balloons

Another 100 word essay from my upcoming memoir, Still Life with Boys... enjoy!

At the highway’s shoulder - a dead buck, bloated, hard. Tied to its stiff ankle, a Get Well Soon balloon, winking like a star.

I laugh until I cannot see. Who put it there? A boy or two or three? A man, marshalling unsuspecting drivers to chuckle at the morbidity, the absurdity, the deflated truth? We all become that deer.

After quieting, a realization: it must’ve been a woman. One like me, neither old nor young, with intuition to plot and execute such subtle silliness, ridiculousness on a minute scale.

A man, a boy, wouldn’t know where to find the balloons.

Jack has already called bull-honky on this though, complete with young-man eye rolls (they're free with every purchase!): Even boys know you get balloons at Dollar Tree, Mom.