Green Dot

by Madeleine Gray

I wanted direct evidence that I was not like the other people, and that if in life I did not gain money or professional accolades this was not because I was less capable than others, but because I chose not to engage in systems that presented careers as rewards.

When you get an abortion you can then leave the building, and you might be really devastated or you might feel really free – either way it’s a decision you’ve made about your body and your life and you’ve had that choice. But each of us who works here will have to come back through the office reception area, day after day, having the hours of our own lives reduced, and by the time we leave at 6 pm each day not one of the decisions we’ve made in those past nine or ten hours will truly have been for ourselves.

People are fucked, the girls are right, but I am also a fool. I should have known, but I didn’t want to. There are so many things I don’t want to know, but the universe keeps telling me stuff like an incorrigible gossip, like a school friend on pingers for the first time, not making sense and not stopping for breath.