izzy

“Jazz hands shouldn’t be used in that –
what d’you call that? –
in that context.”

she wipes the sweat from her brow,
turns with lowered eyes and calls over her shoulder
“Junior whopper, no onion!”

the cash register blinks
“Next.”

*

sarah

When they ask me: what was the exact moment you knew that things were not right?
I’ll say:
It wasn’t when I slid out of the sheets onto my head
It wasn’t melting onto the carpet in a puddle of numb disinterest
It wasn’t noticing vaguely that voices were long and echoed, and faces felt eons away
It wasn’t the sudden crying jag where tears ran across my forehead because of the inane angle of my body
It was when I knocked over the glass of water and felt it seep insistently through my jeans
And I didn’t think: hey, get up, it’s cold and wet down here
I didn’t thing: you can just get right up
I didn’t think: stop crying tears into your hair
I thought: this feels flat and big, like a glacier
I thought: I could just lie here forever in this puddle, staring at the ceiling
I thought: I hope forever isn’t very far away.
That’s when I knew.

*