We were vanishing. Vanishing, and when our husbands accused us, when we cried, our mothers said that’s just what happens after fifty. After fifty, they said, it starts with your hair. Your hair disappears overnight, it would be there one evening and gone by dawn. By dawn it would have vanished, you’d be bald as a baby—that was the first thing that went, they said, but not the only thing. The only thing to know was that it would be just the beginning of many vanishing things. Things like elbows, which would be roughly second after hair, then both crepe-skinned arms and our waists, but we were waist-less now anyway (our mothers confirmed), so it really wasn’t bad, it wouldn’t hurt much, they said. Wouldn’t hurt much by the time our faces vanished, our reflections vanished, our husbands vanished—by then we’d be floating, by then we’d be free.
Kelli Short Borges writes from her home in Phoenix, Arizona, where her family has lived for six generations. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Peatsmoke, Fictive Dream, Cleaver, Your Impossible Voice, and Moon City Review, among many other journals. Kelli’s stories have won contests and been nominated for Best of the Net and Best Small Fictions. Recently, her work was chosen for Best Microfiction 2024. She is currently working on her first novel.