Here We Go Again

by Alison Cochrun

“I always thought you girls would bury the hatchet.” “Hale definitely keeps maps of where she put them.”

“Stay, stay, stay,” she chants like a prayer. Or a Taylor Swift song.

She thought Rosemary would kiss like they’re in a Jane Austen novel, but she kisses her like they’re in a Jane Austen movie adaptation.

western Texas kind of sucks.

apparently everything is bigger in Texas, including hatred.

For the first time since they crossed the border, Logan notices the impossible blue of the northern Texas sky, the way it stretches on forever over the undulating fields of brown. There is immense beauty here, despite everything else.

Logan is sunshine and adventure and freedom and the month of July. Rosemary is September. A new planner and sharpened pencils and outfits laid out on her bed the night before.

“You don’t have to, Rosemary,” she says in that same gentle voice. It sounds the way seeing a lighthouse must feel to a ship that’s desperate for safe harbor.

And that’s the problem with her ADHD brain. If she lets it feel one thing, it will feel all the things, all the time. It doesn’t do moderation either. Every emotion is always at eleven, which is why it’s easiest not to feel anything at all.