One Page #34

Are you praying for rain little girl? The old woman with the crinkled eyes leaned over the girl in the spotted browning dress. The girl was weeding in her garden of herbs but looking more at the sky than the dirt falling between her fingers. The clouds were filling in, diminishing the blue and darkening the earth. The girl looked up at the old woman with curiosity and a little bit of fear. She had never seen this old woman before, and she hadn’t heard her come up from behind. The woman still bent over the little girl, sending the girls blonde curls into the shade. The girl smiled and said yes, she was praying silently for rain so that she wouldn’t have to water her garden but could let God water it for her. The old woman smiled and said that that was what God did best, water little girls’ gardens. The girl looked confused at this statement, so she went back to her weeding with reinvigorated force flinging unwanted weeds into a pile that grew into a mound and then a small mountain. The old woman stood up straight and the blonde curls danced back into the sun again. The woman looked at the sky and prayed for sun to guide her way home. She was miles from home, and lost with no food or water for many hours. She looked back at the girl whose arms were now covered in dirt. She prayed that the girl would offer her water and she prayed that the girl would stand up and talk to her the way little girls were supposed to. The girl stopped weeding and stood up, but did not look at the old woman and did not offer the old woman water. Instead she brushed off her arms and hands and looked again at the sky. She saw a giraffe parading across the sky with a small mouse in tow, both eating from the trees that leaned in and blocked their path. The blue diminished and disappeared and small drops began to fall. The girl smiled as they plopped onto her cheeks and moistened her lips to a shiny red, washing away the dirt that had clouded her face. The drops came with greater and greater speed and the girl twirled around a few times before waving and running up the front path and inside her door. The old woman stood and watched the girl disappear. Then she knelt next to the pile of weeds and systematically replanted each and every unwanted green stalk until the garden looked as it had when the old woman first arrived behind the little girl. The woman patted down the dirt, got up and brushed her hands off, and continued on down the sidewalk, humming an old tune. Her belly was full and her lips were saturated. Around the corner she came to her home and inside she found rest and silence. The little girl heard thunder and saw great flashes of lightning. Her cat purred at her feet. Tomorrow she would plant tomatoes.

One Page #33

The color of sleep was a silent S in red. It was splattered against the wall in random polka dots dancing with graceful feet and angular arms. Red curls flashed wildly. The only meaning I could decipher was an encoded inscription of a passage from Deuteronomy in verses that were numbered backwards. I wasn’t sure where to begin. When she looked at me through the pane of the glass window divided into seventy-seven panes of awkward sizes her eyes were huge and her eyebrows arched. She held up a book up, but the division of glass blurred the title and I had to squint and move my eyes around to focus on each letter spelling a word that was so long I didn’t think it possible. I read one letter after the next and the list continued on like marching soldiers through the misty swamps up to their necks in murky water so warm from the sun that sent spirals of light through the water that lapped around their collars so stiff but wilting from the dampness. I never got the title of the book and her face disappeared from the pane that had distorted her face into a microcosm of worlds each flesh toned but flushed and synonymous with pain. I winced. And turned around and walked away from the splintered panes. I heard a man singing and banging on a bucket, but I couldn’t see him. He must have been around the corner where the shadows danced and the trees bent low nearly to the pavement. His voice resonated and echoed and I recognized the tune until he changed it and I couldn’t hum along anymore because it was strange and disharmonious. My pants felt heavy on my hips and my shoes scuffed unnecessarily on the ground. I found a shell, a perfect circle, in the middle of my walk. It sat there effortlessly until I disturbed its rest by removing it from the ground and holding it in my palm so close to my eyes that my eyelashes almost touched the soft shell speckled with grays. In one exhalation it turned to dust and blew away down the street swirling in the gutters and falling into hair curls and book bags. It was gone so quickly I thought I had imagined it and I put my hand into my pocket to keep it safe, just in case it reached again for something that didn’t exist. A light flashed ahead and lightning flashed through the sky and rain began to fall just as I reached my red door the color of sleep with a lion’s head knocker so regal and shining bronze. My groceries felt heavy in my arms and the sun disappeared behind a black cloud that sent the street into instant night with no stars and only storms on the way. The air was chill and I thought of peppermint tea and a slice of lemon. But I had no lemons and only had chamomile tea, so I figured I would have to sleep soon, the color of red.

One Page #32

I wonder how many people put their hands together in prayer every day. I wonder why people clasp hands, or put their palms together. Maybe it is to still the hands. In a dark room a woman in black clasped her hands together, knuckles white and tense, arms shaking. Looking to the sky in desperation. If lightning struck her down right now. If the floor fell out from underneath her. If a window shattered sending shards into her open eyes. But none of these happened and I watched her from where I stood deep in the shadows where the darkness covered up my slow breath. Her eyes pleaded. I wondered what she was praying for. I didn’t know her. I had never seen her before. The lines on her face showed long times of stress, worry. My brow wrinkled. I wondered why she worried. I thought about the row of rooms, all stone lined up and down the hall, where other women in black kneeled in reverence. Did they all have worry lines? A bell tolled many miles away. It was eleven o’clock and the night was only getting darker. I leaned quietly against the stone wall, so cold against my back, so unfamiliar in texture. I doubted anyone had ever leaned her before, the stone felt virgin of human contact, unaccustomed to the heat and rhythmic breathing. Lightning struck. The floor fell. A window shattered. The woman in black did not move, still looking at the sky as the roof caved in and she had a clear view of the stars. The walls collapsed around us, and instantly disintegrated into the earth. Her arms still shook slightly and her knuckles tensed whiter. I had no where to lean and nearly fell over. I steadied myself and stood with my arms crossed over my chest still watching. The woman didn’t seem surprised and the change in her environment. Now she kneeled in the night, surrounded only by the blanket of darkness and the winking of stars above. Her eyes closed a moment and when she opened them she glanced briefly at me, but seemed to be expecting my presence. Her eyes stayed on mine, and her gaze was calm but sad. I wanted to move toward her but could not lift my feet. I unclasped my arms from across my chest and held my hands at my side. Her arms still shook, but mine just rested, motionless. She slowly rose, her eyes still on mine, and came towards me. The woman in black stood before me and the breeze that lifted through the valley caught our hair and blew it in circles, mingling her blonde curls with mine. I smiled at her. She just looked. It was her turn to study my face. I swallowed. I tried to reach out for her but her body was not there. She nodded at me and I understood her worry lines that creased her face. She smiled. I lowered my arms. And smiled back.

