Elliot.

I have never felt it before, not even once. Most people catch glimpses throughout their entire lives; running through an overgrown lawn full of grasshoppers and petite white butterflies or lying on a creaky hammock with the family dog curled hot and rank by their side beneath a tree-filtered August sun or watching black, almost burgundy ants march along the perimeter of a breadbox. Me, Ive never even owned a dog. It is that feeling, you know, that you always hear about in church and in wholesome movies starring ideal knock-outs with naturally wavy hair. That high when you truly connect with Him, when all the planets align in your favor and a solid beam of clarity shoots down from space and pins you right where you stand, suspended in a timeless moment of awe. As if your ribcage is puffed full of constellations and helium; solar plexus budding to its name. I imagine that nothing could ever be more bright, more robustly vibrant, than in those few precious, coveted moments. I want to see the grass that green. Sky, so alive. Carpet cuts into my knees and I want to stand up as cringes spring to my eyes, but rising during prayer is sinful. I should be delivering every ounce of my full, uninterrupted attention. Discomfort is only temporary. Stay focused on the worship at hand. Shifting, I close my brown eyes harder, squeezing bright, flighty stars. Sometimes, I worry that I am doing something wrong, that maybe I am not good enough. It could be that I am not destined to be saved, not ever meant to discover that extraordinary feeling I so crave. Now, I hold entirely still, straining all of my concentration on thoughts towards Him. Im just not good enough. Shit! Quit thinking! I mean shoot. Darn. At least I didnt say it out loud. But God can hear our thoughts. Rats. Sorry, God. Focus. Pray. Predestined to be bound for solid deathno afterlife, no nothingjust plain death, boxed up in the ground, people stepping all over me as the dirt compacts and weeds push out around my headstone. Stop! I wonder what it would say? Concentrate. But He loves everyone, unconditionally; I have to be given a chance. It isnt fair. Dont say it isnt fair, it is Gods Will. Is Will supposed to be capitalized? Like Word? It isnt fair. I think this and know that it is a sin. I only want to feel it. Just once.

With eyes strung closed, I can feel the bedroom around me thrive. The big, butcher-paper charcoal drawings taped over my walls, new ones overlapping older ones, overwhelming the entire space with pulpy white and millions of shades of black. Obsidian, charred bone, pupil-black. Nighttime-black. Eyes shut, I feel the walls fall away from my presence. Most drawings are indistinguishable; scattered lines and curves and shapes, expressing the highest highs and darkest crevices of my life. Others, though, are still-forms. The world outside my window, sieved by gray lines of soft sunlight, or the silhouette of my mother as she sits on the sofa engulfed in the pages of a novel or the round, dazzling cheeks of my sister as she poses for my taste, smiling with those gorgeous lines of teeth. The earth drops out from beneath my floorboards, the feeling of my stomach suspended in air. All I want, more than anything, is to one day drift off to a perfect planet glittering with gold and jewels and laughter. Diamonds cut with other diamonds, my face, the bronze landscape, reflecting out of each square and hexagon, kaleidoscopic. Absolutely, unequivocally perfect. It is only me and my bed on one remaining pillar of floor, the black vacuum of space surrounding us, widely yawning, offering me the sky. I know that I am being so selfish. It is, after all, not up to me. I am trying to take my life into my own hands, although my life does not belong to me. I feel the way my fingers intertwine, fingertips calloused and filled-in gray from so much charcoal. My fingernails, growing out from their beds, I can feel them. The greasy weight of my forehead supported by my folded, pleading hands. My body is Gods temple. He is a puppeteer, and I the puppet. Without him guiding the strings, I cant live. This feeling, this giant, incredible limitlessness; I lean forward, I can just about taste it, eyes still sealed, mouth opening and in awe of the universe, and just when my eyelids venture towards unzipping, the world instantaneously rushes back, walls hurtling back into place from the vast reaches of space, sun hurriedly eating up the dark blue of the sky beyond this atmosphere. The sun burps out my walls, my drawings, my rug, the clouds, politely patting its lips, and everything is back to its mortal place. My tongue, still poised at the edge of my lips, wet and

aching for that one desperate taste of infinity. My lymph nodes swollen in gruesome lust. Trust in the Lord with all your heart, lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will direct your path. Gently closing my bible, I get up off my knees and roll over into bed, pulling my straight blonde hair around to the left side of my neck. I look down and there are red patterns sunk into my skin from kneeling so long, which I vaguely recall from science class means that I am dehydrated. All I can think about while lying here is not doing anything wrong. This part is called reflection. The ceiling lights, they are already turned off. My teeth already brushed and saliva foamy with pale blue mint. Keep my bible on the headboard, standing out with nothing else around it, as close to me as possible. Lay straight, keeping perfect posture in every position, preserving and appreciating my bodys God-given youth. Always smile. Always, always, always smile. Perfect. Fall asleep with my arms crossed over my chest, guarding His temple. Breathe deepbut not too deep. Stay poised. I pretend to sleep because that is the right thing to do, but my mind is churning gray and violet. I will feel it, one day.

Elliot.
GoI tell myself. Go! Get out of here now! And so I do. I abandon my body where it lies, eyes clamped shut, waiting for the future to arrive, and climb out the window above its head to sit, legs swinging, in the tree rooted right outside. From this angle, looking back through the window to my bedroom I can only see the very top quarter of my wall and the ceiling above it. I see two dirty blades of the ceiling fan, startling a gasp from my lungs that I could have allowed it to become so filthy. How terrible of me! I want to scream, to cry out at my negligence but cannot because my body is way over there where I cant see, and right now, it is not allowed anything of its own. I am itching for a rag and furniture polish, scratching incessantly at the bark of this poor, friendly tree, whose trunk where I sit is already so smoothed and mutilated from my constant, agonizing visits. I calm myself.

At least I know now what needs to be cleaned, I reason. I have never been one for constellations. I know of a few: Orions belt, but only his belt; the little and big bear, which are also called the little dipper and big dipper; and its not nearly a constellation but I know to look for Mars, a faint red star, which I always think I see but doubt I ever really do. The mind has a tricky way of giving you what you want as a token of its love. Looking upwards, the powder-coated leaves unhinging themselves to drift down and bless my forehead, there are not many constellations or stars or softly glowing planets visible behind tonights wispy crochet of clouds. A squirrel sprints across the street from the neighbors yard, leaps onto my tree and races up the grooves of its base until it sees me. It stops, four branches down, frozen mid-run, its small nose twitching, ears two miniature satellites cocking side-to-side, and then takes off running back down and dodging behind my house. It is okay! I want to call to it. You dont have to be afraid, I am not really here! I rub my arms sadly, reinvigorating their blood flow. The animal saw me, thoughhow queer, I think. How beautiful and perfect and tragic. When it is time, I make my way back up, cautiously poking my head above the sill just enough to catch a shadow of my fathers retreating frame, the whiskers bathing his neck reflecting tiny pinpricks of moonlight in his exit. I climb up and over the carefully planted flower box perched outside the window. My body is right where I left it, not a single tear present on its shameful cheeks because I deserted it as only a shell, a skin-and-bone envelope, so that it wouldnt have anything to feel. I step softly onto the bed, sheets wrinkling beneath my weight, and settle myself back into my body by lying lovingly beside it, spooning into its rigid shape, whispering to it sweet words that grow in its belly to keep it strong until next time and, once we are again fused as one, I grant it the ability to whimper and mourn.