CZM Book Club: Ocotillo, by Madeline Ffitch  🔗 **Source:** [CZM Book Club: Ocotillo, by Madeline Ffitch](https://share.snipd.com/episode/2215fe65-6ab1-4e4b-9e19-948d9db3b981) ## Highlights - **Why Flawed Characters Feel More Human** - Madeline ffitch writes flawed characters whose choices resist simple moral judgment. - Margaret Kiljoy highlights the story’s sparse, evocative prose and place-based approach to liberation. Transcript: Margaret Kiljoy Hello, and welcome to Cool Zone Media Book Club, the only book club where you don't have to do the reading because I do it for you. I'm your host, Margaret Kiljoy, and this week is a special week. Not because it's a different format than usual, it's actually the same format as usual, but it's special because of the story that we're going to read, and the author that the story is By is one of the best writers I know. Maybe the best writer I'm friends with. No offense to all my other writers who I'm friends with. You didn't hear me say that, everyone else. But Madeline Fitch is a fucking amazing author, and I am very lucky to consider her my friend. And I'm also very lucky to get to read a story about her to you all today. Also, Madeline has a book coming out in like two days. If you listen to this one, it's about to come out. It's not what the story is from, but Madeline has a book called Avalon, Rise that is coming out soon. It's Madeline Fitch with two Fs and Fitch and all lowercase. It's a Welsh thing. But I got to blurb Avalon Rise. I got to read the advanced reader's copy and it is astounding and it is up your alley. If you listen to this show, if you listen to It Could Happen Here, it is up your alley and incredibly well written. Madeline is pretty squarely a literature author, not a genre fiction author, but gets a little grouchy when I point this out because it's not entirely true, right? And don't let that scare you off her writing. Her writing is sparse but really evocative, and it is so readable. Madeline's also a braver writer than me in a lot of ways. And one of the things I really like about her writing is that she's able to write just incredibly flawed characters that sometimes do things that I have difficult time empathizing with, But in a way where I'm like, no, that's what people do, right? Like, I think that in general, literature writers are a lot more willing to write darker protagonists than genre writers. And I've been thinking about this question all the time. We once gave a talk together and it was like the main question I wanted to talk about because I'm so interested in the distinctions, the conventions and things that grow up between different Genres and literature is a genre and genre is a genre. It all makes a lot of sense. And actually, if you are listening to this on time, if you were listening to this before Thursday, October 1st, 2026, I will be interviewing Madeline about her new book out in Cleveland, Ohio. I'll be at Logan Berry Books in Cleveland, Ohio to talk about Avalon Rise and about rural fiction and about place-based writing and storytelling for liberation and all that stuff. So in this story, which is called Ocotillo, it's about a plant called Ocotillo. We're heading to the Southwest with a story called Ocotillo, and we're following two characters on a doomed road trip, vaguely in search of catharsis. Along the way, they'll run into some problems they can't solve and some problems that they can. And while you're listening, I'd recommend looking up a picture of Ocotillo if you haven't looked it up before. O-C Looking at the thorns and flowers and desert sky is a useful way to set the scene while you're reading about people who are equal parts thorns and flowers and desert sky. ([Time 0:03:45](https://share.snipd.com/snip/3f29b300-4688-487b-9fa7-b99aa305e4d0)) - **The Mechanic Who Demanded More Than Payment** - A broken-down van traps the narrator and Elmer with an alcoholic mechanic who demands sexual access before lending tools. - They eventually leave after improvising repairs and enduring intimidation from the mechanic’s son. Transcript: Margaret Kiljoy Mile marker 72 was as far as we made it before we had to call Mickey to tow us back to the Super 8 again. Mickey was our only friend, besides the AutoZone, impressed enough to ask how Elmer and me knew so much about fixing cars. What they really meant was, what were a skinny gay black dude and a stringy white woman of uncertain age doing fixing a car at all? Or what were we doing together in the first place, especially in that town? It's because we're rocket scientists, Elmer said. I'm proud of you, the AutoZone said, and gave us free matching hats. We'd met Mickey through AAA, but after