An unnoticed rite of passage, a gateway from the oversaturated firework of childhood to the meticulous persistence of adulthood, is the horror of something being too perfect, too comfortable, too pleasant, too right.
You imagine your wedding as a child. You picture the archways of flowers, the expensive clothing, the cake. You imagine champagne tasting like grape juice, as that's all you know of champagne. Years pass; the world betrays you in a thousand unremembered ways. The day comes. The flowers are soft and fresh and fragrant, arranged symmetrically in artisinal blooms. All your friends and family sit in ordered rows, smiling the same smile. White butterflies trace the golden ratio in a cloud-speckled summer sky. Your spouse is beautiful. Your feet don't hurt. Dinner is served at precisely 5:30 PM.
Where's it going to come from? Someone has to be crying in a back room. Your aunt, she's probably already drunk by now, right? Insulting your cousins on the patio. Is your make-up smeared? How much did this all cost? Is anyone allergic to anything? How long do you think this will last?
You check into your beachfront hotel. Rose petals carpet the ground; a bottle of wine sits on the patio, two glasses, napkins folded like nuzzling swans. On the beach, far and down, children race each other in the undiminished purity of the oncoming surf. You worry you'll get sick. You worry the drinks are an additional cost. You wonder when your work will ask you to Zoom in. You wonder if there's Legionnaire's in the jacuzzi. There has to be something. There's going to be something. When's it going to happen? How much will it hurt?
Every lazy Sunday, with your mug of Keurig coffee and your hardcover romance and the cool rain silvering the windows, comes with its expectation of disaster. Will the basement flood? Will I have to drive in this weather? You take your mother skating over the Christmas holiday. You're ready for a trip to the ER, a broken hip. You drink red velvet cocoa rinkside as geometric snowflakes twinkle through the dry air just as perfectly proportioned as a garland on a tree. Tomorrow, you're accepting an award at work. There will be a party, a little speech, a $250 gift card to the sit-down chain restaurant of your choice. In a week, you're driving up to a vineyard to see your friends from school. It's been years; everyone's excited. You can't sleep for the dread of it. In between beats of faceless panic, you get your night's 8 hours.
It's not supposed to be like this. This isn't how things happen. You want to break the clean dishes just to get it out of the way. You walk through beautiful parks and clean streets imagining people suffering to make them this way; when you see the workers laughing at TikToks on their generous breaks, the panic only grows. There are rats under the streets. There is plastic in the water. Your body is producing cancer cells right now. Every day that passes perfectly is another gram of certainty.
How long do you think this will last? Where's it going to come from? When's it going to happen? How much will it hurt?
