Free Fist of the Spider Woman by Amber Dawn Page B

buttons, steering one-handed. I look out the window and can’t read any signs. The letters are blurred. I squint. Doesn’t help. I can’t read a single word in print. I have no idea where we’re headed and I feel woozy. Weird. I open the window a crack because it’s hot, and everything’s too close. I want out. Wish I had convinced her to ditch the car. We’re speeding along even faster, it seems, although cars are honking, passing on the left. Lights blur. She turns up the music. Electronic, trancey, house shit. It starts to make sense to me, for once.
    A car pulls up and keeps pace beside us. Dudes are hanging out the back windows yelling “Show us your dyke tits!” She laughs and shakes her shirt the rest of the way undone. They scream and honk, peel past us, and when they drive away I can see two bare asses in their back window.
    We hit gravel and she jerks the wheel sharply. We’re back on the road.
    â€œHey,” I say.
    Numbness spreads through my limbs. I take deep breaths; the sensation matures, becomes solid in my chest. It beats outward with each pumping thrust of my heart valve, fast and furious. My skin is hot; it is paper igniting. It is kindling. It crackles. Flames leap to my fingertips as they trace a delicate dance around my cheeks, down my neck, back to my mouth. I’m so thirsty.
    â€œWaaater?” I say thickly.
    She produces a sparkly bottle; her smile wavers crooked like Charlie Brown’s T-shirt. The bottle is blue and light and cool and so out of reach. The car seats are miles apart now. I can’t move my arm, but somehow the bottle is there, in my hand. I can’t feel it. Liquid splooshes out the top, shocks my face, runs down my shirt. The tip of my tongue taps around on skin, sucks up the coveted drops.
    So thirsty. My large tongue, ungainly in my mouth.
    She laughs and bounces in her seat, mouth open, singing along all party-circuit mode, like she’s in one of those fucking car ads.
    I try to say something, yell. Nothing comes out. There’s a low sound (a bear?) growling (me?). I want her to stop this, stop the car, pull over, and end it.
    She faces me, head swivels on her skeletron neck, says, “The Juice, it was in the Juice,” and her face chainsaws apart into huge mawing gaps. “Liquid K for me’n’all my friends.”
    I pull the seatbelt, but can’t move. Trapped. Only my eyes work. I pinprick gaze a falling star, a million miles away, one that I will never reach. My hand rests immobile on my pocket, in my lap. I close my eyes. Fireworks trail inside the lids, red lines spiral and drip, invade the velvet deep. I open them and things are much, much worse.
    The truck is upon us, blasting the horn. The driver is screaming, waving his hands, and Blondie is smiling, hands up, eyes closed, head back like she’s about to come. I’m thinking, shit, now I’ll never make any money tonight. Metal grid pounds into the Civic’s hood, grinds slow motion through the crumpled car, legs buckle and cramp, the ripping sound fills my ears. I’m looking down into my lap at one hand. My other hand is still on the armrest, and it is an acrobat, flying through the air at a tremendous speed, far away from me.
    There is the suddenness. The explosion. There is brightness and lightness, the dull roaring rage that consumes me. There’s the smooth black pebble in my pocket, from my homeland.

In Circles
    Aurelia T. Evans
    He did not run out or slam the door or shout at her. There was the snick of the door latch and then she could hear his Chevy rumble out of the parking space. Her apartment smelled of Alfredo sauce, cat dander, and the detergent he used on his dress shirts. He left his wine glass on the coffee table next to his Blackberry. She would have to mail it to him. He would not want to come back.
    Her breathing seemed loud and her skin warm as she pulled the open sides of her blouse over her breasts.