Ctrl + B Page 17

  The clothes I shove to the back of my closet because they’re screaming “Look at me!” to every unwanted onlooker on the street

  The color of the flame I burned my finger on when I was young

  Red is the color of my reminiscences

  The first color of the first rainbow I caught

  The summer sunset my friends and I would watch in the park across the street

  The strawberry ice pops melting in the flaming heat so we would always slurp up the sticky dribbles on the Popsicle sticks

  The color of the burning sky surrounding our silhouettes

  Red is a color I fear

  The stain of my underwear every few months

  The crimson liquid seeping from my fingers when I accidentally scrape them against my homework assignments in my haste

  The complexion of my friend’s face when she finds the devil in the details of my elaborate lie

  The color of her eyes as she struggles to stay furious at me

  Red is a color I love

  The YouTube logo I tap on every day

  The carnation I received from her on Valentine’s Day with a note attached revealing the words “I’m so glad we met that day in the park” in her barely legible handwriting

  The rosy blush on her cheeks when she receives all the roses and chocolates and adoration she thought she didn’t deserve

  The color of my favorite phrase: You yourself are your most loyal lover

  Red is a bold color

  Bold enough for me to dye my hair the hue myself

  Bold enough for me to color code my Girls Write Now reminders on my Google Calendar

  Bold enough for me to dig out those garments from the back of my closet on days I feel good about myself

  Bold enough to make me aim to make every day red because

  Red is my favorite color

  Bright Spot

  LAUREN VESPOLI

  I don’t write much poetry, but was excited when Irene asked me to write a color poem with her, and chose an appropriately bold shade.

  I grew up in a yellow house—

  my mother’s favorite color—with white trim and a blue door

  A bright spot hidden in the trees, down a dead-end road;

  I’d trudge through the snow to catch the bus.

  Every spring on the playground,

  My friends and I held buttercups beneath our chins, asking a question we could all answer—yes, we liked butter.

  I always used yellow marker to draw the sun, before I knew it was every color.

  I sang along with the Beatles in the car, pretending I was inside the submarine and the traffic was nothing more than a school of shimmering fish.

  Now yellow tells me to wait, and I listen:

  Back away from the train tracks

  Slow down before the light changes

  Caution! Do. Not. Cross.

  But then, I’ll remember the bursting yolk of morning

  The sunflower’s heavy head, nodding to me from behind the fence,

  The edges of a dancing flame, bouncing off my glass, and I’ll think,

  It’s time I caught fire,

  glowed fiercely in the dark.

  SADIA HAQUE

  YEARS AS MENTEE: 1

  GRADE: Senior

  HIGH SCHOOL: The Bronx High School of Science

  BORN: Sylhet, Bangladesh

  LIVES: Queens, NY

  MENTEE’S ANECDOTE: I remember being at one of our first meetings together, where Mary asked me what kind of voice I wanted in my story. At the time, I hadn’t written for a while and couldn’t understand the concept of having a voice in my writing. But as I continued to write more stories, sharing each one with Mary, she helped me find that voice. She helped me grow as a writer, giving me the confidence to delve into different genres. She helped inspire me in my writing, through the discussions we had, sharing our opinions on a variety of topics.

  MARY DARBY

  YEARS AS MENTOR: 1

  OCCUPATION: Vice President, Burness

  BORN: Peekskill, NY

  LIVES: New York, NY

  PUBLICATIONS AND RECOGNITIONS: “Running Out of Cures” and “Storytelling and the Gift of Truth,” Burness

  MENTOR’S ANECDOTE: Sadia loves sweets, especially waffles with lots of maple syrup and hot chocolate with lots of whipped cream. Watching her eat and listening to her chat about what she’s doing at school and at home reminds me of myself at her age, with my whole life ahead of me, so many doors to open, so much to learn, and so many places to explore. It makes me happy and excited for her, because I know she will go far. And it reminds me as well of all I have yet to do.

