Suppose she breaks up with you again: a dashed-off note, a voicemail, a text. A declaration through a social media dance. Braless, free. She has music now & a viral routine. Suppose she ghosts you as she did before. A disappearance back to her checkout job in the hippy co-op & swapping numbers with those blond dreadlocked guys & that girl with the septum ring & gold eyeliner. Or suppose she declares herself celibate, asexual, nonbinary, queer. She jokes about these identities with her friends & sometimes with you when you share a bed with her & she glances up from her phone & says thank you for not leaving me.
Christopher Linforth’s latest book is The Distortions (Orison Books, 2022).