Dante 20:11-12

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It was a pleasure to hold Heaven at my fingertips before my burial. Even the most impure of oil patches simmering miles below were once the remains of Eden.

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I told you to run. You obeyed, escaping this monastery to trade a world of establishment for a world of anonymity.

(There’s a difference between listening and obeying, but instead, I’ll unpack the word run like how you would unpack the news of my downfall.

Run, as in: Pierre runs to the lakeside, lonely and breaking, but not yet alone and broken.

Run: Overlay the sounds of disorder in the distance with the rush of running water beneath the frozen surface.

Run: Pierre walks across the lake, while I run all the lifetimes we could’ve had together over and over in my head like a disciple flipping through the pages.

Run as in they escort me to the pathway that runs to the hillsides, as in I run out of reasons to justify my betrayal, as in I want to run us back and fix the worlds I broke.)

Pierre, the only fuel I run on is you. They can douse me in contempt, but without you, remember:

I will never burn.

Pierre 1:1-2

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In the beginning, there was you. In the end, I was found.

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(The first time you spoke, I almost skidded into the lake.)

During restless nights, I sneak out to the lakeside and befriend the night to remedy my loneliness. (Tonight, the sky repurposes the full moon as a sclera. Combined with the lake’s reflection, two omnipotent eyes study me, unblinking.)

A voice mumbles, barely audible over the lapping waves.

“It’s almost like paradise.”

I nearly stumble into the waters when I hear you. You lock eyes with me. Moonlight glosses your skin in silver, desaturating you from head to toe. “Who are you?”

“I’m your despair.” You crack a slight smile, a contradiction to the melancholy ringing in your voice.

I tiptoe through the boulders to reach you. “No, really—who are you?”

“You can call me Dante. I suppose you like midnight walks, too.”

“You could say that.” Picking up a pebble, I hurl it across the lake, ripples disrupting the shimmer on the surface. “I’m Pierre, by the way.”

“Pierre, like a ‘peer.’ A friend of sorts.” You bend down to retrieve a stone.

I notice your bad form as you cast the stone into the lake. As expected, it plummets with a splash. “We could be, in time.”

“In time—that sounds about right.” You sigh, shaking your head. “I’m always waiting, in time.”

Dante 19:56

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God has given us all batons, but will you choose to conduct harmonies or bludgeon prisoners?

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(I said ‘I love you’ at the orchestra pit a week after Christmas. For the last time.)

We sneak into the auditorium, knowing the front door would be unlocked. (We’ve always wondered what secrets lurk beneath the stage. Perhaps the secrets were us all along.)

“I told the Cardinals. They say they can fix me.”

“Priests used to burn sheet music and instruments like these during bonfires of the vanities.”

“Wish that Heaven was wherever I established it. I would take refuge in your eyes.”

“The stage above is quiet tonight.”

“I can’t hide what God already knows. I love you. If I could, I’d love you until the day you break. You need to go. I’m sorry.”

“We’ve known each other for two years.”

Pierre 7:17

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You were a fire, sealing the wounds in my waters.

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(There are dragons on the map.)

(Hic sunt dracones—here be dragons. These words haunt me with every page turn. With a bundle of stolen atlases, I plot out the uncharted waters surrounding the monastery.)

I scatter the papers on my duvet, the bed now a detective board. Nothing is consistent between these maps. I survey the diverging shores, misplaced mountain ridges, and absent woodland basins.

(I learned ages ago never to trust an ancient book.)

As you finish showering in the bathroom, I fold the maps back into the atlas and climb into bed with the Bible. (If you had known my skepticism, you would’ve advised me that warnings are to be observed, not disregarded.

With your unyielding loyalty, I guess you’ll never know, but I’d rather live in a world of sight than a world of blindness.)

Dante 12:25-26

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When zodiac constellations reflect in your irises, I mistake you for mythology. Forgive me if I confuse reality with allegory.

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(Of all the constellations in the sky, I will always choose to look for yours.)

(You tried to teach me how to hurl a stone with the right angle, but you soon realized that was never the problem. So you shifted to showing me how to let go instead.)

“Dante, put a little more strength into it.” A rock flies from your hand. “That’s why yours keeps falling.”

Your rock continues to leap on the water, but I divert my gaze to your reflection in the lake.

(Your eyes like shooting stars. Your jawline like mountain ridges. Your mouth like woodland basins. A world too dangerous for me to map.)

“Now you try.” You shiver in the winter cold and place a stone in my palm. I blink, glancing away from the lake. “Remember, put force before you let go.”

Pierre 12:23

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How a stone is handled reveals the persona within.

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(Of all the ways I could throw a stone, I will always choose to skip them.)

We are alone at the lake again. The sun spins above our heads as another one of your rocks sink to the bottom. In the spring heat, sweat soaks my shirt. White flowers pepper the perimeter, boughs bending with the weight of eventual fruit.