  All-Consuming Reality

  SADIA HAQUE

  In my mind, Ctrl + B means being brave even when you’re afraid. It means jumping into the unknown, following your instincts, and never giving up. It means taking your own path, shaping your own destiny.

  PART 1: THE UNKNOWN

  When I first woke up, all I saw was light. A bright, blinding light. I lifted my arms to cover my eyes, my movements slow and brittle. My body ached with disuse. It demanded I move, but everything felt too heavy, too much.

  I tried to figure out where I was. I used my free hand to feel around me. I felt a coarse substance around my fingers. I grabbed on to it and lifted it closer to my face. It slipped out of my hands, leaving behind a trail of sediment. I squinted at the residue left on my palm.

  Sand …

  I lifted my body, grabbing more of it. I felt it in my hands, felt it trail down my palm, felt the small crystals on the pads of my fingers. I laid my entire palm down on it and felt the familiar burn.

  I’ve felt this before, I thought. I tried to go through my mind, tried to find the memory I was searching for. Nothing. My mind was blank.

  I lifted my head from the ground and took in my surroundings. Sand covered everything around me.

  Desert. The word came to me in a haze.

  I was in a desert. I squinted and saw some large black things in the distant. And what looked like different-sized green plants dotting the horizon.

  But something seemed off.

  I felt something cloying inside of me. Something crawling inside my throat, ripping into the edges of my mind. I realized it was panic. I was panicking.

  I didn’t know where I was, or how I got here, and then, as if my thoughts had just caught up to me, I realized something.

  I had no idea who I was.

  The panic took over and I let it consume me. I screamed into the desert, hoping that if I did it loud enough someone would hear. My throat burned from exertion, my eyes watered, but I kept screaming. Little black dots began to appear in my periphery.

  No one was coming. I was alone. I let the darkness consume me.

  PART II: THE SEARCH

  Darkness was falling when I woke from my panic-induced unconsciousness. The bright light up above was descending and disappearing into the horizon. The air was cooling and I realized I could not stay here any longer.

  I lifted my body, easing it into a standing position. My legs shook in the sand. I didn’t know where to go. I looked up to the darkening sky and felt an emptiness inside me. But I needed to move. I inhaled and took my first steps, willing my legs to stop shaking.

  One small step for man …

  The words slipped out of my mouth before I could think, settling onto my tongue like a sticky glaze. They brought an ache to my chest. I felt an inkling in the corners of my mind. Everything seemed so familiar, and yet I could not find the memories to link them to me. I felt a strange hollowness in my body, and soon a realization took over my body.

  I do not belong here. I do not belong here. I do not belong here.

  The thought ricocheted through my mind as I walked around. It penetrated the deepest recesses of my mind and fueled the movement of my limbs. I did not know where to go, but everything inside of me demanded I keep walking, keep moving. There was something out there, something I needed to find.
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br />   Soon my new world was cloaked in darkness, but this did not dissuade me. Using the small little lights and the large white circle in the sky as my guides, I kept walking toward the horizon.

  PART III: THE DISCOVERY

  The farther I marched, the more my motivation ebbed. I did not know for how long I had been walking, but it felt like an eternity and I had found nothing. Soon, the cool air overtook my senses. Gone was the warmth of the light, and the sand beneath my bare feet felt cool.

  I shivered, belatedly realizing that I was not prepared for this terrain. It’s hot during the day, but it cools down fast at night. My clothes, white and made of a soft fabric—cotton—did nothing to quell my shivering.

  My legs, not used to strain, were growing weaker as I walked. My eyes, too, were getting tired from the darkness. I could feel splotches of sand on my face, my arms, and my feet. I wanted to lie down, I wanted to give up, I wanted to go home.

  Snap out of it, my mind screamed at me. There’s no Glinda to get you home, you have to do it yourself.

  I blinked in confusion at my thoughts. I didn’t know who this Glinda was, but I was right. I did have to do this myself. So I kept walking, kept pushing myself forward, and that’s when I felt something odd under my feet. I looked down and saw a rusted, grayed sign with letters on it.

