When our friends left, our mothers would ask to talk to us. They had no real evidence against our behavior other than a sneaking suspicion things were unsavory. “Are you involved in hate and destruction?” they’d ask. They’d comment on the asymmetry of the family as we grew and distanced ourselves. They were worrying and we all felt moments of sympathy for them, but we shook our heads like they were out of their minds. “Is this what it is to watch your daughter grow?” they kept asking themselves as we walked away from the table. We shaped our fingers into guns as we rounded the corner and shot at our heads.

We stole all the photos of ourselves from this time. We stole our mothers’ passwords and deleted the photos of us off their computers, and slipped pictures out of the frames lining the halls. “No,” they’d say with big worry in their voices. “This is the end. I’m putting up with your secrets, but I won’t let you take my memories.” Our mothers would hunt our rooms for them to no avail. We didn’t think about how someday we’d like to look at who we were. Our mothers hugged us tightly trying to convince us to return to our old selves, the selves in those photos. “You’re soaked through,” they’d say, but it was our mothers that were coated with sweat like dishes too early out of the dishwasher, squeaky and startled. It is not uncommon for a person to first imagine someone else is showing their symptoms, in an attempt to objectify the pain and disease.

Our mothers told us we smelled naked and ripe, and when they got close enough to hold an ear to our hearts they recreated the burbling with wet sounds, their clammy tongues  flicking around their mouths.

“Decay,” we whispered outside their other ears. All those manners and ethics were being pulled loose of us, like too many bones. Coyotes and vultures were burying them deep to savor at a later time.

First the lifeblood blood drains to the dependent parts of our consciences, and that lividity rises up behind our expressions. The muscles of our decency refuse to uncouple. Our honor cools to a temperature of consensus.