A conversation I had with Kyeli really made me aware of the destructive power of silliness. I’m not talking about the “Hey guess what, I can stick pretzels up my nose” kind of silliness, I’m talking about the “Hey guess what, I can do magic and it actually works” kind of silliness. We hide parts of ourselves because we fear others thinking we’re silly, or different, or flawed, or abnormal in some uncomfortable and unacceptable way. Sometimes the parts we hide are the best parts of ourselves. Why are we so afraid of others thinking we’re silly? Why are we so afraid of others thinking we’re different? Why are we so afraid of others thinking we’re how we actually are? What would happen, really, if we just showed ourselves, fully, as we truly are? What would happen if I unfurled my wings in public? Would the world come to an end? Probably not. But maybe if it did, it would be replaced by something even more beautiful.

Some of my friends submitted words or phrases and I wrote a drabble for each one. The submitted word or phrase is the title of each story.

Your lips resting against the base of my throat, we lie together languidly in the freshly fallen autumn leaves. The midday sun peeks out from behind a sluggish cloud as if to say “I see you!” with a wink. Resignedly I rise and kiss your shell out of weakness, anger, and love.

“Why are there grass stains on your skirt?” he asks when I arrive. I gently take him by the hand and lead him outside to the sea. “Do you see this?” I ask him calmly, gesturing to the ocean. He nods. “Do you see this?” I shout, removing my shell to expose the fist-sized knotted bruise underneath.

He turns away, for the last time.

Stephanie swung gleefully on the monkey bars.

She lost her grip, fell, and broke her spine. She was rushed to the hospital and put in a body cast. It took her four months, but she made a full recovery. Afterwards, they moved out of their nice house into a tiny apartment, and Mr. Meow Mix couldn’t come! Stephanie hoped the vet was taking good care of him. She missed all her friends because the kids at her new school were really mean. Stephanie didn’t completely understand all this, but she knew it had something to do with the hospital, and she knew it was her fault.

Stephanie continued swinging to the other side of the monkey bars. She shivered as she felt a strange feeling, kind of like deja vu, but sideways. She shrugged, and smiled.

They eat the food the Earth provides for them. They struggle for survival but do not wage war, for if they did, the balance would be upset, their food would be no more, and they would disappear in the blink of an eye.

Millions of years pass.

One day, a small faction of them get some dangerous ideas in their heads. They believe that they do not need balance to survive, so they take all the food for themselves.

They disappear in the blink of an eye.

Alliteration is asinine. Its “poetic” percussive panderings are a put-down to any proper person. Its silly sibilants simply sound substandard, with a scarcity of subtlety. Contiguous consonants can clearly command confidence, but come on! No one with a knowledgeable noodle needs ninety-nine Ns to knock in a new notion; no, never! Revolt, readers! Rise up! Refuse to read ridiculous repetitions! Boycott bombastic bastardization, I beg you! Fight for freedom; forsake phonemic flatulence! Our language is languishing. Let’s leave alliteration and lift ourselves up to the linguistic light.

“You have a lightning bolt of hair across your face,” she said to me in the shower.

Suddenly it all came back in a flash of memory and power. I took her hand, leapt out of the shower, and said “Get dressed! We’re going to the Greyhound station right now! I’ll explain later, for now just trust me!”

I never should have ordered that pizza with extra Horcrux last night, I thought to myself as we arrived at the station and headed towards the blank wall of Platform 0¾.

I brushed my hair back and looked her in the eye. “I have to take care of some unfinished business.”

A bee flies by without buzzing. The trees’ branches sway gently back and forth in the silent wind; the leaves do not rustle. The birds open their beaks and sing soundlessly to each other. High up in the clear blue sky, a jet plane passes, its engines turning without a whisper.

I hear nothing else as she and I lie together in the grass. I hear no sound at all except for the soft beating of her heart that embraces me, envelops me, and becomes my world.

“Well, we agreed that I’d only have to do this job for a few months, but it’s been almost a year now.”

“But you know that there’s nobody else that can take it over yet.”

“I know that, I know the situation is unavoidable right now. It just feels like everyone’s just expecting that I’ll continue to do it rather than appreciating it.”

“But you’re the only person who can do this job!”

“I know! I know! I’m not trying to solve any problem! I just want to feel understood!”

That was the moment I realized what it means to be a woman in an industry full of men.