Cold Engine

 
Breath recedes on the windowpane. Almost March but the world shows no signs of letting up.
 
Didn’t take the meat out of the freezer at the right time, so now we have to wait for it to thaw.
 

*

 
One of these days I’m gonna drive this piece of shit into the ocean, is what I tell you. But it’s your baby, you say. Junk baby. I don’t even know if it’ll last me this winter. It’s been groaning for the past three. The heater barely does a damn thing, but the vent always burns like a stovetop. It’s like the car’s scorching in on itself. So then you’ll say that it’s alright, that it’s warm enough as long as it’s the two of us. I can never get past you.
 
I’ve been at home since the holidays much longer than anyone ever intends to stay with their parents. Time grows still the longer this season passes. My dad refuses to replace the heating system, so we drape blankets over sweaters over socks. My mom always complains that her hands are cold, and the robe she’s been wearing for years has lost its synthetic-cotton-fluff, down to the marrow shag of what it used to be. This is the first winter I don’t feel like a kid anymore. I look at the peeling bedroom posters, the desaturated grandma quilts, the one cupboard door that never closes. Dad and Mom’s gray hair and the rust around bathtub edges and the fridge half-empty. I feel how old I am.
 
The trips to the grocery store are silent. Slush on gravel and snowflakes melting on the wheel. Condensed to pink knuckles. I forget to bring my gloves.
 

*

 
Winter; losing faith. Time is still and so are you. Always in shotgun. Always on the defense, the cigarette dying in your mouth. Always with the red-gum grin.
 
One of these days we’ve got to go to the beach, you say. We’re at the gas station waiting for the pump to finish. Still shivering from the outside and waving off the homeless guy begging for cents. You’ve got one knee propped up on the dashboard, scratching the lotto ticket you bought for the sake of scratching. I say, It’s too cold for that.
 
Because junk baby? / Because it’s winter. / Because it’s cold? / Yes because it’s cold what are you— / What’s a little cold ever done to you?
 
Shut up, I say, but I am really thinking: Plenty of things. Almost froze my finger off last year. Knocked my ass onto the doorstep ice. Compressed my tires. No tropical fruit. Emptied my chest. Snow-packed my voice under all that dead ground. Laugh hibernations. Hurt me in ways you’ll never know because you’re still there. Every year that passes winter still takes a cut of my heart.
 
I’m repenting. I go to church more with my parents. I don’t spend hours taking hot showers anymore. I don’t throw away receipts in the glove compartment. I don’t spend pocket change on gum I never chew. I look people in the eyes when they speak. I squeeze hands when I hold them. I don’t forget to turn off the hallway light before bed. Sometimes I remember the sky is there and look up.
 
I don’t know. I think that’s what you want me to do.
 

*

 
I haven’t been to the beach since you left. A part of me feels like if I do, and you’re not there, it’ll be like you’ve never been in the first place. Gray sand, gray water. Boats in the distance like flickering dust. Nothing else. Just wind biting my face. But I dream of it, I still do: taking the drive, plunging into the cold. Slamming the pedal. Watching the sea rise through the window. Water pools the inside, from my feet to my knees to my stomach to my neck to my mouth. Slowly, surely. The last breath of saltwater and junk baby. You at the silver shore.