Atlas and Alice, Issue 20
Hayley Swinson
Wild onions My sister’s fingers dig deep in the dirt, encircle the bulb. Shorn roots pop, their tips wriggling like slashed worms underground. Can you eat wild onions? We are thirteen years old. Yesterday I was twelve; today, I eclipse her, and we are teenagers together for the first time. When she asks me about the onions, I feel new, a sharp and surprising taste on my tongue. My shrug turns the taste bitter, turns her away. She rinses them under the hose, pops a clove into her pink mouth. I watch her chew with envy. Tomorrow, she will grow a year older again, as new onion shoots rise, already inches taller than the clipped, even grass.
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