You pick Atlantic City because the bus fare is cheap, and you remember a mug from your first apartment: red, with Resorts Atlantic City written on it in white letters. There was a single chip on the rim, but it was the thing from your childhood that was closest to whole. But you don’t choose Atlantic City because you think she will be there. She’s been dead for nearly a year by the time your bus from Baltimore pulls into the depot. In a way, you’d been waiting for her death your whole life, the question always in the back of your mind. Not if but when when when. A cellulitis infection took her. Your uncle and aunt hadn’t needed to explain that she got it from shooting up.

And yet, she’s here in Atlantic City. She’s at the bus shelter, smoking a Pall Mall. She’s waiting in line at Harrah’s for a pots and pans giveaway. She’s at the McDonald’s near the bus depot, stirring six packets of sugar into her coffee, licking the pastry crumbs and grease from a cardboard apple pie container. But it’s not your mother you’re looking for, it’s your shadow. With every potential fuckup, every misstep, you felt her step closer—the girl you’ve been fated to become all along. Now you’ve decided to just meet her, to reach out and shake her filthy hand. One night you are walking along the dark boardwalk and stop in front of a psychic’s shop. The lights are out and you stare at the gold evil eye symbol on the glass. You let yourself feel held in its gaze for a moment, wondering what it sees. A feral cat winds its way around your ankles, its whiskers holding the light from the moon. Something lost recognizing one of its own.