- Rub your eyes just enough to show that you’ve been crying, but not enough to smudge the makeup.
- Walk in to the beat of your favorite Dolly Parton song.
- Look around the room as if you are lost. Make eye contact with everybody in the room other than the one that left you. Do your very best to convince him that your entire life will derail without him, that you’ll be spinning around in the center of that café for an eternity. Then when the barista calls out “Helen,” run to grab her coffee. Make him wonder if that’s still even you in there. But don’t give him a chance to see.
- Become Helen.
- Use the kids, use the house, hell, use the dog (that he never walked) if you have to.
- Look directly into his eyes and tell him that you want to push reset.
- Thirty five years ago… Before the Mercedes Benz, and the hotel rooms, and the sirens. Before all the pictures. Before you had to type into Google search…
Nico Mestre
Alloy 