100 Proof

She dreamed of cauliflower, roasted, drizzled with olive oil, tossed with a crackle of salt. She dreamed of a campfire still burning when she arrived beside it, and of laughter that filtered through the thick forest around her. She dreamed of wind audible only at night, when everything has grown still enough that the sky can whisper. I hear you, she dreamed. I hear you.

The sad, low moan of the coffeemaker announced the arrival of Monday morning. Outside, tandem pigeons dipped and rolled as if they’d choreographed their flight. Everything felt brittle: the light through the kitchen curtains, the dry toast, the china cup she carried around the apartment as she gathered her thoughts for the week ahead. It had been the sort of weekend that left her with so many questions that their very weight threatened to shatter her into pieces before she even left the house.

I don’t have an answer, she said. She sat on the grass among scattered leaves, and she just kept coming up with question after question.

She folded one of the leaves in her palm, but when she opened her hand again, it had cracked in half, some of the edges pulverizing into dust that settled into her health line. She brushed the leaf and its detritus away and settled onto her back, staring up at the nearly-nude branches above.

Does it really matter what I say? She had long stopped looking in his direction, after all.

From the time he could walk, she taught him to stay close, even though she knew it was the one lesson he would spend the rest of his life unlearning. That morning, they crossed the street together, while she juggled bags loaded with groceries.

I want to run, Mama! he said.

She saw the park ahead of them, and she wanted to tell him to go. But she still felt his hand curled, light as a bird, against her hip, and she knew the absence of that weight would start the inevitable breaking of her heart.

He’d aged so much in such a short amount of time. His body had developed an extensive catalog of aches, and when he looked in the mirror, he saw his father staring back at him with confused eyes.

Buck up, kid, his reflection told him. You’ve got plenty left in you.

He felt his mouth form the words, but they still didn’t make any sense. He left the mirror then, determined to find a calendar that would show him the date of the tipping point, the event that marked the beginning of this far-too-quick decline.

Turn the corner, he said. See what’s out there.

The space before she turned had been so cramped, so the large expanse startled her, with its vast emptiness and frozen ground. She had never known it was possible for land to be so beautiful and so terrifying all at once.

She turned back to say something about it to him, but he had not followed. I should have expected that, she thought, and then she stepped forward, the frost crackling underneath her boots.