Today is my brother's birthday, I told my husband when I woke up in the early AM, inexplicably cranky, lumpy, a pea niggling at me from somewhere under my skin. You should e-mail him, Jimmy suggested, And tell him to Rest In Piss.

. . .

The other night, I remembered something about my family. We are sitting on a blanket laid out on the grass in the backyard of our old house, the one in Santa Ana. This is before the great oak tree was cut down limb by limb, before the grass crisped into a desert. My mother is holding a white rabbit and we're grinning, Deth in white underoos, pleased with our pet. It is obvious that the rabbit is terrified, you can tell by its stiff legs, the way it has to be grasped.

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