Will

There was no will. They were superstitious like that. To name a thing is to conjure it into being. To spell it out in sections is to establish its jurisdiction and claim. Bank statements and medical records fell under the same category. And so I don’t know where to trace the erratic nature of my blood, my propensity for salt, my aversion to creases, the easy alarms set off beneath my skin. When the doctor describes my breasts as dense and lumpy like cold oatmeal and one hip as tilted like a ballast, I don’t know how to think of the future. Insurance is the belief that there is no crisis that can’t be averted by a steady will. We buy it in increments: monthly, a guarantee that the unforeseen won’t maim when it bites. That spring, when it returns, will be infinitely more interesting than last.