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Back Aesthetica
Chapters (30)
  1. Title
  2. Part One
  3. 1.
  4. 2.
  5. 3.
  6. 4.
  7. 5.
  8. 6.
  9. Part Two
  10. 7.
  11. 8.
  12. 9.
  13. 10.
  14. 11.
  15. 12.
  16. 13.
  17. Part Three
  18. 14.
  19. 15.
  20. 16.
  21. 17.
  22. 18.
  23. 19.
  24. 20.
  25. 21.
  26. 22.
  27. 23.
  28. 24.
  29. 25.
  30. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

In the car she read her emails. Too early for traffic, we sailed I-45 toward Galveston, where the highway ends. When we were freshly teenaged, even before learner’s permits and licenses, my mother had moved to the passenger seat and let us take turns driving the last strip of road, to where the ocean begins.

“We could keep going,” I offered. Leah typed, said nothing. “Remember our spot on the beach?”

Her fingers stopped but she didn’t look up. “Of course I do,” she said.

AT THE TERMINAL, we stood on the curb and hugged. The hug lasted, or it didn’t, but I closed my eyes long enough to see images: the egg white bites and skinny latte I would order from Starbucks on the way to the hospital; the blurry mother who waited there; Jake’s red-lit bedroom. All of it arranged, unfiltered, on a private grid.

“You could stay,” I said as Leah pulled off.

“I know she will get better,” she said.

“Don’t go,” I said and wondered if I meant it. “Don’t forget me.”

Her face had locked up again and the sky still looked like a storm. “I’m not going to forget you,” she said, and I could tell it annoyed her to have to say it.

“I love you Leah,” I said but she was already walking, already too far gone. A revolving door enveloped her body, spit it out behind a long window. She looked for signs, found a line and joined it. From the center console, my phone buzzed and Jake’s name, a picture of his pewter contacts and prayer beads, wrote itself across the screen.

Part Three

image

14.

Nighttime now. I stumble from a Lyft into the lobby of the Princess Hotel. It’s been thirty-three hours since I left for the Aesthetica Center, most of which I’ve spent unconscious, sleeping in a recovery suite, my body working to stave off infection. I should do more to thank this body, I think, and pull the cords of my sweatshirt’s hood, tightening the cocoon around my head. Beneath it, I’m fully masked by layers of gauze, a sterile sheet of ice Velcroed to my face. My face, beaten like a prize fighter’s, my head, toggled by twin tubes hooked to clear containers the shape and size of lemons, filling with my watery blood.