she lost interest in adding to the family, Bart began a series of affairs with female sales associates and college interns. Linnea compensated by doubling her accordion repertoire. Then her father-in-law was caught in a child pornography sting and the franchise was sold and rebranded.

Linnea took the money from the divorce settlement and moved her girls to my hometown. She found a townhouse within walking distance of the real estate brokerage firm where she’d been hired as the marketing director. I was the first man she called when the ink dried on the decree.

“I’m married,” I told her.

Linnea thought we could work around that.

I told her I didn’t think we could.

She began drinking heavily at night after her daughters were tucked in. Since my wife rose every morning at 4:30 to get to the gym by 5:00, Linnea began calling after 11:00 when she knew I was the only one awake.

At first, I was a reluctant listener, staying on the line only because I knew she would call back, again and again. She shared her life story after graduation; I shared mine. Maybe over-shared. Eventually our therapeutic and nurturing conversations morphed into phone sex and clandestine rendezvouses on nights my wife, Jennifer, played duplicate bridge.

I came to my senses, thanks in no small part to Linnie’s insistence on post-orgasmic accordion recitals. I blocked her calls on my cellphone and unplugged the landline after my wife went to bed. Perhaps if I had ended our affair less abruptly, Linnea would not have felt the necessity for her 4 a.m. serenade.

When Jennifer woke up on Sunday morning, she found Linnea on the living room floor, spooning with our German shepherd Bruno, using my bathrobe as a blanket. Her accordion was at her side. There were half empty coffee cups, and crumbs from the cake my wife had baked for the Rachel Circle sale at church. What Linnea and I hadn’t eaten Bruno had finished off.

I was snoring in the La-Z-Boy, dressed only in my pajama bottoms. Linnea wore the top.

“Well,” Jennifer said, amazingly calm, “what have we here?”

I put my index finger to my lips. “S-h-h-h-h.” I eased out of the recliner and motioned that we should go to the kitchen to talk.

Over orange juice and scrambled eggs, I confessed. Everything. The Swedish classes, the college romance, the clandestine affair, the breakup, the makeup sex, and the accordion concerts.

Jennifer took it all in. After I finished, she calmly buttered the last piece of rye toast. She raised it to her lips, pausing for dramatic effect. “Perhaps this would be an opportune time to discuss my personal trainer, Bennett, and what I actually do on bridge nights.” She bit into the toast and chewed. “Bennett loves music. Perhaps we can work something out.”

Paul Lewellan lives and gardens in Davenport, Iowa, on the banks of the Mississippi River. He’s currently sheltering in place with his wife Pamela, his Shi Tzu Mannie, and their ginger tabby Sunny. He keeps a safe social distance from everyone else. Since the quarantine, he’s had work accepted by The Athena Review, Ramblr, The Daily Drunk, and Statement Magazine. You may contact him at plewellan@mac.com.

Micaëla Clarke

Bridges

The morning after lacks the magic of the night that came before. She and I, we watch each other across the kitchen from one another. The grey morning drains the colour from my hands. The kitchen feels uncomfortable as if the tiles of the oven’s backsplash don’t fit together correctly. As if our bodies are now changed beyond recognition, she and I made different after last night.

“I have to go.” Her tone leaves no room to misinterpret. She doesn’t acknowledge the breakfast I made reminiscent of our after overnight study sessions. It sits on the counter, abandoned. My toast with one rounded bite taken from it.

My head pounds from the hangover and coffee cravings, “Please. Stay for a cup of tea. Just one. Please.” She always preferred tea.

There’s only one unused mug, so we end up sharing. I can tell she isn’t pleased when I don’t clean another. She turns away from me, her angular face rigid, closed off. Different from the warm smile when she kissed me last night. Her short hair draws more attention to her sharp features. Somehow, she still manages to look put together after a night out and staying over.

We have Earl Grey. I like to add milk and sugar, but she doesn’t. It’s extra strong when that first taste hits my tongue. The bitter tang rests heavily in the back of my throat as I hand the mug to her. She relaxes into the warmth of it. When she doesn’t say anything, I suggest we go outside.

“Fine,” she says.

We sit on my front steps, and the rain comes down like nobody’s business. Water edges towards my mismatched socks but I don’t move them. It’s a game of chicken with mother nature.

She takes a long drink of tea before handing it back. It’s half-empty. I wrap my fingers around the remaining warmth and stare at her in my peripherals. She grabbed a jacket on the way out, and she pulls it tighter around her.

A shiver washes through my body as the rainwater seeps into my socks and toys with my toes. I pull my knees to my chest and rest my feet on the dry step below me. My toes wiggle against the stair. I hope she notices I’m being cute, how calming the rain is, anything that might make her stay longer.

She’s stiff when she’s sober, unlike the open, easy alter-ego that comes out after a few drinks. In the grey grasp of the morning, she can’t even look at me. The cold isn’t helping. The chill is bone-deep, and I can feel my nipples against the thin t-shirt I snagged off my floor. I hope she doesn’t notice the old smell of the floor-shirt but that she does notice my nipples.

Her knee bounces up and down faster than my heartbeat and I can’t help but wonder if I make her uncomfortable. If I do, I wonder if I can make her feel un-uncomfortable by saying something. Maybe an apology or I can confess my feelings for her. I jerk to my feet. Rain tickles my scalp, drips down the back of my neck. When I go to talk, the intention is there. But the signals from my brain stop. My mouth is left gaping. Fish-like. Catching raindrops on my lips, my chin.