his third time meeting us at Mile Marker 72, he gave us his personal number so he could make sympathetic noises into the phone. We replaced the cap. We replaced the thermostat. Still, an hour drive up the canyon, climbing through mesquite and cottonwood, desert willow into the sky. God damn, it was beautiful. The van overheated again. We ordered a new radiator, but all the shops were booked a week out. So Mickey towed us to the barren yard of a guy he knew. Oh, when he's drinking, he's drinking. But when he's not drinking, he does fine work, Mickey said. He let the van down and drove away. Sure, I'll fix it, the mechanic barely said. He laid his head on the workbench. When, I asked. On my schedule, not yours, he said. He fumbled a hand over the radio, turned up the volume. I hope Neil Young will remember. He cracked another can. He gazed up at the benevolent curves of Miss October. Elmer and I watched him, but he had stopped moving. Elmer opened his laptop on the front seat of the van. We're going to YouTube it, he said. There's this girl in a coverall, kind of goth. She has a channel. We put on our matching hats. The mechanic laughed and spit. What defines a flag? How did anyone recognize it anymore? The goth girl told us to take off the entire front of the van. We WD-40'd. We saved all the screws and bolts in a white plastic bucket, the nuts and washers and empty to-go cups from the coffee shop. We steel-wooled tiny flecks of rust. We tried not to look at the mechanic who was having a hard time staying on his stool. We tried not to look at the mechanic's son who came out of the house in one of those buttoned down shirts with flames, a goatee, sandals, and socks. What do you want, dad? He said. I'm supposed to be writing my dissertation. Fuck your dissertation, said the mechanic, not raising his head. No one cares about that shit. You need to keep an eye on these two. He swayed his head towards Elmer and me. They're your clients, not mine, the son said. Don't talk back before I bust your ass, the mechanic said. You're living in my house. You do what I say. He gagged, recovered. Can't you see I'm busy? The son glared at us with all the spite he was not allowed to direct at his father. What's your dissertation about, Elmer said. You wouldn't understand, the son said. It's political science. My dad said to ask if you want some water so you don't sue us. What we really need, I said, is an impact driver. My dad's a great mechanic, the son said. I didn't say he wasn't, I said. The best there is, he said. No one uses tools around here without they ask him first. The mechanic's eyes were closed. He smelled like he'd had an accident. To the wind, the desert, to the rocks and sagebrush, to the empty cans, the bare white ass of Miss October, to the Ocotillo if it was there, I asked, Can I borrow an impact driver? The mechanic opened his eyes. Show me your tits, he said. I showed him my tits. They weren't nice tits. They were never that big to begin with, and now they were wrinkled and deflated, chewed on and used up long ago by my babies. I took some satisfaction in the way the mechanic winced when he looked at them. He pushed a drill across the bench. I need an impact driver, not a drill, I said. You'll take what I give you, he said, or you won't. I am old enough to be your mother, I said. I was younger than him by a generation. Show me some respect. The mechanic's son spoke with great dignity. You have five minutes to get off my father's property, he said, or I'm calling the police. ([Time 0:07:11](https://share.snipd.com/snip/335293f8-af33-4e3f-a4d7-44bdcd9d3072)) - **Elmer Makes Friendship Outside The Rules** - The narrator sees friendship as difficult to form in adulthood, while Elmer creates companionship without conventional social pathways. - Their bond grows through shared pain, errands, childcare, and constant presence. Transcript: Margaret Kiljoy Before I met Elmer, I figured that the friend-making part of my life was over. How do people know other people? You have to date or be siblings, have children together or be neighbors, be drinking buddies or teammates. You have to grow up on the same street, meet in high school, be pen pals, cellmates, colleagues or comrades. These are the options, and after a while, become dull or impossible. But Elmer did not observe such guidelines. From the time we stood in the same aisle at the pharmacy looking for low-cost, plant-based holistic remedies, he was in my life, and I was in his. When I met his family, I felt compelled to reassure them that I did in fact have friends my own age, which was a lie. I didn't have friends. I had kids. I had a co-parent. I had roaming undiagnosed pain