To the Woman Kissing the Broken Bone in Your Clavicle She kisses the skin right below your collar bone and her tongue finds the jagged line of puckered scar tissue. A ski slope mishap? A car accident? A childhood fall? Until her attention is engaged elsewhere, she keeps coming back to this one imperfect spot, drawn by the strange feel of it against her lips and, perhaps, by the connection it holds to the person you are outside the bedroom you occasionally share with her. The connection she cannot seem to find anywhere else. In the morning you’ll be gone, leaving nothing but a polite yet increasingly disengaged presence in the contacts list of her phone, and she’ll never get the chance to ask how that bone got broken, and if it hurt, and if you cried even a little. She won’t get the chance to do that just like I never did, and, many years later, she will still remember the stretched scar and the unasked questions, and she will wonder why they seemed so important at the time.
Beeper Peddle is a writer and healer living on the East Coast. She lives with her partner and their beloved soul puppy. Beeper writes about sorrows, lies, and deep loves. When you read her work, you will dip down into her heart and end up in all manner of body parts. Should you find yourself reflected in these words, it is merely coincidence; however, it does not surprise her you share the same heart. Find her at bethpeddle.com and @beeperpeddle on Twitter and Instagram
Laila Amado (she/they) writes in her second language and has recently exchanged her fourth country of residence for the fifth. Now, instead of the Mediterranean, she can be found staring at the North Sea. The sea, occasionally, stares back. Her stories have been published or are forthcoming in Best Small Fictions 2022, Cheap Pop, Cotton Xenomorph, Flash Frog, and other publications.
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