Some air and then sand between your teeth. Some breeze and then the smell of freshly baked bread. Some wind and then the cumin. Some gust and then the spice.

The carpets in the Trucker’s motel were dark red. At least, at the edges. The middle section all the way from the front door to the vending machine to the lift to the staircase up the stairs to the bedrooms was threadbare and grey like scar tissue over an old wound.

Red for warmth, red for class. Red for easy to clean after a violent crime.

Sometimes the world is so ugly that your heart cowers in the darkest corner it can find. It covers its face and weeps.

Circle the words you fall for.

Underline everything you want to remember.

You’ll be at home on a Saturday night flicking through the free ads.
You’ll be sending the waiter back with the wine. 
You’ll be the deer in the woods and if you’re not moving, I’ll kill you. 

Let me tell you a story, because I can’t deal with the silence. I’m going to talk to you and if you can hear me, blink that star over there. The one that looks a little blue.

I’m going to talk until you blink.

Here’s Hannah - twenty years old, crooked nose from a childhood accident she’ll tell you about sometime, eyes like badges saying have a nice day hiding signs saying I’m lonely help me. Mousy blonde hair tied up with giraffe-striped shoe laces from the zoo gift shop.

The flowers are lilies today and they are replaced every day and that makes me smile and I wonder who does that. This is the room of flowers because there are flowers on the mantlepiece too. Under that, a flat screen TV and games console and pretend homework out on the dinner table with pens and exercise books and a fake spilled glass of water.

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Glue.

Men in blue overalls.

Paralysis.

Panic.

“My darling” she said, rubbing the stains of a shirt with a butter-coloured bar of soap, “No matter how small you are, you will always have your father’s shoulders. You can look all horrors in the eye and they will never forget you.”

She checked the coin return slot of the arcade machine and walked out through the sliding doors. I’ll never forget that walk. That carefree stride with a backing of Everybody Hurts.

Daisy reached down and kissed me on the cheek. She touched her lips to my ear and whispered keep it safe before pulling the night sky around her like a blanket.