Page 19--Some Facts--Alexa Langrock

The old man sits in the kitchen sharpening his knives. Several hundred blades glisten, the moon floating in his palm. A girl sees a hummingbird and says, “I’d like to have that.” She pins the animal to the front of her dress, an ornament sure to receive compliments. The bird brings her dreams that night, but she cannot get comfortable in bed with the lump attached to her chest. Come morning she steals the old man’s sharpest knife, pierces her neck with equidistant holes, watches as water pours out like a wine fountain. She places the hummingbird in the bathroom sink, listens to its song as it drinks up, its chest swollen like the moon.