For Whom the Belle Tolls

by Jaysea Lynn

How many times had she told her friends that no one’s opinion of them mattered more than their own? She’d cheered for them as they learned to care for themselves, to see themselves as wonderful and flawed and complicated and unique, convincing herself that while others deserved to take up space in the world, she was inherently too much, required too much space and effort.

nearly seven-foot-tall, magenta-skinned mother hen whose solution for what she called the “missing your man blues” involved a large margarita, a brand-new vibrator in a pretty box, and a chocolate sheet cake decorated with fudge frosting and an enthusiastic application of rainbow sprinkles—courtesy