Gifted & Talented

by Olivie Blake

How long had she been holding her breath like this, and when had she started, and what might shatter if she stopped?

“Does she make you happy?” Jamie’s mother had asked, her one question as to whether Meredith was right for her only son. The only thing she had ever cared about: Jamie’s happiness. Such that when Jamie couldn’t do it, couldn’t stomach the thought of law school, of kowtowing to white men in suits who asked if he spoke English or said “But where are you from originally” when he told them he was from Boston, the thought of representing some corporation like Wrenfare, of defending its right to whatever-the-fuck because they had the money to hire some kid who wanted to get paid right away, for reasons that were maybe unselfish but still, in the end, pretty bad. And his mother just said I want you to be happy. I just want you to be happy. “No,” was nearly Jamie’s answer, “no, she doesn’t make me happy, when I’m with her I don’t even know what happiness is or what it means, it seems too small and unimaginative an idea, I’m not sure happiness was ever even real, I mean what is that? I was happy before her, now I’m something else, something sickly and weak and yet massive and esoteric, I am confounding and arcane, I am consumed by something ancient and universal and yet no one has ever felt the way I feel, I’m sick with it, I’m sick to death with it, I want to hold her forever, I want to crawl inside her heart and wear her skin!”