Keratin
Patricia was skipping. She donated her hair to a charity. She sat down on a sofa and picked up a magazine from the coffee table. She was wearing an oversized button-down shirt as she looked at photographs of models wearing oversized button-down shirts. She tore up the magazine. She picked up the wool from the carpet and loosened her feet from the fibers. She mountain’d her body around the hideous plates of chafed-up nature—she crawled around the floor once she removed the wool from the carpet and later the carpet and later the dirt that had poisoned the carpet. Only floor remained. Still crawling. Her reflection shimmered in a mirror against a wall beyond the coffee table. Only scalp and soft forehead.
Patricia flared her nostrils for only a moment. She pulled herself from her button-down shirt. She dragged herself from her button-down shirt. Far away near a door frame was a child with hands and feet. Patricia held the child’s face in her hands. Patricia smoothed her hands around the child’s scalp and a fleshy movement stammered. Circular. Wrist muscles throbbed. Child loosened and slowly hair floated up nerves and matter. Down shoulders and back.
The child was thankful and warm.