Alyssa Quach

The strength she possessed was not physical—she was ill during flu season, and she needed eight hours to be pleasant. Her strength was of the mind. She thought herself capable in a dangerous situation, though she didn’t carry because she knew she wouldn’t be willing to actually wield whatever it was, and believed that switching languages or doing a cartwheel would work better to throw an attacker off their expectation.

The temperature had dropped to 60 and it was cool, and people were out strolling for safety. Although there had been many conversations about self-defense classes, there had not been any follow-through, and she still walked the neighborhood after every dinner. She had the kind of gall that sons admire in their fathers.  

Three men on mopeds rode smoothly down the center of the street. They looked like men who were friends because their children were. Not unlike the dystopian backdrop of steam rising out of steel pipes toward a hot colored sky, there appeared a loitering fog.  

The girl crossed the street after they passed by. Another girl exited her apartment building to return something to her car, and the three men approached her; they shouted statements that would’ve been complimentary and kind if spoken in a different tone. As they bothered her, the first girl started walking faster and rerouted to a strange path back home. She saw the girl surrounded, opening her car door. She had an exoskeleton; it was four wheels and navy blue, so she left the girl to fend for herself; she reached her front door. 

She fumbled to lock it behind her. One turn, no bolt. She felt small and ashamed and that she should go back to help the girl, but she also thought that from her height and length of hair, the moped men wouldn’t be compelled to different morals from her presence. . Naturally, she held a mind free and at ease, and she did not care for feeling so limited. She knew her strength, but she supposed it mattered that it wasn’t observable. She left the girl to fend for herself.. 

In her car, she drove south until hitting the freeway so that the moped men wouldn’t follow. They were not deranged enough to enter a freeway in vehicles without doors and must’ve had work the next morning. She took the second exit and started back home, thinking of the girl she saw walking who crossed the street after the moped men and increased her pace after they started shouting. She wondered if they were still roaming and if they located that girl’s front door, whether they were knocking with intentions to blow her house down and dine. But then, she thought, they seemed to lack the dedication to loiter, so then she thought further that the girl must be alright. 

Upon arrival, her parking spot was still open, the men had dissipated, and the lights in her home were a rich yellow. Being without her key, she knocked on the front door under the porch illumination and heard footsteps approaching where she stood. Her roommates were at the ends of laughter when they opened the door—the oven was beeping, and the smell of bananas and cloves traveled just enough outside for her to notice that for all the early evening they had been baking together. One roommate held in her palm, a plate with a very thick slice of banana bread; it was extremely hot, still a bit raw, finished with chunks of chocolate, and steaming. With her free hand, she took hold of her roommate, returned, and gently pulled her inside.