“As long as anyone could remember Margaret loved racecars. Everything about them fascinated her. She was prolly bout 3 when I first brought her to the track. I member walking into the Speedway, immediately I saw her bright green eyes gloss over right b’neath them coke-bottle glasses, jaw damnnear hit her boots. I spent lots o’time wit kids in the past and never seen such passion on a child’s face before. I never expected for that day to spark what would become her life long dream. Growing up, all she’d do was talk about cars and how she would be the best racer there was. In elementary school, she practically begged my wife and I to move to Alabama, so that we would be closer to the Talladega Superspeedway. Course, we quickly shut that down. Instead, Margaret settled for something else. We told her that for every birthday we would go down to a different Nascar track. She wanted to see them all. One Friday afternoon, new little miss 8th grade attitude so boldly walked up to me and said ‘ten dollars please,’ with her hand out so high and mighty. I looked down at her and said ‘and for what exactly young lady’ to which she so confidently replied ‘Im going out.’ Before the panick set in, I allowed her to explain herself. She told me there was a new kart track next county over, she had to go. No ifs ands or buts. So, I slapped them ten dollars into her hand and said ‘let’s go’. A few days after her 16th birthday she came to me the same way she did in 8th grade. Head held high, confident with that sneaky little grin of hers, stuck her hand out and said ‘$1000 please’ with confidence even stronger than before. I could not even imagine what this could be about. She had a job at the gas station a mile down the road. She proceeded to say ‘I know its a lot but Ive been saving. Them neighbors is selling their car and I’m $1000 short.’ My little girl always gets her way. Soon enough she got her full license and was driving and dragging that car everywhere she could… not always so legally. When she graduated she applied for a special driving school to become a racer. Course she got in, ‘woulda been their loss if they hadn’t’ , she would walk around and tell everyone. I remember the day of her final test. Somehow she had gone through all this time without them telling her she needed perfect vision. She was devastated — beyond that, she was crushed. Just when she thought her dreams were over, one of her teachers told her she would be a perfect pit leader. Sure, she wouldn’t be racing, but it was the next best thing. He even told her that she could race ‘unofficially’ from time to time. On her first official day, halfway through the race, one driver lost control. The car flipped the baracade and hit Margaret head on. My daughter whom I loved more than anything gone in an instant. Today is the 3 year anniversary of her death. I thank god everyday that my wife convinced me to start going to these, sharing my story, our story, Margaret’s story. Thank you for listening.” He sits down shakily, the person next to him grabs his hand. “Thank y’all for sharing today, it’s been another great meeting. See y’all next week” the AA leader says. “See ya next week” they reply in unison.

For many years her mother was sick but didn’t realize how bad her condition’ had become.

Anne was my mother’s name. she was woman in her 40’s, hardworking and relied on only herself to take care of her only child. Me her youngest daughter Jewel was a cheerful but shy at times, I was 8-year-old that lived right her mother and wanted to be by her side through thick and thin.

“Mommy are you feeling better yet” I asked my mother

“Yes baby” my replied as she secretly tries to hide the fact, she’s in pain.

She always told us tells her child knowing that it would her a peace in mind.

Anne would act as if she was invincible in front of her children and to show that her sickness could not stop her from having a normal life like any other mother.

“Come on baby get ready were going to the amusement park” mother says cheerfully

“I’m not a baby anymore mommy” I say

I hated that name.

I never understood why she would push herself knowing she didn’t feel well.

Well either way we still went to the amusement park, and she even went on the rides along with me. it made me happy that’s I was able to spend time like this with my mother like this. Eating popcorn, winning prizes, taking pictures and the screams we shared while riding the big kid roller coasters as my mother says. A memory that would always hold a special place in my heart. Days later after I thought she was feeling better she seemed to have gotten worse, and my heart skipped a beat as it ached in pain of the thought of my mother in constant pain.

This pain, her pain. It was different. She was rushed to the hospital to be taken care of. This was normal to me. In and out the hospital but this time… this time she didn’t come out.

I was scared as I sat next to my mother hospital bed as her tray of mash potatoes, chicken breast, peas, and her cup of closed apple juice collects dust on the side table of the bed.

“Why didn’t you eat your food” I asked with concern

“No baby I’m not hungry right now, I’ll eat later I promise” she replied slowly

Silence as she slowly drifts off to sleep.