  It was partially obscured, buried underneath the sand, so I grabbed a corner and pulled. I dragged it closer to my face, wiped away the sand, and slowly read it.

  A… B… I… R… A. I spelled out the word slowly, silently mouthing each letter.

  This is my name. I grasped at the sign, reading it once more, memorizing each line and curve of the letters. I turned the sign over and found even more words on the back.

  This is not real. This is a simulation. You have to escape, and you are close. Keep following your gut instincts. They will not lead you astray. Everything will come back to you in time.

  A burst of laughter escaped me, bordering on hysteria. I was right. The feeling of vindication overwhelmed me. I fell to my knees in shock and smiled into the sky.

  I was right.

  PART IV: THE ESCAPE

  Following the directions given to me, I kept walking. I kept moving forward. Even as the fatigue hit, I pushed past it. I held the rusted sign tight in my hand, as I moved closer and closer to the horizon. I didn’t know what I was doing, but I swallowed my doubt.

  The sign told me to follow my gut, I’m going to follow my gut.

  Suddenly, I saw a sparkle on the horizon. A small, blinking light. I latched on to it and ran toward it. My body ached, my legs shook, my lungs screamed, but I ignored all of it and kept on running. This is it.

  As I ran closer, the light grew brighter and brighter, until I had to squint and cover my eyes from the glare. Then the light disappeared.

  No, I thought desperately, I’ve made it this far. Don’t go away yet, please. I wanted to scream again, to fall to my knees and beg. But before I could do that, the ground shook and a doorway opened, right there on the horizon. It was dark and empty, but it was also my escape.

  I felt an inkling of doubt creep into my mind. I looked back at the desert and took it all in. It was empty and hollow and vast. But it was also all I knew right now, all I’ve ever known. Could I really leave it behind?

  I felt a memory in the back of my mind. My first clear memory. Another door, another sky, and a man. In case I don’t see you, good afternoon, good evening, and good night.

  I breathed in and breathed out. This was it, and I looked at the darkened doorway and felt fear. But I looked back at the desert and knew this could not be my home.

  I took in another breath, closed my eyes, and stepped forward into the darkness. This was it. Goodbye desert, hello Abira.

  I stepped fully into the darkness, feeling the light from the desert disappear as the doorway closed. The lights came on and I remembered. The hollowness in my chest eased. I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, and looked around.

  I was home. Finally.

  The Question

  MARY DARBY

  My intense dislike of bullies and avocados, along with my love of girls asserting themselves, inspired this story.

  Molly was used to making people uncomfortable. It wasn’t intentional. But when something terrible happens to you, people often don’t know how to act or what to say. They smile fake smiles when they see you, or they look the other way, pretending not to see you at all. Many times, they want to be nice, but they don’t know how.

  The Chumley twins stared at Molly from across the cafeteria table. They were new to this school, and shy.

  But curious. The twin on the right asked Molly The Question.

  Molly frowned. “I’m not supposed to talk about that. It’s hush-hush, understand?”

  The Chumleys nodded.

  “My parents weren’t ordinary parents, like most kids’ parents. They were spies.”

  She paused for effect.

  “They made believe we were just a normal family, and that they were normal adults with normal, everyday, boring jobs. But I figured it out. There were signs.”

  “Like what?” the twin on the right breathed.

  “Mysterious phone calls at night. Bits of conversation in foreign languages, when my father pretended not to even understand Spanish! And what about the facial-recognition home security system he installed? Why would an ordinary university professor need that?”

  She shot the twins a challenging stare. They shrugged in unison.

  “Because he wasn’t an ordinary university professor! Their code names were Mad Dog and Raven, and they worked for a top-secret agency saving the world!”

  The Chumley twins’ eyes went wide.

  “What happened?” the twin on the left stammered. “How did they—”

  “Murdered. Made to look like an accident, but someone tampered with the brake line.” Molly paused. “I know who the murderer is, but I can’t tell you. Too dangerous.”