One Page #31

A lobsterman in worn yellow rubber coveralls walked down the pier towards his boat. The sun had not yet risen and the waters were calm, reflecting the moon that danced in the ripples. The stars still shone above and he looked up once, staring, as if he had never really looked at the sky before. He steadied himself with one hand against a weatherworn pole that had withstood many storms, floods, hurricanes, and seagulls. He heard a few other men preparing their boats, pulling lines, rearranging nets. And then silence. The lobsterman walked to the end of the pier and sat on the edge with his legs dangling over. This he had never done either. He saw his boat a hundred feet away, floating, waiting, bobbing gently up and down. But he did not move towards it. He could feel the oars of this dinghy in his hands so rough from rowing and hauling and shelling. He lifted one hand to his face and felt the salt-laden beard dripping with the early morning fog so damp against his skin and pooling in droplets on the folds of his coveralls. He rubbed his eyes, blinked, and looked again out to sea. He could see the open ocean beyond the cove and the small scattered islands and the lighthouse that stood white in the moonlight. The lobsterman breathed in and out slowly, savoring the salt air, and wondered why. His father was dead and lay in his grave a mile away and six feet down. His father had been buried wrapped in a fishing net. He smelled like rotten fish and warm salt air. He smelled like the ocean. The lobsterman had inherited his father’s boat. He had grown up on its decks, and sailed around the islands thousands of times, every morning before the sun rose. But he had never wondered why. His friends were lobsterman, and his friend’s wives were friends with his wife, and they all smelled like the ocean, the salt so deeply imbedded in the wrinkles of their skin and soaked behind their eyes and in every strand of their hair. He didn’t think that any of them wondered why. It just was. The boats came in and out with the tide and he knew the moon’s reflection better than the shadows cast by the sun and the ring on his finger turned green with the constant dunking into the sea. The lobsterman flicked an abandoned mussel shell into the gently waves and it floated a moment bobbing up and down before sinking and disappearing into the green. The weatherman said it would rain today. He looked up and saw the beginnings of clouds forming. He wondered whether the clouds were salty too. The lobsterman stood up and took off his yellow coveralls and removed the green rubber boots. He padded back down the pier in his thick wool socks and walked home to his bed and his wife.

One Page #30

I am not quite clear. The shadow passed through my arm, not over my arm. It felt cold and sent a chill up to my shoulder. I looked back, thinking I might see what it was. But it was gone. I was in shadow. The trees were dripping on my head, falling through my body to the ground where they puddle and spread out and away as if scared of being to close to my feet. My feet were rooted far into the ground below the gravel and the dirt and the dark dampness far below. The cold traveled up and met my heart and my head and forced my eyes closed. My fingers were unsteady, shaking a bit. When someone walked by, so purposeful and determined, she didn’t seem me even though she passed inches away from my rooted body. Her eyes were focused forward only, glancing occasionally at the ground to make sure that she didn’t misstep. I thought maybe she would trip and fall into me so that I could see whether she would fall through me or into my chest hands first. But she didn’t trip or fall into me, but passed by arms swinging. I bird overhead watched her as well, maybe hoping for a spare crumb from the bagel in her hand, or maybe protecting a nest in the branches far above. Neither of us moved as she walked by, and soon she had disappeared out from under the line of trees and into the sun. A small child toddled along near me, poked my knee, and wandered on. Her finger met my pant leg and I felt the pressure on my kneecap and into the bones and tendons like a quick shock to my nerves. My nerves. I was shaking. The child hid behind a tree and peaked out to look at me once before disappearing again. The mother raced by. I knew she was the mother because the child, even though she was only a couple of years old, looked exactly like the mother. It was in the eyes. The mother didn’t see me and nearly passed over me. But she didn’t notice, arms flailing, looking for her girl in the polka dot dress holding a worn brown teddy so scruffy and soft. I was shaking. My feet were rooted. The cobblestones rumbled. A truck passed and then all was quiet again. Leaves fluttered down from the trees, silently, like ghosts falling to the ground and settling. With a gust of wind they lifted and swirled around my legs and then out into the street. They passed through me. Only the child with the brown teddy had seen me, touched me, looked back as if to make sure I was still there, to make sure I was real. I was real. And I was shaking. The air was perfumed with fall as if the leaves took on a scent when they turned from green to red or orange or brown. The air brushed against my cheek as if it were a hand caressing. I was still shaking.

One Page #29

Shamed into the salt flats that radiated gold and blue like a thorn in my side so sharp. Sun fades and my arms are cold. Belly sticking out and falls into the sea carried away by the waves on whales backs and fishy brine. Sea eagles circle overhead cawing to the fish below as a warning so useless. Rocks protrude from the waves angled pointy to the sky providing perches for the gulls and sea lions that don’t get along and bark at each other mouths wide open catching the salt air on their tongues and deep into their throats. Pastures of blue waves turning gray and green with white caps blowing like wheat dancing in the wind. Spry kites. Rainbows against the sky so gray now with the coming storm. Clouds reaching high into heaven standing so tall and proud bringing darkness like a blanket in behind them. Blanket ripples. Sends me into shadow. Goosebumps leaping. Hairs on end bristling. You walk up behind me and your faint shadow merges with mine. Arms around. Skin settles and smoothes. Our shadow disappears with the darkening sky. We back away from the waves that tickle our toes. Waves crying out in urgency. Seals and gulls disappear, falling into the sea, leaping into the sky and away like specks then gone. We stand like a rock into the wind impenetrable. Skin like bark reflecting the weather. Clouds cover the blue and sea turns to gray almost black with white foaming in anger. Boiling. We turn to leave arms still wrapped around each other, our chests sheltered from the wind. Our shoulders taking it all in, hair flapping. We fall in the sand that blows and stings our ankles. With a glance we run through dried seaweed and hollow crab shells empty and abandoned. I don’t know what a palindrome is. But the saints are knocking around in my skull wanting in. And there is a crow slowly eating my eyes out. If I grew horns I would wear a crown so that you would never know. And it would be decorated with rubies and sapphires and sharp as a knife in case I needed protection. The moon reflects off the gold. It is so shinny that if I held the crown in my hands I could see whether there was anything in my teeth, even in the moonlight. But I won’t take it off my head. Otherwise you might see my horns. And run away. Scared. Because the wind is picking up and the sea is rolling and we haven’t reached the house yet but I see it up ahead coming closer. The rain has started and it has soaked through my shirt. My goosebumps are back. Ten more steps and we grab hands to hold each other down and we reach the screen door that bangs several times as we race through. Thunder is grumbling now with my tummy rumbling and I towel off, and towel you off, and we shiver together.

