Sliced Bread

I don't know why I was skipping, I just was. Kids, you know, they skip. I skipped. Not that much, but I guess a little, and I certainly was that day. In the house, whatever, kids are stupid.

We were setting the table, out on the porch, this kind of indoor porch we had. We had the plates out, had the water glasses, had the silverware, too. I was heading out with napkins, skipping with napkins. Some food was out there, too. The salad, the meat, the bread. The bread knife. I don't know why the bread knife wouldn't just stay out there. Kids, they don't think about these things, not too much.

We turned the corner at the same time, my sister and me. And her, holding the bread knife, serrated knife, points out, close to her belly like a horn sticking out of her. Turning the corner with the knife like that. And me, skipping, indoors, fast, foolish.

We joke about it now, we laugh, we try to. It still hurts to laugh. Not a lot, but a little. Enough. Whenever we're there together, slicing up bread, we're never quite sure which one of us should do it. We slice our own bread when we're apart, and we probably don't even think about it too much anymore. I try not to. But together it's near impossible. We get that loaf, we have that knife, and suddenly we're wondering why we eat so much goddamn bread in the first place.