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SIMON BRIGGS
My airways are constricting, and there’s a dance of white spots before my eyes. It’s a full-blown panic attack. I try to breathe my way through it, like my shrink has taught me. I turn on the car and blast the A/C; the air is hot at first, then chill. I start to calm down. I catch sight of myself in the rearview mirror. My face is a mask of terror.
“What is wrong with you?” I say aloud. “Pull yourself together.”
After a while, when I can breathe again and the inner quake has subsided, I drive home. My headache has reached operatic proportions.
Gray is waiting for me at the kitchen table when I return home.
“Where’d you go?” he asks with false lightness.
I’m sure he knows I moved the things under our bed. I sense he’s worried about me and what I might do. What I love about him is that he always gives me my space, gives me the benefit of the doubt.
“To the store,&rdq
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