The goddamn pen. It shove there, innocently enough, sleek black instrument promising to transliterate the chaos in my head into something real. But the moment I try to wield it, it turns traitor. It slips, skitters, drags across the pristine page, leaving trail of inky failures. I want to write about her, about Mother, about the woman who was both the anchor and the storm in my life, but the words are like frightened birds, fluttering just out of reach. They circle me, teasing snippets memory; scent of her lavender perfume, the way she hummed off-key while cooking, the steel in her eyes when she was angry, but refuse to land, to be captured and pinned down.