protrusion of my lover’s belly, past her chest, past her thick neck. One could place a perfectly vertical pole connecting my eyes to hers, which angled downward to return my moony gaze. “What modesty!” exclaimed the tour guide, his long hair whipping in the coastal breeze. “See how she kneels at her lover’s feet, how she devotes herself entirely, her pride absent, her dignity absent. Inferior. Beneath.” The tourists wiped their tears and took pictures with their year 5000 technology. A child tugged at her father’s skirt and asked, “What is inferiority?” The father replied wisely, “A plague of the old. Think nothing of it.” The waves rolled down below, invigorated. The tourist directed the attention of the group to the lover. “And there, the focus of this piece. How beautiful. How ethereal. How absolutely deserving of Our Goddess’ devotion. And her name—her name— her name—her name—her name—” The tour guide faltered on his cliff and I faltered in my bed and the Goddess faltered in her Garden, the women-girls screaming their names to her ecstatically, hoarsely, disrupting the serenity of the scene. The Goddess tore the third eye off her head and flung it away from herself as if burned, crawling towards it on all fours to reach inside its pendant, her fingers stained with green and mud. The tour guide was the first one she smote. She swatted him like a booger into the sea, and the universe, every last bit of it, crumbled. I woke up and ran to Frances’s room. It was three in the morning. “I just had the craziest dream,” I said instinctively, wiping spit from my mouth, tears from my eyes, sweat from my nape. But the dark room was empty, and I remembered that Frances was still gone. Hours later, when the sun was just working up to a decent glow, she called and told me that her mother had died. I don’t remember much after that—I remember the funeral, the cruel beauty of Ohio in autumn. I remember staring at a dead leaf on the ground that was the same color as my skin. After Frances switched schools so she could be closer to home, I entertained a succession of new roommates, all of whom came and went like she did. None of them liked to watch improv with me, liked to laugh about nothing with me. I remember the ad I copy-pasted onto Craigslist each time around; I have it saved somewhere. This apartment is small, but cozy. $750 a month for rent, including utilities. One and a half bathrooms, wood flooring, newly renovated, stainless steel kitchen appliances. Ample common space. Windows facing east, in-unit air conditioning. Two loveseats.
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