You tell me not to come, but I’m already in the car. You’re cursing under the sound of the ignition and heater starting and I’m switching on the radio, flicking through the stations, stopping on a Queen song, hoping you’ll shout out the lyrics and forget about shouting at me. My seat warmer’s on and it usually comforts me like a cup of Campbell’s Cream of Mushroom, but all it does now is make me feel more shit. I don’t deserve Bohemian Rhapsody, I don’t deserve a warm back, and I sure as hell don’t deserve you. Because as soon as I felt love, I pushed and pushed, and fucked around until I discovered the terms that made our bond conditional. I turn off the seat warmer and pull my sweatshirt, then my tee shirt, over my head, trampling them with my combat boots. I’m sitting beside you in my burgundy bra, and you act as though you don’t notice, stare straight at the road ahead and nothing else. When we first started dating a year ago when we were juniors, that would have worked, you would have parked at the side of the road and turned to me and I would have climbed across the center console and onto your lap. That was before what I did with Tyler though. It will be harder to make you care now, or—terrifying to think it—impossible. I roll down my window and stick my bare arm out, the wind slapping against it. I glance your way, but you don’t flinch, your eyes still on the dark road that stretches longer than patience. I’m hanging out of the window now, the wind whipping against my stomach, my chest, and I’m yelling the words of a prayer my mother taught me, out into the woods for the squirrels and birds to listen to because you’re acting as though you can’t hear me at all. THE LORD IS MY PROTECTOR AND HE OFFERS ME FORGIVENESS AND LOVE. You twist the volume dial and Freddy Mercury bellows the lyrics over me and my prayers and I’m pine needle-small, pebble-small, so I whisper your name instead, laced with a string of futile words. You park at the mouth of a trail and I get out, step through the teeth of it, away from my sweater, my shirt, your car, you—eyes closed, head resting against your steering wheel, and I’m running, running, running through the thick underbrush you will refuse to chase me through. And the further I sprint the less I care.

Marie Hoy-Kenny attended the University of Toronto, where she earned her bachelor of arts in English, and professional writing and communication. Her work has been published in several literary magazines, including trampset, Cosmonauts Avenue, and FlashBack Fiction. Her debut novel, THE GIRL FROM HUSH CABIN, was published by Blackstone Publishing in 2023.