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tones 2011 literary editors jennie conway dana mingione art editors victoria hardy jessica sorace staff kira carlee bridget flynn grace gorenstein sarah kugelman maggie mcevoy alex natale caroline peeples juliet quaglia jenna wecht advisors donna grasso sarah mcmane cover sarah song jennifer amos principal sheila silverman assistant principal mark soss assistant principal tappan zee high school 15 dutch hill rd orangeburg ny 10962

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table of contents 1 2 3 4 5 7 8 9 10 11 12 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 30 darkness alex natale dr seuss and shakespeare take a stroll through a graveyard jonathan pang art jessica sorace a very potter essay dana mingione art jessica lynady lightning maggie mcevoy art jessica sorace dear mike grace gorenstein strength jenna wecht art jessica sorace first date emily thomas art tess kelly smiling crocodile owen gould art jessica lynady love s not blind it just wears rose colored glasses jessica risolo art jessica lynady mears shuttle dana mingione art owen gould ophelia and hamlet a tragic tale of two fish maggie mcevoy art diana yu what a weeping willow mackensie huelbig art judy zhang tabby eyes of ember linda garzia art sarah song 3:21 a.m maggie mcevoy art kimmy herrera purple couch theatre bridget flynn art ally nelson electric monster sherjan ahmad art charlotte harrow my favorite word john brancato january 17 2011-a dream jack carey art diana yu back molly defalco art ally nelson ignored kira carlee art sarah song coldstone nicole bermudez art tess kelly macbeth in limericks jenna wecht art jessica sorace lily caroline peeples art tess kelly a smile on my heart jessica risolo celestial maggie mcevoy art carmen uruttia-orme art everyone poops theresa flynn 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 57 58 your loss on repeat mackensie huelbig cherry blossom grace gorenstein art jessica sorace struck by innocence linda garzia childhood summer amanda gariola art tess kelly passion sherjan ahmad art kira carlee dreaming of winter s approach nicole bermudez art juan molina bow abby flynn art victoria hardy geometric dreams linda garzia art sarah song stormy haze mackensie huelbig art sara zawalick this one s for you shannon andrews art kira carlee the shadowlands nicole bermudez art juan molina lemonade stand kira carlee art diana yu i am with you gabriela castro art katy kim corkboard jennie conway art dana mingione heart-shaped rash bridget flynn art juan molina the obscure kira carlee art diana yu all the world s a stage jennie conway art olivia joseph innocence bridget flynn art sarah song dream a youth s perception linda garzia art kira carlee truth-telling lies kira carlee art juan molina pork perfection jennie conway art dana mingione scarecrow abby flynn art victoria hardy the wizarding world jennie conway art ally nelson 8 ben yassky art kira carlee dust amanda lafiandra art saeun yoo art sarah song

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darkness by alex natale it was the darkness that terrified me it poured in from every crevice to consume my room with blackness from beyond my window stars burned holes against the dark sky i d lie trembling in bed alone in what seemed like an infinite abyss of blackness forcing my eyes to stay open my parents down the hall i d nestle ever closer to my stuffed animal and bury my small face under the covers the fight raged on each night my fears versus the drowsiness that weighed heavy upon my eyelids invariably each night i lost to slumber and when my eyes reopened my room was flooded with sunlight and i was safe once more but my peace was only temporary and the sun would recede into the distance every evening bringing darkness in its place it was an impossible battle one i seemed doomed to fight for the rest of my life each night i d crawl into bed and hide deeper underneath my covers ornate quilts i had chosen because they looked like princess sheets it was there i sought protection from visions of malicious criminals that threatened to spill from the darkness i never talked about my fears with anyone hoping they d vanish eventually but i had no such luck then one night my fight took an unexpected turn i was sleeping over my friend s house and it was bedtime from my sleeping bag my eyes fixated upon the window the night was eerily black and the branches morphed into sharp claws against the window pane which seemed as though they were reaching out to grab me beyond the branches stretched a vast empty meadow where darkness poured from every corner my fear seemed to lock all my joints in place leaving me with no option but to tremble with wide eyes my friend seemed to sense my terror yet she appeared unaffected by the black night what s wrong she asked i hesitated then attempted to explain my fears sitting up she offered words of comfort that i ll never forget you don t have to be afraid she said if you you can t see it it can t see you suddenly my fears melted and my eyelids drooped i allowed myself to be comforted by the hollow darkness i now saw it as a shield and hid blanketed by the blackness that had once traumatized me words uttered in youth are often forgotten by adult minds but i haven t feared darkness since that night now at the end of a long day i look forward to coming home and turning off the lights to seep myself in peaceful blackness i lie in bed hiding from the world reassured that because it s beyond my vision it can t see me either 1