One Page #28

Are you praying for rain little girl? The old woman with the crinkled eyes leaned over the girl in the spotted browning dress. The girl was weeding in her garden of herbs but looking more at the sky than the dirt falling between her fingers. The clouds were filling in, diminishing the blue and darkening the earth. The girl looked up at the old woman with curiosity and a little bit of fear. She had never seen this old woman before, and she hadn’t heard her come up from behind. The woman still bent over the little girl, sending the girls blonde curls into the shade. The girl smiled and said yes, she was praying silently for rain so that she wouldn’t have to water her garden but could let God water it for her. The old woman smiled and said that that was what God did best, water little girls’ gardens. The girl looked confused at this statement, so she went back to her weeding with reinvigorated force flinging unwanted weeds into a pile that grew into a mound and then a small mountain. The old woman stood up straight and the blonde curls danced back into the sun again. The woman looked at the sky and prayed for sun to guide her way home. She was miles from home, and lost with no food or water for many hours. She looked back at the girl whose arms were now covered in dirt. She prayed that the girl would offer her water and she prayed that the girl would stand up and talk to her the way little girls were supposed to. The girl stopped weeding and stood up, but did not look at the old woman and did not offer the old woman water. Instead she brushed off her arms and hands and looked again at the sky. She saw a giraffe parading across the sky with a small mouse in tow, both eating from the trees that leaned in and blocked their path. The blue diminished and disappeared and small drops began to fall. The girl smiled as they plopped onto her cheeks and moistened her lips to a shiny red, washing away the dirt that had clouded her face. The drops came with greater and greater speed and the girl twirled around a few times before waving and running up the front path and inside her door. The old woman stood and watched the girl disappear. Then she knelt next to the pile of weeds and systematically replanted each and every unwanted green stalk until the garden looked as it had when the old woman first arrived behind the little girl. The woman patted down the dirt, got up and brushed her hands off, and continued on down the sidewalk, humming an old tune. Her belly was full and her lips were saturated. Around the corner she came to her home and inside she found rest and silence. The little girl heard thunder and saw great flashes of lightning. Her cat purred at her feet. Tomorrow she would plant tomatoes.

One Page #27

The woman knelt at her bedside with her eyes squeezed shut and her hands clasped before her and resting on the soft flannel of her bed sheets. Her knees hurt from kneeling, but her devotions muted her pain. She spoke the same words over and over again in a low whisper, nearly silent so as not to wake her sister who lay sleeping on the other side of the bed. There was one candle that remained lit on the bedside table, and the woman could see it flickering behind her eyelids. She imagined the shadows dancing ravenously across the walls in the breeze that blew in through the open window. She had been praying for many long minutes, waiting for a sense of God, and connection, a feeling in her chest that she always felt when she prayed for long enough. But it hadn’t come yet and she momentarily worried that she would never feel it again. Her sister snored lightly. The woman tried to clear her mind, but she was distracted by the heavy beat of a bass coming from the house next door. She found her head was nodding in time with the beat and she immediately stilled it. Her hands were sweating and her knees ached into her thighs and calves. She winced in pain and her sister turned over in her sleep, facing her now. Her light breathing rhythmically fluttered the hair that fell over her face. The woman took a deep breath and focused all of her attention on her prayer. She was praying for guidance. She hadn’t prayed in about thirteen years, ever since he mother was killed while crossing the street. The woman had cried and screamed and raged against the walls, but never prayed. Eventually the pain of her loss began to dull. But now she didn’t know what else to do. She felt utterly scattered and confused. Her sister still attended the Episcopal church of their youth. But the woman despised the people there and had long since ceased going. Now she yearned. She was not sure what for. Her cat padded in through the open doorway and nudged into her side and her knees and her back, wanting to be pet. The bell around her neck jingled softly. Then there was silence. The breeze had stopped and her cat had lain down, and her sister had paused in her night travels. All was quiet. She heard from far above her the strain of a high voice, following one note and holding, suspended. The woman’s head raised, her eyes still closed, but relaxed. The note continued. Everything else disappeared. And then all was silent again. The woman’s chest felt lighter, like it had risen far above her body and held there with the note, suspended. Her clasped hands relaxed, and her knees no longer ached. Her sister turned over and the jingle of her cat’s bell faded into the other room. Rest.

One Page #26

She called herself Myrtle and she looked at me and laughed, spit flying into my face and resting in shiny pearls on my nose and cheeks. She turned away from me, and I was relieved because the look in her eye was dangerous. I knew she was about to propose something to me, and it would be something that I didn’t want to do. It always was. The light was fading as we stood on the beach. We had moved away from the water because the waves lapping against our feet sprung goose bumps on our arms and shivers along my spine. We were nearly warmed by the sun now, which had turned a crystal yellow orange surrounded by rays of red and deepening purple. My feet were dry now and my hands were deep in my pockets as I faced Myrtle’s back. Her neck was unusually long, and I always thought about this when I looked at her back. There was nothing else extraordinary about Myrtle, except for her neck. I had once touched it and she had looked me coldly in the eye. I never went near her again, even though sometimes I thought that she wanted me to. But only as a dare. I turned my back on her and looked towards the mountains in the distance that were rimmed in fog. I could see the first of the stars appearing. From behind I heard Myrtle turn around and then felt her hand on my shoulder. I spun around unnecessarily quickly and looked at her. Her eyes were soft and her mouth slightly open. A plane flew far overhead. It whispered a rumble in my ear. Myrtle’s hand was still on my shoulder and we were closer than we had ever really been. Sometimes when we went to scary movies she would grab my hand in fright, but we weren’t close then; her reach was only out of necessity. But now something had changed. The red light reflected in her eyes and glinted off her stud earrings. Through her tank top I could see her chest rise and fall with her breathing, but I didn’t look down, I only looked straight into her eyes. She looked away first and headed toward the pier from where we had come. There were kids and old men fishing off the pier, but they looked bored and tired, even from far off. I waited a moment and then followed her. We didn’t walk next to each other the whole way back. At the pier she hopped up the stairs and headed home without saying goodbye. My house was in the other direction. I felt like I had failed a test that I hadn’t signed up for. It was more of a pop quiz really, sprung upon me unknowingly. And I had failed. I wondered what the consequences would be, if I would fail the course or still be able to get an A later on if I worked hard enough. Myrtle wasn’t her real name, it was really Rose. But she was not a flower in my eyes.

