Fresh Ink: An Anthology

“This had been her home for over twenty years. This small, two-bedroom, third-floor walk-up with good sunlight and hardwood floors. A show fireplace and ornate molding. Ugly prewar bathroom tiles, like standing on a psychedelic chessboard. This was where Shay took her first steps. Where she took sink baths before pretending her dolls were mermaids in the big tub. Where she scribbled her name on the wall in her room under the window […] Plants they weren’t able to keep because now this space—their space—was gone. Bought out from under them. Empty. All packed into a clunky truck that was already headed south.”

This description of Shay’s family’s apartment is one of the longest and most descriptive passages in “Eraser Tattoo.” The descriptive language establishes the apartment’s importance to the family, which then immediately contrasts with the stark, cryptic statement that it was sold without their input and they’re now being forced to move: “Bought out from under them. Empty.” This contrasting style humanizes the people whom gentrification is affecting.

“Somebody gotta care for all the stuff underwater that nobody can see. It’s a beautiful world down there, full of living things that most folks don’t understand.”

Shay’s aspirations to be a marine biologist and explore the world under the ocean symbolize her feelings about how the world treats her. As she’s being evicted from her home and separated from her boyfriend, she (perhaps subconsciously) realizes that the world is largely ignorant of people like her and her family and thus often mistreats them. While she longs for help for herself and others like her, she also wishes to offer similar help to something she sees as in need of care: life under the ocean.

“I’m happy that Sulu got to be the gay character. It’s too bad there can be only one, though, even in the Star Trek universe.”

This quote from Nic conveys one of the important issues that anthologies like this one address: lack of representation. The Star Trek world has only one gay character, which leaves queer people like Nic with little representation and few role models.