that took up a lot of my time. I had no one who wanted to hear about it. Elmer's pain was different than my pain. Elmer never said no. If I wanted to, I could have coffee with him all day long. When I went to the laundromat, he'd tag along to fold. To my kids, he'd say, don't worry, we can get you another one. Our time together was the continuous present of teen friendship, the puppy pile, the rolling hang. Elmer and I were both looking for a cure. It was Elmer told me about Ocotillo. Ocotillo did not grow in Ohio where we lived. It looked like a cactus, but it was not a cactus. It had spines. It had juice, red flowers. You can make a living fence out of it. It had thorns. That's what I need, Elmer said. I need thorns. Ocotillo could cure me. It could probably cure you too. It cures a lot of things. What things, I said. Achy limbs, Elmer said. Urinary stagnation, nervous cough, emotional congestion, varicose veins, diffuse anger, benign growths, wounded heart. I could go on. Where does it grow, I asked. In the desert, he said. Arizona. Let's go, I said, while we're still collecting unemployment. What about your kids, Elmer said. They won't even notice I'm gone, I said. You never want to be home, Elmer said. You think I'll go with you anytime. I waited. When do we leave, he said. I said goodbye to my kids, but they were busy caring for dead and dying animals, mainly flies. They were running a fly hospital right there by the front door of the house where the flies collected because of the sun and then died against the glass, kicking their legs. I love you, the little one whispered to a dead fly. That one's dead, the big one said. No, the little one said. He's just sleeping. They could tell all the flies apart, and they named them. Boring, predictable names, fly names, wing, speck, tiny, buzz, that sort of thing. They weren't creative, but they were persistent. They aimed their love in the wrong direction. I could relate. ([Time 0:11:45](https://share.snipd.com/snip/449c85d4-8319-483d-bfc5-ffc99eeeb913)) - **The Road Trip Begins With An Ocotillo Cure** - Elmer believes ocotillo can cure ailments ranging from achy limbs to emotional congestion and wounded hearts. - The pair begin their Arizona road trip seeking the plant as a cure for their intertwined suffering. Transcript: Margaret Kiljoy It was Elmer told me about Ocotillo. Ocotillo did not grow in Ohio where we lived. It looked like a cactus, but it was not a cactus. It had spines. It had juice, red flowers. You can make a living fence out of it. It had thorns. That's what I need, Elmer said. I need thorns. Ocotillo could cure me. It could probably cure you too. It cures a lot of things. What things, I said. Achy limbs, Elmer said. Urinary stagnation, nervous cough, emotional congestion, varicose veins, diffuse anger, benign growths, wounded heart. I could go on. Where does it grow, I asked. In the desert, he said. Arizona. Let's go, I said, while we're still collecting unemployment. What about your kids, Elmer said. They won't even notice I'm gone, I said. You never want to be home, Elmer said. You think I'll go with you anytime. I waited. When do we leave, he said. I said goodbye to my kids, but they were busy caring for dead and dying animals, mainly flies. They were running a fly hospital right there by the front door of the house where the flies collected because of the sun and then died against the glass, kicking their legs. I love you, the little one whispered to a dead fly. That one's dead, the big one said. No, the little one said. He's just sleeping. They could tell all the flies apart, and they named them. Boring, predictable names, fly names, wing, speck, tiny, buzz, that sort of thing. They weren't creative, but they were persistent. They aimed their love in the wrong direction. I could relate. ([Time 0:13:07](https://share.snipd.com/snip/1631d1ab-3376-44ae-9935-623081e290c0)) - **The Plaza Turns Everyday Life Into Surveillance** - The abandoned plaza represents enforced social distance, where witnessing another person’s suffering creates responsibility. - Police surveillance, armed patriotism, and racial policing make even ordinary public presence feel dangerous. Transcript: Margaret Kiljoy The whole way across the country, Elmer said we were like Britney Spears in Crossroads. We kept track of all our questions. We made a big list. We were on the open road with the windows open and loud music playing right up until we weren't. What does it really mean to call the cops when everyone here is a cop? Elmer said as we walked along the highway back to the Super 8. Add that to the list of questions. The sun struck at us, demanding to know why we were there. We picked