One Page #25

Patrick looked out the kitchen window at the waves that crashed dramatically on the beach below. Rain was splashing against the windowpanes making pink pink sounds as if it were hail. But I was unseasonably warm out for spring and it felt more like an August thunderstorm. The wind was fierce and the petals were blowing off of the newly opened daffodils and Patrick knew that his mom would be upset when she went outside the next morning. His parents had already gone upstairs for bed and his sister was long asleep in her crib at their bedside. He was alone downstairs. The lights were mostly off except for one leading up the stairs and he leaned against the kitchen window wondering how strong the wind would have to be to shatter the glass and carry him away, across the ocean, to a new land. He would ride the wind faster than his bicycle would carry him, and even faster than the family’s station wagon would carry him. He would fly faster than he had every gone before and arrive at this new land to discover faeries and unicorns and dragonflies the size of his arm. But the wind wasn’t strong enough and the glass panes held their weight and he could only watch the storm rumble across the sky, leaving streaks of lightening it its wake and blowing sand from the beach across the road. Tomorrow he knew their car would sputter against the sands resistance and he could already hear the crunch of shells and pebbles beneath the tires. He always planned the night of storms to get up early the next morning and see the wreckage before anyone else was up, but he never did. Sleep held him captive. He hoped that this storm would bring in a pirate ship that would anchor itself off the shore and send rowboats to the beach. Pirate would pillage the town, wreak havoc among the neighbors, and meet Patrick, shake his hand, and haul him off into their rowboat and out to sea where he would live among the scraggily fellows who stole their food and gold and sent shivers up the spines of all the people in all the land. He would wear a bandana over his head and a black and white stripped shirt and he would say ‘ello matey with a casual but threatening voice. But he didn’t see any pirate ships. He heard the foghorn from the point just south of his house and around a few corners and inlets. But it was dulled by the crashing waves and the rain pounding the roof. He opened the window just wide enough to stick his head out and soak up the rain, he hair laying limp and plastered against his forehead and face was drenched with the skies tears that tasted salty just like his own. After a moment he retreated back inside and knew his mother would be upset with the wet kitchen floor.

One Page #24

Their home was powered by brilliant blue sails that puffed into the wind and blew them out across the seas toward the new world unexplored and uncharted. New waters promised new hope that would carry them into the newly unexpected. Turnips and porcupines and scratched porcelain bowls and shards of glass in blues and greens and browns littered the deck that was shaded by the billowing sail but speckled with light that bounced off the glass lanterns that swung back and forth, back and forth. One misstep led to a spill into the silky black waters and so they walked carefully down the deck, holding the railing that had splinters that broke off and stuck into the fingertips. The waves were lapping gently against the walls that had circular portholes and pictures of trains and forests and long winding staircases. The air was smoky from the grill that cooked dinner, fish they had caught earlier. They saw a dolphin leap through the air and a school of sardines race by as one unit, so comfortable together but strangers to each other. The sky was fading into purple and orange and the sails caught the light and trembled in the breeze. The mast creaked and the floors creaked and tilted gently from side to side. They flopped about in their sandals; flip flop against the polished deck. Their cat crawled sneakily around the open door that swung in the breeze, hinges also creaking, door rocking methodically. They saw seagulls cawing and ravens leftover from dreams years ago and a saber tooth tiger and even a Viking with a pointed-horned hat and silver chest plates that caught the glint of the sun that was just disappearing under the horizon, sinking so liquidly into a melted puddle of colors mingling. They saw cliffs, but only in their imaginations, dreaming of land and solidarity and trees that shaded them from the brightness, and beaches that left sand in every crevice of their bodies and bananas ripe and falling from the trees into their laps where bowls of yogurt sat just waiting for the tender fruit so sweet, almost caramelized from the sun. But land was many miles behind them and in front, since they were always moving forward, there was only water littered with sparkling diamonds and bubbles of white in the choppy air. Shorts were to revealing now and hats were no longer needed and they settled into the cabin with goblets of brandy because that was all they had left and they ate grilled fish, picking out the bones from between their teeth and crackers that were soggy and limp and no longer crunched but smooshed. One smelled lavender and the other smelled chamomile and they both thought of bricks piled into walls and roofs that housed chimneys with smoke billowing.

One Page #23

Paula screamed at the girl across the counter, and then blushed and felt terrible. She apologized over and over again, saying she didn’t know what came over her. But she knew. She just pretended to herself and everyone else that she didn’t. It had been a long week and most things had gone badly and the sky felt black and like it was pressing down on her from above like God laying his great hand on her head and squishing her into the floor. She didn’t believe in God, but that was what it felt like anyway. If Paula did believe in God, it wouldn’t be a man, and he wouldn’t have a hand, and he wouldn’t be squishing her but lifting her up, giving her a hand and a moment of forgiveness. But in this moment all she felt was a great weight and all she saw was a dimming world that glimmered and faded into her skull so thick with mothballs and smelling of salt. The girl across the counter looked at her wide-eyed, not knowing what to make of the crazy screaming and the raging fists and the trembling hairs on the top of the woman’s head. Paula wanted to faint, only for a moment of relief, a pause that would allow her to think and let go and possibly shed the weight that burdened her. She thought of cacti in the desert and she thought of paper bags that crumpled and she thought of lentil stew simmering on the stove with tomatoes and herbs and onions. She looked at the woman behind the counter, blushed more deeply, and stepped out of line and headed for the door. People stared at her and a little girl in a pink tutu reached out a hand towards her and a dog watched her with woeful eyes through the front door. The dog moved when she opened the door, standing aside as if afraid, and she felt the sun hit her face with a force that almost made her take a step back, but she moved forward and closed her eyes a moment as she walked. When she opened them she was free of the stares and the pitying glances and the embarrassment and she looked for a way out. She wanted root beer, and a wedge of lime, and a strong shot or two of tequila, even though she didn’t drink any longer and hadn’t for years. It interfered with her medication. She fingered the small oval orange pills in her pocket that she brought with her everywhere in case she needed them. She took one now, swallowing without water. She thought of the time she had been caught in a rainstorm far from home and the orange pills in her pocket had disintegrated and stained her shorts orange. She had needed one then, but they were gone and she wondered if she sucked at her shorts pockets whether she would get any of the relief the pills offered or whether she would only end up with a mouthful of fuzz and lint.

