Run For Cover

When I find out, I retreat into my shell, and I take the 9 AM train
to Alexandria.
On the way home, I pull my jacket closer to my chin, sink into my seat,
stare out of the window at the green rushing past.
Trying not to think.
Wanting not to think.
And once I'm home, in my old stuffy house with the high ceilings and
the dark corridors, I crawl under the covers, listen to my bed creaking
so familiarly. And underneath the layers, I know that a manhunt is
about to begin, and both sides will be searching for me, the foreigner,
the misfit.
So I shut my eyes, and pretend I'm still eight, where skin color and
ethnicity are just words I can't understand, where the sky and the
earth are still my playgrounds, and where the taste of fear still
hasn't touched my tongue.
Under the covers, I hide from right now.
And for a while, it works.