bubble people.

If we could be bubble people, you and me, I think we might make it. We could give this, give us, a real shot. We'd be safe in our bubble world.

We'd bring in the props and people. The people, yes they'd be grand. They'd wander around in striped stockings, boys in suspenders and girls in sun dresses, each person meant to be there. We'd grow a garden out back, the striped stockings drying on the porch as we plant and sow with bare feet. I'd take up button-making and you'd compose your novel.

Weekends would come and we'd drag our plaid couches and creaky, wooden rocking chairs outside. Basking in the sunlight while reading Miranda July, Michael Chabon and Charles Dickens and sharing stories of superheroes and heartbreaks. In the afternoons, someone would bring a fiddle and a harmonica. And so we'd play and twirl.

Yes, there'd be good days and bad days ones. But I think we could make it, me and you.

From time to time, we'll open the bubble door to glance at what life could be and was before. We'd slam it shut and stumble safely , happily back inside. Just you and me.

And I think I could be happy.

But maybe I'm wrong and maybe you're right. Like Lenin and Marx, you say. Good in theory, bad in reality.

Eventually, you'll forget about me and my crazy habits; my tongue clicking and whistling to fill a nervous silence, my shivering in bed, and funny sense of humor. And your oddities, too, will become whispers of my past.

And I am happy without our bubble world.