Prologue -- Waternova
Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale . . .
When I’m like totally done with my very, very relaxing breathing exercises, a pillow of neon-pink light warming my supercute face, I blink open my doll eyes and uncross my superlong legs. Then I stand up slowly, like very slowly, and go through my morning stretch routine. Arms and neck, tingling chest and sighing hamstrings. I twist and crack my back, my spine. I try my very best to loosen up my obnoxiously tense suburban psyche. Then I lick the yucky night off my new front teeth and tippy-toe away from my twin-sized cot. Easing myself down on my softer than soft chair, at my plastic desk. Letting my extra-small elbows dangle like the sweetest sugar cubes while I blink and breath and make myself like totally comfortable . . .
Blue, yellow. I’m looking out my window and seeing a crispy blue sky wrapped in a yellow silence . . .
I pick up one of their pencils, twirl it like a conductor’s baton between my fingertips and wait for Them to put their clipboards away and whisper themselves out of my florescent cockpit, out of my precious personal space. Because I definitely can’t remember the last time I used an actual pencil and it definitely doesn’t feel right. Something’s off. But maybe it’ll just take a few pointless practice lines to find my perfectly perfect grip . . . I nod my heavy head, brush back my supercute bangs and look out into the blue, the yellow . . . Because I definitely don’t know what They want from me. Because I mean it’s been over two or three months since I last saw him. And even when I squint and squeeze as hard as I possibly can he’s like just a grumpy green ghost now. Just a superhairy monster who won’t stop growling and groaning outside my window . . .
Sighing, waiting, sighing I tap-a-tap my pencil against the side of my desk. Then I smile and glance over at my flatscreen friend. Because luckily They told me I could keep him turned on if I thought it might help get things “flowing” or whatever. And that’s like definitely a really good thing because tonight’s the season premiere of what I’m like totally sure is going to be my favorite reality TV show ever! . . . A tiny tickle in my tiny throat, I smile and blow the mute face a goodluck kiss.
But when I look back down at my plastic desk, at the spiral-bound notebook with its evenly spaced taunts, like all I can do is frown and pout and bite my lower lip as the first scene suddenly comes a-buzzing through my window and lands on my stickysweet skin—the seriously gross images pumping themselves into my wincing jugular as my room starts to glow red, mosquito-red with spreading black wings of dread and shame and really itchy trauma . . . I close my doll eyes. I hold on tight to my #2 pencil. And totally trying my very best not to pass out I lean all the way over my desk and wait for the tsunami of college-ruled memories to hit—someone somewhere whispering in tongues as the massive wave swallows the air out of my past and his or her future . . . Please don’t overthink this, Zoe. Please don’t make a ridiculously big deal about this whole thing like you usually always do. Just take a deeper than deep breath, crack your extra-small knuckles, and dive right on in. Because this is like obviously the only way you’ll be able to move on and forget about him and her and everyone else who didn’t like actually wanna be a part of your truelove blockbuster. Because this is like obviously the only way you’ll ever be able to get your twentysomething rom-com back on track. You just have to hold your breath and keep on moving and moving and moving and—
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