The Unmaking of June Farrow

by Adrienne Young

I suspected that the ache of missing her would mostly come from those little things. The holes that were left behind, empty places I’d stumble upon now that she was gone.

It was one thing to miss her when she was gone. It was another to miss her when she was still here, in this house with me. For the last few months, I’d found myself longing for the end as much as I’d dreaded it.

My world was a very small one, made up of only a few people and places, and it felt like it was shrinking by the second.

“Maybe I’m still waiting for you to suddenly realize you’re in love with me.”

The morbid, superior curiosity of people who pretended to be good Christian folk was something still alive and well in Jasper.

I recognized that cool judgment in her tone. The sweetness-laced insult. I’d known a lot of women like that in my life.

“You may have ruined my life, June. But first, you gave me one.” My fingers found the damp fabric of his shirt and I pulled him into me, pressing my lips to his.

I’d never felt fear like that. Not ever. And I didn’t think there was any way to ever come back from that explosion of light that had birthed a universe inside of me when she said that word. Mama.

She was a prism that colored me and my world with a story. We were the limbs of a broken tree with poisoned roots.