Everyone in This Room Will Someday Be Dead

by Emily R. Austin

I hesitate. “Are you just being nice to me because I’m crazy?” “You’re not really crazy, are you?” she asks, touching the top of my hand again. “I don’t know. I might be. I haven’t been feeling well lately,” I explain. “I’ve been struggling with feeling like nothing matters.” One day I will die, and one day everyone I know will die. One day everyone I don’t know will die.