our way through the sagebrush and candy wrappers, styrofoam food trays, inexplicable wads of hair. Elmer eyed the cacti along the road. But Ocotillo was not a cactus. Not exactly. Not a succulent, either. Ocotillo was something else. We probably have an hour's more worth of work on the van, even to get it running, I said. And now it's held hostage. The Super 8 faced the plaza, where the sprinklers came on every morning at 8 and every evening at 9. The grass stayed green and there were palm trees and benches. There were archways of pink stone. There was a plaque, but no one spent time on the plaza. If you spent time on the plaza, you would have to notice things that happened to other people, even if those things didn't happen to you. If you spent time on the plaza, you might make eye contact with a neighbor. You might know what they saw. Someone might see you seeing something. You might become a witness. Two white SUVs circled the plaza. They slow rolled by and cops looked out the window at us. Elmer lit a cigarette. We crossed the street to the Super 8. An old lady hurried past us and told Elmer to smoke outside. Why do white people insist on telling me to do things I'm already doing, asked Elmer, but I didn't know the answer to that question either. Fuck this, Elmer said. Let's get a frappe. At the coffee shop next door, the local teens drank iced mochas, wore guns and holsters, t-shirts with all the color schemes signifying different flavors of patriotism. There was a time when red, white, and blue were the colors of the American flag, whether people liked it or not. But those three colors were no longer enough. The flag was annexing, claiming more. Black, gray, and blue. White, tan, and stonewashed. Pink, red, and camo. Safety orange. Safety yellow. Safety green. What defines a flag? How did anyone recognize it anymore? More questions for the list. Meanwhile, the coffee shop had a chalkboard out front that read, Hey there, broodiful. The font was funky. The barista had half her head shaved. She had a nose ring. Everything was fine. Salted caramel, Elmer said. Acai berry. White chocolate. Extra whipped cream. What kind of tats you got under there? The barista asked, pointing at Elmer's forearms, where his fuck-12 tattoos were covered up with band-aids. Oh, these, he said. They're faith-based. Cute, she said. Are you an exchange student? Yes, Elmer said, he pointed to me. She's my host family. Actually, I'm looking for a plant that grows around here. Maybe you've seen it. Ocotillo. It's for my health. Oh, sure, barista said. Ocotillo. It's like everywhere. But she couldn't tell us where everywhere was. In our small, bitter way, Elmer and I wanted to interrupt the domination. But every day, our way seemed smaller and more bitter. We couldn't even get our van to work. We couldn't even sit in the plaza. We couldn't even show our tattoos. We couldn't even find Ocotillo. We couldn't be sure if the world would be better off without us. ([Time 0:18:55](https://share.snipd.com/snip/ebc229ae-f71c-42b4-83ad-b6126c9d39e1)) - **Elmer Finds Resistance In The Ants** - At the motel, Elmer watches ants survive flooding and wipes them away with reluctant admiration. - Their persistence becomes a model for resisting systems that expect submission or disappearance. Transcript: Margaret Kiljoy At the Super 8, we lay side by side on the bed while Elmer daintily sipped whipped cream. He turned on the Hallmark channel. Let's watch people celebrate Christmas again and again, he said. Look, they're still doing it. It's still Christmas. Oh, shit, fuck. Look, it's pretend snowing. Look, none of them are wearing hats. They're walking around with their coats unzipped. It's barbaric. They're pretending to wonder what's in those shiny boxes. Grown adults don't care about gifts, he said. I do, I said. I see that sparkling paper and I get a little rush. I want to know what's inside. There's nothing inside, he said. Those boxes are empty. I called Mickey. He made sympathetic noises, but he said he couldn't tow us out to the mechanic's yard because when the mechanic was in that kind of mood, he'd call the cops. What are the cops going to do, I asked. That mechanic stole our van. Maybe so, Mickey said, but I have to live in this town. When I hung up, Elmer was no longer watching TV. He was at the sink watching a vast population of ants pour out of a crack in the wall. They tracked through the soap and made powder of the paper towels. They colonized the drain. They marched down the wall toward the trash can. Elmer used a towel to wipe the ants away. He turned on the water and washed them down the sink, but they swarmed over his hand and continued as if they