One Page #22

He aligned his book so that the sun slanted diagonally across the page. It was so bright that he could only read the shaded side of the page but reading those words, half cut off and mottled, he was reading a poem of mismatched and undirected phrases. Cassandra was jumping through red hoops of fallen leaves towards Bethlehem that was divided by lightning in the early morning sky of purple shirts and olives soaked in oil and sage. He closed the book and rested it between his chest and his arms, which he crossed over the book, clasping his elbows against the chill that was settling into the air after the storm that had raced through the night, rattling the windows and soaking the chair, which he had forgotten to bring in from his front porch. It was sunny now but clouds still passed meanderingly overhead sending him into shade and then sun and then shade again. When the sun didn’t reappear he took his book inside and put water on for tea. The light was dulling and lazy and when he opened the window that had been shut tightly to keep the rain out he smelled the gardenias and rosehips that were splashed across the side yard between his house and his neighbor’s house. Their house had just been painted a shocking pink with yellow trim and he had closed his blinds for the first few days as the paint dried to shelter his eyes from the glare that bounced off the nearly florescent walls. But he had slowly grown used to the pink and even liked the yellow trim so his shades stayed open now and he watered his plants by leaning out the window. Sometimes his neighbor Ron leaned out his window and they chatted about the weather or the Red Sox game (even though neither watched the games, the just read the newspaper and pretended that they had because that is what men were supposed to do). But today Ron wasn’t around and his plants didn’t need watering and the teakettle was boiling into a piercing whistle that brought him away from the window and into the kitchen for his tea. He had given up drinking coffee the week before and was still suffering the headaches that tea didn’t abate, and he missed the smell of the brew early in the morning that filtered through the house and made it feel like a home instead of just three rooms that he resided in. He poured the water over the mint teabag and the scent permeated the air around him and he thought briefly of England where he had lived years ago in the countryside and grown a selection of mint plants for no reason aside from the fact that he loved the scent. He drank coffee then and never made mint tea, but gave away the leaves to friends that did. Now he missed those plants, and the rosehips were no replacement.

The Accident

She had been miserable, but the days had passed and now her elbows bent and her knees bent and her skin was healing over. There were patches of scabs still that she tried to resist picking at, and she watched the skin change colors as the bruises deepened and then faded. She got out of bed for the first time aside from brief trips to the bathroom in about a week and her legs felt weak and shook a little as she stood. But the tremor disappeared as she walked around the room. She was tired of her view from the bed and she stood by the window for several moments looking out over the trees. She could just see the ocean through the branches since the leaves had started to fall. She loved winter because it changed her view entirely and she almost had a full view of the beach a few blocks away. But in the spring when the trees leafed out she lost her view and could hardly even see the sky as it was sheltered by the maple tree right outside of her window. Standing wasn’t comfortable so she went into the kitchen to make tea.

Her friend had been coming over every day to cook and help her to the bathroom. But she had rung her friend this morning and said she could take care of herself now. She didn’t like to ask for help, but it had been necessary. She had ignored the mail in hopes of not thinking about the legal ramifications of the previous week, but she could pretend no longer. Denial had served her throughout the week though, except in her dreams where she relived the accident over and over again. She hardly remembered what had happened now though. She remembered a man with a full beard and piercing olive green eyes. She remembered metal scraping and the flicker of flames out of the corner of her eye. And she remembered the view of the trees from upside down, and the surprise at how foreign the world looked from a different angle.

She had made the front page of the newspaper and had received cards and flowers and small gifts that remained unwrapped on the kitchen table. Her car had been totaled and the bearded man’s truck had burst into flames, but he had remained miraculously unscathed. But the caged bird in his backseat that was on the way to the vet had gone up in flames with the truck and the man had repeated over and over again the last caw he had heard from the colorful toucan. He cried about his bird, but not about his truck. He said a deer had leapt into the road and his brakes had screamed into the pavement. She didn’t remember a deer. He had sent her a gift but it was with the others. She didn’t want to open it. She had lost nothing important in her car, but her palms were shredded and the bruise around her eye looked like the result of an abusive relationship. She thought of the toucan and wondered whether the colors of its feathers looked like dancing flames. She hoped it had died quickly, instead of smoldering slowly trapped behind bars.

The bearded man was supposed to visit her today. She knew he felt guilty that she had been so beat up and he hadn’t. But she was glad that he hadn’t gone up in flames as well, a man and his bird burning together, skin and feathers melting into oblivion. She wondered what burning feathers smelled like, and if it was anything like burning hair which she had discovered the smell of when she tried to straighten her hair with an iron when she was about seven years old. That had been a failed experiment. Her mom had screamed at her, and then took scissors to her head and cut off all of her hair until there was only an inch left. She had kept her hair short ever since to spite her mother since she knew her mother envisioned having a beautiful daughter with long curly hair and graceful hands that stroked the pearly white piano keys. She never learned to play the piano and her hands were not graceful.

Her knees buckled and she hobbled over to the kitchen table and sat down. The room was cold and she hugged herself with her arms wrapped around her shoulders for a moment. She looked at the gifts on the table and moved them aside. She lay her head down on her arms and fingered the bristle of her hair that was growing long enough to flop over instead of standing straight up. The kitchen looked larger from her horizontal perspective and the fridge seemed so far away. But with the grumble of her stomach she rose and looked for the peanut butter. She made a sandwich with honey and raisins and brought it back to her bed to eat. Her bed felt safe and familiar whereas the rest of her apartment felt oddly distant and cold. Her bedroom was bright and sunny compared to the dark kitchen, and felt warmer as she climbed into bed. She could feel the stretch of new skin across her knees and elbows and she gently fingered the bruises to see if they still hurt. They did, but less than they had before.

Her phone rang and it was the bearded man whose name she couldn’t remember, even after he said it again over the phone. He asked when a good time to visit would be, and she couldn’t think of any good time, but said early afternoon would work. She gave him directions and hung up. She finished her sandwich and lay back against the pillows watching the leaves flutter in the late fall breeze. She pulled the covers up to her chin and dosed off. She dreamt of a camel with pearls around his neck and water flowing out of his mouth. She was drinking the water and splashing it over her face. She could feel the salt crystals of her sweat flow off of her chin and into the sand that was hot from the sun. When she awoke her hair and shirt were damp from sweat. She smoothed her hair back and thought about the view of trees from upside down. She heard a crow outside but by the time she got to the window it had flown away.

