Louise Heal Kawai

don’t really know what it means to feel like myself

I’ve never seen the middle of the ocean or the edge of the sky, but maybe the kind of breeze that blows in those places now comes blowing in out of nowhere and I feel it wrapped around me. Like when you’re holding a cat and you touch its soft belly. Or sticking your finger in a jar of jam and stirring, then slowly sinking in all the rest of your fingers. Or licking the sweet condensed milk at the bottom of your bowl of strawberries. Or when a blanket brushes the top of your feet. Or when butter turns transparent when it melts over your pancakes.

The whole day I don’t really feel like myself (though, to tell the truth, I don’t really know what it means to feel like myself), and today is the worst day of the week for lessons, because it’s Tuesday, and we have Maths, followed by Science, and then PE, and then after it in fourth period, Music. I can’t believe whoever made that schedule: they know nothing about kids and how they feel through the day, what were they thinking, putting things in that order?