From the Jump

by Lacie Waldon

might’ve stayed in a car that just happened to be parked on a street, but I certainly didn’t live there. If I’d vacationed in Paris for twenty-three days, I guarantee nobody would’ve allowed me to claim I’d lived in France.

don’t think there’s any such thing as who you are,” Deiss says. “So, I wouldn’t worry about getting back to it.”

“Well, it’s all fluid, isn’t it? You walk around in this body, but that changes according to what you eat, or your level of physical activity, or the years that pass. And inside, especially, there’s nothing constant. Every moment, you’re making a different decision. If you decide to start hitting strangers in the face, you’re a person who hits strangers in the face. It doesn’t matter if you spent the last ten years of your life behaving like a saint. Nobody you hit in the face is going to thank you for the good you did yesterday. To them, you’re just the asshole who clocked them with a right hook.”

I’m talking about the fact that friendships aren’t declared. They just happen. But a relationship is decided upon. Two people agree that they want each other for a finite period of time. At any point, they’re allowed to change their mind.” He snaps his fingers, the sound cracking through the room. “No harm, no foul. All memories together are invalidated. They might as well have taken place with a stranger. Doesn’t that seem crazy to you? Why would anyone choose to invest their time and emotion into something that tenuous?”