Waving Not Drowning

One by one they went away. She stopped reading his messages, left emails unopened, dumped files, deleted histories. Pictures, videos, playlists, all gone. Wipe the heart drive clean. It's taken months, almost a year, really. Now she doesn't roll over at 4 am half asleep and grab the phone charging on the shelf above her head. She's letting go by blowing things up. Just short of annihilating- it's not in her nature to leave without a trace. In this day and age she knows that's an impossibility. She will always exist in some form, some code, some file, texts, download, screen grabs, half opened bottle of hairspray in the corner of the back shelf. She's eradicated any visible trace of them together. Contact lists, addresses, important dates, favourite links, wish lists, all of it wiped clean. Slowly she's getting herself back. The coffee shop on 4th two blocks west of her, once their, apartment is returning to the rotation. As is the regular Wednesday night mee...

The neighbours must think she's killing the cat. An intermittent high pitched squeak that opens up to a full throated belch travels through the vents, like a goose in heat or an old man trying to blow his brains out through his nose. This was way easier in seventh grade. It's been 24 years since Reggie picked up a clarinet. She thought for sure she'd be able to run some scales, play a few ditties from memory but she fears she's bursting blood vessels instead. Two thousand dollars in facials, microdermabrasion and intense light therapy for age spots down the drain. The horn was on display in the window of a pawn shop on Queen East and in a flurry of nostalgia she shelled out $150 cash. Perhaps it's a just a crappy horn and would sound like an animal being impaled even if Benny Goodman was blowing it. The real question is what is she doing trying to recapture obsessions of her youth. She hated band practice. Reggie skipped rehearsal as often as she could fake a cold o...