Activity

I’m a firm believer in tricking myself as I write. Bad confessional poetry has always raised my hackles, because it goes skewering in deep, exclaiming, Ooh, look at all this blood! But I’m like, No one’s interested in your blood. Make me bleed as I’m reading.

Down the hall a door creaked. She wrenched away. Horror wiped his face blank.

“Take the beer,” he said.

Adult collusion. His hand destroyed the evidence. A few pieces fell on the floor.

Upstairs, she could hear them talking. No words, just a man’s voice, a woman’s, back and forth.

The not-quite-not-yet-maybe-soon Natalia took another sip of beer then brushed his trousered leg with one bare foot. Her present-tense self trembled. He didn’t seem to notice. Talking to her was a pretext to speak whatever he usually left unspoken even to himself.

“You wouldn’t be able to tell n…

The beer was disgusting. She didn’t want to say that. When she had so many thoughts, why was there so little that could be said? He was staring at the nothing hanging between them. The beach umbrella. Something strained within her, a pressure like that of the Holy Spirit when it overtook a person. …

“Sit down.” He began to unmake the towers and arrange the pieces on the board. “What’s your favorite color?” Not waiting for her to answer, he said, “I forgot something.”

“What?” Her favorite color was the blue of his robe. He flicked off the light and left the room without replying. Two minutes…