The First Thing
Warm, then searing. Those screaming nerves, the signal your brain sends to your body: take your fingers off the fucking stovetop. As you now know, it’s hot.
The signal, your brain sends it. But it always arrives too late to stop the burn.
The scarred insides of my wrist act as proof of this. After pulling pizzas out of a hot oven, for years, I should know better, know these warnings, listen to them. Instead, I brush the shame away like a phantom itch, remind myself that I’m in my thirties and living at home for a year, and my life is pretty much the norm these days: too much schooling, under-employed but rocking the side-hustles, chronically single.
Like all other online purchases, my frantic search for a coupon code (single gentlemen readers between 28 and 37 years of age: I’m thrifty) is followed by held breath as I wait to see if my pilfered code actually works.
It does.
