I faked the ankle at the family thing —

I faked the ankle at the family thing —

just a reason to leave.

My aunt said she'd drive me home,

and that was the whole reprieve.

Front seat. The heat on. She asked

what I was actually thinking about.

Not school — the real things,

the ones I carried without

anywhere to put them.

My foot was on the dash, intact.

I kept the fiction. She kept asking.

I answered honestly. That's a fact

I've held onto: forty minutes,

the highway, the exit signs,

her voice, me talking, the lie

making room for the true lines.

She died last month.

I sat with the memorial card.

Nothing I wrote felt true.

I tried hard.

The standard phrases. She was. We loved her.

I crossed them all out.

The true thing was the Buick, the heater,

her asking about

the actual me. I signed my name.

Folded the card. Put it in the pile.

Drove home.