In 2021, some bad behaviour was discovered at a literary journal called Black Cat Magazine. Said behaviour implicated other journals with which one editor in particular was involved. In response, writer V.F. Thompson posted a call to action on Twitter: anyone who had submitted work to the now-defunct Black Cat Magazine (or any related journals) could resubmit their work to a new zine called Curiđ sity Kills. The first release from Dionysian Public Library, the zine comprises five pieces of anarchist, political prose. I am so proud to be a part of the zine, and to present my story “Tell Me the Good Stuff” in full below. At the bottom of the page, I will leave details on how to support the zine.
I hope you enjoy my story.
~
At last, the jeep crests the hill, and for a moment Jackâs vision turns white. He shields his eyes, blinking rapidly, and squints towards the encampment nestled in the reddish-brown valley. They pass between two bollards that once, heâs sure, must have bracketed a checkpoint, but now serve as pummel horses for shoeless children â some freckled and fair, some with their hair in locs, others grinning through sunburn â who now abandon their game and come running, yelling welcome at the newcomer. Jackâs chest tightens. His hand twitches, but he keeps his head still, stares through cracked and dusty glass.
âHungry?â The driver glances at him. âYou can eat first.â
Jack shakes his head. The children peel away and chase each other, screaming, through the dust. Absurdly, Jack wonders if theyâll let him join them. How old is too old? He frowns at his hands, at the brownish crusts beneath his nails, the stump where his pinkie should be. He chews his thumbnail, thinking how silly it is, to want children to play with you now when they never did before; or if they did, itâs been so long it hardly counts. But he thinks about the children, about their games and stories spawned from fertile, shared imaginations. He thinks (hopes) theyâre all friends, and that there are best friends sprinkled in amongst the group. Something niggles at him there, at the base of his skull. It shivers down his spine and agitates his stomach. Best friends.
He gnaws the inside of his cheek.
âHere we are.â
Jack looks up, first at the driverâs kind face, and then beyond, towards the greyish tent.
âWeâll say our hellos first.â
Jack nods and slips from his seat. His feet throb, and he hobbles around the jeepâs idle nose. The driver waits for him, and then embraces a new man, who climbs behind the wheel and rumbles down the track.
âWe keep the cars and trucks together,â the driver explains. âAll the fuel and everything â it stays in one place. Easy to run low, so we have people to take care of that.â He rubs the back of his neck. âSure you donât need anything?â
Jack shakes his head again and tries to smile. He likes this man â who is tall and dark-skinned, with long black hair hanging down his back â and wants this man to like him. Again, he thinks about the children; he thinks that if he were still like them, still young and small, he could go to this man, let himself be swallowed up in his arms, bury his face in his chest. He could ask, even. He could look him in the eye and ask to be held. A little strange, he thinks, for a boy who is really a man to ask someone his equal in height for a hug. But even big men, even men who donât radiate kindness the way this one does, would allow a tiny, frightened child one small comfort.
Still.
âCome on, then.â He helps Jack inside, takes his negligible weight on his arm. They pass through the heavy flaps and sigh in unison. The air is lighter here, and cooler, and with the sun blocked out, they can at last relax.
The people in the tent look at them, curious. But Jack has eyes only for the person at the table: the man with sandy hair and greenish eyes. The man whose jaw drops, who stands and reveals his tall, slim frame. The man whose shirt hangs open, hinting at surgical scars.
They stare at each other. Then Jack cries out â some useless noise â and weeping falls into the manâs arms. He hugs him tight, and Jack hears him ask the driver Where incredulous where did you find him? He holds him at armâs length, looks into the face that is now opposite his own, and touches his hair.
âSam,â says Jack, voice hoarse with disuse. He tests the word, the name that might not be right anymore. But the man nods â just once, emphatic, almost proud â and tears roll down his cheeks.
âI told you,â he says. âI told you weâd see each other again.â
Jack hugs him fiercely. He is distantly aware of voices growing softer. A puff of hot air touches the darkened space as the tent flaps move, and then they are alone. Jack marvels at how easy it is, how simple to rearrange himself to match this new version of his friend. Before â so long ago now â when they were both children, Sam was the taller, and painfully thin. He would shrug off Jackâs worried hands, glare at him through sunken eyes. Jack would watch him fiddle with the bandages that bound his chest, loath to remove and replace them. He didnât understand at the time. He was only five when people started getting sick, too young maybe to know all the words. All he knew was that his friend was sad sometimes, and hurt. His makeshift binder pinched and squeezed, and nights heâd go without, hunched and silent. He explained it once, towards the end, when he was too sick to stand. Then he went away, taken in the back of a truck by people who knew what to do. How to help.
