Week 6

Thursday, April 26^th, 2012:


                When the executioner cries out One! you begin to feel it. In the muteness of the blindfold, your sweat creeping through the threads toward your eyes, you realize that what you see now is your final memory, your last chance to take in the world before it disappears only to realize that your last chance was prior to your prison sentence and already the memory feels unclear. Two! A tugging feeling that pulls slowly from your head to your toes like silk slowly slipping away from your body. This is your soul. It’s slipping away and with your hands tied behind your back and your legs together, you have no hope of chasing after it. Three!  

Friday, April 27^th, 2012:

                What makes the man said to stalk through the woods with a low-burning lantern so unnerving is how the light source seems to move with its own volition; that is, it is not an indication of where the man can be found. It merely gestures to the vastness by which everything disappears.

Saturday, April 28^th, 2012:

                It’s strange how a short step from the train platform can alter so many ticket times, make so many phone calls to spouses, children, or academic conferences, and force the tired traveler to make due with sleeping on the divots between the chairs. My toes curl, my back sinks against the seat, and I wonder if I’ll see her here, punching moneyless numbers into a vending machine or turning the faces on the magazines around.

Sunday, April 29^th, 2012:

                Chantelle came home to the sight of a small pair of footsteps leading from the back door to the birdhouse. She found her mother in the living room alone, her feet crystallized by ice. Countless times, she had told her mother not to go outside. Her mother, however, continued to insist on the existence of a small figure beckoning her from the entrance just beyond the wooden perch. 

Monday, April 30^th, 2012:


                I unlocked the door to my suite and heard, prior to entering my room, a low buzzing alternating steadily between small differences in pitch through the wall on my roommates’ side. I stepped away and sat down on the living room couch. For a while, I figured I could wait to go in and get my textbook, but as her voice began to emanate, I began to feel like skipping class.

Tuesday, May 1^st, 2012:

                He was, for all intents and purposes, Patient Zero, the first to be diagnosed with the disease that caused distinct shapes to appear upon the skin of the person infected. By no means was it deadly, but it was incurable. Still, Patient Zero, and other patients alike, grew accustomed to the sight of familiar memories manifesting themselves on their bodies like tattoos.

Wednesday, May 2^nd, 2012:

                There’s nothing wrong with housewifery, she thought. A true breadwinner is a bread maker.
                She slipped the loaf from the oven and let it cool.