Waving Not Drowning

A certain stirring lingers deep in her gut. Nat can't shake it but for the life of her she can't name it, either. Hour after hour of plugging straight through and now she hits the pillow at night and wakes up oblivious to her surroundings. At least she's sleeping. Deep, dreamless exhaustion. If only she'd strung herself out like this months earlier she'd have saved herself the anixiety of insomnia and long dark nights of the soul, counting down minutes til sunrise and the dawn of a new day. Another cycle completed. The world keeps turning regardless of how mired in stasis Nat is. There's hope in that, she thinks. She charts the shape of the moon. Full, half, quarter, crescent. On cloudy nights she draws the curtains and drowns herself in Rachmaninoff, headphones cradling her ears on the pillow. When sleep won't come the music lulls her into a semi catatonic state. Nat's not sure it's restorative or meditative but it drowns out the interior noise whic...

Oh my god. She's never going to get this hour back. Maybe she can deke out when they get back to her car, beg off, feign a headache or a brain tumour. An anuerysm, maybe? Probably a bit much. Aw man, why does this always happen to her? She says yes to a blind date of sorts with some guy she meets randomly cause she thinks, hey, how bad can it be? This bad. Terrifically bad. And the worst part is that she shuts down. She's too polite, too Canadian. She wasn't raised to be rude. Evidently, he was. And oblivious. He takes calls from clients in jail awaiting bail on speaker in front of her. Tries to pawn the phone off on her as some sort of clever joke. It's inhumane and deeply discomfitting to her. An awkward walker, he takes his aged dog out with her off leash, letting him wander, sniff, pee, lick everything in sight. He displays a certain arrogance that shuts her down completely, so she comes off as awkward, shy, scattered. She's trying to bite her tongue and keep th...