Not to long I left to go home with the rest of my family

After that next day when I planned to go visit my mom at the hospital, but something was different at home. It was so gloomy but yet it was so bright outside. Something wasn’t right. My family cried and for some reason I started to cry but for some odd reason I knew that I wouldn’t hear that nickname that I hated so much again.

I was a kid only when I was six. My family owned a glass shop at the time next to a prominent waterfront restaurant. I would stumble over the massive curb, some times falling but mostly jumping, and head to their back door across the alleyway. I knocked and brought out the big man that would open the door; everything was round about him other than the grease stains on his apron and the brown paper bag he held in his hand.

”Two?” I said, holding up my thumb and pointer finger in front of a shit eating grin.

He gave a quick exhale through his nose, smiled, and reached somewhere I could not see. In my mind, I was hoping that it was going to be a white rabbit that he pulled from thin air. Or a dove. Even then I knew he couldn’t fit into a suit, though.

He pulled out another paper bag and held them steady as I tugged.

He bent down to me and said, “Tell Ernie that Pop needs to talk to him.”

I agreed without wincing at the smell cigarettes coming through his smiling teeth. He smiled like dad, and smelled like him too.

He let go of the bags, grabbed the top of my oversized head, and then twisted me. He pretended to kick me off like a horse in one of those westerners my grandmother keeps on in the waiting room. We both laughed as I barreled recklessly through parked cars towards the sound of blasting six shooters and screaming horses.

I stepped inside to see Zelda, Ernie’s daughter. She was younger than me, too young to hate her name. I’d spent a lot of time sitting on damp carpets in front of T.V. screens so I know the trick that was played on her. I wished I had a name like that.

”Where’s your dad,” I asked her.

She responded with a finger that was pointing out back to the shop where the old men hock and spit smoke. I was too excited to be Pop’s messenger to say thank you and ran through the clear plastic tentacles that constituted the door to the shop. I stood on the stairs and scoped the place out to no avail.

I then headed upstairs to the apartment above the office and slowly opened the door. I heard sniffling like I had when I got the cold going around a few weeks before, or like the times pop would open the door and let the smell get to me.
I saw my dad snapping pens while Ernie looked like he was chopping up onions with no smell to them. He was crying.

I walked in and they both jumped and covered the plate like I would when I was caught doing something bad. I gave them the bags and said what Pop told me to.

Ernie put something together from the back of his pants and his pocket.

He said a naughty word.

The woman promised he’d be free by morning.

Her name was only spoken in whispers behind cupped hands, recorded only in memory and never on paper. The day he heard it spoken first, he was lying spread-eagle in the snow, face crusted with tear tracks, fingers curled around the neck of a half-empty liquor bottle. The girl saw him from the house across the road—he thought he knew her from town. What was her name? Amal?—and came rushing over, dragging his limp body back to the house when he refused to respond or get to his feet. He stared blankly, unspeaking while she asked him what he was doing in the snow, while she pried the liquor from his frigid, blue fingers and sat him in front of the crackling fireplace. 

“Were you trying to die?” she asked, peering at him the way you would a particularly challenging riddle. “That’s a terrible way to go! I can’t imagine what would be worth dying so painfully for. You’re lucky I found you.”

He said nothing, the fire throwing a flickering orange glow over his features. She said, “I know you. You’re Shahryar, from the farm down the road, aren’t you?”

The sound of his name startled some of his consciousness back to the surface. He said, “I was not trying to die. I was trying to forget. Though I suppose it might take death to forget after all.”

Amal studied him with a sharp, secret gaze. She said, slowly, deliberately, “Memory is not so stubborn. It is not so eternal. It’s easier to let go of than you might know.”

Shahryar moved of his own volition for the first time, turning his creaking body until he was eye to eye with her, his gaze suddenly attentive. He had a feeling that she didn’t mean her words in the way of a cheap comfort or a rehearsed platitude. 

He spoke, haltingly. “Wha—what does that mean. What are you saying.”

“There’s a woman. A rawia. She’s a craftswoman. Her trade is memories. If you have a memory you want forgotten, you can tell her what you want gone.” Amal’s cadence was no different than it had been only a moment earlier, but her eyes were fervored and she was leaning too close to him. He didn’t move back. “When you speak the memory aloud, she takes it and it is gone from you; you forget whatever burden you were carrying.”

Shahryar’s chest heaved with something like a gasp. He blinked and Amal’s thin shoulders were in his hands, crushed under the sudden, desperate strength in his grip. “Tell me,” he croaked. “Tell me! Who is she where is she how do I find her what’s her name—”

“Her name is Khalida,” Amal said, fearful of his sudden animation, but not so fearful that she’d forget to whisper, to look to the ground as she spoke. “You can see her tonight. You’ll be free of the memory by morning. That’s her promise.”