Jack buries his face in Samâs neck, not wanting to remember, needing to remember nonetheless. Someone held his arms, but the righteous fury unique to seven-year-olds was too much, too hot; he broke away, screaming, and bolted down the potholed road, bare feet ripped raw, tears whipped from his eyes into the dead heat of that August day. Then he was caught, swept up into the last hug of his life before now. When the screaming stopped, so did his words.
âJack, look at me.â
He looks at him.
âIâm sorry I left you.â
Jack shakes his head, vehement. âDonât.â He wipes his face. âI â wasnât angry at you. I was angry they⊠they took you away. Away from me. I didnât understand.â
Neither of them says, They could only take one.
âSo youâreââ Jack coughs. Samâs eyes widen, and Jack quickly flaps his hands. âNo, itâs okay â my throat â I need some water.â
Sam hands him a canteen and lets him drink.
Quenched, Jack tries again: âSo youâre in charge?â
Sam pulls a face. âI donât like to put it that way. A group of us â I guess you could say weâre in charge. But itâs more equal than that.â
Jack nods. âThe man who drove me â I donât know his nameââ
âBear.â Sam smiles.
Jack feels the possessive child in him stick out his chin, tries to quiet him. âHeâs nice, I liked him. Well, he said he was taking me to âthe bossâ.â Jack laughs softly. âI guess he was just joking.â
Sam scratches his head. âHe likes to call me that.â The expression on his face is one Jack has never learned to parse. He thinks perhaps in another world â another time, where his parents lived, and maybe no one ever got sick in the first place â at twenty heâd understand expressions like that. But then (and itâs an awful thought, despite the distance between him and half-remembered parents) if no one died, he never would have met Sam. He feels a little sick thinking about that, and tries to push on.
âWhat are you doing here?â Jack asks. âWhere did theyââ take you? he thinks. âWhere did you go?â
âWeâre working,â Sam says. âThey took care of me, Jack. And now weâre working to take care of others.â He smiles softly. âYou saw?â He opens his shirt a little wider, revealing the scars. âI spoke to someone â theyâre still here, Iâll introduce you. Dr Nguyen. Once I was better, they let me talk about how I felt. They did the surgery, too.â He closes the shirt, buttons it halfway. âFor a while I was obnoxiously shirtless.â
Jack giggles, setting off Sam â and for a moment they are seven and thirteen again.
Sam pauses. For no reason Jack can see, he looks almost nervous. âYouâre not⊠I mean, itâs okay. Isnât it?â
Jack frowns. âYou explained it to me before. I remember.â He gnaws on his cheek. âIt made me sad before. I mean, that you were sad. Because you knew who you were, and I knew who you were, too. But sometimes you didnât feel like who you were. Is that right?â
Sam nods.
âSo if youâre not sad anymore. If youâre not hurt. Then itâs okay.â He smiles. âI think before, I just didnât like that something was making you sad. Something I couldnât help you with, I mean. When you were sickââ He pauses, shoves aside flashes of his friendâs distended ribs and sallow skin. âWhen you were sick, even though I knew I couldnât make you better, I could do something. I could try to look after you. But you were sad sometimes. And angry. And there wasnât anything I could do. ExceptâŠâ
Sam watches him closely. âExcept what?â
âBe your friend.â He shrugs. âYou canât really do anything except that, I think. You canât fix things for your friends. You can just be for them.â
Sam is quiet for a moment. Then he laughs. âI hardly remember anything. I donât know if I lost the memory â if thatâs a side-effect â or if I just repressed it.â He hugs himself, briefly. âIâm glad I donât remember much.â Then, with a small smile: âExcept you.â
Jack, who remembers everything â remembers how, on his worst days, Sam would snap and hit; how heâd hate so much it would consume him â thinks, and not for the first time, that children who are hurt so easily must understand easily, too. Furtively, he puts his hands behind his back, fingers the nearly-nothing of his pinkie. And he thinks, no, itâs better Sam doesnât remember. Itâs better heâs well now, and leave it at that.
Jack hugs him again. âWhere are we?â he whispers into Samâs neck. âWhat is this place?â
Sam squeezes him. âThis is the future.â He holds him at armâs length again. âNo oneâs sick here, Jack, can you believe it? Wellâ â he laughs â âI mean, of course people get sick. But what I had â what everyone had â itâs gone here.â
Something pulls at Jackâs chest, loosening and tightening at once. âGone?â
Sam nods. âCompletely. We all tested negative. And we all keep testing negative.â
Jackâs mouth goes dry, and he reaches for the canteen again.
âI wasâŠâ Sam sighs. âThereâs no point lying â and Iâm sure you already figured it out. I was almost dead, when they found us.â
Jack sets his jaw.
