Throat scorched with bottom-shelf tequila, a massive effort to put one foot in front of the other. There is an untouched cheese board on the counter, sweaty and texturally unthinkable in this heat. The friend you just made an hour ago is passed out in the yard. You think their name is Cory, or maybe Cameron. Semi-familiar faces swirl around you, people you were kind of mean to in college, now grown and showing off little curly-headed kids. Gary died, last year. GI Gary, the 35-year-old from your undergrad program, with the naked lady tattooed on his forearm. The news guts you, in a way you couldn’t have counted on. You reel numbly through thick soup toward the fire pit, navigate five pairs of outstretched legs, and take up a lawn chair.
The wild blue unthinkable happens. As you sink down, the chair buckles. The supports bend
under the weight of your big, stupid, 250lb ass, and you go down hard. Cruel, cartoonish, and soul-desecrating, your slow, humbling descent to the grass.
Two girls, ethereal fairies, drift over and save your beer as you hit the ground. Briefly, you ask
God to just fucking kill you. Hands you can’t identify reach down and grip your wrists, pull you out of the wreckage, and everyone is laughing, and it feels like you should be laughing, too. So you laugh, hoarse and braying, agonizing, laugh to keep from crying, laugh to keep from evaporating into the muggy night. You laugh until your lungs heave up and slide out of your throat. You force a chuckle that rips your diaphragm clear out of its place. You sprawl on the lawn, hork up a taupe kidney, and you laugh this shit off to the last rattling breath.
V Garmon Koski is an Atlanta-born housewife and writer, with a penchant for making and rating soups. She isn't really sure how she got here. Her work appears in Maudlin House, Roi Faineant, and others. You can find her on Twitter at @veanimator.
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