The Line

Hot water for coffee.

The news came in when I reached for my phone to see the 15 minute timer I set to check my COVID rapid test.

Phone tells me I have 3 minutes left to wait for one result and 0 minutes to wait for another. You know it already but I’ll write it down anyway, the way I’ll also take a photo of the completed COVID test. One I’ll send to my bosses, one I’ll send out into the internet, the ether, to history, to future children, little girls wondering why they feel so worthless. Both for the same reason, proof:

June 24th, 2022 Roe V. Wade overturned.

Pour the coffee. Wait 2 more minutes.

Phone is on the counter still lighting up: Notifications. Texts from friends going to protests.Thinking about going to protests.

1 more minute

Turn on the radio and the poor radio DJ’s are making a comically feeble attempt to go off script and incorporate the news into their regularly scheduled music programming.

30 seconds later there is only one line on the rapid test. Lucky. Allowed to take my body outside into the world where it can continue to crumble under a now made legal threat.

Wash hands.

Not surprised, just disappointed, how my existence, which has always been exploited, undervalued, treated with disdain, disgust, and a joke by the place it lives, moves, loves, fights, breathes in– still can’t catch a break.

Rapid test goes into the trash. Wish I could throw away today’s decision just as easily.

Wash your hands again, turn off the radio, and leave the house.