Jello

Breathing craters into her spine, her breathes come out in whips as if squeezed through a microscopic hole. Normal breathing is monotonously comforting, her disjunctured gasps constantly remind the room of her pain. Our mother flips another page of superficial celebrity gossip with excessive force, announcing her frustration and adding to mine. She's disappointed in Kelly's refusal to eat. I'm disappointed in her refusal to except blame for Kelly's refusal to eat. The nurses bring food at every meal time, switching the new food for the previous, untouched meal each with a giggly, fluorescent green cup of jello. We grew up with jello. Jello whenever we got sick. Jello at sleepovers. Jello at sporting events. Jello as substitutes for birthday cakes, which we both had a strange aversion to. Jello shots when we starting to go to parties. Now jello at the hospital when Kelly has a heart attack at 19.

Empty

Bumps arise from spots I've never seen on my skin.
A creature, a beast, searches my insides for a home.
I wait. I itch.
Nothing will come of it.
The creature, the beast, the monster, unsettled by my soul can find no place inside of me.
It creaks out of my ears leaving crusty rings and pebbles of wax.

Road bumps

We always parked on the speed bump, our own trivial rebellion, our way of spitting on the world that so often spit on us. She had cut her hair, but instead of looking younger, it aged her. She had become a woman without any warning, an adult accepting of the unexplainable cruelties placed upon her.  I felt a sudden urge to spill the secrets, to let them spout onto her as if I were the fountain of youth capable of bringing her back from maturity. The tears, long awaited, lingered, stale, in the car full of too many memories, filtered me with hope. The miserable drag the ones they love behind them, regardless of the scars the road will leave.

Showstopper

There is music in my soul
I feel it in every pour.
The breathings of my heart
bring me to the start
of when we met
and then to when I wept.
The music goes on and on
and on with no end upon
which to stop.
Closed up shop,
my eyes listen to your stories
but my insides focus on the flurries
of sound
for I and it are bound
to nothing.
You are a fling
for which I can no longer
be urged to ponder.

Sweaty Palms (fictional)

I sweat when I'm nervous, or around any male that's not my father. Sheltered from that world for over a century and instantly petrified, my body reacts before my brain can tell it to stop. I pinch my face while concentrating on calming myself down. Now I look royally pissed. I think he just said something. It must have been comical because the ends of his mouth had curved up ready to join in when I started to laugh. Too late; they drooped and I'd lost my moment. This boy had blondish hair, newly cut so the ends looked extra stiff and combed over. He shifted his weight his left foot and seemed ready to retreat.