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hi this ridiculous thing I edited is finally live also I’m really proud of the editor’s note please read it ~ & follow @circuslit for more freakish behaviour

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the most heinous piece of fiction i've ever written is in this collection so you should defs read it when it comes out

Get your TMNT Sourcebook now! It covers everything from the first 150 issues, and all the mini-, macro-, micro- and side-series that ran along side that historic series. Plus, I wrote it!

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Fall Apart Silently A collection of stories by Mileva Anastasiadou / @happymil_ #MythicPicnicTweetStory _______ How to Fall Apart Silently and Not Bother People First published in Bending Genres _ When I fall apart, Dean knows how to put me back together. He lifts the pieces and places them back, like I am a puzzle he knows by heart. Dean knows how to fix me when I’m broken. They say there is one special person for each of us, the one who fits perfectly like a fitting puzzle piece. I say there is one person, just one, who can put you back together when you fall apart and when Dean fell apart, I fell apart too, and only he knows how to put me back together, but he’s busy dying. When I fall apart, mom panics, she picks up the pieces and she tries, she tries hard to put them back in place, but she only makes it worse, mom doesn’t think much but she thinks fast, she fills the holes with the wrong pieces, she tries to mend me but she doesn’t know how, you look fine, she says in the end, and she can’t see why the pieces don’t fit where she places them, why they fall onto the floor again. When I fall apart, dad hurries to help, he collects the fallen pieces from the floor, looks at me in disbelief, like this can’t be happening in plain sight, then he says he can’t bother, that he’s too busy, he throws the pieces away, he claims I don’t need them, if they fall, they fall, he says, you’re still standing without them. When I fall apart, my sister turns the other way, like I’m problematic by default, or like I’m faking it. She pretends that she cares, but she doesn’t. She smiles politely, she asks, how can I help, she then disappears, she comes back later, and she wonders how long it will take me, and she rolls her eyes before saying, you’re still a mess. When I fall apart, my brother stares at the pieces, but he’s too lazy to lift them, he says, they’re broken, not you, and he goes on with his day, he comes home with new pieces and he tries to mend me, but those new pieces aren’t me, and he acts surprised when they don’t fit, he finds it shocking when he can’t buy his way out of trouble. When I fall apart, my aunt says she’s sorry, but she makes a grimace of disgust, like the sound of my falling parts annoys her and she wants her peace back, like saying, it’s Dean’s fault who spoiled you, she then scolds me, pick up your pieces, she shouts and she means it, she thinks I know how to and I don’t, that I’m grumpy, whiny, now that I have to care for Dean, but Dean can’t do much in return, like she’s taking revenge for the Dean she never had, not all of us were this lucky, she says, in an old and wise manner, as if I have to pay the price for having once been whole, a jigsaw fallen into place. When I fall apart, I don’t fall apart, I go back to where I had been before Dean, when I was a bunch of pieces randomly put in place, but nobody knew and nobody cared, only it’s harder now, after I was lucky enough to get a glimpse of what it feels like to not be a wreck in progress. I clench my teeth to keep the edifice standing, and mom is proud that I’m strong, dad is satisfied like he had been right all along, my sister couldn’t care less, and my brother is happy he’ll save money, now that I know how to fall apart silently and not bother people, and they think their troubles are over, and I keep pretending I’m not broken and they know but they don’t mind, because that’s what we all do, says my aunt, in the same old and wise manner, we keep standing and standing and standing, until we collapse. _______ I Live Among Trees First published in Roogarou journal _ Mom doesn’t speak much lately because trees don’t talk. Be like a tree, she said in the past, only I wanted to be a bird. Mom never paid attention to my needs. She claimed trees are better, they bend but don’t break, trees are strong, grounded, rooted, stable. Mom doesn’t talk much lately, doesn’t move either, mom is a tree finally, and I don’t move much either, like I’m on a leash, but I can still talk. My boss is like a walnut tree, he has that thing, juglone, that suppresses the growth of anything beside him. I tell him I want a raise. He looks me in the eye and I remain still, don’t even blink, he sees I’m serious, then asks, for real? I nod. Next thing I know is that I’m jobless, which sounds better