The television keeps you company. TV educates you. Tells you stories. It turns your dreams into reality. I guess I always envied her a little. Her, Daphne. I wanted to turn into a laurel, too. I can’t love you so much. I can’t love you so much. I can’t love you so much.

The water is still warm, but she’s ready. She doesn’t need shampoo or soap or conditioner, all that’s left is to get out.

Then she realizes that there is a scene they never show in the horror movies: the moment when the heroine finishes her bath and gets out of the tub. They only film the protagonist when she jumps in fear or straightens up from underwater, splashing.

She thinks she has learned something about that scene from her most recent baths. When she pulls the plug and the mass of water descends like the floors of a detonated building. When the water starts to flow away from you, to leave you. Because that’s what she feels, that the liquid comes from inside her and carries everything away, emptying her. And she wants to disappear with the water, but instead she stays where she is, like a rock in a dry river.

Aunt Nana

Aunt Nana

I’m hiding. Enclosed in a vague darkness circled by a floating line of light, the only border of my hideout. Yes, I’m hiding, though I don’t really remember why. I know that I’m taking cover, but it’s the way a person takes cover from the sun in the shade of a tree. I feel calm, and at the same time it seems I’m waiting for something to quiet down so I can come out. I’m under my bed. I am seven years old, and I hear my mother calling me. She’s looking for me. My head is resting on my crossed arms. It smells like dust and the floor is cold. From here I can see the bottom drawer of the dresser and the outline of the bedside table. What stands out most is the rug, the colored fibers that don’t quite form any image. But if I looked from the door, what would most call attention in the room would be my bed: its white wooden frame, its flowered comforter. A bed chosen especially for me, like all the things that I have—that I had. But I’m under the bed. Hidden, safe. Maybe I’m playing. When I was a little girl, everything I did was playing.