You Too Can Have a Body Like Mine

by Alexandra Kleeman

C was suited to his life and to the historical period within which his life unfolded. He didn’t long to return to a simpler time, or to destroy the current time, or to build a better future.

More exciting, like one of the things that happen on TV to TV people instead of the calming numb of watching it happen.

I could imagine them now facing the TV as noise poured from its wide glass eye, happy and content as the rampant weirdness unfolded outside, their hands clasped together like a single, monstrously large heart.

They didn’t want the gift-curse of recognition by those they loved and who loved them back, one consequence of that love’s durability being that they would be recognized and loved aggressively even on days when they couldn’t stand to recognize themselves in the mirror, even on days when merely remembering themselves made them sad and want to sleep. Love that made every day a day that they had to live in a handcrafted, artisanal fashion, rather than being outsourced to someone who could do it happily and efficiently for a third of the price.

Any lacuna that took a place in me was opened and filled at once by the same thing, so that hunger and its solution occurred simultaneously, barely leaving any sort of gap for desire to take place.

“You’re like everyone else. A ghost trapped in a body, loving what kills it.