Smallara

Charity awoke to the low, rhythmic snore of Alejandra beneath her. The familiar plaid bag swayed gently where it hung next to the bed. From the hook where it dangled,…

The joint burned slow between Alejandra’s fingers, the smoke curling toward the ceiling in thin, lazy ribbons. She took a long drag, her chest rising, then exhaled through her nose,…

Charity realized it halfway through.  The small dish beside her wasn’t for cleaning her hands, it was for sealing the paper. A cruel little basin of utility. Each time she…

The paper curled again.  Charity groaned, not aloud, but in that low, breathless way that lived in her chest now, where frustration couldn’t even afford the dignity of volume. Her…

Charity sat in Alejandra’s lap like a forgotten trinket, her legs curled to one side, her body dwarfed by the soft valley of fabric beneath her. The worn couch smelled…

A sickness wrapped around Charity as Alejandra carried her from the cramped bedroom. The thin walls of the dingy apartment now felt like an impenetrable fortress. Only with Alejandra could…