Every night I go to bed I put my skeleton in the closet. I hang it up like a pair of slacks that you don’t want to wrinkle. Were I to leave it in a heap on the floor, it might develop kinks. I could find myself waking in the morning to a dislocated hip.
The only part of my skeleton that doesn’t get hung up is my skull. That stays. You hang up the skull and the face loses shape, the brain folds in on itself — pathways cross. You do that, you go to put your skeleton on in the morning and end up putting your foot on your head and your skull in your crotch. You look like an idiot.
I pull my skeleton out through a little latch in the center of my chest. Just push and release, and out pops the top of a rib. Hook that around a hanger that is securely fastened in the closet, lean back, and fall into a comfortable pile of skin and muscle on the bed.
I can’t tell you what a comfort it is, what a relief not to have bones, if only for a while. Not much can be expected of a person without bones. Demands cease. Expectations are basically nill.
Sleep comes easily.
*Fiction circa 2012
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