She slowly dressed and rinsed her face in preparation for the bearded man’s visit. He had seemed nice over the phone, but she was nervous about having company, especially since she still looked so battered. He arrived with flowers in his hand, and she accepted them with slightly raised eyebrows. She offered him a chair and a cup of tea which he accepted, tilting the chair at an angle to the table so he could rest an ankle on his knee. His eyes were smiling and kind, but also full of sympathy. He asked how she was doing. She was momentarily distracted by trying to remember his name, and then answered that she was fine. She sat down across the table from him and leaned on her elbows with her mug of mint tea in her hands. The sharp scent filled her nostrils as she breathed in deeply, and her face felt damp from the steam. She apologized for the loss of his bird. He looked down at his lap for a moment and then back at her face and said thank you. His smiling eyes faded into sadness and remembrance. They talked about the accident, and he filled her in on the details that she didn’t remember. But their conversation was factual and lacked emotion as if they were already too distanced from it to even remember that they were both there. It was as if they were talking about an accident that they had read about in the newspaper, something that had happened to someone else. It felt easier that way. When she asked him about his interest in birds he became animated and spoke with gestures, and leaning in towards her, she could smell mint on his breath from the tea. His eyes were smiling again.

He left a little while later. She was glad he had come by after all. After he left she put the flowers he had brought, pansies that looked freshly cut from his garden, into a small ceramic vase and brought them into her bedroom where they fit nicely on her bedside table. She leaned over the smell them, but they hardly had a scent. She thought about the bearded man’s smiling eyes, and wondered if her eyes ever looked like that, so shiny and sparkling, as if they knew something that no one else knew, a hidden well of happiness.

She lay down on her bed facing the bouquet of pansies and studied their dark centers that flared out into brilliant color. She closed her eyes and quickly fell asleep. She dreamt of the crow that had cawed outside of her window. It was sitting on a branch watching over her. But after a moment it dipped into the air and as it flew away its inky black feathers turned to shocking reds and oranges and blues and it cawed like the toucan had in the burning truck, but with less desperation. It circled several times through the sky above her bedroom and then flew off into the distance until it was nothing but a black dot against the graying horizon.

Flying far far away.....

Today a slacker...tomorrow a slacker...next week, back in business, so don't give up on me!

Old

Unfortunately, the flight of stairs was far too steep and far too tall fading off into the nether reaches of the house, for the old woman to climb. She stood at the bottom of the staircase looking up, one hand resting on the banister, a shiny carved piece of cherry wood that the old woman could see her reflection in when she looked closely and over the rims of her glasses. She sighed. She did so want to be able to climb the staircase, one step then another, to see her brand new granddaughter who lay asleep in her crib upstairs. The old woman had entered through the front door without being let in. She hadn’t knocked or rung the doorbell. She had quietly turned the polished brass knob and entered, stepping lightly on the plush Indian rug of reds and oranges. She had peered into the parlor and saw nothing but an abandoned silver tea set and mostly empty china mugs. She heard rustlings upstairs, but no footsteps. She thought she could make out coos from the baby, and the old woman wondered what her granddaughter looked like. She hadn’t seen her daughter in over twenty years, and only new about the birth from the daily paper that always posted the comings and goings of the townspeople. She longed to see her estranged daughter, to see the crinkles around her eyes, and the softness of her cheek. She longed to see if her granddaughter had the same brilliant blue eyes, and dimple in her chin. As she looked up the staircase, she wondered how she had become so old, so decrepit. She turned and sat herself down slowly on the third step up, knees bent and cracking, a steady hand on the banister to help her down. She would just wait. And she wondered if, when her daughter saw her back leaning against the banister, he silver hair pulled tight into a bun, whether she would just decide to stay upstairs forever.

The Game

The game began innocently enough, three girls and three boys playing tag on the playground at recess, desperately needing to race around dodging reaching arms, a longed-for break from sitting tall in wooden seats attached to wooden desks where the tops open and inside lie pencils sharpened and notebooks blank and wanting. It was only a game, one girl explained later. She didn’t think there was anything wrong with it. The teacher who watched them didn’t think there was anything wrong with it, at first. The other girls and boys were happy to be stretching their legs and breathing deeply, gasping for air and dodging enemies. Staying mobile was all they were thinking about, the girls and boys on the playground. The other children were sitting reading, or in small groups giggling, or watching the tag game from the sidelines. But when one girl swatted her mile-long pigtail at another girl, hands clasping momentarily, one boy watching from across the blacktop at the flirting laughing girls, clinging to each other, he yelled. All eyes were on him. His body shook and he raced toward them. The girls ran in opposite directions, hands tearing from each other, fingers still wanting. He chose one and followed and around and around they went dodging the basketball poles and potholes in the pavement edges. He caught her and threw her down. Another boy joined, for it was only a game. Soon all three boys were piled on top and the other two girls stood watching, braid ends in mouths sucking nervously. The teacher was reading; even the yell hardly brought her eyes up, it was only a game. Moments later, the game was over. The girl on the bottom of the pile of three boys had smashed her head to the pavement and disappeared from the game, from the schoolyard, from this life.

Bed Ridden

And so the days passed, one after another never ceasing, never changing. Well, actually this wasn’t completely true; it only felt true to Susan who lay in her hospital bed surrounded by four white walls, white sheets, and a single window to mark the turn from day to night, and night to day. She lay on her side most of the day looking out the window. The tree right outside shaded her room for the first few months, but then it turned cold and the leaves turned yellow then brown and then fell to the ground leaving her with a new view. She could see across the road now, she could see the stone steps of the library, and the kids sitting on them after school waiting for their parents to come pick them up. She could see the old man who came every day around noontime to smoke his pipe, puff puff, and walk inside. He would reappear about an hour later, book in hand, reaching for his pipe, puff puff. And away he walked. She could see her sister, who stopped by the library before coming to visit her. She always brought Susan a new book to read; since this was about all she could do besides watch the people come and go up and down the stone library steps. She remembered how the stone turned to ice in the cold, and then soaked up the sun in the summer, changing with the seasons just the way her tree seemed to do. She watched.

