His mouth is open, half-hung. From this angle, his cheeks slouch downward. They look as if they belong to an old man.
         I cock my head. Examine my upturned feet beside the underside of his--my crooked toes, the red polish chipped and splotchy.
         Then I close my eyes. Try to dream him off me.

It goes like this:

         I don’t normally smoke but on this particular day I do. The cigarette is loose in my fingers and I suck it hard and deep so the smoke burns into my nostrils. Tickles the inside of my throat like a feather. Outlines of it float in the room and draw figures in the air. Ghosts hang. I see strange faces and think maybe I should keep the habit just so they won’t disappear.
         And then of course, I immediately think of Ray.
         I think of him getting up and stumbling out of bed, not yet realizing I’ve gone. The image makes me feel something similar to fear. Something not too far from giddiness.
         I think of him in the kitchen, unshowered and scratching himself, expecting his coffee. He likes it waiting for him on the table next to his two fried eggs and his buttered toast. I picture his face changing as he begins to understand why the table is empty and suddenly something feels not quite right with my body. Sharp pangs rise up from my stomach, collapse into my ribcage.
         I walk to the window of the hotel room and pull back the curtain, lean into the pane and let the hot glass touch my skin. It isn’t even ten o’clock yet, and already my thighs are stuck together.
         Black heat swims above the asphalt outside. Waves ripple the air, wash over dried dirt and rock.
         A prickling sensation runs through my finger and I look down, surprised for some reason to find the cigarette now only a nub in my hand, the red ember barely alive.
         I mash it hard on the windowsill and stare at it. The way it bends under itself makes me want to stand here forever. I outline a box around it, remove the dust with my forefinger. Trace the line again and again.
         I leave it like this, a hard square box around the nub.

~

         After lunch I drive an hour away to my old high school. No particular reason or purpose, just the inclination to go.
         When I pull into the parking lot, I sit in my car for a long time. The building in front of me reminds me how easy it can be to forget a place exists. And then there it is in front of you rooted into the ground. Existing without your permission.
         Runnels High is still standing, but barely. It hadn’t actually looked much better when I attended. But the feel is different now. Creepier with its eroded brick and broken windows, overgrown weeds sprouting up from cracks in the concrete.
         I get out of the car and walk up to the front entrance, pull on a rusty lock that comes loose and breaks apart in my fingers. The gap-toothed doors are discolored, ambered over and concave in some places where the metal casing has warped. Spiraled light wedges itself in the space between the frames.
         It’s how it is in these small towns. A new school is built and the other one’s left to rot on the side of the road because there isn’t enough money to tear the thing down. At first there’s a strange sentimentality attached to it, a kind of nostalgia. A way to remember. But eventually people get used to seeing it like this. They drive by, hardly noticing as it crumbles.
         I step up to a window next to the doors. Rub away crusted dirt with the back of my hand and make binoculars with my fingers.
         Inside the place is a tomb.
         Half a curtain remains in the room. The desks are in jagged rows, tipped over. A couple of stray papers litter the floor. Half a word is written on the chalkboard.

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