You’ll need strength to do this.

You’re with me on those summer days, all the windows down and the moon roof open, the sun strong enough to warm our skin but not so strong as to blind us. Your kaleidoscopic bracelets reaching from wrist to elbow clang together, my stubby fingers thrum on the wheel. That’s when I make you sing.

I lift the turquoise and purple shawl out of the storage drawer and drape it over my shoulders. The caress of the soft yarn against my skin transports me to an earlier time and place.

“From here on out,” my therapist says, “we refer to him as L’Ass et Le Putz.”

I live in rural middle Georgia, so few in person therapists are available. Instead, I’m having a tele-health appointment with Charles on encrypted video chat.