Large

This is her standing. She doesn’t stand often; she is too large to heft her body out of the easy chair she sits in all day long. But once and a while she finds deep within herself a hidden strength that motivates her just enough to lift her body from the chair, which is worn, the flowered pattern in oranges and browns mostly rubbed into nothingness and bare threads stick this way and that prickling her arms. But she doesn’t seem to feel them; she doesn’t seem to feel anything anymore. Watch her stand. Her ankles wobble and I always think she is going to fall forward, flat onto her face. But she surprises me every time by maintaining her stance. Sometimes she walks a few feet; sometimes she turns in a circle. Other times she doesn’t move her feet, just stands a moment and then sits back down, shaking the ground with her weight, the chair creaking beneath her. I can’t imagine how the little wooden legs of the chair support her weight, and have for so many years now. But they withstand her body, and maybe even miss her body during the scarce moments that she stands. As soon as she falls back into her chair, her arms coming to rest on the threads that hold her arms, she falls fast asleep and I almost think she has died from the exertion.

The Fall

In a way I wanted her to fall. I watched her standing on top of the jungle gym, her skirt blowing in the breeze behind her. Her shiny black Mary Jane shoes reflected the sunlight and made me blink and squint and turn away. She leaned into the wind until her body was held up only by the anchoring of her shoes to the wooden slats. The tire swing swung back and forth making a creaking sound. She looked over at me and laughed, as if daring me to want her to fall, or to test how anxious I was about her being so high up and held to the ground by so little. She waved and I waved back. Look at me she called down. No one else was around. The playground was silent except for the creaking swing and her calling voice. It started to snow and flakes caught my lashes and I could hardly see her anymore through the wet crystals forming before my eyes. She threw her head back to face the sky full on and laughed as loud as she knew how to. Then she jumped.

One Page #21

I do not know which of us did it, but maybe it doesn’t matter anymore. I still think about it though, and feel the stabbing pang of guilt. We both stood side by side watching it fall, pausing a moment in mid air as if trying to decide whether it wanted to go all the way down or maybe bounce back upright. It fell. It shattered. We watched. Our hands were trembling a little bit, and the hairs on my arm stood up straight. But the fire burned in the hearth and the yellow-orange light flickered in our eyes and warmed our cheeks to a blush. I heard you make a noise and when I looked over at your face I saw you were laughing. You tried to hide it for a moment, but that moment passed and you were throwing shrieks at the ceiling, howling into the rafters that were so far above our heads that it was nighttime dark up there. I expected the stars to be shining, but there was nothing there. I thought I saw a bat fly from one beam to another, but I could have imagined that. I looked back at your laughing that was waning slightly now, and smiled at the twinkle in your eyes. They shone like the stars that were absent from above and looking into them I fell weightless into the distance over treetops and oceans tumbling and continents adrift. You pulled me higher and higher and you held my hand tightly promising never to let go. You laughter echoed into the heavens now and I thought I saw angels blowing horns that raised your laughter into song and the melody still plays in my ears now as I lie in bed looking at the ceiling under comforters and quilts and orange flannel sheets that have been washed over and over and feel like the softness of your cheek against mine in the early morning sunshine when our eyes are still fresh to the dawn and the rooster is cackling outside with the chickens clucking around him and we throw corn and seed from our bedroom window in arcs across the lawn. But I think back to why you were laughing and I feel the guilt again like a rock tumbling around in my stomach and I cringe at the memory of the awful shattering that echoed throughout the room as shards jumped into the fire and sizzled with a hiss into smoke that coiled up through the chimney and was released out into the night sky scenting the air and pervading the noses of passers by who looked into our lit windows with envy of the warmth and safety that we endured, not hearing the cackling and not seeing the scattered shards and not peering into the rafters at the elusive bat who tumbled around in the darkness. I looked out at their faces peering in and I held your hand in the shadows where no one could see and I smiled towards your dancing eyes that blinked away tears.

One Page #20

She wanted to savor the last moment they spent together. And she would remember this moment until her memory faded with old age. As her hair turned white and her teeth grayed and her fingers started shaking like leaves on a windy day she began writing down her memories. Her pen quivered on the page making scribbles in circles as she sat and looked out the window at the forest and the ducks that were flying overhead. She remembered yesterday and the day before, but everything else was fading away. She kept trying to hold on to it, but you can’t hold on to memory because the more you try the more elusive it is. Memory plays games, and every second that goes by alters your memories until soon they are nothing like what really happened, but you don’t know that because you can’t remember what really happened. And what really happened doesn’t matter anymore, what matters is that it did happen, and you wouldn’t be here today, pen in hand, if it hadn’t happened. So you can rest assured knowing that something happened, even if you can’t remember it. But she did remember that last moment pretty well. She remembered the smell of the new spring day, and the lilacs were just opening their petals and the hills were bursting green. They had stood before each other, looking, memorizing, and then disappearing. She remembered the last thing that happened, a finger to the tip of her nose so smooth with a perfectly rounded nail. There was a wink and a touch to the shoulder and then a turn of the head toward the sun. She caught the glimmer of gold in her ear and the long stretch of her neck angled impossibly, straining veins popping. They had looked at each other one last time, and the air felt velvet. The last moment was long as if the trees around them stopped rustling for just a moment and the birds paused in mid-flight. And then it was over and all she saw was a back and heels click clacking on the gravel road, bag bouncing against hip and hair flipping in the wind towards heaven. If a tree fell on her that very moment she would have died a happy woman. But now she couldn’t decide now whether she was happy or not. And maybe it didn’t matter. She looked at the paper and pen in front of her and wrote every detail that she could remember, but all she knew for sure was that her shirt was red and the sky was a brilliant blue and a hawk had flown through the trees with a caw caw shrieking. And the rest has been changed by many years of experience adding layers upon layers over the memory. She thought of the long, outstretched neck and how smooth the skin was under the chin when it was pulled taut, and she wrote that down too. Her hand shook.

A Little Bit of Weirdness

Nick had considered himself a lucky guy, until now. Today he was Meredith complete with curves, high heels and a bitch of a backache. This hadn’t happened in years, and he thought he had solved his problem way back when with thousands of dollars to an infamous psychiatrist. But today there was no denying it; he was Meredith. His luck had run out. He had won at scratch cards a few times, and raffles, door prizes, and concert tickets off the radio. That was luck. This was not luck, this was the opposite of luck, this was negative luck.

