January 19, 2023 - “The road is dark and she is still going too fast” by Elizabeth Lerman

The road is dark and she is still going too fast. She becomes a teenager the moment she crosses the bridge. She slows and tries to match the speed of the song. She listens and smokes and thinks of the body in her bed, thinks of his face in the morning, when she crouched down to kiss him, when she bent herself over him and whispered “goodbye”. The moment it left her lips, the word settled somewhere in her stomach. It sat there as she walked out the door, sat there still, as the plane carried her from him to here, and now, on the silent stretch between Lillian and Elberta, goodbye sleeps soundly in her guts, stirring softly as she drives, as she smokes, as she tries, very hard, to keep the wheel straight and her breath steady.