The bullet of flesh and cartilage lodged in her uterus was going to ruin her. She hated the hair that was thickening on her legs and the blue veins tendrilling out over breasts she’d never had before. The light was too direct, voices too loud, people ugly, food too watery or sparse or smelly. Each night she went to bed praying she could go backwards, change what she’d done, and each morning she woke and it was worse. She felt as if her feet were sinking into the mud and every day they sank further until her knees, hips, hands, were buried her neck, mouth, eyes.
All she could think about was how to get through the next hour, and the next. “You keeping it?”Ĭassie shook her head no. Gail scanned for shoes in the other stalls. She had sucked air quietly through her mouth while he held her and cried. She could no longer abide the sour smell of boy, the damp weight of arms. She squeezed her eyes shut against the memory of the back seat of his truck, the slippery wet of his lips. “You sure?” Gail slumped against the bathroom stall door, skinny arms folded against her chest.Ĭassie had already broken up with Jayben. Everyone knew Gail had been pregnant before, and some kids said twice. Missing one period was, maybe, a fluke, but when she missed a second time Cassie cornered the girl from her homeroom with the fierce Joan Jett eyeliner. Loved in a celestial way, without judgment or fear. She’d be untouchable, floating through an astral plane that glittered like a coverlet of fireflies. It would be a beautiful feeling, looking down on the small, awkward actions of humans.
I began to exist in a body that was not the body I was born in.Ĭassie was sure this was possible-that if she worked hard enough she’d be able to lift above her physical body and be free of it. Inside, people reported astonishing things: The astral plane is indescribable, fantastical. On the cover was a drawing of two figures-one lying on his back, colored in black, and the other, hovering above, colored in red. CRAFTĬassie found the book at a bus stop next to a pair of abandoned men’s shoes: The Study and Practice of Astral Projection: The Definitive Survey on Out-of-the-Body Experiences, by Dr. Check out Bannatyne’s author’s note for more on setting, character, and astral projection. Bannatyne’s corporeal writing is honest and strong Cassie inhabits her human body, and wishes to escape her human body, with intention. The setting of 1980’s rural Pennsylvania and New York contributes to the tone of isolation. Bannatyne uses allusion in the form of a found book on astral projection to explore Cassie’s pregnancy, her experience in her female body and her desire to leave that body-this is not an overly familiar teen pregnancy story. Cassie, Gail, and Carl, the teenagers, each feel supremely real. Send us feedback.In “The Study and Practice of Astral Projection,” Lesley Bannatyne achieves a complex and authentic teen voice, capturing in protagonist Cassie the sense of entrapment and utter lack of agency that define the teenage condition (“She understood she was no longer a girl that did things she had become a girl that things happened to”). These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'astral.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. 2021 Or with astral projection, the more spiritual concept of intentionally creating an out-of-body experience.ī, 18 July 2021 Or with astral projection, the more spiritual concept of intentionally creating an out-of-body experience. 2021 Chavez can travel freely between realities, while Wanda can only astral project to different timelines.Ĭhris Smith, BGR, 1 Oct. 2021 Wanda and Doctor Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch) can only send their astral projections to other realities.Ĭhris Smith, BGR, 12 Oct. 2021 The post-credit scenes showed us Scarlet Witch in astral form reading and teaching herself Darkhold magic. 2021 This is the kind of music to soundtrack a late-night solo swim in a lukewarm pool, a journey through the darkest recesses of the universe, or perhaps a trip to the astral plane. Recent Examples on the Web That’s the scene that precedes the one with the astral projection.Ĭhris Smith, BGR, 18 Nov.