The Grip of It

by Jac Jemc

Maybe something as simple as a doorbell deserves our dread occasionally. Maybe we’re foolish to stay calm for as long as we do.

The picture Julie paints of the house is a bit rosier than the truth. She feels the need to protect us against criticism.

Julie, at heart, is a people pleaser, a straight-A student. She’s had a series of jobs she hates but can’t help being the best at. If someone gives her advice she deems sound, she’ll act on it immediately.

I skim the surface of the room for cats. I know, though, that they can make space for themselves behind and between and below.

We run out of things to tell each other. We share second- and even third-tier stories we’d never bother other people with. Those minutiae calcify into the bones of our intimacy.

smoking is a way of trying to satisfy each moment. It disregards the future.

feeling the gap that’s formed between us widening when we’d hoped this move would close it.

I want to rock James awake and say, James, you said this was over and also I feel like something’s gone wrong in me,

Mother may be an impostor. Perhaps she’s been replaced.

“I believe you, Julie. I didn’t want to, but I do.” That’s really the most I could ask from anyone: to hear someone say that I count more in her mind than logic.

I make a lazy chicken curry, overspiced because of my resistance to dirtying measuring spoons.

“A nice one-bedroom where we can see the whole place at once if we stand in the middle of it.”