Fix by J. Mann (highly illogical behavior .TXT) 📕

bag of pasta and box of cereal—not even in an annoyed way, but like she’s interested in it. My eyes blur the long shelves of food until it’s all a single block of color.

The vitamin section is even worse. We’re there so long I’m sure Mary Fay is sprouting gray hairs. Who knew there were so many vitamins? It seems once they ran out of the twenty-six letters in the alphabet, they moved to adding numbers to them like a vitamin bingo game. I sway into the metal shelves, knocking over a row of bottles.

“You all right?” Mary Fay asks, not really looking at me.

“Mm-hmm,” I answer, although I don’t move off the shelf or right the vitamins.

By the time we get to the baked goods aisle I’m ready to crawl on top of the loaves of whole wheat bread and sleep for a week.

“All I need is the deli and a few things from the dairy section,” Mary Fay announces.

“Can I go sit in the car?” I ask. “I’m so tired.”

“Sure. I’ll walk you out. Not bad for a first trip back out into the world. You did well, Eve.”

Some of my old love of Mary Fay returns in that moment, and when I smile at her it’s actually genuine.

“No, I can do it,” I tell her, reaching for my second crutch and her keys sitting on top of her purse. “You finish up, Meef.”

Where thirty minutes ago I had been petrified of being alone in this place, the Roxy really has me feeling fine. Very fine. As if all I need to do is blink my eyes and I’ll be in the car. First, though, I have to hobble out of the bread aisle. Slowly. Deliberately. Because she’s watching. Yet as soon as I’m out of her sight, I sloppily clank toward the front doors. Which seem to be moving away from me.

I’m shuffling past a huge display of toilet paper two aisles later when the floor seesaws beneath my feet and my eyesight darkens. Sucking in a sharp breath, I stare out across the long row of checkout counters lined up like lanes at a bowling alley. The world is too 3D… people, carts, kids, and it’s all happening between me and the exit.

Stopping to catch my breath, I reach out and grab the metal shelf loaded with toilet paper. The car’s too far. Way too far. A tsunami of fear breaks over me, making me think I might pee right here on the floor of the grocery store. I need Meef. I need her.

I turn without thinking, without care, and my foot catches on something. I kick it, losing what little balance I had, causing me to swing back into the toilet paper, my crutch clanging against metal. My heart pounds against my brace. A horrible coldness blows through me, gripping my throat.

My lungs are collapsing. I’m going to fall! And my lungs are collapsing. It’s the atelectasis thing.

I’m going to die in the middle of the Stop & Shop.

Hanging by one hand to the shelf, I’m sweating and panting and freaking out. Somehow I’m also trying hard not to let anyone in the grocery store know that I’m sweating and panting and freaking out. It’s embarrassing to be dying like this, in front of all these shoppers. But I can’t hide the ugly secret of my impending death because it’s happening. It’s totally happening.

Frantic, I call out for help.

And he’s there.

He grabs my arms and stands me back up. I clutch at the apron strings around his neck, my nose inches from his skin. Again, that fresh T-shirt smell. Why is he wearing a red apron? I look up at him. The lights of the store shine out of the lenses of his gold-rimmed glasses.

“Hang on,” he says.

I wrap my arms around him. The human form feels so good.

“Not to me, Eve,” he says, “to the shelf.”

I don’t understand.

He takes my hands from him and puts them onto the shelf. Then he gets down on his knees at my feet. He ties my shoe. When he stands back up, his face is so close to mine. Just like the long line of coffee on the shelf, everything is a blur—the bandanna pulling back his hair, his eyes behind his glasses, his lips. His lips. I lean into them, closing my heavy eyelids. They are warm… and still.

I kiss him again.

His lips are so soft in their hesitation, but he does not move away and this just makes me kiss him longer, harder.

He breaks down, kissing me back. Although only for a second before he stops and pulls away.

He’s all warm haziness as he leans me back onto the toilet paper and picks up the keys from somewhere on the floor.

“Mary Fay’s car?” he mumbles.

I nod yes.

He hands me one of my crutches, keeping the second. Carefully, he shores me up from behind with his arm, gently guiding me through the mess of color and movement to the exit. When the automatic doors open, I don’t even flinch. We’re hit by a blast of chilly air, and I feel him gently tighten his grip around me.

It must be snowing because tiny freezing specks hit my cheeks, but his body is so very warm next to mine that the icy wetness feels refreshing.

He opens the door and lowers me in. He places the keys on my lap and when the door shuts, it’s like all sound has been erased from the world. My head rests against the cold window and I shiver because of the cold. Because of that kiss.

Mary Fay climbs heavily into the car next to me.

“Hey, Sleeping Beauty.”

I’m smiling. I can feel it.

She plucks the keys from my lap and within a second, the engine hums to life beneath me. Heat hits my knees. I slip off into darkness as the car pulls out onto the road.

“Saw your friend in there,” she says.

“Friend?” I don’t need to hear her