Descent — Word Count 143 (Prompt: heat)
It wasn’t the baby crying from dusk til dawn.
It wasn’t her name on the shortlist but not on the winner’s line.
It wasn’t the heat.
It wasn’t the clinging smell of the vinyl in the new car.
It wasn’t the Visa bill, $500 over limit.
It wasn’t the caffeine.
It wasn’t losing her grandmother’s ring, only to find it behind the jam jar.
It wasn’t cycling at the front of the pace-line in the relentless sun.
It wasn’t the chocolate.
It wasn’t the whine of chainsaws in the forest behind her house.
It wasn’t the stack of work, already two weeks late.
It was everything.
She looked at the small, pharmaceutical wonder in her hand: $30 a pop. She hesitated only a minute before she swallowed in. Soon the migraine’s light and thunder would recede and she’d sleep almost comatose for hours.
© Maggie Bolitho
Photo from Wikimedia Commons by Sasha Wolff from Grand Rapids