The walls on the apartment hallway were peeling and damp with mold. Filling the air with his cigarette smoke, Y walked down the hallway glaring at each door number until he found his target; 6A. He stopped and knocked three times. Some noise could be heard before the door opened and a slim middle aged man was standing before Y. “You Y?” the man asked. Y smiled and nodded, “Yes sir.” The man let Y in. Y tossed his cigarette aside and headed for the couch. He waved at a woman standing at the kitchen doorway. She gave him a nasty look but kept quiet. Y shrugged it off and sat down. The man stood across the coffee table, “You have it?” Y dug in his inner coat pocket and pulled out a black rectangular box. He set it down on the table and slid it to the man. The man picked up the box and opened it. Resting in a velvety cloth were a number of glowing green shards. He let out a chuckle and closed the box, “You want something to drink?” Y shook his head, “I want my money.” The man reached into his pocket. A sudden noise came from his wife. Y and the man both looked over at her. She looked flustered. “Isn’t this enough already!? Those damned drugs are just gonna get us in trouble! And you’re even bringing in this random man in here. He could be a cop!” She yelled. Y let out a hearty laugh, “You know she has a point.” The man began laughing just as hard as he walked over to his wife. He pulled out a gun and rested it on her head. The laughter stopped and a deep silence filled the room. He cocked the gun and pressed it deeper against her head. “I don’t rememb-” A loud creak interrupted him. He turned around and saw Y standing a few inches from him. A pipe wrench dropped from Y’s sleeve. Y raised his arm and brought down the wrench with great force onto the man’s head. At the same time the man managed to get a shot into Y’s abdomen. The man dropped like a ragdoll and Y stumbled back. He pulled the bullet out of his vest and went through the man’s pockets. “You asshole! Did you kill him?!” The wife shouted. Y ignored her and grabbed the money from the man. He split off a portion of bills from the stack and reached out to the wife. “Sorry for the trouble, honestly.” Her hands shaking, she grabbed the money. Y headed for the door. He stopped and looked at the box on the table, then back at the wife who seemed to care more about the money than her husband. He grabbed the box and slid it in his jacket. Y walked out the door and back down the damp and peeling hallway. I hate this job, he thought to himself, lighting up a cigarette.

Every week before Halloween, my neighbors would always decorate their front yards with spooky scary decorations such as inflatable spiders, ghosts, and skeletons. The one that really gave me the creeps was the old abandoned house at the corner of 40th Street. This house didn’t need decorations, as it was just spooky on its own. I don’t know if this is true, but there are myths and stories stating that the house on the corner has a spirit living inside it. This spirit of the deceased owner embodies the house, which can transform itself into a living object. I can’t even handle a spider, or a corpse, let alone be scared of a haunted house. 

The next day, my best friend Jeffrey visited my house for lunch. We had my favorite, which was Sloppy Joes with french fries, as well as Jeffrey’s favorite. Once we were done eating, we sat down on the couch talking to each other. 

“I got an idea. Do you wanna visit that haunted house on the corner?!” says Jeffrey with enthusiasm. 

“Hell no!” I shouted to him in fear. 

“Please best friend, I’ll never ask anything from you ever again,” said Jeffrey. 

“Alright, but if I get a heart attack, I’m suing you,” I warned him. 

We rushed down to the house on the corner as fast as we could. There was nothing really scary about the front porch. The gusts of wind were speaking to us dreadfully. 

“Beware, the curse of Mariana!” whispered the winds. 

We were able to get inside the house with no problem, but the curtains shut instantly as soon as we came in. An old lamp approached us as we were heading deep into the kitchen. The oven started turning on by itself. It started burning everything in the kitchen, and made itself into a lava dome monster. We ran, shaking our hands up in the air before the oven was able to roast us. As if we hadn’t had enough today, a fan started flying towards us, and blew extremely strong winds at us into the eternal pit of the giant rug, which sucked us in. We had no way to get out but the stairs, and unfortunately for us, that wasn’t the most brilliant idea in the book. They grew fangs from the food, which made them hungry for humans. The only way we were going to escape alive is through the walls.  

“If we can climb up the edges of the wall, we can get to the door,” I said while planning my idea. 

