Bottle caps. A poker chip with the hologram worn off on one side. Cigarettes she doesn’t finish.
You’re three months old in the car, teething on the steering wheel while she drives. The Stardust parking lot at 2 A.M. Your car seat angled away from the slot-machine lights, away from the woman at the next machine who keeps looking over.
Her thumbnail split to the quick.
The window—she leaves it. Open, or forgets, or doesn’t want to close it.
A raccoon: shadow first, then inside. It holds a bottle cap between its hands like a coin. Sets it down three inches to the left. Returns.
She watches from the doorway.
Deodorant crust in the tank-top armpits.
The raccoon’s hands almost human, working the pile—bottle cap, poker chip, lipstick tube—same route every time.
When it uncaps the Revlon with its teeth, Pink in the Afternoon cuts through the cigarette smoke still hanging.
The temperature drops. She leaves the window open.
The raccoon brings things now.
A bendy straw still in its paper sleeve. A Motel 6 key card.
Adds them, rearranges, leaves. Doesn’t look back.
Your pacifier with lint in the holes.
A press-on nail holding the shape of someone else’s finger.
Pull tab from a Coors Light.
Her work badge, laminate peeling.
She stands at the window. Waiting.
Her reflection: hair stuck to one side of her face, hand flat against the frame.
The raccoon doesn’t.
She kneels. Carpet cold.
Picks up the poker chip, sets it down.
The press-on nail, turns it over—dried glue catching hallway light.
Your pacifier. She wipes it on her shirt.
Through the wall: your breathing.
The wet sound of your thumb.
She puts the pacifier in her mouth, takes it out, sets it on top of the poker chip,
moves it three inches to the left, and sets it back.
The air smells like smoke and baby powder.
The window is open.
The window is open.
The window—
Kellan Jansen writes from the American Southwest.
Find him @MarryMeMachine on X.