Fix

on it. A look that says, I win, always, because all I need to do is just sit here. And you lose.
“Problem?” I ask. Trying to hold on. Trying not to fall into her trap. But it’s too hot inside me, a burning pressure expanding, shoving at my casings, and it’s all I can do to keep myself from screeching.
“Forget it, Eve.”
Forget it?
Forget it just means fuck you. It means this is your shit, not mine, thank god, and I can just leave you like this, all balled up and pissier than pissed sitting in your own piss.
That is what it means.
Forget it.
And I don’t fucking forget it. I hold it inside and let it twist itself into knot after knot after knot, filling my belly, smashing my heart against my sternum, forcing itself up my throat and into my skull, until it threatens to explode out the top of my head. But it doesn’t. I won’t let it out. I won’t let her have this one.
She slaps the orange plastic bottle on the table next to me.
I don’t dare touch that bottle. Instead, I close my eyes, and despite the raging storm whipping through me, I say it, calmly, quietly.
“Make her disappear.”
I sit, frozen,
clutching at the round, smooth plastic
of my Roxy bottle. Knowing
I’ve been here before.

The Real One
You wore the fedora.
I wore the visor when,
two hours later, wandering
under the bright lights of the mall,
I finally let it fall
from my mouth.
“I’m having the surgery.”
I remember the
single word that slipped
from yours.
“What?”
Not a happy and excited
WHAT?
But something much smaller,
tighter.
I looked away to give you time—
instantly feeling your anger at this.
Me,
giving you
time.
Me,
knowing you needed it.
Knowing you needed something.
“Two weeks from now,”
I whispered,
watching you
out of the corner of my eye while you
tried to breathe,
tried to respond.
All you managed was a
lick of your lips.
It started then. My babbling.
Anything to cut through
the terrible silence.
Blood draws
MRIs
pulmonary function tests
out of school
for the rest of January and February
and maybe March
better junior year because
college apps
you know
and just think
Thomas the saint will have to do
all the work for
School Within a Freakin’ School, you’re so lucky, Lid,
to be partnered with Ayanna Bilkowski
that chick works harder than a Navy SEAL
maybe harder—
“You’re having the surgery?”
you asked,
sounding
more like I needed you
to sound. Like I
wished you’d
wanted to sound.
“January fourteenth,” I said,
forcing my mouth
into the shape
of a smile, and struggling
to hold it there.
Then… finally
you threw your arms
around me
and I hoped more than anything
you couldn’t feel me panting.
“Good for you, Eve,” you said,
your voice vibrating off the plastic shell
of my brace. “You’re going to be straight, and
I’m going to have two hands.”
You said it like we were going someplace.
But not the same place.


Need
WHEN I WAKE UP, IT’S DARK. I’M STILL ON THE COUCH. Still holding my Roxy. It takes less than a second for the fight with Lidia to flood my memory.
I turn my face toward the window. Close my eyes. Try to breathe slower. Try to return to wherever I was—that quiet, soft place of unconsciousness. But I’ve crossed some sort of awareness line and it won’t let me back in.
I open my eyes. The light coming in from the bay window illuminates the living room. The streetlight throws a stretched-out square across the living room rug and onto the dining room table, where a stack of books and papers sits.
Schoolwork.
In my mind’s eye I see Thomas Aquinas standing in my living room, wearing his T-shirt from Minnesota. I see him opening up his jacket, showing me the words Gophers Hockey. And before I can stop myself, excitement crackles across my chest as I remember how nicely those letters stretched across his.
Then I remember another boy. This one in a black fedora, and I pluck out a pill, stick it in my mouth—swallowing it with a sip from the nearest glass of water. It’s warm. And I can taste the dust floating on the top of it. I have no idea how long it’s been sitting there.
I settle back to concentrate on the Roxy’s effect, absently reaching my fingers into the orange bottle to count my pills. Then I cap it and close my eyes while the dwindling number settles heavily at the bottom of my stomach.
The blanket is twisted around my legs.
And it’s hot.
If only the window were open. I ache for fresh air. I close my eyes and imagine it.
“As you wish,” he whispers.
Cold air slides across my face. My god it feels good.
“So did I just wipe out a few lakes in return for my breeze?” I ask.
“You’ve visited Minnesota’s wiki page,” he says.
“‘The land of ten thousand lakes.’” I recite Minnesota’s nickname, sucking in a huge breath of state-destroying air, drawing it in long and slow. It tastes cold and delicious—yet by the time I’m releasing that very same breath, I see her on the chair, her eyes on my Roxy.
“Take me back,” I whisper, meaning exactly that. Back. To being twisted and bent and hunched and me. Me. How could I have wanted to be anything but what I was? Now I am… this. And I don’t know what this is. It’s like Sowah straightened my spine but left everything else crooked.
“I can stop the pain,” he says.
“Yes,” I beg him. “Please.”
“She didn’t need the hand, Eve.”
My telescope. It’s scary how he understands me.
“Do I need you?” I ask.
He laughs. The sound tingles across my scalp.
But then I see her face… the disapproving look.
I pull out my phone. And text.
Lidia
And then wait, staring at the screen, staring at all the bubbles filled with her name. Lidia Lidia Lidia Lidia Lidia Lidia Lidia Lidia Lidia Lidia Lidia Lidia Lidia Lidia Lidia Lidia Lidia Lidia Lidia Lidia Lidia Lidia Lidia Lidia Lidia Lidia Lidia Lidia
There is never an answer. She is never going to answer.
“Eve,” he says quietly, kindly. “You can stop the pain.”
He’s right. I can.
I dig out another pill. This time, I don’t give a shit how many