The day she said I love you, a Thursday, was a windy day. As if it was an afterthought, a slip of the tongue, as if the words only said goodbye for now, as if it was obvious, as if it meant something else, as if the words were not the words, as if she forgot to pull them back or she thought the wind would carry them off, as if the words could evaporate like rainwater or be buried in rubble, or stolen by thieves, as if somewhere, a ventriloquist’s lips quivered, she said the words. He heard them, and they echoed for days in the long blue halls of his mind.

But really, the wind paused and he heard it, and he was sure she said it, as if a big iron bell rang once far off, as if a train had pulled into a station, as if a fine old book was found with a folded page, as if the words were a sunrise, a sudden discovery, a jingle jangle, as if it was the solution to a puzzle, as if it was confession or a purple cloth or the key to a room, as if it was the cool spring-fed headwater of the river of his very existence, she said it, he heard it, he was sure. It was a Thursday.

Bio: Lee Kisling