march

The night that she sat with a shotgun barrel in her mouth, the sky outside was a pinkish-grey -- ashes-of-roses, she remembered. She licked her tongue around the shotgun barrel, idly, flexing her fingertips; she wondered how she got here.

This is a story that is both true and a lie.

She sat cross-legged on the bed, chin resting on her left palm; she sits in the same position today. Her face is impassive but her eyes flicker from surface to surface: blank walls and floors, lingering on the window.

She considers the weight of the gun and she tries to decide what she feels; she has resolved herself into small compartments of sensations. She rubs her cheek against the shotgun barrel, briefly, like a kitten, then presses it across her lips, embarrassed.

The first night that she sat with a shotgun barrel in her mouth, the sky was not a pinkish-grey. She remembers it clearly: it was late autumn but hot and the ocean keened in the distance. She was cross-legged and her chin rested on her left hand, but there was not a shotgun in her hand; there has never been a gun in her hand. Again, this story is both true and a lie.

Let me start over.

There was a night when she sat cross-legged on the bed with her chin in her hand when the sky was a pinkish-grey. She watched the precision of the trees through the window, the formality of their silhouettes. She felt the weight of the shotgun barrel in her hand, then pressed her hand across her lips, embarrassed.