All the Dangerous Things

by Stacy Willingham

I think about the violence again, like I have so many times over this past year. About how sometimes, it presents itself as a shotgun blast, loud and messy, spraying gore against the wall—but other times, it’s as quiet as a whisper: a handful of swallowed pills or a scream underwater. A stranger slipping into a window at night before leaving without a trace. But then there are the other times, too, when it comes masked as something else. When it’s invited inside, stepping politely through the front door wearing a disguise: an ally, a friend.

I like to think of our memories like a mirror: reflecting images back to us, something familiar, but at the same time, backward. Distorted.