We quickly grabbed each edge, but we ran into problems as the stair planks were jumping to gain on us. We had no choice but to step on the staircase as fast as possible in order not to get bitten.  We got to the door, but we stepped on a button causing the chandelier to drop on a loose floorboard that we were standing on, which flinged us to the exit, thus escaping the house alive. 

“Jeffrey, I’m not gonna lie to you, but that was the most fun I’ve ever had,” I told him with excitement. 

“Are you out of your goddamn mind?! We almost died in that house,” yelled Jeffrey with resentment. “This is the first and last time I go inside that house!” 

When it comes down to it, these images we see are all make-believe. I imagined the house as an amusement park, and it was a fun journey inside the house.

Sweat. Tears. Saliva. Pain. Pleasure. Ecstasy. Tension building. Muscles pulsing. Hearts racing. Bodies about to give out. In particular, Sandra and David. The couple’s usual spot, the House from Hell, Sandra and David are and have been frequenting since the day they first met. A commonplace for the pair, though others don’t dare visit considering the name. Especially intense, the House from Hell was built to torment people and put their minds and bodies to the test. 

Sandra and David always love to come back, as the intensity increases and spices up their relationship each time. Because of their constant returns, Sandra and David have an exclusive membership that gives them unlimited access to any room of the House of Hell. For this moment, they’ve got a three hour window to do whatever they want in the exclusive back room.

The House of Hell is equipped with all kinds of toys and technology, suitable to anyone and everyone’s needs regardless of background and orientation. ‘There’s no discrimination here, thought Sandra, ‘as long as you tell your friends about us and bring them along for the ride.’ By the time Sandra finished the House’s motto in her mind, David was already undressed down to his shorts and ready to party.

“Ready babe?” David asked Sandra as she got down to her bra and boxers.

“Ready as always, you maniac,” she remarks with a smirk and a lustful yet determined look in her eyes. This is her favorite part of the day: Sandra loves to out-time and surpass David in their affairs. 

Not a second later, Sandra is in front of David, almost pressed completely into his lap. They heave heavy, huffing and puffing from forcing their bodies to work so rough and so fast in the seconds that have passed. Sandra starts to moan, her legs not used to the build up of intensity, but she’s determined not to come last to David. David, falling for Sandra’s trick, begins to moan and feel his legs start to give up.

“Come on, baby. You’re not done already, are you?” Sandra teases her boyfriend’s struggle.

“No way. It takes two to tango, woman” David retorts, frustrated with how quickly he succumbs to Sandra’s wit each time they go to the House from Hell.

“Keep going, baby, I’m so close!” Sandra teases again. Despite the music that fills the room, Sandra and David get louder and drown out Hey Baby (Drop it to the Floor) by T-Pain and Pitbull. 

“I can’t take it anymore!” Sandra lets out with a final moan and a gasp of air that sounds close to an orgasm. She lets her body give out on her and release all of her built up tension; her limbs falling limp and slouching into David.

“Guess you couldn’t beat me this time, love,” David is proud of himself for surpassing Sandra for once in their couple’s workout for the day.

“I can’t believe I let you out-pedal me this time,” Sandra sighs, still slouching on the Peloton’s newest tandem bicycle. David gets up off the bike seat and begins to squeegee the sweat off his chiseled chest.

“Better luck next time, babe,” David taunts his collapsed girlfriend. Sandra eventually gets up and wipes off the sweat with her towel.

As the couple walks out the main doors to the House from Hell, Sandra stops to tie her shoe. Whilst this she asks David, “So, will you marry me now?”

“Yes, but only because you let me kick your ass on the bike,” David laughs. 

Once her shoe is tied, Sandra gets up and locks hands with David as the couple walk home, to prepare for another intense session at the House from Hell a day later.

It was a gloomy afternoon. Clouds filled the sky and you can almost feel the precipitation in the air. The floor was wet from the previous hours of non-stop rain. That didn’t stop me from doing what I was passionate about. You couldn’t tell me that I wasn’t going to play basketball after school because I would simply laugh and run to the courts. At least that’s what I did when my mom told me I couldn’t. I would run off and greet my friends with a jump shot. Clank. I wasn’t always the best but I most definitely wasn’t the worse.

“Yo, Hasib, Chris and Tim! Let’s play a two versus two.” I shouted across the court.

Chris yelled back, “Bet, me and Tim versus you guys. Your ball first.” Him and Tim were best friends as they lived just a street away from each other.

They game started and we simply had a great time like any other fifth graders getting ready to graduate. Jump shots, crazy layups, flashy passes. We were doing it all.