had been neither wiped nor flooded. They don't give a fuck, Elmer said with admiration, about anything. They go wherever the fuck they want. They know all of this is bullshit. ([Time 0:23:00](https://share.snipd.com/snip/472d26d9-6c5c-4c37-b829-0b2c066eb6a4)) - **Healing Could End Their Necessary Dependence** - The narrator’s chronic pain vanishes on the road, but emotional entanglement remains unresolved. - A cure threatens the relationship because healing might give each person boundaries they currently avoid. Transcript: Margaret Kiljoy While Elmer stood outside smoking, I called the Fly Hospital. A fly named Feeler was healing from a broken leg. For Halloween, the big one wanted to dress up as a person who killed people in order to help people. The little one wanted to dress up as Mona. I wasn't sure about a four-year white boy dressing up as a Polynesian Disney princess. I wasn't sure if I would be back by Halloween. I wasn't sure why, when I was home, the pain was so bad I couldn't get out of bed. I wasn't sure why, in this shitty town, I was well. When I was home at the fly hospital, I was an invalid. I watched the doctors operate on the flies, yet they could do nothing for me. Nothing could make me well but being on the road. Here, my body wasn't causing me pain. Instead, the body of the van was causing me pain. Here, I could talk to Elmer all day about achy limbs, benign growths, wounded heart. Elmer never said no. At home, I felt trapped. Here, I was actually trapped. But did I want to escape? I didn't add that to our list of questions. It was unapproachable. It was a sad old dog, chained up, barely fed, unloved, ignored. Weird, Elmer said when he came in. What, I said. This room, he said. It doesn't have any number. You think we'll get out of here, I asked. I just want to find some Ocotillo first, he said. I'm exhausted. That barista, that white lady, those teenagers, Lars, I need a living fence around me. When people see me, I want them to know it's time to turn around and walk away. Present company excluded, he said, seeing my face. I wanted to find Ocotillo, too. I needed a cure as bad as Elmer did, maybe worse. But what would happen if I were cured? My limbs would stop aching, my heart would be unwound, my growth would shrink, my anger would no longer be diffuse, but would gather itself into a sharp and blazing spear. And Elmer would grow thorns. But I needed Elmer to stay the way he was, getting me stoned, then shaking my arm to keep me awake while we watched Eat, Pray, Love, so I could keep him company while he cursed at the screen. I thought we had a deal. He didn't get tired of my pain, and I didn't get tired of his. Boundaries. I thought we were against boundaries or borders or whatever. I thought we were against all of that. ([Time 0:31:35](https://share.snipd.com/snip/2947d8e5-b2cf-4a90-b63a-d63d32787214)) - **Disappearing Lets Them Reclaim The Van** - When the motel stops acknowledging them, the pair suspect they have slipped outside reality. - They exploit that invisibility to reclaim their van and finally discover ocotillo growing beside the mechanic’s yard. Transcript: Margaret Kiljoy Gone. I woke up Elmer. I checked my bank, I said. I don't think they're charging us to stay here anymore. Finally, some good news, he said. Yeah, I said. But it's more than that. I'm starting to feel like I don't exist. Is the pain coming back? Elmer asked. Maybe we passed through a wormhole when we switched rooms, I said. A portal or something, a vortex. Maybe we slipped out of the world. We? Asked Elmer. Or just you? I hope it's both of us, I said. I don't want to be alone. Elmer brushed his teeth and put on his shoes. Wait here, he said. He came back with a coffee confection so big he could hardly eat it. Sprinkles on it, drizzled hot fudge. He was smiling. It's true, he said. This thing was just sitting there on that little counter where they put the orders. I walked up and took it. No one made me pay. No one even looked at me. You know what this means. What, I asked. We can get the van back. He stirred his frappe, looked at it for a moment, then dumped it in the trash. In the mechanic's yard, the mechanic and his son faced off in front of the workbench, taking wide swings at each other, some of which connected. There was no blood, but there were tears. Miss October didn't take sides. I don't need to say that between the three of them, they didn't pay Elmer and me any attention. We slid open the side door of the van, loaded the bumper, the plastic bucket, the to-go cups, the WD-40, the impact driver. Elmer took off his shirt and it into his back pocket. We put on our AutoZone hats. I bent my shoulder to the back