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Before I said it out loud, I could pretend I didn’t know, I said, but speaking the words out loud, I feel like I’ve let something loose that I can’t control.
Sometimes I wonder how my parents found each other. They are so different, like matter and antimatter, and I don’t know that their marriage won’t zap itself into oblivion.
His face betrays no emotion, but I can tell from the way he lets his head fall onto the seat back that he is tired. When he came home like this, we just left him alone because it was unclear what might make him snap. It could be dirty dishes or the music playing a little too loud, or a dating app on his son’s smart-phone that set the world on fire. His blowups did not happen often, but when they did, the consequences were severe and lasting.
It’s a cruel trick of fate to have admissions letters sent on the day of our first track meet. It makes you feel like God sometimes just wants to fuck with people, or like admissions officers and track coaches want to test your faith in God.
That is why he never has any fucks to give—because his family can afford not to give them.
Our team trophy has passed from hand to hand as we take pictures so that later, when we have children, we can prove that we were once active and fit.
His face is still fresh but his movements are deliberate and old.
Sometimes it is better to go to the world than to bring the world to you.
I am always someone’s accessory, someone’s afterthought, the supporting actress in another person’s drama and that thought fills me with fire.
Sometimes I wonder if my parents like me. I know the laws of nature and genetic self-perpetuation demand that they love me, but it has never been clear that I am integral to their lives.
This is what I have done.
But, do you really want to live in a world so closed, Ms. McConnell asked us in class when we read Invisible Man and nobody paid attention.
But here before me was his old man bent and unable to support a heavy head, his pain now fully revealed, blasted out from deep within, mined, cut and polished to perfection.