than heartless to my ears but not for long; I’m both jobless and heartless when I get home. I make dinner for the three of them, but I don’t eat, I only watch them. My son pats my shoulder, you did good mom, he says, you deserve better. Mom looks around like she’s not aware that something’s wrong, she eats and eats, swallows and swallows, like that’s all she cares about, like she’s feeding her roots. My husband frowns like he didn’t expect this, like I’m a huge letdown. He asks, now what? My husband is like a happy cherry tree blossoming, doesn’t notice what’s ugly around him. I tell him we need a plan. That I am tired and weary and that I could sleep for years. He says I shouldn’t talk in song lyrics, he laughs, then asks, a plan for what? I shrug. A plan to get us out of here. He doesn’t get it. I say my dream is to have a secret plan about how to escape the life I’m trapped in, like in the Shawshank Redemption, he nods like he understands, but he doesn’t, I tell him I need to find my paradise, but he looks at me like he’s already in his, he says my life is fanfiction because I dream of being a character in a movie, although he doesn’t give a damn if my life is fanfiction, as long as I’m trapped in Desperate Housewives. Mom is a weeping willow, she cries and cries, she grieves all the time, but she’s still here. I tell her she should take her meds. She makes a gesture like asking, what for? I shrug, I tell her those drugs keep her alive, and she frowns, she doesn’t get it, or doesn’t care. She frowns like saying life was better when she was young, only it wasn’t. Life was harder back then. And it only got better since then, but she forgets. I also claim life was better when I was young, but I am right. We both romanticise the past. Like life has failed us somehow, like we expected more, but we got this, and we grew tired of romanticising life, instead of plainly hating it. My son doesn’t look like a tree yet, but he’s getting there fast. I tell him he should be sober. He asks why, I say to enjoy life; I’m tired of seeing him wasted. He says, you don’t get it mom, but I do, I do get it. He says he takes little trips to remind himself he’s not a tree. But what if we are trees? I ask him. What if growing up means you turn into a tree, stuck, rooted, trapped? He stares at me, looks disappointed. This thing is smothering me, I tell him, he asks, what thing? I shrug and say, this thing called life, like life is out to get me and I can’t run fast enough. He passes me the joint, he laughs, looks me in the eye, he says, it’s not life, mom, it’s you, you’ve set the trap. I am like an anxious, withering tree. I tell myself I have no fear. That my son is safe from harm and he will be the bird I never could be. I live among trees, inside a forest, only it’s not the happy place mom promised, because I am trapped in the woods with no way out. My son is not a tree yet, my son is a boy, like in those fairy tales, where a boy is lost, and the woods will swallow him, but some kind trees find a voice and talk to him and help him out, that’s the kind of tree I am, the kind that bows down to offer a shade, but then stands tall, lets the wind shake the branches so the birds fly away into the sky, I bend but I don’t break and I dread the time when all those fantastic expectations fail him and life catches up with him and turns him into a tree, I’m terrified, but I don’t tell him. Instead, I sing a song that comes to mind about dreams and expectations and he sings back, like he knows the lyrics, only he doesn’t, he sings of great hopes and revelations, and I don’t correct him, I prefer the song this way. I take a puff and smile. A bitter, condescending your-time-will-come smile I try to hide, but he can read my mind and still ignores it, because he thinks he knows better and for a moment I believe he does. _______ The Subtle Art of Making Ghosts First published in Clump Plum journal _ It started out as a ghost story but it may be a funny story instead, about a girl in need of birthday wishes from someone in heaven, only she didn’t believe in heaven or life after death, but on that special day, she would compromise all her beliefs and take anything as a sign, she’d even settle for subtle signs, like a solitary cloud in an otherwise clear sky, or a sudden cool breeze during a hot summer day, or even the waters touching her feet while sitting on the beach. She’d count the petals of a rose, and if the number was even, it’d mean a happy birthday wish from above, a game of ‘he-loves-me/he-loves-me-not’ but with roses and heavenly revelations instead of daisies and romantic doubt, and the number was even indeed, and she believed in heaven if only for a second or two, and that was cognitive dissonance in progress but it was also bliss. It started out as a ghost story but it may be a sad story instead, about a girl whose life puzzle would never be complete, because there was already