Insert, Reference, Footnote

* Nowadays, he thinks of her like an asterisk: substitution or addendum, blank-faced skeleton of a star where the letters of her name used to be. He doesn’t think of her often and pretending she is a vulgarity or an endnote – preferably something obscure, like a footnote within an endnote – makes it easy to forget her soft, taut body, made for birthing fairies and guerrilla warfare in the mountains of Bolivia. He does not like that she and California are assonant, too. He cannot rid her of that n-i-a. He cannot rid her of that extra feminine a. She and California share that last syllabic plateau and her feet are soft, like a rain-slicked boot. On those occasions when she makes an appearance, requires a glance, he squints his eyes, cocks his head a bit, thinks her ropes of hair are like ivy, parasitic and thirsty. His mouth is dry as he turns away. He thinks, "I couldn’t even read her handwriting."