Her hazel eyes watch me and change from the hard reservation. She looks apologetic, her eyes softer and the crease in her forehead is concerned and adorable in one simultaneous moment. I feel the impact before the blow is delivered.

Micaëla Clarke is a writing student at the University of Victoria. This is her first published story. She can be reached on Instagram @micaeladclarke.

J.G.P. MacAdam

The Pickers

Six men in orange neon walked on-line down a grassy highway median, trash bags in one hand and leg-long white grabbers in the other. It was just before sunrise. Under the hiss of traffic, the men’s prison-issue sneakers crunched in the dead turf; the mechanisms inside their grabbers clicked with subtle repetition; chickadees chirped in the naked maples over their heads.

Roland felt the whoosh of a car passing on his right.

“Ey Roland!” said Darrell, picking on Roland’s left.

“You hear it’s taco night?”

“Taco night?”

Beer cans, plastic shreds, the front half of a Happy Meal box—all the world’s garbage disappearing into their black bags.

“Yup. You like tacos?”

“They’re alright,” said Roland.

The pickers ignored the cigarette butts.

“Man, I love tacos… You gotta have sumthin to look forward to inside.” Darrell snatched up a Nyquil bottle. “How many days you got now?”

“Till a wake-up?”

“Yeah.”

A big bright grin broke out on Roland’s face. “Only sixteen, man.”

Darrell whistled. “Shew! You’re about to be a free man… Mm-mm… No feeling quite like that, is there?”

Roland shook his head in agreement. “No feeling.” 

Darrell would know. He’d been in and out of county three times for, so it seemed to Roland, the most simple and innocent of repeat offenses: trespassing, loitering, unpaid DUI’s and parking tickets, vagrancy and possession when, as Darrell told the story—“It wasn’t even my pot! It just happened to be in my car, which I was living in at the time.”

“Hell, the world is a beautiful place…” said Darrell over the traffic and the chickadees, “… full of beautiful people and limitless opportunities, when all you got is less than a month till a wake-up. Am I right?”

“That’s r—”

An eighteen-wheeler blew by Roland, sucking on his clothes, its back tires swinging over the yellow line just a smidge.

It took Roland a moment to catch his breath. Being on the right always was a bit nerve- wracking; you never could see them coming. Out of his left ear he caught the routine clicking of the other grabbers and Darrell whistling a few nonchalant notes of an old gospel tune. The tips of the maples were tinged red with early spring buds. Fresh shoots pushed up through the dead turf. Robins bopped through the grass, already returned from their winter sojourn.

Roland went on picking. 

He recalled what got him stuck in county in the first place: motor vehicle theft. He stole his neighbor Vicky’s Dodge Neon. She never used it, he figured. So why not take it and see just how far he could go? But Roland was caught on about a dozen traffic cams before he even made it across state lines and by the time a cop got suspicious about why this rusted red Neon was idling in a rest stop at 3:00 AM on a Saturday morning, the gig was up for Roland.

“Why’d you do it?” asked the judge.

“No reason, your honor.”

“Where were you going?”

“Nowhere.”

The judge smacked her gavel. “Hundred-eighty-days detention, one-year parole, no bail. Next!”

Roland was lucky Vicky’s car was worth less than a thousand dollars and there was no damage, at least none that he caused. His charge was bumped down to a misdemeanor.

A dirtied pacifier disappeared into Roland’s bag next. They were scheduled to be out here all day. The world’s garbage seemed never-ending.

A Tesla shot by him and in the split-second of its passing he glimpsed the driver-side window open and a pale hand toss a Starbucks out. The cup seemed to float like a piece of pollen through the air till it finally landed in the grass, its creamy coffee sweetness emptying right in Roland’s path.

Roland threw his grabber to the ground. “C’mon now!”

The Tesla’s taillights diminished into the distance. The sky in the east blazed yellow. The vapor trails crisscrossing the blue bled imperceptibly pink.

“Man, d’you see that?”

Darrell shrugged, snatching up a used condom. “Just keep your nose to the grindstone, man. No point in looking up.”

Roland frowned—retrieving his grabber and shoving a Mountain Dew, toothbrush, prescription bottle, hypodermic needles, the Starbucks coffee cup and lid, one after the other into his bag.

Darrell lifted an eyebrow. “C’mon, man. Don’t let it get to you. Remember: only sixteen.”

Roland glanced over his shoulder. The sup was a half-mile behind, watching them with binoculars from his heated seat inside a white van. “And they wonder why…”

“Who what now?”

The highway thickened with commuters. The sun peeked over the horizon and glared off the windshields. The chickadees in the maples fought with one another for the highest perch.

“People… They wonder why we get out and go and do the same stupid shit that got us locked up in the first place.”

“Oh yeah? Why’s that?”

Ahead, the highway stretched on, bound with littered turf, nothing but plastic bags and broken bottles and close-calls and dead-ends.

“Forget it,” said Roland. “It’s nuthin,” and he went on picking.

J.G.P. MacAdam is a veteran of two deployments to Afghanistan and the first in his immediate family to earn a college degree. His fiction appears or is forthcoming in Bewildering Stories and Apeiron Review. You can otherwise find him wandering the Appalachian woods with his wife and son, or at jgpmacadam.blogspot.com.