a missing piece, the puzzle starting dissolving before it fell into place, and she knew she wouldn’t replace that missing piece, and that there would be more pieces missing with time, before she ended up a missing piece too in someone else’s puzzle, because that someone would love her enough to wish for a heaven even if heaven doesn’t really exist, that someone would give her a ghostly home inside their mind, their heart, their soul, before letting her go to vanish forever, and that was despair in progress but it was also hope. It started out as ghost story but it unfolds into a sci-fi story instead, about a girl who met an alien in the form of a loved one who traveled through space to wish her well on her birthday, to mend her broken parts back into a whole, and she saw the spaceship landing, she rushed to the neon door and stood there waiting, because she knew who would come out, who’d travel that far to only give her a hug and eat birthday cake, and she asked, is this reincarnation, but the alien stared, like ghosts stare when ghosts can’t speak because they can’t let you know what it is like on the other side, and the girl didn’t mind the silence, the mystery, and that was nostalgia in progress but it was also joy. It started out as a ghost story and it’ll end as a ghost story too, about a girl who saw a ghost on her birthday, because she needed the lie so badly that she became an expert at making ghosts, because sometimes we invent the truth we need and we make ghosts up and we place them inside our mind, our heart, our soul, and when they leave, we say, take me with you to keep me together, and that is grief in progress but it is also love. _______ Evan Dando is Haunting me But This is More Than a Ghost Story First published in Milk Candy Review _ Evan Dando is haunting me, which makes this not only a ghost story, but also science fiction, for it’s a story about time travel, but only for ghosts, because he’s not dead yet, but someday he will be. Evan Dando is chasing me and he falls into my arms in a ghostly, terrifying, tender way, that’s where it’s safe, he sings, that’s where it’s warm, he sings and sings and he never gets me actually, he falls right through my arms and into the void, because that’s what ghosts do, they go through things, through matter, through flesh, they travel back and forth, in time and space. The ghost of Evan Dando is haunting me and I feel scared, but I feel flattered too, which makes this not only a ghost story, but also an eerie romance, like Wuthering Heights, a toxic love story people find romantic, about love lost and never found, about love doomed to die, only to come back stronger. He brings back my past, back when he stood by me, when I was taught how to adult, how to make the world tick, and now we’re both full-blown adults, with teeth problems and white hair, and we’re sick and tired of making the world tick, of making this world tick, tick-tock, tick-tock, closer and closer to the final boom, closer than ever to that last explosion. He brings me back to when I missed home, a safe place, or someone to whom I’d say, take me out of here, when things got rough, and they would, and they’d take over. Evan Dando is haunting me and opens his ghostly heart to me and tells me I haunt him too, he’s haunted by many people, like I’m haunted by everything I ever loved and loved me, which makes this more than a ghost story, it’s also a philosophical story about the urge to immortalize everything that we love, the human urge to love, be loved, be seen, remembered and somehow stay here forever. His words are waves that travel forever, not fading out, they’re always loud, no friction can erase them, no law of physics can touch them, and I still hear them, they speak to me, like when I was young and the world made sense or didn’t, but someday it would eventually. He frowns sometimes, like he’s disappointed, like he wasn’t only a rock star, but also the Catcher in the Rye, and he speaks to me in a ghostly, terrifying, tender way, he says he failed, he couldn’t save us, but still that’s all he wants to do, to be an angel, protecting souls from disillusionment, like the Catcher in the Rye but for older people too, not just for kids. The Ghost of Evan Dando is haunting me, although he’s not a ghost yet, or maybe he has always been a spirit, a soul above all else, and I haunt him too, at least a part of me that died long ago, only to come back stronger, a part of me that has already turned into a ghost, or has always been a ghost, the spirit of youth, of a world that once made sense, or didn’t but someday it would eventually. They say you’ll meet the same person in different bodies for eternity, until you learn enough to break the pattern and I did, I found someone who would jump into my arms to get home, which makes this more than a ghost story, it’s also a love letter, but he’s a ghost and he falls right through my arms, into