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dr seuss and shakespeare take a stroll through a graveyard by jonathan pang not very far a mere few blocks away lay the state of denmark with something rotten that day we resume our story where the tall tombstones stand where two gravediggers dig for a grave in demand and among the tall tombstones where two gravediggers dig they laugh and they joke and from their drink take a swig there is so much to dig says the man called the clown yes says the joker i dig with a frown i ll cheer you up with a riddle of mine it goes like this tis clever and fine i m good at riddles i ve answered a few let me try my luck at this one from you as they joke and they dig two men watch from afar and one of them cries with his mouth left ajar have they no respect to joke with the dead clearly that gravedigger he s lost his head you re right says horatio to hamlet the dane why don t you tell him he s quite insane excuse me sir whose grave lies here why mine of course me with my shovel and beer i shall ask again mr gravedigger sir is this a grave for a him or a grave for a her why none of the above for she is now dead died a horrible death drowned in a river bed oh death is so dreadful for the rest is unknown and all that is left is mere skull and dry bone there s the late yorick a jester he was now he lies in a hole that s all he does the great the loved the missed the many why after death they are worth less than a penny even grand caesar and alexander the great men of much power and heads of the state jessica sorace even they die and turn into dust oh i must have my revenge i will and i must and now a procession comes along marching so let us hide in those trees the ones that are arching why tis king claudius along my mother and laertes too ophelia s brother and there lies ophelia so pale and still she is dead oh no it brings me a chill dear sister cries laertes how i loved you so i loved you more than you could ever know you are wrong laertes shouts hamlet the dane i loved her the most and i am not insane hamlet shouts laertes tis your fault she lost her life and now i shall kill you with my hunting knife cease shouts claudius the deceitful king or i shall ship you both off straight to beijing yes please end the fighting gertrude says to her son thou is not well for thy wit is undone come laertes remember our plan soon we ll have our revenge he ll be a dead man yes you re right good king laertes replies soon we ll both bring about hamlet s demise 2

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a very potter essay by dana mingione i am a nerd plain and simple i have never tried to deny or hide that fact because quite frankly i am proud of it in fact i remember the exact moment when my nerditute sprang into being i was sitting on the reading rug of my second grade classroom staring innocently up at my teacher in complete awe of the power of the words she was unleashing upon me the more she read the more spellbound i became i needed to get this book about wizards and magic into my hands so i could become fully immersed in the world of harry potter since that fateful day in ms o brien s class i have devoured each and every installment of j.k rowling s enchanting series cover to cover more than once i have engaged in heated debates about which hogwarts house each of my friends belongs in i have participated in multiple midnight release parties at bookstores dressed in full robes glasses and lightning scar i am a nerd the idea of a magical world where anything is posjessica lynady sible captured me instantly but it isn t the reason these books remain close to my heart reading about harry s adventures allowed me to escape from the muggle world for a while and lose myself among the corridors of hogwarts castle a ten-year-old me wanted nothing more on a saturday morning than to curl up on my couch and devour prisoner of azkaban for the third time on any given day during my elementary school years i could be seen sporting my gryffindor house backpack filled with hogwarts emblazoned notebooks as well as a t-shirt with a harry s face on it my friends and i constantly wrote read and critiqued fan-fiction which gave us a chance to unleash our own creative twists onto our favorite stories during a school production we reenacted the famous wingardium leviosa scene from the sorcerer s stone movie it would be a laughable understatement to say i was obsessed when i first adopted this fervor for harry potter my parents were initially thrilled by their daughter s energetic attitude toward reading they probably had no idea how heavily it would impact their own lives my mother read the first few books in the series with me and eventually took to reading the rest herself my father kept a relatively safe distance from the world of potter successfully sleeping through the movie adaptations but no matter how many times he smacked his head on the stuffed owl hanging from my ceiling he never made me take it down each and every time i pulled on my gryffindor hoodie or logged online to re-watch the latest movie trailer i would pause and take a second to appreciate what a spectacular nerd i was i d then smile knowing exactly how i looked to the outside world and still feeling completely content with myself i was and still remain thankful that i found something that i throw myself into heart and soul harry potter and the sorcerer s stone was published in 1998 and harry started his education at hogwarts the same year that i started kindergarten the final film installment of harry potter and the deathly hallows will be released less than a month after i graduate from high school in a way graduation marks the end of my childhood and the end of the harry potter series only adds to the sense of loss that i know i will be feeling but these dramatic changes in my life do not mean that i leave harry behind entirely the lessons and memories that i took from these books were part of the foundation of my childhood along with the family and friends that i learned to value like nothing else i know i ll always have that metaphorical scar on my forehead a constant reminder of my everlasting nerditude 3

