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she smelled so beautiful and I thought, nobody here that is watching us, none of these people knows this, about her lovely smell.
     
    I reached down and gently touched her on the shoulder blade.
     
    I said, “Come on. You need to get up. All of these people…”
     
    She said, “I know. I will. I will when I am ready.”
     
    There was a “don’t fuck with me” resonance in her voice that was clear and clean so I got up, shrugged my shoulders at the waiting cars, and walked back across the intersection to get my coffee.

Their Daughter Played in the Boxes
     
    The neighbors got a new washer and dryer this weekend. I heard the truck. It came early. I heard the metal slide and slam of the truck’s loading door or whatever it’s called. It sounded like WAKE THE FUCK UP! And also, I AM BRINGING NEW THINGS! I felt happy for my neighbors. New appliances are so exciting for at least three weeks. Week four they become just appliances. Week five and beyond you open and close them. Their noises that in the beginning were Tinkerbell pretty and magical now sound familiar. They do what you expect them to; their new and different skills are forgotten and taken for granted. It’s like they were always there, like this. Like the crappy old ones that were hated and cursed and kicked at never existed. Like life had not been improved after the trucks’ metal door slammed down and rumbled away. They are reliable and take up space.
     
    I have appliances. They’ve been here for a long time. I think. Maybe not. Who knows? I forget. I want to recognize their Tinkerbell sounds. I should try. But all I hear is nothing new.

The Mill Pond
     
    All of my tank tops are striped the wrong way for a girl of my size. They are also too short. My belly bulges out from beneath the bottom like, “Hey, wanna play with me?” My corduroy pants are also striped, but in the fabric. That is how they are made. My hair hangs like greasy blanket fringe. I feel like a stripe. I am a stripe. A big bulging stripe painted down the middle of a highway by a drunk highway stripe painting guy—probably my dad.
     
    My mom won’t buy me new tank tops because she thinks forcing me to wear tops that are way too small for me is motivation for losing weight. I don’t tell her that the only motivation it is giving me is to put on my shortest tank top, go out in the backyard to my old playhouse, and kill myself with her sewing scissors.
     
    “We can go shopping for some new clothes when your belly fits back inside, Tinker.” She says this in a voice that I would like to punch. Also, it is hard to judge an infant, I know, but there should be laws against naming your baby daughter Tinkerbell if the baby’s father’s family has a history of obesity. Seven pounds, two ounces at birth turning into 160 at age thirteen on a 5’2” frame is a recipe for misery. “Bertha” would’ve been kinder.
     
    The tank tops belong to last summer. My belly belongs to this summer. My mom won’t buy me new tank tops because she is cheap and also poor, so she is blaming it on me and my belly. I wear my cords because I won’t wear shorts because of my thighs. They are too wide for the style of shorts they sell now. My thigh flab bulges out from the too tight leg holes. I tried on a pair of light brown ones once and my thighs looked like upside down ice cream cones. The flavor they looked like was a sort of watery peach strawberry swirl, like how if those two flavors melted out on a white kitchen floor in long thick strips that looked exactly like my legs.
     
    There is no way I am going to wear boy shorts or my mom’s shorts. She actually told me, “It’s stupid to wear pants all summer, Tinker. Why don’t you wear one of my old pairs?” Then she held up a pair of jean shorts that looked like a perfect light blue square. I walked out of the trailer and after the screen door slammed shut I heard her say, “What?” and then, to herself, “I like them.” I could picture her