Mince

Thursday morning and the fire department climbs your stairs, weary fire fighters stomping around your kitchen and seeming superfluous. You stand in your stained hoody and sleep-drunk eyes, trying to assess danger. Is this the moment I blow up and all the things that used to matter no longer do? They leave within the minute, and you live to see another day. Count your pennies, again, again, do you think the numbers will come out different if only you do it enough times? Refresh the search for airfare; wonder, is this what it means to be delusional?

But you feel saner than you have in years, calmer, relieved of the air in your lungs and the tickle in your temples. No matter the outcome, somehow it will all come up roses. The air is frigid but the sun shines like spring. There's a mouse in the kitchen, she writes in despair. You giggle and buy traps on the way home.

Nothing scares you, anymore.