Write a Novel in November, Post #2

The doctor always seems like he's leaving in my memory of him. His face looks sore, like he has recently taken bandages off his cheeks. He looks like he's been cut with an extremely small knife, one made in tiny town with a tiny knife shop. It's a blade that someone surprises you with, one that fits perfectly into the pocket of a dress. His neck-skin seems too tight, not too tight for his age, but too tight to be human. You can tell by his ears that the skin on his body is smooth. One day when he was explaining cartilage he let me touch the outer rim of his right ear. It felt like a petal would feel after a windstorm. His eyes are deep like water towers. Ones that you climb up as a child, like a cat, you're not asking to be rescued. You're asking to see the world.

But I'm always revising him. I go back and change him so that one day he is a blonde with a red and black tattoo running down his arms. Sometimes the ink looks like it comes in waves. Sometimes it's in the shape of a wolf and the wolf is always smiling. Sometimes the doctor comes in the room and you can hardly see his eyes because they are superbly white--like the pupil, the iris, and the cornea all blend together in a vanilla milkshake. Sometimes the wolf leaps out from his skin and sticks to hers. Sometimes I move the sheets around to see her arms, and sometimes the wolf is gnawing at them. And there is nothing I can do. There are piles of snow. I watch. And sometimes it's out of love, jealously, or cruelty. But sometimes I don't think much at all about the wolf and I hold her arms above her head, then let them go gently back down. I do this with her over and over to get the blood moving mostly, but also because when the palms of her hands are almost to the ceiling she seems happy enough to blink.