The girl in the feather skirt gets tired of waiting for her story to start. When would the mushroomy underside of the moon explode? Darling, she writes, I’ve sold your clothes. She loves the slash and glister of her pen. By the time you read this, my ship will be en route. Here on board, gold-tasseled tablecloths sway. Petal by petal, an inchworm crosses the centerpiece of lilies and phlox. The galley door swings, dishes clink, a kettle hisses.  Sometimes she strokes the cricket in her pocket for luck. Here on board, staircases unfold into silken dark and tenderness begins at its regularly scheduled time, nothing like a coin purse snapped closed. Snowflakes fall like whispers and someone keeps shaking the globe.

The girl in the feather skirt opens door number two. Behind door number one are rain and hail, tornadoes, a roiling mess.  Door number three conceals a hearse. She doesn’t mind silence, so she drives around her island.  She just got her learner’s permit. It’s slow going, but she likes the wind on her skin, how the hearse gleams like polished leather, even the steep hills with no barriers between herself and the sea. Alone on the road, the girl tightens her seatbelt as kitchen windows blink past: a woman peels carrots:  a man sharpens knives. A dog howls behind a picket fence. The girl in the feather skirt never thinks about the other doors. She hums. A door is not the story of a bright blue sky. She memorizes fractions and their decimal equivalents. She pets her skirt which she wears like an invisible shield. Like an opal, its color changes by increments, depending on the light.