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lightning by maggie mcevoy hold still just for a moment i just want one good picture my camera is too crappy my shutter is too slow for me to catch you dancing across the sky you have me spinning round and round trying to catch a glimpse of youjust out of sight while you scream in my ear lighting up the world as if it were day if there truly is a god he must be behind this raging for what other powerful creature could make this sort of ruckus but it is not the source i want to captureit is you the creation of sound and light and water and anger you who is always out of reach 4 jessica sorace

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dear mike by grace gorenstein dear mike attached with this letter is that sweatshirt you let me wear that day i was cold over the summer even though it was august it was windy so i wasn t faking the chills when i held my arms tight to my body implying that i was cold i would have been fine if you hadn t been there with this sweatshirt but it was really nice that you let me wear it i wore it more than once a lot more than once i never wanted to be that girl who associated a sweatshirt with someone and wore it all the time because i missed him but somehow that happened i started out telling myself that i liked it as a functional piece of clothing with no relation to you but then i started wearing it to bed with my sleeved arms close to my face hoping the warmth of the cotton would be a reflection of your warmth so it became pretty clear that i wore it for you it s washed so don t worry i hated when it went through the wash because every time it smelt a little less like you but especially before giving it back i had to if it smells like me it s because i sprayed it with my perfume i m not sure if you noticed how my hair smelt or if you noticed the color of my eyes or anything like that so you may just think the sweatshirt smells like vanilla not the girl you used to hold did you notice i mean more than my scent i know that you probably won t respond but i m just wondering did you notice how my chest felt close to yours when you held me how my lips felt how i couldn t stop smiling when you demolished me in soccer there was other stuff too remember how we lost track of time talking more like debating but i liked it well maybe debating half of the time talking half of the time i liked how we disagreed it was fun remember batman and superman i m sticking to my decision that batman is all around better because he s a normal man who made himself super while you re going to keep being lame and saying that superman s better just because he s invincible the regular talking was good too about what it would be like to live in the middle ages or what the real problems with society are like dishonesty and trust maybe we re both a little too philosophical for our age but i liked us that s basically what i m trying to say i liked how we were together i liked the way i fit in your arms sorry if i already said that but i felt so safe but at the same time i felt really exposed we talked about things i never thought i d talk about just because i thought certain things were off limits so the magazine gods say men don t want to hear about a woman s insecurities because it s not sexy to be self-conscious but i wasn t worried about that with you you told me the truth so i could tell you about my insecurities not as a lover but as a friend maybe that s what i liked the best how we were close like friends and we could tell each other anything you were always honest always even when what you said especially towards the end made me cry that s why i could never stop feeling how i feel towards you as horrible as i feel about everything i respect your side of the story and understand your rationale there was never any it s not you it s me that s probably why the he doesn t deserve you thing never worked it s not about deserving one another it s about finding someone to be happy and relaxed with but also being able to grow as a person from being with him that s what you did you changed me even though you didn t mean to it just happened i felt so strong with you but not just as an individual i felt protected which then made me feel like a stronger person on my own does that make sense i never felt like i had to do anything different but i wanted to i wanted to look good for you to make you feel lucky for being with me because i felt so lucky just to be with you but at the same time you made me feel beautiful so i could be happy without any makeup on and my hair all mufasa because it gets so frizzy remember making up that 5

