By Nicole Chang In the morning, Oscar rises earlier than me and rustles around in my kitchen pantry to make us each a fried egg. I pretend to sleep so that I can lay in bed for a little longer, the heat of his body leaving a shadow of warmth that I savor in these unending winter months. It’s fun to observe people when they don’t know they’re being watched. He’s just in his boxers, whistling faintly to himself. His torso is long and it vees in nicely at the waist; something ab

By Kocheng Lin Under the streetlight, which only sharpened the darkness surrounding us, I wasn’t looking into her eyes. Instead, I was feeling the flower blooming in my mouth. I was thrown into panic and blown into pieces. I was recollecting and recounting my life up to now… 1…  In grade 9, I was still struggling to turn thoughts into words, not to mention projecting my voice. But one morning, the teacher called up the new transfer student, Carla, with straight dark hair fall

By Phoenix Mcdaniel Design/Cover art by Mackenzie Abeleda She inched toward the venue, slowly A caterpillar is what she was Surely, she was beautiful in her own right Yet, still, something about her was sluggish and weighty  As if the many segments along her thorax and abdomen contained the world The world and all the multiplicities of her being The weight of it all  The fatigue of it all The pain of it all  Surely, she was beautiful in her own right  Yet, still, something ab