A Good Story

Some days—dishes piled in the sink, books littering the coffee table—

are harder than others. Today, my head is packed with cockroaches, 

dizziness and everywhere it hurts. Venom in the jaw, behind the eyes,

between the blades. Still, the dog is snoring on my right, the cat, on my left. 

Outside, all those redbuds are just getting good. I tell a friend, The body

is so body. And she nods. I used to like the darkest stories, the bleak 

snippets someone would toss out about just how bad it could get.

My stepfather told me a story about when he lived on the streets as a kid, 

how he’d, some nights, sleep under the grill at a fast food restaurant until

both he and his buddy got fired. I used to like that story for some reason, 

something in me that believed in overcoming. But right now all I want

is a story about human kindness, the way once when I couldn’t stop 

crying because I was fifteen and heartbroken, he came in and made

me eat a small pizza he’d cut up into tiny bites until the tears stopped. 

Maybe I was just hungry, I said. And he nodded, holding out the last piece.