Emergency Contact

by Mary H.K. Choi

Some people’s coping mechanisms were all about festering and secrecy and ruminating until you grew yourself a nice little tumor in your heart with a side of panic attack. Different strokes.

“What kind of question is that? It’s fucking art, man,” he said, scowling. “You don’t choose it. It chooses you. If you waste that chance, your talent dies. That’s when you start dying along with it.”

“I know I love someone when I can’t remember what they look like in any real way. I can never seem to recall whether they’re handsome or ugly or if other people think they’re cute. All I know is that when I’m not with them and I think about them, where their face should be is this big cloud of good feelings and affection.”

Loving someone was traumatizing. You never knew what would happen to them out there in the world. Everything precious was also vulnerable.