hika.

Stonys, a sophomore English major with an emphasis in creative writing, is the author of the short story, “children,” which will be included in our published copy at the end of this month! (*Spoilers included below*)

What’s the meaning behind the title, (“children)”?

I guess the whole piece is less about the action of finding the ear and more so about interiority like the way that children process shock and just general emotions. What I was thinking when I was writing it is like, as a kid, you’re not really necessarily taught to fear things as you are as an adult. Like, as an adult, you see a dismembered body part and your immediate thought is like someone was murdered; somebody was, you know, like some kind of heinous crime went down; but I guess as a child, you’re a lot more naive. So, you think more, like, how could this have ended up here? You know, maybe someone hit their head and just fell off. And I think that difference in mindset is kind of why I called it “children.” I also just needed a placeholder title and that was it. 

Do you have any inspirations behind this story? 

It’s really inspired by David Lynch’s Blue Velvet because there is a scene where Kyle McLaughlin’s character finds an ear pretty early on into the movie and it like sets the entire story into motion. And I just thought it would be interesting to see how a kid would have encountered that and how they would process that kind of action, or experience. And I don’t know, I also just really like writing in settings that don’t take place in a specific time period or place. I like ambiguity around time and place, and I like writing about rural areas, because I feel like they’re pretty scary when compared to the city, like I know a lot of like horror movies are set in the woods or something and there is something scary about something being able to hide behind trees or like tall buildings or something following you in that way and being able to be hidden. But I also think there’s something even more frightening about it; a super open space where you theoretically could see all the threats that are around you. But then not seeing them and how they could hide in plain style. 

Why is the main character in the story so nurturing towards the severed ear, but not her clothes or her appearance?

I think it’s something that mostly just happened while I wrote, but also I think that, I don’t know, I guess I put a little bit of myself in there in the way that, I don’t necessarily care if my jeans get dirty if I’m helping someone off the ground. It’s something about empathy. I feel like kids are born with empathy and they’re taught to not have it in a way. So I feel like, now, not being naturally empathetic means that you care, like, even for the small, like, the smallest things, you know, I think it’s interesting. I don’t think I really did that on purpose, but I guess it just shone through a little bit.

Would you plan to write another piece that would follow this specific piece, almost like an attachment to it, or would you rather this piece just be a standalone?

I mean, I wrote the piece for my intro fiction class last year. It was just an exercise that I wrote, but I ended up getting really attached to it just because I really liked the frame of thought that I put the main character in and like how she, in the section where she’s like, “oh, how did it (the severed ear) get there?” “Maybe, like, it’s from this guy who hit his head or maybe it’s this from this girl who wears his hat?” I really was proud of myself for that. And I was thinking about maybe expanding it into a full short-story. But I don’t really know where I (should) start. Like, I would definitely work backwards to the beginning. But afterwards, I don’t know what would happen. So, I think I would have to spend some more time thinking about that. 

You mentioned that you wrote this for your intro fiction class. Was it last semester or just last year? 

Last year; spring semester last year. 

How would you describe the amount of time it took to write for you to write this piece?

This piece, particularly, started off pretty hard because (the assignment) that we were given was to stretch a very short amount of time into like a few pages. So, from when we were given that assignment, I was like, I don’t even know where to begin with that. Because I feel like a lot of the classes I’m in, like the workshops I’m in, a lot of the fellow writers in that are fantasy writers, so they kind of have a lot to work with in that regard. So, it’s like, you know, you can really stretch time in a place that’s magical and maybe time doesn’t even work the same way as it does where we are. But I like writing like realistic fiction. So it was kind of like, I don’t really know what action would take a while. But so when I like, when I overcame that bump, it was pretty easy and it kind of just came out of me. But I think in general, I feel like that’s also just the way I work. I maybe don’t have the easiest time coming up with an idea, but once I come up with it and I like sit down and I start writing for a while, then just these new pieces just keep stacking up on top of each other, like, like flashes in my brain, and then all of a sudden, I’ll just be like, oh, and I want to do this too. And then it kind of works itself out. That’s all I can really hope for.

 What would you say is your favorite line or just part of the story? And why? 

I really like the imagery. I had in the beginning of like, kind of like teasing into the body horror element where there’s like that little snippet of the girl walking into the tall grass and like how it tickles her, but also like, it leaves her like legs really scratched and like, I totally forgot how gruesome I got with the imagery there. And my my other favorite part is this paragraph where she says, “I began to wonder if the ear belonged to somebody I knew, maybe Meredith, who always wore a hat or Sarah, who never tucked her hair back, maybe belonged to Lucas, who had been sick and out of school, or Sophia, who had hit her head pretty badly on the monkey bars that afternoon. Imagine her ear flying off like a frisbee after the impact, so he was a guy landing in the prayer out behind the building. No, I thought that’s impossible. The teacher would have noticed if her ear is gone.” That’s my other favorite line, that last part of it.