Thirst

by Alejandra Ramos

On an impulse, she bought a bottle of Orange-Orange Vitamin Water at the 7-Eleven last night and drank it. She felt closer to him for a moment while she swallowed, making up for those times she'd refused for reasons that never really existed. "Water sans vitamins," she'd said while she stretched out on his moonlit bed waiting for him to come back from the kitchen cool-skinned with clinking glass in hand. She grips the bottle and gulps quickly now, attempting to fill the gaps with the only piece of him currently within reach, but as she nears the plastic bottom she understands: two dollars and fifty cents of citrus-flavored water on a convenience store shelf just won't cut it. This, she notes, is one of those times when the sum of the parts will never, ever equal the whole. She misses the whole.

6S

Alejandra Ramos lives in New York City, where she is a magazine editor, writer, and consummate daydreamer. She occasionally remembers to update her blog, Sent from My Dell Desktop.