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nickname it was so crazy legitimately being comfortable with someone like i was with you even now that you ve moved on i m still changed ­ which is new no one s ever left that kind of impression on me we re not together anymore but you ve made me more aware of myself and more willing to tell the truth no matter the consequences before you i saw nothing wrong with white lies but after seeing how you epitomize how honesty can actually work i could never go back to little stretches of truth that s kind of what this letter is my coming out as an honest member of society except most of society isn t honest and the craziest part is i m not honest only because i want to win you back i m honest because now my character demands that of me i know that it seems unrealistic that i changed so much over one summer but most of me is the same my realism hasn t changed i never believed in love and i probably never will but then again i never saw myself as the type who wears someone else s sweatshirt to bed just to feel a little less lonely i never expected to keep hoping that maybe possibly you ll burst into my classroom one day having driven the five and a half hours it takes to get here with either a rose or some chocolates or a teddy bear something like that you ll have a speech planned something very sweet your face will get red just like it does when you play soccer or get into a heated debate with me but once you see me and start to say what you had planned the words will evaporate this is my favorite part because it s cute in a human way you re not superman baby and i like that you ll struggle a little trying to find the way to say everything it ll be something about how you re willing to wait for me to believe in love because you love me even though you believe that love can t be unrequited and that you consider me not loving you only because i haven t associated a word to my feelings yet so the unrequited clause doesn t matter for the moment you ll say you just want to spend every moment you can with me after everything is said i approach you say something reserved that makes you question even making the trek but then i soften kiss you and the rest is a flashback of what we had only intensified you remember don t you how you felt with me i remember what i felt because i still feel the same way it must have been different for you though since we re in this situation being with you meant that nothing else mattered but at the same time the world kept moving so we had to keep up except instead of standing alone we d be doing it together and as we kept going forwards we had each other to stay grounded it was the togetherness that was the best part every single connection we had was amazing from the electricity of when we kissed to the relaxed feeling i got when you d draw little circles with your finger on my skin each interaction had a special meaning whether you made my heart speed up or slow down i was always happy with you does that make sense being active and being relaxed with you were both nice those moments when we were together were so long ago but i still feel the same way maybe that s what being together is feeling the same feelings even though that fight happened and you ve moved on makes me think that something s still there i know that waiting for you to convince me that love exists is unrealistic you know how stubborn i am but my belief that love doesn t exist is still the one thing i m secretly wishing you ll prove wrong realistically that s not happening but i still can t let go of what it felt like to actually be with someone not just physically but emotionally our words and ideas were just as intertwined as our fingers when we went on those long walks which made me believe in crazy ideas like a boy bursting into a classroom and confessing how he feels about a girl i keep telling myself that you won t respond to this but i m hoping that the more i say that the more i ll be pleasantly surprised when you contact me sort of like the whole love thing even though you felt different things you must have felt something and maybe if you felt something then there s a hope that you could feel something now what i really want more than the rose or the chocolate or the teddy is for you to give us another chance so that you can feel what i felt when we were together elizabeth 6

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strength by jenna wecht the sky had turned an ugly shade of grey and thunder rumbled in the distance it seemed to be mirroring my emotions as i stormed into the forest my anger seemed so strong that it blurred my vision as i stumbled along the trail no piece of nature was safe as i traveled further into the wood i tore leaves from trees ripped branches from saplings and kicked stones as i continued to walk in my rage finally when my anger had fused out i collapsed into a heap on the forest floor all around me was the wreckage that i had created but through the debris one lone fern stood once again thunder echoed in the skies above and it let some drops of rain slip from the clouds pat pat it fell on the fallen leaves the fern seemed to bounce as rain drops fell upon it jessica sorace as i stared at it the joyful bounce took a more cruel meaning the little fern was laughing at me mocking me for being so weak my anger returned in an explosion and i reached for the plant intending to pluck it out and end its pathetic life after all it was even weaker than me but as the tips of my fingers grazed the fragile stem of the small fern another vision came to my view i imagined the little fern i watched as it persevered through wind and rain through thunder and lightning even after flood and heat the little fern stood i removed my hand from around its stem as it continued to bounce about to survive another storm i stood up not bothering to wipe the mud off of my pants and looked up to the sky i felt the rain as it fell on my face my anger extinguished for now and as i looked back to the fern i did not see mockery or cruelty in its bounce now i saw something else dance to the beat of the rain little fern who knew you could be so strong 7