”I can’t wait to get to 6th grade man, so we could all join the team!” Tim said.

”Same dude, we’re going to be all stars.” Hasib said.

Still playing, I decided it was time to get my fair share of buckets.

“Give me the ball.”

Jump shot from beyond the arc. Good

Another one. Good

“Hold up, move out my way. I’m going to try something” I asked.

As I got the basketball, I stared at the rim for a good 10 seconds. I run towards the rim and jump and attempt a 360 degree layup. My body contorts and I release the ball. Good. However, as I land, I end up on my back. Unable to move.

”HEYYYYYYY, YOU DID IT!” Hasib yelled, trying to pick me up.

I couldn’t move, nor speak.

“What’s wrong, Raiyan?” Chris asked.

I couldn’t answer. I looked up at the sky and thought, “God, my time has come already?” Like a fool.

I looked over to the other side of the park insinuating where to go get my mom. She was talking to the other parents. Tim runs over to her and grabs and her to lure her to me.

“Oh my goodness. My son. Get up, get up, get up.” My mother cried.

It was as if I was half- paralyzed. That was until she picked me up and held me in her arms. That was all I needed to attempt to move. A parents loving. That’s how much my mother means to me. I will attempt anything if it was about her. I slowly get up as I hold her with my left arm wrapped around her arm and my right around Chris. I motion wit my hands to get something to drink and out my mothers purse she pulls out a water. Gulp.

“Ahhh. That was a close one. “

”You’re not coming back,” she said.

“Ma, you are out of your mind.”

As Michael walks the silent streets, he wonders what is occurring. Michael just arrived from his long trip from Spain he has not been around for about 20 years. He left his neighborhood when he was a small child his parents took him to have a better education.

As he came back to the neighborhood, he walked around to remember the places he use to play in. But as he walked around he did not see people not even a car wondering.

He asked himself, “Where is everyone? Where did they go?”

As he walked back home he had so many questions in mind. He arrived at his house and went straight to his room. He began his research about his neighborhood, Hamlet Cherry. His computer started to pop out with articles, newspapers, and blogs. There was so much about Hamlet Cherry.

He was surprised by all the information that was being told about Hamlet Cherry. But what surprised him the most was one of his childhood friends’ names was also in the news, Eric Montgaremy.

” What is Eric Montgaremy’s name doing on newspapers?”

He kept on researching and trying to figure things out but he found the main one that could answer all his questions.

As he read the article from a news reporter. It was all a shock. But he just continued to read and read more of the article.

We’ve all been told to report to our local underground bunkers where food and supplies wait for us. I held on tight to my small rag doll mama had made for me the previous year for my birthday. The sky was painted this crimson red. The scent of sulfur threatened to invade my nose past the cotton rag Mama had tied around the bottom half of my face. Houses across the neighborhood boarded up and you could still hear the constant hammering ringing down the streets. I made sure to wave goodbye to every house I could see.

I do pray that the sun comes out soon. I miss running through the fields our house used to be nearby. Laying down in a bed of flowers and just let the sun beat on my exposed skin. Mama would always scream at me when I’d come home beet-red and burnt. She tells me that it’ll be a short while before I can run around and be free again. One of the last things she grabbed from the house was a rosary and she’d been clutching that pretty hard ever since we got here. Papa hasn’t said a word. He’s just been walking around like a zombie. Head held low and eyes like a deer in headlights. We all walked in unison toward what would eventually become our new home. I hope I’d be able to make new friends there. I could show off my betty doll!

~

They’ve all left me here. I’ve lost count of the days that have passed. My skin had become pale and flaccid. My nails had grown jagged and long, with dirt-caked underneath. I fear to open my mouth lest another tooth comes tumbling out. The clothes I came in here with had become rags after everything that had happened. Sadly, I had to burn my doll in the fire. Mama said we’d freeze to death if I didn’t. Maybe that fate is better than the life I’d been stuck with.

God has left us, or at least that’s what Mama kept rambling on about. She finally let go of that rosary once she got tired of waiting for food, just like the others. One believes in the lord until they’ve been dragged through the very depths of hell itself.

Papa did eventually speak, but I couldn’t understand him between his exasperated screams and howls. I think he pleaded for me to help but I just ran as fast as my calloused feet could take me.

I found shelter inside some empty shipment container at the end of the camp. I thought I was safe in there but Mama found me one day. Her eyes were dark, not a shimmer of light left. I think she held some pieces of Papa.

I never go to see the sun again.