WATCHING by Peter Breakfast


There is nothing else to do, she has to sit here. They all left, went for the border, past the border into the west claiming "oh, you're crazy" and "Why would you do such a thing?" etc. And her insides remained calm and collected because there are many spots that no outside human can come close to.
       The force thing is coming up but slowly. It started as a very pallid glow far away, not in an instant like they predicted. But then brighter with a strip of orange that grew as it floated south and started to deepen like it was holding on but she knew it wasn't holding on. It was doing absolutely nothing besides being itself utterly and truly, nothing in the way, no second-guessing. It was soft-looking like an amorphous cake and gave great color and intrigue to the otherwise boring dark sky.
       Not far away is a barn in which a farmer, overalled, overworked, and half-shaven wakes. He's too old for this shit and his rooster sounds. A soft and kind wind. Streaks of vertical light from deep purple to taupe shoot at nothing, the force thing is coming.
       You will not disagree with me when I say that she is beautiful. She has deep inset eyes that are absolutely perfect circles, ensōs, marking the spots with which she interprets myriad faces and colors and this. Long hair draped, tucked lovingly behind the soft ears and around in a perfect parabola meanwhile other renegade hairs are also flying free but staying in their parabolic arrangements (These are the rules). Her chin rests on her palm, her fingers clawed around her mouth. She is glad to be here but that is only a thought. Her chair is a bucket.
       The force thing grows as predicted. She notes that it is beginning to resemble some sort of adorable animal, the big raccoon in the sky.
       Her family and friends actually just left as it started. The devoted others felt that their affinity for her was strong enough to grant that. That maybe if she saw that they felt real she would snap out of it and get in the car. Then their fear became greater than that and they left, those are the rules. A piece of wire was jettisoned from the vehement acceleration of the car and stabbed her in the back but it didn't matter. She is bleeding now, kind of a lot, from the wound and it is soaking into and contrasting sharply with her beautiful white dress. It couldn't possibly shake her contentment. There is nothing left to do and nothing left undone.
       She could see it on the ground now, crawling and gaining speed as trees and houses fell quickly. Shooop! Flat again. Flatter than the calmest summer lake. This was an engineered flat. She knows exactly what is happening.
       Ah, sweet serenity. It flattens her good, shooop! It catches up with her family's car and flattens them too, shooop! It sucks down our farmer with all his past and knowledge and stubble and divorce and lust and whiskey and regrets and dirt under his fingernails and all the fences he'd built and his rooster, shooop!
       When the earth was still young it rained for millions of years. The surface was too hot so the rain would evaporate before it made contact.






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