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first date by emily thomas tess kelly we take our seats in the front of a crowded room side by side as i lean back in the itchy seat the first squeak rings in my ears it s funny how on important occasions the slightest imperfections seem to encompass the mind consume every breathe chip away at your soul my wandering eyes stumble upon a girl as young as me walking across the carpet two shiny silver crutches make her movements awkward and staggered a plump man in a gray sweater obstructs my view as he waddles down the aisle the smell of buttery stale popcorn wafts toward me filling my nostrils as i inhale i turn my head straight forward gazing at the black screen before me as i aimlessly twirl my hair between the thumb and pointer finger of my left hand then as if being awakened suddenly from a dream i feel a large sweaty hand fit its way into mine tilting my head ever so slightly i take a peek at him through a forest of eyelashes his foggy blue eyes seem to echo my jittery nervousness he moves forward ever so slightly the lights dim and everything is silent until one annoying squeak echoes throughout the theater 8

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smiling crocodile by owen gould smiling crocodile covered to its crust in lilies crocodile smiled at nature and nature laughed back lady crocodile s smiling snout became so mammoth that the frightened lilies slid down her gleaming teeth and gently floated down the saturated swamp silly and scared she dove closed eyes tasting the warm purple water oh beauty she swam deeper lady creature lurched eyes burst open glowing magnificently deeper still fat little fish hummed a happy sailors song unsuspecting he he he softly whispered through the teeth of cunning lady crocodile he he he ha with beethoven she plunged piercing biting gnawing drinking caressing the tender skin of the soon to be lifeless animals with the fangs given by oh glorious one ha she sang ha ha ha echoes of weeping faded into the primordial goo jessica lynady lady crocodile yawned all this loving made tired grow upon her limbs and snout she quietly tiptoed to the shallow tip of the water and rested her heavy bursting belly onto the nearest darkest lilypad her eyelids drooped she fell into a deep slumber dusk waved goodbye and the night creatures planned their attack 9

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love s not blind it just wears rose colored glasses by jessica risolo he wasn t pretty unless you were in love with him his features were large and somewhat obnoxious at first glance and every one after that his nose was too big hooked and flattened unattractively at the tip dark eyelashes made way to large icy blue eyes with tiny green flecks around his pupils his eyebrows were too bushy with unruly stray hairs pointing out in a manner similar to a porcupine s spikes the crease lines in his forehead allowed a breeding ground for an angry crop of pimples that starred at me menacingly his cheeks still held baby fat a stark contrast to his gangly skinny body his lips were always chapped and bloody and when he smiled he revealed two rows of thick metal braces usually containing remains of his most recent meal his chin jutted out too far the product of a horrendous overbite that the orthodontia was meant to repair his sideburns were non existent due to an unfortunate incident involving a do it yourself fireworks kit he was always as pale as the milk he drank from an eco-friendly bottle each morning as he rode to my house on his trust banana seat bike to pick me up for school but that s a completely separate topic despite all his pedaling his leg muscles were scrawny and his knees knobby matching the rest of his bony frame i often didn t want to stand next to him for fear of looking fat his clothes were always too loose and often mismatched unless i had picked them out for him during one of our nightly hours long phone calls he wore converse sneakers every day of his life including junior prom needless to say he wasn t exactly the next mr universe ironically i had been participating in and winning beauty pageants since i was six years old my life had been a series of the same compliments repeated over and over again it didn t matter who told me i was beautiful i just nodded graciously and thanked them he was the only one who made me feel it and believe that it was true many of those who praised me had taken me aside during the course of our relationship and asked in a serious tone why a girl like me was with a guy like him i always answered in the same way with the same clipped tone that was cold and irritated what kind of a girl would that be beautiful stunning exuberant flawless were just a few of the replies i had received i had heard it all just in different forms and varying levels of conviction so is he i would say in as a polite of tone as i could muster through my layers of defensiveness to me he truly was beautiful just not in the conventional way he spent every sunday afternoon with his grandmother at her nursing home often bringing her the small cookies and candy she liked despite her diabetes he volunteered at the children s hospital around christmas as a candy striper and managed to pull off the humiliating uniform with dignity he was fluent in french russian and spanish and he always helped with my calculus homework if it hadn t been for his tutoring i would have spent my summer retaking the class instead of having impromptu beach picnics with him he was always up for a game of uno and preferred staying in and watching old movies to going to a party and drinking the night away when i was cold he would give me his flannel shirts to wear and then wrap his arms around me tightly so i could bathe in his warmth i always kept the shirts and he never asked for them back in school he would wait for me after fifth period english just so we could walk the thirty-five feet to my locker with our fingers interlaced snugly and share a quick kiss before he headed off to ap psychology he would text me silly facts and anecdotes throughout the day and every time he signed off after instant messaging me he would end with the same words talk to you later beautiful 10 jessica lynady