the void, for that’s what ghosts do, they go through things, through matter, through flesh, like bullets but slower, like bullets that don’t kill, like bullets we carry inside and keep us together. _______ I See Dead People But This is Not a Ghost Story First published in The Afterpast Review _ I see dead people just like the kid in the movie. They speak to me all the time, they haunt me, and they’re not aware, they can’t tell what’s wrong, they are confused, afraid, upset, they laugh, they cry, they gesture, and just like the kid in the movie, I don’t tell the truth, I play along, and we feign life and normalcy, as if no disaster can touch us. I see the dead and we speak about the news, and future plans and past regrets, because I have the magical sixth sense. I watch them smile, dream, be happy, fall apart, then rise up and smile again, I watch the loop repeat, the downward spiral into oblivion, and I wave goodbye to the sound of ‘If you go away’, sung by Terry Jacks in a sad but less melodramatic way, the banality of grief-to-come briefly interrupted by loud bursts of hope, and it isn’t a love song, it’s but a goodbye song and this is saddening, but even more saddening is the uncertainty; the dead could evaporate and vanish and you never know when it’s the last time you see them. I walk among the dead but not like the kid in the movie. I see dead people but this isn’t a ghost story, because they aren’t ghosts yet, but someday they will be, they come to me for comfort, and I lie when I say we’re forever, but also I don’t, for we’re the glitch in the matrix, we remember, believe, hope, and we care. We dig holes in reality and we hide there, and we love hard, against odds, and we beat death all the time. _______ My Boyfriend Fell Down the Rabbit Hole First published in HAD _ But now he’s back and he’s brand new. He saw the darkness, the fear, but he survived and came back to tell the tale like we all do after we rise. He thought it’d be intriguing, inviting, but he jumped right out of it, and he’s relieved he’s back in the light, he doesn’t find the surface boring, not anymore. There is no truth down there, he says, no fairy tale, no wonders, because he thought he’d have fun, like there was a carnival, a mystic place only a few know and he’d meet Alice, and magic, and interesting creatures, but he only met demons and monsters and me. But now he’s back and he is safe. He feigns innocence, normalcy, ignores the memory, like he never went down, he waves at people and smiles like he means it, he asks, how was your day, like he cares, he nods and says, I’m fine, but he’s a mess, he’s not like them but he pretends, he plays this funny game of assumptions, one boring cliché after another, like he’s mastered the game, and he’s better than people who play for years, like he was born talented at being inauthentic, but it’s a talent much appreciated, like looks, useless but, oh, so precious. My boyfriend went down the rabbit hole, but now he’s back and he can’t stand sad songs, or frowns, or tears, not anymore, he won’t dare take another glimpse and he is eager to close that hole forever, or make believe it doesn’t exist and he doesn’t believe me when I tell him that not all of us can pretend the way he does. Not all of us went there as tourists or are good liars, and some of us are trapped for good. _______ Fake Plastic Everything First published in New World Writing _ The rich shrink can’t help himself when he’s depressed, can’t self-medicate with pills and stuff, he needs a therapist to help him out, to sell his house and clean his mess. You should buy that house, my therapist says and I trust him, it’s not that I don’t, for he’s old and wise, like the rich shrink, only he’s not rich, like the rich shrink, or like me. I tell him I’d rather go back in time. That’s what therapists do for god’s sake; they take you back in time to examine causes. He says I suffer from covert OCD and I shake my head as I don’t seem to mind messes, yet he insists I enjoy time travel stories for it’s control I long for, over the most uncontrollable mess, that is time. I don’t intend to control time, it’s her I want to control. She’s been ungrateful, I say. He says I should buy her the house. You’ll get her back, he adds then croons something like you can’t buy love, cause he likes paraphrasing songs and I like to pretend that I don’t hear him. The rich shrink can’t help himself, he’s been a total mess, he just wants to get rid of the house, claims that will heal him. My therapist knows, for he’s the rich shrink’s therapist, who’s unapproachable but also too messed up. My therapist needs a therapist too, for from time to time, he can’t control himself, I have to remind him I’m the patient here, not him. That house, he says, that house, he repeats, like that house has been his own dream or nightmare, not the rich shrink’s, not my salvation. He turns my way, unbuttons his coat, like