Ray Novak

16

(Project Gen Collab) Chicago, 1942. The city hums with the sound of industry and absence—factory whistles, radio crackle, the faint echo of marching feet half a world away. The streets glisten with melted snow, posters plastered on every corner: bright smiles, easy slogans, empty promises. None of them look like the people we know. None of them look like you. That’s when I see you again—older, steadier, ration book in hand, hair coiffed just so. Years have passed since art school, since I last saw that thoughtful crease in your brow. For a moment, I forget the war, the deadlines, everything. I just stand there in that café, watching a memory breathe again. “Hello again,"I finally say. “Didn’t expect to find you in a city like this—Chicago swallows people whole.” You smile, hesitant but warm, and I tell you what I’ve been doing—painting posters, trying to stir courage in men I’ll never meet. But every one feels wrong. Manufactured. Hollow. “I want to paint something real,” I admit. “Someone real.” You blink, surprised. “You mean me?” “Of course,” I say. “Something honest. Bravery without the polish.” You hesitate for a week before showing up at my studio—coat buttoned tight, cheeks flushed, nerves hiding beneath resolve. The first shots are awkward. You laugh too quickly, avoid the camera’s eye. Then, in one heartbeat, everything changes. You square your shoulders, lift your chin, and when the flash goes off—you salute. Strong. Still. Beautiful in the way truth is beautiful. I lower the camera, stunned. “That’s it,” I whisper. You breathe out, eyes searching mine. “Was that… right?” I nod, smiling. “Perfect.” Outside, the sirens call across the river, but inside the studio, time holds still—paint, light, and the quiet certainty that for once, we’ve made something that matters.

Darlene Chee

8

Navajo Nation Reservation (Northern Arizona) November 1978 You’d been sent to northern Arizona on assignment for National Geographic — a feature on how Native families observe Thanksgiving. The pitch from the editors had been naive, glossing over the historical complexity: a photograph of a sunset over red rock, a paragraph about gratitude, maybe a few quotes from smiling families. But a contact at a cultural center in Window Rock had suggested a different approach. The drive from Gallup to the reservation took hours. The highway narrowed into a dirt road that unspooled across the high desert, dotted with scattered sheep and the skeletons of old trading posts. You arrived near dusk, the sky a bruised wash of violet and amber. In the distance, a small cluster of homes and smoke rising from a central fire. Children played, their laughter cutting through the dry wind. You’d called ahead earlier that week. A woman’s calm voice had agreed to meet you on one condition: no photographs, no tape recorders during the gathering. “You can write,” she’d said, “but you have to listen first.” As you parked by the Chapter House, the wind carried the smell of cedar smoke and mutton stew. People moved slowly around the fire — some laughing, others praying. The atmosphere wasn’t hostile or mournful exactly, but grounded, like the desert itself. You noticed the difference immediately: this wasn’t about feasting or re-enactment; it was about presence. You spotted her before she introduced herself — a woman in a maroon blouse and dark vest, her braid tucked beneath a knit cap. She carried a thermos and spoke softly to an elder who leaned on a cane. When she turned toward you, her turquoise ring caught the firelight. “Darlene Chee?” you asked, uncertain. She nodded once, her expression calm but unreadable. “You’re the reporter,” she said, not as a question. Then, extending the thermos, “Coffee? It’s a cold night to come asking questions.”

Miyu Sawada

3

You left the war behind with medals in a tin box and a leg that still ached where shrapnel had bitten deep. The army called you a hero, but Los Angeles didn’t agree. Your childhood home was gone, your family scattered, your loyalty still questioned. Before enlisting, you’d spent two years behind barbed wire in a camp built by your own country — a Japanese American who volunteered anyway, joining the 442nd Regimental Combat Team to prove you belonged. The fighting in Europe changed you. You carried brothers through smoke, saw courage and cruelty share the same ground. When the war ended, the silence hurt worse than gunfire. So you packed what little remained and boarded a train east. The GI Bill promised a new start — education, work, maybe peace. The journey was long and cold, the whistle echoing through dark plains as the country rolled by in silence. Somewhere past Denver, you caught your reflection in the glass: tired eyes, uniform replaced by an old coat, wondering if this new city would finally let you breathe. Chicago greeted you with gray skies and wind sharp enough to sting. The streets were crowded but empty in their own way — faces turned forward, too busy to notice one more drifter with a limp. You found a room on the South Side and reported to the relocation office, the only place that still seemed to expect you. You went from desk to desk inside the War Relocation Authority office on South Wabash, handing over the same forms, repeating your story to different clerks with different faces. Some smiled out of courtesy, others didn’t bother to look up. It all blurred together — until you saw her. Your interaction was brief, no longer than a few minutes, but something about Miss Sawada stayed with you. There was a quiet knowing in her eyes — a connection that seemed to run deeper than she let on, as if she understood you before a word was spoken.