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mears shuttle by dana mingione airport shuttle german men business suits medical conference hushed conversation foreign intricacies intrigued ears dulcet tones soft cadence lilting mumble calm buzzing no commanding bark no icy hiss delicious rumbles subtle purrs door opens firm handshake silent bus 11 owen gould

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ophelia and hamlet a tragic tale of two fish by maggie mcevoy it was the beginning of summer and one of those dodgy carnivals had made camp in the parking lot behind my school it was small and bright the smell of popcorn and cigarettes coating the air above here was where i won two bright orange goldfish i was hesitant to play any games after last year s incident in which i got conned into playing some stupid balloon popping game for five dollars those carnival folk are so sneaky i surprised myself though by winning three orange goldfish during the ring toss game that nobody not even little league coach dads could seem to win i walked around with those yellow cards in my pocket saying that you won a fish contemplating whether or not i was really going to go back for my fishies i thought of how my mom would react to me bringing home another pet but it wasn t like they needed a lot of attention and i didn t even have to buy them i gave one of my cards to my friend since she hadn t won any and went to claim my two new gilled friends on the ride home i considered what to name them as a new mom this was the most important decision i would make that night my sister and her friends chimed in from the back seat with their own silly idea names such as maximilian fishy the second and bob i decided that since there were two fish couple names were a must i finally narrowed it down to shakespeare inspired names romeo and juliet where out of the question they were overused and romeo was a whiny crybaby i ll name them hamlet and ophelia i said i had just finished hamlet in school and was still obsessed with shakespeare s denmark tragedy i ran the name over in my head and realized that if ophelia died the sad irony would not be lost on me i wanted to take back the names and name them tatiana and oberon from a midsummer night s dream but i had declared their names out loud and they were doomed to live with them at home dad dug out an old fish bowl and we filled it with water and let the two lovers get used to their new homes i left them on the dining room table for the night almost forgetting to feed them the next day before i ran out to a friend s house when i got into the car to go home later that day my dad told me he had some bad news my heart dropped you see i was not the only one who had recently become a new mommy my brother and sister-in-law had given birth to their first child the day before i had acquired my own two finned children my first thought was that something horrible had happened to my nephew that wasn t the case one of your fish died my dad said oh i sighed with relief which one uhhhh the little one he replied i knew it i said ophelia had died just like i had predicted when i got home i found hamlet in his bowl swimming around and staring at the floating body of his other half who lay belly side up in a cup right next to his bowl who left ophelia s dead body right next to the fish bowl for hamlet to stare at i screamed my dad just shrugged his shoulders i quickly disposed of flower girl s body muttering about how scarred hamlet must be his place on the dining room table seemed improper and wrong now so i looked for a new location to place his traveling pond my room seemed too dangerous i was sure to do some stupid maneuver that would end up with water and a fish all over my floor besides books and knickknacks covered every surface and there was no where safe to really place him i decided that the counter in the bathroom seemed to suit him just fine there he would not have a lot of people disturbing him it was there that hamlet sat for almost three months the bathroom took on this fishy food smell almost immediately it wasn t too great to inhale while brushing your teeth and hamlet had to get use to seeing everyone shower but we all adapted everything was fine until the end of august i was in the bathroom when i noticed that hamlet was very close to the water s surface i panicked and quickly 12

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