Deep Cuts

by Holly Brickley

Instead of sleeping that night I revised my end of the conversation in my head over and over, a lifelong pastime I always rationalized as productive since the lessons could apply to future interactions, though that never seemed to happen.

a song never made the narrator happy until

he danced to it with her, and now when he hears it, much later, it makes him lonely.

His warm skin and wiry muscles filled me with a yearning that felt somehow comfortable; I’d gotten used to the yearning, I supposed.

I found it deeply disappointing even as I related to an awful seed of truth inside it: that all my attempts to grow, to find creative independence and purpose, were at least partly in service of becoming more lovable.

He had started to feel almost like an imaginary friend; in the morning I couldn’t remember how much of our conversation I’d dreamed.

He made me feel so good. He went down on me after dinner as a matter of routine.

and suddenly I felt so incredibly bored with myself I wanted to jump out of my skin.

He kissed me on the lips, fast and firmly. Then his eyes widened. “Sorry. Carry on. You’re not the worst. Carry on.”