Me: I am!
Nova: Then I’ll have some things delivered for you—are you okay enough to get the door when it’s dropped off?
Me: Probably?
Nova: Okay then I’ll order you some shit. Mama Nova will take care of you—from a safe distance, ha ha.
Me: You’re a national treasure. Please get me the boring kind of soup, not the fancy stuff with quinoa
Nova: Got it. Chicken noodle, saltines, maybe some sad little pudding cups.
Me: Only the beige food group. Beige like me, I need a spray tan.
Nova: You are so bossy, but ok.
I roll over with a groan, hugging my phone to my chest, eyes burning with a combination of dehydration and raw emotion, frustrated at being sick, wanting to shower but not having the strength.
Thirty minutes later the knock at the door has me slowly easing out of my cocoon and shuffling toward the door.
Bland snacks in all their glory.
“My god why is this so heavy?” I complain, hoisting the bag onto my kitchen counter, wobbling limbs barely able to lift what weighs like fifty pounds.
Inside the bag is what every person with the flu needs to survive: chicken soup. Saltines. Apple juice. Gatorade. Chocolate pudding cups. One pack of toasted cheese crackers I didn’t ask for but am now grateful for. A bag of gummy bears.
“Thank you, Nova.” She is a queen.
Nova: Are you alive??? The groceries are showing delivered.
Me: Alive and chugging Gatorade.
She is a godsend.
turner
. . .
The sound of clanging weights and bad rap music fills the air—both things I normally find cathartic. Today? They're just background noise to the chaos in my head.
I rack the barbell, drop down onto the bench, and exhale through my nose like I’m not secretly using these reps to work out some unresolved Poppy-related tension.
It’s been three days.
Three since she replied to my last message. Since she hit me with that “somewhere between feral and functional” line that made me laugh in the middle of the cereal aisle.
And then—nothing.
Radio silence.
No memes. No sarcastic insults.
Maybe she realized she doesn’t want this.
Doesn’t wantme.
I roll my neck, trying to shake it off. Grab the bar again. Push through another set even though my shoulders are burning and my head’s not in it. I’m usually good at this—burning off stress, letting my brain zone out and my body take over.
But today?
