The Plumber
Brian Reynolds
"I can see where she's leakin'."
The plumber's legs protruded from the cabinet beneath the sink. He had something stuck to the bottom of one shoe. Seeing it made me nauseated. Then again, almost everything made me nauseated.
"You got a loose bib here. If I could get a wrench on her, I could cinch her down, stop the leak."
My water broke. Then off to the delivery room and he was born; a pipe-wrench of a boy, always clamped down on his mama until my breasts were in agony. Then he turned two and blue. A leaky heart valve. Another plumbing problem. And now he's in heaven, or maybe in that box of ashes upstairs.
The faucet works. I turn the chrome knob and splash cool water on my face remembering the plumber's legs protruding from the cabinet beneath the sink. If he could have only got a wrench on her. Cinched her down. Stopped the leak.
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