âI think thatâs why they took me.â He sighs. âYou were all right. They needed someone who was sick. Someone they could â wellâŠâ
Something snaps in Jackâs chest. âThey used you like that?â
Sam pulls a face. âYeah.â He tries to shrug it off. âThey had to be sure. They couldnât test it on someone who wasnâtââ
âGoing to die anyway?â
Sam nods, eyes averted.
Jackâs fists burn, and heâs suddenly aware of his nails digging into his palms. He forces them loose, and rubs them while he asks, âAre they still here?â He feels his mouth twisting, can barely push the words between his lips.
Sam shakes his head. âLong gone. They brought me here, then left. Who knows about them nowâŠâ
âLooking for more sick kids toââ
âI donât think so.â He smiles wanly. âThey only needed one.â
Jack sits heavily on the cot in the corner. âI should have been with you.â
Sam comes to him, puts an arm around his thin shoulders. âIt was so long ago.â And he repeats, softly: âSo long.â
Jack rests his head on his friendâs shoulder. He thinks again about the look that crossed his face when they spoke about the driver. âIs he â Bear â is he yourâŠâ He frowns. âWell, I mean, are youââ
âWeâre friends.â Sam squeezes him gently.
Jack narrows his eyes. âBest friends?â
Sam throws back his head and laughs.
âBecause thatâs not fair, if you are. I know we lost touch for a while, butââ
Sam doubles over, and manages: âWere you always funny?â
Jack grins. âYeah. You just donât remember.â
With a mischievous glint in his eye, Sam makes to hit him â and Jack flinches so violently Sam not only withdraws his hand, but moves away from him, putting a foot of space between them on the cot. Jack breathes hard and tries to smile, to reassure him, but something flashed across Samâs face: this time an emotion Jack knows, something old, something of memory.
âI â Iâm sorry. Iââ Sam puts his hands under his thighs. âI wasnât going toâŠâ He shakes his head. âI donât know why I did that.â
âItâs okay,â says Jack, too quickly. âYou know, itâs been⊠Well, I donât know how this sounds, but itâs been so long since anyone â you know, touched me, I just. Iâm not sureââ
âNo.â Sam touches his chest. âItâs my fault. I wonât do that again, I promise.â
Jack nods. He brings his legs up, hugs them close to his chest. âWhat else happens here?â
Sam relaxes visibly. âEverything. It started small, before I got here. Weâre making sure we know how to live. People like Bear, they go out to see whatâs still out there. What we can salvage, you know. Food and resources, things like that. Greenhouses went up years ago. We grow whatever we can, regulating the soil, the temperature. I donât pretend to understand how it works.â
They laugh, and Sam moves a little closer again. âAnd it isnât just practical things. Not just food and water and supplies. Weâre trying to cover as much as we can â anything we think weâll need, and then anything we want. Whether thatâs leisure or education. Whatever. And of course, there are people like Dr Nguyen. People like me, too. We do everything here, for everyone. I said before about being in charge â that group you saw when you came in. But again, itâs more equal than that. We want everyone to have a say. And the consensus is, right now, to make sure we can survive on what we have. To see if things are sustainable. But we donât want to just stay here. We donât think thatâs fair. If we survived, there must be others, right? Like you.â
Jack smiles.
âAnd youâll have to tell me all about it. But we figure, it canât be just us. And if we can figure out a way to live, we shouldnât only keep ourselves alive. Does that make sense?â
Jack nods. âItâs good,â he says. âItâs nice.â
âWe hope so.â Sam grins. âSo many people died, Jack. I mean. How old were you when it started? Do you remember?â
âFive.â
âSo I would have been just eleven.â He gets a faraway look on his face then, and his eyes go glassy. âI think I â I think I can just barely remember seeing something on the news. I donât know if I just invented the memory. But elevenâs old enough to remember, I think.â
Jack stays quiet, unsure.
âDo you know how many people died?â
Jack pulls a face. âI donât like to think about it.â
âNo.â Sam touches his hand. âNeither do I. Sometimes we have to.â
Knowing the answer, he asks, âYou have to think about the bad stuff?â
âItâs not good to do it all the time, butâŠâ He sighs. âYeah, sometimes.â
Jack gnaws his cheek. âDo you â want me to tell you sometime? About the bad stuff.â
Absently, eyes unfocused again, Sam strokes the spot where Jackâs pinkie should be. âYeah,â he says, far away again. âBut tell me the good stuff first.â
~
Thank you so much for reading.
Of course, my story is not the only piece in the zine; four other brilliant creatives offered their work, too. If you’d like to read those, too, you can request a copy (digital or print) of Curiđ sity Kills by emailing dionysianpubliclibrary@gmail.com
Please make sure to follow V.F. Thompson and Dionysian Public Library on Twitter so you never miss an update on future publications.