Summer Romance

by Annabel Monaghan

I want to be that mother, both steering the ship to safety and being the safety itself.

There’s something intoxicating about how he’s looking at me like I’m someone I used to be.

I look at my phone for a few seconds, at the word “normal.” It morphs in front of my eyes into something negative. Normal is a man walking into my kitchen and making me feel absolutely nothing. Normal is just getting through a conversation so it can be over.