Mary Burkhart

The Club Car

My body is cold. Like ice-needles pressed into my pores. I'm being rocked. No. Shaken? Swayed. Side-to-side. I'm sitting. Slumped? In what feels to be the softness of a leather chair beneath my left hand. My right, in my lap, directly below my heavy, drooping head. Lifting it proves to be a workout I haven’t prepared for. Tight muscles and creaking bones clue me in to the fact that I may have been assaulted. A sharp breath escapes between my clenched teeth at the searing pain making its way down the back of my neck.