but I had to try. We were slicing onions in your flat—window flung open, Für Elise billowing—when I

nicked myself with the kitchen knife. Blood seeped into the wood, blooming like watercolor. I wanted

to drink in that cool space of comfort between us. To soak it in whiskey, develop it in yellow-green

fluid, watch the edges slowly take shape. I wanted to laugh with you over a cup of bad coffee twenty

years from now. I wanted to ask you how to watch owls soar into black night without trying to follow.

I wanted your quiet Saturday mornings. I wanted to scream and cry, but I just stared at the marble

counter. You just wrapped the bandage firmly around my thumb like a promise. When I offered

to drive you to the hospital, you told me you would do it. You wanted to remember what it was like to be

free. I tried to smile at you, then, but I ended up crying. I had sliced the onions for too long.