Our Wives Under the Sea

by Julia Armfield

This has always been the chief point over which our friendship has endured—the hypochondriac back and forth of two women with too much time on their hands.

thought of strange-shaped ocean creatures peering in at the three of us and smiling with all of their teeth.

Like an insect that mimics something else,

so I held my breath and thought about screaming and imagined the ocean coming to an end.

My heart is a thin thing, these days—shred of paper blown between the spaces in my ribs.