Aurora 2026

Krislyn Moreland

sounded like a bunch of popsicle sticks breaking all at once. “Miss?” I noticed I hadn’t yet moved, but she had made it halfway down the alley, her and those long legs. “Yes, sorry.” I moved to meet her, and she walked at my weakened pace to the car. I clutched the string of my cross-body bag tightly, hoping to enact some resistant part of my internal equilibrium. I wonder if Sally noticed how my walk has worsened over the time I’ve been with her. How my steps have gotten more unsure and my posture more crouched. Of course, it’s not always Sally who comes to get me. Hell, I don’t even know if her real name is Sally. In the beginning she said to address her as Miss, and I did religiously the first few times. Then, on the drive back one day, addled with laughing gas and a concoction of other drugs, I started calling her Sally as a nickname, and when I did, I saw her smirk a little from her passenger seat in the front. I’ve kept doing it ever since. Who knew I’d be calling her Sally for almost a year next week? The cars are usually the same. Always black, tinted windows to the point of blindness, and a leather interior. I guess for some kind of easy cleanup. The streak of nervousness had mostly gone by now. All I was left to do was clear my head until the procedure. In a way, I could pretend that I wasn’t in this car at all but back at that night, having chosen an Uber instead of driving myself and Lucy. We are both quiet and tipsy in the front seat, heading to my house to crash for the night. Lucy sits next to me, calm and quiet. I can feel her heart pumping. I can hear the quiet stream of blood move through her. Her cartilage makes quiet popping sounds as she adjusts in her seat; the soft flick of her eyelashes sounds through the quiet. The life flowing through her is deafening. In this moment, the silence I’ve lived in since her absence is filled, her heartbeat a crescendo, every breath a symphony. The car

41