Day 30 (0)
I am tiny, and small-minded. My dad acts like a goon trying to make me laugh. He says I won’t remember this at all.

Day 382 (1)
Summer, and the breeze doesn’t exist. The trees loom over my head of thin blonde hair, and I can’t help but feel at peace in the arms of my ma. These days were some of my best, when life could be so new and shiny, when each day, settled softly onto my sleeping back.

Day 14, 601 (40)
Today I can’t get up. I know the world outside will have changed. I know the innocence and the mysteries will be flung off, shaken, and put to dry on the clothesline, like a drape in the attic. Today I decide not to get out of my smooth wooden bed. I don’t want to go through the trouble of making it. I don’t need to hassle myself down the hall to brush my cavity filled mouth with overpriced, over advertised, mainstream toothpaste, only to be surprised again at how awful it is. I can’t force myself to put a toe on the staircase and listen to the obnoxious creak on the fourth stair from the bottom, which always makes me conscious of the amount of food I consumed the night before. Then this stair will torture me with the memory of last night, and only twist my stomach into seizing knots, allowing me to creep up the stairs, un-brush my teeth, and slither back to my bed. Today, I won’t get up.

Day 3, 650 (10)
I am ten today, and Ellie Johnson hasn’t come to my house. We pinkie promised, too. She said she would come to my house today, but Ellie Johnson is not here. I wait until four o’clock, and then I begin to pack up the cone-shaped party hats with Poo Bear on them. They are left overs from my 1,825th day. Maybe she doesn’t like Poo Bear.

Day 14,601 (40)
It’s eight now. I think I’ll call in sick.

Day 3,652 (10)
I don’t ask Ellie Johnson why she never came. She doesn’t explain. Our friendship falls apart casually. Not sitting next to each other at lunch, going to separate sides of the playground at recess. Not making eye contact, ever. I want to congratulate her on her new life, but I can’t think of a way to phrase it without a punch somewhere in it.

Day 5,840 (16)
High school sucks on rumors like they’re lollipops. Each person keeps them going as long as they possibly can, until the hardened sugar water is nothing but a paper stick. I’m the paper stick. At least throw me in a trashcan.

Day 14,601 (40)
I avoid the fourth stair from the bottom, but my head still spins with the pictures of last night. The kitchen smells of cinnamon and vanilla. He must have been baking. I look in the oven. Cool as an empty kitchen. Did I have cinnamon last night? My head throbs from the thought. I can’t tell whether I’m really sick or just pretending to be. I pick up the phone to call work, or somebody. I can’t dial. I put the phone down and try again. My fingers are locked. What’s happening? My bones are aching, and my head is being crushed. I realize I am pressing myself into the tile floor. I don’t move.

Day 5, 840 (16)
My aunt didn’t even remember. I had to tell her I was going out to buy a cake.

“What for?” and “Do you really have enough money for that?” were her responses. “All right, well, don’t go on the subway after eight, and don’t use the bus. You never know who might be on it.” I didn’t get a cake.

Day 1,825 (5)
I think it was my fault. Ma told me to turn it off as she was taking the cake out and she never double-checked. I was so overwhelmed with the aroma of perfection that I forgot. I forgot to turn off the oven, and as I was digging into the luscious piece of cake with the number five written in large swerving handwriting, I smelled the smoke. Our house was small, modest, so in the amount of time it took for water to hit it, there was nothing. I didn’t lose my freckled father or angelic mother to my fire. Instead I lose them to depression while driving and fleeing from exhaustion 2,574 days later. Which is worse.

Day 14,601 (40)
My hands don’t leave my face for an hour. I am trying to both remember and forget. The flickering candles begin to swim the narrow pathways of my mind, and I can just make out the image of the waxy four and zero with their heads on fire. I remember waiting until the wax had pooled and the brilliant light reached the formed sugar surrounding the cake. Why did I torture the flame with the open air for so long? I wasn’t looking at it, or I would have noticed its wiggling form. I was caught in the swirling green grasses of his eyes. He was watching me, his mouth moving. He was trying to tell me something. I couldn’t hear it.

“Grace! Grace, just listen to me. This is what I’ve been talking about! You never listen; you never want to discuss it. I’m done. I’m going. I’m leaving! Do you hear me? I’m leaving!” I think I’m dreaming. I want to be.

Day 8,395 (23)
We met at an internship in the city. I was standing in the middle of chaos, the mist of garlic and oregano swirling in my throat, and he pulled me aside. I jumped at his touch and he stepped back into a waiter with five plates of the fish special. The waiter dropped them all, cursed in Portuguese, and gave him a stare that said go to hell. I bolted into action, throwing fish into the mixture of butter and garlic, sprinkling some ginger, and turning the heat on high. He asked me if I needed any help. I told him no and went back to the fish. He told me he didn’t have anything to do, that no one was ordering dessert. I took him for a whiner and ignored him.

“I hear it’s your birthday,” he continued.

“Where did you hear that?”

“Around.”
“Oh.”
“I also hear that you’re applying for a job at Burnwood. You know, they only take the best.”

“And who’s to say I’m not the best?”

“That’s what I hear.”

“Who are you?”

“Oh, I’m just the pastry chef.”
Which was how the cook fell in love with the baker.

Day 14,601 (40)
He had put the cinnamon on top of the cake. I hate how the smell lingers, filling my nose. He took the news like a rock to the head. My head still hurts, but I don’t know what from. I walk to the medicine cabinet next to the fridge, placing my feet only on the blue tiles along the floor. The clad pans glare at me on the cool stove, begging me to use them. As I’m reaching for the handle of the cabinet, I notice a sticky note, scrawled with my handwriting.

Call the doctor!
Is that for me? Did I already do that? Yes, last night. My birthday.

Day 11,328 (31)
Today I got a dress. I said I would send the invitations but didn’t want to. He said he would bake the cake, and I said he was crazy. We didn’t care what happened at the wedding, just as long as we were there. At night, we had a few of his friends over. I put on my dress and twirled. The men nodded approvingly, and the women hmmmed knowingly. At the end of the evening, as the guests were filing out with their bulky coats, one woman pulled me aside by our oval table.

“Loved your dress, and can’t wait for the big day! I mean finally after, what was it? Eight years! I wasn’t sure it was ever going to happen!” I explained, as I had to all of his family, that our careers as head chef and baker were very demanding, so we decided to wait. I don’t know if I believed that, though. She pecked me on the cheek, congratulated me once more, and left with a sweep of the hand. I didn’t mention it to him.

Day 14,601 (40)
The couches are too hard. I’ve never noticed it before. I am blushing so hard I feel like my face is burning off as I think about what the doctor told me. I push my mind into the seat cushion, trying to press the thought out and onto the armrest beside me.

I didn’t know what to say to him. Did he want an explanation? I couldn’t give him one, so I let him create his own.
Did he say he was going? My brain is blurred by thousands of moments, millions of seconds. Would he be back for lunch? It’s 12:07, so maybe not.

The time. I can remember the time when the candle started to burn. 11:07.

“Hey, can we talk about this, Grace? Before you clam up and everything. This isn’t a big deal. At least we know why nothing’s been happening for so long. You were never really in to the whole idea of a family, anyway, right? Grace and Nat forever. You remember that? When we carved it on that tree? We were so stupid. Hey, Grace, it’s fine. I’m not angry with you. Can we please talk about it?”

Day 14,602 (40)
I made his favorite breakfast, but he’s not coming back.