MAGAZINE

1. There’s a place I’m going / no one knows me The first time I hear the only Matt Simons song I know, I am sitting on the floor of my childhood bedroom. A girl I have only met twice has punctuated an Instagram montage of coming home from OCAD—landing ...

An adventure for Dungeons and Dragons and similar tabletop RPGs

My brother and I were never the closest growing up, with multiple factors stacked against us: our seven-year age gap, our subsequent lack of common interests, and the slight bumps in communication due to our uneven bilingualisms, and my brother’s hearing disability. The few times I did feel close to ...

The defining feature of an only-childhood is playing alone. As the solitary offspring of my parents, I conjured for myself a rich world of make-believe, the nooks and crannies of which—depending on their content, and to a dwindling extent as I aged—I shared with my parents and no one else. ...

I thought I saw you when I stepped to the counter the third morning in a row, and you waved my hand ready to pay away as you slid the faded blue mug towards me, “It’s fine” you caught my eye between the swish of your ponytail and the glint ...

Superimposed childhood nostalgia

Content warning: suicidal ideation and depression There is a Joan Didion passage I almost chose for my high school yearbook quote. One thing in my defense, not that it matters: I know something Carter never knew, or Helene, or maybe you. I know what “nothing” means, and keep on playing. ...

“How many play partners do you have?” “Are you into the edge play?” “Do you want to go to a play party with me next week?” Whether you’re describing play as a set of activities or kinks, as a descriptor for a sexual partner, or simply a verb that acts ...

My father passes me a pack of gum as he drives us to school. My brother can now sit in the front seat, and he turns the radio on to 96.3FM. In a rare moment free of advertisements, Mendelssohn’s Octet in E-flat Major plays. The notes become tinged with the ...