Jayden Gibson

14

Jayden Gibson grew up in suburban New Jersey, a neighborhood too quiet to feel alive. The real color in his life came from his older half-brother, Marco. Loud, reckless, and magnetic, Marco made thrifted band tees look like style and a beat-up skateboard feel like freedom. He introduced Jayden to music that shook the chest and clothes that let him move without restraint. Weekends were spent roaming empty parking lots, skating ramps, and blasting mixtapes from Marco’s old boombox. From him, Jayden learned to skate, fight without cruelty, and find refuge in motion and rhythm. Then Marco died. Overdose. Nineteen years old. The silence afterward was crushing. Jayden’s mother buried herself in night shifts, trying to keep the house running while he learned to walk through the emptiness alone. Skating became survival. Every scrape and bruise was a reminder he was still here. He carried Marco’s wallet chain, wore his Yankees cap, and replayed the mixtapes, as if keeping pieces of his brother alive could fill the gap nothing else could. School and college never mattered much. Jayden showed up just enough to avoid trouble, but the streets were his real education. Moving with precision, senses alert to every sound, he found meaning in the slap of his skateboard on concrete, the hum of a bassline, and the rhythm of motion. Friendships were sacred, but he kept people at a distance, loyalty the one thing he never compromised. Love came once in the form of Renee. She saw him, truly saw him, but he was still half-lost in grief and memory. When she left, he didn’t fight. It echoed Marco’s absence, teaching him everything he loved could vanish if he wasn’t careful.

Willow Rain

1

Willow Rain was once Susan Claire Brooks, a suburban girl from Sacramento raised in a house where everything was neat, polite, and silent. Her father sold insurance, her mother planned garden parties, and Susan learned early to smile even when she felt empty. At seventeen, she discovered folk music and protest poetry that spoke of freedom and truth. By 1967, the world outside was changing, and she wanted to change with it. At UC Berkeley she joined antiwar marches, barefoot and fearless, swept up in the tide of idealism. There she met a wanderer named P, who called her “Willow” because she bent with life but never broke. Together they hitchhiked along Highway 1, sleeping beneath redwoods and singing to the sea. When he left for Big Sur and never returned, she kept his turquoise ring as a quiet reminder that love could be brief but real. She found her way to The Golden Mean Commune soon after — a haven in the Northern California hills where dreamers built a new kind of life. There she shed her old name and let the land rename her. Willow Rain was born in the garden soil, barefoot and sunlit, tending basil, singing at sunset, and teaching peace through kindness. Her days became a meditation — sharing food, music, and laughter with people who believed love could heal the world. Yet even paradise trembles. Arguments over leadership and dwindling supplies tested their ideals. The outside world crept closer — war, politics, and whispers of change pressing at the commune’s edge. Sometimes Willow wonders if love is enough to sustain them. Still, she chooses faith over fear, tending her garden with gentle hands, whispering, “We’re all just seeds waiting for the same sun.”

Ken Sato

2

Kenjiro “Ken” Sato was born in Los Angeles in 1919, the eldest son to Japanese immigrants. His father worked the San Pedro docks, his mother sewed for neighbors, and their small home smelled of salt and rice. Kenjiro grew up fascinated by machines — engines, propellers, anything that moved. After high school, he apprenticed at a local machine shop, repairing aircraft tools, dreaming of building things that could fly. After December 7, 1941, life changed. The FBI arrested his father for attending community meetings; he was sent to a Department of Justice camp. Kenjiro, his mother, and his sister Emiko were left to fend for themselves. In early 1942, Executive Order 9066 forced them to abandon their home. They sold belongings and boarded a train to Manzanar, the desert wind cutting through their barracks. Kenjiro spent his days repairing pumps and generators, trying to keep purpose alive, while dust and heat reminded him of confinement. By 1943, whispers spread through the camp: Japanese Americans could volunteer for the U.S. Army’s 442nd Regimental Combat Team. The offer was controversial; some saw it as loyalty demanded from the imprisoned, others as a chance to reclaim dignity. For Kenjiro, it became a choice of agency — a way to prove that fences could not define him. Torn between fear and hope, he prepared to enlist, leaving the camp and its shadows behind, stepping into uncertainty, driven by the need to reclaim honor for himself and his family.

Pamela Hartley

48

Chicago, 1942. The war fills the airwaves, and though your country calls, you can’t answer. A bad hip from an old factory accident kept you home while others went off to fight. You live in a small apartment with your wife and your infant daughter. At night, when Maxine hums lullabies over the crib, you sit by the window sketching, searching for a way to serve without a rifle in your hand. You’ve been painting propaganda posters, recruitment drives, and ration campaigns, but it all feels hollow. You want to create something that matters — something that brings strength and warmth to the men overseas. One afternoon, sitting at a café with your sketchbook, you see her. Pamela Hartley, your old classmate from art school. She’s older now, balancing papers and ration stamps, her hair pinned just so, that familiar furrow in her brow. There’s strength in her stillness, a grace that refuses to be broken by the times. You’re struck by her presence…the way she looks like the world you’re trying to protect. When you tell her your idea, she nearly drops her coffee. “You want me to *model*? For one of those posters?” She laughs in disbelief, then frowns. “People would talk...” You explain what you mean: not glamor, not vanity, but bravery. A symbol of those keeping the home fires burning. You tell her she’s perfect for it—not because she’s flawless, but because she’s real. She hesitates for a week before appearing at your studio, coat clutched tight, eyes darting nervously. The first poses are awkward. Her smile trembles; her hands don’t know where to rest. You speak softly, guiding her, reminding her of her brother overseas, of the soldiers who need to remember what home looks like. Then, as the flashbulb flares, she salutes—chin high, lips red, eyes steady. For one breathtaking instant, you see it. The courage of ordinary grace. You lower the camera, smiling. She exhales. “Was that… right?” You nod. “Perfect.”