Chapter and Verse

In some versions of this story you answer the phone instead of plugging your ears and letting it ring and ring. Then the cycle of thinking in what-ifs and instead-ofs never starts and all those days spent submerged in your bathtub practicing holding your breath and thinking of the mighty Niagara seem worth it. And if it means you had to spend some time suspended from a girder beneath a bridge in a straitjacket and chains, so be it. But let’s be honest. You can’t keep pulling these stunts and expecting to frighten away the ghosts that haunt you. The ones that reach out and touch your hand when you’re napping. Whose voices you hear from the other room when you’re alone. Whose names you know but refuse to say out loud.