“I should’ve been a pilot,” he says to anyone who comes close. “But my eyes let me down.”

He frowns as if he might be able to make his eyes what they should have been through sheer effort, then slumps, just a little, just for a few seconds.

When the planes fly low he leans a little further still, stretching his neck and chin skywards.

“Look!” He grabs my arm. “Look! This time they’re coming.”

His eyes are bright. “We have to be ready.”

“Okay, yep.” I nod. “Be with you in a second.”

His head bobbles with anticipation. I pat him on the back and walk down the steep curve of the driveway, taking care not to get my sleeve caught on the bougainvillea thorns.

“He still up there?” Karen says when I walk inside. “Don’t you think it’s time you brought him back down?”

“He’s happy enough,” I answer.

Karen tut-tuts as I peer out the window and watch him watch the sky, watch him leaning in towards the planes that never land, and for a moment I wish that my head, too, was filled with the simple wonder of things that can never be, and never wonder why.

Maree Kimberley is a part-time Ph.D. student who lives in Brisbane, Australia where it’s nearly always sunny. She holds a Bachelor of Creative Industries and a Master of Arts, both from Queensland University of Technology. She has published short stories, feature articles and a children’s book, and has several novel-length manuscripts hidden away. You can follow her on Twitter @reebee01.

I remember it was hot that noon. I was sitting outside on the loading dock, leaning on the corrugated steel. The steel felt cool in the shade. The explosion had to be loud, but I don’t remember. I think I saw an orange flame. Then maybe the top two thirds of “The Largest Blast Furnace in the Western Hemisphere” disappeared in that black disaster smoke. Just like you see on TV.

What I really remember is the coke. Pea sized. Coming down all around me and bouncing on the concrete. I remember my hard hat was lying upside down with a sandwich in it. Pickle loaf with American cheese. Then I was standing inside the loading dock with the hard hat on my head and pickle loaf mush on my hand.

When I looked back, men were coming down the stairs along the outside and running toward the road. A line of light shirts under a black cloud. I finished lunch later, inside. Went back for my chocolate milk. Bought a Butterfinger at the canteen. I have forgotten who died. No one I knew. But I remember those pellets of coke, dropped around like petrified bunny shit. We swept coke balls out of the parking lot all afternoon.

Mike Smetzer has been published in New Letters, West Branch, Cottonwood, and Hanging Loose, among others, and has two chapbooks: A Quiet Man and Teaching the Clergy to Dance. Some of his published work appears on his writing website, mikesmetzer.wordpress.com.

Alexandra Tanner is currently an undergraduate at the University of Florida, where she reads, writes, and does her best to avoid football culture. Her plays have been presented at the Pittsburgh New Works Festival as well as at the University of Florida. Her work can be found online at Anderbo.