by Audrey T. Carroll
The scurrying upstairs sounds strange now, like a million things it isn’t. There are squirrels for certain—I’ve seen them escaping onto our roof like they’re emerging from some portal to another world. There are heavier creatures, too. Our best guess has always been racoons, but how they get in and out I couldn’t say. No matter how much they all skitter and thump around, no matter how many times they make me jump in the middle of the night when I think I’m utterly alone, I haven’t got the heart to call an exterminator. Or maybe that’s just another story I tell myself. Maybe I’m just afraid—afraid of the weight of silence, afraid of hearing the ghosts that linger. Continue reading
Hawaii Pacific Review 