Ignoring crosswalks, we shuffled into wind-whipped streets. I was in sweatpants, an oversized coat, and no bra. Dan wore khakis, a checked shirt, and a green puffy vest. Wreaths rattled on their lampposts and storefront twinkle lights were turned off.
The man at the funeral home with soft eyes knew not to fill the hallway with smalltalk. He led us to a deep leather couch, clicked the door closed, and pulled out a neat stack of papers from a manila folder. I told him the painting hung behind his desk was the mountain ridge we see from our front porch. He asked, gentle as a leaf, which twin had been born alive. I was on the edge of the overlook. Dan’s hand settled on my shoulder. I had to be the one who said their names.
Christmas was a slice of space-time we didn’t visit—Dan and I on the moss green sofa in my mom’s living room, covered in knit blankets, our raft to float above those calendar days. We filled in my niece’s coloring book with thin markers. We were handed cups of warm citrus tea, grandmother’s ham rolls, and slivers of pecan pie. My aunts pieced together a puzzle of a bouquet of peonies on the coffee table. My dad clinked plates as he loaded the dishwasher. Dan and I dragged our blankets to the guest room and slept until sunrise glowed the room mauve. We woke to the sound of my nephew dumping out wooden blocks in the hallway.
After the funeral home, Dan and I puttered from pottery shop to pottery shop. We opened doors to quiet galleries, the bells above us dinging. We turned smooth clay cups and cool bowls in our hands. When folks asked us if we were looking for anything in particular we lied and said no. I saw a display where a potter used glaze the color of cold mountains and winter rhododendrons. She etched birds flying from the lungs of trees into the stone sky. I clutched her business card like a hall pass, a love note. I asked her if she could throw a piece big enough to cradle the cracks in the cosmos and small enough to rock wrens slipped out of their nest.
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Molly Bolton is a spiritual director, teacher, and writer in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina. Her work can be found in EcoTheo Review, Susurrus Magazine, Free the Verse, and Morehouse Press. Molly was named a 2022 NC Gilbert-Chappell Series emerging poet. They write weekly for the queer, antiracist spiritual collective enfleshed.