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UNTITLED We weren’t sure how contagious it was. That was the warmth I needed three months ago when I was alone and broken and cold. Now I sweat through my clothes, though I only wear what covers nearly all of my limbs. I remember

MIST SPRAYED LIGHTLY OFF once saying that I’d rather be too hot than cold, the water down the coast like the and no one else agreed with me. I think I was sweat seeping through my temples. thirteen then, when the world was so big but no When I pass the orchard, I am reminded of your bigger than my magnified life. temporary wordless obsession with beekeeping Strange it is to feel like a child when you’ve had that was almost strong enough to buy us an one. To have my mother kiss my forehead the apiary for the backyard. I keep the picture book, way I should yours. There is nothing quite like the one with tiny happy bees that sing and laugh, motherly love but I’m unsure if I get to say I still in the bottom drawer of my desk. have mine. Is it retainable, redeemable? It’s not The drive was quiet and lingering and at times quite regression but I worry that it might be, and the congestion in my forehead gave me no scan parenting advice blogs on the Internet. I choice but to pull over on the side of the road. still have twelve of my favorites bookmarked on I massaged the canvas of skin above my nose, my phone, and I don’t even consider removing underneath my right eyebrow. Every time I tried them. to laugh or cry, the movement transformed into I know I will survive this the way you didn’t, a violent, unrelenting cough that made me want because I am not a small child. My immune to feel nothing at all. system sturdy, my body bruised and scraped and When I got there – what I suppose I should dented. My insides feel the way they did when call home – she wrapped her arms around me, I was seventeen and heartbroken, when I was unafraid of contracting what brought me there. twenty and lost. Arguably, I am weaker now than you were. So maybe I will not.

In some ways I am reluctant to let it go. I want to feel better but I also want to hold on to the last thing you gave me. I sip the tea and feel nothing but heat drip down my crowded throat. Before, I did not know the privilege of taste. I did not know the privilege of a lot of things.

Caeleigh