I must have rung up the pepperoni package seventeen times
before it occurred that you wouldn’t notice me
no matter how loudly I tap-tap-tapped to delete
or how many times I coughed into my elbow

but I knew you—
the way your nostrils burned
from your first peroxide bleach,
the crooked grin you slipped me
like a five-dollar bill—

so I knocked over a tabloid,
the kind we used to clip the models from,
and watched it flop face-heavy like buttered toast
the same way the magazines did on my carpet

but you didn’t come.

I’m not sure why you’d start now—
random convenience store,
Sunday afternoon, dressed down—
or why I thought you might:

you, real,
ring-fingered, dark-haired,
with your collage-making safety scissors
left behind so long ago—

but I waited for as long as I could,
ruminating on you like sour cud,
rushing my hands over stipple edges
until I got finger cuts.

now I gotta pick up the magazine.

I gotta leave the store.
I gotta swallow
what I’ve been chewing.

An Arkansas native, Sarah Watkins is an educator by trade and a writer by necessity. She currently resides in northeast Arkansas with her husband. Her work has recently been featured in several publications, including Menagerie, Moss Puppy Magazine, and Heart of Flesh Literary Journal. Instagram: @sarahwatkinspoetry