*S

In the evenings she fell against the hardwood floor, staring at the lazy milk carton tossed against the edging of the wall. That night he called her ‘milkmaid’ in the fluorescent light of the kitchen, and she hurled it towards his head as she finished pouring herself a kitchen sized cupful. The milk, the cat lapped up with a quick tongue, humming along as it went. The rest swiped up with a wet paper towel. The carton, it found itself smashed against the corner next to the crumpled television wires, its bottom sour with a damp smell.

 The girl on the side of the carton, etched into the plastic with the TM symbol plastered across her breasts. He called her milkmaid.

“You see, it just curves,” he said as he traced his finger up the small of her back. They sometimes hid in the closet when no one was looking, he with a red laser pointer in his hand saying ‘s. just s’ over in his brain.

 The closet. Because no one was at home. “It holds us like a children’s box,” she said.

 Inside she slipped her white t-shirt off her shoulder with an a-size bra hanging loosely on her rib cage. And the red pointer, it moved down the bones of her back.

 “Like an s,” David whispered. “Like an s, milkmaid.”

 She never said more than yes or no. Just watched as the red laser bounced against the white of the walls. Sometimes saying “in the closet, it’s ok. I’m milkmaid, no?”

 “Like an s,” he always said.

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