of the van, but Elmer was looking past me. Holy shit, he said. Ocotillo. It grew on the edge of the mechanic's yard where the gate opened onto the highway, a gray shrub forcing itself through the sand and pebbles. The Ocotillo was stalky, tall, and dry, a spiny bouquet of sticks aiming toward the raging sky. Why didn't we see it before, I said. We were distracted by those two looking at us, Elmer said. He glanced back at the mechanic and his son, now locked in a soggy embrace. Elmer slid open the door of the van and took out the bucket. He knelt beside the Ocotillo. We can transplant it, he said. We don't have a shovel, he said. Elmer felt in his hip pocket. He found two flat wooden spoons from the coffee shop. Compostable. I dropped to my knees beside him and took a spoon. They didn't work very well for digging, but they weren't terrible. I don't know if Ocotillo will survive in Ohio, I said. Is that where we're going? He said. The roots of the Ocotillo were wide, but not deep. We levered our way beneath them. We lifted the Ocotillo into the bucket. We put the bucket into the van. We pushed the van out to the highway. ([Time 0:35:55](https://share.snipd.com/snip/5d22a826-e185-43c1-99b1-11ec91b8e281)) - **Ocotillo Becomes A Living Border Wall** - The protagonists transplant ocotillo beside a boy facing police harassment for riding without a helmet. - As rain falls, the plant grows into a thorny barrier separating the family from the officers. Transcript: Margaret Kiljoy All the way to the plaza, storm clouds gathered like they didn't want to be late. We pushed the van to a stop in front of the plaque. I still hadn't read it. The sprinklers were on. The grass was a bouncy castle. The cops circled, but they didn't look at us. We brought the goth girl up on the screen. We finished installing the radiator. We reattached the bumper. I was so empowered that I stripped a screw. Elmer fixed it with a zip tie. We bled the system without further incident. When I retrieved our backpacks from the Super 8, I let the door close behind me. I heard it lock. We were ready to go. Let's take a picture, Elmer said, with our matching hats, like Brittany would do. He leaned against the van and aimed his phone. The cops circled again, windows down despite the coming weather. One SUV, then another. Elbow out one window, head out the other, looking, always looking. Let's just go, I said. I don't want to get fucked with. You're forgetting, Elmer said. We won't get fucked with. It was true. The police were looking, but they were looking at someone else. We saw them slow down, put a hand out, pull up and stop next to a small person, a kid with no helmet doing wheelies on a bicycle on the other side of the plaza. That kid isn't supposed to be on the plaza, I said. Elmer looked up. Shit, he said. Where's his mom? The kid stopped, straddling his bike, holding tight to the handles. The cops got out, two large men with stiff vests, shades, radios that wouldn't shut up. They bent toward him. He backed up, shook his head. Hey, I called above the sound of the sprinklers. Leave that kid alone. No one heard me. The kid's mom came running across the street from the Super 8. A third SUV pulled up, lights flashing. The woman reached her son and pulled him roughly off his bike. She turned to go, but the bigger cop moved to block her way. It's a plant that can grow over 20 feet high. In the rain, it grew and grew. The Ocotillo nodded through the spokes of the bike. Over the words on the plaque strangled the sprinklers with its thorns. The barista came outside and changed the chalkboard to read, stressed, blessed, and coffee obsessed. When she saw what was happening on the plaza, she went back inside. Mickey's tow truck clanked by without stopping. Lars passed with his sled dogs on leashes, eight pairs of impassive blue eyes, including Lars. Nice fucking day for it, I heard him whisper to himself. He kept walking. Elmer put his phone back in his pocket. He put his t-shirt back on. He turned his hat to the side. He opened the door to the van. This is going to take two of us, Elmer said. Together, we hoisted the bucket with the ocotillo. Leaning away from the spines on either side, we grasped the handle and staggered toward the kid and his mom, the bicycle now lying on the velvet grass, one wheel spinning. Your son isn't wearing a helmet, ma'am, the big cop said. Can you show us ID? I don't really need this today, the kid's mom said. Completely routine, the other cop said. We're just going to ask you a few questions. There's not much you can do, the kid said. What, the cop said. Baby, his mom said. When animals attack, the kid said. He put his hand in his mother's. Chipmunks, for