She loved him so much her legs hurt. This caused her to wriggle through every meeting, twisting her lower body in constant search for relief.
He invited her dancing—it was obvious she wasn’t a dinner-and-movie girl. On the floor, he wrapped around her like music, and it was only after he dropped her off at her apartment that his back spasmed.
In the cobwebby kitchen, she stirred the soup. The small pot held one potato, one carrot, a handful of peas, a pitcher of broth. The radio played Bach with a crackle.
Later, leftovers put away and dishes washed, she replaced the ring on her left hand and turned out the kitchen light, plunging the whole house into darkness.
The firefighters forgot to close off the road when the Smelt house burned. Drivers slowed to watch flames tongue through blown-out windows. In the yard, Mrs. Smelt settled down in the grass, her coat spread beneath her. It had always been so cold in the house, she thought, and it was so nice to wear a single layer. As she watched, the house dropped beams and glass.
On the right side of the United Express plane with tail number N650RW, the flag is backward, stars toward the front of the plane, bars stretching tailward. It makes me uncomfortable not to know the logic behind this, whether or not it was an accident when the decal was applied. After all, if they can’t get the flag on in the right direction, how can I trust them to apply the correct pressure to the bolts, put the right amount of air in the tires, calibrate properly the instruments that guide the plane as it carries our daughter between us?
Normally, I am willing to lose my identity. But that day, as the crowd swarmed, I wanted a nametag and a sign to carry. I wanted to stop in a salon along the route and ask them to streak my hair purple.
Too many of us wore black. Too many of us knew the same chants. It left me powerless to raise my voice, knowing it would only be part of a solid block of noise.
We saved the bathwater, but not the baby. We went to the doctor when we got sick, even though we ate plenty of apples. We put beauty before age. We ended badly, but all was well, nonetheless.
She makes coffee in the morning, because she does not have time to stop along the way. She packs a lunch because some days she is hungry by 11, other days by noon. She keeps ibuprofen in her purse for anticipated headaches.
In the twilight, she sits on her front porch, imagining ways to save enough to buy the house she borrows from her landlord. As night falls, she tallies the list of ideas in her mind, plans their implementation.
She is going to sleep now, coins beneath her pillow that she hopes will turn to bills by morning.
100 Proof 