He knew as soon as he woke up that something was off, but it was a familiar off-ness. The feeling flooded back, and he felt different in his body, in his mind. He reached first for his face, which was the safest place to start. His cheeks were smooth, his lips full, and his eyes still sticky from makeup remover. He felt his neck, also silky smooth, and a hollow where his Adam’s apple usually protruded. He gulped. He could feel the gulp with his hand at his throat. Slowly, with dread and fear, he worked his hand down toward his chest. His touch was light, he could feel the drag of his long curved nails run along his upper chest and then move outward with the curve of a breast. When he came to the nipple, hard beneath his camisole, he stopped. He circled around the nipple, slowly, and felt damp all over his body. He stopped and withdrew his hand to above the covers. His heart raced. He was an unlucky man today. Or, should he say an unlucky woman today?

The few other times this had happened he had never been anything other than a man. He had awoken with different names, different homes, and even different bodies. He thought with relish about the bodybuilder’s body, he had never known such strength! Oh, how the ladies loved him then. But he had never been a woman. He couldn’t move, his body was immobilized in bed. The sheets felt suddenly cold, then hot. He was sweating. The names always came to him, as if they were ingrained in him. Meredith just felt right. As he said the name a few times in his head a slow smile crept across his face. I am a woman, he thought. This was like Gregory Samsa waking up as a bug, but a million times better. Maybe I am actually the luckiest man alive.

His sense of manliness slowly ebbed. This always happened. He lost himself, and everything he knew about himself, as he became someone else. He knew, or hoped, that he would return to this same sense of self at some point, usually a day or two later. But he never really knew that this would happen. He always worried that he would lose himself completely, and never return to the self that he knew. As the last inklings of memory and identity disappeared he looked around at his room with desperation. Already the baseball posters were fading, replaced with blue and white striped wallpaper. He saw his sneakers fade into black high heels, discarded after a long night of dancing. He surrendered his terrycloth bathrobe that hung on the back of the door for a silk slip. And then everything was fuzzy.

When she awoke, Meredith looked at the ceiling. Last night had been amazing, dancing and margaritas until four and a meandering cab ride home with her three girlfriends, looking at the moon reflected in the river and calling out to the prostitutes who lined the streets, telling them how gorgeous they looked. She didn’t remember coming home, or falling asleep. She didn’t remember her dreams very well either, but she thought she might have been a man in one and could almost feel the folds of a terry cloth bathrobe and the sweaty smile of Babe Ruth, bat in hand, striped baseball cap at a jaunty angle. But then it was gone. She rolled onto her side and looked at her clock. She had ten minutes to catch her train to work. She sighed, and then moved the covers aside, kicked her high heels under the bed, and went to the closet. She pulled on jeans and a Black Sabbath t-shirt. She pulled sneakers from the floor and tied the laces quickly. She had just enough time to brush her teeth before running down the stairs to the train station a block away. A man in an orange plaid coat at the station looked her way and smiled. She frowned and looked away, eager for the train to come.

She tried to remember back to a few days ago when her boss had yelled at her for being late. He was on old friend, and the yelling was only for show. But she couldn’t seem to remember the conversation. It was an almost-memory, the kind where the more you think about it the less real it seems. She tried to think about something else, hoping that the conversation would come back if she pretended not to care. She thought about the groceries she needed and the funny old lady with blue hair who worked at the corner market where she shopped. No luck, she couldn’t remember. The train was late. She moved toward to the track and realized she had stepped in gum. The pink strings between the wad and her foot elongated as she lifted her shoe. She scraped her foot against the ground, hoping the concrete was rough enough to get the gum off. As she moved away she could feel her sole was still sticky. This was not a lucky day.

The train came and Meredith boarded. The seats were full so she held onto a vertical metal pole as the train bounced into darkness. People were reading newspapers and drinking coffee, eyes half closed, still partially lost in the trundles of sleep. Meredith looked at the floor, wary of more gum wads, and then glanced up and met the gaze of a man who was staring at her. She thought of Babe Ruth. She saw the man swallow and his Adams’ apple bounce twice in quick succession. He looked away. His scruffy cheeks seemed familiar. She looked back and he was gone. People swarmed around her, clamoring for the exit as the doors snapped open. A moment later they closed; the train was quieter and she was carried off into the darkness once again. She reached up and rubbed her tired eyes. As her hand fell back down to her side, she caught the scruff of her cheek against her thumb. She reached back up and fingered the coarse hairs. They felt familiar.

At the next stop, a girl with a Black Sabbath t-shirt got on the train. He admired the image of bright lights and painted faces silk screened on the front with jagged letters underneath announcing tour dates. He had been at that show. The woman sneered at him and he realized she must have thought he was looking at her chest. He blushed. This was not a lucky day.

One Page #19

Before I saw them coming I turned several circles in the yard with my arms outstretched and my face raised toward the sunshine that filtered in through my mostly closed lashes. As I passed around and around I saw the sun fly by between my lashes that stood like bars between my self and the sky and blurred the tree branches and the crows that were flying around first one way and then another as if they couldn’t make up their minds about which direction they were headed. I don’t blame them. Finding direction, choosing direction, is nearly impossible. You are always going one way or another way, but changing course is inevitable and sometimes the most exciting part, but it is the long stretches of moving only forward, not to the right or left, just straight on, that is easy but boring and makes my eye lids droop low and my eyes cast downwards toward the grass where I nearly miss a branch that would have caught on my pant legs and held on tight like it’s life depended on my forward motion but just then I decided to swerve and I missed the branch and instead flew off to the left where the lawn slopped down towards the pond and as I neared it, still spinning slowly in circles, I saw the ripples on the surface of the water coming towards me like the wind and they passed in and out of my view as I spun around and I thought that maybe I would fall in. But I didn’t. I stopped instead because I was getting dizzy and the ripples were catching the sunlight in just the right way so that with each ripple I could see just for a second the glint of the sun and then it disappeared and rolled into the next ripple where I saw the same glint of the sun, except it wasn’t exactly the same because no ripple is exactly alike, even though they look awfully similar. I wonder if the sun is the same sun, maybe with each ripple a new sun is reflected until there are so many suns and so many ripples that I am drowning, and I am nearly halfway drowned when I see them coming. And I stop and watch them come across the lawn towards me. They are holding hands and I wonder whether her skin is still as smooth as the rock that is warm in my pocket and has two parallel lines that run in circles around the surface of the rock. The lines are white and the rock is a dark green-gray and the white lines divide the green-gray into three sections that are all different sizes, but the middle one is the smallest because the two white lines are close together, almost like they want to be touching but are scared to because touch is scary, so I don’t blame them for keeping to themselves. The hands that are clutching each other arrive, with two bodies, and two grinning faces that meet mine. But I am not smiling, not just yet anyway.