  A voice behind Molly sneered: “That’s because it’s all a lie—a sad, pathetic story made up by a pathological liar!”

  Delilah, Molly’s archnemesis.

  The Chumley twins exchanged confused glances.

  Molly winked. “Delilah wrote the book on sad and pathetic. She puts other people down to hide her own insecurity.”

  “At least I don’t make up bizarre stories about my own parents! Your father fell asleep at the wheel! Get over it, weirdo!”

  Delilah flounced off.

  Without thinking, Molly reached for the avocado her Uncle Randolph had inexplicably packed into her lunch bag. It was whole, unpeeled, and very ripe. It squished in her hand.

  Molly detested avocados almost as much as she detested Delilah.

  In a flash, she hurled the slimy globe, hitting the back of Delilah’s luxuriantly blonde head with a satisfying splat.

  Delilah shrieked.

  “Avocado is a natural hair conditioner,” Molly said and smirked. “That should fix those nasty split ends of yours.”

  And that’s how Molly, on her twelfth birthday, ended up in detention.

  AGUSTINA HARRIS

  YEARS AS MENTEE: 1

  GRADE: Senior

  HIGH SCHOOL: Queens Gateway to Health Sciences Secondary School

  BORN: Queens, NY

  LIVES: Queens, NY

  MENTEE’S ANECDOTE: Being a girl who doesn’t get out much, this mentoring program has been a wonderful experience for me! My mentor was a perfect match for me, which I wasn’t expecting—a true friendship that I cherish has grown from sitting together in a cute little coffee shop in Brooklyn. Our love for writing has brought us together. Sarah has truly helped me grow as a writer and as a woman.

  SARAH CUSTEN

  YEARS AS MENTOR: 2

  OCCUPATION: Adult ESL Instructor

  BORN: Ogden, UT

  LIVES: Brooklyn, NY

  PUBLICATIONS AND RECOGNITIONS: “Zoom-in Freewrite,” in New Ways in Teaching Creative Writing for the ELL Com
munity, TESOL Press; “Laughs in Translation” in The Font: A Literary Journal for Language Teachers

  MENTOR’S ANECDOTE: Agustina and I hit it off immediately, becoming fast friends, creative collaborators, and women writers together, making the best of whatever life throws at us. I am inspired by her drive, her maturity, and her work ethic—just spending time with ’Tina motivates me to write more, try new things, and submit my work for publication. Her interests were the inspiration behind my anthology piece, and I think the fact that we both included a visit from a small animal in our pieces—unplanned!—is evidence of our bond and connection.

  Waves

  AGUSTINA HARRIS

  For lost children, it’s easy to find yourself in nature, accepting your past and realizing your future through something as simple as a crashing wave.

  I look up from the garbage on the hot sand on this sultry day, gazing at the commotion on the boardwalk. A big group of skaters is speeding past everyone. Looks like fun, I think, as I continue to pick up empty soda cans and cigarette butts. Sand keeps slithering its way into my off-white Converses; I can’t stand the dry friction anymore. I drop my trash bag and the stupid grabby thing the beach patrol gives out before sneaking off toward the water. With a quick glance around the beach, I see that the patrol members are busy enough, laughter erupting from the mouths of teens running around the beach instead of working. Kids will be kids.

  I untie my shoes, the laces ripped and dirty, slipping them off along with my socks. There are monstrous waves far out, seeming to graze the vast horizon; rolling and rolling until dying out before they can even dream of reaching the sand. They look like me. I sit on the soggy sand, “squish,” it says as it holds my weight, molding to my form, how thoughtful … I stretch my legs out and lean back on my Band-Aid–covered fingers, grains of sand sticking against my sweaty skin in the cool winds. Eyes smiling at the ghostly clouds painting the sky. I close them, catching a glimpse of colorful spots dancing across my marble eyelids. A moment of peace … never lasted long in this world.