Haze

There are cat whiskers grazing my face. I can't open my eyes. I slide my hand under the sheets. It's cool there. An impression. This is where she would be.

The phone vibrates beneath my pillow. I pick it up. I look down.

Y R U sad, it reads.

I sit alone in my bedroom.The ceiling fan whrrs overhead.The curtains billow and rest.

The phone rings. Hello. No one replies.

I move to the sofa. The lights are off. The cat nestles into a pillow beside me. The sun comes up. I hear garbage cans being thrown, empty, into driveways. The truck passes and turns the corner.

The door opens. She looks past me, doesn't move, doesn't blink. I sigh. I close my eyes.

Now she is sitting on the floor, cross-legged, head bowed. She looks up. Where are you going?

The sofa floats past her, my legs dangling. The cat stirs, returns to sleep. She rises from the floor, comes to rest beside me. A feather.

We breathe deeply, lean into one another, glide through the window into the drifting night mist. A cicada chorus envelops us: now as one, now not at all.