35

 

 

 

 

35

 

 

This is your Uncle. This is my Friend.

That slow, sick wave coming up my insides and sloping down my scalp.

Those other things she’s said to me.

Open your legs.

Flash.

“Fuck you, Susie.”

I say this out loud, looking at my mother as she lies asleep across from me. Naked and weak on murky-white sheets. Passed out, wasted, drunk, drugged, or just very tired, or sexed-out, or whatever. I don’t know and I don’t care. Her breath catches in the back of her throat in half-snores. She won’t wake up.

I guess this is rage, spitting through my nerves so my hands shake as I look through her jacket. Mock-zips, half-sized pockets. But of course she wouldn’t leave them there. I dig the blue bag out from under the bed. She’s already split the new pictures into their own envelopes. Three packs of three. It doesn’t matter which shots are inside. They’re all the same, even when they’re not.

Behind me, Susie clears his throat. “I didn’t know Po