Cold Lungs
I run my fingers along inside.
I can't remember how much.
It was a long time walking through items queued for liquidation. I reflect, I should be on that shelf, between that bottle of WD-40 and that dead fly. A fibrous milkweed seed traces a long sweeping curtsey through the automatic doors, and I watch it drift on the currents before it secretly nestles itself behind a box full of vanity plates. You're not going to do any growing there, I think to it.
That is not a place for a milkweed seed.
I tug the fraying strand from the inside of the respirator mask, and nestle my face into it. I close my eyes and breathe in deeply. It smells like menthol, cold in your lungs, like a trip to the dentist and he left his spit-sucking tool in your mouth. Cold.
I look back over my shoulder. You're asleep. I breathe again, I think through smells and sights, textures. I like to touch things.
I gently nudge the dead fly with my finger, barely feeling the brittle wings, the haired armor. I wish I was smaller, so I could really get my hand around one of its bristles, to feel the coarse texture, run my palm down the faceted eye the size of a beach ball like it was the hull of some shipwreck.
I breathe in again, this time nearly burning my lungs with that cool menthol. My eyes water for a different reason, and I watch the streetlamps outside. My right lung hurts.