The Isle of Sin and Shadows

by Keri Lake

Long tresses of exceptionally unruly curls fall around my shoulders, failing to offer much of a shield against the thirty-two-degree air that hits my skin with a blast of goosebumps.

Not asking questions about how it got there. Where it happened. When they look at my body, they’re not seeing me, at all.

These days, I try to document as many moments as I can, because I’ve come to learn that the mind is not a reliable enough storyteller of the past. Its memories are an ever-changing landscape that moves and slides with time. Like a viscous liquid that can be poured into any shape.

Second thing is, the world’s a big place. And life is too short to get hung up on the past. Live. Fall in love. But don’t ever let some ungrateful prick put out your fire. You find someone that burns with you.

Unrequited love tends to be a wound that festers into a raging sepsis, if not treated right away.