Just an hour later, Tiana was walking to her friend’s house when a guy passed and said something about pussy, and she kept walking and he said, “Hey, c’mere, c’mere!” and she heard footsteps as she kept walking, she’s sure that’s what she heard, and she hoped they’d eventually end or wouldn’t get louder, and she got inside and nothing happened. A couple of nights later, a guy followed her and tried to kiss her. She said, “No, no,” very gently and softly; she detected no malice from him. She smiled and said no and pushed him away. As she did, his dick came out. He never managed to kiss her, though.

Back home, she thought about quitting her job, which she completely hated. Her co-workers were boring and her boss was an asshole. Maybe she should just apply for welfare? She knew girls on welfare. But then she’d have to give up her apartment. Plus, she’d have no money for booze. She could maybe get another job? Maybe. The last time Tiana’d tried to find something better, it was one of those once-every-five-months-not-passing times and the guy’s voice went up an octave in the interview when he realized. He didn’t say anything outright. His eyes just bounced for a second after the voice thing, and the rest of the interview was short. It was an office gig for a company that made canes. She wore this flattering skirt suit—she thought it was flattering. She was super qualified, too. She didn’t get the job. Tiana’s friends told her there were other jobs in this city that would take her. She didn’t look for another job.

Now and then, her mom called. She and her mom grew up together in the country three hours away, two klicks south of the Trans-Canada and far down a gravel road. Her mom was retired now, on a teacher’s pension, and was always chirpy when she called. Her mom’d say really nice things like, “Hello, my darling daughter!”

Her darling daughter.

Tiana knew how lucky she was. It hadn’t always been this way; she really did know how lucky she was. There was a short but formative time when all she had wanted was her mother back, and now she had her mother back. She knew how lucky she was. When they hung up, she felt worthless and ungrateful, and she got drunk, always, and she didn’t know why. She would sit straight up in bed, delivering shot after shot into her body, getting the kind of drunk where she didn’t move; she just sat upright for more than an hour, lifting the bottle and hardly even feeling hammered (or any better). More a settled, stomach-folding cloud of anaesthetic haze. She would become part of the bed, the bottle on the floor, taking pull after pull after pull without moving, feeling nothing.

But tonight, now, in winter, Tiana’d had a normal evening and it was nice. She tottered around in front of the mirror before heading to bed. She’d just brushed her teeth, and after she took off her makeup, her eyes followed a divot from her collarbone. It was just shallow and curved enough to hold the spill from a shot glass, a finger, a baby mouse. There were quiet, regular moments like these when she found parts of her body beautiful. She put her hand over the divot, then over her chest.