Mothers

Last time, he followed her home in the tiny darknesses between streetlights. The girl caught only a glimpse of him; she still couldn’t tell if she was seeing things or not. If she was paranoid or stalked. My guess is probably both. 

Mom nagged her yesterday to have coffee. She didn’t really know why she cared for her at this point. But she did… I mean, she did. So the girl went out of the apartment for the first time since then. The morning air was indifferent to her. She was to it too. Still compressed, just not by four walls. 

So on the trek to this dinky breakfast place, the girl looked away from the beaming sun and focused on cracks in the sidewalk and she counted them and she got up to about seventy-eight. Thinking to herself, “Cracks in the sidewalk are far better than Mothers.” Maybe she was right—maybe not. 

Either way, her mom had died alone on the opposite side of town one hour, seven minutes, and fifty-two seconds before. Anyway, the girl sat at a free table for two. By the time her coffee went cold, the body was too. A big fall Mother had had. But it was a long time coming. 

Ezra is a ninth grader at Lafayette High School’s SCAPA Literary Arts. Ezra is the Finance Director for High School Democrats of America, and he aspires to elected the Governor of Kentucky. He brings a skill set framed around a drive to affect change in Kentucky, and he channels that through his writing.