4:53pm

it’s nearly noon when i lock
my keys in my car. the moment
it happens i don’t even
flinch, instead bask in the
double exposure of my
purse and precious tech
in the back seat and my
weary face in the window. i knew
the moment i heard the latch
i was being made to slow down.
to pause. to loosen my jaw
beneath the cherry trees. who
was i to disobey. i call for help
and wait in the dappled light.

it’s nearly five when i get off
the train, juggling boxes and a
long distance call with my sister.
up ahead is a stretch where a
cluster of rougher folk often
hold court, stereos on max and
shoulders taut, bracing for impact.

i approach and see a crowd formed,
a tension is pinning them
in place, still and staring.
between them i see two shapes,
a body on the ground and one above–
a thin frame counting out chest
compressions. a choreography
this city has burned to memory.

i push through, dropping my
belongings at their head and finally
hear what the men who claim this
corner are yelling,

“the guy gave him poison and
ran, he knew it was laced”

the woman doing cpr is frail
but does not stop. his pulse
has begun to disappear back
into his body. he has no breath, and
no one feels safe to offer theirs.

i run out to the
middle of commercial & grandview
and yell for naloxone. my aerial brain
marvels at how social anxiety
dissolves at the altar of fight
or flight. the cluster of rougher
men run out behind me, yell even
louder. a small trauma bond forms
in thin air.

a woman runs in front of three
busses crossing to us, black box in hand.

the first dose is conjured in
moments. i scramble for a pen,
scribble on my hand 4:53pm.

my fingers find the face shield and
breath is brought into rotation,
heart, mouth,
heart, mouth
until sirens surround us.

the man comes back to us
gasping like he’s reached the
surface of the ocean. i show my
timestamp hand to the
swarming medics, grab
my boxes and keep walking,
around the corner and up
the street, away from the
crowds of people i did not
really see until that moment.
i try and reach my breath to
my vagus nerve as i feel the
tremors of adrenaline ripple
through my skin. my mind
flashes to locking my keys in
my car hours ago, wonders
where i might have been if
i hadn’t shut that door.

a polaroid of my cousin lights up in
the corner of my mind, falling to
his feet as his best friend runs
away, poison filling his chest. how he
now lives in an urn on
the family hearth.