Ly Faulk

The technician smooshes my breasts into the machine, flattening each one out in turn. Pancake flat. I wince and look away. What if the results are positive? Would it be a relief? A sort of confirmation, my rottenness made manifest. 

I miss a call from my sister as I lie napping. My husband kisses me goodbye on his way to work as I lie napping. The dust settles on the furniture as I lie napping. 

The dust forms into bunnies that hop, jumping over each other and me and the furniture and the empty air between all those things. When my husband comes home from work, they settle back into dust. I don’t tell anyone what I saw. 

My doctor assures me this isn’t perimenopause. There must be another explanation for waking in the middle of the night, wide eyed and gripping my pillow. He assures me that my labs are normal. The unspoken accusation hangs there. 

I try to read but the words pass over me. My cat curls up beside me and I occupy myself by petting her soft fur, burying my face in it to take in her clean scent. She grumbles and moves away, beginning to groom herself to make her fur lie flat again. 

My cat stops grooming and asks me why I am so tired. My cat asks me what I am outside of my symptoms. My cat asks who I would be if it wasn’t for the pain. I tell her I don’t know anymore.

The doctor tells me to scoot down, scoot down, that’s good, places the cold speculum inside. I wince and look away. She warns Big Pinch and snips off a piece. I wonder how many holes they’ve scooped out over the years and whether or not they grow back. 

My husband drives me to and from the appointments, never complaining, always supportive. It eats me up. He takes my hand and squeezes it, one hand still on the steering wheel.

The car lifts up off the road and points itself at the horizon. The sun is overhead, casting yellow light on our little slice of creation. “It’s just like in Grease,” I want to say but my husband is concentrating so hard on piloting the car, his face scrunched up in a cute way, as we sail over the bumper to bumper traffic and gently land in the parking lot. 

My doctor assures me that studies show that metabolism doesn’t actually slow down until 60 and I am only 44.  He assures me that my thyroid problems aren’t to blame. Studies said. I will have to figure this out on my own. 

I scroll through the pictures on my phone. At the top are all of the creative projects I used to work on, clumsy drawings, dramatic poems, bad digital art. My recent saved pics are all memes I’ve collected while scrolling on my phone in bed and tired-looking selfies with messy hair. 

The selfie beckons with one silent gesture and I follow into the digital realm. It feels good to leave my body behind for a moment. My selfie points and I follow the line of my finger and see that there, in the digital realm, is the horsie I used to ride as a child. I climb on and somehow I’m small enough to fit. I ride and giggle and play until it is time to go home. 

The finger monitor somehow knows when I’m sleeping and monitors my blood oxygen levels. There was a time, I would have had to go sleep in a lab. Now it’s an app. I pray for a diagnosis. I pray for the not-knowing to end. 

I dream of having the energy to paint my kitchen, walk a 5k with my sister, travel to visit my mom. I have whittled my dreams down to pocket-sized.

My dreams tumble out of my pockets, too many to count. Who would I be without my symptoms? A fucking dreamer of dreams. Or whatever Willy said. I pick one up, small as a marble. Inside, I am making a sweater and it looks so cozy and colorful and perfect. I slip the dream marble back into my pocket for later. 

I wait, test results trickle in. My doctor assures my sleep apnea is very treatable and I will need to sleep with a mask on from here on out. I try not to smile but my laughter bubbles up in my throat, spills out in the sterile air. The laughter turns into bunnies and they spill out of my mouth and onto the exam table and jump over me and the doctor and spin and are beautiful.