(I yearn for the day we could witness the blossoms bloom together. You’d sit on my shoulders, plucking an apple straight off a branch. Luscious red would fill the gap between your teeth while sugar would coat your tongue.)

“Any help here?” You fidget with a pebble. “All my stones fall right through.”

I blink, and the apples shimmer back into flowers. “Let’s come back at sundown. We’ll have more time then.”

Dante 7:17

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You were an ocean, extinguishing the fires I started.

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(There are dragons in my mind.)

(Ignis aurum probat—fire tests gold. My thoughts burn with inextinguishable beasts, their throats ejecting serpentine flames. I shut my mouth to keep it all in. Luscious red between my teeth. Spice and sugar on my tongue. Inhaling the smoke of guilt.)

Falling, falling, fallen—

I fall into the bathtub. Warmth. Splashing water. Porcelain beneath my fingers.

I exhale. Eyes closing. Breath slowing.

Silence.

After the water runs cold, after the memories run out, I step onto the bathmat and fetch a towel.

When I leave the bathroom, you are deep in a chapbook. (If you had known my struggle, you would’ve tried to mend my battles with only pelting stones and death wishes.

With your unyielding loyalty, I guess you’ll never know. But I’d rather incinerate alone than smother you with secondhand smoke.)

Pierre 19:14

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Ever wonder why fire is easy on the eyes, but the sun blinds with just a glance?

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(You said ‘I love you’ for the last time at the bonfire a week before Christmas.)

As the bonfire dies down, no one else stays at the firepit. (Our voices, a dying fire, flicker away.)

“We’ve known each other for two years.”

“Cicadas, quiet tonight.”

“Centuries ago, priests burned lyrical manuscripts, musical instruments, and everything harmonious in vanity bonfires.”

“The Cardinals think they can fix me. I told them about you.”

“You’ve shown me that Hell is just a state of mind.”

“I wish I was the love you deserved. Every day, I’m still wishing. I promise.”

Dante 1:1-2

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I finally found you in the end. You were only the beginning.

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(The first time you spoke, I knew I was unsavable.)

(Perhaps I was unsavable from the start, and you were just another combustible underbrush. Obliterating everything I touch. Consuming you to prolong myself.

But even wildfires die given enough time.)

The night is half-chasmic, half-scenic. (Constellations like buoys drifting in the abyss. A crescent moon grinning in the ether.)

“Even this Hell has moments of paradise,” I whisper.

“Who are you?” I swing my head toward the voice’s direction, and that’s when I see you. You, the source of my eventual unwinding.

You, who smiles like the night and entices like the lake.

“I’m your nightmare.” (Closest I could warn you to stay away.)

Instead, you approach closer. “No really—who are you?”

I hesitate. (Despite a lifetime at the monastery, there are always reverends I’ve never encountered.) “Call me Dante. Guess you like to stalk the night, too.”

“You could say that.” You thrust a pebble from your pocket at the lake. “By the way, I’m Pierre.”

“Pierre, like a ‘peer.’ A friend of sorts.” I kick a few stones into the water, watching them succumb to their own weight.

“We could be in time.”

“In time. Sounds about right.” My frigid breath disperses. (Like smoke clouds warning of danger.) “I’m always wading in time.”

Pierre 20:12-13

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I was burned by the sun but kissed by the fire. The smoke of your inferno shielded me from the rays.

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You told me to leave before the friars could capture me. I dart across the frozen lake, my mind still aching from your Judas kiss. You were right—in time, we became only the wait before the unwinding.

(Perhaps I’ll never understand your betrayal, but I want to understand the word leave like how I understand your oscillating outlook.

Leave, as in: You leave holes in my timeline as I wonder where we went wrong.

Leave: I remember the atlas paths while the leaves overhead cover me in my getaway.

Leave: You leave me wondering about the accuracy of our memories and all the nights we searched for salvation within each other.

Leave as in you start sparks that leave me distracted from the inferno, as in the sky leaves the moon on the floor and lifts the sun out of bed, as in I leave behind stones only you could recognize if you ever found a way to follow.)

Dante, I will sift for your lessons in the ashes you leave behind. You ignited me on fire in hopes that we could stay warm together, and now I know:

I will never burn.

Author's note:

The style of this was a mixture of epistolary and prose poetry, with a lyrical storytelling narration. Definitely a bit out of my comfort zone since my prose-esque writing is definitely not lyrical xD Ever since “When Heaven Freezes Over” was disqualified, I've always wanted to find a way to bring Dante and Pierre's story to the writing competition again. This was definitely a challenge to write because I had to avoid using any of the plot points from the original piece (as per the rules for re-writing past pieces); I didn't want to replace the original story, so instead, I had to figure out a way to write this new story without contradicting the old piece. I think I did a decent job filling in the gaps of the old story with this piece while still making this piece somewhat coherent xD If you want to read “When Heaven Freezes Over,” the piece is located here: https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/932771126/ . “When Heaven Freezes Over” and this piece can definitely be read as stand-alones, but they also make a lot of sense together! I won’t repeat anything I said in the author’s note of that story since it basically applies to this story too.

