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45 The Spirit of the Hour Visits Big Pappa’s Barbecue Joint No one notices my wings—folded, hollowboned . Across the room a girl slurps red sauce from her fingers, and I fill with the scent. Its thick molasses marrows up my carpus, my metacarpus. This is why I come here. To remind myself I was once alive. To weigh myself down, down to the wishbone that almost breaks when I remember how the world tasted—summer rain on my neck that rolled off, off like the hour. Or the old house with its broom closet door—the oak grain pencil-marked with girl-heights. Once my sister and I were small enough to slow down time. We climbed the cedars on each side of the yard. Scent peeled from them in strips. Once we crawled up the swing set’s ladders and lay across its top rungs at dusk. We watched for long-eared bats, hoped to get bitten by vampires and changed, until the flank steak flamed and smoke moved through the kitchen window, until the voice of our mother called us back. The rack of ribs arrives at my table. I raise 46 its flesh to my mouth. I’m allowed this bite before my wing-bones empty, before I rise, red-lipped, a vinegar sting in each corner of my mouth. ...

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