Her lips are cracked and her tongue is dry from licking rolling paper and forming careful words like 'I need to go now,' spoken softly and unsteadly to the man who calls her 'Love,' because he can't remember her name. And lying on her back she looks up through the skylight watching the black branches scrape the glass and imagining herself dangling like a dying leaf, balanced ambivalently on the edge of extinction, fragile and delicate and irreparably torn, stained red and oh-so-eager to fall. She clears her throat and reaches for and apple shake, while an internet ad urges her to shell out petty cash to 'Miracle net' and as night crawls up the window panes, she swallows her regrets and chases them down with a bitter cough of indifference. Biting a chunk of styrofoam out of the cup she's been crushing in her hand, she lays out a game of solitaire on the table and plays until she realizes that it doesn't feel like a n y t h i n g when she wins; and she curls up again on the floor that hurts so good against her feverish swollen skin. The cellphone rings and she freezes, her eyes scanning the room frantically, struggling to hear herself think over the silence between urgent outbursts that echo off the walls and haunt her vague and distracted headache. Sighs dripping between her fingers and melting into the floor, like sirens disappearing in the distance. She stumbles into the bathroom slamming the door, walking unsteadily to the mirror and staring hard at her reflection. A victim of misunderstandings represented in two-dimensions. She sucks her breath in and wipes the expression off her face, focusing for the first time in weeks on her pale hands, tangled hair, harsh scars, empty mouth and cold teeth.
Outside the wind blows and she braces herself for disaster, her tongue dry and lips cracked....