Using unreliable narrators and non sequitur was such a fun challenge with this piece! I've rarely seen these literary devices used for this writing competition, and I thought this piece was the perfect opportunity to incorporate it. It pairs well with the allegorical nature of this piece, especially given the details that are added, removed, and/or changed in different versions of the Bible. Dante’s perspective uses sentence fragments to represent his mental state, and hopefully it helps differentiate the different narrative styles of Pierre and Dante. The non sequitur in the dialogue for the bonfire/orchestra pit scenes were quite a challenge to make jarring but understandable, as I was aiming for it to add a lot of ambiguity in terms of interpretation. This entire story is meant to be ambiguous and open to interpretation, and it’s up to the audience to make assumptions and fill in the gaps with their own biases and contexts (allegorical much…).

I think this story also expands a lot on Pierre's point of view, which isn't something that's seen in “When Heaven Freezes Over” despite the major part Pierre plays in “The Codebreakers.” I borrowed the verse quoting syntax of the Bible to represent the passing of time and the order of events of the passages (Dante’s story is told from end to beginning, while Pierre’s story is told from beginning to end!) in this story, and to also represent where the perspectives converge and diverge. There are many ways you can read this piece—in the order it is now, in chronological order (with the perspectives side by side), or in chronological order (one perspective at a time).

Anyways, thanks for reading! Special thanks to @Stariqe, @–tranquility, and @Luna-Lovegood-LOL for critiquing <3

• textbooks where I shake the pages until their secrets are let loose
  
• paper scraps and other reminders of my personhood. I will keep until the edges soften into abandoned shores
  
• my mother used to take me to coasts like these. She finds beauty in the fragments of a crashing world
  
• my mother tells me I am beautiful and I ask her to thank the crash I came from instead
  
• shades of crimson left behind by paper-cut fingers
  
• urging atlas maps to alleviate only went as far as the compass allowed it
  
• my fraying wallet, my sewn name coming undone
  
• water bottle, lunchbox, gum packet, prize candy, calculator
  
• (all the things I devour until my guts spill of metal)
  

A/N

The concept for Last Streetlight had brewed in my mind for quite some time, and it was originally going to be part of a longer short story I wanted to write called A.N.T.I. — safe to say I lost the motivation to write that short story, so I reworked the idea for this fan-fiction! The characters are Connor from Detroit: Become Human and Oliver from Maybe Happy Ending, and wow they’re both robots who somehow share the names of our favorite couple in How to Get Away With Murder! What a coincidence, let’s plop them in a gripping, tragic short story and move on.

Thanks to Rockie and Alia for looking this over! If you need their usernames, then you need help (they’re hosts. come on, are you really in SWC).

A/N

The idea for PROM really came out of nowhere— well, technically it came from my brain, but regardless, I truly have no clue how I thought of it. Originally, I had this long dystopian short story idea whose title was going to be A.N.T.I., and I really wanted to do something with acronyms. The planning for A.N.T.I. took way too long and was going to use too many words, so I scrapped it and the acronym for PROM was born! I think the stylistic choices I made in this short story were really quirky, really innovative, VERY mindful and demure. Lasagna donations are welcomed on my profile.

Thanks to Rockie and Alia for looking this over! If you need their usernames, then you need help (they’re hosts. come on, are you really in SWC).

a/n (written by Alia): A little bit of background on our piece! Funnily enough, this piece was inspired by a saying from one of our schools - we were joking about writing a piece based on it, and then were like …wait. What if? From there, we created this dystopian-esque world, inspired by elements of the Wizard of Oz, the fifth substory in the Cloud Atlas, and 2000s dystopian novels. This story is written in a style called hermit-crab fiction, which is essentially a piece composed of multimedia, or a story told through other forms of written media (in our case, emails, transcripts, and footnotes, to name a few). We really wanted to step outside of our comfort zones with this, and try something neither of us has really attempted - something that wasn’t character/emotion focused for Alia, something without description or poetical writing for Zai - and of course, neither of us is deeply experienced in hermit crab fiction, nor have we submitted anything in this style. This piece was so much fun to write, and we hope you love it as much as we do <3

ps. To get the story to 2000 words Zai would like everyone to know he had to cut some very funny emails. He says if we get first he will release the unpublished emails. And everyone wants to see those emails right!! #zaliafor1stplace #releasetheemails

special thanks to inky, alana, livy, and toko for offering useful feedback to the dome's operations – they have been taken care of :). the dome welcomes all critiques of their system; if you have any feedback, schedule an interrogation meeting with an executive at the dome. you TOO belong at the dome!!