Water Coming Over the Hill

The day after the first substantial snowfall of the year. The ground grey and showing the lost beauty that is perverted so easily like a virgin raised in the church slurring her words in the bar on her 21st. The Woman, blonde, pulls up to the pharmacy in her white nondescript SUV. Her "The North Face" jacket is tight and accentuating her ageless body just how she likes it to. The tequila from last night is leaving her stomach unsettled and her general demeanor "a bit agitated". The conditions of the roads and the effect of them on her larger than necessary vehicle are the last thing on her Xanax hazed mind. Picking up her children (a boy and a girl, the perfect ages apart) and delivering them to their respective post-school events, the condition of her marriage that is sinking slowly from a place of distance to that of rage and misunderstanding, the AA meetings that her husband keeps suggesting and she keeps dodging. All these things weigh on her narrow minded psyche, making refilling her anti-anxiety medication just another slight annoyance. The speaker crackles out the effeminate voice of the drive thru pharmacist, relating instructions that the Woman in her SUV is already very familiar with. She goes through the necessary motions to accomplish her anticipated result, just as she does with every task. The intended outcome is reached, just as it always is. "Have a wonderful day!" crackles enthusiastically out of the machine in a way that you know you can't trust it being genuine. "Thanks, you too." She replies to the machine, face expressionless.