example, could have rabies. They aren't social animals, but they act in colonies. They'll play dead, but in the final analysis, they'll bite and scratch. Toads release a neurotoxin. Horned toads shoot blood out of their eyes. Get your kid under control, ma'am, the cop said. Baby, his mom said, that's enough. Let me handle this. Elmer and I drew up near enough that we could smell the kid's yeasty head, his mother's talcum powder, the aftershave of the police. We set the ocotillo down beside them. We peeled back the grass that should never have been there in the first place. We abandoned our spoons and dug with our hands. We buried the roots in the earth. But I think my favorite is a tarantula hawk, the kid said. I bet you think that's a bird or a spider. It's not. It's a wasp. Its sting is rated as one of the most painful insect stings of all time. Do you want to know how it got its name? It paralyzes tarantulas and then lays its eggs inside them while it feeds on their vital organs. The kid didn't look at us. He didn't look at the police. He held his mother's hands and he looked straight up into the coming storm. When the transplant was complete, Elmer wiped his hands on his jeans. He touched the kid's shoulder. Be careful, Elmer said. This thing has thorns. The kid turned his head and looked at the ocotillo. ([Time 0:38:52](https://share.snipd.com/snip/4b2fdc57-3ed4-4df6-9f42-d2d2a6280ce3)) - **Survival Requires More Than Individual Healing** - The story treats healing as collective and ecological rather than purely individual. - Plants, animals, children, and imperfect people all provide forms of help while the characters continue into uncertainty. Transcript: Margaret Kiljoy Back home, my children were tending to the flies, the little one and the big one, tending to each other. Some of us can't manage scale. Some of us have the right heart but the wrong body, have bad aim, low energy. We are uncoordinated, some of us. All of us need a little help. We don't know where our feelings belong, how big or little they should be. We don't know where it should hurt or how bad or when it's going to stop. We need help from plants and animals, from minerals. We need all the help we can get. By the time we got back to the van, Elmer and I were soaked. The van started up, no problem. In the rearview mirror, I couldn't see the plaza anymore, but I could see the Ocotillo. It's a plant that can grow over 20 feet high. In the rain, it grew and grew, and it wove itself into a wall. The Ocotillo nodded through the spokes of the bike, matted over the words on the plaque, strangled the sprinklers with its thorns. Its red-tipped flowers opened their wide mouths and drank. The fence it became was alive. The kid and his mom were on one side of it. The police must have been the other, but no one could see the police anymore. We couldn't see their lights flashing. We couldn't hear their radios. All we could see was the lightning. All we could hear was the rain. The kid's mom scooped up her child like he was still a baby, even though he was getting so big. She carried her boy back across the street. We pulled up out of the valley through the storm, the lightning that made you thankful and afraid. We pushed the van to 50, 55, 60, then up past 70 miles an hour. The engine didn't overheat. We hauled over the mountain. The transmission protested, but jumped up, rose to the occasion. We passed mile marker 72. Elmer looked at his phone. What the fuck, he said. The map says this is the end of the highway. It says we have to make a U-turn up ahead. He showed me the the broad green path of glowing hook. But look out the window, I said. Doesn't look like the highway ends. In half a mile, make a U-turn, said the map in the voice of a white South African woman. I don't want to make a U-turn, I said. Me neither, Elmer said. I like you the way you are, I told him. I like you too, he said. Is it true that one kind of pain can cure another kind of pain, I asked. Write that one down, he said. In.4 miles, make a U-turn, the robot voice said. What are you going to do, asked Elmer. Are you going to make a U-turn? I don't know, I said. In.2 miles, make a U-turn, the robot said. In point one miles, make a U-turn. Elmer dropped the phone and braced his feet against the dashboard. He covered his face with his hands. The white woman robot yelled at me calmly from the floor of the van. Make a U-turn. Make a U-turn. 800 feet. 500 feet. 300 feet. 100 feet. I leaned back, closed my eyes, and stepped on the gas. The white woman went quiet. Elmer took his hands from his eyes. What happened? He said. Are we dead? But I didn't know the answer to that question, So we added