In My Dreams I Hold a Knife

by Ashley Winstead

I’m scared college was the last time I was really alive, the way you’re supposed to be, and I’ll never get it back.” “Of course college felt extreme,” Coop said. “You had infinite freedom and almost no responsibility. Nothing was fixed—you had your whole life ahead of you, and it could go anywhere. You had best friends you spent every minute with, so you were never alone. And you were in love. Real love.”

I was an automaton, moving in the ways I was supposed to, doing things I could see other people doing in my peripheral vision:

A woman who wanted was an ugly thing. I knew it made me childish and vulnerable. My whole life had taught me that lesson. But still.

Wanting is dangerous. The less you want, the safer you’ll be.