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Opposable One (A Bookmark Contest Finalist) |
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by Josh Potter
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1:26 |
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The doctor told her to count backwards from ten, but instead she thought about mittens. It's all a matter of function and coverage. A quotient of will and grasping. But this was as far as her thoughts would take her before the anesthesia pulled her in. She'd hardly considered the possibility of gloves or of pockets lined with flannel. All of this, no doubt, was getting ahead of oneself, as they say, and as the doctor had, no doubt, accounted for. And so, as she slipped away, her thoughts never turned to the charm of a muff, or of simply relocating to a warmer climate. It was the freedom to seize that she was after in the first place. This was why she'd signed on the line. To subvert the tyrany of chromosomes that held her in a way she longed to hold another. It had always been more than blue or brown eyes. The presence of a widow's peak. Detached earlobes. The ability to whistle. She never blamed her parents. Like her, all they were built for was cupping and pressing, clinging to a flat, rigid surface until air seeped in and the seal became broken. Some were simply suited for suction while others were forced to endure it. All she craved was to ratchet, wrench, tong and tweezer. When she woke, all she wanted was utility.
Josh Potter writes fiction and music journalism in his apartment upstate. He has destroyed shoes, engines, and illusions all over the country, but this fact rarely finds its way to his resume.
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