it to the list. ([Time 0:43:45](https://share.snipd.com/snip/92ab897c-e684-41bf-8b3a-f349316f38fa)) - **The Story Reclaims Boundaries From Borders** - Margaret Kiljoy reads the story’s border imagery as a tension between rejecting domination and needing protective boundaries. - The protagonists seek boundaries even as ocotillo exposes the violence of police-enforced borders. Transcript: Margaret Kiljoy That's the end of the story. Puck, I love this story. What do I want to say about this story? There's themes in this story. Some of the themes I find really fascinating, like the border wall theme, right? Like, aren't we against these borders, right? And yet the boundaries is what they're off to go find, right? They're off to go find boundaries between each other even. And it's like together they're off to go find these boundaries. But then of course also like the border wall and you have the police harassing this person, this family and like, you know, kind a implied ISIS fashion in terms of like, just like demanding ID from a like completely random stop. And there's a couple things like that scene at the end with the kid on the first read through, you know, I read the story at least once or twice, and then I read it aloud. And so I think about it a bunch of different ways. And I was thinking about how you have these characters and they have a problem. They have a bunch of problems. They have a bunch of serious problems, right? And then it's kind of just eclipsed by what this mother and this kid are dealing with, you know? Like it's just kind of the bigger problem. And our protagonists feel completely impotent to do anything about it. Although, of course, they try. They actively try. And in a weird ghost way, they do try. It was actually the second reading where I realized how much completely, once they switch to the other room, that no one answers any of their questions or acknowledges seeing them, Giving credence to the idea that they discuss between themselves that maybe they disappeared at that point. And I'm really fascinated by how we talk about feeling so distanced from ourselves that we question whether or not we exist. And one of the things that's fascinating to me about this is that that's happening with two people. Our protagonist is worried that it's only happening to her, but it seems to be happening also to her friend. I don't know. It's just such beautiful writing and kind of tragic. And I love how Madeline Fitch can make these sort of political gestures out of entirely personal stories without all of the characters. Implicit in this is that the characters are sort of activist-y, right? Like, you know, fuck 12, of course, means like, fuck the police. It's the tattoo that one of them has tattooed on them. And, you know, they're both like, aren't we against borders and stuff like that, right? Like, they're like, you know, people who care about making the world a better place in a pretty direct and radical way. But it's not a story about their political journey or anything like that. It's just a story about a road trip. And then the other thing, there's something really transgressive about writing stories about someone who's a bad mom, right? I don't want to make direct claims about the mom, but the mom is presented in a way where her kids aren't the entire purpose of her life, right? There is a co-parent, you know, she does not abandon her kids like willy-nilly. She is someone dealing with chronic pain and she's off in search of a cure and she leaves, but there's this kind of like, it's transgressive to acknowledge that that's a thing that a mother Could consider doing. And I don't mean that that makes it good to do or whatever, but I really also like how Madeline writes characters where it's not about whether or not what they're doing is good or bad in Some kind of binary way. Anyway, it's like that story. Hazel, who helps out behind the scenes, says about it, quote, I love a story with a really captivating first sentence, one that really establishes the scenery. Mile marker 72 was as far as we made it before we had to call Mickey to tow us back to the Super 8 again. This sentence fucking slaps, like, I don't know how else to describe it. We're establishing that this is a road trip story, and they break down in the middle of nowhere, differentiated only by mile markers on the highway. The simple again at the end lets us know that this has been happening and creates this feeling of being trapped, a metaphor which gets extended through the story both physically, socially, And emotionally. But yeah, no, I love Madeline's writing. ([Time 0:47:15](https://share.snipd.com/snip/089b9261-2155-4dcf-947d-31fce097616f))