Same Time Next Summer

by Annabel Monaghan

And I just loved that. I wanted to wrap myself in that banner and enjoy a lifetime of predictable outcomes. No more surprises, no more broken promises. Just people doing what they say they’re going to do.

Sam was a person who was capable of giving herself up to her laughter,

Jack might be the privet of people.

I look up and try to organize my features into neutral. I tilt my head the way dogs do, for good measure.

I did the right thing, I know it. But I’m exhausted. Breaking out of a life that’s not working is a lot of work. It might have been easier to have kept doing what I was doing for the next fifty years.

I just know that what’s ahead of me is the rest of my life, starting with tonight. And then tomorrow.