“Just,” I start. “Just give me a week, okay?” A week. In that moment, in the warm, dim, smelly duck coop, I decide. I decide—this is not smart and I know this is not smart—but I decide to fake it. Shake off the emu feathers, get the goat poop out of my hair and the duck penises out of my brain, strap the service vest on my puppy, and head into GNB Upper like nothing has changed. Maybe—you never know—there will be some other kind of miracle or catastrophe and everyone will have something else to talk about. Maybe I’ll never have to send any kind of message at all.
