What if the sun falls from the sky? What if it drips fire down down down and lands in North Carolina? What if you and Tammy switch clothes and pretend to be each other? What if Dad dies in a car crash on the way to Greensboro? What if the babysitter doesn’t make a comment about how you talk that sticks in your brain the rest of your life? What if she does and it’s not a big deal? What if you quit piano and join swim team? What if acne is the real problem? What if you get into the elevator and instead of facing the doors, you turn your back to them—randomly, as, like, a social experiment? What if people see that and are like, “Who is she? What’s her story?” What if Josh Groban comes to Starbucks the day he’s playing a concert in town and you’re working the register and as he’s paying for his coffee he shakes his head a bit, smiling shyly, and says it’s weird but it feels like he’s always known you and then he invites you back to the green room after the show and you have an amazing, just really deep conversation about music and life and several years later, when your skin has cleared, you run into him while hailing a cab in NYC and fall in love? What if you don’t get into college? What if Tammy doesn’t introduce you to her boyfriend’s cousin at the graduation party, or what if she does and you tell him you don’t want to go back to his place to watch skate reels because his vibes are a bit intense and you don’t really want to be alone with him? What if, like Tammy told you, what happened at his place is not a big deal? What if you start swimming laps again? What if your pee doesn’t start burning and your favorite pair of lilac panties don’t start to smell like lake water? What if Tammy doesn’t say that if you were more chill and less annoying, guys might actually respect you? What if Tammy is right? What if the car mechanic says that you’ve been using diesel instead of gas all these years and it is only by the grace of God that your car never exploded? What if you go on the spring break trip and the train crashes, the way a high-speed rail recently did in Croatia, injuring dozens? What if you end up having a nice weekend in Montreal? What if your therapist wants you to try parts work? What if having sex felt pleasurable? What if you fall in love with city planning? What if Tammy is actually kind of a bitch? What if your therapist tells you to love your inner child? What if that doesn’t have anything to do with what you were just saying to her? What if it rains this weekend? What if it doesn’t?

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Sarah Edwards is a writer and editor in Durham, North Carolina, with work published in Joyland, The Yale Review, Ninth Letter, The Stinging Fly, and The Southeast Review, among other places.