I put your tape in, turn the volume up obscenely high, and roll the windows down. It's really too cold for this. Undaunted, I step out and jump onto the roof of the car. Jay’s words are ugly little white worms with sharp teeth and voracious appetites. They squirm inside of me, trying to eat their way out of my head.
Your voice blares from the speakers, ugly and desperate. It hums against my butt and dances in my spine. Wistful, ugly things are welling up inside me.
I grit my teeth, undo the dainty buckles on my heels, and chuck them in different directions. I hear one crash into a flowerpot. I'm glad the frost has already killed the nice green thing that once lived there. The duster comes off next and goes into the rosebushes. Then my cardigan is dangling from the radio antennae. Shivering, I lay down, pushing my body into the numbing metal, trying to drown myself in your voice's anguished crackles... trying to drown Jay’s unwelcome advice.
A single brown moth, disoriented and dizzy, skitters along the shaft of light illuminating my toes.
I am acutely aware of how alone she is.