Emily Elizabeth Buckley

Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow.

She stands on the doorstep, her hand raised in a fist, poised to knock. There is a worrisome edge to her, lip caught between her teeth, her eyes glazed over; she is terrified. Gathering her short blonde hair into her other hand, she bobs up and down on the balls of her feet, before stepping back. A look passes over her face. A look of resigned defeat, a hole of gaping disappointment in herself opens. Turning suddenly, she walks back down the path, glancing over her shoulder at the door for a final time.

Tomorrow, she will do it tomorrow.

I can do it,
I say, walking towards
the door. My heart

flutters painfully in my
chest as a wave
of anxiety fills me.

I can do it,
I say, pushing down
any feelings of fear.

I reach the door,
raising my shaking fist
ready to finally knock

I am doing it,
I say, as the
wave builds, and builds

and builds. My lip,
chapped and dry, caught
like my lie between

my teeth, hand caught
like my lie by
an invisible force of

Nature. Threading my hand
through my hair as
the shocking sense of

dread again washes over
me. And I step
back from the Door.

Tomorrow, I say again
I’ll do it tomorrow.

I grow tired of waiting; of subtly checking through frosted windows for a glimpse of her. I grow tired of hoping. Hoping that today the dance that we do will change. A thought passes over me, the same thought that has drowned my existence for the last eternity. I force it back down, back to the depths of creation. The window beside me chills, mirrors the snow falling in the street below. I curl into my seat, pull my blanket closer, to escape the ice. The well thumbed book in my lap, abandoned as I rise to stoke the roaring fire. The clock chimes and the dance has changed.

She is late.

A panic forms in my mind.An eternity passes in a single second. I reach out, searching for a thought in the winter darkness; searching for a sign of her. Colour changes. Warmth emerges. There she is walking down my garden path. She tries to be sneaky, but she must know that I can sense her. Must know that I can sense the change in her. The renewed determination.

The dance has changed.

She knocks on the door.

Oh no.
Why did I do that?
What in my right mind

Has just made me
knock on this God-
forsaken door? I hear

movement.
From the house.
Footsteps on stairs

coming closer
and closer. A new wave
fills my chest.

The door creaks open.
My panic
F
A
L
L
S

It’s not who I expected.

Previously published: Flash Literary Journal