he’s suffocating, he coughs once, coughs twice, then fixes his eyes on the ceiling, like the answer is up there. I look up but see no answer, I look back at him and now he smiles, his white teeth shine bright, hiding his face, blurring the image and I smile too, can’t think of anything else to do. He mumbles some words I don’t hear, his thoughts are too scattered to fit into words, but he goes on, ranting, venting, as if I’m not there, and I already feel stupid I handed him the straw to suck my soul out of me, mend it and put it back where it belongs, only he mocks my soul, like I’m a hopeless case, and I’ll have to go on pretending I’m not part of the joke, for that’s what people do with therapists. I cheated on her and she left. I offered her gifts but she insists you can’t cut a piece of love, however tiny, and pretend everything is fine, because suddenly all love is in that little missing piece and the gifts don’t count anymore. That fake plastic house is what you need, says the therapist, crooning again about a fake plastic love, cause that’s what he does, he talks in songs he thinks I don’t know, but I’m familiar with pop music, only I feign ignorance to not hurt his feelings. The rich shrink can’t help himself, he needs my therapist to keep him sane, but he has a house that can help itself and clean itself. That house is too big for me, I say. It needs too much effort. That’s another problem I have; I love the idea of things but not the actual things, the idea of a big house, but not the house itself, or the work it involves. I assume she too liked the idea of me but not the real me. My therapist smiles like he knows better, he says it’s a self-help house, like the owner is a self-help guru, it comes with a maid. The rich shrink is bored with that house and my therapist is bored with him. He has repeatedly advised him to keep a low profile but the rich shrink can’t help himself. And I can’t help myself either. I’ll buy that house like he advised me, that fake plastic house, and I’ll buy me love and I’ll be fine and I know my therapist thinks that purchased love doesn’t count, I know for he’s been repeatedly paraphrasing songs, sings them to me, thinking that I don’t hear them. My therapist rubs his fake plastic lies onto my face, longs to be one of us, part of this fake plastic everything, but he pretends that money is useless, my money is useless, that I don’t count as much as I think I do, he puts me down again and again, for that’s what poor therapists do to rich people; they don’t know, they can’t know what money can do. _______ My Best Friend Lives Underwater First published in Rewrite the Stars _ He can’t walk properly, and can’t fly either, he’s not made for the land or the sky, my best friend moved into the sea, because he feels more safe there, although he barely breathes, he dives deep, then floats and takes a breath or two, and he has built a home underwater, like life is like that and won’t get any better. My best friend lives underwater because he’s been exiled, I don’t belong among you, he says, among those who bruised him and mocked him, and I want to bring him back, back where he was born and raised, but he won’t come along, he says he doesn’t need roots, he’s not a tree, he’s turned into a sea creature, and he feels safe underwater, impermeable to pain, like the sea is the barrier that won’t let sadness touch him. My best friend swims with the dolphins and the fish and the whales, he rides the waves, like this has been his home forever, he’s safe there, he’s carefree, he’s built a home underwater, and he’s abandoned his old life, the land, me, he says he’s always been a mermaid, he found his tribe and he is happy finally, and when he waves at me, inviting me, calling me from afar, I stand still on the shore, like I have roots and I’m a tree. _______ Mileva Anastasiadou is a neurologist, from Athens, Greece and the author of "Christmas People" and "We Fade With Time" by Alien Buddha Press. Her work has been selected for the Best Mirofiction anthology 2024 and Wigleaf Top 50 and can be found in many journals.

So grateful to see my tiny collection posted by @MythicPicnic! Some of my favorite stories are in here, from @BendingGenres @RougarouJournal Club Plum @moonrabbitcandy @afterpastreview @NewWorldWriting @havehadhavehad @rtsmagazine I'd be honored if you gave it a read, friends ♥️

LIKE AND REPOST AND I WILL SEND YOU A PDF OF MY BOOK OF A THOUSAND POEMS. I DON’T CARE IF IT SELLS. I JUST WANT TO BE CARED FOR AND APPRECIATED. PLEASE READ IT. PLEASE TELL ME WHAT YOU THINK. YOU CAN BE MEAN TO ME AND I SWEAR I WON’T CRY.

Lost $60,000 betting Kendrick would do Steely Dan’s “Reelin In The Years.”

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My ring cam keeps goin off from this chick and my neighbor who are obviously more drunk with each passing. I sure hope Lucas is getting laid tonight 🤞🤞

I wish guys didn't smell so bad