cobalt

This must be my seventh time going to the bathroom.
Must beware the strips of wood outside the can. Theres
a goat outside. A goat!!
Jean Marie: lying across from me on the other couch.
Hard to travel in the dark, I tell you, living room in shadow. She resurrects
nothing but the cat. My motion. Detected. Causes a cat to
leap on Jean Marie.
Shit! She says, swinging at the feline protagonist.
Larissas upstairs in her room. Im bereft of any appropriate verbs.

Nothing?

Look at your hands. And look at your mouth.
They are definitely separate. Tom Sawyer and Becky Thatcher.
Larissa Golden and Jean- Marie. And me, yes, this time shaking
on the back of a truck.

Jean-Marie passes in a car; is this a dream?

Larissas room is cluttered, dim, smoky. When
whispering, she is endowed with a
talent for dark and mysterious diplomacy